Best Photos from 2007

Here are a few of my best photos from 2007. I hope they bring some satisfaction that there is a lot positive in our world after all.

2008 01 Bubbles

Bubbles

Bubbles appear in many different places. Bubbles are a thin membrane, usually almost spherical, which divides a three dimensional space into inner and outer segments. The membrane can be made of many different materials ranging from gum to soap. They can be produced in liquid, gas or (rarely) solids. They can be fun, they can provide us scientific clues on the properties of matter and they can be beautiful.

Many of us experience our first bubbles with a small ring-on-a-stick device made of plastic which is dipped into a bottle of soapy water. We then blow into the ring and a soapy semi sphere forms on the opposite side, gradually breaking loose from the ring and giving way to a free floating sphere. Depending on wind conditions, the bubble can float, fall or pop. Looking closely at the bubble, you can see the colors of the rainbow reflected in the clear sphere as the light is broken into its components by the angles created in the bubble. Now toy manufacturers have made bubble making guns which spew a continuous stream of bubbles using up both soap and batteries! Great for adults as well as children. A memorable bubble machine was that used by television personality Lawrence Welk. He had a bubble machine to create a playful atmosphere for his show and he made a big deal of the phrase, “Turn on the bubble machine”.

Children also have a fascination with bubble gum. It is fun to watch someone chewing their first bubble gum after seeing someone else blow a bubble and then try to emulate the same. It takes quite a bit of technique to soften the gum, form the membrane evenly, stick the tongue into it to the correct depth and then blow a stream of air into the pocket to create a bubble. Then refining that technique to form a very large bubble requires not only more gum, but persistence and practice.

My sister has a device designed to form extremely large bubbles using a wand with a cloth ribbon loop and a bucket of water mixed with soap and glycerin in just the right proportions. Just as with bubble gum, this device takes quite a bit of practice to get the bubbles to form without popping first. But when the technique is mastered, making huge bubbles in a park is sure to draw a crowd. I took this up to a camp on Austin Creek in Cazadero one volunteer work day. The college students who came along were quite fascinated with this big bubble making device and spent quite a bit of time mastering the procedure. They were able to obtain tube shaped bubbles several feet long. Then, when the bubbles broke free from the wand, they became rounded, though not often spherical. The biggest ones were nearly a couple of feet in diameter.

When learning to swim, teachers often have their students blow bubbles under the surface to become accustomed to the idea of having the face in the water. Here, of course, the medium into which the bubbles form is water rather than air. Since air is lighter than water, these bubbles move upwards toward the surface. So these bubbles are in constant motion. They are hard to see unless you have a face mask, goggles or an underwater camera. At the surface they pop instantly.

Bubbles form at the ocean edge where seawater meets the sand. Wave action causes the air to mix with the water. These bubbles are under constant motion, churning until they reach the surface, only to be drawn under by the next wave. Sometimes the mix of water and salt and seaweed is just right and they stay on the surface for a bit, looking somewhat like meringue.

When I was a boy of about ten or eleven, Boy Scout Troop 5 in Berkeley took a field trip to the Lawrence Berkeley Lab where scientists were making a bubble chamber designed to measure the behavior of high energy particles. We got a chance to look inside this special tank and learn how they were planning to fill it with liquid hydrogen warmed almost to the point of boiling, negative 252 degrees Celsius. As they beamed a particle into this super cooled liquid they simultaneously used a piston to increase the volume in the chamber. That allowed the hydrogen to “boil”, forming bubbles which were photographed to see how the particle behaved. This was the high science for which the Nobel prize was awarded to Donald A. Glaser in 1960.

Using my definition of bubble, a balloon could be considered a bubble. However, the balloon has a defect because it requires an entry point for the interior gas or liquid which must be closed for the bubble to maintain its shape. Therefore it is not spherical and self-contained in the same way a soap bubble is. However, it has the advantage of being longer lasting than a soap bubble. It also has the advantage of being able to contain a different substance on the inside than is found on the outside. Tossing this object to a friend at increasing distances until it can not be caught intact provides lots of fun.

My wife and I have a hobby of collecting bear statuary. One day in a gift shop we saw a clear piece of glass where an artist had sculpted the interior of the glass in the form of a bear. We were told that the technique was to use a laser to create superheated bubbles in the solid. By designing the laser to point at just the right spots in sequence, it creates the appearance of a three dimensional figure embedded in the crystal. This added a unique piece to our collection.

Another case where bubbles appeared in solid form was when we visited volcanic Mt Lassen. Even large volcanic rocks were full of bubbles which made them quite light. As children, we enjoyed playing strong-man with these large rocks, lifting them high above our heads and pretending that they were as heavy as normal rocks.

Bubbles manufactured in sheets of plastic are used in packaging to protect fragile items. They are an efficient way to surround a delicate item with air pockets. After the job is done, we often enjoy popping the bubbles which makes a nice percussive sound. But that’s not so good when we discuss an economic bubble bursting.

Shakespeare used bubbles in his famous cauldron scene in Macbeth.
“Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire, burn; and, cauldron, bubble”
Now I’ll try my hand at some intelligent nonsense on the subject of bubbles:

Flubble Bubble

I’ll make a bubble from flubble!
“Flubble,” you say, “what is that?”
I can’t tell you for sure,
It’s a thing of de jour,
But I found some one day on my hat.
--
Flubble’s flexible, stretchable, moldable,
It is goopy, soupy and droopy,
It’s quite bouncy, pullable, foldable,
But too much could make you quite loopy.

Flubble is made from sweet dreams,
Then you add in some water and mud,
Top it off with white paper in reams,
Add some muck that you scooped from a flood.

Good flubble needs tasty mint jelly,
Even better to add juice and fruit,
Throw in some lint from your button of belly,
For good measure stir in an old boot.

One expert in flubble adds wax,
Another adds silvery spoons,
My favorite has cotton and flax,
But that’s just for goblins and goons,

All ingredients are in to make flubble,
And the objects you mix to a cream,
Blow with a straw—there’s your bubble,
In your eye it reflects a nice gleam.

A flubble bubble flies in the sky,
Or droops to the earth in a plop,
It could stay afloat very high,
If helium was used at the top.

Flubble is made from dreams you see,
With magic properties galore,
It’s not what you’ll find in the sea or a tree,
Or even a hardware store.

May your Flubble Float Finely aloFt,
Dreaming the impossible!
©Frank Bliss 2008 All rights reserved
January, 2008

2007 12 Culture

Culture

Every person born on earth comes into a culture. It could be American, Korean, Baganda, British, Serbian, Polynesian, Chinese or many other choices. In civilized society the culture is synonymous with the tacitly understood rules governing thought and action. If you were born to Maori society several hundred years ago, your view of the world would have been substantially different than if you were born in the Massachusetts Commonwealth at the same time.

So why is it that we human beings, who are genetically ninety nine percent the same, attribute so much importance to the color of our skin, the religion we were taught and the customs we practice based on where we were raised?

When we speak of cultured events we often think of that which is sophisticated, refined or elegant. But some cultural traditions are anything but refined. For example, many European settlers of the American continent called Natives “savages”. The settlers were by all respects invaders of these native lands. They were out to claim for their own land which had no legal title. These settlers felt threatened when natives defended their space and way of life. One way to justify killing natives was to call them savages. Stories of the great migration westward are full of references to the plains covered with buffalo and redskins. Several accounts relate how in a single day they killed both buffalo and savages with their rifles. There was no different emotion associated with killing a human being and an animal. We have since learned how wonderful and sophisticated the native society was. Yet the settlers came from traditions of great scientific and technical advances which added up in their eyes to a high society of world travel, education, art, music and commerce.

Corporate culture is what allows greed and graft to sneak into the workplace. Or, by contrast, it allows for orderly and ethical procedures to protect the common good. On the greed side, corporations are replete with examples of chief executives reaping millions of dollars in bonuses each year. They justify their positions by making decisions which affect either the profit or loss of a corporation. More often than not, they are tied to short term results in the market price which allow for generous stock option purchases at reduced strike prices. That gives them more power as they then control more shares and have more votes to make shareholder decisions which benefit themselves at the expense of both the buyer of the company’s products and the other shareholders who had to pay full price for a piece of the action. On the ethical side are executives who truly represent the best interests of the customer and only incidentally are interested in how it affects their personal bottom line. Examples of this are, I believe, certain Mutual companies…owned by customers and always keeping the customer in mind when making corporate decisions.

During High school I came in contact with a culture very different from my own. A student from Uganda came to live with my family. His name was Andrew S. Babumba Kyeyune. We called him Andy. He had a beautiful black complexion. Living in the same house for a year was a great experience for both of us. Andy described one experience of his Baganda tribe which demonstrates how different our cultures were. While he was from Kampala, a fairly large metropolis, he told us how his tribe would dig a pit in the ground, line it with broad leaves, fill it with bananas and other fruits, let it ferment and then ladle up the juices for a three day drinking and dancing festival. All ages participated in this community event. Subsequent to this fun, a brutal dictator came to power in Uganda and slaughtered many of the society’s best educated members. I’m afraid Andy may have been one of the casualties to this brutality, as I have not heard from him in at least twenty years. It is also possible that he didn’t live past his life expectancy…37 years. If he were alive today, he’d be 60. (Amendment as of October 2009. I have now heard from Andy and he is indeed alive. I hope possibly to visit him some day.)

For some reason, people throughout history have defined themselves by race. Even if a casual outsider would consider two individuals who look about the same to be of the same culture, many misunderstandings can occur by broad generalizations attributed to race. For example, to a Caucasian, a Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese or Korean might appear to be from the same culture. Yet their languages, animosities stemming from historical conflicts, and religious practices are radically different. Within the United States, race has (and still does) play a significant role in how we look at each other. Regrettably, walking down a lonely dark alley and meeting someone evokes different connotations depending on the color of their skin. While legislators have worked hard to make racial equality a reality, the true character of a culture by race comes from how hard individuals within a given race work to gain a reputation of honesty, trustworthiness, integrity and predictability. Every race has its demons. Every race has its shining stars. So why we retain false stereotypical impressions along racial lines is irrational yet prevalent. I for one prefer to not mark the box when a survey asks for “race”. I could not control what “race” I was born into. Why does it even matter? Asking the question only begs for a continuation of age old conflicts by marking quotas and arbitrarily defining our society not by the contributions of talented individuals, but by the color of their skin which is impossible for any individual to control.

One thing under our control is manners. Manners are learned rules which each culture passes on from generation to generation in an effort to control our behavior and define our interactions. In many Asian cultures, the bow of the head upon greeting and parting shows respect. In America, the handshake has a similar meaning. In Europe the dual cheek kiss is an accepted greeting. The same greeting in America would signal greater intimacy than the European greeting intended. Those salutation clues can assist you in discerning a person’s cultural origin. During our formative years, each of us grows up in a culture where our parents or other adult caregivers remind us to “mind our manners”—the code of conduct. In one culture, it is impolite to talk to someone without looking them in the eye. In another culture, looking directly at a person is uncomfortable. In one culture, the veil is of utmost importance. In another, the veil would feel strange.

The veil is often seen in the context of Islam. Religion, by its very nature, influences how a person thinks and what relationship a person has to the world. Moral systems are a big part of religion. Those systems define when a person can date, get married, have children, use certain substances (like communion) and go to war. These systems are designed in such a way that they put order into what otherwise could be a chaotic society. I am convinced that religion is a useful tool to order society when used properly. It can also be a terrible mask to truth—generating hate and bias when not used properly. Religion based on a claim to a truth which professes to be universal for everyone is often blinded by a zeal for that truth, which may in fact not be the truth. Many cultures develop their own “brand” of religion to explain human existence and human relationships. Often a sub-culture will get focused on a detail of a religion, breaking from the “mainstream” in an effort to be right. That is why we have so many splinters from the base religions of Islam, Christianity, Buddhism and so forth. With the exception of Hinduism, it is interesting to note that whatever claim to God each religion has comes through a person—Christ, Mohammed, Buddha. Hinduism is more a way of life than a religion.

The isolated Huichol in Mexico, have developed their understanding of the world through four deities: Corn, Blue Deer, Peyote and the Eagle…all descended from the Sun God. This remarkable society has resisted change from the modern world in many ways, from maintaining their stick-in-the-soil agriculture to the method of making important decisions by consensus in town meetings. Also known as Wixarika, the Huichol people have developed a highly artistic culture of weaving, beadwork and fabric sculpture which defines to some degree their value to the rest of the world. Many other societies could learn from Wixarika better ways of communicating, resolving conflicts and enjoying life.

Recently we visited South Korea. That culture is superbly energetic and industrious. Having had a conflict with their neighbors to the north some fifty years ago which continues in an uneasy truce to this day, they have overcome poverty and hunger to become one of the most prosperous countries in the world. Every bit of land we saw was being effectively used. Dwellings were compact high-rises, saving the arable land for agriculture. Train systems are efficient and inexpensive. The KTX—high speed rail from Seoul to Busan and back—is quiet and efficient…sometimes going 300 kilometers an hour. What prompted this culture to thrive in contrast to its northern neighbor even though they started at virtually the same point historically? One developed an alliance with the “West” and the other with the “East”. These were cultural decisions…a democratic or centrally controlled government. Each was virtuous in their ideals. Each was willing to sacrifice in order to prevail.

So culture, a word derived from the Latin cultura, meaning to cultivate, is a complex subject involving politics, geography, language, art, commerce, religion, norms and values. It involves how people dress, how they understand their world and how they view tradition. It defines how people survive in the midst of competition from weather, geography, neighbors or competing philosophies. Culture can be sustained by maintaining tradition within a society which supports that tradition (monoculturism) or which allows tradition without conflict (multiculturism). Immigration plays a role in whether a culture becomes a melting pot, such as in the United States. That is where the cultures become mixed together without a government dictating what is culturally acceptable. Marriage and inter-cultural marriage create new variations of culture. In some societies, inter-cultural marriage is not only frowned upon, but political or religious laws prohibit the practice. In those cultures, I believe that fear of change is the driving motivator rather than a confidence of ideals. Gender roles are often defined culturally, which either enhances choice of endeavor or stifles it.

Culture is important for human survival. Culture can either get in the way of—or make possible—artistic creativity, commerce, scientific, religious and political understanding. May culture in all its forms thrive!
©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved December, 2007

2007 11 TIC

For info on this musing, contact Dowps. Too personal.

2007 11 Shoes

Shoes

On a recent trip to Korea I saw an astounding array of shoes on display in a street market. They are pictured here:








This exhibit made me think of the huge variety of products available in the modern world and the ramifications of this choice in our lives.

Shoes with bows,
Shoes with toes,
Shoes with lace,
Shoes to race.

Shoes with style,
Shoes beguile,
Shoes of suede,
Shoes hand made.

Shoes for climbing,
Shoes for shining,
Shoes to cobble,
Shoes to wobble.

Shoes orthotic,
Shoes exotic,
Shoes to dance,
Shoes to prance.

Shoes with heels,
Shoes to kneel,
Shoes for boating,
Shoes for goating.

Shoes for golfing.
Shoes for bowling,
Shoes for welding,
Shoes for hunting,

Shoes for hiking.
Shoes for biking,
Shoes for tennis,
Shoes for Dennis.


Sandals, clogs and other wear,
Polished blacks or scruffy gear,
Army boots and football cleats
Sprinters shoes for fast track meets.

So you see, shoes protect our feet, but they also decorate and provide individuality. Some in this world go without shoes. But shoes make life interesting. Children have a fascination with them. The right shoes make them feel big, important, fast and able to jump and run.

Ladies tend to have more shoes than men. They have to match that special outfit. They have to emphasize the wiggle of the hips. They have to show off the shape of the calf and the all-important toenail polish. And most importantly, they must be different each time they are displayed in public. Sometimes shoes cause us problems. Blisters, corns and athletes foot fungus are just a few of the problems shoes give us. Nevertheless, they’re not going away soon. The benefits still seem to outweigh the problems.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
November, 2007

2007 10 Words and Books

Words and Books

One day I started to count the books in our home library. We own about two thousand volumes. Then I started to count how many I had actually read. While all of them have been looked at, I have read only about a third of them cover to cover. Some of the gap is because many of them are in R’s field of interest. A good portion of the gap is because many of our books are reference in nature. Encyclopedias and travel books are key examples of books we use from time to time to check a fact or plan a trip.
Recently R and I went on a trip through the Southeast parts of Utah and Southwest part of Colorado. We went to our library to learn what would be good to see there. Among our book treasures I found a volume inscribed in my grandmother’s handwriting: “________ ___ Brooklyn Ave. Oakland Calif”. Dated 1947, this book’s title is “Exploring Our National Parks and Monuments”[1]. It was written by Devereux Butcher, Executive Secretary, National Parks Association and published by Oxford University Press in New York. All photographs are black and white, but they are stunning even sixty years later. One of the photographs which fascinated me was the one of Mesa Verde. The caption reads in part, “Cliff Palace is the largest of Mesa Verde’s many hundred prehistoric Indian cliff dwelling ruins.”[2] I compared the photo in the book with a digital image I took on our trip several weeks ago. Sure enough, the site has been well preserved in spite of multiple millions of visitors since 1947.
So the book provided a terrific narrative of what to expect. The differences between the 1947 copy and our 2007 experience are fun. For example, the book states, “Daily bus service to the park is provided...”[3] Today, there is no demand for bus service as most travelers arrive in sport utility vehicles and nicely air conditioned cars, perhaps with the exception of travel coach tours.
Have reference books become obsolete due to the fingertip search engines of the internet which allow almost instant access to a wide variety of information? Perhaps. When it comes to the information, that might be true. Nevertheless the tactile nature of books is exciting. In many respects books are easier to use as reference tools because you can thumb through hundreds of pages in a few seconds. In contrast, on most search engines, you can search through thousands of entries in a matter of seconds by entering a few key words. In addition, you can change subjects almost instantly. As information is updated, it is possible to obtain the latest knowledge of a field from news reports and educational articles. What you gain is the access to the current version. To some extent, part of what you lose on the internet is the historical record of the past. Even that is gradually changing with the copying of libraries such as the Bancroft Library at the University of California. What you miss on-line is the ability to quickly locate items which you used to have at your fingertips. This is particularly true in my occupation. I used to be able to go right to a relevant page in our rate books in the time it takes to say, “Pull the book, flip to the proper tab”. Now the ratebook is online. To find an item now, I must to open the proper file, know the right word to ask, let the machine do the search and possibly get the right answer…much more time-consuming. However, I no longer have to have updated pages sent to me every several months which is a terrible waste of paper and time, especially when you consider that every person in the office has the same challenge.
It is fun to think how words originated. What I surmised might have happened is that the grunts and squeals we hear from animals in the wild or the zoo gradually took on meaning. As homo sapiens developed, I would guess that those grunts gradually became more sophisticated. Perhaps the soft hmm, meant “I’m feeling good right now”. Perhaps the hunt led to points of communication which meant, “There’s game over there”. It is not hard to imagine how that vocalization became more complex as people realized that sharing by way of language made life better for everyone. Of course trade was an important means of survival. That gave way for the need for agreements…and misunderstandings.
One time in my insurance business, I decided it would be good to summarize and insurance policy in language the lay person could understand. I was attempting to explain complex concepts in simple terms. Of course insurance policies are written by attorneys—our modern wordsmiths. Their intent is to define what is a covered loss and what is not a covered loss. Many court cases have been fought over the meaning of these words…testing the clarity of the policy language. It is clear that what is unambiguous to one person can be interpreted differently by another person. In my attempt to clarify the language of a policy in simpler terms than were used in the contract, I encountered what I will call “a profound stumble”. I could not out-perform the brilliance of the original drafters of the policy. Sometime, I encourage you to take out a policy booklet and read it! It’s pretty cool how they’ve answered the basic question: “Is it covered or not?” That language must be applied to a myriad of actual life events.
One of the funny things about language is that we use some words to mean different things. Pitch is one example. It can mean to throw, to set up a tent, to convince by selling an idea, to lurch, to slope, to describe the frequency of a musical note, or even describe the sap of a tree. The word “stable” can describe the place to put a horse or to illustrate steadiness. Alternatively, there are examples of ideas which require many different words to explain the same concept or idea. A word I used in the last sentence “steadiness” has a number of synonyms: Control, evenness, calmness, reliability, dependability and stableness.
How we convey our ideas in writing is interesting. We are soon to embark on a trip to Korea. There, they have adopted a system of characters which allows for phoenetic spelling. If you know how to pronounce a word, you automatically know how to write it. In English, we have spelling contests because it is amazingly complex how many possible ways we spell certain words based on tradition. Why we spell “does” the way we do is inexplicable. Shouldn’t it be “duz?” And why isn’t “fuzz”, just “fuz”. And “was” should be “wuz”! Since I’m on a roll, “’cause”, should be “cuz”. In Holland, they do the same as the Koreans with respect to spelling. It’s a phoenetic alphabet. So if you can pronounce a word, you automatically know how to spell it. Just as in Korea, the Dutch have certain rules which are applied consistently, even though they might at first seem strange. For example, the U sound as in food is spelled “OE” in Dutch. Words using that sound are boek and hoek, meaning book and hook. All this leads to my final point:

Speling

If I wur to invent speling
Id du it lyk this
So weed no how to ryt
“I luv yu, lets kis.”

Speling bees wud kansel
Cuz therd be no mor need
Teechurs kood retyr
Students wud just reed.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
October, 2007
[1] Exploring Our National Parks and Monuments, Devereux Butcher, Oxford University Press. New York, 1947.
[2] Ibid, p 50
[3] ibid, p 51

2007 09 Really Truly vs Make Believe

Grandma was a great story teller. At bedtime, she’d sit on the side of the bed and tell us fantastic stories. Some of them were from her vast array of experiences and some of them were total fiction. It was a time where her total focus was on us and we children loved the attention.
The choice of story was up to us. We could choose “really truly” or “make believe” as the subject matter. I don’t remember any of the specifics of the stories, but often they were punctuated with references to my name and a point in the future which made them seem real even if we chose “make believe”. In addition, they often had a moral or life lesson from which we could learn how better to prepare ourselves for adult life. Here is an attempt to tell a story as she might have told it. I imagine the telling as if I were only about seven or eight, but she might have told it as if I were sixteen which made me feel really old and important.

Make believe

Frank, would you like me to tell you a story?

Oh, yes, grandma! Please do!

Would you like a really truly story or make believe?

Um…I’d like a make believe story tonight!

All right. That’s what we’ll do. I’ll tell you a make believe story.

This is a story about an adventuresome boy named Frank.

One day, when Frank was about sixteen years old, he decided to take a very long hike into the wilderness above _________. Now Frank was a smart young lad and he knew that out in the wilderness were lots of dangers about which he had to be very careful. One of those was the great big brown bear that lived in the deep dark forest. Now Frank was such a bright confident lad that he knew how to be prepared. So he planned how he was going to get a bright early start. This night before his trip he put some peanut butter and jelly on a piece of bread, spread it around with a butter knife and he put another piece of bread on top to make a nice delicious sandwich. Then to be sure it would be nice and fresh, he wrapped it in a piece of waxed paper and carefully put it in a paper bag. He also knew that it would be important to have something to drink, so he filled a canteen with pure fresh water from the well. And he knew that a healthy part of any meal was some fresh fruit, so he also put a nice juicy orange into the paper bag. To top it off, he put a nice piece of chocolate in the bag for a special snack.
The next thing Frank did was to go into his closet and get a map and a compass. He knew that being in the wilderness meant that he could get lost, so he carefully looked at the map and figured where he was going to hike. Now Frank knew that he couldn’t hike alone, so he asked his friend Charlie if he would like to go along. Charlie’s parents agreed, so they met that night at Frank’s place to plan the details. Charlie brought along his sleeping bag.
Now the mountainous country which Frank and Charlie wanted to visit was very rugged. They planned to hike eight miles, so they packed away cups so they could drink out of the pure streams which came down from the mountain snow melt. They put their lunch into a knapsack and their canteen on the hook by the door. They then were ready to get into their sleeping bags in the tent just outside the cabin. Frank set the alarm for five the next morning and listened to the tick-tick ticking of the alarm clock as he went comfortably to sleep.
It was exciting to think of the adventure they were about to have, so Frank dreamed all night long. He dreamed of the fresh air in the mountains blowing the leaves of the aspen trees. He dreamed of the rushing sound of the streams. He dreamed of the crunch of his feet on the trail. Before you know it, the alarm went RING, RING. And Frank jumped out of bed, ready for his special trek. He shook Charlie awake then went into the kitchen to make a breakfast of delicious hot porridge and milk.
Now Charlie was a strapping good chap. He was ready to jump up when Frank waked him. He enjoyed the good breakfast and was prepared to start the adventure as soon as he was finished with his meal. So off they went.
First, they walked on the road, since that was their plan. Then the road got narrower and turned into a dirt road. Finally, it turned into a wonderful rocky path leading through the forest up to the top of the mountain. The air was deliciously clear and the sun was shining in all its summer glory. As they climbed up the trail, they saw spectacular view of the mountains and lakes. When Frank and Charlie got thirsty, they drank from their canteens. When the canteens were empty, they filled them from the springs which came right out of the rocks in the side of the mountain. It was a glorious day.
But then all of a sudden as they were walking through a wonderful alpine meadow, Frank saw a BIG hungry brown bear. The bear was looking at them and wondering…”Do these lads have anything I can eat?” He stood up on his hind legs and sniffed the air. It was almost as if he could smell that wonderful peanut butter and jelly sandwich which Frank had so carefully wrapped in the waxed paper. Frank and Charlie weren’t sure what to do, since they had never met a bear before. They had only heard the story of the three bears…the papa bear, the mama bear and the little baby bear. This bear looked like the papa bear.
Someone had told them that when you see a bear, you make him think you’re very big. So Frank and Charlie waved their arms in big circles to make the bear think that they were very big. But the bear just sniffed some more and started toward the boys. Charlie started to run, but when the bear started to follow him, Frank quickly took off his knapsack and tossed his orange at the bear. Then he tossed the peanut butter and jelly sandwich in front of the bear. And for good measure, he also threw the chocolate bar on the other side away from Charlie. The bear was startled and stopped to sniff at the delicious things Frank threw at him. At that point, Frank started to walk away calmly. When the bear saw the food, he stopped and thought, “My, this is a nice lunch. I think I’ll stop and eat a fine meal while those boys go hungry.” So he stopped chasing Charlie. And even though Frank and Charlie had nothing to eat that afternoon, the bear had a nice meal. The good thing was that the bear did not bother either of those fine boys and they made it back to the cabin hungry but safe.
And that’s the story of the clever boy Frank and his friend Charlie.

Did you like that story, Frank?

Oh, yes, Grandma.

Do you think that Frank did the right thing?

I think he did, Grandma. Thank you for the nice story.

I’m glad you liked it. Good night now.

Good night, Grandma. I love you.

I love you too.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
September, 2007

2007 08 Greed Haiku

Several Haiku
Mostly on greed and owning
But other things too


Five, seven and five,
Those are the pertinent rules,
Keep Haiku alive.


Greed rules people’s lives,
Why so much focus on stuff?
Flowers are pretty.


It’s mine she exclaimed!
How can you claim that is true?
Go take a long hike.


What you have is mine!
Things corrupt your good psyche,
Jump in a cold lake.


Is that what you want?
It was my grandmother’s piece!
Enjoy it with love.


Here’s a new subject
Hoarding the same thought bores
Why not try new things?


Playing violin
Hard work but satisfying
Please do it some more.


This is my first attempt at Haiku. If you know rules which I haven’t followed, please let me know.
When our children were young, we had the chance to observe how they carved out turf by controlling stuff. One child would have a particular toy and that was “MINE”. As they grew they learned that it is more peaceful if they give up ownership to some extent. That applies to ideas, land, copyrighted ideas and other personal property. But to give up ownership is very, very hard. Just look at Jerusalem, Bethlehem, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip. Remember Napolean, Hitler, Hussein.

So where is the balance between ownership and peace. If we start to hoard, envy and misunderstandings can occur. Shouldn’t you be able to benefit from personal effort? But how much is enough. I have customers who have multiple homes owned with no mortgage. After all, our society rewards entrepreneurs. It also rewards class action attorneys who prevail in big cases. They take the risk of research and the unknown outcome of their effort. They target big companies with great wealth to hold them to high standards. But the wealth of those big companies came because people trusted their products and came back for more at whatever price they charged. And wealth is created from ideas implemented well. Shouldn’t a person benefit from providing what people want and need?

So when do you fight to maintain control and when do you give up?

I like possessions
Don’t take them away from me
Go your way in peace.

You have stuff I’ve not
It’s nice that you enjoy it
Look, the tree blossoms.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
August, 2007

2007 07 Organization

Organization

Tonight I’ll clear my desk, I said,
But I’m tired so I’ll go to bed instead,
I’ll leave my work a mess for now,
Tomorrow’s soon enough—I vow!

Waking to clutter was hard, I confess,
Its morning and time to clean up my desk!
But first I’ll feed my hungry tummy,
Oh the bagel and coffee taste so yummy!

Put the dishes in the sink I thought,
I’ll leave the crumbs to mold and rot,
My desk is what should be my focus
The kitchen should not now be my locus.

The phone rings loud as I go to my den,
To take good notes, I’ll need a pen,
“Hello?” I inquire into the headset,
The reply, “Our meeting…did you forget?”

“When we set that up, my pen was buried,
I vowed to be tidy but got quite hurried,
I feel as if I’ve committed a crime,
May we just reschedule our meeting time?”

The considerate voice took up the chorus,
“I cleaned my desk last week, of course,
So I know how your mistake could occur,
Just give me a time to which we’ll defer.”

We set the date and time to meet,
But finding a pen was too great a feat,
I searched the desk, the drawer, the counter
Being unorganized had caused me to flounder.

So I filled the garbage right up to the brim
And now my desk looks quite neat and prim,
Never again should I miss my appointments,
For my pen has a place in the drawer with my ointments!

Moral:
Keep only what you need. Toss the rest.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
July, 2007

2007 06 Circular Science

Circular Science

Run electricity through wires wrapped in circles around a coil. Who would have thought in advance that could create a powerful motor? Yet that simple concept propels our cars, our computers, our toothbrushes, yea, even our economy. A brilliant mind made that connection. How is it that science moves forward?
Most scientists today live on grants. The cycle goes something like this:
Do new science…write the grant. Do new science…write the grant.


Do
New Science
Write the
Grant


The problem that this circle represents is that the grant givers want to receive credit for having funded scientific discoveries. Because they are interested in success, the circle often goes backward. The science is done first, then the grant is written to prove what has already been proven. So the scientist uses the money to do something other than what the grant was for. It also gives more credit to outstanding grant writers than to outstanding scientists. I’ve often wondered if there isn’t a better way to make this process work..
When I was in Junior High School, one of the things we were expected to do was enter the school science fair. We students were asked to dream up an experiment which would prove something using the scientific method. Hypothesis, test...hypothesis, test. Neither of the two projects which I remember earned any prizes. Both proved a hypothesis which was fairly obvious. But today, almost fifty years later, they do serve to illustrate the point I’m trying to make about how much of our science is conducted.
The first experiment I devised was to determine heat absorbtion of different colors. I built a box with a light bulb at one end and a thermometer at the other end. In between I put cloths of various colors to see how much energy was conveyed through the cloth if it was black or white or some other shade. I charted the results and found indeed that the black cloth absorbed more heat than the white cloth. The other experiment was more of a psychology test. Could it be that distractions affect your ability to think clearly? I took a simple wooden jigsaw puzzle (about ten pieces) and practiced completing it until the completion time was consistent within a limited time range of a few seconds. Then I asked someone else to distract me while finishing the puzzle to see if the completion time varied. Distractions ranged from calling out my name to wearing clothes pins on my ears and nose. The clothes pins hurt so much that I was brought to tears. And yes, the hypothesis was proven…Distractions do slow down the completion of simple tasks.
Yet the best science is done when the conclusion is a surprise, the scientist recognizes the surprise in the data and interprets the result in a new way—counter to the accepted wisdom of the era while concurrently accepting the possible risk of ridicule by peers. And the grant giver gains notoriety along with the scientist as having contributed to the new discovery.
If we really want to try new ways of looking at things, it would make sense that the failure rate is the important measure of success in scientific exploration. The best grants should be given to the scientists that try the most out-of-the-box thinking. That way the unlikely hypothesis will gain traction and new territory in thought will be uncovered. So a high rate of failure is better than a low rate.

The Scientist’s Dream

If you measure success
By how much you fail
You have to confess
That thought makes you pale.

So endeavor to fail
To be a success
So a college like Yale
Will let you profess.


©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
June , 2007

2007 05 Our Special Place

My writing for May of 2007 is too personal to publish on a blog. It is about one of our most special places on earth. For those of you who know me and want a complete record of my writings, please make contact. I'll be happy to share my experiences about TM privately. I think you'll understand why when you read it...

Dowps.

2007 04 Scouting

Scouting

When I was about eight or nine years old my mother suggested I join Cub Scouts. So of course I did. I didn’t much like cub scouts. I considered it too sissy. We did things like make hot pads for our moms. I was much more interested in what the older boys could do. Things like hiking and swimming in the rugged California Sierra Nevada. When my family drove my older brother up to the mountains for scout camp I tagged along. When the scouts and the troop leaders left the parents at the trail head we waved after them. I wistfully wanted to hike down the trail with them. At nine, I felt I was ready to do the demanding hiking they required. Instead I watched them disappear into the forest, only to be loaded back into the car wondering what great adventures the scouts would be having while I was left with my family.
Then the year arrived when I could become a Boy Scout. There was a fine candle ceremony where new boys were inducted into the troop. We were required to memorize and recite the scout oath. I remember it to this day: “On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country, to help other people at all times, to obey the scout law, to keep myself physically fit, mentally awake and morally straight.” They also recited for us the twelve points of the scout law. A scout is: “Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean and Reverent.” Our mothers received a pin which we had to pin on them…a bit of a challenge for a twelve year old.
During the school year, we’d go on outings to various places around the San Francisco Bay area. Sometimes it would be a day hike out to Mount Diablo where we climbed above the fog and looked down as if we were flying off the mountain. Other times it would be overnights, such as to Tennessee Valley in Marin County on the Pacific Ocean or Mt. Tamalpais to a spot we called Laurel Dell. On one such outing I learned a lesson in economics and the Scout Motto: “Be Prepared”. Patrols of six boys would organize their own food for overnights. The older boys were organized into the “Junior Staff” and they enjoyed making sure that the younger boys were prepared, clean, and so forth. They wielded their power in the form of contests between the patrols where they judged the results of meals, clean-up. The prizes were things like a can of blueberries awarded for the Sunday morning pancakes. A lesson in economics came when our patrol, the Boas, had decided to bring along Kool Aid. The packets cost five cents each in those days. However, one of the patrols saw that we had Kool Aid and they didn’t. So we were out in the country with no store nearby. We had the supply, they didn’t. Therefore the price for our Kool Aid was not five cents, but fifty. Supply and demand ruled. They argued that it was unfair that we would charge so much. But we were prepared.
The weekend outings became great preparation for a three week wilderness summer camp. The Junior Staff gave lessons at our weekly meetings in how to get ready. They instructed us in what to pack and what not to pack. They enticed us with great stories of the adventures they had had in previous summers. The backpacks were weighed in and had to be less than thirty pounds including the wooden frame. Some of the more wealthy boys had aluminum frame packs.
We started our trip to camp at 5 a.m. by loading into station wagons in Berkeley. One fun stop was Tracy where we were given $2 bills to buy breakfast. After a five hour drive we arrived at Lake Alpine on Highway 4.
Summer camp was located in the Sierra Nevada at a Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) reservoir called Union Lake. Eons ago, glaciers had carved the granite rock into East-West Valleys. PG&E found that by putting concrete dams at one end of these valleys, they could form lakes to control the flow of water late into the snow melt and produce electricity using turbines. But because these valleys ran East-West, through rugged mountains, they are a bit hard to find. So the boy scouts started their summer camp with a seven mile hike from North to South on the PG& E tractor road full of boulders. This road was passable only on foot or by four wheel drive vehicles with high underbody clearance. Down a valley, up the ridge, down another valley up another ridge and a bit of cross country hiking, we finally arrived at the shore of Union Lake. Many camp stories were related by the staff who got to drive supplies into camp in vehicles with names such as “Gutless” and “Yellow Fever”. Yellow Fever was a yellow Ford truck with a radio telephone to be used in emergencies. That was high tech for its day. The tractor road did not actually go into the camp site, but terminated at one end of the lake near the dam which we called the jeep landing. Supplies were ferried in boats from the jeep landing across the lake to the campsite.
There were six patrol camps, scattered around the south shore of Union lake in a tamarack forest. The patrols were all named after snakes…Rattlesnakes, Cobras, Moccasins, Vipers, Pythons and Boas. On a promontory overlooking the lake in what might be called the camp’s most desirable real estate, the staff constructed a rustic commissary consisting of a few tables made from plywood nailed onto the tops of sawn logs placed on end and some canvas tents for storing supplies. Thick insulated sacks called meese bags helped keep vegetables cool, but as each week progressed, we gradually got away from fresh food and more and more canned food was the order of the day, since there was no electricity and no refrigeration or ice. Each Saturday some of the scout fathers would come up to camp bringing fresh vegetables and meat which was a real treat. Commissary also stocked items of need such as axes, shovels, saws and binder twine.
In the center of the six patrol camps was a granite rock called assembly rock. The staff raised a flagpole at the top of assembly rock and the bugler would call meetings in the morning and evening to count attendance and announce plans for the day. The evening assembly also involved a personal inspection in which the staff checked for dirt under fingernails and behind ears. It was forbidden for patrol members to enter commissary or go onto assembly rock without permission. That was how the staff could control the distribution of desirable items such as candy bars and keep the dust down.
We drank water directly from the lake without any filtering. A latrine consisting of rocks in the ground was stationed at the campfire circle on the “back side” of assembly rock. One staff function was to sprinkle the rocks with lime powder to keep down the flies and smell. That latrine was called “Junior”. Back in the forest several hundred yards was where you’d find “Senior”. Senior consisted of two logs placed over a hand-dug pit about four feet deep. Four toilet seats were nailed into the logs and wire screen covered the whole affair except the middle of the seats. Huge spikes were driven into the logs at strategic intervals to hold toilet paper rolls. Because the forest is very dark at night, you quickly learned to plan your trips to Senior during the daytime so as to be able to see the rattlesnakes and bears which might happen by.
Garbage was hauled up the hill into the forest by the younger scouts to a pit dug in the week before the camp by the junior staff. In those days we didn’t haul out our garbage, but we buried it in the ground to rot and rust. I suppose an archeologist could go up there to this day to uncover some of the camp stories. Nowadays scouts take their garbage out to be recycled or rot in an official land fill as opposed to an informal land fill. At the end of camp both the garbage pits and the latrines were covered with dirt.
After settling in to our patrol camps on the first day, the staff arranged an evening “promenade” at different spots around the camp designed to orient new boys to the camp and convey the rules. Some of the rules were for our own safety. For example, you couldn’t go out in a boat without passing the swimming test. There were different levels of accomplishments you had to pass before you could use an axe or cross cut saw. There was a lesson in fire safety. Swimming in the cold mountain water was to be supervised and had to be done at certain announced times. If you broke the rules, you were subject to “laking”…being thrown in the lake with your clothes on. Inspections were conducted on a schedule for cleanliness and food preparation. Patrol leaders got to test their skills in organization to put on meals quickly and with nice presentation, including entertainment for the staff if possible.
New scouts were labeled “flunkies”. On the first Tuesday night of camp, the flunkies were told to pack for an overnight to Morley dome and bring their packs to the campfire circle. Morley dome is up a fairly gentle grade roughly a mile above camp. There is no trail and most of the hike is heavily forested. We took the hike at night, preferably without flashlights. Honestly, for the first year boys it was a bit scary hiking through the woods cross country in the dark not knowing how far and not yet having the skills to be on our own to camp overnight in the wilderness alone. At the “baseball diamond” (a clearing in the trees about two hundred yards from camp, all the flunkies were told to put down their packs, that indeed we were all going to take the hike, but the flunkies would not be bivouacking by themselves. What a relief! The older boys always got a good laugh out of that little practical joke. We did get to Morley dome, had a nice campfire and then hiked back in the dark to our packs and more familiar camp. In later years I again went to Morley dome and found a beautiful native American arrowhead out in the open just sitting on some sand. I avoided the temptation to pick it up and instead left it there for some other lucky person to find the same surprise another time.
After the Morley Dome hike and indeed most nights, we slept in sleeping bags under the stars. Because camp was many miles from any electricity and city lights, the stars were spectacular. The Milky Way in particular was very much like a cloud in the dark night sky. We learned the names of some of the summer constellations, especially the Big and Little Dippers and Cassiopeia. On several occasions it rained, so then we stayed in patrol tents. These war surplus items were canvas with wooden poles secured with binder twine tied to stakes. Thy were barely big enough to sleep four even though there were six in a patrol. We often got a bit wet when it rained, but that was part of the adventure and made for good stories afterwards. One summer in later years when I was scoutmaster it snowed and rained a full week. That was a most miserable summer camp.
Hiking was a big part of the scouting program so we had two major hikes a week. They were on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The first hikes were shorter and toward the end of our three week camp they became gradually longer. There was a scout designated hikemaster who was in charge of showing us the way and keeping us together. He often got lost which was part of the adventure and learning experience for him and would-be hikemasters. Even the names of our destinations evoke fond memories for me: Elephant Rock & Pothole Lake; Spicer’s Reservoir; Gabbot Meadows Overnight; Bull Run Peak; and the 20 mile Dardanelles Cone Overnight for hiking merit badge scouts. Often at our destinations we would swim…sometimes in very cold water. Once there was still ice floating on Bull Run Lake and the dare was to get in the water at all. Of course the Polar Bear Club was formed on the spot and each boy had to decide for himself how much of a man he really was. Another tradition was the Island “hike” and the “round” the lake hike. These events involved patrols going onto different islands or campsites around the lake. It was especially fun, because sometimes a 14 year old was in charge and did cool stuff not allowed in camp like putting unopened cans on a fire to watch them explode. Such adventures would be deemed too dangerous today.
One of the hikes we took as older scouts was to Arnot Peak, some 20 miles east. The direction is important because when you’re on the western side of the Sierra, going east means going up hill. We got an early start and being in really great shape, we made the summit about four in the afternoon. That night we camped at Highland Lakes, near the headwaters of the Mokolumne River. The following day we returned, arriving in camp late. I remember being so exhausted that I couldn’t even eat dinner.
Swimming, boating and canoeing were highlights of camp life. Every afternoon there was an opportunity to go into swim lagoon and swim or check out a boat or canoe. The water was Sierra snow melt, so it was pretty cold. Nevertheless, we enjoyed the opportunity to engage in merit badge advancement for swimming and lifesaving merit badges. First Class seaman allowed you to go in a boat on your own. For that you had to have Rowing Merit Badge. To take out a canoe, you had to earn Canoeing Merit Badge. Second Class Seaman meant that you could swim 100 yards and could be in a boat with a First Class Seaman who could only take you within 100 yards of the shore—all wearing life vests. The names of the boats were as colorful as the vehicles…Nameless, Fred K and Useless. One summer we took the Bliss family double-oared boat to camp. It required a lot of work because it was wood battens with caulk. It leaked but was very fast on the water. We called it Blissful and it served two seasons before vandals shot at it while it was stored for the winter.
Because the camp was so remote, it did not make sense to haul supplies in and out every single year. So there were a couple of ways we dealt with things like tables and boats. Above the camp in the forest was a big rock with a hollow underneath one side. After camp, the big items were packed up into this cache and covered with plywood to protect it from snow. Sometimes canned food was put there along with some other heavy items like iron ice-box stoves. That is where Blissful met it’s demise after the logging road made camp more accessible to the gun-toting public. The other means of avoiding transport of heavy items was the shed at Arnold just off Highway 4. For many years, some of the boats, canoes and larger pots were stored in a simple shed part way down the mountain.
Pots varied in size from the big commercial aluminum pots used for rare communal meals in commissary to the smaller patrol vessels. Because of the regular inspections, the pots were always shined to perfection even if the meal was burned. We learned to put soap on the outside before it went on the fire which made cleaning easier. The patrols with the best record of making a hot fire were the ones which had hot water for cleaning. The stoves were old iron ice molds with one end cut out plus a hole cut in the top. The end opening was a rectangle roughly 12 inches by 24 inches and with a length of about 48 inches. Because cooking takes a bit of skill, the older patrol members would stay in camp cooking and send the younger scouts out to collect wood in the forest. Of course the younger scouts felt put upon since they thought the action was in camp instead of out in the woods. In addition, the wood became more scarce toward the end of the three week camp.
An important part of scouting are merit badges and what is called advancement through the ranks of Tenderfoot, Second class, First class, Star, Life and finally Eagle Scout. Camp merit badges generally were the outdoors challenges of Nature, Astronomy, Cooking, Camping, Pioneering, Hiking, Swimming, Rowing, Canoeing, and Bugling. Badges such as Citizenship in the Nation, World or Community, Music, Reading, etc. were better suited to city living and were not always offered at camp. For Nature Merit Badge one of the requirements was to write an essay about what we thought Union Lake would look like in forty years. I wish I had some of those essays today to see which scouts had the foresight to predict what it is actually like today…more people, less privacy, no gas powered motors, more kayaks and boats, major logging and reforestation, no camping near the shore, roads which can be navigated by two wheel drive sedans, a bigger dam on the nearby lake which destroyed Gabbot Meadow, cell phone access and a public toilet at the boat landing. Some of the changes are good. For example, we don’t pollute the water by soaping up and then jumping into the lake to get clean any more.
Eagle Scout Projects often had the environment in mind. Often they involved erosion control or trail maintenance or mitigation against human impact. I am sure in hindsight that some of the erosion control would have taken care of itself had the Eagle Projects not been done. The lesson there is that even good intentions are not permanent.
After we worked or played hard, we tended to get dirty and chapped in the dry mountain air. So bathing was an important part of camp life. Each patrol had a spot on the shore where we would take our towels. We’d strip naked then carefully soap up and then jump in the lake. It was an exhilarating experience to be clean in that cold mountain water, sometimes with the afternoon wind blowing across the lake. Then we’d take nylon brushes and clean under our fingernails and behind our ears. There was a lot of pride in being named the patrol with the fewest demerits for dirt or chap. As during the patrol overnights, the weekly prize was a can of blueberries for the Sunday breakfast.
Sundays were a special day at camp. Saturday night before we got to sleep out on the rocks between the Python and Boa camps. The advantage of that arrangement was that if you had a friend in another patrol, on this one night a week, you could join him for the time after the bugler blew taps and share stories in your sleeping bags while you looked up at the stars. Then Sunday morning reveille was an hour later than usual. We dressed in our scout uniforms for morning assembly. Then after breakfast, everyone went over to “church point”. There, a member of the junior staff would give an inspirational talk. There would be some prayers and singing of hymns such as “The Little Brown Church in the Dell” or “For the Beauty of the Earth”. And the last special thing about Sunday was that you got to have the “emu”.
Emu is a bird, but in scouting we used a leg of lamb. Each patrol would dig a pit, line it with granite slabs and build a fire for about three or four hours in the pit. While the fire is going strong heating the rocks, the patrol members took the lamb and surrounded it with potatoes, vegetables and spices. We’d then wrap the entire concoction with aluminum foil, wet dish towels and tie it all together with binder twine. Once the rocks were very hot, we would put the emu into the pit, cover it with hot ashes and keep the fire going for another three or four hours. Finally, when enough cooking time elapsed, we’d dig it up, unwrap the towels to shed the dirt and dig in to a delicious feast…if we timed it right. Those patrols who were not so organized and had too small a fire or got a late start on the preparation often had to eat an undercooked meal in the dark. Eight hours is a long time to prepare a meal for 12 to 15 year olds. The staff cooked their own, and with their experience, they often produced very delicious results in a timely fashion.
Scouts in their third camp year (or more) were eligible to be voted Union Lake Pioneers. The Pioneers are an honorary society of Troop 5 scouts similar to Webelos in other troops. Election is not automatic. One afternoon, camp gets very quiet and previously elected Pioneers disappear from view. A bit later, several selected scouts “disappear”. They later reappear and without saying a word to anyone, but working together (if there are more than one), they form a raft out of logs to carry minimal supplies which they then push through the water as they swim to Pioneer Island. They stay overnight on the island to finish their initiation. There are many secrets of the Pioneers which are held sacred by those elected into this honorary society which I cannot tell, even to this day. Nevertheless, the public knowledge of the Pioneers includes several items I can share. First, the Pioneers can wear a juniper sprig as a symbol of their honor. If a non-Pioneer scout disobeys and is caught wearing a juniper sprig, he is placed in isolation on a granite “bump” in the middle of the lake for four or so hours while the rest of the troop is having their swim time, boat races or some other fun activity. A non-Pioneer may not touch the sacred axe “Susie” which hangs in commissary. The penalty for touching Susie is the same as wearing juniper. Finally, Pioneer Island in the middle of the lake is off limits. No non-Pioneer may touch that island.
I was elected to the Union Lake Pioneers and cherished the honor. Later, as an adult leader, just before an Eagle Court of Honor, the scoutmaster handed me a letter from the Eagle Scout which he had written as part of his Eagle application. I was told to read the letter as a “remarkable and moving testimony of how important his camp experience was”. What I didn’t know at the time was that the letter outlined in pretty great detail some of the sacred traditions of the Union Lake Pioneers. Only after I had started to read it publicly did I realize what was happening. I cut it short, but not after the damage was done. Some of the non-Pioneers had been let in on some of the Pioneer secrets. My reputation was tarnished. Two weeks after the incident, ten Pioneers showed up in my office (unannounced) wanting an apology and an explanation. Naturally I gave them both. That was a learning moment for me on how a quickly a breach of confidentiality can destroy trust.
Scouting provided lots of opportunities for teaching moments. I learned some lessons in scouting from scout leaders. I subsequently gave some lessons as a scout leader. One time a scout got very angry with another. He went totally out of control in a rage. He was from a broken home and had a lot of pent up rage to begin with. The lesson was that he could learn to control that rage with his word. I grabbed him by the arm and pulled him aside from the fight he was engaging in and sat him on a log, still holding his arm. He really didn’t want to give up the fight. So my grip on his arm was a major annoyance to him, since it prevented him from doing what he was bent on accomplishing…hurting the other scout. I told him that I trusted his word and that if he gave me his word that he would not do harm, only then would I let him go. He was pretty stubborn. It took about fifteen minutes, even to the point that I wasn’t sure if I could sustain my grip. Finally, he gave me his word. And he kept it. An apology for the altercation was delivered and camp went on.
Another lesson was the scout who was led to believe that he’d be promoted at the beginning of camp to a staff position, having already served as a patrol leader. The staff had some issues which they couldn’t resolve and were not able to keep their promise. The scout was crushed to the point of tears, anger and frustration. I pulled him aside and sat with him on a log for about fifteen minutes. He wanted to quit, leave camp and go home. Quite frankly, I didn’t blame him for he was extremely capable and would have been a great asset to the staff. I shared with him that the best way to show them that he was ready for staff was to be the best patrol leader they’d ever seen. I told him that I knew he was ready for staff but for some reason they didn’t think he was ready. Therefore that was not a reflection on him, but on them. The advice stuck, and by the end of camp they had promoted him to staff. He has gone on to be a very successful leader in our society.
Scouting has provided me with some very satisfying moments. As a scoutmaster, I enjoyed watching some inner-city boys see the mountains for the first time. One trip, I had one of these boys sitting to my right in the van I was driving up to camp. It was his first camp. When we passed through the Sacramento Valley and started climbing into the mountains, I knew of an overlook at “Hells Kitchen” and pulled off when we got there. The scout took one look at the vista of snow capped peaks over a forested valley and simply said, “WOW”. Chills ran up my spine as I realized that he had never left the city before.
I’m only active in scouting now as a merit badge counselor. But whenever the opportunity presents itself, I go out of my way to get back to the site of our Scout Camp. Troop 5 has all but vanished now, but the great memories linger. I’ve been there for a weekend with our younger son. I’ve gone up to camp on Pioneer Island alone for a few days. I’ve been back for a reunion with some of the old timers. The spot is more crowded now, but still very beautiful. I only hope that people who don’t understand the huge role which scouting plays in turning boys into men is not overlooked by the agenda of a few who want to label scouting as discriminatory and forbid them access to public meeting places. Scouting is a great component of building character. Those boys who achieve scouting’s highest honor, Eagle Scout, are some of the most productive people I know.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
April, 2007

2007 03 Taxes

Taxes

Imagine the brilliant pre-historic mind that invented taxes. He (or she) imagined making the world better by pooling resources to improve the common lot in life. It was such a selfless thought. “If we can collect a little bit from everyone, then we can do really great things for everyone.” Those less imaginative could see the wisdom of such a plan and willingly agreed to entrust a little bit of their property to the person who suggested the idea.
The inventor of taxes became the leader (king), elected out of trust that he would do the right thing. Gradually, the power of kingship went to his head (greed) and he realized that he had control over other people’s lives by invoking the fairness doctrine (you must pay your fair share to help us all). Presumably, out of arrogance, he started to exercise that control and make decisions (pass laws) which enhanced his power and gave him comforts and privileges of life. He could easily rationalize that he was worth the respect and privileges shown him because he had the power to do great things. Many surrounded him because it made them feel great as well. They started to get paid by their king to make pathways to the neighboring village so they could exchange stuff (commerce) which wasn’t available at home. When the neighboring village found out about how easy it was to set up this system, they stole the idea and applied it to their village as well.
Then, someone got the idea that the king had too much power (envy) and decided that he should be overthrown (coup). They had to do this surreptitiously because if the king found out about it, he’d react (anger). When the neighboring king found out about the plot he wanted to help so that he could extend his realm by taxing his neighbors as well as his own citizens. So the neighbor supported an overthrow.
Pretty soon, the more powerful king prevailed and his conquest gave him even more power which was defended by soldiers who wanted to position themselves next to greatness. The king raised taxes to pay for all the soldiers saying, “Look, our neighbors are trying to take us over. I’m here to defend you, but to do that I need more money.” In times of peace, kings did, in fact, do great work. They built pyramids, roads, water works, buildings and temples. They also did harm in that their grand ideas taxed their people into poverty. They perpetuated their rule by appointing sons to succeed them. Some of the sons were not so capable because they plundered what their fathers had built rather than seeing the vision of greatness for the benefit of their citizenry.
It has been just over two hundred years that some brilliant statesmen in the American colonies fought to give common people the right to influence how their taxes should be used. “No taxation without representation” was the cry. Their idea was that the presumption of power rests with the people. They elected leaders to decide what role government should play. In spite of their intentions, those leaders took on much of the characteristics of the old kings. They tended to be arrogant, thinking that they knew how best to run the world over which they had dominion. They tended to enjoy the power vested in them to influence outcomes. They were surrounded by minions who wanted to do their bidding to get close to that power.
When it came time to be elected, politicians promised great returns on the people’s loyalty. “If I’m elected, I’ll give you back this and that which won’t really cost you because THEY will pay for it.” So taxation became a means of shifting wealth just as it did in the old days. It really wasn’t the people who were deciding in the best interest of the whole, it was people deciding in their own self interest. Getting something for nothing became the goal. After a while, the taxes were not enough any more, so it was suggested that the government borrow money to do even greater works. Bonds were invented.
The sales pitch on bonds was that bonds are not really taxes. We can do all this great stuff now and not have to wait until we really have the money. I heard the other day that the service on the bond debt in California has gone from three percent per year to eight percent per year in the last several years. The principal is over a trillion dollars. In most cases bonds are paid back with tax revenue. If not paid by tax revenue bonds are paid by the users of the project (such as bridge tolls)—which is a tax by a different name.
In California, bonds are voted on by the people through ballot propositions. We are always told that there is a tremendous need which needs immediate attention. “Look what you can help us do by voting for this great bond measure which will be paid for by someone else!” What often isn’t said is that hidden in the fine print is “education” which goes back to the bond-sponsoring organization. They have nothing to lose by sponsoring boondoggles because they benefit if the measure wins. The world has become so fast paced, that we seem to have lost the patience in building great things over time. Immediate results are the primary measure of success. In Europe, cathedrals sometimes took a hundred years or more to build. In this country we have lost the art of patience.
Taxes at the Federal level are some of the most insidious. It is really easy to say, “Let’s get help from the Federal Government.” It has become so big, that many people believe it to be the solution to local woes because somebody else—the vast faceless others—will pick up the tab for a close-to-home project. Citizens in one state are taxed to solve another state’s problem. It is another redistribution scheme. Wealthy people are deemed to have already bilked others of their money, so the idea of taxing them more seems fair to many people. But capitalism needs capital to start a business. Before you can sell lemonade, you need lemons. And if the people don’t want a wealthy person’s product at the price they are willing to pay, they either shouldn’t buy that product or they should compete and produce it more cheaply.
It has been proposed that a flat income tax is the most fair way to distribute wealth for the common good. However, that mechanism has a basic flaw. Entrepreneurs don’t get a normal paycheck. They have legitimate expenses before they can sell even one widget. What is a legitimate business expense becomes the subject of a tax code which is many thousands of pages long. An industry of preparers, Enrolled Agents, accountants, attorneys and software programs has sprung up to help people comply with the complexities of legitimacy. Interpretations vary based on a myriad of multifarious methodologies.
So we live with taxes. What can be fairer than that we all pay a little bit to make our world a better place? To a degree, that makes sense. However, when all taxes exceed 50% of earnings, they become onerous by my way of thinking. Currently a successful person in California pays income tax at the rate of 38% to the Federal government and 9% to the State government. In addition, there is sales tax of 8.25% on any purchases (except food from a grocery store to be taken home.) Gasoline is taxed, luxury items are taxed, gifts are taxed, estates are taxed, and real estate is taxed at various rates, depending on when you bought your home. If you run a business, you pay taxes on behalf of your employees by matching social security while your own social security tax is 15%. In addition you provide for employees welfare through the mandatory workers compensation insurance system. So for every dollar earned by selling your product, expenses in the form of taxes hover around 70%.
I predict that at some point, the scale will tip and the government will not be able to sustain itself. The burden of debt will become so large that the system we’ve allowed to develop will collapse. This will happen because there is no one person or entity which is responsibly watching the whole. Local taxes, State income taxes, State property taxes, Federal income taxes, corporate taxes, county taxes, city taxes, gas taxes, social security taxes all work independently of one another so the taxing authorities can look to each one and say, “That’s not such a big tax, it’s only $100 per parcel to keep our libraries open. Look at the great social problem we’re fixing with this little burden on everyone.” Few will predict when the scale will actually tip. I predict that almost everyone will be taken by surprise. Nevertheless, the fingers of blame will point with great authority, “I told you so. It’s the fault of …(fill in the blank).”
Those who survive this debacle will be those who can best be self sufficient. I predict looting and plunder and a call to arms to defend property. Food will be difficult to obtain. Gold with its limited availability will become a medium of exchange, In short we will have another great depression. There will be great despair. The government which caused the problem will be asked to provide the solution which it will be incapable of doing. The cry will go out to our elected officials to do something immediately. They will publish edicts and initiate programs to help the needy. They will try to convince us that they have the solution to our woes. The cycle of government “solutions” will begin even before the worst of the disaster has run its course.
Is there any hope of avoiding this doomsday scenario? I believe only if we elect people who exercise long range vision and restraint. They will have to run on a platform that helping the people means deferred gratification rather than quick results. Things which are wants, not needs, must be postponed until long after the term of office is completed. The platform will require more self-sufficiency on the local level and less big government intervention to solve problems. It will be a platform that encourages entrepreneurism and the investment of capital. It must include the lowering of taxes across the board so that more can be accomplished in the private sector where the drive to profit will benefit more people who will be willing to spend their money because they will reap the enjoyment of a better life. It must be a platform where blame is absent. We must make do with what we have rather than yearn for what we don’t have. It will be a platform where the veto pen is used often.
It won’t be easy to sell the small government platform, because people want big benefits without paying the true price for them. That is valid in life insurance planning just as it is in government—People refuse to plan for an event where the odds are 100% certain. But armed with knowledge about what the future holds, some bright individual will decide that more taxes are not the answer to our problems. The citizenry will listen and elect that person, crowning him or her with glory for making the difference which actually saves our way of life. That person could be me. Or the next time you vote, it could be you.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
March, 2007

2007 02 Religion

Religion

Over the years, I’ve pondered our existence and tried to figure out why we are parked here on earth and what we’re supposed to do with our lives. I enjoy looking at depictions of the universe on my computer and marveling on how vast and complicated it is, but cannot fathom what is beyond what we can perceive even with our best instruments. The wonder of the complexity and ingenuity of creation is so intricate that it seems somehow impossible that we humans will ever be able to comprehend how it all started and where it all is going. Even if we scientifically believe that our universe has evolved into life forms, that cannot explain issues of purpose or lack thereof. In medicine, we can manipulate what has been provided to us, but we cannot create the building blocks of life on our own. Science cannot answer the questions, “Why do we exist”, “How big is the universe”, “What’s beyond the end”, “What’s inside small?”, “When was the beginning?” and “When will it end?”.

These are questions which eons of philosophers have struggled with. Religion offers one (or many) explanation(s). Religions have been formed in two principle ways: Regionally or Prophetically. Regionally developing religions are Hinduism from India and Judaism from the Eastern Mediterranean. Prophetically developing religions are most others, particularly Buddhism (Buddha), Christianity (Jesus Christ) and Islam (Muhammad). Newly created prophetically based beliefs are labeled cults, as they depart from locally accepted norms of thought. No matter how they were established, all religions have one thing in common: Faith in the veracity of their teachings. Because faith is not something which can be proven, religion has a fundamental problem. Fervent believers cannot defend their faith with reason. This explains why over the centuries many schisms have torn apart mainstream beliefs and caused wars of passion—even hatred. In its simplest form faith says something like, “I’m right and I know I’m right. You must be wrong. Because I’m right, I’m justified in any action I take to prevail over your thought and control your life.”

I have observed that most people who have faith gained that faith through conversations with others, often family members. Faith is as much based on cultural traditions as it is in the wisdom it conveys. If mom and dad believed and took junior to church or synagogue or mosque, that’s what junior taught his children. It is only natural that we would teach what we were taught. That is what teachers do best. Occasionally in history, prophetic thinkers have taught a new way of looking at life’s questions and have thereby created a new religion. The religion I am most familiar with is Christianity. Believers say that Christ came to earth as God, because God cares for us. Because we failed to listen to God’s plan to do right in the world out of respect for his creation he died for us so that we would live...which is what God wanted anyway. Had I been born in Iran, it is likely I would have been taught a different story. Another story would have been told if I had been born in Hawaii in 1500 or to the Aleut tribe in the Arctic two hundred years ago.

Religion often relies on ancient teaching. How is it that old books can be better than new books? Religious scholars might tell you that “the truth” is true and therefore the age of that truth is timeless. My understanding of our ability to comprehend our world would tell me that human brilliance is severely limited and that there is still a lot to learn. It was once commonly thought that the world is flat. We once believed that the sun rotated around the earth. We once did not know that an atom could be split releasing tremendous energy. We once thought there was a big bang. No one has yet told me what happened before that and I’m not bright enough to figure it out on my own. I surmise that only an omnipotent Creator would have that answer. Whoops, that’s a religious answer to the question. As many people study our world and as more information becomes accessible to more and more people, the proliferation of knowledge has caused a recent burst of understanding about how things work. Nevertheless, this expansion of understanding doesn’t begin to answer the fundamental questions posed in my opening paragraph.

Religions not only seek to explain the universe, they seek to modify and control our behavior. By making human beings insignificant in the grand scale of the universe and God (the omnipotent one) most significant, religions paint our task on earth as one of making a difference beyond ourselves. If we can only keep God as the focus and not ourselves, then the world will be a better place for everyone. That is sometimes done through contemplation, sometimes by doing good works, sometimes by self sacrificing in some way so that God is honored by our presence. Stories of bad and good punctuate religions as examples of what to do and not do. Religions help us get through life’s crises. They help us culturally be supported at life and death moments…the birth of a child or the death of a parent or close relative or even our own death. Those are the times when we realize how short our time is to answer life’s questions. If we don’t get answers really fast, it will be too late!

So is there a single truth? A truth which is irrefutable and unchangeable? At the moment only religion can answer that question. Is it the right one? Only God knows the answer to that question.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
February, 2007

2007 01 Games

Games

Much of the world plays games to pass the precious time we have here on this earth. The variety is enormous. Computers have proliferated the concept of solitaire as well as being able to play games with anyone else in the world who has a computer. A search of the internet finds almost two billion entries for the word “games” and only eight hundred million for the word “sex”. I wonder why it is that we are so fascinated with spending so much time on games when there is so much else to be done in the world.

The variety of games seems endless. In interviewing friends I have found that some prefer the solitude of solitaire. Some prefer the anonymity the internet affords. Some enjoy the risk of loss or gain. Some use games for escape from reality. Some use it as an ego boost…keeping track of the number of wins. And some enjoy the mental jousting…the challenge of getting the better of an opponent.

There seems to be an innate desire in children to play games as they interact with others—children or adults. Sometimes those games are a prelude to taking on responsibility in life for the outcome of certain actions. For example, if a child cheats at a game and is caught, the reaction teaches an important lesson in fairness. If a certain card is played, that gives an advantage to an opponent, while if that card is held, it becomes a winning tactic. In making our way through life, games help us understand our position in the world and how to best take advantage of that position.

A family tradition we used to enjoy was the New Year’s eve gathering. Children would get out the Monopoly board since it allowed a slowly developing strategy to take us to the midnight approach of the New Year. We’d work hard at buying properties on the board, collecting rent, acting as banker and ultimately winning or losing the whole pot. We’d laugh, complain or boast about luck, watch for the breaking of rules and sometimes try to slip a roll in when it wasn’t our turn. Failure is a great lesson learned in games. Because it is only a game, the idea that a failure is not permanent gives rise to the notion that a failure in life is also not permanent. Most often failures can be followed with subsequent tries toward success.

Another tradition were the card games in the afternoons in the summertime. Friends would gather at one house or another and play “Hearts” or “I Doubt It”. It was intense, but the banter was lots of fun. Another card game we enjoyed was “Pit” where the object was to corner the market in a commodity such as corn or barley without being duped into getting the bear card in a trade. The bidding to exchange cards was furious and fast. The winner got the brief thrill of success which usually was quickly passed on to another player in the next round.

Poker is a game of skill and chance which has recently gotten a boost through televised tournaments. A good poker player can work the odds to his favor, but there is still an element of randomness which makes it exciting. There is also the psychology factor…reading the opponent’s bluff while putting at risk big stakes.

Bridge is a card game my wife and I have enjoyed with a special group of friends for over three decades. I have never taken bridge very seriously, but we have friends who play tournament (duplicate) bridge and always seem to know exactly where all the cards are. The knowledge of how to bid, when to play what cards, how to finesse the opponents to your advantage is beautiful to watch when it is done well. I keep trying to learn from our association with these good friends, but have a hard time remembering the strategies from game to game. They are most patient with my ineptitude and are willing to offer the “booby” prize to me with great regularity. For this group, the real game is the sharing of our lives with each other. We talk about trips, our children and their activities, romances, marriages, grandchildren and issues of the day. We enjoy getting together on a regular basis in spite of our different skill levels. The bridge game is partly an excuse to connect in an ongoing way with engaging people.

Games are sometimes associated with a certain place and time. For example, Scrabble is a game we play in the evenings at the cabin. That tradition was established by our parents who noted in the cover special plays with big scores. One of the fun aspects of that game is the memory of one time where our creative son had odd letters left at the end of the game and created a word, “UZIKPINCH.” He wrote it in the dictionary and declared it a legal play which won the game by hitting two triple word scores simultaneously. The dictionary definition is: Noun. A word used to win scrabble. It seems that every time we play, the subject of UZIKPINCH comes up which makes a nice family recollection.

Some games require a tremendous amount of practice and skill. Take the Olympic Games for example. Started in four Greek cities in 776 BCE they were played for a thousand years before they fizzled out. The modern Olympic games were revived internationally in 1896. In Nemea, one of the four original sites of the Olympiad, professor Stephen G Miller of the University of California, Berkeley has made his life work the excavation and study of the ancient stadium where these games were played. In 1996 he revived the contest in Nemea and our son E was able to attend, compete, and come away with a celery wreath as a winning competitor. In the modern Olympics, the level of competition is so fierce that issues of doping (cheating) become very important. So the authorities create rules to provide equity in competition.

Throughout history some people enjoy challenging the rules either for personal gain or a disregard for others. Rules are an interesting aspect of games. Societies develop rules to provide stability and an understanding in advance of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable. Penalties become an important part of playing. Two American sports, football and baseball are full of nuances in the rulebook. Football is a rough and tumble sport, but you cannot block from behind, grab the helmet, or “rough” the passer or kicker. In baseball, the tie goes to the runner, but it is legal to “steal” a base. In ice hockey, there is a penalty box. In soccer, a penalty kick.

Whatever the rules, games have become a lucrative business. Playoff challenges create huge interest among the public. It was recently reported in the national news that over a billion dollars are wagered in one athletic contest held early each year. The rules are just one way advertisers create controversy and interest. The endless discussion of who was right or wrong over a glass of beer adds color to our life experience. If the game is close, a single mistake by a referee can decide the winner. That of course fuels the need for more discussion and a subliminal replaying of the commercials associated with the play.

So games are useful in many ways. They relieve stress. They present challenges. They create opportunites for fame and fortune. I plan to continue to play games for a long time.

©Frank Bliss 2007 All rights reserved
January, 2007

2006 12 Peace

Peace

When I was a very young boy, world peace seemed so easy. If only “those people” wouldn’t fight, I could help the oppressed people of the world and “they” would love me. The pictures of war in Life magazine, screamed “help”. I wondered if the photographer did something about the squalor and deplorable plight of people portrayed in the photos instead of just snapping the picture and leaving? It was unthinkable that someone could see the misery of war and just walk away from it.

Then it happened. In the fourth grade I got into an argument with a classmate. We decided to solve the problem on the corner after school. I was a bit bigger and stronger than he. I prevailed easily. At the time, victory felt so good. I really whipped him with my fists until he gave up and stopped fighting. I don’t remember his name. I don’t remember why we fought. I do remember feeling very superior. I had power over him. Days later I realized that our fight was so stupid and that I had lost the dominance I had gained with my fists. We simply avoided each other. Perhaps he respected me enough to keep his distance. I suspect he actually hated me for being a bully.

Projecting that personal incident into the world, if I, as a fourth grader, cannot get along with a classmate, how is it possible for millions of married people to live decades in peace—or for communities to resolve to care for each other—or for nations to always agree? Self interest is very powerful. Even between two people, there will be differences of opinion. In communities, there are different ways to build a park. Within a nation, there are valid, natural divisions of thought. Take Republicans and Democrats, for instance. At the extremes, it seems there is more room for hate than love. I remember a time when (I perhaps naïvely thought) we allowed the democratic process to take place. When a president or governor was elected, that was the will of the people and even if we didn’t like his (or her) policies, we’d support our elected official as best we could during their term of office. At the next election we’d vote a change if we didn’t like the actions of our elected officials. In the last few decades there has been a shift. Now the losing side enters into malicious personal attacks on our elected officials during their term instead of waiting for the next election. The press, instead of reporting the news of creative new ideas, instead feeds on the frenzy of sensationalism and conflict.

The lack of world peace seems to be intertwined with power. Getting one’s way becomes the dominant thought. Gaining power over other people becomes the goal. I suppose the initial effort is innocent enough: “If I could gain power, I could help ‘the poor people of the world and they would love me’”. The problem is that our political leaders innately want the authority to do good in the world. They cannot wield their influence to make this world a better place without that power. So they do whatever it takes, including some very nasty things, to gain that power at all costs. Gradually, power translates into a personal boast. “Look at me, how important I am and what I’ve done in the world.” Or, “You can see from my great work that I’m a really good person.”

A study of tyrants would show that their quest for power begins in subtle ways. Several years ago, I met the man who fingerprinted Saddam Hussein after his capture. During the fingerprinting, Saddam asked for a comb. What an innocent request! But to grant that request would have meant giving this brutal dictator power over his captor. The next request could have been for a nail file. Then a hammer, a knife, a gun, mustard gas and ultimately a nuclear bomb. Ultimately, once he gained that control, failure to follow the dictates of this pathetic man would lead to death.

So where upon that continuum between innocence and dictatorial power does one draw the line? If someone’s avowed goal is to kill you, when and how do you object? In the answer to that question lies the secret to world peace—or war. It is almost impossible for normal, reasonable people to understand why anyone would want to murder another human being. But we know that such brutal acts happen. If you believe that basic human rights include life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness then at some point you must act even in self defense to prevent murder, incarceration and oppression. How do you do that without murder, incarceration and oppression (substitute the words war, prison and law)? And what do you do about a person who doesn’t hold life, liberty and pursuit of happiness as their ideals? Can you trust such a person to uphold your values?

Peace has to do with trust. To be trusting one must be open. To be open means to expose one’s vulnerability. To expose one’s vulnerability is to show weakness. Weakness is the delight of those wishing power. Power drives those seeking peace in the world…their way. Unless you can obtain universal agreement that power is not the way to peace, the cycle will continue.

If the answer to world peace is in trust, how is that built? The United States should not care if Iran or North Korea or anyone else has nuclear weapons as long as we trust that they will not use them against us or anyone else. By the same token, they need to know unequivocally that we will not use the awesome nuclear power of the United States to wield force over them. And if peace is tied to trust and we know that trust is lost quickly and gained slowly—by acting in predictable ways—we need time to evaluate that our trust in them is genuine just as they need time to evaluate that our motives are genuine. But with nuclear weapons, time is not on anyone’s side. It only takes an instant to explode a device which will murder thousands of innocent people. If that happens we can never in our lifetime trust the perpetrators of that event to not do it again. The United States used that power in 1945. As a result, we still are not trusted several generations later. However, now that power might rest not with a nation, but a few individuals.

So if peace is founded in trust, what are the chances that world peace will ever occur? I think the chances are pretty slim. We would need unequivocal cooperation with one hundred percent of billions of people. The odds are just too long. If that is true, then what is the best we can hope for? I think it is in the ongoing dialog with all world leaders. Even if someone wants to kill you, opening the dialog to understand why in very blunt terms is our best hope. It doesn’t make sense to support that person, but it does make sense to talk. To do so means swallowing one’s own pride and assumption that one way is the only way to achieve understanding. That is why peace is so hard. It is also clear that we cannot treat others as if they were the same as we. It would be like training an allegator to protect it’s nest with soothing words instead of it’s sharp teeth.

In other words, world peace will only come when we all agree that the weak will rule. As soon as we give the weak that power, they too will be corrupted by the power. The end result is that world peace is impossible.

So the best we can hope for is an uneasy tension. The stakes for that uneasy tension are high. Especially in a world where a rogue group or nation has power to cause death and destruction on a massive scale. So the answer has to be a constant effort to break down the walls of secrecy. Oddly, that must be done on two fronts, overtly and covertly. Overtly so that the world does see the transparency that your intentions are honorable. Covertly, so that you’re not caught by surprise when the other side’s overt statements do not match their covert agenda.

Good luck, world leaders. Swallow your pride. Talk a lot. But watch carefully! As for me, the only impact I’ll ever have is on a few people at a time when I volunteer to do a little kindness. What about you?


Labels

Individuals Murder Governments Wage Wars
Individuals Oppress Governments Pass Laws
Individuals Kidnap Governments Imprison
Individuals Extort Governments Tax
Individuals Pursue Happiness Governments Wield Power
Individuals Riot Governments Build Bureaucracy
Individuals Rebel Governments Control

If I’m a Zealot You’re a Combatant
If I’m a Defender You’re an Insurgent
If I’m a Terrorist You’re an Imperialist
If I’m willing to die for a cause You’re a suicide bomber

©Frank Bliss 2006 All rights reserved
December, 2006