Neddy's Palaver

Vanquished, Vanished

Come, come, come …
Let us ponder the America of our memories:
We sang like the birds of the field; we sang of freedom;
When we sought opportunity, we found it awaiting us.
America was a dream, a vision of seekers;
America was a dream that lasted ten score and thirty years.
The dream that was America encountered the anarchy of liberty;
And was felled by the anarchy of immorality.
We beg forgiveness of our founders, our fathers;
We weep for the blood they shed for us.
The America that was their dream is now our master.
Freemen no longer, we are serfs to toil land that is not ours.
We live the lives of the slaves of old, lives of quiet desperation;
We beat our breasts in despair knowing we sold our posterity into bondage.
We still pray, but not to God; We still sing, but not of freedom.
We tell tales to our children and they laugh,
For, as we recollect our remembrances,
Our children hear fairy tales of long, long ago.
We talk to those who sacrificed for freedom,
And they ask: “Did we win or did we lose?
Was God with us or were we against God, in those days?
Was freedom worth the blood we spilt?
Or was freedom but a mysterious nothing,
A mere longing of our souls?”
We will soon go away too, we who have the memories.
When we are gone, will seekers ever dream that dream again?

Oh Poor Lady Caroline; to be saddled with the “Curse of Beauty.”

Try as she may to be snooty and dismissive to others, her bewitching beauty and lovely voice betrayed her true feelings. The more she tried to be rude and cold to acquaintances. the more they were enchanted by her natural charms and they loved her even more. Oh, to be so cursed as was Lady Caroline!

So she ignored Mrs. Arbuthnot’s remark and raised forefinger, and said with marked coldness–at least, she tried to make it sound marked–that she supposed they would be going to breakfast, and that she had had hers; but it was her fate that however coldly she sent forth her words they came out sounding quite warm and agreeable. That was because she had a sympathetic and delightful voice, due entirely to some special formation of her throat and the roof of her mouth, and having nothing whatever to do with what she was feeling. Nobody in consequence ever believed they were being snubbed. It was most tiresome. And if she stared icily it did not look icy at all, because her eyes, lovely to begin with, had the added loveliness of very long, soft, dark eyelashes. No icy stare could come out of eyes like that; it got caught and lost in the soft eyelashes, and the persons stared at merely thought they were being regarded with a flattering and exquisite attentiveness. And if ever she was out of humour or definitely cross–and who would not be sometimes in such a world?—she only looked so pathetic that people all rushed to comfort her, if possible by means of kissing. It was more than tiresome, it was maddening. Nature was determined that she should look and sound angelic. She could never be disagreeable or rude without being completely misunderstood.

‘I had my breakfast in my room,’ she said, trying her utmost to sound curt. ‘Perhaps I’ll see you later.’

And she nodded, and went back to where she had been sitting on the wall, with the lilies being nice and cool round her feet.”

“The Enchanted April,” by Elizabeth von Arnim, at the end of Chapter 6.

Perhaps I’ll see you later.

Who were Harry Thaw, Evelyn Nesbit and Stanford White?

I have been listening to an audio book of “Ragtime,” which I purchased because I have tickets to the play “Ragtime” that is scheduled for the Kennedy Center in May. Halfway through the book, I have decided that Evelyn Nesbit and Harry Thaw are featured characters that I should know more about. To learn more about them is quite easy, as, before reading “Ragtime” I had never heard anything of either of them; for all I knew, they were figments of the author’s imagination.

After the author’s coverage of Houdini, Teddy Roosevelt, Admiral Byrd, the famous psychiatrists Freud and Jung, I decided that murderer Harry Thaw, Gibson Girl Evelyn Nesbit and Evelyn’s lover Stanford White must have been historical characters. In 1906, Harry Thaw’s trial for the murder of White was labelled the “Trial of the Century.” Of course, OJ Simpson had not yet been born, and his trial for murder was fated for the end of the same century.

I find “Ragtime” interesting reading as it covers the historical events of my father’s boyhood. He was born 1901, and came to the U.S. as a teen. Also, my grandmother and my mother had grown up on a Virginia plantation of the family of another Gibson Girl, Irene Langhorne Gibson. I remember my grandmother recounting how she and her siblings played with the discarded drawings of Irene’s artist husband, Charles Dana Gibson. This is all doubly intriguing, as E.L. Doctorow links all of his historical characters with one another, and with his created characters, and I have found that my own family is linked to the very same people of his novel.

Well, back to “Ragtime” and Evelyn Nesbit, I finally Googled her this morning. (I’m not sure if “Google” the verb should be in caps or not.) She and her star-crossed lovers are in Wikipedia as real American characters and she even has her own web page: “The Story of Evelyn Nesbit.”

The image, Evelyn Nesbit, was originally uploaded by westiemom. It is posted here from Barneykin’s Flickr account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.

To My Daughter-in-law, Diane, who turns thirty-three today, January 18th.

Happy Birthday Diane - May three be your lucky number, as in the third time is always a charm. Three times six equals eighteen, as in January 18th. Three is the first of four perfect numbers - 3, 7, 10 and 12. Three denotes divine perfection. Three is the number in the Godhead; three times the Seraphim cried “Holy, Holy, Holy” (Isaiah 6:3). All time is divided into three parts - Past, Present and Future. On telephone keypads, the “3″ key is also associated with the letters “D” for Diane. You were married in 2003 to a man with three names from a family of three boys. You have three children, a family of three girls. Two threes = 33. And … a tricycle always has three wheels.

Today, January 5th is the Eve of the Epiphany.

For our ancestors, who celebrated “Old Christmas,” the night preceding January 6th is the Eve of Epiphany. It was on this night, over 2000 years ago, that the Magi came to Bethlehem to find the baby Jesus.

Today, the Day of Epiphany is still known as “Old Christmas,” which was the day that Christmas was celebrated before the calendar changed in the 18th century. One of the old beliefs concerning the Day of Epiphany was that a person should never lend anything to anybody on Old Christmas Day, because the lender would never get it back again. Also, the Eve of Epiphany is the night when the Holy Spirit manifests Itself upon the earth in many subtle ways. Upon that night, no matter how hard the ground was frozen, elder bushes would sprout from the ground. Even more mysterious is our ancestors’ belief that at midnight on Old Christmas Eve, if they crept silently into a barn or field, they could hear the cattle and sheep praying. At the exact stroke of midnight on Old Christmas Eve, animals would start moo-ing and baa-ing and bellowing as though they were crying, in remembrance of their own ancestors who had been present in the stable at Bethlehem to witness the birth of the Christ Child and His revelation to the Magi.

A wonderful book that I am reading about celebrating Christmas in England of long ago is “Old Christmas” by Washington Irving.

• “On The Twelth Day of Christmas”
• Old Christmas in Rodanthe, North Carolina.
• Epiphany 2007

The image, The Epiphany, was originally uploaded by barneykin. It is posted here from Barneykin’s account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.

OVER 10,000 Apple Apps and Counting!
Did you know, that in the first 142 days since Apple first started accepting new iPhone/iPod Touch Apps, there have been over 10,000 Apps added to the iTunes App Store?

My grandson told me that he has downloaded five pages of Apps onto his new iPod Touch. My Touch holds twice as much as his and I have only five Apps in toto: Facebook, Crazy Candle (came in handy for a candle-less birthday), Stanza (love it for reading ebooks), Twitterific and DataCase. Actually I have only four, as DataCase, the most expensive of all of them, didn’t work, so I deleted it.

So, thanks to Grandson’s enthusiasm, I went to the Apple Apps Store and downloaded many of the recommended ones at this link: “Top 15 iPhone Apps of 2008,” except for the games, plus a few others I found. Games bore me. I only downloaded the “FREE” Apps, as I know from experience that the Apps that charge oftentimes do not work, and there is little if any chance of getting a refund. Then I went to bed and before falling off to sleep I tried figuring out what I had done. Imagine this - I now have 160,000 recipes on my iPod, the complete works of Shakespeare plus some that scholars are not sure he wrote, Pandora radio, Urbanspoons restaurants, and two more lights, in case I need to see where I’m going at night. Now I need to find time to sync these to my new iPhone.

I am here to report that the favorite of all that I downloaded has got to be Pandora. It works perfectly. I now have my own custom made radio on this little device. It is like the old “Bluegrass Country” at WAMU has come back to life. WAMU kicked “Bluegrass Country” over to HD radio and the Internet, so they could have more “BORING, BORING” talk on WAMU. I’ve not listened to them since. Who needs them anyway? I’ve got an iPod Touch with all my favorite music on it. But I do miss Ray Davis.

The Shakespeare App is incredible, except it is not easy to read. I am used to reading books on my iPod Touch with STANZA, and I feel certain that I can download Shakespeare’s plays from STANZA for reading. But this Shakespeare App is nice for impressing my friends with my “new found” erudition. See, I carry ALL of the Bard’s works in my purse. If there are any quotations that they cannot remember, I can find them all right here on my iPod.

One of the lights was really not worth the price - FREE. I am going to delete that as I cannot figure what it is suppose to do, except click off and on. I like the Flashlight, as it could come in handy at the theater or when trying to find something at the bottom of my black bag (my purse). I’ve not tried the WordPress App yet.

Most of these Apps need WiFI to work, which in the past would have been a problem for me, as the iPod Touch is not always connected. That is probably why I had not downloaded so many Apps to it. Like the Google Maps are great, but I don’t usually need them at home where I have computers and Internet. I need them when I’m away from home - like on the streets of DC where they don’t work on the iPod Touch. Now my iPod Touch stays home and I go abroad with my new iPhone, where I will always be 100% connected to the real world - the Internet.

Although I have not yet had opportunity to view it, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is now in the local movie theaters. I listened to the first half of the audio book for free this morning. It was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1922, in response to Mark Twain’s comment about the unfairness of youth coming at the beginning of life, and old age at the end. The venue is my hometown of Baltimore, Maryland, described accurately as a “Southern” city.

The audio of the second half of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is not yet available at Librivox.org, but you may find the entire text of Fitzgerald’s work at Gutenberg.org (three fifths down the page), and probably at Stanza too if you want to download it to your iPod. See “Reading On My iPod Touch.” You can listen to the first half of the story right here, thanks to Librivox and computer technology. Give it a listen.

As to the movie - I just read a review, and apparently it has almost nothing in common with F. Scott Fitzgerald’s story, except the title and the basic premise. REVIEW.

T’was The Night Before Christmas Read to You by Librivox.org.

Remembering warmer days on the beach at Assateague Island, whilst hoping for warmer days to return again. Remembering days that will never come again, whilst I “shed a bitter tear.”

The sea was wet as wet could be,

The sands were dry as dry.

You could not see a cloud, because

No cloud was in the sky:

No birds were flying over head—

There were no birds to fly.

The Walrus and the Carpenter

Were walking close at hand;

They wept like anything to see

Such quantities of sand:

“If this were only cleared away,”

They said, “it WOULD be grand!”

“If seven maids with seven mops

Swept it for half a year,

Do you suppose,” the Walrus said,

“That they could get it clear?”

“I doubt it,” said the Carpenter,

And shed a bitter tear.

(”The Walrus and the Carpenter” from “Through the Looking Glass” by Lewis Carroll)

The image, Assateague Island, was originally uploaded by barneykin. It is posted here from Barneykin’s Flickr account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.

Below is a screen-shot of part of my PortableReading library at Facebook.

I am very skeptical of most applications at Facebook. I have had some bad experiences with them. A music application I tried took over my computer and would not let me escape from its website. Just today, I tried one that a friend sent me, which resulted in a $9.95 charge on my cell phone - unbeknownst to me. So beware with most of them.

However, here is one, totally “FREE,” that I cannot say enough good things about. At Facebook the application is known as “PortableReading” however, its website calls itself “TextOnPhone,” which is somewhat confusing. “TextOnPhone” is for iPhones and iPods which I have not had much success with on my iPod Touch. For iPod reading I use Stanza, as I have already blogged.

But … “PortableReading” works wonderfully on Facebook. Join Facebook for free, and then sign on for the “FREE” application “PortableReading.” Then you will have your own personal library at your fingertips. You can choose your free books, set the type, colors, and size, so that you can read on your computer screen without scrolling by just clicking the “next” button to go to the next page. I do not know if one can use this application without an Internet connection. I have not been able to do that on my iPod Touch, which is another reason I prefer Stanza for that.

Stanza does not have a Facebook application, so if you want to conveniently read “FREE” books on your computer, PortableReading works great. Give it a try.

The image, My Facebook Library, was originally uploaded by barneykin. It is posted here from Barneykin’s account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.