American Elephants

I don’t have a good feel for the extent to which we respond to the news, or what we read online. And I’m not really sure about how much what people read actually influences their behavior and interests and actions. I am a major reader. I have a house filled with books, probably way too many, but I have read them all, and most, more than once.

My father’s older sister always sent him the best books of the year for birthdays and Christmas, and I read them all. Our closest town was nine miles away, and a very small town, probably around 800 or so people. But it had two grocery stores, a bank, lumber yard, hardware store, drug store, doctor’s office, dentist’s office, jewelry store, and of course the court house, as it was a county seat. There was a grade school, and a high school, and none of those facilities had a library, including the schools, or a book store. Only the drug store carried a small selection of what my dad called “Blood and Thunders”, (Westerns) and he may well have been the only purchaser. I read all of those too.

In Boise, the State Capitol, there was no public library, the two small department stores carried no books. There was no book store.The State of Idaho had a “traveling library” in the basement of the capitol building. I’d borrow a huge stack, and mail them back by train. Boise was 100 miles away, and we usually didn’t make more than one trip a year. That can be accurately described as “growing up rural”.

The advent of computers has changed rural areas as well as cities, and the world has shifted some. I haven’t been home for a long time, but I’d be surprised if much as changed. It’s not a part of the country where books and reading are common or important. But then even in college, lots of my fellow students struggled with the amount of reading that was required.

I have never seen a report on how successful American schools are in turning out readers. I know that many kids who had difficulty in learning to read, not because of any self-deficiency, but because they did not value the idea of learning to read, and resisted as much as possible, somehow were not forced to learn. Whether that came from a family that did not read much or did not value the ability to read well, the familial attitude towards reading, I don’t know. I presume that to some extent it is passed down in families. If American schooling is to be successful in creating a highly educated populace, we need some kind of deep appreciation for the act of learning to read well. I just do not think that has happened, at least in those families that do not especially appreciate books and knowledge in the first place.

In a modern, highway spanned country, where you really have to hunt to find an unpaved road, and our lives revolve around our cars, transportation, how long it takes to get to where you want to go, and lately — the outrageous price if gas, that President Biden has inflicted us with. This gets all mixed up with misplaced concerns about the “climate”. The climate of the Earth is controlled by the actions of our sun, and the sun keeps on doing just fine.

Somewhere in there, concerns about the climate got mixed up with concerns about our extensive network of highways, that enabled us to get to our destinations easily. The people who had suddenly become interested in climate, became interested in nature and forests and trails, especially trails. Love for “trails”got into rejecting railroads and highways as too mechanical and not “natural” enough, or something like that. The highway here that extends from the South end of Lake Washington was clearly needed, but the railroad from one end of Lake Washington north to the other end became excessive when most of the merchandise being moved was going by truck anyway. So the trail-lovers were pushing for turning the now unnecessary railroad than spanned the length of Lake Washington into an unnecessary trail, instead.

What has become fairly apparent, though no one will admit it, is that few people are interested in hiking a trail the length of Lake Washington. In the first place, if you are traveling the length of Lake Washington, your trip probably involves moving stuff as well as people. Hiking a very long trail encumbered with loads of stuff isn’t really what they had in mind, but that is sort of the way it developed. And, of course the “idea” of hiking the length of Lake Washington was way more appealing than actually doing it.

We have the Cascade Range of mountains just a few miles up to the East, where there are trails all over the place. What I am trying to point our is that it is the “idea” of trails that is so appealing, not the actual walking of them. We are naturally lazy as all get out, and will do some major walking when absolutely forced to, but probably not just for fun. In other words the trail people liked the idea of trails, not the real hiking of them. But the creation of trails continues apace, they just don’t get very occupied or well used. If you go hiking in the Cascades, you may run into someone else on a trail, but the traffic does not yet require much beyond, at best an occasional bench. Trails may be loved in the abstract, but hiking them requires determination, and we are in reality a lazy bunch.

It apparently hailed significantly last night. Lots of scattered whiteness, neighbors’ roofs in particular, but not white covered, as it would be if it had snowed. The skylight in the kitchen is completely covered. It seems to be doing something outside, probably closer to rain than snow. Not nice weather! I live on an East-facing hill, the streets off the hill are either East or West slopes. Looks like we’re stuck at home today. No urgent requirements, but I’ll be really glad to get back to normal weather, and the ability to go wherever we please, when we please. There is some precipitation coming down, but not significant enough to tell whether is should be classified as rain or snow. It’s just a staying at home day.

I know, I know, I have no real need to complain when so many people are having a difficult time with the winter weather. We do get spoiled, don’t we. There seems to be a significant snowfall dropping from the sky at present. Well-stocked pantry, though we might get sick of tuna fish! There was a time, long ago, when if it started snowing, that meant good sled runs, snowmen, Some years we even got very fancy with the snowmen, trying to make them into famous characters. Our George Washington may not have had a distinctive resemblance to his portraits, but it was fun to try.

The railroad ran by at the base of the hill, and the section-hands had the job of keeping the crossings de-iced and snow free, which messed up the sled tun, so that was a constant, unspoken battle. They could have just asked us to keep the crossing clear, but they never did. The front hill was a dandy sled run in itself, but we often extended it with banks to reach the next little slope. I had sledding parties all winter, we’d sled for a while, then go swimming (hot springs pool) and have lunch, and probably sled some more. I do miss that. I had a magical childhood, I admit.

It snowed a little today, early, in Seattle. Does that make it officially “Winter”? I had to look it up to see when Winter officially begins. According to my computer, Winter is composed of December, January and February. Not much help.

Growing up in the Idaho mountains, winter started when the snow started, and that’s what I’m accustomed to. When it snows where you live, it becomes “winter”. If you have to drive up a local mountain to find some snow, that does not count. Winter does not depend on the calendar, but on snow. On the other hand, this is Seattle and snow is not necessarily a regular thing even in the winter months. Seattle really is a coastal city.

I lived in Phoenix for a while, and snow happened on the surrounding mountains not in the city itself, but we did occasionally have a little. For someone who grew up in the mountains of Idaho, that didn’t really count as snow at all, just a minor annoying mess, only rarely enough to turn anything at all white. Obviously one’s understanding the the term “Winter” may have more to do with the presence or absence of snow than with what the calendar actually says. Or that may be just me, and others may see the seasons differently.

Winter is quite different in many parts of the country. Deep snow, where you’re stuck until the snowplows do your street. I’ve never lived with deep city snow, where you have to plan ahead to make sure you are supplied for however long it will take to be well plowed or melted. I don’t have much understanding of how northern cities deal with major snow. Obviously they are well prepared with equipment and practice to handle what the rest of us might regard as crippling. Here it seldom lasts long enough to be a very big deal. It would be interesting to compare cities across the country, those who get a significant amount of snow, in just how they handle it. Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, New York for example. Those are states that have cities near or on the border. We’re a big country with a lot of different climates and skills in dealing with them.

The photo is simply a snowy city. No idea where it really is. We don’t get anything that dramatic, ever. We don’t get hurricanes either. People learn to live with what Mother Nature dumps on them. If you want a specific kind of weather, you may have to move to find it. The United States is a big country with lots of options.

According to the Gods of computerworld, the important people of our world are called “celebrities”. Related to the word “celebrate” in some way. A “Celebrity” is apparently someone who has once been in a movie, which makes them more important than other people. They have been seen on a big screen, or possibly just on your computer screen, if they have been seen there often enough. So large size and frequency are apparently the determining factor. Being in a movie is apparently all that is needed, not accomplishment.

My mother’s sister lived in Southern California, and once worked for a major studio. On one visit many years ago, she took us to her studio to watch a movie being made.The director rehearsed the brief scene with the players,over and over, then when they got the dialogue and actions right, turned on the cameras and filmed it. Then moved on to the next scene. Original words or movements were not allowed. Made you wonder how anything so disjointed could ever be made into an actual story on a big screen, that could possibly be enjoyable I pretty much lost all respect for “movie stars” at that point, and never really regained it. Phony world, nasty people.

“It is however, being a face on the big screen that makes one a “celebrity” not accomplishment. To appreciate accomplishment, you have to understand what an accomplishment is and the difficulty involved in making one, which is not much involved with Hollywood. Lots of online articles about “celebrities” who were in a movie in their childhood, and either grew up to continue that, or grew out of it, but remained a possibly familiar face.So a celebrity” is being a face on the big screen, not any accomplishment. To appreciate accomplishment, you have to understand what an accomplishment is and the difficulty involved in making one, which is not much involved with Hollywood. Lots of online articles about “celebrities” who were in a movie in their childhood, and either grew up to continue that, or grew out of it, but remained a possibly familiar face. So a “celebrity” does not represent accomplishment necessarily, only familiarity. Musicians also can become celebrities, but ordinary people with major accomplishments cannot.

Journalists like to have a celebrity name in their stories, because that may make you more apt to read it, because of the familiarity of the name. If you click on their story because of the attraction of the celebrity name, that just reinforces the whole scenario, and we get more “celebrities”. We the people who are just trying to find out what is going on in our world, are screwed once again.

The day after Thanksgiving, is a time to switch attention promptly from Thanksgiving to Christmas. All those ideas you’ve been putting off about what you are going to get for whom for Christmas turns serious, and we have to make decisions. And that’s the hard part. You undoubtedly have some family members who are easy, and you know just what you want to get, and where to find it. But if you are normal and have a normal family, quite a few of them are just hard. The things you’d like to get are just too expensive and you just have to figure out a better solution.

Ideally, you have a little notebook in head or in reality, and all through the year, you tuck ideas in that little notebook, so you are well prepared for the next Christmas. You know, you are out shopping with them and they fall in love with something in the store. You can move on to your nest thing, but tuck away their beloved object in your mental notebook, and know what to get them when the season moves around. But it can be hard to find the special thing to get, to fit the personal budget. And we all want our our gifts to be special and received with gratitude!

I hope everybody had a wonderful Thanksgiving. There were some doubts about the turkey supply because of the Bird Flu that has been going around. Do you rely on Turkey for your Thanksgiving dinner? In my family, Thanksgiving was always Turkey. Cannot imagine anything else!

Or do you not bother to follow that tradition? We’re very traditional here. Probably more the stuffing than the turkey. We do like stuffing. I have no idea if most people have a turkey dinner with stuffing, or if they just have a roast or something or other. Thanksgiving was always a family dinner celebration, usually with guests And definitely with Turkey and Stuffing. Where we lived, in the mountains of Idaho, with a steep hill down from the highway, there was almost always snow for Thanksgiving and we could get in a little sledding before dinner! There are advantages to living in the mountains!

Do you have similar traditions’? Or are your family holidays quite different? We get caught up in what the press tells us is traditional, which doesn’t always match up with reality. If your traditions are different, tell us. Very interested. Always find others’ traditions fascinating! That’s a fat and lovely turkey!

Are there other holidays where the menu is so traditional? Is there a difference in your family between Thanksgiving and Christmas? Ours was pretty much the same. Our cranberry sauce was jellied. Hot rolls, mashed potatoes with gravy. I don’t remember ever having cute little pumpkins like that. Our grocery stores were quite traditional, and our small town didn’t really allow for gourmet experimentation. If I remember correctly, we had to go to a farmer who raised turkeys just for the traditional dinner. We had o supermarkets, just small grocery stores, and had to go elsewhere to even get a turkey.

Vastly different from living in a fair-sized city where if your grocery store didn’t carry what you want, there were a wide array of other choices. I have the impression that Southern dinners were different, but never had Thanksgiving dinner in any other part of the country. l

Just outside my second story window is a vine maple, and it sheds a few very yellow leaves every few minutes. Not done yet, but it’s clearly on the way to winter. Saw online today pictures of a small temple in the Japanese mountains surrounded with beautiful falling red leaves. We get lots of yellow, but no red leaves. I’m sure it would be different if I wandered over to our botanical garden, but late fall here is yellow, not red. Never been anywhere where the fall color is brilliant red, but I’ve seen lots of pictures. I remain abysmally ignorant of where one goes for really dramatic color. I always assume New England, but never been there.

Our fall color in Idaho was also yellow, in varying shades. Red was rare or non-existent. It was that small online Japanese temple that has made me so hungry for something at least a little more spectacular. !! I’ll have to go for a walk in the botanical garden. I don’t think I’ve ever gone out hunting for fall color before. It may be time. Seeing pictures online of other people’s fall color has me unjustifiably hungry for more.

I found this image online, and never been anywhere where the color was anything like this. That’s what I’m after, being able to go for a walk right there. The fallen leaves look maple shaped, but I don’t even know what else turns a spectacular color! It did not say where this photo was taken.

Good picture, but no location nor direction. We just don’t have that kind of color here..

No, this is not (unfortunately) the view from my window. There are forest fires in the Cascades. When I look to the South today, it’s smoky, Odd that I have to see smoky hills in the distance long before I can find out where the forest fires actually are. As I think I’ve said before, I don’t think the Forest Service understands that ordinary folk might want to know and understand what is going on. Their specialty! They apparently feel no need to share! If you care, you might let the U.S. Forest Service know that you do. They are apparently oblivious! Perhaps I’m the only one who notices!

I have read that when you have a tornado coming, it’s a good idea to get in the bathtub, but I have never experienced it, nor a hurricane either. The pictures of the hurricane in Florida were frightening, and the mess left behind promised a vast losses and a major effort to clean up! The home insurance industry there must be interesting! I assume that many people can move to a new area (husband worked for a company that moved employees around the country a lot) without being aware of the potential natural disasters. I read a lot, and keep up with the news, but there are weather events in some parts of the country that are natural to long term inhabitants, but frightening to newcomers.

I have no idea if most residents of the Seattle ares know nor care about what is going on in the Cascade mountain range. Perhaps I know and care only because I grew up surrounded by National Forest and BLM land and trails. A Forest Service trail that took off from our place ended up 20 miles away at Lost Lake. Nice ride, though the name of the lake was more impressive than the lake itself. Just another small mountain lake.

Seattle is located on an arm of the Pacific Ocean, Puget Sound is salt water, with two fresh water lakes to the East. Bellevue lies between two lakes and the country then rises to the Cascade Range. The Cascades are simply a part of a long range of mountains separating the coast from the interior that actually runs all the way down to Mexico. I have no idea how informed or even interested most residents here are.

I don’t remember a time ever so full of murders! Senseless murders. At the University of Idaho several students were just murdered in their residence. Apparently just random. No particular reason, no enemies, no cause. Haven’t found out who did it nor why. That seems to be going on all over the country. Like a new fad. School shootings, Random killings. Does hearing about a seemingly random killing inspire other killers? I’m not sure that this particular time is especially unusual, but it surely seems so. Does seeing or hearing a report of a random killing inspire potential killers? I haven’t seen anyone addressing this question.

Certainly we have seen reports of those who invade stores and make off with the merchandise, which seems to inspire others to try the same thing. Can reports of random murders actually inspire more murders? I have no idea. Can anybody see a report of a murder and think “Oh I’ll go try that”? There certainly seems to be an uptick in the numbers of random killings.Perhaps we’re just not as civilized a society as we thought. I do not get it! I was under the apparently faulty impression that murders were rate and vicious and unacceptable.

Have yous seen reports of similar upticks in other countries? Some sort of worldwide aberration? Or is it just us? Somehow the school shootings seem to be less weird than these random murders. I can vaguely sort of understand how someone could be enraged at their school, but turning it into a school shooting seems way beyond comprehension. That it could happen once is strange beyond belief, that it could be duplicated in other cities or other schools seems impossible!

It’s 4:45 in the afternoon here in the Seattle area, and getting dark. I always forget every year about the days getting shorter this time of year. One would think I would remember and expect it, but apparently a long year including summer daylight makes me forget short winter days.

New York City is apparently having a major snowstorm, and they have my sympathy. City snow is not pleasant! A better arrangement would be for it never to snow in cities, and only in the beautiful countryside, but it doesn’t work that way. I’m still seeing the vine maple outside my window dropping it’s leaves. Time to stock up a little more on food so we’re not strapped if it does snow. When it does snow, the city is prompt with sand and gravel, and it never lasts long anyway. My biggest problem is that as a person brought up in very rural country, I’m used to having snow plows and shovels and all the necessities to deal with 3 or 4 feet of snow, and here I am in hilly Seattle (the city famously built on seven hills) worrying about possible snow. Seldom does, and if so, it’s usually very short lived. I assume that New York’s subways prevent anyone there from being stranded anyway.

The thing about being a “country” person is that you are pretty much prepared for anything, so it’s mostly not a big deal in any case. I have no understanding of whether a big snow storm is worse in a huge city like New York, than in a small city that has less territory to cover and less worry about getting people to their grocery stores. Do New Yorkers suffer more from a snowstorm? Dunno. I lived in California, Oregon, and Arizona, and coped with very different kinds of city snowstorms. Can’t imagine what it would be like for a lifetime Southerner to move North to snowy country.

Here the only signs of changing seasons are the leaves drifting down steadily from the trees outside my window,. a little seasonal color, but so far no snow, and many winters we don’t have any anyway. I’d happily trade it in to go home to Idaho.

It’s 5:30 in the afternoon here, and pitch black outdoors. I hadn’t been paying much attention to the change of season. but it is November, of course. Winter months, except not really “winter” here at all. Just a little colder, more likely rainy. At home in Idaho (Idaho will always be “home”) Winter usually began with the first snowfall. Here in the Seattle area, snow is regular but rare. Seattle is famously the “City of Seven Hills” though there are probably way more than seven, depending on your definition of “hill.” It’s not flat territory. It’s a major pain in the neck when we have snow, because there are hills in every direction and streets can get icy without snow. It’s 50 degrees here now, no snow visible in any direction, but I cannot see the mountains from my window. There are winters with no real disruptive snow. Depends on whether you want snow for beauty or no snow for getting around.

In Idaho, we had to plow our own road once they redirected the North-South highway over the hill to the East. We were once on the main North South highway, but they created a short cut that left us on a side road. Since we had an effective plow on our truck we got to get the neighboring small ranchers in and out too. So I am thoroughly familiar with very rural life.

The nearest town was nine miles away. and a very small town at that, but a county seat, and usually some small industry like a sawmill,

Court House, grade school, high school. hospital, two grocery stores, 3 or 4 gas stations with repair shops, hardware, lumber yard, Odd Fellows, and three churches. That’s what I can remember offhand. There was a farmer’s pond just outside of town where everyone went ice skating in early winter. Last figure I saw was a population of about 800. No idea how accurate that is, nor how related to how big it was when I was growing up. I have no idea if this is typical of small towns all across the country. Nor just what population qualifies a town as an “officially” small town.