Christmas

At Confabulation (an SF convention put on by IUSFC), Aija Beldavs used to make latkes in the morning in the consuite, though there was problem with the hotel smoke detectors.  She was a Latvian who said that she saved her mother's life many years earlier -- when the Communists came for the family, she was in a hospital giving birth to Aija.  The NKVD got Aija's father, but didn't bother going back for her mother.

Where did you find a picture of my first wife? Out is that my second? or third? Must be the first because that is the face that sent into the marines. No, that is my first mother-in-law. 

We are coming to the time when we celebrate the time when God chose to appear as a perfect human and, of course, came as a Jew. Artler shouldn't let that go to his head. But those are the facts. Or the reported facts. How anyone ever justified antisemitism because of this is beyond me. Jews are, admittedly, somewhat of a lost tribe even today. But they are the tribe central to the story of humanity and due our ongoing protection.

One of the most poignant Christmas songs is "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day," based on the 1863 poem "Christmas Bells" by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow



We live in a world where the wrong often prevail. Putin should be in hell by now but he's still bombarding innocent civilians. Still, one does seem to be inevitably faced with the choice of hope or despair, confidence or skeptic.

This above song defies common sense and the rational and just says "Dammit, Jim, I'm a doctor not a philosopher." Or something like that. It says that we will act like men of God and not a rabble even if the rabble sometimes have control. It says that we will hold onto the idea of peace on earth and goodwill to the-pronoun-of-your-choice.

The Christmas Spirit has eluded me thus far. I must have some Jew in me or something. In fact, my older brother did a couple of DNA ancestry tests and we do have about ½% of Jewish blood. But that's a poor excuse for rejecting hope and goodwill and staying a sourpuss. But then do we really have control of these things? Can we just flip a switch and suddenly It's a Wonderful Life?

I guess that's what bourbon is for. But, seriously. Have a Merry Christmas, Happy Chanaka, but take your "Winter Festivals" and shove them where the sun doesn't shine. Those "festivals" are fence-sitting quagmires of political/social neutering. Be hopeful or a cynic. As Jesus said, run hot or cold, but don't be lukewarm water. That's all that a "Winter Festival" is.

And that's precisely the problem at this time of year. Rarely do we human beings do other than sit on the fence and practice lukewarm. But then this holiday rolls around. And no matter how commercialized it may be, it hits us over the head with happiness and joy...or if the blow misses, we are on the sidelines realizing that we are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, just numb from living day to day and getting by as best we can.



Yeah, why not?

Wonderful thoughts.

That is pretty sad. My father was no bleeding heart, he had been in the 82nd Airborne. But I have no doubt that had I come home and said something like your brother did, my father would have been somewhat surprised, but then would have asked me more about what I did and why I did it. After that talk was over he would have probably told me I had done a good thing and then have either bought some presents in my name or contributed money to the various causes I had given money to, unless they were left-wing. 

My father could be very tough, but he was very generous and softened up a bit as he/we got older. 

So was mine. He was a career Marine and prone to violence. I think the children of violent men learn to read to signs of an impending explosion and it makes us able to detect the violence in others and ourselves. I've certianly never been reluctant to use violence in some of my former professions. I've seen death in some of its most violent forms, ocasionally admininstered by me. Now that I'm old, a little crippled up and slow, I won't provoke violence, but I won't run either. 

Mark Twain once said, "all young men hate their fathers more or less, in time they learn to forgive them". 

My father wasn't cruel, he just had a bad temper at times. I think there is a difference. He might over react to a situation and we could pay for it. After such occasions I might wonder what I had done that was so horrible. Then I would ruminate on the injustice of the harsh punishment meted out for a relatively small crime. It was hard to understand. That said, I cannot remember him ever trying to belittle me or hurt my feelings with an insult or such. In fact, he probably praised me too much for things I accomplished. 

The last time my father tried to hit me, he threw his back out and I had to help him get up and into bed. He didn't hit me after that. 

When I was three or four, after any such, to my mind, unjust punishment, I would blame God not my parents. Interesting how a child thinks. 

As to loosing one's temper, I can still do so, but have things under much better control than before. I believe one can lose one's temper for all sorts of reasons, but one has to be careful not to let anger feed anger. There is a sort of stimulation that, if one let's it take over, can get out of control.  

Well, my aversion to Victimology means I won't be relaying any such stories. But there were oodles of them. I'm glad that your father simply had a temper.

But there were many good times too. My own temper is almost always limited to inanimate objects. I don't take things out on people.

The world is full of crap, shitty people, and sometimes we ourselves add to the pile. One of the core Christian ideas (Jewish as well) is to pray that one doesn't get what one deserves.

May the LORD smile on you and be gracious to you. —Numbers 6:25

He does not punish us for all our sins; he does not deal harshly with us, as we deserve. – Psalm 103:10

Earthly fathers tend to not be so picky sometimes.