This week’s Presidential election has reminded me of Marshall McLuhan’s trademark, “The Medium In the Message.” From it, I recall his belief that we go through life looking through the rear-view mirror, and becoming aware of our environment only after we have left it and that what is communicated doesn’t count as much as how it is communicated.
Of course, the medium that exists today is much different than that of the sixties, they still alter our sensory life, therefore what we know. As a result, our society is like the driver who sees neither ahead to the future nor outside the side window to the present but looks only to the past in the rear-view mirror — “Make America great again.”
McLuhan believed that education must serve as a defense to the media fallout. He likened our society to the mariner in Edgar Allan Poe’s story, “A Descent Into the Maelstrom.” The mariner is caught in a whirlpool, but he figures out the relative velocities of currents and saves himself. The question remains whether, as a society, we are educated enough to save ourselves.
“TIME FOR MORE ACTION”
January 17, 2003, Peace Demonstration In Houston, Texas — Photo by Joy
In some ways, I feel as if I may have been in a trance these past eight years, kind of a passive free feeling. It’s now time to stand. Social justice, like art, requires an effort. It’s time for those who have half a heart for poetry, half for life to stand for truth. Those who have continued learning and have been sharpening our weapons by night to clear their throats and stand, becoming the voices of truth.
Until my brother, Tom, stop sending emails in 2010, many of the titles would read “The ‘blank’ is in the well,” and the message would include this cat image. We never talked about the image or the use of the phase, but he used them often as a preface to the message and a reflection of his condition.
In an October 16, 2009 email titled, “Cat’s In The Well” he wrote:
Your blog was splendidly poetic….(Visually and Verbally)!!!! Such a graceful turning inward and reflecting on two brothers and kindred spirits….. I love yah Talk to you very soon t.
Again, I would think about the phase and the why he would use it, e.g., “Photography is in the Well with the Cat.”
One can gather all kinds of meaning from the image and the phase, but it wasn’t till one day while running and listening to Bob Dylan on my iPad and I heard, “The cat’s in the well, the wolf is looking down.”
“That’s it!” I thought, maybe this was the connection, Dylan’s “Cat In The Well.”
The cat’s in the well, the wolf is looking down The cat’s in the well, the wolf is looking down He got his big bushy tail dragging all over the ground
The cat’s in the well, the gentle lady is asleep Cat’s in the well, the gentle lady is asleep She ain’t hearing a thing, the silence is a-stickin’ her deep
The cat’s in the well and grief is showing its face The world’s being slaughtered and it’s such a bloody disgrace
The cat’s in the well, the horse is going bumpety bump The cat’s in the well, and the horse is going bumpety bump Back alley Sally is doing the American jump
The cat’s in the well, and Papa is reading the news His hair’s falling out and all of his daughters need shoes
The cat’s in the well and the barn is full of bull The cat’s in the well and the barn is full of bull The night is so long and the table is oh, so full
The cat’s in the well and the servant is at the door The drinks are ready and the dogs are going to war
The cat’s in the well, the leaves are starting to fall The cat’s in the well, leaves are starting to fall Goodnight, my love, may the Lord have mercy on us all
The theme of the song is apocalyptic — very mythological. The cat’s in the well and there’s just no escape.
Goodnight, Tom, may the Lord have mercy on you. Although broken and mangled, you were one “cool cat.”
The laws of God, the laws of man, He may keep that will and can; Not I: let God and man decree Laws
for themselves and not for me; And if my ways are not as theirs Let them mind their own affairs. Their deeds I judge and much condemn, Yet when did I make laws for them? Please yourselves, say I , and they Need only look the other way. But no, they will not; they must still Wrest their neighbour to their will, And make me dance as they desire With jail and gallows and hell-fire. And how am I to face the odds Of man’s bedevilment and God’s? I, a stranger and afraid In a world I never made. They will be master, right or wrong; Though both are foolish, both are strong. And since, my soul, we cannot fly To Saturn nor to Mercury, Keep we must, if keep we can, These foreign laws of God and man.
View of Tucson from the Box Camp Trail on Mt. Lemmon (Click here to see more hiking the Box Camp Trail photos.) — Images by kenne
The ground we walk on,
the plants and creatures,
the clouds above
constantly dissolving
into new formations –
each gift of nature
possessing its own
radiant energy,
bound together by
cosmic harmony.
The invasion of Iraq began March 19, 2003. On this Memorial Day I share a piece I wrote in January of 2003.)
Freedom doesn’t come without a price, an individual’s price can very greatly depending on his/her color, wealth and power.
I served during the Viet Nam era. On the day I was drafted, so too were two other young men. They are not alive today.
There are others I knew that paid the greatest price, which is how many of us put a face on Viet Nam War.
For many Americans going to war in Iraq needs to have a face, a face of those who have already died from this war between bullies.*
During my duty in the Army I had a top secret-crypto clearance. I began to become aware of the difference between what citizens are told as fact and what was the truth.
The Army told me we live and die by international law and standards, by the Rules of the Geneva Convention, but we lie.
We expect others to live by international laws, not us.
Just because a bully in Iraq doesn’t believe in international laws shouldn’t mean that we lower ourselves to the bully’s level. We are better than that!
The lesson I have learned is that it’s always a mistake to believe your own lies.
Yes, Sadam is a tyrant. However, he should be treated as such through the international justice system. He should be replaced by elected leaders, not a regime that is ours.
Remember, it wasn’t that long ago that Sadam was our bully.
As the most powerful country in the history of the world, we have an obligation to use our power with constraint and with justice, to lead by example so that other countries will not take unilateral action against another country simply for preëmptive reasons.
We are better than that!
Let’s show respect to our position of power and greatest by leading and supporting diplomacy and the rule of law, not the rule of vigilantism.
Peace.
kenne
*(note — we have been at war, with Iraq since we have
been bombing them daily for years now, which we justified by our own unilateral action, not International law,
or the UN.)
Ev’ryone can see we’re together As we walk on by and we fly just like birds of a feather I won’t tell no lie all of the people around us they say Can they be that close Just let me state for the record We’re giving love in a family dose
“Self-Portrait” — Image by kenne
“TIME FOR MORE ACTION”
Until my brother, Tom, stop sending emails in 2010, many of the titles would read “The ‘blank’ is in the well,” and the message would include this cat image. We never talked about the image or the use of the phase, but he used them often as a preface to the message and a reflection of his condition.
…..
The cat’s in the well, the gentle lady is asleep
In Remembrance — 
“A World I Never Made” — Image by kenne
View of Tucson from the Box Camp Trail on Mt. Lemmon (
The invasion of Iraq began March 19, 2003. On this Memorial Day I share a piece I wrote in January of 2003.)
Freedom doesn’t come without a price,
an individual’s price
can very greatly
depending on his/her
color, wealth and power.
I served during the Viet Nam era.
On the day I was drafted,
so too were two other young men.
They are not alive today.
There are others I knew
that paid the greatest price,
which is how many of us
put a face on Viet Nam War.
For many Americans
going to war in Iraq
needs to have a face,
a face of those who have already died
from this war between bullies.*
During my duty in the Army
I had a top secret-crypto clearance.
I began to become aware
of the difference between
what citizens are told as fact
and what was the truth.
The Army told me we live and die
by international law and standards,
by the Rules of the Geneva Convention,
but we lie.
We expect others to live
by international laws,
not us.
Just because a bully in Iraq
doesn’t believe in international laws
shouldn’t mean that we lower
ourselves to the bully’s level.
We are better than that!
The lesson I have learned is that
it’s always a mistake
to believe your own lies.
Yes, Sadam is a tyrant.
However, he should be
treated as such through
the international justice system.
He should be replaced
by elected leaders,
not a regime that is ours.
Remember,
it wasn’t that long ago
that Sadam was our bully.
As the most powerful country
in the history of the world,
we have an obligation
to use our power with
constraint and with justice,
to lead by example
so that other countries
will not take unilateral action
against another country
simply for preëmptive reasons.
We are better than that!
Let’s show respect to our position
of power and greatest
by leading and supporting diplomacy
and the rule of law,
not the rule of vigilantism.
Peace.
kenne
*(note — we have been at war,
with Iraq since we have
been bombing them
daily for years now,
which we justified
by our own
unilateral action,
not International law,
or the UN.)
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