Why Truth Beats Fiction

You can't make this stuff up:
According to the Associated Press, an Ohio man was arrested after he was alleged to have consumed fifteen beers, just prior to making too sharp a high speed turn on his motorized bar stool.

It seems to me, in one sense, that's the very stuff of what family legend is made. You can almost imagine the conversation at wedding receptions and birthday parties: "Yeah, that's my Uncle Zack; he got a DUI on his bar stool," followed by "that's him? I heard about this!"

Years ago some of my high school friends stole over the high wall of a monastery at midnight to harrass--I'm sorry to say--the monks. The story is so strange on a number of accounts, even though it's true. In the first place, who lives close to a monastery anymore? In the suburbs? In the 70s? The story goes that one of these teenage ruffians had to scamper up an olive tree and sit in it all night, because a big, barrel-chested Friar Tuck stormed out of the monastery and started pumpking rock salt out of a shotgun.

My wife has a colorful Greek uncle, who--as family lore has it--wandered between mildly pixilated and vaguely dangerous. He was given to making up words, and entire phrases, in a language no one else understood. ("Is that Greek?" strangers would ask, and the Greek relatives would respond, "no one knows what he's saying.") This side of the family was part of the Greek resistance to the Nazis during World War II and "Uncle George" was rumored to have left the love of his life in Greece when he came to America. From all accounts, he was crazy--in more or less an amusing way--until one day, in a fight with a deputy sheriff, he wound up locking the deputy in the trunk of his squad car. When he was arrested, he heard a familiar voice over the wall of the jail--and fell into a conversation with another relative who was arrested on an entirely different matter. Call it a family reunion, I guess.

How is it that events completely beyond the pale in the here and now somehow become gentle legends when considered in the abstract, at a distance? It's nearly suicidal to pursue a life of legend, and people who try to make a legend out of their antics usually wind up hospitalized, dead, or worse, but sometimes the Almighty allows an act born of passion, a sheer piece of momentary idiocy, to stand more or less unrequited by the physical and legal universe. Call it mercy, or comedy, I guess--the Divine sort.

At any rate, don't try any of this at home. No one will believe you.

All I need is loving you and ...

One of these days, I'm going to make a systematic study of what a singer means, when she turns to the band and says, "Key of G, fellas." (I mean I know a tad, but not as much as you could find out reading this article and pondering it for a few weeks.)

The kids are downright aching to play music these days, so I'm trying to figure out what a reasonable family ensemble objective might be with suitably 18th century flavor. I downloaded a new version of Cakewalk yesterday, tooled around with my new fife in the key of F, tried to accompany David Thomas on the guitar in the public house, asked Freeman a few questions about keyed instruments, waxed more confused, then went to playing with the innumerable MIDI settings on banks, patches, and the like, and finally got Cakewalk outputting acoustic grand piano sound on three tracks. I typed in the melody line for a fife tune that was played on the morning of April 19, 1775 at Lexington--the White Cockade. I wondered what harmony or counter melody might sound like in three parts. Here's my first try at three part something or other. (Turn up the speakers, but not too loud.)

Dunno what I did there--whether it's harmony, counter-melody, or just pure "dissonance." It sounds a little too "barber-shoppy" to me for the 18th century. There's a maddening phrase you see quite a bit when you read about 18th century folk music. It usually goes something like this: "crude scores were written on broadsides and in the journals of itinerant country musicians, but the ensemble was expected to come up with their own harmonies."

Now, I just need to see whether any "itinerant country musician" wrote a harmony somewhere, and if someone has been kind enough out there in internet land to sequence it for me--as an example. Then I have to figure out parts for piano, tin whistle (6 keys to choose from), fife (two keys to choose from so far), fiddle, and recorder, and...voice.

Fun, frustrating stuff..

Father Knows Best

I find movies like Liam Neeson's "Taken" better than Sunday School. Think about it; there's more truth bundled in this revenge drama than in most church teaching today: 1) there are evil disgusting people in the world, 2) when someone has the courage to put them down like the dogs they are, we should celebrate that strength 3) fathers have an instinct for the danger facing their children and that instinct should be honored, 4) teenage girls shouldn't be traveling in foreign capitals by themselves 5) when bureaucratic functionaries value their jobs over justice, they become part of the evil they claim to be fighting, and 6) Islam--with its "one morality for us, another for the Kuffars"-- doesn't exactly make for a happy sing-along at the U.N. peoples' choir.

People of faith hear the words of the Psalmist (58:10): "The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance: he shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked," but there is a disconnect when it is played out either in reality, or in film. (I'm not sure if fellow theater goers appreciated my whispered cheer--'send the little jackal back to hell!') After all, it's probably a good thing that we have a sense of mercy, written on our hearts, or we would all be something like the savage Druids and Celts and Aztecs and Animists from which we descend. However, there is also a false mercy operating in our own generation that keeps Charlie Manson eating meals and reading fan mail in prison. Obviously, we need to be a nation of laws, not of men, but the sort of human vermin that kidnap travelers for sale into the harem-trade know that very proceduralism works in their favor. A public firing squad for the authors of these cartels--and they do exist--would be good for the soul of the nation, and for the safety of international travelers.

Granted, I don't quite buy Liam Neeson as an American. I think the story would have been equally effective if he had played an IRA partisan, retired from the troubles, and brought back into the fray by the theft of his daughter. I could also do without car chases, and, of course, the plot is full of the outright improbable, but in a generation given to mutant special powers, it's nice to see a morality play chronicled with more probable human weapons--knives, slamming doors, guns, hammers, and electrical voltage liberally applied.

Apparently, the film is making more money than the producers thought it would.

Is it any wonder?

Breakfast in the Colonies

I'm fast approaching, with any discipline today, a "10 Pound Loss" mark on Weight-Watchers. Actually, it's a little more complicated than that. I started an account with Weight-Watchers online about eighteen months ago, and lost ten pounds over about 12 weeks. The resulting increase in energy and the reduced blood pressure made me feel something like the Papa figure in The Incredibles and I entered a long Holiday eating binge that lasted from Thanksgiving of 2007 to about Labor Day of 2008. (The Holidays are always tough.) The shameful truth is that I charged right on past the original "panic weight," (the weight that made me say to myself 'you, Jim Riley, are a big fat DISGUSTING slob'), and proceeded to take on another ten pounds of ballast by way of celebrating my previous discipline. Well, my nephew, Quinn approached me one night at Sunday family dinner and said:

"Uh, Uncle Jim?"

"What is it, Quinn?"

"You need to get some exercise."

"Quinn," I said. "Thank you very much for that. I know you are mad at me for changing the channel, but there is a grain of truth in what you are saying to your dear old Uncle. Would you get me another one of those peanut butter cookies?"

What followed, over the next few months, was kind of a rolling ocean wave of up and down--peas and popcorn one week, triple lasagne and family sized jars of roasted almonds next week--followed by another period of steely resolve that now brings me back to the starting perch again--the platform, the weight base camp--where I can make the assault on that far away goal of my desired mass--which in truth is about 20 pounds more than the goggle-eyed, death-march dieticians would say is my ideal "healthy" weight. I am 6' 4" and by some weird calculus I'm supposed to be, like 190-200 pounds, but I would settle for five pounds less than my honeymoon, twenty-eight year old weight of 225 pounds. 'The Mighty 220' I call it.

The trouble is that we bake something like 150 apple pies a day, and we feature really good sausage and omelet breakfast platters, and it's not that you can't have that from time to time. You can. But taking just one or two sausages, for me, is something like giving yourself just a tiny little peak out the window at Yosemite, or allowing yourself five seconds of The High Kings' Parting Glass. If something is good, I mean you want to kind of indulge.

Those big one pound bricks of Trader Joe's Milk Chocolate. An entire box of Costco Croissants. A salty, buttery jar of Planter's Dry Roasted Peanuts.

Do I reach the Mighty 220 and then kind of pig-out for the Holidays, or can you make an indulgence out of discipline itself? Can moderation ever be as belly-rich as two plates of Penne Rustica at the Macaroni Grill? It must be part of our condition as humans.



Mother Eve would have something to say on the matter.

Fifes & Pianos & Music & Such...

Sometime last year, during one of our dinners, I sat down with a guest and asked him his profession. He was the conductor of an orchestra, and his wife was a composer. Now, keep in mind, I'm very proud of our musicians here, but it's always a little intimidating knowing that the audience might hold a Carnegie Hall or a Feature Film type out there.

Rod Stewart once claimed you only needed to know three chords to be a rock star and I think a lot of well-packaged pop music is 70% charisma, 28% technical assistance, and 2% musical training, but even with all of that, in the era of shrink-wrapped, downloadable, "slick" entertainment, most people don't trust themselves to even dabble in music. Truth be told, I get a little annoyed with people who don't even want to try singing. Freeman House, our fiddler, will tell you that Jim Riley shouldn't even try singing either, not because I have pitch issues, but because I make up my own version of the tune--which of course makes the whole ensemble thing sort of difficult.

We started paying for piano and fiddle lessons a few years ago and I was worried that the kids were looking upon the whole thing as a chore, but then for some reason everything popped and they all wanted to join the family band (which in this case is headed by the musical mama and papa--Freeman and Kathy). It's been a real joy to hear them working on tunes, checking out Irish flutes on the internet, and coveting baby Grands down at Oak Valley Piano. (One of the few places you can actually go and play a piano before buying it. Highly recommended.)

Moral of the story: play good music around the house, keep paying for the lessons, and then let them play something well enough, in front of the public, to get a little praise--and they will be hooked.

The other issue is that Americans should really begin taking more responsibility for their own music. They should start turning off the radio, the Pod, the CD-Player and start buying sheet music. We need to start singing our own songs again!

The Hard Loving, Hard Living Fellowship

After yesterday's post on branding criminals, I saw this video of a break-in "artist" caught on tape. Watch it to the end. I don't think you would have to brand this guy. He's self-branding. (He also seems to be very nearly indestructible.)

I also received a critique of my Bristol Palin lament the other day, and I was reminded that "only Jesus was without sin. Bristol Palin is not our role model; Jesus is our role model." I guess I find that sort of response a tad disorienting. It actually makes me a little dizzy. It would be something like finding out your house painter had completely paint-splattered your patio, your pool, your cactus garden, and your dog, but he isn't even trying to clean up. He is, in fact, pulling out of your driveway. He's saying, "see you tomorrow-maybe." When you ask him about the mess, he says, "heah. Only Jesus is perfect."

In another sense, it would be like hearing Jesus Himself tell the story of the Good Samaritan only to have someone in the crowd respond, "okay, okay, I get it, Lord. It's okay to ignore wounded people on the roadside because only you are perfect, right? The Samaritan was, like, doing the legalistic thing, trying to work his way to heaven, and.."

<<deep sigh>>

It all brings me back to the sort of faith community I would design if I were a playwright capable of speaking the "city on a hill" into existence. Here's my version of what a "real" Christian church would look like:

	The Perfect Church Community -- By Jim Riley
	1.	First of all: It probably wouldn't allow me as a member. If my Bristol critique made someone think I hold myself out as "not needing Jesus," then I should make it clear: I'm probably too selfish and impulsive to be a member of a community that really "took up its cross" daily. I say this to make clear what shouldn't need to be clarified: the speaker may sully the idea, but that doesn't make the idea any less important. Another way of putting it: just because we might not ever be Navy SEALs doesn't mean we don't need their services.
	2.	No wimps, no whiners: the guys who hung out with Christ were tough dudes--ready to lop off an ear at the sign of an insult. Yes, they were meek, but it was a meekness that came out of strength of spirit, not out of cowardice. Ideally, everyone in a real Christian church should know how to shoot; they should know how to put the hurt on wrong-doers, even if they know the value of restraint. Believe it or not, I once encountered two teenage Christian boys who swore they wouldn't even defend their own mother from a murderer. Lord save us from that sort of cowardice--and from the pastors who preach it. Christ turned the other cheek, but he also turned the tables--and braided the whip.
	3.	No False Holiness: Everyone in a real Christian church should be more or less who they are--not who they think they should be, unless that ideal really is scriptural. I've had it with people who pretend the joke isn't funny because it doesn't seem "grave enough" or "reverent." The same God who waxed sick of hungry complainers and threatened to give them meat until it came out their noses (Numbers 11), has a powerful sense of the comic. I don't trust anyone who doesn't have a sense of humor.
	4.	Be Political, Make it Relevant: John the Baptist got right in Herod's face. We should too. Paul makes it clear that any leader who isn't a terror unto evil and a rewarder of good, isn't really a leader by God's standards. Pastors who preach abject obedience to evil are evil, and any pastor who isn't political these days, really isn't a pastor. Shepherds feed the flock, but they fight off wolves too.
	5.	Have a Drink, Throw a Feast: You've heard me preach it before. The Wedding at Cana? The return of the Prodigal Son? Christians should have a good time. We have good news to celebrate. I'm not a very good dancer, but Christians should dance, play music, sing. King David made a few mistakes, but not while he was playing music. This is not, of course, an excuse for drunkenness or substance abuse; it is a recognition that Christ gave us wine to make our hearts glad. Don't make a gospel out of turning down His gift.
	6.	Live the real commandments--not the gospel hobbies: We should spend more time crucifying ourselves for dishonesty, murderous hatreds, covetousness, infidelity, casual sabbaths, dishonoring parents--and we should spend less time on rapture rumination, diet holiness, and weird fads like "Christian environmentalism." We should spend more time taking scripture to life and less time putting Christian labels on junior college curriculum.
	7.	Sex is not the enemy--infidelity is: Married Christian couples should have a Song of Solomon love life. They should get married young and have a lot of kids. Love is not a feeling that settles down on you. It's a decision. It is not "fate." It is "will." Christian "singles" and Christian "youth" culture--with serial dating, serial sensuality, and, at its very worst, serial abortion--is an abomination. Don't wait for your education to get married. Get married and educate each other. Don't spend your youth slumming through one heart-break after the next. Try to earn what a papa owns when his little boys run through the front door to give him a hug at night.
	8.	Covenant is Everything: Why are we tithing to these mega-church audio-visual ministries when we could be tithing to each other, in real Christian communities, that would be unafraid to speak the truth? When a church gets too large, it starts operating like a franchise, or a businesses, and the gospel suffers. Keep it small. Keep it covenantal. The burden of one should be the burden of all--and the rest of the world should learn from that relationship. We wouldn't have this monstrous, hideously inefficient welfare state if Christians really cared for each other.
	9.	Discipline the Remnant: the best and worst things about some "Christian Independents" is their very independence. Just because some of us pull ourselves out of the mainstream church, doesn't mean we've really replaced it until and unless we learn to submit to each other. I've seen a lot of the remnant claim, in effect, they are the "remnant of the remnant" because of their peculiarly keen collection of liturgical theories and domestic routines. It comes off as just plain nutty. Do not divide over non-essentials.
	10.	Be the best at what you do: John Winthrop effectively said this was his wish for the Bay Colony. "Let it be as in New England." Ideally, a community of believers should be so devoted to doing their work well that others say, "those guys are the best doctors, the best lawyers, the best film-makers, the best brick-layers you can find."

 

Okay, so who wants to join up? Show of hands?

The Swift Economy of Colonial Justice

Here are just a few incidents of crime and punishment as they were administered throughout the colonies in the years 1768 through 1770 and chronicled by the Portsmouth New Hampshire Gazette. Contrary to what you might assume, crime was not a major feature of colonial newspapers. In this era, correspondents were far more interested in political intrigue and the ideas surrounding the rights of free men. You have to really look, in other words, for a crime blotter, and when crime was reported, unlike today, it had a beginning, a middle, and an end. You read about the crime itself, the trial, and the punishment.

I would argue the speediness of this justice is good for the soul of any society. You aren't left, as a citizen, with the angst of hearing about the villainy of one barbarous act after the next, followed by years of procedural maneuvering and the prospect of a smug criminal laughing at the system after a few years of watching Jerry Springer in the can; you have the satisfaction of knowing that the enormity of the crime was met with the enormity of punishment. Attempted rapists were publicly shamed and whipped, burglars were branded with a "B" on the forehead, murderers were hanged, and even common criminals proposed their own punishment, administered by the victims, without the censure of the local magistrate.

Those of us outside today's criminal justice apparatus tend to see our own system as erring on the side of caution, mercy, and the rights of the accused, but the reality is much more cynical. What we call "criminal justice" today is primarily a jobs program. Every new rapist, every new burglar, every new murderer represents money to the system--new jobs for jailers, new jobs for prison builders, more billable hours for detectives, social workers, psychiatrists, more fund-raising letters for various silly sisters of mercy who put Berkeley post-grads to work, trying to make the world safe for arsonists and child-killers. Follow the money. What we are paying for today has nothing to do with either justice for the victim or mercy for the accused. It has everything to do with handing out more state pensions to people who have the gall to say they are "reforming" criminals. Our system, in the last analysis, at a time of budget constraint, certainly has no respect for the tax-payer.

Think of the sheer beauty and simplicity of burning a burglar with a brand-iron "B" on the forehead. This was done in public, before children, as an example of bad behavior. For the rest of his life, the burglar carried with him a very efficient background check and a collosal incentive to reform himself. Imagine the man who truly wanted to change, after a life of crime. He had to work harder to win his fellow citizens' trust, and in the faces of those who reacted to his branded flesh, he had a reminder--every day--to change his ways. If he did continue in a life of crime, the judge could see, immediately, without the benefit of a computerized rap-sheet, what sort of offender he had before him.

We have come very far, on many fronts, as a society, but we are fooling ourselves if we really think we have become more merciful, and more "progressive" in the arena of criminal justice.

To wit:

Boston, April 23, 1770 In the present Term of the..Court, one George White was convicted of Burglary, in breaking into the House of Mr. John Moffatt, and had the Benefit of the Clergy, being burnt in the Hand, he was also convicted of breaking into the Province House and stealing, for which he was sentenced to be branded in the Forehead with the Letter B and to pay Cost; he was also convicted upon other Indictments against him for stealing, on each of which he has been sentenced to be whipt 20 Stripes, to pay treble damages and Cost.

Portsmouth, August 11,(1769) Friday last came on at the Superior-Court then sitting, the Trial of one Arthur Meloy, of this Town, a Man near 60 Years old, for abusing and attempting a RAPE...last Wednesday being the Day appointed for him to make his public Appearance in this Character, at Eleven A.M. he was mounted on a Stage before the State-House, erected for the Purpose on which he was Pillory'd, and there remained one Hour, a Spectacle to a great Concourse of People, he was then taken down and conducted to the Whipping-Post, where after receiving 15 Lashes...

(Charleston, SC, May 1, 1769) On Wednesday Matthew Turner, late a Mariner on Board the Ship Bacchus of Liverpool, was arraigned...for the Murder of Wililam Harrop, late Master of the said Ship, ...On Friday the 28th after a long and full hearing, the Court unanimously found the said M. Turner Guilty, and sentenced him to be hanged....

New York, December 4, 1769: Last Tuesday one John Campbell, was indicted and convicted of Grand Larceney, and received sentence of death, and is ordered to be executed on Friday, the 22d inst. He is an old offender, and has been crop'd and branded in the Forehead; and said to have been whip'd in South-Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Boston.

HARTFORD, November 27, (1770) In the Evening preceeding the Thanksgiving, a strolling Vagabondly fellow in his way (as he pretended) to Boston, coming into a private House in the eastwardly Part of the Town, in the Habit and Character of a Beggar plausibly sought for Entertainment; calling himself a Native Subject of the King of Denmark, from whose Dominions about Ten years ago he came into this Country; since which among other misfortunes, he has that of losing all the Fingers on one Hand, and free use of those of the other by falling into the Fire in a convulsion-Fit. Being thus recommended to the Pity and Charity of the hospitable Family, commiserating his calamitous Circumstances they could do no other than receive him as their Guest. But as he preferr'd solitary Retirement to Company under a Pretence of not being troublesome to the Family, was introduced to a comfortable Fire in the Kitchen. But while the Family were busy in the other Room, confiding in the Simplicity and Honesty, as well as imbecility of their new guest, he, with several Articles of Value, was soon found to be missing; whereupon with all convenient Speed, the Thief was pursued, and overtaken at a Tavern about a Mile distant, where in merry Mood, he was offering his new Assortment upon Sail (sic) to the highest Bidder. This Merriment might have lasted longer, had it not been interrupted by the true Owner challenging his Property, who after some proper Diversion, bound the apprehended Criminal, for a more easy and convenient Escortment about seven Miles in a retrograde March to a civil Magistrate. But the reluctant Villain, choosing rather to make a present than a future Settlement, made the Proposal, to which, with the Advice of the Company, the indulgent Creditor consented; for the Receipt of which (Matters being thus amicably accomodated) he voluntarily stripping himself receive'd upon the Spot seven hearty Lashes, with a good sturdy Horse-Whip warmly apply'd, which he tamely submitted to and endured with all the Patience and fortitude which his own Circumstances and the Nature of the Thing would well admit of..