I'm "Moving"

A few months ago, I started an account at a site called “Hubpages,” posting past blog entries to see if they could find some more readers. Click here for my Hubpages profile page. Recently, I have been getting more traffic with my Hubpages account than on this site, so I have decided to shut down this blog and publish exclusively over there. Some of these “hubs” will be (slightly revised) past blog posts, but I plan to keep writing new stuff as well.

If you scroll down on my Hubpages profile page, you will find a list of the articles that I have posted, with some of them arranged by general topic. You can also search my profile for certain topics, follow me, and subscribe to an RSS feed just like you might be doing with this blog. I also appreciate any comments, and if you click on ads or buy stuff from Amazon through my site, I will still make a little money. As always, thanks for reading, and I hope to “see” you over at Hubpages.

John Lennon (and Heroes)

This is an Elton John song dedicated to John Lennon. It was recorded a couple of years after Lennon's death.



I didn’t really get into music until I was in high school. Like many people that I have talked to over the years, high school was, by and large, a lonely time for me. Music therefore became a refuge, a means of both connecting to the world and escaping from it. This is why I would often gravitate toward songs that could be a bit on the depressing side. In both the lyrics and emotions expressed, I could personally relate to both the feelings and the message. Much of the stuff that I listened to, which can be loosely classified as “classic rock,” was already considered old at that time. The fact that some people my age saw it as old and outdated only added to the appeal. It was just one of many signs that I was deeper and smarter than they were.

Like many classic rock aficionados, the first band that I really loved was The Beatles. In my humble opinion, there is no rock band in history that produced such a wide variety of incredibly catchy songs. My favorites then, as now, came from their later period when the music became more experimental, no longer consisting of nothing but catchy love songs. And the most experimental of these songs tended to be written by John Lennon. In both lyrical content and style, his songs had an edge not found in most of Paul McCartney’s music. His voice also had a raspy, soulful, world-weary quality, the same difficult to define traits found in all of my favorite voices: John Fogerty, Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, etc.

With Lennon, however, it was more than just the music. In reading books about him and The Beatles, I found aspects of his personality that I thought were pretty cool: his sarcastic sense of humor, brutal honesty, liberal (“hippy”) idealism, and ability to recognize the silliness of his ridiculous level of fame. In many ways, he was a perfect hero for someone suffering from “teen angst.” He seemed able to see the stupidity all around him, and he was willing to take unpopular steps to make a better world, particularly with the various “publicity stunts” and songs designed to bring “peace.” As a kid growing up in the 1980’s who somewhat idealized the 1960’s, Lennon seemed to be the ultimate ‘60’s rebel hero.

So like many young people, I looked for heroes and tended to idealize them. Like Lennon, however, my childhood heroes were hardly perfect people: Magic Johnson, Bruce Springsteen, Babe Ruth, Jack London, J.D. Salinger, John Fogerty. Their primary appeal, however, was not the ethical quality of their lives. In an entertainment-crazed culture, my heroes became the best artists and athletes. I admired them for their remarkable talents, not for their general behavior. With Lennon, however, his flaws – drug use, infidelity to his wives, naïve idealism, occasionally foolish public statements – were almost part of the appeal. In his music and life, he could be so brutally open and honest, and agree with him or not, there was no denying the passion of his convictions. He put himself out on display, which was part of the reason why he provoked such strong positive and negative reactions. He made it more difficult for people to put him on a pedestal, a fact that could be annoying to those who did not want their heroes to be human.

A few days ago, people throughout the world were commemorating the 30th anniversary of Lennon’s death. No other entertainer, not even Elvis, can provoke such a reaction decades after his or her death. Some of this is due to circumstances. History is filled with examples of people who have become more deeply immortalized and idealized because they died a “martyr’s death.” If he were alive today, I wonder how much attention Lennon would still receive. How many more songs would he have recorded? Would he have reunited with The Beatles at some point? Would he still be out there today, fighting for “peace”? Or would he have gone back to what he did for most of the last five years of his life, staying at home as a full-time househusband? We will never know. But we can hopefully agree on one point. Whatever you think of Lennon’s politics and music, his murder, like all murders, was an unspeakable tragedy. And in his case, we lost a brilliant individual, a man whose youth could hardly be described as normal, just as he was reaching the age when most of us truly start to grow up.

Soccer Parents

I couldn't find a good soccer song, so I settled on this slightly cheesy tune that can make even the most masculine father choke up a little. Apparently, Darius Rucker, former lead singer of Hootie and the Blowfish, is now considered a country singer.

We just had a strange weekend. My younger daughter’s first ever soccer team was in an end-of-the-year tournament, so we were guaranteed to have two games on Saturday and at least one on Sunday. If her team did well and advanced to the semifinals, we might end up playing two additional games on Sunday. I had some conflicting feelings. My rational self wanted her team – and especially her personally - to do well, but not well enough to advance. After all, I did not want the entire weekend eaten up with soccer games. But then the games started, and my emotional self took over. So as I found myself yelling, jumping up and down, and exhorting her team to victory, it became clear that it is impossible to root against your child. This episode, then, can be added to a long list of irrational behavior carried out on behalf of my kids. It was more evidence that the state of parenthood can be classified as a mild form of insanity.

After winning two of the first three games, we advanced to the semifinals on Sunday afternoon. Her team outplayed the opponent, but the game ended in a one-one tie. The game then proceeded to one of the most unjust procedures in sports: penalty kicks. Five different players per team get one shot each, and most goals wins. For the first time, my wife got to experience what I feel when watching a Laker playoff game. Luckily for us, the other team relied heavily on a couple of great players. So after those two made their goals, the rest of their team missed. Three of our kids scored, so it was on to the finals.

My daughter would now have a chance to play a night game under the lights. And to make things more interesting, it rained pretty heavily off and on throughout the game. In the first half, there were a few close calls, but neither team was able to score. Then, in the third quarter, the other team managed to punch one through. I figured that this was the beginning of the end. Our girls were looking tired. It was, after all, their third game of the day and fifth of the weekend. But then, halfway through the fourth quarter, one of our best players managed to get a ball past the goalie from an almost impossible angle. Suddenly, there was hope again, but that would be the last goal of the day. Believe it or not, it was another one-one tie. This time, because it was the championship game, they decided to play a sudden death overtime period. Five minutes were played, and it was still a tie. Now if this was earlier in the day, it wasn’t raining, and there wasn’t another team waiting to play their championship game, then they might have played more overtimes with various scenarios that would make a goal more likely. But time had run out, so it was time for more penalty kicks. Believe it or not, each team made four of their five shots. So now it was sudden death penalty kicks involving the players who were not as good. Our sixth kicker barely missed, and the other team’s made it, and it was finally over.

So as this epic battle raged, I could not help standing there in the rain wondering what the hell we were doing. I was cold, wet, and my feet hurt from a whole day of standing and screaming. The kids, of course, had to be in more pain than I was. And yet, at the same time, as I watched those little girls playing their hearts out in the mud, I couldn’t help thinking, “It doesn’t get any better than this.” This was clearly a game – and a day - that we will remember for the rest of our lives. And hopefully, both of our daughters will have fond memories of their parents standing and yelling, hour after hour, rain or shine.

 
After a game and weekend like this, it was hard to see any player in this game as a loser. In sports, however, even with seven and eight-year olds, there can be only one official winner. But even the most chronically hyper-competitive parent had to take pride in the performance of everyone involved. After the game, there was a little ceremony where everyone received her first and second-place medals. And as my daughter carefully clutched her little medal under her jacket in order to make sure that it didn’t get wet, I knew that she would be looking forward to the next soccer season. Hopefully, she doesn’t expect to play in a championship game every year. Games like that don’t come along very often. That is probably a good thing. I don’t know if I could take it.

Can I Still Relate to Students?

A song about remembering our youth. There is something to be said for being young and "impractical."

I have almost reached a point in my life where I have been a teacher longer than I was ever a student. So soon, I will have given more tests than I ever took, delivered more lectures than I attended, and handed out more grades than I ever received. (That last one became true some time ago.) As time passes, it becomes more difficult for me to relate to students, particularly eighteen-year-old freshmen. Sure, I have some vivid memories of my early days as a college student. I remember being very nervous about the first college tests that I ever took, assuming that it would be infinitely harder than those easy high school exams. I remember how difficult it was to adjust to the idea of registering for individual classes each semester, always afraid that I would either sign up for the wrong classes or be unable to get the ones that I needed. And don’t get me started about the standard fears of an eighteen-year-old: What did I really want to do for a living? When will I stop getting zits? Has that girl in the second row noticed that I exist?

These memories, however, become more distant over time. Today, when I look back to my past, it feels like I am reflecting about a different person. I can no longer see the world through the eyes of my former self. And if I am unable to fully empathize with my former self, than how can I view the world through the eyes of modern day freshmen that have had various experiences so different from my own? I had things pretty easy in college. Mom and dad paid most of the bills, and I could focus my attention on classes (along with some other “extracurricular” activities). A lot of these kids are working full-time, dealing with family issues, having medical problems, and wondering how long they can even keep going to college.

I used to laugh at the old people complaining about the youth. Now, I sometimes find myself feeling the same way as those “old” folks. I often wonder what the heck these young people could possibly be thinking. Don’t they understand that skipping classes, ignoring reading assignments, wandering in late (and/or leaving early), and showing up to class without so much as a pencil in their hands will lead to failure? Don’t they realize that drinking oneself into oblivion the night before a test is a bad study strategy? Have they not learned that taking a class that you put no effort into passing is a waste of time? Once you have taught for a while, you can understand why some people in this profession became a bit burned out and disgruntled. You also tend to think that students are completely responsible for their failure, and they should have the common sense to understand what it takes to succeed in college.  It’s easy to forget that there may be many factors contributing to their struggles, and that being a student can at times be exhausting, boring, and extremely stressful.  It’s also easy to forget that we all did some pretty dumb things when we were younger.

 
Is the ability to empathize with students a necessary quality in an effective teacher? I hope not. As time passes, I will only get older, and young people growing up in a world very different from the one that I knew will seem even more foreign. Still, there are some difficulties faced by young people that are both timeless and universal. If nothing else, trying to remember some of our youthful struggles, and attempting to view our classes through the eyes of students, can reduce the chances that we teachers will get burned out. Remembering that a lot of us old people turned out OK in spite of ourselves can make us more optimistic about the current crop of kids.

Necessary Drudgery

Here's a song about the difficulties faced by a rock star, one of the most common "dream jobs." 

 

In the past week or so, I have given out six tests, with four of them requiring students to write two essays each. It is only during these grading binges that a slight part of me wishes that I had either chosen a different career or was a firm believer in multiple-choice exams. After reading more than three hundred essays in a short period of time, and then punching in the scores on the Excel spreadsheet, the job can feel a bit like drudgery.

Now don’t get me wrong. I like just about every aspect of teaching. But like everyone else, I imagine, I grew up with more romantic notions regarding my future career. Truth be told, my dream job is still to be a player in the NBA. I started shooting baskets from practically the day that I could walk, and after countless hours of shooting on my driveway over the course of many years, I was pretty damn good.  I was also very good at inventing scenarios while shooting in which I was the dominant player in an imaginary basketball league. The only problem was that there was not a big market for five foot seven inch white guys in the NBA. So my dream of being a famous basketball player or athlete of any kind was dead by high school.

Of course, when I stop and think about it, there are probably moments when Kobe Bryant or Lebron James has doubts about his career choice. Sure, they get to play a game that they love for a living, are paid obscene amounts of money, and experience amazing moments of glory in front of a live, worldwide audience. Their job, however, is not all fun and games. To maintain their skills, they have to spend countless hours practicing repetitive drills and working out. But the hard work of improving their skills is only one difficulty that they face. They also have to spend countless hours traveling on buses and airplanes, answering questions from annoying reporters, and being away from friends and family. And if you become famous enough, it is difficult to go out in public like a normal person without being mobbed by admirers. In some ways, modern day celebrities are trapped by their fame.

There may be a dream job out there that is nothing but big money, international fame, interesting activities, and/or adventure. But I can’t think of any offhand. Virtually every famous writer, actor, athlete, doctor, CEO, spy, fireman, or any person living someone’s “dream job” had to put up with many hours of drudgery to get to where they wanted to be. Then, even after reaching their goal, they must continue doing some things that they would prefer to avoid. Failure generally results from more than a lack of talent. It comes from an unwillingness to put up with some necessary drudgery. 

So during those moments when I cannot imagine reading even one more essay about Andrew Jackson, I try to remember a few things. First, doing any job well requires the performance of a certain amount of mundane activities. Second, I try to remember why I give essay questions. If I want to teach something that is more than a memorization class, I need to ask the types of questions that do not work in a multiple-choice format. And finally, I think of all the things that I like about my job: the chance to perform, share what I have learned, be creative, have flexible hours, and get the sense of satisfaction that can only come from reading a really good essay response.

Happy Halloween

When I asked my kids what video to include with a post on Halloween, they quickly suggested this one. For a kid like me who grew up in the 1980's, there could be no other.

Halloween was one of the highlights of childhood. Virtually every child, after all, welcomes the opportunity to get boatloads of free candy from throughout the neighborhood. The dressing up in costumes and carving faces into pumpkins were just an added bonus. When I became a teenager, however, Halloween started to lose much of its magic. Sure, there would be some good parties and occasionally decent costumes during my young adult years, but nothing can really compare with the joy of getting free candy when you are a child. So Halloween evolved into just another day on the calendar.

But then my wife and I eventually decided to have children, and once they were old enough to walk, the childhood ritual of trick or treating was back. Only this time, I experienced the joy of Halloween vicariously. Like many of the experiences of parenthood, Halloween became a chance to do it all over again.

One of the great things about kids is their ability to become completely absorbed into the moment and become excited about what is happening with every fiber of their being. For some reason, we tend to lose some of this capacity as we become adults. Some of this is the result of self-consciousness. We worry about what other people are thinking, fearing what may happen if we let too much emotion show. This is not an entirely bad thing. Children’s ability to show emotions very freely can be cute when they are happy, but when they get upset in public, it can be a complete nightmare. And happy or sad, the general noise level produced by children can be irritating to those not accustomed to it.

Older people’s lack of spontaneous emotional expression, however, can also be the result of experiences just getting old. When many years pass, many of the simple joys in life can lose their freshness. Thankfully, many of us adults eventually get the chance to have kids, and through their eyes, we can sometimes recapture those moments when everything was new.

Unfortunately, many of us parents can be tempted to take living vicariously too far. Through our children, we may try to achieve goals that we were unable to fulfill personally. So we may push our kids to be great athletes, musicians, students, doctors, or any other number of things. We justify this by saying that we want the best for them, an assertion that is somewhat true. But on some level, our goals can be rooted in selfishness, and we look forward to the opportunities to brag about our kids and show everyone what great parents we are.

If we push our kids too hard, we are in danger of wiping away that natural childhood enjoyment of life. Activities that they may have initially enjoyed become a chore, and they start to become one of us boring adults far too early. So here’s hoping that there are some parents out there, myself included, who are able to step back from time to time and let kids enjoy themselves. We have as much to learn from them as we have to teach.

So tomorrow night, I will do my best to look at life through the eyes of my children. And maybe, just maybe, I can score a piece of candy or two from their plastic pumpkin bucket when they are not looking. Don’t worry. It will be just a little taste. Old people like me get a little nauseous when they eat too much of that candy stuff.

I Might as Well Dance

A song from the time period when I should have been a teenager.



My wife is trying to put together a group of people to go dancing on Friday night. There is a club where they play ‘80’s music on Fridays, and if there is a musical era for my generation, that would be it. (Never mind that I generally listen to music either pre- or post-eighties.) If the DJ at this club does his or her job correctly, I will be transported back to an era of big hair, bad clothes, strange videos, and synthesizers blaring in the night.

Before I graduated from college, I generally avoided dancing whenever the opportunity presented itself. This was partly the result of my inherent whiteness. I also lacked any proper training in dancing techniques, making my ethnic lack of rhythm more difficult to hide. Much of my reluctance, however, was more about self-consciousness than lack of dancing skill. Many of my dancing friends, after all, were not exactly God’s gift to choreography. They seemed less concerned, however, with the possibility of making an ass of themselves. As time has passed, I have become more like those dancing maniacs throwing caution and self-respect to the wind. Part of this is a result of aging. For some reason, the older that you get, the less you tend to worry about what others think of you. It may be a part of the natural process of becoming old and, therefore, uncool. Standing in front of people talking all day also tends to wipe away inhibitions. Screwing up on occasion is unavoidable, and you realize that looking stupid is not a big deal.

I have also learned over time that the opinions of most people are not worth very much. And even more importantly, most people are not paying much attention to me anyway. They are generally too busy thinking about themselves and the details of their lives to notice me for any significant amount of time. And if a person does on occasion think about me or anyone else, he or she is often, like everyone else, self-consciously worrying about the opinions of others. So if the opinions of others have little impact on me, and if they are probably too busy to notice me anyway, I may as well get out and dance. Once I learned to ignore my inhibitions and give in to this urge, I found that it was actually pretty fun. I have always loved music, so if I relax and let myself go, dancing actually comes (somewhat) naturally. Believe it or not, I have actually been complimented a few times for my “skills.” For a semi-self-conscious, uptight, white boy, I’m apparently not too bad.

This Too Will Pass

Here's an old Peter Gabriel song for people in the middle of hard times.



On Thursday afternoon, two days before my brother-in-law’s wedding, my stomach decided to stop functioning properly. I will spare you the gory details, but let’s just say that the idea of food was not particularly appealing for a while. When in that state, even the thought of my favorite foods was nauseating. Of course, I knew from past experience that everything would soon be back to normal. So sure enough, by Saturday, I was able to eat, drink, be merry, and dance as only a white boy can.

Today, it is over one hundred degrees outside. In the valleys and deserts of southern California, this is standard weather. Near the coast, however, extremes of weather are pretty rare, so it does not take much to get us Orange County people to start bitching about the heat. After a few days of this, it can be hard to envision a future in which I will be crazy enough to put on a jacket, wear long pants, or turn on a heater. Of course, in parts of the country where they have actual winters, it can probably be difficult at times to imagine ever being warm again. Even in Southern California, where winter is a slightly cooler version of spring, there are times where I long for a warm, sunny day. When we are in the middle of something, it’s hard to imagine that things could ever be different. This is in spite of the fact that we all know from past experience that life goes in cycles, and no matter how bad things may seem, the only guarantee for the future is change.

Right now, our country is in an extended economic winter. Fortunately, I have been spared (so far) from many of the negative effects of the current recession. Many others, of course, have not been so lucky. And while history may provide little immediate comfort, the fact is that economic cycles have been a reality of life for centuries. This is why you should never get too excited during the good times or depressed during the bad. It will always turn around, one way or the other. Unfortunately, it does not feel that way when you are still at the bottom. Now I could say that I know how struggling people feel, but that would be a lie. Neither I nor anyone else can figure out how someone is feeling at a given moment. Every situation is unique, and no one can (nor should) be talked out of his or her current emotional state. You literally have to be there, and reason in itself is not enough to get you out. But so long as the emotional problem is not physiological, reason can stop the emotions from taking over completely. Thinking back to times when you ate normally, were nice and warm (or cool), and had a (seemingly) secure job can also be helpful. Since life goes in cycles, there is no reason to believe that the bad times will last forever.

100th Postiversary

Here's a happy song - reminiscent of what the Allman Brothers used to do - about moving forward.

A few months ago, a friend of ours called and invited us to go with him and his mom to see his cousin performing in a two-man show. His cousin and a friend had flown in from Chicago to perform in a festival of plays being put on in a bunch of L.A. theaters. Since we had not done anything like this for a while, we decided to drop off the kids at the grandparents and check it out. After fighting the traffic, locating the theater, and figuring out where the heck to park, we walked in a little late. The theater, it turns out, was about the size of one of my classrooms, and upon our arrival, we doubled the size of the audience.

Immediately after sitting down, I wondered what the two performers were thinking. First of all, our friend’s cousin must have wondered who the heck these people were with his relatives. Second, it must have been a little strange and disheartening to travel across the country and be performing in front of almost no one. But still they pressed on, obviously pouring their hearts out in performing this series of skits that they had clearly worked very hard to create. I couldn’t help but be impressed, and not just because it was a pretty good show. In my mind, anyone who is willing to pour out that kind of an effort in front of any sized audience deserves some respect. And the small size of the audience, rather than diminishing their efforts, made the performance all that more impressive. Whether performed in front of eight or eight thousand, there is intrinsic value in the act of performing. There is definitely something to be said for creating art for art’s sake.

This is my one-hundredth post on this blog. Some have been viewed well over one hundred times and others have been read far less. And if anything, the number of views has by and large been decreasing lately. Whatever dreams I had of building a big audience and generating a little extra revenue may be impractical, and there have been times where I have asked myself if this whole enterprise is worth the time. But then I think back to those guys in L.A., and it reminds me of something very simple. Writing in itself is a worthwhile activity, even if only a relatively small number of people get anything out of what I post here. If nothing else, this blog has helped me to exercise a part of my mind that was somewhat dormant for several years, and I have been compelled to ask myself repeatedly what I actually believe about some very complicated political, historical, educational, and philosophic issues. Hopefully, a few readers have been nudged toward reevaluating and putting into words their own beliefs as well.

So the plan is to start working toward my next one hundred posts. We shall see if I run out of ideas before then, burn out, or get distracted by the oncoming basketball season. Whatever happens, I will not base my choices regarding future writing on the apparent size of my electronic audience, and if this blog, like most blogs, never makes anything approaching real money, oh well. I will think of it as an electronic journal, sitting on a virtual outdoor desk, open to anyone on the planet who comes by through cyberspace and takes a look.

Luck: The Key to Success

Here's a "bleeding heart liberal" song from the 1960's, sung by one the great voices of the time.



"I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all. Moreover, no man knows when his hour will come: As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds taken in a snare, so men are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them."  (Ecclesiastes 9: 11-12)

For the first time, after about ten years of college teaching, I have a blind student in one of my classes this semester. After each of the first two class meetings, I talked to him for a while in order to figure out what he might need in order to make the class more accessible. In one of these conversations, he mentioned that he had only been blind for about three years. When I asked him what happened, he said that he just woke up one morning blind. The doctors said that it was the result of glaucoma, but prior to this time, there had been no indication of a problem.

A few thoughts flooded through my mind after this conversation. The prevailing thought, however, was that life is basically a crapshoot. Three years ago, without any warning, this man woke up blind. Meanwhile, I woke up on that same day just as any other day. I still get to see sunsets, my children smile, Laker games, and racquetballs flying toward me. He will most likely never again have the opportunity to see the people and things that he loves, and he never got the chance to take one last look around. Now some would say that there is some sort of meaning in all of this. It is all a part of some divine plan, and I should be thankful for my many blessings. But personally, I have trouble being thankful that someone else became blind instead of me, and any claims to finding meaning or patterns in the chaos seem like intellectual suicide.

My good fortune, however, does not end with my continuing ability to see. I was, after all, born healthy to a middle-class, loving, American family in the late 20^th century. If you were to change even one of the circumstances just listed, then I am probably not sitting here typing this blog. If I were born prior to the 20^th century, then there is a good chance that I would have been dead before the age of five. If I were born to abusive parents, in a poverty-stricken nation, or with a physical or mental disability, then my life today – if I were still around – would be quite different. By any reasonable standard, I won the lottery. And while I have worked hard to achieve a certain amount of success, my fate is largely due to luck, and my future prospects were somewhat determined on the moment that I was first conceived. Of course, as the blind student in my class discovered, your luck can change at any moment.

So what does one do with this not so comforting reality? Clearly, my new student has decided to keep on living by pursuing a college degree. I should take my cue from him. Instead of wallowing in guilt and pity in response to those who are less fortunate, I should take advantage of my good fortune and make myself useful. My new student, along with all who suffer from misfortune, does not need my pity. He needs me to help him learn some history.

So the next time that you see me on this blog complaining a bit too much about the lingering pain in my left arm, my inability to land a full-time job, or a shortage of adequate writing time, feel free to electronically slap me upside the head. There are, after all, a lot of people out there with some real problems.

A Quick Blog Update

Only the title of this song - "Time for Change" - has anything to do with this post. Mostly, I chose this song because this blues band of young siblings is fantastic.



Since I started this blog about nine months ago, I have had a lighter teaching schedule than normal. Outside of the drop in income, it’s been nice having a lighter load, and I have used some of my extra time writing like crazy on this blog. But my full schedule for the fall started this week, and I will be teaching seven classes at three different schools. So free time may be a bit scarcer, and 10-12 posts a month will be a tough pace to maintain.

About a month or two ago, I noticed that the number of visitors to this blog was dropping a bit anyway, so I started reevaluating my online writing strategy. I then discovered “Hubpages,” a social networking site and writing platform designed for people like me who are writing as a hobby and/or want to make some money from their efforts. For various reasons, I think that it might be a better platform than this blog for reaching a larger audience. So I’ve been going back through some of my old posts, making some updates and revisions here and there, and posting them on “Hubpages” to see what happens. Like with blogging, it takes some time to let people know that I exist, so it’s too early to know if this will lead anywhere. But as I invest my newly limited time revising, posting, and promoting the older material, it leads less time for brand new stuff.

So the moral of the story is that I will be posting things on this blog, at least for a while, somewhat less often than in the past. But if you are a new visitor, or only found your way here recently, I have a whole mess of posts listed on the blog archives to the right. (Or just type something of interest in the search box to see if I ever wrote about it.) I’m also sure that people who have been visiting for a while can find some stuff that they missed the first time.

You can also check out my new account at Hubpages. Here is the link to my profile page. (It can also be found at the top of this blog.) I have also put links to a couple of my “hubs” at the bottom of this post. (You don’t need to join Hubpages to read them.) Thanks in advance for any feedback that you can give. And if you like anything that you read, tell a friend. Who knows; maybe you will end up helping a formerly (and possibly future) semi-starving teacher (and “wanna-be” writer) make a little extra money. Thanks for reading.

Here are a couple of links to my "hubs":

Creation / Evolution Debate and Public Education

Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and the Meaning of Holidays

A Little Thought About Judging Others

This song from my favorite Creedence Clearwater Revival album is about all of the "little people" that we tend to take for granted each day.



As I get older – and particularly since I started this writing experiment – I find myself dealing with two sets of competing thoughts and emotions. On the one hand, I seem to get less tolerant of ideas that seem so obviously irrational and stupid. Often, these ideas are rooted in tradition and/or convention, and their adherents are either unable or unwilling to ask themselves if these beliefs make any sense. They are content to just mindlessly follow their herd of choice. But on the other hand, I also find myself mellowing out a bit and becoming more tolerant of thoughts and behaviors that I do not personally believe or practice. I get frustrated with humanity a little less often than I used to, and I generally let more things slide. So which tendency is going to win?

I have heard it said that if you are torn between choosing either justice or mercy, you should err on the side of mercy. So instead of focusing on the negative aspects of a person, I try to focus on one central question: is this person doing any significant harm? It’s so easy to get caught up in judging people by rather high standards. But in a world filled with rapists, murderers, thieves, and other scumbags, it is important to commend those who avoid these blatantly evil acts. Following the laws – at least the big ones – and generally respecting the rights of others are actions that we tend to take for granted. Instead of being grateful for all of the people who leave us alone each day, we tend to notice those few who either get on our nerves or, occasionally, do us actual harm.

Now one might argue that a lot of those people who do no significant harm are also doing little that is uniquely positive and good. It is also true that many law-abiding citizens behave and think in some strange, irrational, and stupid ways. But I can try to live with those facts. Given the various forms of evil that are out there, I should be grateful to anyone who is nice enough to not intentionally harm me. And if a person actually has some moments of real goodness, that is just an added bonus. Expecting too much more of the human race will only lead to frustration, cynicism, and some long, angry blog posts.

Pain Relapse

Here's a catchy little song about hoping for a better future.

I’ve been having one of my periodic chronic pain relapses over the last week or two. (Click here for a past post that provides more details.) The culprits these days have been my left arm and shoulder. I haven’t played any racquetball for a while, and at times, it even hurts to type. So some writing ideas that have been floating around in my head will have to wait, and I will be keeping this short.

It is only at times like these that I fully appreciate the blessings of good health. So if you have been feeling healthy lately, be sure to do something active each day in order  to take advantage of your good fortune. Hopefully, if the chiropractic adjustment sticks, I will be doing the same soon, and I will be able to get back to some more serious writing in the near future.

Help, I've Been Plagiarized!

I picked this song for three reasons. First, I have never posted an Allman Brothers song, which is just wrong. Second, it has amazing guitar work by Duane Allman and Dickey Betts. Third, it is about a man who is about to get caught cheating.



About a year ago, I started writing education related essays in the hopes of compiling a book someday. When I told people that I was enjoying this new writing hobby, some suggested that I should start a blog. While recognizing that this would be an easy way to get my writing out there, I also thought that blogs were a strange concept. You write all of this stuff, and then you give it away for free. Why would people ever pay you to write what they can get for nothing, and what’s to stop people from just taking your words and/or ideas and publishing them as their own? In theory, of course, you could “monetize” your blog, and if you ever got a decent amount of traffic, it could turn into a little money. Also, in theory, people are not supposed to steal your work. Blogs are copyright protected, and there are tools to search the web in order to find out if someone is posting your words. Proving that someone took your ideas, however, could be a bit tricky. Still, I decided to plow forward about eight months ago. After all, how else could a person with no writing experience get himself so easily “published”? I could have kept my ideas “secret” until a book was put together. The odds, however, of an unknown essay writer like me finding a willing publisher and paying readers seemed pretty slim. And so here I am, having a great time sending my thoughts out into “the cloud.”

A couple of days ago, I joined “Hubpages,” a popular site where millions of users share articles with one another. After a couple of days of posting “hubs” and of doing a little browsing in order to see how the site works, I am thinking that it may be a better platform than this blog for sharing some of my stuff. (Here's a link to my profile.) There was a little problem, however. For three of the four hubs that I posted, I received a “duplicate” warning. This was not a big surprise or major issue. After all, everything that I posted had previously appeared on this blog, and posting duplicates is not against their rules. The only problem, apparently, is that it lowers something called your “hubscore.” So I decided to email the site and let them know what was happening. When I received their reply, however, I found out to my surprise that my posts were duplicates from two sites: first my blog, which I expected; and second, some mystery site with a business sounding name. Out of curiosity, I clicked on the link that they sent me, and there was one of my blog posts, copied word for word on to some site called “Finance / Go for Gold.” After doing a little browsing on this mystery site, two things became clear: there was no source or author listed for any of the works on the site, and this was not the only one of my posts copied. It turns out that this site had posted practically everything on this blog that was related to either politics or economics. (Here’s a link to the site and one of my copied posts.)

My reactions varied. On the one hand, I was a little bit flattered. No one, after all, had ever cared enough to plagiarize me. I also noticed that some of my posts had a fair number of clicks, so some people out there are unknowingly reading my words. (Of course, the site looks kind of crappy, so I’m not that flattered.) But on the other hand, this was a confirmation of my previously stated fears. I have been chasing this crazy dream that writing could become a second career of sorts, supplementing my inconsistent adjunct faculty income. Meanwhile, here is a site (from China apparently) trying to benefit in some way from my hard work. How am I supposed to get off of the ground if people can so easily steal my stuff? I guess that this is what people mean when they say that they “feel violated.” Luckily, I have not been the victim of any kind of significant theft in my life, so this is a little shock to the system. And I can’t help wondering if there are plenty of other characters out there doing this kind of thing to myself and to other hard-working bloggers in the world.

I have now been officially welcomed to the internet age. Like everything else, the World Wide Web can be a great tool for good or evil. It creates unlimited opportunities for people to communicate. Some use it to publish their thoughts, start legitimate businesses, and find others who share their interests. Others use it to break copyright laws, post disgusting videos, and plan terrorist attacks.

I’m still pondering my next course of action. My first priority is to get that duplicate warning removed from my “hubs.” From corresponding with the “Hubspace” people, it seems that they are probably willing to do it. Most likely, I will start focusing more of my attention on that site when posting in-depth, longer essays on history, politics, and more academic topics. Future would be plagiarizers might be more reluctant to copy material from such a well-visited site. “Hubspaces” has also been nice enough to give me some courses of action for dealing with copyright infringement. If there are any internet experts or lawyers out there, I am open to suggestions. And if you are a blogger who writes on political or economic topics, you might want to click on the link to “Finance / Go for Gold.” Who knows? Your words may be more “famous” than you are, and you may even be helping someone else earn a little money.

My Front "Lawn"

This little song by Pete Seeger satirized the suburban culture of tract housing communities that developed in the late 1940's and 1950's. In addition to mocking conformity, it pokes fun of our desire for status and acceptance. 

The title of this post is misleading. After all, the greenish collection of plant species that covers much of our front yard does not quite qualify as a lawn. It is more of a random assemblage of weeds with some patches of grass thrown in. Now don’t get me wrong. It doesn’t look all that bad. We pay gardeners to mow the lawn once a week and to keep our flowery bushes trimmed. So as long as the weekly mowing routine has not been disrupted by rain or holidays, things look neat, trim, and somewhat green and grass-like. And so long as people only see it from a distance while driving by or pay scant attention while strolling past our home, they will not be aware of the true nature of our “lawn.” But if anyone stops and looks for some strange reason, or, heaven forbid, if guests walk onto the lawn and discover the prickly little weed balls that stick to anything that moves, then they will recognize our somewhat dried out weed farm for what it really is.

This is not entirely our fault. When we moved into the house, the plants right in front of the house were overgrown, and the previous owners had clearly done little in the way of lawn care. So we have managed to plant some new plants, keep trim the previous inhabitants, and lay out some of those brick thingies to create a separation between “lawn” and plants. But I have not been willing to pay the cost in terms of labor or money to rip out the accumulated plant life of several decades and lay down a new lawn. So I try to water two or three times a week to create the appearance of green grass, and we get a good deal paying those guys to hide the weeds by keeping them short.  It could be greener, but two factors keep me from watering more often. First, there is the simple fact that I have other stuff to do, and second, I know in the back of my mind that watering only encourages further weed growth. If I know that I am not doing lawn care correctly, then why do it at all?

If a bunch of money ever comes our way for some reason, then I will immediately get someone to install both a sprinkler system and a proper front lawn. Or, if we suddenly get really rich, we could just forget the current house all together and find another one with proper grass and irrigation. This fantasy that I often indulge when standing outside with a hose, however, forces me to ask a simple question. Why the hell do I care about the appearance of my “lawn”? How will green, “weedless” grass enhance my life?

I often like to pat myself on the back for being a person who does not care about the accumulation of material things and the luxury and status that they provide. I am just so damn down-to-earth and insightful, seeing right through the American delusion that happiness comes from accumulating stuff. So obviously, my desire for a nice lawn must be my innate love of nature and appreciation for beautiful things. I just want to lay down on the soft green grass, sniff my beautifully manicured flowers, and share all of this beauty with those who are fortunate enough to either pass by or visit. The only problem with that explanation is that it is largely a bunch of crap. The simple truth is that I want to make a positive impression with my home, and much of this desire, as much as I don’t want to admit it, is rooted in a desire for status.

Whenever I visit someone who has a nicer house than ours, I feel a tinge of jealousy. This only gets worse, of course, if they have a nice flat screen, a fancy kitchen, and if the place is obnoxiously clean. I feel similar emotions when I get a taste of luxury at a fancy event or during those rare occasions when we stay in a nice hotel or go to an expensive restaurant. I can’t help thinking, “Wouldn’t it be nice to do this all of the time, and wouldn’t it be cool if there were people out there who were jealous of me?” Apparently, the score is materialistic, status-loving American culture: one, Paul Swendson: zero.

It’s all a bit pathetic. I am, after all, a person who tries to keep up on current events and who has read quite a bit of history. I am well aware of the fact that I am, by any reasonable standard, already living a life of luxury. My house has running water, electricity, air conditioning, DSL, and DirecTV, so how the hell can I be bitching about my “lawn”? Fortunately, the rational part of my mind generally wins out over that whining, emotional, jealous part. This is why I don’t become a workaholic or take drastic steps toward changing my career in an effort to make more money, indulge in luxury, and show off my success. I can’t control my irrational, competitive, self-centered emotions. But I can control my behavior and recognize these emotions for what they are.

Watering our “lawn” isn’t all that bad anyway. It’s a chance to get outside and get in touch with nature for at least a few minutes a day. For a spoiled urbanite like myself, it’s the closest that I can often get to working the land as my tougher, less privileged ancestors once did. Plus, the smell of wet grass/weeds, either early in the morning or just before dark, can be a beautiful thing. Why let the sprinklers have all of the fun?

Looking Back at a Semester of Teaching, Surviving, and Blogging.

This Adrienne Young cover of a world-weary Grateful Dead song does not directly relate to this post. But this song has been stuck in my head over the past few months more than any other.



Another semester is basically done: four classes down, one to go. It’s been an interesting few months. After teaching seven classes in both the spring and fall of last year – plus three in the summer – I was down to five this semester (and one this summer). With budget cuts impacting public education at every level here in California, adjuncts like me, who have no guarantee of being retained from semester to semester, have been feeling the pinch. And through the course of this semester, I heard lots of nasty rumors about how bad things would be in the fall. It was only a couple of days ago, in fact, that I finally found out what my full fall schedule will be: six classes (at three schools). So it looks like we will be financially solvent for another few months. Hopefully, the worst of the class cuts are behind us. But in California, you just never know.

After nine and a half years as an adjunct history professor, living from semester to semester is nothing new. Through most of my college teaching career, however, my schedule has been set months in advance, so I haven’t been constantly stressed out, wondering if I needed to explore alternative career options. More recently, of course, I’ve been a bit worried. It would be nice to have the job security that comes with a full-time position at one school, and I occasionally lapse into self-pity due to the “injustice” of it all. Of course, in a world where most people have far less security than I have, I try to count my many blessings. Security can often be an illusion anyway. In life, there are no guarantees.

The fragility of life has been on my mind a lot this semester. My wife spent much of the last few months driving to where her dad lived, trying to help care for him as he suffered (and eventually died) from cancer. She also spent many hours doing research and dealing with insurance company bureaucrats in an effort to get him the best care available. This left me with more of the parenting responsibilities than normal. Now I am tempted to say that I happily took this on and played the part of the perfect, supportive husband and father. All in all, as husbands go, I did a decent job. Still, I managed to lose it at times, and, I am sorry to say, found more than a few opportunities to feel sorry for myself. (Human nature can be a bitch.)

In the end, however, we both did what we had to do. And though I would never wish this experience on anyone, as time moves on, I see this as one more step in a gradual journey toward greater empathy and wisdom. As my wife has said several times since, it is impossible to understand what it is like to see a loved one dying from a terminal illness until you have been through the experience yourself. The people who were truly supportive over these past months, by and large, were friends and family who had been through similar experiences. People with little personal experience with death often seem uncomfortable talking to someone who is facing tragedy. They seem worried that they might somehow say the wrong thing, and they often run away as quickly as possible. (I should know because I have often been that uncomfortable person.) Those who have been through it know that there is no right or wrong thing to say. Simply being there is what really matters.

Through the course of teaching, worrying about the future, and trying to be a decent husband and father, I also started this blog experiment. Since I started this blog at the beginning of the year, I have managed to crank out sixty-two posts. Both my motives for writing and my range of topics have expanded over this short time. When I first started writing at the end of last summer, the idea was to put together a book based on my years of college teaching experience. After a few months of composing some possible chapters, I decided to start this blog in order to get feedback from a few Facebook friends. Then, as I learned a bit more about the blogosphere, and as I received a little positive feedback, I decided to start writing this blog for its own sake. I then started shamelessly promoting this blog, using the few methods that I knew, in order to let people know that I exist. And in order to make things more fun, and hopefully to appeal to a wider audience, I began writing about more than just education. Now, I alternate between posts about history, politics, education, religion, current events, and personal ramblings like the “masterpiece” that I am composing right now.

But what am I trying to achieve by writing these blog posts? To be completely honest, I am not quite sure. Several motives seem to be wrapped up together: writing stuff that will hopefully have a positive impact on people, generating a little extra income on the side, keeping my mind sharp, creating some sort of a personal journal for the future, catching the attention of that “right person” who can help me build a career as a writer, stroking my fragile ego by looking for positive feedback, trying to gain some sense of tangible achievement, releasing pent up thoughts and feelings, and the list could probably go on.

As I look back on what I have written so far, I am pleasantly surprised by what I have done. (When I periodically go back and read old posts, I usually think, “that’s pretty damn good.”) I also can’t get over this nagging feeling that I have the potential to be much better. After all, before I started this blog not so long ago, I had not tried to write anything of any length since grad school. I have also been cranking out these posts in the midst of a crazy semester, writing in little bursts whenever I can squeeze in some time. If I manage to keep plugging away, and if am able to find more time to invest, how much better might I be in a year (or two, or three)? It’s hard to say. I may become a famous blogger and/or published author; or I may be a guy still maintaining the delusion that he can write things that more than a few people would want to read; or I may quit writing and go back to devoting more time to other (more practical) pursuits. With a light schedule over the next few months, I might have a better idea of where this writing hobby is taking me by the end of the summer.

Some would say that writing has value whether it finds appreciative readers or not. On some level, I agree. Still, I would be fooling myself and lying to anyone reading this if I claimed that I was not looking for an appreciative audience. If I just wanted to write to myself, I would keep a diary. So thanks to anyone who has read (and commented) so far. And if anyone has helpful suggestions or some kind words to give me a reason to keep at this thing, feedback is always appreciated. If nothing else, it’s nice to know that someone is out there.

You Can't Put a Price on Free Time

Here's an old Louis Armstrong song that captures the sentiment in this post:

For a person living in the United States, the word “summer” brings up many common images: sweat, barbeques, cold beer, baseball, surfing, bikinis. For a kid growing up in America, however, the dominant feeling associated with summer has to be “freedom.” Summer as a child is one of the few times in life when a person has an extended period of time when there is nothing that he or she is obligated to do. To a certain degree, I have spent my entire adult life trying to recapture that feeling as often as possible.

One of the blessings of being a teacher is that I get to experience that feeling of freedom, to a certain degree, every summer and winter break. It’s not quite the same as childhood. Even without work, there are always plenty of things that need to get done. But still, the moment when my final grades are turned in is similar to the last day of school as a kid or to the completion of that last final exam as a college student. A weight is lifted off of your chest, and the distant horizon seems filled with stress-free moments.

As a college teacher, I am particularly blessed with free time. Even during the school year, life is not a day-to-day grind of the same old routine. Part of the reason that I liked being a college student so much more than a high school prisoner was that the classes were scattered around, leaving much more room for flexibility in day-to-day life. So college teaching, for me, is a way to avoid growing up completely.

The downside, however, of my part-time, “freeway flying,” college professor life is the lack of a high, consistent income. We have gotten by OK for the last nine years, but we are nowhere near being rich, and I don’t anticipate a flood of cash coming our way any time soon. Truth be told, I have never been particularly motivated by a desire to get rich. It’s not that I am some kind of an ascetic or anti-materialistic hippy. If colleges decided to pay me more, I would happily take it. And if I won the lottery or hit the mega-jackpot in Vegas one day – both of which would be a challenge since I don’t gamble - then I would be dancing in the streets. My desire to have more money, however, is not rooted in dreams of accumulating all kinds of wasteful, luxurious crap. In my mind, the greatest thing about having lots of money would be the freedom from obligation that this wealth would provide. I could work almost entirely on my own terms, and I would have plenty of time to enjoy the many things that life has to offer.

I want to make enough money to provide my family with the basic necessities of life: nice house, good food, attractive enough clothing, quality education, high speed internet, DirecTV. Beyond the basics, however, the greatest thing that I can give my family is time. If you ask children whether they would rather have parents who had more money to buy them lots of stuff or parents who spent a lot of time with them, I could make a strong, educated guess about the answer that you will usually hear. I can also say with some confidence that few people are ever laying on their deathbed wishing that they had just worked a little more so that they could have more material possessions around them when they die.

For some, retirement will be the time in life when they get to recapture the feeling of summer vacation. Personally, I don’t want to wait that long. The truth is that I may never get a shot at retirement. After all, I have a pension with the state of California, a fact that hardly gives teachers like me considerable comfort. This is why I imagine myself teaching when I am 90, reminiscing about the good old days way back in the 2020’s. And to be honest, if my body and brain are still in decent shape at that time, I wouldn’t mind teaching a few classes to stay both productive and sharp. But even if I were someone sitting around dreaming of retirement, I would have the nagging sense that both my life and the lives of my children were flying by while I was working nine-to-five (or more). So even if we have to do without some “necessities” due to lack of funds, or if I have to work until I resemble a fossil, I will be blessed by living this fantasy life in which almost every day provides a little taste of summer vacation.

Why does Everything (and Everyone) Have to be Temporary?

Here is one of the best songs about growing old that I have ever heard.



A few days ago, I went to my parents’ house to water their lawn and plants because they were gone for a week on vacation. They live in the same house where I grew up, not ten minutes from where I live now. (I have come far!) On some level, this place will always be home. As I sat in this empty house, I found myself thinking of the day when my parents will no longer live in it. It’s hard for me to imagine this anchor no longer being there. It would be like the sun not coming up. After all, from my perspective, it has been my parents’ eternal home.

My dad turns seventy tomorrow. My mom hit that same milestone at the end of last year. Birthdays are the holidays more than any other that measure the passage of time. They are the only days, after all, that are defined somewhat by a number. (No one ever says that they are celebrating their forty-seventh Christmas or their twenty-eighth Arbor Day.) It wasn’t too long ago that seventy was an age that I only associated with grandparents. It was also roughly the age of three of my grandparents when they died.

My wife and I are at that age where we are sandwiched between caring for young children and worrying about aging parents. The mortality of our parents was driven home like a knife over this past year. My wife’s dad was diagnosed with cancer back in July, and he lost this battle at the end of March. Shortly after her father was diagnosed, my dad entered the hospital to get open-heart surgery. As often happens in life, my wife saw her dad’s health deteriorate while my father recovered very nicely. As we watched her dad take his last breaths a couple of months ago, I could not help but think of how I would react if one of my parents was lying there.

We all know that everything in life is temporary, and we deal with this reality in different ways. Some reassure themselves through faith in some sort of a positive afterlife to come for themselves and their loved ones. Some try not to think about death, and they fight it off by taking steps to appear or feel eternally young, or they distract themselves with the concerns of everyday life. I have fluctuated between all of these states of mind at different times in my life. At the moment, however, I am unaware of any conception of an afterlife that makes any sense, and I can’t keep myself distracted all of the time. And when tragedies occur, the temporary nature of all things cannot be avoided.

So why does everything have to be temporary? For nostalgic people like me who can see on a daily basis the places and people that are so closely associated with every event in my life, death and deterioration suck. I would prefer that certain people and things last forever. And for a person who spends his life teaching history, I am well aware of how forgotten both myself and my world will be in the not so distant future. An atheist would argue that there is no answer to this question. Life just is what it is. Many religious adherents would say that the temporary nature of life should drive you to focus on the ultimate spiritual reality that will guide you eventually to an eternal home.

Now I don’t know if there is any kind of a divine plan. If there is, the planner(s) has not made it particularly clear. So is there any reason why some sort of a creative force(s) would just leave us hanging, stuck pondering the great questions of life? Why did he (or she or it) create us to live with the possibility that we might ultimately be snuffed out? For the sake of argument, I am going to assume that there is a divine plan that the creative force(s) has chosen to keep somewhat secret. I am also going to assume that this force(s) has positive motives and is not just creating some playthings to use for entertainment. If we were guaranteed of eternal life, would we be able to appreciate life fully? Maybe something can only be truly precious if you know that it will someday be gone. So often, people convinced that they know the answers to life’s great questions have seemed somewhat smug and callous to me. The struggles of the rest of us unenlightened mere mortals, after all, must seem rather distant to them. By realizing the “truth,” they were freed from fully experiencing the pain caused by the temporary nature of all things. In my view, by immersing themselves in the “spiritual,” some people lose a certain amount of empathy for those struggling with their humanity. In a sense, “the enlightened” are no longer fully human.

Maybe real joy, sacrifice, ethics, and compassion can only exist in a temporary world filled with pain and uncertainty. After all, if we were given a guaranteed path toward eternal life, then our choice to take that path would be, to some degree, selfish. But if you choose a sacrificial, ethical path without any guarantee of a reward, then you have done something truly selfless. Pain, injustice, and death – and the possibility that this life may be all that we have - stink, but without the things that make life tough, can we ever be truly joyful, compassionate, ethical, and, ultimately, alive?

Our Trip to the Huntington Library

Here's an oldie from one of the greatest voices in rock history: Roy Orbison. It's called "Working for the Man."


 

Yesterday, as part of my wife’s birthday weekend, we went with the kids to Huntington Library & Gardens up near Pasadena. It is definitely worth checking out if you have never had the opportunity. The place is part historical research library, part museum, and part arboretum. If you do nothing but wander through the various botanical gardens, you will easily get your money’s worth. The kids had a great time sniffing and photographing the various plants and flowers. Just the Rose Garden took about an hour. I’ve included some pictures below (most of which were taken by my older daughter, a budding photographer.)

As we wandered through this amazing place, my wife and I had the same recurring thought:  “man, Henry Huntington must have been freaking rich!” The main art gallery is located in a small part of what used to be his ridiculously huge mansion, and the various botanical gardens are essentially his former front and backyard. Much of what you see has been collected and planted since the Huntington exhibit was established after his death in 1927, but still, what he and his wife managed to compile and create is astounding.

So how did he get all of this money? I did a little research, and it turns out that he got some of his fortune the old-fashioned way: he inherited it. Collis Huntington, Henry’s Uncle, made an enormous fortune in the railroad business.  Henry started working for his uncle as a young man and worked his way up in the company. When his uncle died, Henry inherited one-third of the family fortune. Henry would then proceed to become quite a businessman in his own right, making much of his money building electric public transportation systems in California. This was how he ended up buying his “little estate” in Southern California. He married his uncle’s widow – who was close to Henry’s age, so it wasn’t too gross – a woman who turned out to be quite the art collector herself. And the rest, you might say, is history.

Some would therefore describe Henry Huntington as a great businessman, collector, and, ultimately, philanthropist. This is not the only valid point of view, however. After all, how did Henry’s uncle accumulate the massive fortune that became the basis for his nephew’s success? Who did the hard labor of building those railroads, and how well were these workers paid? Some, myself included, would argue that Henry, like his uncle, was also a great exploiter of the working class, and money which could have gone toward providing these workers with a decent standard of living instead went into a fancy house; a hell of a collection of art, furniture, and historical documents; and some damn impressive landscaping. It’s a beautiful place, but was the cost truly justified?  I better discontinue this line of questioning. People might start labeling me as one of those Obama-supporting socialists.

The Huntington Library is one of the many great monuments to wealthy and powerful individuals that have been built throughout the history of the civilized world: the pyramids, the Taj Mahal, Versailles, The Forbidden City, etc. One of the greatest mysteries of life for me is how certain elite individuals are able to amass so much wealth and power. Why do the masses feel compelled to devote so much labor, resources, and devotion to an individual who, in a purely physical sense, is basically the same as they are? Why do people tolerate this degree of inequality? Many answers to these questions have been developed over the years, but I have yet to hear a completely adequate explanation. It may be just another piece of evidence proving that our species is not particularly rational. In the end, monuments to the powerful may be the ultimate paradox. In a place like the Huntington Library, beauty and incredible human achievement are wrapped together with human vanity, waste, and injustice.