Four Months Without News (and counting)

Not exactly bliss, but…

At the beginning of March, 2017 I’d gone a full four months without reading any news.

I’ve discovered ignorance is easy; a little more of it and I might become a Republican. By default, not by choice of course.

My biggest problem has been the technology sites. For some reason, they can’t seem to let the political stuff alone. For example, the fact that Dumb Donald uses twitter seems to be reason enough to report on his electronic drool.

Inappropriately Articulated Ailments

One of the dangers of getting older is that you acquire an increasing number of ailments. Each of these contains intrinsic dangers, of course, but there is one nasty side effect you can avoid if you make a strong and determined effort:  deciding that your affliction is interesting.

It works like this. Your doctor encourages you to read about your disease or condition so that you can “better manage your care.” A reasonable approach, but a truly dangerous one. You’d be much smarter if you just blindly followed her orders.

If you do step on the slippery slope and start to read about whatever you have, you’ll likely soon find that your affliction is actually quite fascinating. It has a number of variations and an array of treatments with some recent, thought-provoking possibilities. And no one knows why people in Borneo never get it.  

A Year Without News?

Now seems like a good time to give up on the news. The wackos have won Washington and frankly, I don’t want to read about their campaign to trash American values, not to mention our economy.

I'm not saying the country is going to the dogs, because that would be unfair to dogs. Most canines I’ve encountered are smarter than the people taking over the federal government. More honest, too.

The bottom line is that the experience of continuing to read news wouldn’t be good for either my physical or mental health. So, I’m out. The plan is a year. We’ll see how it goes.

Dear Committee Members

Chair, Committee on Creative Writing

Department of English

Standard State University

Dear Committee Members:

Please consider Professor Julie Schumacher’s Dear Committee Members as required reading for all students beginning your creative writing program. It’s true that the book doesn’t break new ground – satirizing English departments is like shooting fish in a barrel with a bazooka. Many have tried and few have failed. Nor is it the sharpest, most biting such satire, John L’Heureux’s Handmaid of Desire easily wins that prize. And it probably isn’t funnier than Richard Russo’s Straight Man or Jane Smiley’s Moo (which satirizes an entire university).

But Dear Committee Members  is still a brilliant achievement which delights readers even as it offers lessons for writers. I wouldn’t have thought the simple stratagem of the letter of recommendation could sustain an entire book, but Schumacher manages without discernible effort. Talent can make any format work.

Moreover, and I won’t say more to avoid spoiling the reader’s pleasure, the author accomplishes a change in emotional atmosphere across the pages with the smooth subtlety of morning sun dissolving maritime fog. Anyone who wants to learn to write should carefully study what she has accomplished here.

Best wishes and don’t let your students’ mutant human-bedbug creatures bite.

Garrison Walters

Author of the Aldus Stewart thrillers:  Killing Justice and A Riddle (as well as another novel which shall not be named – we all have to learn)

On Not Hearing the Homily

All my life I’ve struggled with human speech. If a person talks continuously for more than a few minutes, I’m off riding my own mental drone, buzzing and skimming erratically through a forest of random thoughts like an inebriated dragonfly. My impromptu flights seems to want to take me anywhere and everywhere – just not back in the direction of that human sound, which is annoying to me because I can’t quite stay fixed on it.

I’m obviously better with interactive speech. Otherwise I’d be writing this from a monastery or an asylum. Still, when people start to repeat themselves, or drift off into pointless trivia, my mental drone is there to free me.  

Me, The Great

Sylvia and I were discussing relatives during our beach walk the other day, and I realized that most of the people I called “aunt,” and “uncle,” were in fact “great” aunts and uncles.

And this led me to realize that, thanks to Alex and Kate Didion, I am also a Great Uncle.

Remembering that ambassadors and former ambassadors get to be called “ambassador” no matter where they are, I now wish to be addressed as “His Excellency, Garrison The Great Uncle.”

Martial Arts and the Italian Door

In another essay, I described how the support and encouragement of others made it possible for me to succeed in taekwondo. One interesting little vignette was left out of that story, for the excellent reason that it’s not relevant to the main message. But it is fun, so here it goes.

Playing with Languages

Everyone has plans for retirement, and a key goal for me was refreshing some of the foreign languages I’d studied.

I’ve dabbled in lots of languages, including exotics like Albanian and Hungarian, but wanted to be reasonable and focus on restoring ability in the languages I knew the best:  French, Romanian, and Bulgarian.

Motivation and Sports

In the initial round of college football’s first playoff, players at favored Alabama and Florida State knew they had to do well to win, but saw the real challenge as the next game—against each other.

By contrast, players at the underdogs, Oregon and Ohio State, believed they would need to have an exceptional performance to win.

Rental Car Journal

A Review of the Chevrolet Malibu, Hyundai Sonata, and Chrysler 200

During the last month, I’ve had the experience of driving three of the major entries in the American market’s fiercely competitive mid-size market. These vehicles, all of which I drove courtesy of rental companies, give an interesting window into the state of the automobile industry today.

In Memory of Roger Blair

Roger Blair was a wonderful friend for 44 years.

We met through mutual acquaintances and got along extremely well though we couldn’t have been more different in personality and in interests.

A Writing Excerpt

The following is a sample from my first novel, the quite forgettable Transylvania Connection. 

Kursk, Russia / March 2

Someone, Gennadi Yazov thought, should write a book about the history of the hangover in Russian history. Even he, with his moderate education, could think of many turning points whose pivot was the harsh reality of the morning after. The most important, he mused, was of course the Decembrist Revolt of 1825, when many of the key officers plotting the overthrow of the new Tsar Nicholas I “overslept” and left their colleagues to be overwhelmed. Overslept? All the students had smiled when the teacher said this. In Russia, happy spirits of vodka ruled the night and the evil spirits of its sister, the hangover, dominated the morning. Such was certainly the situ­ation in this rough building, for the bloodshot eyes and pasty com­plexions of the men around him showed that they had appreciated the three bottles of Stoli that Yazov had “found” yesterday afternoon.

Yazov watched carefully as the small truck made its way to the checkpoint. From where he stood, by the front window of the rather large guard hut, the truck appeared somewhat mystical, its lower parts enveloped in the kind of wispy ground fog that appeared early on Spring mornings.

Yazov was confident. The papers were good, and the security detail was not enthusiastic about doing more than moping in their warm building and drinking sugary tea. The appearance of the truck had caused an audible groan, synchronized almost like a chorus, from the half dozen men on duty. A sergeant had gone out to get the papers and was now examining them with a minimum of attention. But he did fax the documents and make the necessary phone calls to verify the signatures. The fact that the voices on the other end were unfamiliar occasioned no surprise—after all, it was only 7:00 a.m. on a Sunday. Perhaps only the cleaning lady was on duty at such a god-awful time, the sergeant had observed sullenly.

Close, Yazov thought, as he heard the calls go successfully. The low-level officers covering the phones at the two command centers were honest—they did find the matching documentation in their systems. But they weren’t experienced enough—or alert enough—to question the questionable details. Yazov smiled to himself. It would have been foolish to try to bribe them; the money had been better placed elsewhere.

The sergeant, moving slowly as he stood up from putting the phone down and complaining of a headache as he did so, told his commanding officer, Yazov, that the paperwork was in order.

The next step in the process was inspection. It was one thing for the papers to say what was inside, and the validity of the documents to be confirmed elsewhere, it was quite another to make sure the de­scription matched the contents. Yazov barked an order, and the entire crew moved outside.

The first step was the radiation test, designed to be very, very sure that nothing nuclear was inside. To do this, the team removed panels on the two devices that exposed the interior and carefully put their high-tech American-made probes inside. Given the small size of the area inside the warheads, and the sensitivity of the probes, there was no chance of having enough shielding to mask a nuclear device.

The sergeant holding the device spoke loudly, “negative, no ra­diation,” and handed the device to a second sergeant, who repeated the check and announced the same conclusion. Yazov knew that there would be two more such double checks down the road before the truck was cleared. After some years of rather loose supervision, the leaders in the Kremlin had realized that, if a nuclear device went astray, it was just as likely to be used against them as in the West somewhere. Nuclear security was very tight.

But the concern about other weapons was less serious, and this checkpoint was the only one that would actually examine the ship­ment to see if it matched the description. The devices were supposed to be dummy warheads of a particular model number—ones they hadn’t seen here before—and the security team had been given de­tailed internal drawings that showed the difference between the pho­ny and the real warheads. It was obvious that the difference wasn’t obvious. The warheads would have to be lifted out of the truck and carried inside for inspection.

Yazov spoke briskly, “All right. I guess we have to bring these in. They look heavy and the forklift doesn’t seem to be working. Best for all six of us to carry them. Ready now.”

As he spoke, Yazov gave a swift glance to the officer next to him. The rules required that two officers from different units sign off on each inspection, and although Yazov was the superior, his every ac­tion could be countermanded. Conflict meant that a team from headquarters had to be summoned.

No one moved for a long moment, waiting to see what Yazov’s fellow officer would say. Their bloodshot eyes implored him.

The Major nodded his head as if in agreement with Yazov then moved his hands to grasp the dark metal of the first missile. He gave it a tug, and muttered, “All right,” then, under his breath. “Let’s take a look.”

Yazov stiffened, his breath slowing as his body began to prepare for fight or flight. Actually, he didn’t know which. The backup plan was none too good—at least from his point of view. The bosses’ idea of Plan B was to say, “What a shame! And Yazov seemed so capable. Who shall we get to replace him?”

Two of the soldiers moved forward and placed their hands on the missile, waiting for others to come and help. Faced with the need for physical action, the Major, looking down at his trembling hands, seemed to reconsider. Finally, pale and sweating slightly even in the cold, the man spoke unsteadily. “No. I can see that this is the dum­my.” He pretended to look at the plans. “There’s no doubt.” The voice was now a bit stronger.

Yazov, after a pause to replenish his oxygen supply, used a quieter voice. “Well, the Major is more expert than I in these matters. I will sign.”

Quietly, the two senior officers worked through the paperwork, then Yazov used his radio to call the commander of the twenty or so heavily armed men who guarded the gate and the neighboring area of fence. “Let them proceed.” The gate opened smartly, but the driver, seemingly frozen by the long wait, didn’t move for many seconds and Yazov felt the tension again build inside. The man was a regular and obviously had expected to be here much longer. Was he going to call headquarters to complain there had been no inspection?

But the driver’s fog lifted, perhaps he too had spent the evening with the siren in a bottle, and the truck noisily went into gear and through the gate.

Two more inspections, Yazov thought, but only for radiation. The missiles will be in Tiraspol tonight and on the Black Sea tomor­row. He smiled. Another victory for the hangover.