Marcel Marceau, the famous French mime, danced a revealing truth in his parable of the man and his mask. A little man playfully tries on a series of masks. After cavorting about exhilarated by his disguises, he grows tired of the novelty and tries to remove the mask. Horrified, he discovers that he cannot. The mask is fixed to his face. A terrible struggle follows; his body writhes in agony while his face remains frozen in a grin. At last the false face is wrenched off, but the real face behind it is now simply a blank Marcel Marceau - The Mask Maker (1959)…
Read MoreNew Era Colorado has figured it out: the immense potential political power represented by the youth contingent. Perhaps, though, the youth contingent first needs to be awakened Young people say they plan on voting in November ... - Washington Post . Or, in this post-mortem on the “tired radicals” of the First World War era, Walter Weyl wrote, “Adolescence is the true day of revolt, the day when obscure forces, as mysterious as growth, push us trembling out of our narrow lives into the wide throbbing life beyond self.”…
Read MoreAs our nation threatens to pinwheel into identity politics — too much Pluribus and not enough Unum — perhaps it’s a good time to take stock of the unifying myths that have defined America in the first place…
Read MoreWho knew?: Title 40 of the U.S. Code makes it a federal offense to take your bicycle into the National Institute of Health building, not because any legislative body ever deliberated on that subject but because it's one of the wholesale regulations (this one by the DHS) automatically incorporated into that criminal statute…
Read MorePerhaps a big story, such as this one about “illegal” immigrants, is best told as the mosaic of little stories like the one we discussed years ago as portrayed in the novel Tortilla Curtain: Mexican illegal Candido Rincon is left as so much road kill after having been accidentally struck by Delaney Mossbacher's SUV on a southern California highway. Candido…
Read MoreStep one is the acknowledgment of its pervasiveness. It’s the call of the all-night FM disc jockey taking requests all the while beseeching, “Is there anybody out there, anybody at all?”..
Read MoreMember Monday (4/16)/The Making Of a Congressman II is the second in our series with Mark Williams, examining the realities of participatory politics. The series centers around providing us — armchair "everyman" wannabes — a glimpse of the nuts and bolts involved with running for political office…
Read MoreWe once discussed the delicious book Night Train To Lisbon (discussion intro 9/26/10, attached below) with the question: given that we can only live a small part of what there is in us — what happens to all the rest?…
Read MoreAsk the owner of a sick or seriously injured pet about capping the anticipated vet bill and you may learn something about animal connection. “Whatever it takes.” But the dog in any case is nearing the end of its natural life. Whatever it takes. But the poor thing is suffering from advanced arthritis, incontinence, and a horrendous case of halitosis. Don’t refer to him as a thing and, yes, Whatever It Takes...
Read MoreMental illness. The very term conjures up . . . . what, exactly? First impression, maybe: the guy talking to himself on the bus; the depressed shut-in; the alcoholic on the street; that hyper-focused Aspergers guy featured in The Big Short who made a fortune; or any other of the afflicted representing one of the 297 personality disorders listed in the DSM-5…
Read MoreSome years ago a provision was added to the Boulder Municipal Code declaring Boulder to be a nuclear free zone. The City Council followed that up with a mayors-for-peace initiative to exempt Boulder (and other cities) as a nuclear target. Whew, with that threat now reduced, we can move on to other matters…
Read MoreMany of us grew quite fond of a certain fresh-faced McGill University student named Eli who interned with Sina a few summers ago. Actually, Eli’s toughest assignment involved some books Sina made him read. Young Eli then graduated with a finance degree and wondered about the next chapter…
Read MoreThere may be no better way to close out the subject of Truth in the postmodern world than with a reckoning of social media’s role in shaping perception…
Read MoreImagine, as some would have it, the prospect of the president under oath. There’s Mr. Trump, hand raised, as he solemnly swears “to tell the Truth, the whole Truth, and nothing but the Truth.” Eyes roll as he spins yet another narrative. Perjury trial ensues. The defense opens with the president's own statement: “Listen, judge and jury, what are you gonna believe — my truth or your own lying eyes?”…
Read MoreIt’s now been sixty years since this one-time eight-year-old kid first faced what might be called the metaphysics of an afterlife. Before the Sunday school class that day the whole concept of heaven and hell had been introduced as cartoonish metaphor — imagine that all people were born with arms so long that their hands couldn’t reach their mouths: hell, you see, would consist of all those wretched, starving souls unable to feed themselves; heaven, on the other hand, would be populated by the joyous, well-fed ones who’d learned to feed each other. Fair enough…
Read MoreTen years later and some fans in Philadelphia still talk about it. On October 29, 2008 Brad Lidge pitched the final out of the decisive game-five to win the World Series for the Phillies. This capped his perfect record in the regular season as closing pitcher. Brad had touched the very stars that year.
Brad will join us for Member Monday (2/5) as we try to imagine what it must be like to be famous, even momentarily, even among a contingent. In his novel Humboldt’s Gift, Saul Bellow described the onset of fame: “I experienced the high voltage of publicity. It was like picking up a dangerous wire fatal to ordinary folk. It was like the rattlesnake handled by hillbillies in a state of religious exaltation.”
Read MoreLike it or not, the only constant is constant change. That even (especially) applies to Boulder. The only question is whether you embrace it. You ignore it at your peril.
Come along for the ride as we share and discuss the Boulder vision. The ink is not even dry on probably the most exciting major city project since, well, since the Pearl Street Mall decades ago. You've undoubtedly heard broad references to the Civic Area redevelopment, bordered West/East by 9th and 17th and North/South by Canyon and Arapahoe. Well, the gem of that project is now taking shape in what's called the Boulder Center and Nature Art Science Port, also known as the West Bookend Concept Plan. Yes, that's West as in its proximity to our own Highland City Club…
Read MoreOnce upon a time the word “awesome” carried special meaning, suggesting something so magnificent, so stirring, that time itself seemed to stop (as distinguished from its more emasculated usage in today's world, say, that of a waiter commenting on the diner’s menu choice). It is a state to which many, maybe most, people can only aspire — a vicarious thrill of the imagination. An engaging written account, however, can sometimes provide a glimpse.
A Water-Based Religion is about awe in that true sense. Read this angler's account as meditation, as a kind of prayer, “What I love almost best about fishing is another property it shares with reading and writing: it concentrates the mind, while at the same time liberating it. It is much less about catching a fish than releasing the fisherman. This ecstatic dreamtime lies within the reach of anyone able to bait a hook and is what many of us, really, are angling for – a settled but excited state of mind in a place of outstanding beauty.”
Read More“In a perfectly efficient society man is redundant”
Len Barron, quoted at an audience talk-back at the World Affairs Conference some decades ago
The man behind that quote will join us for Member Monday (1/15). Many of you know Len Barron as Boulder’s own educator, playwright, director, writer, and dancer, whom most recognize for that one-man Einstein performance -- the one celebrating that physicist's deep sense of humanity marked by fairness, beauty, and playfulness. Those are words not commonly associated with efficiency.
So let us then reflect back on that quote as we discuss man’s standing in a world increasingly seduced by efficiencies, the efficiencies of technology that is. We are accorded a front row seat to such spectacle by way of “Inside China’s Vast New Experiment In Social Engineering” (link: https://www.wired.com/story/age-of-social-credit/). The venue may be overseas but the phenomenon most assuredly is not. It’s America’s embrace as well.
Read MoreIn a quote attributed to Bismarck, "Laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made." Well, fair enough, but how about watching the making of one who makes the laws?
We are honored this next Member Monday (1/8) to welcome Mark Williams, candidate for the second Congressional District district seat (includes Boulder County), the one vacated by Jared Polis who, in turn, is running for the governorship. The winner of the democratic primary to be held this June will most assuredly win the seat in November….
Read More