Farewell Terri ~

As we expected, Terri has passed on. It is a wonder she survived this long. Although this young woman is now deceased, our prayers continue to go out to her. Indeed, for as many years as she suffered through this terminal illness, it would be divinely insensitive and unjust if she is made to spend even an instant in purgatory.

Clearly, no one was untouched by her travail! But sadly, and not regrettably, this period was not characterized by a unanimity of feeling among us. Our nation was wracked and divided by moral, religious, philosophical and even political differences. Does that reflect well or ill for us and America? My response would be, considerably more well than ill.

However, what we urgently need now is a candid admission that not one of the attitudes we espoused was essentially right or wrong. Indeed, the profound diversity of the attitudes we expressed, can be viewed as a genuine testimonial to this nation’s capacity for great depth of feeling when it is confronted with serious matters. In my clinical judgement, America’s vital mental signs are intact, healthy and strong.

Addendum: There is a lesson to be drawn from this tragic sequence of events. Every adult in the family should have a living will! And it should be kept under a magnet on the refrigerator door.

Andy Gross and me

A widely read supplement

Today, I was interviewed by Andrew Gross, a reporter for the Journal News. He will be writing an article about me that will appear in the May issue of Suburban Golf. As you may have read in an earlier post, Mark Vergari, Senior Photographer of the Journal News, has already taken a number of fotos of me as well as the scorecards that we are planning to use this season.

The Journal News is aware that changes and improvements are being made to the two golf courses managed and operated by the Somers Pointe Golf Club. The newspaper also knows that Maria Sanyshyn, our newly installed Managing Director, is at the helm, and that this Golf Club is now on a fast paced beam reach and gathering speed. Our scorecards, in particular, have piqued the interest of Suburban Golf.

Andrew Gross spent almost three hours with me and together we visited many areas of my life and background, but his principal focus remained on the scorecards. In essence, there is nothing that different about our design. But in contrast with most clubs that don’t quite know where on the card (or in the Club itself) women players should be, ours (like our Golf Club) makes it clear that no gender distinctions are operating here. Hopefully, that will someday be the case everywhere this game is played.

It was an exhilarating experience, being interviewed by this remarkably intelligent young man. He asks profoundly searching questions and although we went on for hours, our rapport never waned for an instant. Instead of a tape recorder, he used a laptop computer and in all candor, I have never seen fingers fly over a keyboard as fast as his. And yet, all the while he is typing, he maintains unflagging eye contact. Amazing!

So far, I have met only two members of this newspaper’s staff, and I am impressed!

Cogito !

If Aristotle were to be presented with the dilemma that troubles all of America today, I believe he would without hesitation, opt to restore Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube. He always adhered unswervingly to his tenet that existence and life are inviolable. But if Rene Descartes were faced with the same question, I am equally certain that the father of "modern" philosophy, would take a diametrically opposed position. With one glance at Terri's flat-lined electro-encephalogram, the author of cogito, ergo sum (I think, therefore I am) would instantly declare, "This woman has ceased to be alive!" To feed her or not to feed her, he would have regarded as pointless rhetoric.

However, it is important to note that the 180 degree divergence between these two positions is a purely philosophical one. Neither of these venerable philosophers would attach an iota of moral or religious value to their respective views. But, sadly, that does not appear to be the case with us in America today. We are disputing this subject with much more moral and religious fervor than philosophical understanding. We are too prone to believe that we are standing on higher and purer ground than those who oppose us. Nevertheless, we are all moving inexorably into the next act of this tragedy. Within days, Terri will expire and not long afterwards, each of us will retreat into the false security of our individual and collective moral sanctuaries.

Addendum: Isn't it odd that this is happening during this year's Easter season, that hallowed period when Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, whose human life was terminated by Roman cucifixion?

Foto Time!

Mark Vergari a First Rate Photographer

Fate has contrived to cast a glaring spotlight on my senescent endeavors to produce brand new scorecards for the East Hill and West Hill courses of the Somers Pointe Golf Club. The Journal News will publish an article to this effect in its May edition of the Suburban Golfer. Towards this end, the newspaper scheduled me to be photographed today by Mark Vergari and interviewed by Andrew Gross on March 30.

My foto session with Mark Vergari was an interesting experience. In the extended years of my life, I have had occasion to see many people, amateurs as well as professionals, practice their metiers and I tend to make intuitive judgements as to their respective competence, skills and commitment to their work. Mark ranks with the best I have seen.

He is genuinely cordial and congenial, qualities that are indispensable in his profession. As he unpacked his gear and set the scenes for his picture taking, he exuded competence and a multi-dimensioned panoply of skills. Having so totally and abysmally unphotogenic a subject as me, for his model, tested his devotion to his work. He passed it with room to spare. With his camera at every conceivable angle, he focused on aspects of me that even my wife has not yet explored.

In designing our new scorecards, I am making serious efforts to respond to every specification, technical and esthetic, proposed by our club’s Course Superintendent, our PGA Golf Professional and the newest member of our local managerial Board, the vibrantly intelligent young catalyst, Maria Sanyshyn. With their input, the accepted design will set a high and proper standard for Somers Pointe.

My dear Lenore

Dearest Lenore,

Know this, I truly love thee

Ere the bloom fades from thy rose

I’ll live an eternity ~

Dom

Che gelida manina ~ please let me warm your hand, the ardent, love-struck Rodolfo sings to Mimi. And when she responds to him with her seductive and poignant, Mi chiamano Mimi ~ these two lovers succeed in creating opera’s most unforgettable moments of ecstasy. However, La Boheme is theater and theater can invent magic.

But here on these undulating byways of Heritage Hills, where you see so many husbands and wives walking blissfully, hand in hand, you can feel real magic at work. While you may not hear arias being sung, you will not fail to sense that in this beautiful and tranquil setting, we elderly people are happily living our penultimate moments together.

If you have ever wondered why our five children, twelve grand-children and three great-grandchildren are so outstandingly attractive, the photo above will provide a substantial part of the answer. It was at a St Valentine's dance, on a cold February evening 65 years ago, that I met Lenore and warmed her hand. We were married soon afterwards and except for the nearly four years I spent overseas during WW II, and a few weeks of ocean sailboat racing, we have never been apart.

Her birthday falls on Sunday, March 27th (Easter)

She is looking forward to dinner at the Pinnacle Restaurant

with her sons, daughters and their spouses on Saturday, March 26th

RSVP

Quo vadis?

Whither goest thou?

I invite you to join me on a brief excursion into flip-flop land. What follows was copied verbatim from the Scrapbook of the current issue of the Weekly Standard.

## These editorials are only ten years apart. In the first one, the Times sees the Republican use of the filibuster against the Democratic majority, as reprehensible. In the second, the Times loudly applauds the use of this stratagem by the Democrats against the Republican majority. I have no argument with the Times taking this ambiguous position, its their prerogative. But I do believe it should have made a credible effort to explain to its readers, its rationale for doing so.

A January 1, 1995, Times editorial on proposals to restrict the use of Senate filibusters:

In the last session of Congress, the Republican minority invoked an endless string of filibusters to frustrate the will of the majority. This relentless abuse of a time-honored Senate tradition so disgusted Senator Tom Harkin, a Democrat from Iowa, that he is now willing to forgo easy retribution and drastically limit the filibuster. Hooray for him. . . . Once a rarely used tactic reserved for issues on which senators held passionate views, the filibuster has become the tool of the sore loser, . . . an archaic rule that frustrates democracy and serves no useful purpose.

A March 6, 2005, Times editorial on the same subject:

The Republicans are claiming that 51 votes should be enough to win confirmation of the White House’s judicial nominees. This flies in the face of Senate history. . . . To block the nominees, the Democrats’ weapon of choice has been the filibuster, a time-honored Senate procedure that prevents a bare majority of senators from running roughshod. . . . The Bush administration likes to call itself “conservative,” but there is nothing conservative about endangering one of the great institutions of American democracy, the United States Senate, for the sake of an ideological crusade.

This newspaper is being taken into strange and chilling territory by an Editorial Staff that has ostensibly divested itself of its former, unassailable editorial integrity. For the Old Gray Lady to retain a modicum of credibility, it should cease to misrepresent itself. It should acknowledge that it has undergone a structural metamorphosis. It is now stridently and undeniably partisan.

Doctor's dilemma!

Which one does your doctor wear?

This Post is based on an article by Donald McNeil, Jr., which recently appeared in the Health Section of the New York Times.

Unbeknownst to most patients and even to very many physicians, there is a controversy about which of the above symbols is proper for the healing profession to use as its icon. The history behind this actually reaches back to Moses, to the time when he was instructed by God to mount a brass serpent on a pole to nullify the ravages of the “fiery serpents” that were ferociously attacking the Israelites while they were stranded in what is now the Negev.

Centuries later, Greek mythology relates that Asclepius, a half mortal, learned how to heal the dead from having watched a snake he had just killed with his staff, being revived by another snake that crammed herbs into its mouth. Using the same herbs, Asclepius resurrected a man who had just been killed by one of Zeus’s thunderbolts. Angered by this half-mortal's indefensible intervention, Zeus swiftly hurled a thunderbolt at Asclepius. But he then relented. He revived him and made him the god of medicine. Asclepius's staff, with the single serpent entwined around it, was divinely accepted as the symbol of healing.

The Caduceus, a rod entwined by two snakes, was a wand used by the infamous Hermes (whom the Romans called Mercury). Although he was the god of commerce, he mainly functioned as the god of thieves. Indeed, Hermes even engaged in the nefarious practice of transporting the souls of the dead to the underworld. Clearly, the Caduceus had no credentials as an icon for healing. But it came to be used as such in the 19th century, when a U.S. Army Surgeon, evidently ungrounded in classical history, lobbied successfully to have that symbol adopted as a badge for Army doctors. He had become fascinated by how it was used as a bookmark, by a British publisher of medical textbooks.

Back in WW II, like all the other medical officers, I wore the Caduceus on my military uniform. Even now, previously unaware of the above, I have it proudly pinned to my favorite winter hat. On the other hand (at least my instincts were correct) I have always used the Asclepius as the medical icon on my professional letterheads. Interestingly, the U.S. Air Force, having ultimately become apprised of the historical mixup, now uses the Asclepius as its medical symbol.

Incredible!

These Shoes Have Walked!

Scout’s honor, I am not shilling for the Rockport Shoe people. But I do think they deserve more than honorable mention for the very high quality and astonishing durability they built into this modestly priced pair of walking shoes. I have come to love them so much, I sometimes take them to bed with me.

Before we read on, enlarge the foto above by left clicking on it. Then look carefully at both shoes and check them for signs of wear. To return to the Post, left click on the Left-pointing Arrow in the upper left corner of your screen.

How many of us have ever seriously wondered about how far we have walked on any of our shoes? For most of us that is not the kind of information we factor into our personal database. But know this, Lenore and I do keep an accurate, cumulative log of our outside walks here in Heritage Hills and we average about 390 miles a year over snow, ice, rain and the steaming heat of some torrid summer days. Now believe it or not, according to our figures, in the past 2½ years I have road walked nearly 980 miles (1,568 kilometers) on these shoes. That is roughly the distance between NYC and Chicago. And this does not include any of the walking I do around the house and elsewhere, every day. I am talking here, only about the registered mileage we annually trudge on asphalt surfaced roads, up and down this community of hills and valleys. Question??? ~ how many miles are still left in these two remarkable shoes? If I live long enough, we'll see.

Nota Bene: To take this closeup photo, I placed both shoes on a small shelf about 2-feet from the arm rest of our sofa. But I needed 2-inches more of height in order to center the picture in the lens. A tripod would have been awkward. So guess what I used on the arm rest to center the camera perfectly, the Holy Bible!