sonora2sonoma

hoomalimali
Photographer, poet, fellow traveler on the road of life.

  • Why We Have Paperweights

    hoomalimali

    Ever wonder why we have paperweights? I’ve been aware of the existence of paperweights since childhood; I even own a couple of them. The very term ‘paperweight’ explains itself quite handily, when you think about it. Except, if you think about it, why would we have need of paperweights today?

    Never before this morning have I questioned the need for paperweights, until now, while I was listening to my wife tell me about a cool-sounding glass paperweight she has at her office featuring a miniature scene of the city of St Louis, complete with hot-air balloons engraved inside, I found myself blurting out “why do we need paperweights, anyway?” She shot back, “maybe to keep things from blowing away?”

    Reasoning that office desks are customarily located inside buildings, and noting aloud that wind is not often encountered in such places, my response was,” well, it’s not likely to be windy inside.”

    Michelle proposed, while opening a web browser page on her computer, “let’s look it up.”

    The answer she found didn’t surprise us, yet it caused us both to laugh. The read-out, likely an artifact from a former time when people were less insulated from the elements and had to depend on unique responses to solve specific problems, read:

    “A paperweight is a small solid object heavy enough (usually a glass marble), when placed on top of papers, to keep them from blowing away in a breeze or from moving under the strokes of a painting brush (as with Japanese calligraphy).”

    Now you know!

    Tim Konrad

  • Something to Think About in this Era of Social Distancing

    hoomalimali

    The air upon which we, along with all other living beings, depend for our survival unites us all in our common oneness with all the earth’s creatures and serves as a reminder to those aware that with each breath we take in, we demonstrate that we’re all brothers and sisters joined in a common web of biodiversity of which each one of us is but a piece. As John Donne, the 17th Century metaphysical poet, reminds us, “no man is an island, entire of itself, every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.”

    The next line of Donne’s poem goes “if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less.”

    The belief that we are each separate beings, in possession of our own agency to act, is illusion, nothing more. Despite what we’ve been taught to the contrary, that which befalls the least among us, be it good fortune or bad, befalls the whole of us.

    That is the true meaning behind the idea of shared humanity: Mother Theresa knew this, Mahatma Gandhi knew it and Jesus Christ knew it too, as have all the mystics, sages and spiritual leaders down through the ages.

    And, somewhere, hidden deep within everyone’s ‘heart of hearts,’ each of us knows it too. The principal task of every person alive, with the short time we’re allotted on this troubled sphere, is to part back the veils of forgetfulness to once again reveal that which we’ve always known—that no point exists, physical or otherwise, where “I” end and “you” begin, and that, in our shared destiny, the actions of one affect the destinies of all.

    Tim Konrad

     

     

     

  • When ‘Normal’ No Longer Describes the Situation, It’s Time to Stop Pretending it Still Does

    hoomalimali

    I find it absolutely incredible how people—government officials, the press and the pubic, with relatively few exceptions—are pretending the government’s response to the coronavirus is normal, reasonable, adequate, sufficient, acceptable, you name it, when there is nothing acceptable, reasonable, adequate, sufficient or normal about it whatsoever. The surrealness of the entire scene, the absurdity of it all, is now approaching Fellini-like proportions. What in the world will it take for people to wake up and realize the utter ridiculousness of the spectacle unfolding before us?

    Watching the reporters at the daily presidential “press conferences” ask their questions with childlike naivete, as if they actually expect to receive answers that aren’t stained with trump’s characteristic fog of toxic bullshit and stupid, self-aggrandizing, superlative-ridden drivel is at once astonishing, enraging and sad beyond belief. Don’t these people realize that, by blindly playing along with this deadly game, they are lending a false sense of legitimacy to the fictional narrative being spun by this Rasputin-like master of deceit?

    The cognitive dissonance between trump’s useless utterances and reports on the ground that wholly contradict every fake reassurance, boast and promise he makes is staggeringly mind-numbing. It’s as if everyone’s brains have been consumed by zombies while they were sleeping.  The best science fiction writers could not have conceived of the dystopian world toward which we are all fast hurtling.

    The reporters in the White House Press Corps and their colleagues across the nation need to stop playing along with the circus in the capital and quit acting as if it’s just another day on the job. It isn’t!

    In a world where normal rules are no longer applicable, normal responses aren’t either!

    Tim Konrad

  • A Fake president & his Dark Comedy of Errors

    hoomalimali

    In his daily press conference just now, trump said he doesn’t think anyone has done as much in 3 1/2 years as he has done. True, if you insert the word “damage” just following the word “much.”

    Although the members of the press corps were seated today with a noticeable, if not six-foot distance between them, trump and the officials standing beside him were clustered just as close to one another as they were yesterday. So much for modeling social distancing, mr. president.

    Why this man refuses to treat the epidemic with the seriousness it warrants is deeply troubling and profoundly irresponsible.

    His attacks on the press, calling the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post dishonest in their reportage will only serve to encourage his supporters, as well as those on the fence about whom they should believe, to dismiss life-saving advice from authentic sources that, were they to follow it, would save lives and help blunt the rapid rise in reported cases.

    If the president’s actions weren’t considered beyond the reach of law enforcement, thanks to the attorney general, the damage being wrought by his woefully inadequate leadership in response to the epidemic and his campaign of minimization, misinformation and denial would warrant investigation by the justice department for possible charges of negligent homicide.

    Tim Konrad

     

  • trump now claims he ‘s known the virus was serious for some time

    hoomalimali

    trump is now claiming he’s known about the seriousness of the Covid-19 epidemic for a long time. This bit of cheeky, bald-faced mendacity begs the question why reporters even bother to engage in question and answer sessions with this man when it’s clear beyond all doubt that his words mean absolutely nothing. Perhaps if reporters were to present their questions to him as rhetorical in nature, the entire exercise would comport more consistently with reality.

    Below, for what it’s worth, which isn’t much, frankly, except for the irony and dark humor it contains, is a portion of today’s exchange on MSNBC between Kristin Welker and das Blödführer:

    Welker: “Some people did note that your tone seemed more somber yesterday, you talked about that August timeline . . did you see a projection some people thought perhaps that two million potentially that could die maybe prompted part of that. Was there a shift in tone?”

    trump: “I didn’t think, I mean I’ve seen that where people actually liked it but I didn’t feel different.  I’ve always known this is a real, this is a pandemic. I’ve felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic. All you had to do was look at other countries. I think now it’s almost 120 countries, all over the world. No, I’ve always viewed it as very serious yesterday. It was no different yesterday from days before. I feel the tone is similar but some people said it wasn’t.”

    Clear, as usual, from the president. Clear that he’s an utter fool monumentally ill-equipped for the role he’s bumbled himself into as “leader of the free world.”

    Tim Konrad

     

  • The New Normal

    hoomalimali

    The good advice being offered by folks on how to self-nourish the spirit and maintain a positive attitude is sorely needed during the crisis in which we now find ourselves, as is the call to look beyond personal need and fear and reach out to our brethren to make sure they’re ok and share our concern for their welfare.

    But we should also be realistic about what we are facing and muster the courage to prepare ourselves for what will in all likelihood become a new normal where the conditions under which we have become accustomed to living and have taken for granted to up to now will be forever altered going forward.

    This morning, as I was making my morning coffee while perusing the NYT on my iPad, I came across a column written by Paul Krugman making a case for the notion that Republicans leaders have demonstrated time and time again their ineptitude when it comes to fiscal policy.  As I read on, the realization slowly dawned on me that life-as-we-know-it has now become a thing of the past. It wasn’t the article in particular that triggered this insight, nor was it the incredibly inept response of the trump administration to the epidemic, especially and crucially early in the virus’s advance, when a responsible and well thought-out approach might have lessened the scope of the disaster we all now face. I believe it was the combined effect of those things with the growing list of measures being undertaken by state and local government officials, in consultation with public health officials, that led me to my realization.

    It doesn’t take a genius to foresee how these developments will bring indelible change—signs of this are already beginning to appear—to all our lives going forward, nor is it any stretch of the imagination to envision the lives that will likely be lost, the jobs that will  disappear, the businesses that will not survive and the foreclosures and evictions that will follow as a natural consequence of the inability of people who aren’t financially solvent to cover multiple months of rent or mortgage payments without an income source; the ranks of the homeless will doubtless increase thereby, which will further stretch the already anemic ability of government programs to aid them in their recovery.

    The profound economic damages that will result from what many economists expect will be a serious recession, coupled with poor monetary decisions made since the last crash that have allowed massive debt to once again pile up like it did preceding the last recession, foretell a frightening scenario. With interest rates now at near zero, there’s little further they can go.

    Government regulations, policies and protocols that will be lessened, suspended or waived in response to the emergency will, if history is any indicator, not be reinstated soon; some may never be. For the foreseeable future, concerns about the effects of climate change will lose prominence just when they ought to be taken more seriously.

    These effects will certainly endure longer than the remaining time most of those in my age bracket (70s) have left on this planet and will likely be felt by those remaining for a generation or more; our old, familiar landscape will be forever altered thereby. The belief that things will soon return to normal is based on naught but wishful thinking and is mythical at best.

    I realize these are sobering predictions, and I hope I’m wrong about them, but if they prove true, a clear-eyed peek around the corner should hopefully lessen the surprise and shock should they come to pass.

    Welcome to the new normal!

    Tim Konrad

  • Growing Up In Sonora

    hoomalimali

    Originally written 22 November 2015

    The house I grew up in had a large yard, the street behind it being the outermost of four streets that ran parallel to each other across the breadth of the gently sloping little valley that defined the environs of my neighborhood.

    Beyond the street behind my house lay an open stretch of hills, meadows and oak forest that extended for miles, relatively unobstructed by fences or buildings, toward the Sierras to our east. A rock wall, erected in the 1930s by the Works Project Administration, marked the boundary between my backyard and the world beyond. As the back street was above the level of our yard, access to it required scrambling up the wall the five or six feet to street level. Spaces between the rocks provided footholds making this climb easy for someone young and nimble to accomplish.

    The woods behind my house not only captured my imagination as a young boy but also featured largely in my dreams; those woods ultimately came to symbolize, as I now sit back and reflect, the vast, unknown, open page, or tabula rasa, of my life as it lay before me, yet unexplored and awaiting time and caprice for its unfoldment.

    I often and distinctly recall a moment sixty-plus years ago, when I sat perched atop that wall in reflection–if reflection is not an appropriate term to describe the musings of a boy of eleven, then musing most certainly is. It was the first day of summer vacation and the whole of my favorite season lay before me like an exciting and mysterious present yet unopened. Not only did I have a summer free of the duties, responsibilities and requirements of school to look forward to, I mused, but I also had my whole life ahead of me, with the reasonable and hopeful expectation that it might be blessed with longevity.

    I still remember how it felt to think these thoughts back then, similar to how I felt as a boy at Christmas-time when first seeing the tree ringed with presents, or the way it felt before taking that first bite of chocolate sundae at the ice cream shop. I’ve always savored the expectation preceding the experience, whatever the event itself might be. I still do so today; the promise, the mystery and excitement never cease to hold me in thrall.

    Now, as my number of days past exceeds those that lie before me, that moment on the wall seems more poignant than ever.

    As day turns into night, the dance of life and death, as with all the other dualities in life, denotes the beautiful yet frightening symmetry of all things. The poet and visionary William Blake perhaps said it best when he wrote, in his poem Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright “What immortal hand or eye could frame thy fearful symmetry?”

    But what once was hope need not become despair. It’s all a matter of perspective, really. Life truly is what one makes of it and tomorrow, if one chooses to see it as such, is another tabula rasa just as surely as it was to that eleven-year-old boy perched on that wall so long ago. Only now I have much more to reflect upon.

    Tim Konrad

  • The Persistence of the Pestilence That is trump

    hoomalimali

    I wrote this a year ago today about trump and his wall mania; except for the focus now being on the coronavirus, nothing’s changed; trump continues to make deplorable decisions and most of his supporters in congress continue to stand by him.

    Let’s stop and think about this for a moment. The little orange roughy wants a wall so he can tell his supporters he kept his word, never mind that Mexico was supposed to pay for it—also on his word, or that his word at this point means nothing since he lies almost every time he opens his mouth. And, since he overestimated the degree of influence he has over Mexico by about, say, 100%, he wants us taxpayers to pay for it, even though almost everyone agrees the wall will not stop the flow of drugs across the border, which is one of the main reasons the would-be dictator says a wall is needed, nor will it mitigate the impact of the hordes of Godless asylum-seekers marching northward, if only in his imagination.

    And the congressional Republicans—those stalwart upholders of mom, apple pie and unprecedented corruption—quick to approve every tax dodge but fiscal hawks when it comes to funding social programs or repairing crumbling infrastructure, are poised to allow this massive misuse of public funds, no matter its constitutionality, for no better reason than their continued obeisance to this fool has shrunk their cojones to the point where their voices are starting to change. They have hocked whatever vestiges remained of their integrity and good sense to avoid the dreaded wrath of an orangutan in a business suit who masks his insecurity with false bravado as he intimidates and threatens everyone foolish enough to think it matters what he thinks or says.

    I can’t help but wonder just what these people who hitch their wagons to the (t)rump train are thinking when they do so. Do they really believe whatever perceived gains they may achieve by associating with him will endure, or that they will be able to somehow get out of this unscathed? To witness otherwise seemingly intelligent and responsible people making such poor choices in full public view is not simply puzzling—it’s deeply disturbing! Common sense is anything but, and its absence among this lot proves the point admirably.

    Nancy got it right. He’s not worth it!

    Tim Konrad

     

  • Placing the Blame Where it Belongs

    hoomalimali

    I’m not one to immediately assign blame the first sign someone causes a big screw-up, but the current virus emergency ravaging our country and the world warrants suspension of all such restraints.

    The entire Covid-19 response would have arguably been handled in a vastly more professional manner had Senate Republicans done their duty and removed the mandarin orange menace from office when they had the opportunity to do so during his impeachment trial. By having failed at that task, they must now share the blame for the toll in human suffering and lives lost and the financial upheaval resulting from the pathetic third-world response our government has mounted thus far to combat the crisis.

    When the smoke has cleared and all the dots begin to be connected regarding the whys and wherefores of how testing kits were not made available for so long plus the confusing conglomeration of conflicting messages that have emanated from public health and other government officials, as will surely occur at some point, it should be made clear to all who the villains were in this fiasco.

    While trump will shoulder the lion’s share of the blame, senators the likes of Mitch McConnell, Lindsay Graham, Tom Cotton, Ron Johnson and John Kennedy of Louisiana, plus their accomplices, as well as Congressmen Kevin McCarthy Devin Nunes and Matt Gaetz are equally responsible for their complicity in the fiasco; if their involvement in this sordid affair is not addressed in federal court, it should definitely be addressed in the Court of Public Opinion, the ballot box.

    Tim Konrad

     

  • The Crazy Train Continues to Roll

    hoomalimali

    I wrote this a year ago today about trump and his wall mania; except for the focus now being on the coronavirus, nothing’s changed; trump continues to make deplorable decisions and most of his supporters in congress continue to stand by him.

    2020.03.13–Let’s stop and think about this for a moment. The little orange roughy wants a wall so he can tell his supporters he kept his word, never mind that Mexico was supposed to pay for it—also on his word, or that his word at this point means nothing since he lies almost every time he opens his mouth. And, since he overestimated the degree of influence he has over Mexico by about, say, 100%, he wants us taxpayers to pay for it, even though almost everyone agrees the wall will not stop the flow of drugs across the border, which is one of the main reasons the would-be dictator says a wall is needed, nor will it mitigate the impact of the hordes of Godless asylum-seekers marching northward, if only in his imagination.

    And the congressional Republicans—those stalwart upholders of mom, apple pie and unprecedented corruption—quick to approve every tax dodge but fiscal hawks when it comes to funding social programs or repairing crumbling infrastructure, are poised to allow this massive misuse of public funds, no matter its constitutionality, for no better reason than their continued obeisance to this fool has shrunk their cojones to the point where their voices are starting to change. They have hocked whatever vestiges remained of their integrity and good sense to avoid the dreaded wrath of an orangutan in a business suit who masks his insecurity with false bravado as he intimidates and threatens everyone foolish enough to think it matters what he thinks or says.

    I can’t help but wonder just what these people who hitch their wagons to the (t)rump train are thinking when they do so. Do they really believe whatever perceived gains they may achieve by associating with him will endure, or that they will be able to somehow get out of this unscathed? To witness otherwise seemingly intelligent and responsible people making such poor choices in full public view is not simply puzzling—it’s deeply disturbing! Common sense is anything but, and its absence among this lot proves the point admirably.

    Nancy got it right. He’s not worth it!

    Tim Konrad