With an apology to my non-European readers

One of the biggest advantages of not living in the USA is the open skies of what's going on in the world. One of the biggest disadvantages of living in Europe is that you have to too often deal with a lot of distracting nonsense that is called European politics.

Let me set something straight right here at the outset: I'm a HUGE fan of Europe. I'm a less avid fan of the EU (as it is currently being practiced). And, I'm downright put off by what we've been up to as of late.

Europe/the EU was (and could be) onto something BIG. Americans should appreciate it, but they don't (primarily because they don't understand their own history let alone anyone else's). The world is changing, folks, and the notion of the EU was light-years beyond anything that's been even suspected since the American Constitution (which my countypeople, I'm sorry to say, have managed to brutally murder, dismember and bury ... but that's another post for another day).

For those of you who haven't grokked it yet: the nation-state is an obsolescent model. It's available cheap at the discounters. The more nation-state you try to live, well, the less it's going to work. And that is precisely the problem.

Europe is being destroyed, hollowed out from within, by those very viral forces that inspired its creation in the first place. Given the short-sighted and self-serving interests of the US' "vital interests" and global hegemony, given the readiness to reduce everything to ashes before the "other guys" get even a little piece of the action, the recent squabbling amongst the so-called member states can be seen as little more than an irrational fear that their "Rich Uncle" is not going to include them in his will.

The Poles don't want refugees if they're not Christian (though which flavor of Christian they never said). The Hungarians don't want refugees if they just want to go to Germany anyway (and a whole lot of kindergarten strife is called to mind). The Austrians don't want refugees because, well, I don't know, because they're Austrian. The UK doesn't want refugees because they can't come to terms with their own Commonwealth (first they gave everybody they oppressed Commonwealth rights, and now, Lord forbid, a whole lot of them are sympathizing with other oppressed British spin-offs). The wannabes in the East are taking their lead from the whiners (or to be properly British, the whingers), and it's tearing all of us apart.

It's been said that you can't fly with the eagles if you're scratching around with the chickens, and I can assure you, the chickens are the majority. But no matter ... nobody ever got fat feeding off of eagles.

It's time to simply face the facts: the British no longer have an Empire, and they no longer have much of anything to say. The Americans love them because they think there's a language connection. They are, geographically, European, but love that stroking the Americans give them, but it certainly isn't because the Americans like them. You can't demand to be special any more than you can demand to be respected, however: either you've earned it, or you're just another sad soul who just wants to be loved. Right now, the Brits want what the Germans call "an extra sausage". But, there is no extra sausage, there are only the ones that we have and we can all share them or we can't.

I say, if we all want to eat, that's just fine. If somebody at the table wants more than everybody else, they're at the wrong table.

No, Europe is anything but perfect because what it was intended to be has been compromised by what some want it to be. It's time to grow up and decide if you want to be part of the future or a beacon of the past. That's the choice the Brits get to make in June. I wonder how they'll decide.

You can't waste more time than this

When I see what people post on social, mainstream, and alternative media (and, yes, I don't catch it all, but I do try to get a glimpse), I wonder what most of them have ever read. More to the point, quite often I wonder if they read anything at all (including the news feeds that they are merely copying and re-feeding). I mean, who really reads anymore?

Yes, I've always been an avid reader, but I never got into reading as much as when I tried to put together an academic paper on the subject. I tried to take a look at how the process worked and what the notion of "reading" even meant. After all, there are lots of people who can decipher and decode the marks on paper or on the screen, who can read aloud to let you know their decoding is correct, but who haven't the slightest idea what those sounds are saying. Yes, a lot of folks can make all the right sounds corresponding to the letters on the page, but like a parrot, they have no idea what those words are saying.

The skill can be learned. The skill can be taught. But, I can't shake off the feeling that neither learning or teaching is taking -- or has taken -- place. Yes, I can sob and moan about not having a lot of reading friends, but the more I look around me, the more I realize that too many people have too little idea what most authors are saying. It got so bad once that I thought I should start compiling a list of the "most misquoted writers of all time". The list got too long too fast and I gave up the project. I became overwhelmed. I had difficulty coming to terms with the fact that a lot of "authority" was being thrown my way, but little of what was maintained as "authority" found reflection in the texts.

A first example: Adam Smith's "invisible hand". I not only studied business once in my life, I taught it at the graduate level for 15 years. (That's not a brag, by the way, it's just a fact ... truth be told, I don't believe to this day that "business" is an academic field of study, but I played the game long enough to at least make this statement.) Though I was teaching a graduate-level course, not one of my students had ever read Adam Smith: neither his Theory of Moral Sentiments (in my not-so-humble opinion, a pre-requisite for understanding his more famous work) nor his Wealth of Nations. Some folks are aware he wrote the latter, most have no idea he wrote the former, but in any regard, we're confronted with Adam Smith's "invisible hand" at every turn in almost every economic discussion we have, be it formal, academic or in the pub. This all-so-important-and-critical phrase appears once -- yes, just once -- in the Wealth of Nations. In and of itself, that means nothing. However, when we consider that (a) it appears just once, and only once; (b) that it is not a topic of discussion or analysis itself but merely a passing example of another point he is trying to make; and (c) the text in which it appears (that is, the treatise on the Wealth of Nations) consists of five books in two volumes encompassing well over 1,000 pages, well, I have to ask myself, just how important this notion must have been to Mr. Smith himself. On the other hand, it appears to be the only clause that Milton Friedman ever understood in the whole text. If you don't believe me, try reading his Capitalism and Freedom and you can see what I mean. Self-interest plays a huge role, but whereas Smith alleged enlightened, Friedman's is wholely endarkened.

It makes you wonder ... well, it makes me wonder, at any rate. I know it takes time and effort to read, and even more to comprehend. It takes the most effort to engage and think through what you've read as well, and for that we apparently have no time left at all.

Recreational reading and other wastes of time

Anyone who knows me knows that I like to read. Anyone who knows me well knows I like to read a lot. And anyone who knows me really well knows that I'm rarely without my nose in a book whenever I find the time to put it there.

Most people who know me know that I'm a fairly eclectic reader. Most of those who know me better know that I'm more than casual reader. And most of those who know me even better know that there has rarely been a book printed that I would not be willing to read.

Yes, I'm one of those kind of persons who, when someone says, "Hey, you really should read this book", I reply with "Give it to me and I'll give it a shot." I won't deceive you into thinking that I've read every book I've ever had in my hands through from cover to cover. It's not necessary with some (say, have you ever tried reading a dictionary from cover to cover?), it's not possible with others (like when you're trying to decipher a text written with green letters on purple paper), but at least I'll give it a try. Who knows what might be in there? After all, someone went to a certain amount of trouble to ensure that the text got around. The least that I can do is honor the effort, even if I can't grasp what's being talked about. I am more than willing to openly admit that there are some texts that I simply don't get.

Truth be told, I wish I had more time to read, but there are only 24 hours in a day. Consequently, I always try to have more than one book going at any one time. I like to vary genres (non-fiction and fiction, poetry and spiritual texts work well together) and languages (in order to keep up my German which I so arduously learned, I like to have at least one book in German going at any given time). Another confession I need to make is that whatever I read on the internet (be it Facebook or any of the online groups with whom I'm affiliated) doesn't count as "real reading": the primary mode of internet communication is the written word, but that, to me, is a lot like a phone call. It may or not be communication in any meaningful sense of the word.

And so, the question naturally arises: what do I have to show for all of this reading. And, the answer is really rather simple: not a helluva lot. There are lots and lots and lots of interesting ideas out there floating about. No doubt about that. But what is every bit as necessary as reading all of this interesting (and, not-so-interesting) stuff is that you need time to reflect upon it. Reading is one thing. Digesting what you read is another. And I have found that quieter times, such as Lent, when, if you're into the spirit of the season, you kind of slow down just a bit, you can more easily find a fleeting moment here and there (even if it is as a change of pace to the normal monkey-brain-chatter we usually put up with before going to sleep) to think about what you've read.

What I miss sometimes, though, is someone to talk to about what I'm reading, but readers don't always read the same things at the same times. In these internet days in which we live, the neighborhood reading circle is an institution of bye-gone days. I am participating in an online reading group right now, for which I'm more than thankful, but that's a rarity, as most of you know. (The folks organizing and promoting the read are young people, however, and if their efforts are successful, I can only hope that they'll be encouraged to continue in the future.)

Still, all of those silent readers out there may one day be moved to speak. I just want you to know, I'm willing to listen.

Lenten listlessness

One week down, almost six to go. Bet a lot of you didn't know that.

I'll be honest: I'm not taking the season as seriously as I once did. Oh, I did all kinds of fast-like things at times. My high-point, I think, was while I was in California, hustling my way through the Silicon-Valley buzz. There are all kinds of fasts these days. A brief internet search will reveal way more than you ever wanted to know. Being a fan of tradition (while not being a slave to it), I've always leaned toward the more well-known ways of participating in the season: giving up meat, beer, alcohol in general, sweets, you know, that kind of thing, but one year I decided to get real about it all.

In the olden times, Jews, for example, fasted on Mondays and Thursdays; the early Christians, in order to differentiate themselves from their primarily Jewish brethren, chose Tuesdays and Fridays as fast days. That's why when I was growing up, my Catholic friends couldn't eat meat on Friday, but that got loosened in the past few years and meatless Tuesdays have popped up again. All my Catholic friends that I asked couldn't tell me why that all was, but I really don't expect most people know why they do half the things they do. Nevertheless, I decided, on a whim -- how else? -- to do the "real deal", or at least what I could determine that might have been.

It turns out this regular fasting meant drinking only water during the day, and when the sun went down, eating only bread and salt. (The bread part is obvious, and if you ever spent any time in a desert, you get the salt part too.) I wasn't going to get this past the family, of course, being that at most times they're more concerned about dad's health than their own, I compromised. I only had water during the day, and after sundown, only something light for dinner: a tomato-and-lettuce sandwich, a bowl of cereal, you know, something like that. Oh, I still had to put up with a lot of squawking, but each intercession gave me an opportunity to at least thematicize Lent-relevant topics, like fasting, belief, physical needs, habits ... a whole array of topics. You should know that dinnertime in our household was more a food-augmented discussion rather than a meal in the traditional sense of the word, even when it wasn't Lent. Evening dinner in our house could go on for hours; to me (and I think to the others) it was special time together.

No, I had no enlightening experience during those 40 days, but you couldn't help but notice that the world was different. I finally realized how little is actually required in order to get along physically well, and that the time spent with the family, even without eating, is time that cannot be better spent. I came to see that what we truly need is not necessarily food, though there is a lower limit we should not -- and cannot -- dip below, but rather the presence and interaction of others that makes all the difference in the world. I also finally understood that Life is something to which we are connected by the slightest of gossamer threads. And, I grokked what it means to be thankful, for the least of anything. The last lesson was the surprise lesson of the exercise. The food I ate in the evening were some of the best meals I have ever had.

We all have to gather our own experiences in this phase and time of our existence. No one will argue that. But, I can assure you that too many of us miss far too many opportunities to get the most out of the experiences we have. Sometimes it takes a lot of effort. Sometimes a very slight shift in viewpoint -- like a fast, for example, during Lent -- can give us just the nudge we need. If you never look, you'll never see.

Neither the future nor the past is what it used to be

During Lent, for the most part out of habit (but not one that I would rather not think about), I tend to think (or wonder) about others. Fasting, even its mildest forms, can do that to you. (You really should try it sometime ... you might surprise yourself at what you find.)

Yes, I have friends who think that technology, the internet, social networks, digitalization (, whatever) are going to "save us" (whatever that means). They're deluded. By the same token, I have friends who deeply -- and I mean deeply -- long for the way it was, some (merely perceived) Golden Age of the Past when everything was as it should be. In between these extremes, I have friends who think that an adjustment here, some fine-tuning there, and a bit of elbow grease will get things back on track. And, I have friends who believe that no matter what we do where to what or how, we're heading down the tubes: the end may not be here, but it's fast approaching (and there's not a damn thing we can do about it). And, yes, in between those two interim extremes, I have friends who think we're just exaggerating everything: things have always been suboptimal and they always will be.

If Life were a multiple-choice test (as in America, where there is only one "right" answer), I'd have to write in (as I have done in the past) "e) none of the above". Sometimes all the "given" answers are just, well, wrong, or inappropriate, or irrelevant, or whatever. That's what I love about almost all my friends: they think there is a fixed set of possible answers and somehow, if we knew enough or were smart enough or, even, lucky enough, we could pick the right one. I hate to be the one to break it to them (and maybe to you): there is no one right answer to Life.

Oh, that's not to say that there aren't things we want to hold on to, irrespective of the cost: guns, freedom, individuality, rights, commonsense, discipline ... the list literally goes on forever. But, in all seriousness, how can you reduce the world you experience, the world you have to face day in and day out to one, and only one, issue or concept or rule or guideline or religious precept or ... whatever. But, I have to say, that's how most of my friends are: if everyone would only think like they do, the world would be damn near paradise that they so deeply long for. Turns out: reality is rather messy.

Most of you are thinking, I'm sure, I'm not talking to or about you, but I am. Just look at the latest primaries crap that the Americans are wading through, look at the crap about refugees and trade agreements that the Europeans are wading through, look at the crap the anything-but-the-dollar tactics that certain currently frisky nation-states are wading through, look at the crap the poverty and starvation that a third of the world is wading through. We're all in it, and we're all doing a poor job of dealing with it.

We have a terrible past behind us and we have little, if any, idea of how to deal with the future because, in a word, we just don't know what we're doing. We're so blinded by our petty, individual and national interests that we can't see the forest for all the trees. Oh ... yes ... I'm sorry ... we're (literally) cutting those (and real) trees down faster than any forest can grow. But, what the hell ... there's money to be made.

Yeah, the reason I sleep so well at night is because I know there are so many people out there who have it all figured out.

What are you giving up?

Yes, it's Lent ... the 40-day fast leading up to Easter. It's the time of fasting, of preparation, of ... well, my Christian friends should know what I'm talking about. Truth be told, it's them I think about most at such times.

Yes, I have quite a number of friends and acquantances who have accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior and who have been washed clean by the Blood of the Lamb and are ... according to them ... guaranteed a place in Heaven. Just like the guy who shot up those people at the Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado.

I know, I know ... I shouldn't be so cynical. You're right. I shouldn't be, but unfortunately, I can't help but be when confronted with ideas like that.

I have other friends, you know. Yep, friends who are intelligent, enlightened, awakened, who know that all that religion stuff if mumbo-jumbo and only science holds the keys to truth. Yes, these self-proclaimed Enlightened Ones also missed the quantum-physical revolution in which it became clear that matter is scientifically verified to be an illusion and something other than matter and alleged laws drive the universe. There is more than one form of superstition alive and well in the world.

If you think I'm picking on either of these groups, you would be sorely mistaken. I'm not. Why should I? As long as they believe what they believe and don't try to make others accept their own personal delusions and are not harming anyone, why should it bother me. At heart, they're all really nice people: friendly, generous in their own ways, and wanting nothing more that the world be less violent, unjust, and surreal than it is. Good luck.

Whether you think Easter is anything worth celebrating, it is, like Christmas (though under under names) a festival that has been celebrated since time immemorial. Yes, animistic, mythic, pagan, Christian ... it doesn't matter. At this time of year, somebody somewhere had some reason to celebrate and it's still around today. The "reasons" may be different, but we celebrate all the same. In times passed, people prepared for their celebrations. Today, well, we have no need to do anything we don't want to or don't feel like doing. We're free and liberated human beings -- or so we like to think -- and besides, we're going to Heaven anyway: after all, we said the right words in the right way at the right time in the right place. What could possibly go wrong?

There was (and still is) something of a reason for Lent, and an even more important reason for observing it. Even as obscure as it is, Lent is (yet another) opportunity to get in touch with your real you, the you inside, the you you've been avoiding as long as you've been alive, the you that's brought the world to the eve of destruction (to paraphrase and capitalize on a well-known oldie-but-goodie).

OK, giving something up for Lent won't save the world. I don't think it will even save just you alone. But giving things up, denying yourself something you really like, even if just for a short period of time, if done seriously, can help you get a different view of the world in which you find yourself. It doesn't hurt, and who knows what good might come of it.

Of course, if you already have a get-out-of-hell-free card it doesn't matter, just as it doesn't matter that you believe nothing at all. The real world, though, is still somewhere in-between, where the rest of us mere humans live.

Hold fast to your fast fast

It's not a good sentence (the title), but it's grammatically correct. That's what's so fascinating about language: the statement can be completely correct, but it means little, and sometimes nothing at all (as in, who can forget Chomsky's infamous "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously"? Whereby I find that particular sentence more poignant than many I've heard in the latest run-up to the primaries in America.) Yes, yesterday was the the kick-off, so to speak, and tomorrow is the big day: Tomorrow, Lent begins. Are you going to fast, or are you above all that? And, if you are, do you know why you are doing it? It's all not self-evident, you know, even if you think it's clear.

I don't know many people who fast anymore, other than for dietary reasons. It used to be that everyone fasted two days a week (Monday and Thursday, if you were Jewish; Tuesday and Friday, if Christian ... tells you something doesn't it?). At least for my Roman Catholic-influenced friends, bells should be ringing. What is more, there were particular times of year (for example, since we mentioned it recently, from 11 November till Christmas, and now Lent, prior to Easter ... which is also two times, which should also tell you something).

Some people will tell you that this was because food was scarce and it simply made good economic sense. Others will tell you, well, nothing, because they have no idea or never thought about it. Most people familiar with religion don't really know why these fasts were proclaimed, and the only ones we ever really hear about these days -- and this most often in an act of belittling and denigration -- is Ramadan, the great Muslim fast of the year. In a religious context, however, it was always about being aware of one's own body (and its needs) in contrast to the Spirit which was, at times, seen complementary to the body and since the rise of the Church (and certainly since Descartes) as its opponent, if not enemy.

When seen in such simplistic terms, I agree, we should just stomp it all into the wastebasket (dustbin, for my Anglo friends). This playing off of the body against the spirit was one way of looking at things, to be sure, and it served its purpose in its time, but we should be beyond that now. Having said that, though, we would be remiss in dismissing the spirit because it doesn't fit into our materialistic worldview. Even serious physicists have acknowledged that consciousness (yes, spirit) has an important and intimate relationship with matter. Perhaps it is time to start rethinking some of the things that we simply take for granted as true.

Body and mind are not a duality, they are part of a whole that is greater than either of them, a synergy, if you will. Our mind can affect our bodies (self-healing of congenital illnesses, psychosomatic illnesses) and our bodies certainly affect our minds (ever try to solve a life-crisis when you're ill?).

Fasting -- and there are many ways to describe it -- is, if properly understood, a way of reactivating the link between the physical and non-physical. Instead of merely thinking that this is another old custom that has outlived its usefulness, perhaps we should slow down, reconsider and recognize that there were good reasons for things long before we even knew what reasons were.

What about February's not to love

February's longer than usual this year. OK, OK ... it's longer than usual every four years. But, in my mind, leap years are nothing special: they're just a way to organize our precious calanders so that the appear to function. The sun revolves around the earth as it always has and how we mark those revolutions has changed throughout the millennia, but who cares about that? Certainly not many people I know. Hell, most people don't know why we count time the way we do, or how we decide what the "correct" time is (as if there were such a thing), or why Christmas is celebrated when it is (and I'm talking to my holier-than-thou Christian readers) or why we celebrate New Year's when we do, but all of that doesn't matter to the everyday, trying-to-keep-my-head-above-water workaholic that most of us have become.

Let's be honest, regardless of our alleged religious beliefs, we spend a whole lot of time just muddling through, trying to ensure we can pay the bills, and, if all goes well, have a bit or relaxation in-between. Let me let you in on a little secret: that's mere existence, it has nothing to do with living at all.

But, be that as it may ... in just a few days, the "Mad Season" will end. Of what do I speak? Allow me a little pointer toward another way to mark the days:

Way back in November, when Anglophones were pretending to care about those who died to bring us the freedom we never had, a simultaneous, mostly-unknown-outside-Germany event took place, but one much more to my liking: on the 11th day of the 11th month, at 11 minutes after the 11th hour, Karneval (as it's known in the Cologne region) or Fasching (as it's known most other places) begins. It runs from 11 November though Ash Wednesday, culminating of course on Rose Monday (the Monday before Ash Wednesday). Fasching is the season of fools, jesters, and all the critical insight that goes with them. (If you don't believe that fools are wise, read a couple of Shakespeare's tragedies, or do a bit of googling on "Till Eulenspiegel".) As for the States, it's called Mardi Gras, but unless you're from New Orleans, you probably don't know much about it anyway.

Though I'm not a big Fasching celebrator myself (it's much more popular in Catholic regions, since Ash Wednesday is a big day for Catholics, but not for Protestants), I'm glad it's still celebrated -- in all senses of the word -- here. There's a lot of silliness, and revelry, good, biting political cabaret, and music, and parades, and costumes, and the driving off of evil spirits, and things blatantly pagan masquerading within the bounds of good old Church tradition. We Americans, in particular, with our predilection to all things Puritanical and Calvinist miss out on all the fun. We like to think of ourselves a free spirits, but until you've been to Cologne on Rose Monday, you really don't know what you're talking about.

Of course, this year it will be different, but elucidating the reasons would detract from all the fun, and wouldn't most of us just prefer to have fun, regardless of what else is going on around us?

Groundhog Day redux

Though I've been accused of it again, I'm not going to bash Americans and their quaint customs. I did that already. OK, it really wasn't a bashing, but just about anything I say these days is taken by one of my fellow countrypeople as offensive. I wonder why they're so thin-skinned?

Personally, I think pseudo-holidays are fun. The only thing similar to Groundhog Day in these parts is Siebenschläfer (lit. "seven sleeper", that is the rodent glis glis, or the fat/edible dormouse (the Romans raised them and considered them a delicacy) ... not necessarily the one who told Alice anything, but perhaps), which is on 27 June (and if it rains on that day, it's supposed to rain for the next -- who would have guessed? seven weeks). But Siebenschläfer isn't as hyped and overdramatized, and it certainly was memorialized in film, as Groundhog Day.

OK, maybe because I was born and raised in Western Pennsylvania where groundhogs are not only cute but tasty (and that's for all you who rumpled your nose at the Romans) that I think it's kind of fun to pretend not to believe the nonsense, even though most people do.

It's OK, you can face up to it. Sure we don't "believe" any of this superstition, but when the day comes, we do stop and try to find out what's what. For most people, Phil's shadow or Siebenschläfter rain, tells the story. And don't give me any of that we're-all-into-science-and-not-superstition stuff. Didn't the US Senate just recently pass a resolution that disavowed the science of global warming? As if legislative votes had anything to do with any kind of reality known to the everyday person.

But inspite of all the denial, when it comes right down to it, when push comes to shove, when we have nothing less to raise as arguments, these are your elected representatives -- the "upper" house, no less -- and according to rules of democracy (which you all also claim to love so dearly and love proclaiming so loudly), whoever wins the election represents everybody, because, well, that's how the system works. Live with it. Should the world turn on its head and America fall to being just another failed empire, you'll all be guilty of whatever the new bad-boys on the block will want to accuse you of. If you don't believe me, just ask the Germans; they have some experience with this sort of thing.

And that's what I love about Groundhog Day. It keeps coming around again and again and again, and just as Bill Murry is a different person each time around, till he changes at heart, he really remains the same. And so is it with any and every empire that has ever plagued the earth. Oh, don't get me wrong, there is good in everything and good can come out of everything, but for the majority of people who have ever lived, we haven't been given the clean end of the stick. That, however, can, and should change. But, to effect that change, we have to start thinking (and acting) differently than we have before. We have to change at heart. Can you?