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January 15, 2025

Chestertown Spy

Nonpartisan and Education-based News for Chestertown

3 Top Story Point of View Jamie

Eudaemonia By Jamie Kirkpatrick

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For more than twenty years, I worked in an all-boys high school as a college counselor, teacher (Middle Eastern Studies) and coach (baseball). I’m still engaged in education as a resource to students who are sorting their way through the college admissions process, primarily as a reader and editor of their college essays. One thing I’ve learned: one of a teacher’s greatest joys comes when the student becomes the teacher and the teacher becomes the student. It happened (again) just yesterday morning…

I was reading a series of short answers—responses could not be longer than thirteen words!—to questions posed by the admissions office of a well-regarded university in upstate New York. The prompt in question was “I am fascinated by:”. My student’s response was “the world, different cultures, peoples, ideas, nature, literature, and eudaemonia.” I was stumped; what in the world was ‘eudaemonia?’

Thank you,Google. Eudaemonia comes down to us from the Greek. It means ‘good spirited’ or ‘well-being,’ and is often translated as ‘happiness’ or ‘flourishing.’ But ‘happiness’ is an emotion whereas ‘eudaemonia’ is more; it is a state of mind, an Aristotelian ideal representing a good life, one lived in accordance with harmony and reason by cultivating virtue. By contrast, its antonym runs the gamut from despair and misery to adversity, suffering, and defeat. I couldn’t help but think of the thousands of people suffering unimaginable loss in Los Angeles.

You may recall that in last week’s Musing, I mentioned that on the day after my wife and I returned from several days atop a mountain in Montana, I experienced a strange sense of health and well-being. I attributed this to all the red blood cells circulating in my system after a week at elevation. Alas, it was but a temporary mood shift, but it lasted just long enough to make me appreciate the difference between life at sea level and life in the wake of the thinner atmosphere of the mountains. It was more than a mood; it was a moment (I now know) of eudaemonia.

We are about to embark on a new era, a time that may well test our national soul. Try as I might, I cannot shake the sense of foreboding that hangs over me like thick fog these days. Eudaemonia seems impossibly far away. All the current talk about expanding American power seems the very antithesis of cultivating eudaemonia in our lives. I can feel Aristotle shuddering.

I think a lot about how to get through the dark days ahead, but I honestly haven’t come up with any reasonable answers. Some people say “don’t worry, maybe it won’t be so bad,” but check the facts; experience suggests otherwise. And when I hear all the bombastic posturing about Greenland or the Panama Canal or even Canada, that fleeting experience of eudaemonia I had post-Montana seems all the more dreamlike, more remote, farther and farther away.

Eudaemonia is a difficult concept to define, but there are several common elements in any attempt at translation: growth. authenticity, meaning, bliss, and excellence. I sincerely hope that my young student who will soon be heading off to college in search of “the world, different cultures, peoples, ideas, nature, literature, and eudaemonia” will not be disappointed. We owe his generation more.

I’ll be right back.

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His most recent novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available in bookstores and on Amazon.

 

 

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

The Shift By Jamie Kirkpatrick

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Horror stories about holiday travel abound. Spoiler alert: this is not one of them…

I hope you all got my postcard—the one I sent last week from Montana. Well, we’re back home now, and I’ve been thinking about our time up on the mountain.

First things first: kudos to United Airlines. It’s easy to squawk about airline travel these days, but I must say: United got all 26 of us—13 of whom are under the age of 15—to Montana and back without a hitch. No cancellations, no delays, no lost luggage, no unruly passengers, hardly even any turbulence. OK; so maybe the planes were jam-packed, but that makes the end result all the more impressive. So, heartfelt thanks to the pilots, the flight crews, the baggage handlers, and the ground personnel. You take a lot of hits, but not from me. Not this time.

Thanks, too, to all the folks who made this particular jaunt possible; the unsung heroes. People like a server named Heidi working the early shift at a restaurant in the Kalispell airport who somehow managed to get everything right for 14 of us and smiled the whole time. Her mantra was, “Sure; no problem.” Or the writer-turned-Uber driver named Jarred in Montana who rescued us when another Uber driver who shall remain nameless screwed up our reservation; Jarred got us down the mountain and to the Kalispell airport with plenty of time to spare. Or the taxi driver named Yohannes from Ethiopia who helped us load and unload a lot of awkward and heavy paraphernalia—skis, boot bags, and heavy suitcases—upon our weary arrival back in Washington. If it takes a village to raise a child, then it takes a lot of good people—friendly, efficient, people—from all over the world to bring us safely home again. Thank you!

When I woke up this morning in my own comfy bed with no agenda other than to unpack and prepare for an impending snow storm—by the way, it’s a lot colder here in Maryland than it was in Montana—I felt something had shifted. It’s just an amorphous feeling, maybe only induced by all that high-altitude oxygenated blood still circulating in my veins, but it’s there nonetheless. You may recall that I’m not a skier, so I missed out on a lot of the downhill shenanigans, but nevertheless I was revitalized by the beauty of the American West—its mountains and lakes, its dreams of glory, its open, friendly people, and, yes, even its sad history. (Whitefish lies in a valley between the Flathead and Blackfoot Reservations.) We live on a vast continent—it still boggles my mind that we can fly from almost one end of this country to another in a matter of hours—and maybe my mental shift is a reflection of my renewed appreciation for America. I know, I know: there’s a lot that is unsettled and scary right now, but this morning, my focus is on what’s right, not on what’s wrong.

But I think my shift is due to something else. Like it or not, I was the patriarch in Montana. I certainly don’t mean I was the person who organized or bankrolled all this, or the head of either of the two mountain households, or the skier who logged the most runs, I just mean that when we were all together, I was the oldest person in the room. Moreover, I’m an outlaw, a member of this clan by the grace of marriage and universal family acceptance. That is a precious gift in and of itself, so even though I didn’t ski a lick, and despite being felled by a bad cold for a few days, I still had a good time,  Sure, I look at the over 400 iPhone photos of the little kids and grownups all bundled in their fancy snow gear, riding lifts to the summit and then skiing back down the mountain, or back home après ski, celebrating the new year and two birthdays, and I feel a little sad that I missed out on some of the fun. On the other hand, I logged a lot of hours in front of a cozy fire, read two good books, and got a lot of writing done. I have no complaints.

And you know what else? I got more hugs and made more memories than any outlaw deserves. OK, so maybe It gets a little chaotic at times, but if there’s a more loving crowd anywhere, on any mountain, I’d be surprised.

I’ll be right back.

 

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Postcard from Montana By Jamie Kirkpatrick

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I’m sitting in front of a cozy fire. Everyone else is out on the mountain, either skiing or snowboarding. It’s cold and the visibility is limited, probably not more than forty or fifty feet.

There is fresh snow on the ground and it’s the weekend, so the lift lines are long and the slopes are crazy-crowded. Did I mention that I’m in the great room of a rustic ski lodge, sitting in front of a crackling fire? Who do you think is happier?

We arrived three days ago—26 of us, spread over three generations. flying here (Whitefish, Montana) from three different airports. I’m the only non-skier, so my luggage was light. There was some concern about this: what would a non-skier do at a ski resort? But I wasn’t the slightest bit worried: I have a good book to read, this postcard to write, and hours of quiet time to chip away at the granite mountain of my next novel. So am I worried? Bored? Did I mention that I’m in a warm lodge with a cup of cocoa in front of a dreamy fire? Hours and hours of peas and carrots and plenty to observe. A writer’s delight!

Skiers are a breed apart. Who else would choose to don layer upon layer of designer  outerwear, buy a lot of expensive safety gear, wear clunky boots that make walking like a zombie difficult if not downright impossible (heel/clunk, toe/clunk), buy lift tickets that cost a king’s ransom, all so they can stand in line for an hour just to make a twenty-minute run back down the mountain with a thousand other skiers and boarders whizzing by at Beltway speed? And then take everything off in order to answer nature’s call? Not me, that’s for sure. I’m just fine in this big leather chair, my stocking feet pointed toward the fire, thinking about what to eat for lunch.

There are a few other people hanging out in front of the fire. They’re talking about sore hip-flexers, strained quads, sore necks, and all manner of other ailments, I’ve yet to see to a sling or a cast, but doubtless that will come. Makes me feel guilty to get up and refresh my cocoa.

Now I have to admit that I, too, am slightly under the winter weather. Airplanes are notorious petri dishes, and yesterday I woke up sneezing and coughing to beat the band. But my wife is a doctor’s daughter who knows everything there is to know about cures and remedies so she sprang into action and now I have a hospital supply room of full of medicines designed to render me hale and healthy overnight. We’ll see about that. In the meantime, I can sit here in front of my foot-warming fire, convincing myself that self care is not the slightest bit selfish.

This is old country. During the ice ages, glaciers pushed tons and tons of alluvial soil down from Canada through passes in the mountains, carving out deep lakes, making fertile valleys. Megafauna and wildlife flourished, bringing hunting-gathering people who lived here peacefully for millennia upon millennia until someone back East decided that what this valley really needed was a rail line snaking its way through the mountain passes, linking Chicago and San Francisco. The rest, as we know, is a sad history.

I throw another log on the fire. It roars back to life, popping, snapping, singing its warming song. Somewhere outside, my wife and her skiing family are doing what skiers love to do. I’m fine right here, thank you very much, comfortable, warm, and counting my blessings.

I’ll be right back.

 

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Winter’s Promise By Jamie Kirkpatrick

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A few days ago, we made it through the inky tunnel of the year’s longest night. Now, for some of us anyway, here comes the year’s holiest night. The common denominator is, of course, darkness and the return of light. Bleak winter’s promise.

I read somewhere that the winter solstice—the astrological moment when we turn our planetary face back toward the sun—is one of the oldest known holidays in human history. Anthropologists believe that solstice celebrations may go back at least 30,000 years, even before humans began farming on a large scale. Many of the world’s most ancient structures—Stonehenge, for example—were designed to pinpoint the precise date of the solstice by using a circular arrangement of standing stones to catch the first rays of midwinter sun.

Some ancient people probably even believed that since daylight had been waning, it might go away forever. They built and lit huge bonfires to tempt the sun to return. The tradition of decorating our houses and trees with lights at this time of year are the descendants of those prehistoric bonfires. We are but links in a long human chain.

“In the Bleak Midwinter” was originally a poem penned by the English poet Christina Rossetti in 1872. It has been set to music many times. The most familiar version was published by Gustav Holst; the tune is called ‘Cranham’ and it was written as a congregational hymn in 1906. It was one of my dear father’s most cherished Christmas carols:

In the bleak midwinter

Frosty wind made moan

Earth stood hard as iron

Water like a stone

 

Today, climate change and global warming may be pushing winter ever farther north, but we still feel its chill in our bones. I suppose it’s even possible that we share some atavistic measure of our ancient human ancestors’ dread about the death of light. But I think it’s safe to say we’ve endured long enough to understand our place in the universe, and to have faith that light and the warmth of the sun will return soon.

Or will it?

Scientists predict that over the course of billions of years, the sun will either run out of hydrogen and swell into a red giant, swallowing its closest planets, or it will lose its outer layers and shrink into a white dwarf, a dead star that will slowly cool and fade away. Either way, Earth will die with it. Another poet, the American icon Robert Frost, contemplated that distant fate in “Fire and Ice.”

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I’ve tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

 

Am I worried about that distant demise? Not really. I figure that by then our planet’s goose will already be either cooked or frozen. Instead, I’ve decided to hold winter to its eternal promise. In the words of the Beatles:

Here comes the sun,

Here comes the sun

And I say, it’s all right.

I’ll be right back.

 

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Two Movies By Jamie Kirkpatrick

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My wife and I took Annie, one of our grandkids, to the movies the other day to see “Wicked,” the film adaptation of the Broadway musical.  At two hours and forty minutes, it’s a long movie. It’s also dense—a complex psychological fable for our age. In case you haven’t seen it yet, I’m not going to spoil it by unraveling the plot for you. Let’s just say there’s a lot to unpack. Oh—and this rendition is only Part One; Part Two drops next year. Talk about delayed gratification!

After the movie, we returned home and ate supper in front of the TV.  At this time of year, there are a lot of Christmas movies on channels all over the map. Every year, we indulge ourselves and watch many—OK, most—of them: “White Christmas,” “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “ A Christmas Story” (my favorite), “Love Actually,” “The Grinch,” “Elf,” and, of course, “Miracle on 34th Street.” (There are some B listers, too, but we avoid those.) Anyway, the night Annie came to visit, we were scrolling through the channel list and came upon “The Sound of Music.” Maybe it’s not really a Christmas movie, but who doesn’t relish the love story of Postulate Maria (Julie Andrews) and retired Captain Gregor Von Trapp (Christopher Plummer) and the widowed Captain’s seven singing moppets. And if the love story isn’t enough, there’s also the added intrigue of the Nazi Anschluss into Austria in 1938 and the last-minute escape of the Von Trapp singers over the mountains into neutral Switzerland.

If movies are a reflection of our time and culture, we ran the gamut that day with Annie. “The Sound of Music” was released in the spring of 1965, not exactly a benign time, but decidedly prior to many of the cultural wars of the late 1960s and beyond. It’s a charming and innocent film, full of sing-along tunes, and it has a happy ending.

“Wicked,” on the other hand, is dark, and the ending—at least of Part One—is neither happy nor resolved. The principle characters—Glinda and Elphaba—each have a significant childhood backstory that informs their adult characters. Moreover, woven into the subtext of the film like the false strands of an heirloom Persian rug, there are veiled references to human (and animal) rights, political repression, thought control, and an all-powerful ruler who seems benign enough on the surface, but who, along with his power-wielding minions, reveals a much more dangerous and nefarious side. On top of all that, the music and lyrics of the songs in “Wicked” are hardly light as Austria’s Alpine air. And as for the flying monkeys who seemed comical enough in “The Wizard of Oz,” in “Wicked,” they are the stuff of vivid nightmares for children and adults alike. I’m still shaking,

At the conclusion of “The Sound of Music,” goodness triumphs over evil, at least for the Von Trapp family. But now that we’re halfway through the “Wicked” narrative, I’m not sure that good will triumph over evil, or over anything else ever again. Maybe Part Two will prove me wrong—we will all just have to wait and see.

I’ll be right back.

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Coming Home by Jamie Kirkpatrick

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Whether I’ve been away for ten minutes or ten days, I love coming home. Home is where I belong, where my wife and I entertain our friends, where we lay our heads down at the end of the day. Our home is hardly a castle—we call it “Standing Room Only’ for a readily apparent reason—but it is a place of safety and retreat. Snug. Cozy. Peaceful—at least most of the time.

By now, you may have read about the front porch, or the burglar step, or the fire pit that keeps us a little warmer on cold nights. Those features are certainly part of the quirky charm of our home, but what makes me love coming home isn’t “stuff;” it’s more in the air that we breathe and the memories we make in this place. We’re coming up on thirteen years in our home—thirteen years of laughter, tears, and everything in between. You see, there’s a difference between a house and a home. The foundation of our house is brick, the siding is wood, the roof is slate, the porch roof is tin, the interior walls are plaster, the floors are original knotty pine, the windows are leaded glass—all materials that you can buy at any large box store.

But our home is made of different elements. It’s made of memories and laughter, of artwork with meaningful provenance, of framed photographs of the grandkids, of knickknacks and scented candles, and of invitations stuck on the refrigerator with magnets we’ve purchased on our travels.

Of course, at this time of year, the scene changes dramatically. The eight framed pictures of the grandkids are stowed in boxes, replaced by a tiny Christmas village with glowing lights. We find a place for some of my wife’s miniature Christmas trees made of sea glass and topped with a starfish, and another shelf for one of her handmade boxwood trees, painstakingly decorated with baby’s breath and bows made of thin, gold ribbon. Giant nutcrackers and bagpiping Santas appear on table tops. The dining room table is set with Christmas Spode china and glassware, there are red candles in the candelabra on the buffet and in the wrought-iron chandelier we found in a little store down in Virginia many years

Our front yard features a fresh Christmas tree with tiny white lights and ornaments made of oyster shells. Our Navajo crèche lives on a table on the front porch and there are new Christmas pillows on the swing. There are electric candles in the second story windows, pine roping along the fence, a small wreath on the front gate and a larger hand-made wreath on the front door.

I know how fortunate I am, how fortunate we are. I realize that not everyone has a warm, safe place to sleep, or enough food on their table, or even a circle of family and friends with whom to share the holidays. We are blessed beyond reason.

No small wonder I love coming home.

I’ll be right back.

 

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Black and White By Jamie Kirkpatrick

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There’s not much that’s just black and white in the world these days. Everything is either nuanced shades of gray, or, more likely, layer upon layer of color, bright or muted, shiny or subtle. Simplicity is out, complexity is in, and for some people—people like me—that can pose a problem. You see, I like to keep things simple, straightforward. Give me two options, and I’ll choose one without much difficulty. But if you give me three, four, or more options, the variables start to kick in, and then just watch me wallow in the muck of indecision.

The holidays don’t help, especially in a year when Thanksgiving falls late on the calendar and suddenly, we’re all in a pre-Christmas panic. Just at that moment in the year when the days are drained of color and we should all be taking a long winter’s nap, suddenly, we’re thrust into a gathering storm of decorating and shopping and merry-making that makes my head spin. Makes me wonder…

…Maybe in some past life, I was a Shaker. The Shakers were (and in one small village in Maine, still are) a Protestant Christian sect that originated in England in mid-1700s. Shakers believe in a second coming of Christ, and on creating a working heaven here on earth. They practice temporal and spiritual simplicity, pacifism, and perfection in all aspects of life. We know the Shakers best through their music, through one song in particular, “Simple Gifts:”

Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free,

‘Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

And when we find ourselves in the place just right,

‘Twill be in the valley of love and delight.

When true simplicity is gain’d,

To bow and to bend we will not be asham’d,

To turn, turn will be our delight,

Till by turning, turning we come round right.

A core tenet of Shaker belief is that earthly satisfaction can not be obtained through the acquisition of power or wealth. Rather, true satisfaction can only be obtained through humility and freedom from worldly goods. Try selling that notion to the marketing gurus who came up with Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday.

Shakers are celibate; they do not marry. Although Shakers do believe in gender equality, they must rely on converts to populate their dwindling numbers. To the best of my knowledge, the tiny village of Sabbathday Lake, Maine is the last surviving Shaker community, a sad testament to the demise of true simplicity in today’s culture.

But back to black and white and all the subtle shades of gray in between. As much as I love color photography, there is an austere beauty in a world reduced to two tones. Color can dazzle me, but black and white images stimulate my curiosity and my imagination. I truly believe I see more by seeing less.

As we rush headlong into the December holidays, I’m going to try my best to see more by seeing less. I’m going to try and keep things simple. I’m sure I’ll stumble, but maybe, just maybe, in some unexpected, quiet moment, I’ll find myself in a place just right.

I’ll be right back.

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

’Tis the Season by Jamie Kirkpatrick

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And just like that, it’s the holiday season. First, there’s that (snow) flurry of family, friends, football, and food we call Thanksgiving. It’s late this year, and for some of us, there’s less to be thankful for, but nevertheless, most of us will gather around a laden table on Thursday and celebrate this bountiful land we live in. And whether we trace the origins of our feast to 1621 and a ragtag band of pilgrim immigrants and a generous band of Wampanoags, or to George Washington’s Presidential Proclamation in 1789, let’s all agree to put aside our differences for a day and come together in gratitude. Amen!

But as soon as we wobble away from our respective Thanksgiving tables, that’s when the fun will really start. First, there’s Black Friday, or as it’s now known as Black Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. There’s just nothing like running up your credit card four weeks before the main event—Christmas, or, if you prefer a different December blow-out, Chanukkah or Kwanzaa. Plus, in my not-so-little family, there are a couple of birthdays and a wedding anniversary that fall within the bounds of the holiday season to keep us focused and chubby.

Don’t get me wrong: I am NOT the Grinch and I don’t rue these holidays (or, as I like to call them, these holidaze). Just color me a little dubious. Sure, maybe we should celebrate a good harvest, or a critical religious event, or our various cultures, but just don’t forget: these modern celebrations are just recreations of pagan ceremonies centered around mystery, darkness, and rebirth. They are shadows on the wall of Plato’s cave, and, like it or not, we are all still prisoners of that cave with no knowledge of what lies outside it. But never mind; in the meantime, let’s all eat, drink, and be merry, or, at least, pretend to. What have we got to lose besides a few pounds in January?

But I digress. There is just one more wrinkle to this year’s holiday agenda. A weekend hence, our little town will celebrate Charles Dickens and all things Dickensian. Men will don top hats and spats; women will cinch their waists and put on bonnets, and for a day or two, we will all be transported back in time to that sooty Victorian Era. And if that were not enough, for reasons that lie beyond my ken, my wife and I have agreed to open our home for a few hours to visitors who have signed up for the Dickens Weekend house tour. Of course, this means that as soon as the Thanksgiving dishes are done, we’ll have to start decorating for a Dickens of a Christmas.

But fear not! My wife has a keen eye for arranging and decorating, and Mr. Dickens is just whom she needs to keep her company during the holidays. Boxes relegated to the attic for eleven months of the year have already come downstairs for their precious few days in the spotlight. There are wooden carolers, a Navajo crèche (don’t ask), and a small tree with several bagpiping Santa ornaments in the living room. Spode china, candles in a polished silver candelabra, and a home-made boxwood table scape will adorn the dining room. There will be festive lights in the windows and a wreath by the front door; a Christmas swag for the gate and pine rope along the fence. And, to top it all off, we’ll put up a tree with oyster shell ornaments and a silver star on top in the front yard. We have neither chimney nor fireplace, so, alas, no stockings, but there are bows to be tied and bells to be rung. And should my wee Christmas magician see something slightly awry, she’ll tweak her artistry until she gets it just the way she wants it, at least for the next few minutes. Her art is always a work in progress, but I will say that when it all comes together, it’s always perfect.

So, even though we’re just getting started, I wish you the joys of this madding season. May all your days be merry and bright!

I’ll be right back.

 

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Permanence by Jamie Kirkpatrick

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In case you haven’t noticed, change is in the wind. For some, it’s welcome; for others, it’s more than change. It’s chaos, and it’s frightening. But whether you like change or not, we’re in for a wild ride.

So, let’s pivot to permanence. Something rock-solid, something unmovable, maybe a place that will stand the test of time. A place of safety, a retreat, a refuge, protection from the gales that are starting to blow. I know: a castle!

The one pictured above is Dunvegan Castle on the Isle of Skye in northwest Scotland. (You know how partial I am to Scotland.) The castle was first built in the 14th Century, and has developed piecemeal over the centuries. If you’re into genealogy or ancestry, Dunvegan is the seat of Clan MacLeod and the ancestral home of the MacLeod of MacLeod, chief of his clan. Some say it is the oldest continually inhabited castle in Scotland, and if that’s not permanence, I don’t know what is.

I know: stasis—equilibrium, if you will—is a rare commodity these days. Our attention spans are shrinking almost as fast as our insatiable appetite for change is expanding. Permanence is in short supply. More to the point, it’s becoming irrelevant. The world is bent on adaptation and change. After all, if things didn’t change, we’d all still be in the trees peeling bananas.

There was a time in my life when I craved change. Fluidity was exciting, and since time hadn’t yet become an issue for me, I surfed that wave. But no more. Now, I’m perfectly happy with my supper of peas and carrots (read ‘peace and quiet’) while I enjoy the immutable elements of my life: my home, my friends, my family. Oh sure, even these pieces of the puzzle are subject to evolution and change, but at least I retain the illusion that the pace of these life changes is slow enough that I won’t get trampled by them.

It was the French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr who coined the adage, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.” (The more things change, the more they stay the same.) I wonder if Monsieur Karr would feel the same these days. It’s not just that the pace of change has accelerated, the scope of change has, too. Change is no longer incremental; it’s leapfrogging everything in its path, and if you don’t believe me, just fiddle with artificial intelligence and explore where we’ll all be ten years from now.

So, call me a dinosaur, but I’m disregarding the meteor that’s heading straight at us, and embracing what permanence I still can. In the wake of the election, I even tried to talk my wife into moving to Scotland, but that dog wouldn’t hunt unless the grandchildren came, too. I understood that, but I did go so far as to search through my photos for something that reassured me that permanence has not gone completely out of fashion, that basic values are not subject to whim, and that there is still a place where I can stand and move this troublesome earth, one small Musing at a time.

I’ll be right back.

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

 

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Raking Leaves by Jamie Kirkpatrick

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The sycamore tree in front of our house is a summer friend, but at this time of year, it tries my patience. Just yesterday, I was raking its detritus in the morning when a neighbor walked by and pointed up at all those leaves still on the bough. “Why bother?” she said. She had a point, but I looked around and muttered, “We’ve all got work to do.”

Don’t get me wrong: I like leaves as much as the next guy or gal, at least up until they become a Sisyphean chore at this time of year.  Then all that summertime shade gets dumped on the porch, on the lawn, on the sidewalk and in the gutter, and suddenly I’m under a blanket of problems. Makes me want to stay in bed, pull up the covers, and pretend it didn’t happen.

But “it” did.

Why do I even bother to rake up all this debris? Well, for starters, dead leaves block sunlight and prevent photosynthesis, the process that would provide the grass under the leaf pile with all the nutrients it would need to regenerate in the spring. In other words, all those dead and dying leaves just smother and starve my little lawn, making it difficult, if not downright impossible, for new grass to grow come April. And then there’s this: dead leaves promote disease by blocking air circulation which can lead to turf rot. So, despite all those leaves that are still clinging to the limbs above me, I pick up my rake and get back to work. There’s a lot to do.

I suppose I could just mulch all those leaves with my lawnmower. Mulching would at least turn all those downed leaves into a thin layer of organic material that would be beneficial for all the microorganisms that help to spin the cycle of life. The only problem with that strategy is its aesthetic value. A mulched-leaf lawn looks like I’m shirking my good neighbor responsibilities, plus it’s a steep and slippery slope that only leads to sloth.

Autumn is, by nature, our most melancholy season. As I rake my leaves into tidy piles, I can’t help but think of Robert Frost’s mournful poem, “Nothing Gold Can Stay:”

“Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.”

In her concession speech, Vice President Harris reminded us that this is not the time to throw up our hands, but to roll up our sleeves. So instead of listening to the pundits’ endless analyses and recriminations, I’ve decided to turn off the television for a while and work. Now, I go outside to rake leaves. There’s a certain satisfaction that comes with yard work, a sense of purpose, an end that justifies the means. I suppose i could just let all those dead leaves accumulate, but passivity makes a cold supper. Work warms.

This shadow, too, shall pass. After all, everything eventually does. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus put it this way: “the only constant is change.” The People have spoken and I will respect their loud voice. In the meantime, I’ll be outside, sleeves rolled up, raking leaves.

I’ll be right back.

 

Jamie Kirkpatrick is a writer and photographer who lives in Chestertown. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Baltimore Sun, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Washington College Alumni Magazine, and American Cowboy Magazine. His new novel, “The Tales of Bismuth; Dispatches from Palestine, 1945-1948” explores the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is available on Amazon.

 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.