Quotes of the week
“Through our willingness to help others we can
learn to be happy rather than depressed.”
Gerald Jampolsky
Gerald Jampolsky
“Science has proof
without any certainty. Creationists have certainty without any proof.”
Ashley Montague
Ashley Montague
“They always talk
who never think, and who have the least to say.”
Matthew Prior
Matthew Prior
“When ideas fail,
words come in very handy.”
Goethe
Goethe
“We are so
accustomed to wearing a disguise before others that eventually we are unable to
recognize ourselves.”
Francois De La Rochefoucauld
Francois De La Rochefoucauld
Websites of the week
Women
can be bad too (Mom ~is that my grandma in that mug shot?
All images are courtesy of the Historic Houses Trust.
Be sure to check out their site for more fascinating historical images.
Americans
United for Separation of Church and State is a nonpartisan organization dedicated to preserving church-state
separation to ensure religious freedom for all Americans.
Search America's historic
newspapers pages from 1836-1922 or use the U.S. Newspaper Directory to find
information about American newspapers published between 1690-present.
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/
Cool shoes at http://www.sanuk.com/
The culmination of millennia of scientific endeavor
Meditation of the week
On this day in 1895, Oscar
Wilde's play The Importance of Being Earnest opened in London. He
wrote the first draft in just 21 days, the fastest he'd ever written anything.
The play tells the story of a man named Jack Worthing who pretends to have a
younger brother named Earnest. Jack uses the imaginary Earnest as an excuse for
getting out of all kinds of situations, and even pretends to be Earnest when
that suits his purposes. At the same time, Jack's friend Algernon Moncrieff
also begins impersonating the imaginary Earnest. When two women fall in love
with Jack and Algernon, they both think they are in love with a man named
Earnest. It comes out in the end that Jack and Algernon are themselves actually
long lost brothers.
Wilde said that The Importance of Being
Earnest expressed his philosophy that "we should treat all the trivial
things of life very seriously, and all the serious things of life with sincere
and studied triviality."
Poem I of the Week
I’d Rather be the Father
Right from the start, it's easier to be the
father: no morning
nausea, no stretch marks. You can wait outside the
delivery room and keep your clothes on. Notice how
closely the word mother resembles smother, notice
how she is either too strict or too lenient: wrong for giving up
everything or not enough. Psychology books blame her
for whatever is the matter with all of us while the father
slips into the next room for a beer. I wanted to be
the rational one, the one who told a joke at dinner.
If I were her father we would throw a ball across
the lawn while the grill fills with smoke. But who
wants to be the mother? Who wants to tell her what
to wear and deliver her to the beauty shop and explain
bras and tampons? Who wants to show her what
a woman still is? I am supposed to teach her how to
wash the dishes and do the laundry only I don't want
her to grow up and be like me. I'd rather be the father
who tells her she is loved; I'd rather take her fishing
and teach her to skip stones across the lake of history;
I'd rather show her how far she can spit.
nausea, no stretch marks. You can wait outside the
delivery room and keep your clothes on. Notice how
closely the word mother resembles smother, notice
how she is either too strict or too lenient: wrong for giving up
everything or not enough. Psychology books blame her
for whatever is the matter with all of us while the father
slips into the next room for a beer. I wanted to be
the rational one, the one who told a joke at dinner.
If I were her father we would throw a ball across
the lawn while the grill fills with smoke. But who
wants to be the mother? Who wants to tell her what
to wear and deliver her to the beauty shop and explain
bras and tampons? Who wants to show her what
a woman still is? I am supposed to teach her how to
wash the dishes and do the laundry only I don't want
her to grow up and be like me. I'd rather be the father
who tells her she is loved; I'd rather take her fishing
and teach her to skip stones across the lake of history;
I'd rather show her how far she can spit.
Poem II of the week
My Dead Friends
I have begun,
when I'm weary and can't decide an answer to a bewildering question
to ask my dead friends for their opinion
and the answer is often immediate and clear.
Should I take the job? Move to the city? Should I try to conceive a child
in my middle age?
They stand in unison shaking their heads and smiling—whatever leads
to joy, they always answer,
to more life and less worry. I look into the vase where Billy's ashes were —
it's green in there, a green vase,
and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes.
Billy's already gone through the frightening door,
whatever he says I'll do.
when I'm weary and can't decide an answer to a bewildering question
to ask my dead friends for their opinion
and the answer is often immediate and clear.
Should I take the job? Move to the city? Should I try to conceive a child
in my middle age?
They stand in unison shaking their heads and smiling—whatever leads
to joy, they always answer,
to more life and less worry. I look into the vase where Billy's ashes were —
it's green in there, a green vase,
and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes.
Billy's already gone through the frightening door,
whatever he says I'll do.
