In the Heart of the Sea

This book was passed on to me by a neighbor a few months back. He is one of the most positive and endearing people I have met in a long time in spite of many afflictions. In the course of two years his wife has been diagnosed with cancer, he has been diagnosed with cancer, lost his father-in-law, had his own mother diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, been laid off from a job he held for over 10 years, and most recently had his only son diagnosed with Asperser’s syndrome. Most remarkable is that in no way does he seek sympathy and no matter how much you commend him for his courage he remains as humble as anyone I have ever met. Obviously he has been through many trials and in discussing them with him one night I discovered he was an avid reader (to the tune of finishing 2 – 3 books in a week). I asked him if he had one book to recommend what would it be and he sneaked away to his house and returned with a book titled In the Heart of the Sea by Nathaniel Philbrick.
The book chronicles one of the most amazing tales of human will in history. I know we are all familiar with tales of survival such as the stranded Argentinean soccer team and the recent movie “127 Hours” and each time are amazed at the perseverance and fortitude of humans facing the most harrowing of circumstances. We are also all familiar with Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick, the story of a salty Captain scouring the seas in an attempt to avenge the whale which attacked and sunk his whale ship. In the Heart of the Sea is an almost unbelievable true story which served as the inspiration for Melville’s masterpiece. Centered on the whaling industry of the early 19th century based almost entirely out of the New England island of Nantucket, the book follows the Tragedy of the whale ship Essex.
Philbrick does an excellent job describing one of America’s first lustful pursuits for oil at any cost, albeit whale oil. Also interesting is the barbaric yet incredibly adventurous manner in which the early whalers brought these beasts of the ocean down. Anyone who has a gripe (PETA) with the seemingly inequitable tactics of the modern hunter and/or fisher who would also like to see a sport where the animal actually has the upper hand would be highly intrigued at the prospect of bringing down a whale in the open ocean 200 years ago. Nonetheless, when successful the whales provided a large profit and many a young seamen set sail in pursuit of the sperm (no pun intended) whale.
The tragedy associated with the whale ship Essex begins when the primary boat, the Essex, is struck down by a whale in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Against inconceivable odds the men attempt to sail to South America facing the brutal heat and endless waves the open Pacific. For 94 days the twenty-one man crew is stranded in three tiny whale ships (each about 24 feet long) battling the ferocity of the Pacific. Without going into too many details the men are well short of the needed supplies to live even 60 days at sea and the protection provided by their whaleboats is at best minimal. Tragedy ensues, but in spite of the overwhelming circumstances, there is also triumph. Philbrick does an excellent job of portraying the story without making the oft-attempted effort of creating larger than life heroes who are in reality just the deserving victims of their own insidious decisions prompted by the pursuit of money. He highlights their poor decisions with no attempt to cover it up as bad luck but also gives fate a fair shake for its part. He openly addresses the fact that no black members of the crew were among the few survivors and goes as far as making bold but altogether believable speculations as to why none survived.
After finishing this book I pondered for a while with astonishment at what humans are capable of when pushed to their limits. While the narrative is nothing exemplary the story surpasses expectations in the end and leaves you with a sense of just how relative of a thing that despair really is.

JFK and the Unspeakable

I've never been big on conspiracy theories.  In college, I picked up Holy Blood, Holy Grail, the book on which Dan Brown based The Da Vinci Code, and knocked it out in a matter of days.  However, after a brief enchantment, I began to note the wide gaps and assumptions made by the authors and easily dismissed them, just as the scholarly community had decades before.  I don't believe in aliens and I think Bin Laden is dead.  So the grassy knoll JFK stuff was not really up my ally.  However, given that I had gotten to know the author's wife, and given that he'd spent 12 years on the book, and given that Jim is a Ph.D. and former university professor, I thought I would give the book a try.  It didn't hurt that names like Oliver Stone had given strong reviews.

JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters by James W. Douglass quickly drew me in.  However, in contrast to the medieval lore and mystery of Holy Blood, Holy Grail, Douglass captured my attention with thoughtful reflections on Christianity and the military-industrial complex.  The book is told through the lens ofThomas Merton, a Trappist monk from Kentucky, who as a poet and writer championed peace and faith.  In 1962, not long before the Cuban Missile Crisis and only a year and half before Kennedy's assassination, Merton wrote these haunting lines regarding nuclear war:

"What is needed is really not shrewdness or craft, but what the politicians don't have; depth, humanity and a certain totality of self-forgetfulness and compassion, not just for individuals but for man as a whole; a deeper kind of dedication. Maybe Kennedy will break through into that some day by miracle. But such people are before long marked out for assassination..."

Douglass writes with tireless consistency, and provides a feasible rationale as to how Kennedy would have beeen marked for death.  Using the resources that have been made available in the last decades, Douglass also provides a coherent and detailed narrative for how the event occurred.  Striking contradictions are neglected by theWarren Report, the government's official investigation of the case, which involved Allen Dulles, the former CIA director who was fired by Kennedy.  From Lee Harvey Oswald's intelligence connections to the remarkably similar plot uncovered by Chicago investigators only a few weeks before the assassination, Douglass brings to light numerous loose ends worth considering.


More than the how of the story, the why of the narrative is where Douglass invests most of his time.  He chronicles Kennedy's conversion from a hawkish presidential candidate running on the platform of "closing the missile gap with the Soviets" to, at times, the lone voice against preemption in his cabinet.  In the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis, perhaps the moment nearest to apocalypse in the history of the world, Kennedy turned from his cold-warrior mentality in pursuit of lasting peace.  He engaged in secret correspondence with his chief "enemy," Nikita Khrushchev.  He stood against leaders in his government advocating for deceit and violence as a means of winning the Cold War.  He championed Third World liberation, and was ultimately marked as a traitor by those who could not see peace as a viable option.

Can I say for sure that Douglass's postulate is the absolute truth?  No.  But the theory he unfolds is remarkably thorough and consistent.  Even with the critical eye that quickly dismissed previous theories, I have a tough time refuting much of his information.  It has re-shaped the way I comprehend national defense, intelligence and the workings of the military-industrial complex.  The book is certainly worth your consideration.  Highly recommended.

By the way, if you have some time, check out this interview.

Underdog Team. Underdog Town...A book review.

"All you have to is show up. Everyone with balls makes the team, I don't mean the family jewels. I mean guts, I mean backbone, I mean heart."


excerpt from Blind Your Ponies written by Stanley Gordon West

*I wrote this up for the other blog and just pasted it here.  After rereading it, it sounds like I am detailing one of those Matt Christopher books.  Something like: The Catcher with No Legs.  This book is nothing like that.*



Blind Your Ponies follows the Willow Creek Broncs; a basketball team with a reputation for failure. Willow Creek is a small town set underneath the shadows of the Tobacco Root Mountains in southwest Montana. Stanley Gordon West admits that this book is fiction, but has a lot of truth interspersed. The year is 1991 and the Broncs are facing another season with the memory of 5 win less seasons in the immediate past. But as much as this story is about a team, it is about a town- a town that seems to have the same reputation as the team. You see, the winters in this part of the U.S. are brutal. Cold, windy, snowy...constantly. The surrounding towns have very little to do or look forward to so they turn to their town's team. Nothing makes for a long winter like a losing team. And this team of 6 has little hope of an early spring.



The story wouldn't be all that interesting without the characters involved. West sucks you in from the start with tragedy that strikes the head coach years before Willow Creek is even a thought to him. Most of the characters involved have their own difficulties to deal with and use basketball as an escape. Its neat how the town itself is a character; fading away with its own losing.



Sam Pickett is the head coach and believes that is life is a record of how to become and stay a loser. It started in middle school when a port-a-potty was turned over while he was inside. These events have created a closed off soul unwilling to let himself love or believe.



Tom Stonebreak, 6'4", is a senior and has never won a game. He is a true cowboy. The kind of guy you may be afraid your wife would leave you for. He decides to forgo his senior season and prepare for the rodeos coming in the spring. His drive and toughness seem to be perpetuated by a longing to prove himself to his abusive, alcoholic father.



Peter Strong, 5'11", has just showed up to live with his grandmother; leaving Minneapolis following his parents divorce. Neither of his parents could keep the guy so they shipped him out; his girlfriend in turn found her another man. I like the way West puts it as his grandma describes his situation: facing "the howling void of eternity alone".



Olaf Gustafson, 6'11", flies in as an exchange student from Norway. The buzz around town is filled with hope when they hear of his size; but are sorely discouraged when they find out he has never played before. He has a Yoda-like grasp of the English language and has the basketball skills of a child learning to walk.



Grandma Chapman is the redemption in the story. Full of hope and optimism, she believes things are looking up. Alot like the town, she has seen some tough years. However, a certain event in her life has given her perspective. One line says it all: "She never again valued herself by the opinion of others, wishing she had been strong enough to live her whole life that way."



The book is full of ups and downs. It will give you hope one minute and leave you in a funk the next. I guess that is what I like about good books: they put you in a place, leaving you with the emotions felt in the story. This book takes you to Willow Creek. You'll feel the coldness of the winter and smell the mustiness of the old court and find yourself gripping the pages like a fan on the edge of your seat.

A New Vision

Greetings Friends,

Given that we are a year into this, I think it is an appropriate time to re-evaluate our efforts.  We've tried one book together, which everyone seemed to enjoy, though certainly in their own time.  Thus I suggest we convert the plan of a book club into a "What I've been reading lately" club.  I'll continue to submit reviews on books I have finished, and I encourage you all to do the same.  Perhaps we will eventually be able to give it another shot with the same book, but until that day, I would love to know what you are taking in.  More importantly, I'd like to hear your thoughts.  What say ye then, brothers?

Will

The Souls of Black Folk

"HEREIN lie buried many things which if read with patience may show the strange meaning of being black here in the dawning of the Twentieth Century. This meaning is not without interest to you, Gentle Reader; for the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line." - W.E.B. Du Bois

A cornerstone of African-American studies, The Souls of Black Folk is a series of essays spanning from religion to economics, and from politics to music.  W.E.B. Du Boishad a unique perspective of the meaning of being black in America at the turn of the century.  Raised as the lone black child in a New England town, Du Bois claims he didn't realize the significance of his skin color until he was an elementary student barred from a playmate's home.  His higher-education opportunities were limited by that same skin color, and thus he headed south to study at Fisk University in Nashville.  He spent time teaching in rural schools for a time before moving back north to become the first African-American to graduate from Harvard.  He studied at the University of Berlin and held teaching positions at Wilberforce and UPenn before returning to the South to teach at Atlanta University.

Du Bois writes in a style that will strike today's reader as remarkably humble regarding his race.  His ideas at the time, however, were far from mild.  Booker T. Washington was the leading black voice of his day, and he advocated social policies of "separate but equal" standing among the races, working to ensure blacks had access to trade schools and agricultural policies that would provide the race an opportunity to accrew financial and social standing before moving towards integration.  Du Bois, however, was adamantly opposed to Jim Crow and segregation, challenging that equal rights are essential to the progression of African-American, and ultimately American, society. The Souls of Black Folk laid the groundwork for the Civil Rights Movement that ensued a half-century later.

The book is well-written, and provides insight into the challenges afflicting African-Americans in the South over a century ago.  Sadly, many of the same issues remain.  While legislated racism fell during the civil rights movement (Though some are pointedly calling the wave of Arizona-style immigration legislation "Juan Crowe"), racism and disparities still remain a blight on our country.   The overt, explicit racism of a generation ago is slowly dying away, but it is being replaced with a much more insidious implicit racism that is often imperceptible by its perpetrators.  Implicit racism occurs in subconcious attitudes that we hold that affect the way we treat other races.  For instance, while I would never use an ethnic slur (I am far too P.C. for that), I will (unconsciously) apply an unfair stereotype to an obese, slightly unkempt African-American patient with a chief complaint of "abdominal pain."  While I may not perceive my racism, the patient suredly will.

Du Bois's topics range from reconstruction to education, and he does a masterful job of using story to convey injustice.  The book also details some history I find interesting, none more than the last chapter which provides an anthropological history of the "Negro Spiritual."  Another essay details the conflicted grief he suffers in the death of his child, whom was denied entry to an all-white hospital before succumbing to illness.  Importantly, Du Bois introduces the concept of "the Veil" through which blacks separated from the general population and a common symbol employed in African-American discourse.

The End of Poverty

One of my winter reads was Jeffrey Sachs' The End of Poverty, a book promoting a worldwide plan to end extreme poverty by 2025.  The head of Columbia University's Earth Institute, Sachs is an economist who stumbled somewhat backwardly into the realm of international economic development.  He has since become a leading voice calling for debt forgiveness and other policies aimed at freeing the poorest countries from the cycle of poverty.  Sachs plays an interesting role: on the one hand, he is a harsh critic of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the wealthy countries that use foreign aid to accomplish their political ambitions, and on the other hand he is an unashamed capitalist singing the praises of industrialization and free-trade.  He is a firm believer in the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (he helped draft them), and much of the book is dedicated to calling rich countries to fulfill their promises to the rest of the world.

Most Americans believe that upwards of 20% of our federal budget is dedicated to foreign aid.  With disasters like we've seen in the Haiti earthquake and Indonesian tsunami, the US is on the forefront in promising emergency relief.  However, Sachs points out that despite all of our promises, the US gives only approximately 0.2% of our Gross Domestic Product to international economic development.  In fact, the US agreed in 1993 to raise expenditures in foreign aid to 0.7% of GDP, a standard that the rest of developed nations agreed to in the 1970s.  Since pledging that number, foreign aid has actually declined, and much of that which is given funds "consultants" from the World Bank or IMF.  For those of you who prefer visual aids, the budget office provides a lovely pie chart here.

Sachs also does a brilliant job of outlining the need for economists who think like physicians.  Economic emergencies require experts that can examine a country, develop a diagnosis and apply a specific treatment plan for the country.  He outlines how this model was used with success during the Bolivian tin crisis and in Poland during the fall of the Soviet Union.

While my optimistic/pragmatic side agrees with many of Sachs' assertions and his overall plan, I must confess that his relentless industrial capitalism is a bit concerning.  My thoughts immediately return to the voice of Wendell Berry:

"We must see that the standardless aims of industrial communism and industrial capitalism equally have failed. The aims of productivity, profitability, efficiency, limitless growth, limitless wealth, limitless power, limitless mechanization and automation can enrich and the empower the few (for a while), but they will sooner or later ruin us all. The gross national product and the corporate bottom line are utterly meaningless measures of the prosperity or health of the country."

Despite my fondest affections for philosophy of Berry, I will admit that his calls to agrarianism are, unfortunately, unrealistic.  But I do believe his call to reflection is a critical component of any plan for development.  Sachs' unashamed cry that capitalism holds the answers left me uncomfortable throughout the book.  Over the years, he has been a voice crying for justice, fighting against the structures and powers of oppression.  And while his plans couple the words development and sustainable, I question whether the marriage between the two are realistic.  I think the fundamental question lies at how one defines development in the first place.

All in all, the book is challenging and encouraging, and despite my mistrust of some of his underlying premises, I believe he raises important issues and calls for movement in a necessary direction.  What say you?

News From the Future

I have finally made it about 2/3's of the way through the book. Ironically most of my reading time has been spent at 35,000 feet or on the 43rd floor of a hotel overlooking the neon lights of a city that was burned to the ground about a 150 years ago. As I stare at the neon, red Coca-Cola sign outside my window, which illuminated this side of the city like the brand name illuminates the world with consumerism, I can't help but think what this city looked like in 1900. Due to that fact that it was a major metropolitan area, I would think it is much like it is now, minus the tall buildings. The homeless sleeping in the dark alleys, drugs and alcohol ruling the lives of those who have yet to find something better to live for, money ruling the lives of others only in a much more glamorous fashion, and those who are working hard doing what is in their power "to feel more secure."

Despite all the discussion over whether or not the Ward's accepted this challenge to put another notch in their belt or somehow profit from the experiment, the most important thing is whether or not they (as a family and individually) were able to take something away from the experience. Over the last few years, I have come to realize that God places situations in our life that are meant to teach us and/or grow our relationship with Him. We usually don't understand why at the time and may never understand in our time as a member of this fallen creation. These situations shape our character and can also be used for use to help others in the future who go through similar experiences. "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything (1 James 1:2-4)."

What I am trying to get at is that for the first time in this book I finally feel that Logan is pulling something from this experience other than a cool story or a self serving exercise. Maybe it was a combination of the experiment and the attacks on New York but whatever it was, I felt relieved to see Logan gain an understanding and appreciation that he can take with him and hopefully spread to his family. When Logan was talking about Heather's grandmother and the Great Depression he said, "she's doing what is in her power to feel more secure - honing her resourcefulness, staying focused on life's essentials, helping others." Logan, that is exactly what you are doing....I hope. The purpose of the experiment itself is laid before us and what our daily lives should revolve around. I go to work in attempts to hone my resourcefullness to provide for my family. I go to Church to help me stay focused on life's essentials, and I try to stay in the word to guide me in these principles and help others in their lives and give them the opportunity to experience a life with Christ that we so often take forgranted.

I don't know what the final outcome of the book will be or what the Wards' will take with them other than a story and a paycheck from the publisher but there is a part of me that longs for them retain something more from the experience. Whether we realize it or not, we encounter experiences daily. How we embrace these experiences dictates the future benefits we gain from them. "turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding, and if you call out for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God (Pr. 2: 2-5)." We are all serching for security in everything we do, and if we take a few minutes and look for it in the right place, we just might find it. I look forward to see if the Wards' find the security they were searching for when they left their broken home in the city.

An Inconvenient Truth

I have to say that as I have progressed onward into the book I have become less and less enchanted with the author's seemingly idealistic campaign to reclaim the purification of his soul by fleeing the evils of modern society. I really think the post by fbw reflects a lot of what I have begun to notice: that this is not about escaping the grasp of modern life in order to enhance one's self but rather an attempt to add another story to his repertoire. I truly feel there is nothing more behind this excursion into 1900. I was watching some show several months back (can't recall what the show happened to be) but there was character who was basically a collector of personal stories. He would pass from one experience to the next claiming to have uncovered some insightful meaning from each one: patience from a year studying amongst the Monks of Tibet, wisdom from the Spanish priests, etc. However, by the end of the show it has become apparent that this guy is actually caught up more in the romanticism of his stories and that he has gained very little comprehension of his own character. The other “locals” on the show soon discover that they have more profound experiences even though they have stayed within the same county most of their life. This is not to advocate any xenophobic attitudes of small town life, but I feel very much as if Mr. Ward just wanted another story to add to his collection. As the story has progressed I have felt this disposition increasingly growing. They want to appear to be this “cool” couple to their New York friends and this pragmatic family who endured the bright lights of the city and escaped it to return to where they truly belong. I am just not buying it. I do want to note that I think that what cwb stated is so very important in that no matter what I say, I do have to commend them for taking action. It is easy for me to sit and here type this out in my air conditioned house and cast judgment when a part of me truly envies what they have done. I just find it hard to believe that the author’s purpose is for anything beyond writing a book to make more money and gain another story that, although unique in nature, has been done with the wrong intentions.

With all of that being said, I actually feel strongly connected to the couple’s story and I am enjoying the read. Despite what I perceive to be the author’s disingenuous motives I feel that the story does convey extremely well how disconnected we really are from our recent ancestors. I am baffled at the fact that it is virtually impossible for an average couple to completely abandon the present day and live as our great grandparents did. It seems as though it would be so hard for a modern person to live one hundred years ago and it makes me wonder what my grandchildren will think of the era I lived in.

One particular passage captured my attention recently. I am over a hundred pages into the book so this might be a little ahead of some of you but I do not feel it will detract anything from your future readings by mention this now. At one point the author introspectively notes that he despite his best efforts to flee the stresses of modern living he has only succeeded in recycling them for new stresses which in many ways seem far more bothersome. He points at that, yes, in today’s society you have debts and deadlines but you never worry about the ability to provide food for your family. If someone is starving in America today it is largely, if not entirely, due to their own stupidity. Any family will have numerous places to reach out for the ability to survive. One hundred years ago it was a very real possibility that your family could run short of food, or a simple cold could wipe out an entire generation of ancestry. I remember distinctly a conversation that I had with Leigh’s great-uncle one time a few years back. I asked, ”what is the biggest difference between the time when you were my age and now?” His reply was surprisingly short and simple; he said the only real difference as far as he could tell is that the pace of life has changed. People have lost all patience with everything: business, nature, religion, and even their fellow man. He said that nowadays everything is expected to be done with great haste, whereas in his youth people appreciated what virtue there is in waiting. As I try patiently to wait for this baby to stop crying, I wonder what else I have to do that is so important. Yet for years now I feel that I have wrongly labeled patience as laziness and I am beginning to see what it is the author claims to have set out in search of among the Virginia farmlands.

The Struggle

Good morning gentlemen! I finally had the opportunity to dive into our our current topic and was consumed with anticipation in the first chapter. As most of you probably know, I am at my wits end with my current job and have began the search for a "normal" life. This chapter of the book has highlighted several of the personal issues I have been struggling with over the last couple of months. The discussion below may not coincide with the book 100% but it was inspired with the book and as my friends you are forced to listen.

I think this chapter consumed me because I can identify 100% with the Ward's, outside the fact they live in NYC and have a child. I have been pushed to the breaking point mentally and physically over the last 4 months, working 60+ hour weeks consecutively and the majority of my relationship with my wife has been that of 2 ships passing in the night. The old saying, "It pays the bills..." describes my job completely. I have no passion for what I do, I don't see the purpose in my meaningless daily tasks 90% of the time and I don't respect the people I work for.

I have brought up the term "self-sufficiency" numerous times over the last few months. While that may be a little extreme, I think the idea is attractive. I have grown frustrated and tired with the demands society has put on each and every one of us. Phrases such as, "We have to have this...", or "You have to do this.....", "You need this....". I long for the simple things that I do not have, and despise the chains that bind me to my current state. How I would love to take a walk with my wife down by the pond and stroll by the garden on the way back to the house, pick a few vegetables for dinner and not hear a car or another human being. I was talking to Ashley last night and discussing why I have such an addiction with turkey hunting and why I let it run my life during the spring. I realized that it is my escape. For a three hour period I use no cell phone, I have no email, I don't have to think about work, or how I can get a lower internet rate. It is absolutely the most peaceful time I have throughout the entire year....it is my escape....my drug. Not only that but the sense of satisfaction that comes with providing meat for my family's table. I truly feel like a real man when I have blood on my hands or dirt under my fingernails. Yes, I love to hunt but there is nothing like the satisfaction to know that I am the one putting food on the table and not picking it up from Publix. I am in control of my family's future. My success or failure in the woods or in the garden directly affects my family. Now there is a daily task that gets my attention, as opposed to making sure the VP of Finance signed off on a reconciliation!

Wow, hows that for rambling? My point is that we have been painted into little boxes that society has molded for us. I'm not saying living in the 1900s would be glamorous because there are definitely hardships that I have not thought about or even know about. I just think our society as a whole would benefit in the morality department if we carved out some things in our life and replaced them with a slower pace. A few examples...actually observe the Sabbath (i.e. take the day off and give it to God), spend time with our families away from the TV, take children fishing, take time out of the day to teach something to our children about the outdoors and get our families back in Church. Last point, I vented to Ashley about society and how I desire to shield our children from the curses it brings but also expose them to the great things it has to offer (a very fine line indeed). It will take a strong relationship with God for our children to not succumb to the desires society says we should have, it will take a mother who is there to love and support, and a father who is a true spiritual leader of the house. I look forward to see what the Ward's take away from their experiment, as such a measure must be a great awakening. And for now, I will continue to settle for the days in the woods and the time on the water for my escape to a simpler time until I can break the chains that hold me in modern day society.

Coming around

Delving into the second chapter, I am overwhelmed by the vestiges of pace and stress the Wards have packed with them from New York. The strain of the project’s preparations engulfs the reader, and the tension between the couple is palpable. I identify well with Ward’s self-doubt as the new farmer’s practical insufficiencies manifest themselves despite his best efforts as a reader. Whether an author or friend, one willing to share insecurities and failures can quickly find in me admiration and respect. Though still a skeptic, I find myself cheering for the couple more and more. The tedious planning for the project is frustrating, but I have begun to take to the author, and I am brewing with excitement over the start day.

Two thirds of Americans cannot see the Milky Way? Our home galaxy is so obscured by lights and pollution that we cannot even identify it. Even if we could, I doubt we would separate ourselves from The Office or Blackberries long enough to look. Numbed by amusement, I find myself less and less attached to reality. Even without a television, this morning I rose to partake of coffee imported from a foreign land and a bagel baked in a factory. While my mind drifts away to Swoope, my lungs draw in carbon-tinted air and I sit upon a chair from Pier One. As I ponder, I become more overwhelmed by the depth that modernity and the American Dream have penetrated my being. Despite soaking in the words of Henry Thoreau, Wendell Berry and now Logan Ward, I observe little alteration in my lifestyle. Keith Watkins used to emphasize the Latin origins of contra- (against, counter) –diction (speech). As I sit under the cool air of an electric fan typing away on a laptop computer, I embody the definition.

The skeptic

Starkly in contrast to the pastoral serenity identified in the posts of fellows Riley and Barefield, I find myself strangely dissatisfied in the early pages of Ward’s See You in a Hundred Years. A pair of affluent hipsters, yearning for a new drug, grows bored with the pace of New York City and careers that provide for a Manhattan apartment and international escapades, and decides to rough it for a year. Just as he had tired of Ecuador and Kenya and small town South Carolina before that, Ward will transition from the city to the farm for a change of scenery. My skepticism seeps in early, suspecting this adventure is nothing more than an extended “expedition” for a journalist who has tired of airplanes and deadlines. The hardcover book in my hands is evidence that he has been well compensated for his most recent story before he departs from the nostalgic farm to pursue his next article.
My distrust is driven by a pair of factors. Firstly, the terminology in the early pages resembles the same rhetoric employed by sophomoric yuppies who have well grasped the verbiage and slogans of the modern environmental movement but without a clue as to what such a movement demands of us as humans. Secondly, I well identify with the dissatisfaction afforded by the modern life and find myself envious of the decisions he has made and actions he is taking. My hope is that this work will stir within me motivation on a smaller scale to alter my life in such a way as the author. My fear is that, armed with an agrarian vocabulary and resources sufficient for a year-long camping trip, Ward will endure and enjoy 1900 before engaging another adventure as the New Year rings in 2010.

...And then, no more light.

I feel like I should be reading this book by oil lamp light and underlining words with a feather dipped in ink. Having read thru the beginning, I am reminded of the days following hurricanes in southeast Alabama. I remember it being real hot due to the instant lack of air conditioning. We would grill a lot of food so that it wouldn't go to waste. Candles were everywhere. I also remember my family spending quality time together during those few days without electricity. We played board games and talked. There was no constant droning of the television. Time was spent outside until the last light of the day gave way to a new darkness. A darkness that causes the stars to shine all the more. Maybe life is much more memorable the simpler it is.