Tomser's Blog

Sometimes I think that I am the last person on the planet that reads the daily comics. I know I can’t be. They would not continue to publish them just for me. Others must indulge. Who are they? Are any under 65? Do they actually laugh at what they read, or, like me, are they just hoping that once in a blue moon something mildly amusing will pop up?

I am not talking about the Sunday Comics. Everyone reads them. Who can resist the large format, the bright colors, the extra offerings. They are irresistible. If every day had comics like those, newspaper circulation would zoom once again. Alas, it’s not to be.

I cannot remember a time when I did not devour the daily funnies. They have been a part of my day ever since I started reading. Through the Bethlehem Morning Call, the South Carolina State, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and now the Philadelphia Inquirer I have faithfully turned to the “Funny Pages” to see the cartoon antics.

My devotion to comics is such that for many years I considered papers without a funnies page as inferior. What was the point of the New York Times or Wall Street Journal if they didn’t feature Hagar the Horrible or Funky Winkerbean. At the very least the Times should’ve carried Doonesbury and the Journal Dilbert. Then I might have read them!!!

The comics differ from paper to paper. No matter, I have read them all. Whether they were masterpieces, like Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side, mediocrities relying on the same joke over and over, like Beatle Bailey and Pickles, or just plain bad, like The Lockhorns and Ziggy, I persevered.

I am proud to say that I never stooped so low as to follow the serials, such as Brenda Starr or Prince Valiant. Even when I could figure out the never-ending storylines, these pseudo-serious sagas were so silly I could not stick with them. I do have standards. They may be low, but they exist.  

The comics I get in the Inquirer are your usual mixed bag. Get Fuzzy and Pearls Before Swine are modern classics. Blondie and Baby Blues are stalwarts you can count on. Pardon My Planet and Jump Start try and be contemporary, don’t quite make it, but are still worth reading. Then there are the just plain inexplicable.

Take Crabgrass, please (thank you Henny). For the last month this comic about two neighbor boys has been pursuing an arc where one kid launches himself into another dimension, plopping his doppelganger into ours. Characters come and go. The dimensions flip flop for no discernable reason. It is neither interesting nor funny. There is no reason to read it, and yet I do. (A trial has just started. Not sure why).

Heart of the City began as a cute cartoon about a little girl with overblown dreams of stardom. Then it jumped to Junior High and the plots (I use the term loosely) became banal and moralistic. Even worse, the renderings are so badly drawn, it is often hard to tell one kid from another. Still, it is part of my daily routine.

Standing above them all is Peanuts. My father would bring me a collection of Charles Schultz’s tour de force whenever he went on a business trip. If he had gone to Paris (he didn’t) he probably would have searched the book stalls along the Seine for the antics of Snoopy and Linus to bring home. I still have over 20 of these compilations, almost all from his travels.

I am not sure what makes Peanuts so enduring. The humor is light, never biting. The ensemble fulfills their assigned roles. There are few surprises. Lucy will pull the ball out from Charlie Brown every time. Peppermint Patty will fall asleep at her desk every day. In many ways, it is the soft jazz of strips.

And yet it works. Schultz marries the uncertainties of childhood with those that carry over as we get older. He gives play to the fantasy world we indulge in (fighting the Red Barron, being a star baseball player), yet grounds it in the reality that never lives up to those fantasies.

The Peanuts world can be harsh. Charlie Brown will never speak with the little red-haired girl. Lucy will never get Schroeder to pay attention to her. The Great Pumpkin will never appear for Linus. But harsh as the world may be, it is never nasty. The kids bounce back to try again and again. Schultz presents it all with a gentility that is endearing.

I hadn’t intended to deal so much with Peanuts, but that strip is the essence of the comics. Like all funnies, it is comfort food. As bland as the cartoons can be, they satisfy. To push a metaphor way too far, they are the meatloaf and mashed potatoes of reading consumption. Some have hot sauce that enhances the flavor. Others pour on Ketchup to seem colorful. Many lack even gravy to liven them up. Even those, however, I gratefully gobble.

I have no doubt that as I lie on my deathbed, hopefully many years from now, I will call my nurse over to request that she read that day’s Hagar the Horrible or Sherman’s Lagoon. While my beath may be short, I will still chuckle, even if it’s a joke I have heard a thousand times. And I will drift off into the netherworld with a smile on my face.     

I have written before how delightful I find kismet. Those rare times when two seemingly unrelated strands converge to send you down the proverbial rabbit hole. This happened recently with a book I was reading and a film I watched. The two combined led me to ponder the roles and obligations of artists.

Stefan Zweig wrote his memoir, “The World of Yesterday”, under extraordinary circumstances. The book was published in 1941 while he was living in exile, persona non grata in the German speaking countries which were his home. Zweig had been targeted by the Nazis as soon as they took power. He had two strikes against him, being Jewish and an unabashed humanist.

The memoir looks at pre-WWI Austria, Zweig’s native land, with rose colored glasses. His take was that the empire led by the aging Franz Joseph was a semi-paradise of freedom and creativity, with ominous rumblings well in the background. While this view is questionable, he can be forgiven as he was no doubt comparing it with the horrors of repression that were to follow.

For Zweig, however, Austria was less important than Europe as a whole. He was a true cosmopolitan, equally at home in France, Belgium, Switzerland or Germany. In each of these countries he found like-minded artists. Though he wrote in German, he sought both acceptance and inspiration throughout the continent.

It was this attitude that permeates his memoirs and solidifies his views on the role of the artist. Zweig wrote, and clearly believed, that “the writer’s true mission [is in] preserving and defending values common to all humanity.” He sought to live this tenet. He was appalled by the nationalistic demons unleashed by WWI, and spent part of the war in Switzerland trying, unsuccessfully, to create a multi-national coalition of artists opposed to both the war, and its disparagement of the “enemy”.

In “The World of Yesterday” Zweig confronted a continent where the hostilities to the other went far beyond what he could have imagined even during WWI. His despair runs through the work, as does his desire to, one last time, plea for a broader view of humanity and assert the artists’ obligation to bring that about. Tragically, in 1942 despair won out and Zweig took his own life.

Frederico Fellini has had a place near and dear to my heart for a long time. The second semester of the first year of law school is incredibly stressful. It dawns on you early on in that term that shortly you will have to take a series of tests to validate the proceeding nine months. John Houseman from Paper Chase is constantly in your head, saying, “Look to your left and then to your right, and three years from now only one of you will still be here”. (Even though he never said this and it is not true).

In the midst of this, I stumbled upon a Fellini film retrospective. Every Wednesday I would shut the books and trudge 20 minutes to lose myself in his world of creativity. Starting with Variety Lights, which he co-directed, through well-known classics like 81/2 and Amarcord, and including the rarely seen documentaries Roma and The Clowns, these films never disappointed. They also helped keep my head on straight as finals approached.

Over the years, I have seen many of these movies again and again. Somehow, however, I never saw the few films Fellini made thereafter. So, when one of these films, “And the Ship Sails On”, fulfilled my week 16 Criterion Challenge (don’t ask) I jumped on it. To be honest, I was a bit apprehensive, as my sense was that Fellini’s best work was long behind him by then.

“And the Ship Sails on” is not Fellini’s best film, but it is very good and one only Fellini could make. On the eve of WWI, a group of musical artists charters a steamship to take them to an island where they will scatter the ashes of a colleague. The company is a typically Fellini mix of eccentrics, egomaniacs and neurotics.

The film gets interesting when the Captain takes on board a bevy of Serbian refugees. Initially, the passengers are mortified, but before long they find common ground in music and are celebrating life with the Serbs. Some of the most enchanting scenes are of the stuffed shirt artistes one by one giving in to the exuberance of the Serbs and shedding their reticence.

The revelry is interrupted by an Austrian warship which demands that the Serbians be turned over to them, threatening hostile action if they are not. Having bonded with the refugees, the artists will have none of that, standing by the Captain in refusing the request. Fellini uses calculated artificiality in depicting the Austrian ship, to contrast the hollowness its warlike stance with the humanity of the artist community.

Fellini reaches the same conclusion as Zweig. Art is a vehicle for bridging seemingly unreconcilable cultures and, as such, artists must assert and support that common humanity. To do otherwise is to give into the impersonal, aggressive forces that would kill in the name of ideologies that divide us.

As I look at our present situation, I struggle to identify the artists that feel that obligation as strongly as Zweig and Fellini. It seems as if art for art’s sake has taken over. Much of it is very good and quite interesting. However, it appears designed to express individual rather than collective values. It rarely embraces and promotes concepts of universal humanity.

Maybe it’s that art no longer has the place that Zweig and Fellini saw for it. The written word that was Zweig’s milieu has lost so much of its sway to the world of digital media. And while I could craft an argument that the video arts have carried the humanist banner more effectively than any other, here too most of the output seems content to rely on cheap thrills in an artificially drawn black/white, good/bad world.

Or maybe Zweig and Fellini were dreaming of a society that never was. As much as these consummate artists wanted a role for the arts, perhaps it is one that did not, or only rarely, existed. After all, Zweig could not quell the jingoism that decimated Europe. And while Fellini’s vision is beautiful, that is not how things play out in the real world.

On the other hand, the musical artists of the 1960’s raised harmonic voices in support of civil rights, and against the Vietnam War. The impact was real and palatable. Artists didn’t end the war, or secure equality, but they did influence public opinion in support of these goals.

I don’t know whether artists today can break through the swirling hate. Many do speak out, but not so much through their art, and, at any rate, their pleas seem to fall on deaf ears. I would like an artistic statement that grabs people by the lapel, shakes them out of their lethargy and forces them to see that we are all one. That our survival on this planet depends on our ability to value each individual regardless of trivial differences. Could be that I am asking too much, though Zweig and Fellini didn’t think so.          

I recently went to see the re-release of the wonderful 1997 Studio Ghibli film Princess Mononoke. It was terrific to see this masterpiece of animation on the big screen. The story was thoughtful and exciting. Moreover, it was beautifully crafted, with many scenes that took your breath away.

Going to a film like Princess Mononoke was typical of my recent movie going. I rarely see first run fare, except during Oscar season. Instead, I see showings of older movies. (My other movie in a theater that week was the hilarious 2007 comedy Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story). Luckily, I live where such films are readily available.

The previews I saw before Princess exemplified why I skip most new studio releases. The previews were of “family friendly” movies and included a live action remake of How to Train Your Dragon, a teen action/adventure film called The Legend of Ochi and a live action remake of Lilo and Stitch.

While I am not the target audience for these films, the obvious lack of originality struck me. Both the Dragon and Ochi involve a teenager befriending an otherwise hated creature. Both included the exact same line, “Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you”. Dragon and Lilo seem to have been remade for no other reason than that they now have the CGI to let them do so. From what I could tell, they are a mere regurgitation of the originals.      

The dearth of new ideas from Hollywood is nothing new. The industry powers that be are constantly searching for something that will tickle the fancy of moviegoers but generally settle for rehashing what they have done before. They are either afraid to venture something different, or don’t have the ability to generate new ideas.

Hollywood struck gold 20 or so years ago with Marvel superhero films. Audiences seemed willing to swallow any savior with special powers, and Hollywood certainly was willing to keep churning such films out. After a while, however, they ran out of A-list heroes and dug deep for material, giving us such white knights as Black Adam, The Eternals, and Blue Beetle. Not surprisingly, interest waned.

With the superhero genre a mere shadow of itself, Hollywood is fishing for something new, by looking at things old. In addition to the live cartoons listed above, we have been recently graced with Snow White, Mufasa: The Lion King and The Little Mermaid. Hercules and Robin Hood are on their way.     

I get it. It’s expensive to make a film. If you can’t attract an audience, you will lose a lot of money. Put together a string of bombs and you could lose your job. It’s safer to put something out there that has, at least ostensibly, a ready-made following. Or at least that’s the argument.

The problem is that these are not normal times for the film industry. According to NPR, five years after COVID resulted in the biggest attendance drop in cinematic history, Hollywood still has not recovered. The first nine weeks of 2025 ticket sales in North America improved over last year, but they’re still running well behind the pre-COVID weeks of 2020. I just can’t see these rehashed films pulling Hollywood out of the doldrums.

The recent Oscars highlighted the problem Hollywood has. It was truly ironic when Sean Baker, director of Best Picture winner, Anora, pleaded with viewers to come back into the theaters and bring their kids. Has he watched his own movie? I can only imagine mom and pop bringing Susie and Johnny to see Anora, only to find that the first 40 minutes were as sexually explicit as Debbie Does Dallas. They would never go to see a film again (though Johnny may have his first wet dream that evening).

I shouldn’t care. I wouldn’t go to most traditional Hollywood output, even if they were of better quality. I am satisfied with small, independent cinema. Yet, for films to flourish and screens to proliferate, there must be movies of broader appeal.

I also don’t have an answer. In all likelihood the cycle will have to repeat itself. Blockbuster hits. Endless remakes, rehashes and reboots follow. The public buys in until it doesn’t and then a lull ensues until it starts all over again. We just have to hope the film industry as we know it survives until things improve.

The expected summer moneymakers don’t bode well. We have another Jurassic Park movie, a film from the world of John Wick (I guess Kenau has had enough), three superhero movies (Superman, the third Fantastic Four reboot and Thunderbolts, whoever they are), the second half of the bloated Mission Impossible finale and Freakier Friday, for all of who have been pining to see Lindsay Lohan return to the silver screen.

The only summer “blockbuster” I am interested in seeing is also a sequel, 28 Years Later. Since 28 Days Later was released 23 years ago, this is clearly not an attempt to rush out a second movie to feed off the first. Plus, Danny Boyle is back at the helm, and I trust him.

I am sure other films currently off the radar will pop up as well. And who knows, maybe some of the other rehashes will be worth the price of admission. For Hollywood’s sake, I hope so. In the meantime, Mishima, a Life in Four Chapters, a Fassbinder retrospective and a slew of other great oldies are coming to the Philadelphia Film Society. Lower the lights and fire up the projector!!!               

We recently bought a new car. While I could write about the inherently terrible nature of making such a purchase, I won’t. Unless you’re a car person – and I definitely am not – you know that feeling of being in way over your head as you try and choose between car models you really can’t evaluate.

As a side note, the only entertaining car shopping experience I had was when I was getting my first car with my father. We took along the Pastor of our church, who doubled as a mechanic. He proceeded to crawl under the car in the midst of the lot, much to the amazement of the salesman and me. When he emerged, he pronounced the car fit and we moved on to the price negotiations.

Now that we had picked out the car and it had been blessed, so to speak, I was very excited. Then my father and the salesman started haggling over the price. I wasn’t paying, so I just wanted it to get over with. They reached an impasse. My father turned to me and said, “Let’s go Tom”. He walked out the door, with me following behind muttering, “but, but….” Sure enough the salesman chased us down as we got into our car and, after the inevitable visit with the Manager, we got our price. The irony of it all, and maybe the lesson too, is that the car we bought was a 1972 Ford Pinto hatchback, designated by Motortrend Magazine as “one of the most infamous cars in automotive history” because of its exploding gas tank.

Anyway, back to our new car. Inevitably, once we agreed to the purchase the salesman sat us down in the car and in a five-minute sprint went through its features. We were shown what each button and lever did, all the various permutations to cruise control, display, audio etc., etc. By the end my neck was sore from mindlessly nodding along.

A couple of months later we had the bi-annual time change. I figured the display on the car would do the same, but it didn’t. My first reaction was anger. How dare the car not perform any function automatically!!! Did this mean that I would have to figure out how to do this myself? Could we have sunk that low?

I dutifully pulled the ridiculous 700-page car manual out of the glove compartment. After searching through the index to discover where they hid the clock instructions (why list it as “Setting the Clock”, instead of just “Clock”?), I perused in amazement as they walked me through two pages of options, including an automatic update. I wondered why they didn’t just set that as the norm and save me the trouble of hefting this monstrosity.

As I flipped through the manual, I realized that I did not know half of what the car could do. Why were there 14 pages on the “Keyless Access System”? Could I really remember the meaning of the 39 indicator lights? What is a “Hill Descent Control System”? Did I actually have a “Traffic Sign Recognition System”, and, if so, why? Am I comfortable with a “Driver Attention Monitor”?

With a sigh, I put the manual back into the glove compartment, where I hoped it would remain for the next 5 years. I know I could have studied the tome and learned all the nuances of this major purchase, but I also knew I did not have the patience or interest to do so. Let’s face it, all I really want is for the car to start when I push the button and for my phone to hook in so I don’t get lost and can listen to whatever Spotify station strikes my fancy. Most everything else is superfluous.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized this was my life. I interact daily with a myriad of contraptions that I know little about. Right now, I am typing on a powerful computer that I have no doubt can do an amazing array of calculations, permutations, solicitations and alterations. Yet, all I ask it to do is display my e-mail, get me on the internet and run the Word program.

Even in Word my knowledge is minuscule. There are nine tabs at the top of the sheet, not counting “Help” (which rarely is). Under each of these tabs there are sub-headings too numerous to count. While I have been using Word for the last 40 years I doubt if I have used more than 10 of these.

As I looked around, I realized that every electronic device I own, from my phone to my “Smart” TV to my coffee maker, has a plethora of buttons that I have never used and never intend to. Manufacturers pile on features meant to impress, but the vast majority are mere window dressing. Do they really expect us to take the time to learn how to use the “Dehydrate” feature on the Air Fryer, or are they, as I suspect, just giggling at another useless add-on that will drive up the price?     

I should not be surprised at any of this. Even the simplest of these electronic devices is so complex it is beyond comprehension. I have no idea how any of them work. If I was honest with myself when one turns on I would fall to my knees thankful for the miracle that just occurred.

On the one hand this is just an old man’s rant. “Back when I was a boy, we had appliances with only one button, on/off.” However, the truth of the matter is that I didn’t know how anything worked back then either. Modern marvels just highlight and mock my ignorance.

Now and then I get it into my head to actually learn what the contraptions I own do. Needless to say, that urge quickly passes. I must admit to myself that I am content to use 1/3 of the functions of most everything I own. As for the rest, I just have to hope I don’t hit some button accidentally and descend into worlds unknown. The last thing I want is to pull out another manual!!!

It has been some time since I have taken the metaphorical pen in hand. Frankly, the state of the world has made me question whether musing on such inane topics as Love Boat, the Trenton bridge and UFOs are worthwhile. And I know that I have nothing unique to say on the political situation that merits expression.

I did, however, realize that I missed the writing, as useless as it might be. Plus, things keep popping into my head, and if I ignore them, they get stuck there to crop up at the most awkward moments. So, I am back at it.

It helps to receive a thoughtful prompt, and I got one by watching the recent documentary “Sly Lives (aka the burden of black genius)” directed by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson. Questlove illuminates the life of the enigmatic Sly Stone, but wants to ask a deeper question, as evidenced by the parenthetical in the title. Was Sly’s failure to live up to his early success, and his descent into self-destructive behavior a personal failing, or emblematic of the pressures on those we consider geniuses, especially if they are Black?

Though I knew the Family Stone hits, I was a few years too young to remember the extent of their popularity. The documentary reacquainted me with those hits but also made me realize the incredible impact Sly had on music I was better acquainted with. By delving into the Stone catalogue Questlove made clear that much of what was standard radio play in the mid to late 1970’s and beyond owed a lot of its sound to the Family.

By 1975 when I toddled off to college the innovation had dried up. Sly was battling personal demons which manifested themselves in copious drug use. The drug use led to erratic behavior, run-ins with the law, and the break-up of the band. Despite numerous attempts, Sly was never able to recapture the magic.

Genius is such a loaded, overused term. Society is quick to apply the label to anyone who excels. But Questlove makes a good case that Sly was well in front of his contemporaries, and anticipated trends in music that became the norm. He was more than your run-of-the-mill hitmaker.

So, whether Sly Stone was/is a genius or not (yes, he is still alive), he is a fitting subject to explore Questlove’s concerns. Do geniuses carry a special burden, and is that burden greater when they are Black? To Questlove’s credit he does not provide a simple answer or wallow in convenient bromides. Instead, he challenges the viewers to try and answer the question for themselves.

As a rule, genius manifests itself in the young. Marconi was 27 when he developed, demonstrated and marketed the first successful long-distance wireless telegraph. Many of Edison’s inventions germinated when he was in his 20’s. Pascal created a proto computer at age 16. The list goes on.

Yet scientists seem able to continue their production well beyond their early years. While many made their best-known innovations while young, they continued to build on them. Maybe they felt haunted by early success, but it is rare that they fully dried up, or stopped being leaders in their respective fields, even if they never achieved another revolutionary breakthrough.

Artistic genius is different, and it is in this realm that Questlove’s inquiry becomes more interesting. As with many scientific geniuses, most artists make their largest leaps while young. Whether it is in music, the visual arts or literature, masters of the arts usually do their most radical work as they start their careers. Unlike scientists, continuing to expand on that work does not necessarily enhance their reputations.

Maybe it’s our fault as consumers. We become bored easily and demand constant innovation from our heroes. We do not want to hear the same tunes reworked or see the same paintings redone, regardless of how radical the original concept was. We quickly integrate new concepts into our realm of the possible and ask, “Now what?”

The pressure on true artists must be palatable. You are proud of your unique creation. You revel in the recognition. Maybe you even start to believe the press notices labeling you a modern-day Mozart or Austen. But you still have to generate the next song, paint the next picture or write the next novel. You are conscious of the pressure to meet expectations. It is a situation wrought with danger, likely to unleash personal demons.

We must come back to the definition of genius. We are too free with the term. We apply it to the creator of every new thing that emerges. Genius has to be more than a single brainchild, especially in the arts. It must embody the ability to continue to push limits past initial success and continue to create in a way that defies convention, even a convention you yourself developed.

Those who meet this standard are few and far between. Miles Davis comes to mind. He went from bebop to cool jazz to jazz fusion and at each step redefined the genre. Picasso is another. In his blue and rose periods his output was unique but followed traditional styles. From there, however, he pioneered cubism, surrealism, and other forms that led us to what we know as modern art. I would also include James Joyce. His early writings, “Dubliners” and “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” are brilliant but it was with “Ulysses” and “Finnegan’s Wake” that he redefined what the novel could be.

Still, we have not answered Questlove’s inquiry. Are there “geniuses” who never fulfill the promise of their initial work because of the burdens they face? Instinctively, the answer must be yes. Yet, it is impossible to prove. Delving into the human psyche to understand why radical creativity stops is a fool’s game. Was it the burdens placed on the artist or the inability to replicate the original lightning bolt?

Does this question become even more unanswerable if the artist is Black? Questlove does a good job of delineating the unique burdens these artists face, especially in the United States. Historical reality forces the Black artist to represent a race and stay true to racial roots whether he or she wants to or not. White artists do not bear this weight. Paul Simon integrated South African music into his “Graceland” album, and while he was accused of cultural appropriation, no one charged him with abandoning his Whiteness.

While we will never know if Sly was a genius, the burdens were undeniable. The late 1960’s had to be a hard time on Black artists with the emergence of the Black Power movement. Heck, the Black Panthers even pressured Sly. For someone like him who wanted to harmonize many musical styles, it had to be particularly difficult.

I would like to ask Questlove whether the pressures unique to Black artists that Sly faced have abated somewhat over the years. Is it still as big a burden, or have so many artists blurred the genre lines that there is more acceptance? It seems to me that’s the case, but last I looked I am not a Black artist (or an artist of any kind) so my opinion means next to nothing.

I will always be skeptical of the label “genius”. It is too easy to use, but so much harder to live up to. We will never know whether Sly Stone was a genius or just a very talented innovator. We will never know whether he was ultimately defeated by outside influences or by inner conflicts. What we do know is that achievement carries with it burdens that we all too often overlook as we obsess on radical artistic creations. The pedestal we erect is a fragile one, and we need to keep that in mind.  

North Dakota is considering a law that would require colleges and public schools to hang a copy of the 10 Commandments in every classroom. They already have a law that shields teachers from lawsuits if they elect to display these ancient rules of conduct. They are not alone. Other legislatures are considering, or have passed, similar laws.

Proponents of these statutes argue that, regardless of religious affiliation, the Commandments provide moral guidelines essential to ethical living. There is little doubt that they are more concerned with imposing their religious beliefs on society. The Commandments are to appear as a talisman of faith rather than any real guide to behavior.

These ulterior motives are evident by the fact that supporters of these laws eschew any rational discussion of what the Commandments actually say. Of course, even quoting them is problematic, unless you go back to the original Hebrew. I will use the King James version because it is the one most generally accepted by Christians in this country. In fact, I would bet that many think God used the King’s English when speaking with Moses on Mount Sanai.

Exodus 20: 2-17 states:

2 I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.
3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:
5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;
6 And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
7 Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work:
10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
12 Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
13 Thou shalt not kill.
14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.
15 Thou shalt not steal.
16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.

Let’s look at what is to be imparted to the children of North Dakota.

Commandment 1 is bound to confuse the young ones. The edict to have no other God before this God implies that more than one God exists, heresy to any monotheist. The Bible itself does recognize these other Gods, mentioning, by one count, 54 alternate deities. My guess is that will not be discussed.

More difficult is the identity of the “me” referred to. Moses’ followers knew who this was. But there is still that pesky First Amendment. We cannot just come out and say that this is the Christian God (sorry Jews and Muslims, but he’s ours!!!). Does that leave “me” to be defined by each student based on their own beliefs?  Are we really just saying, “Hey, get a God and put it before all the others.”?

The Second Commandment is one we kind of ignore. After all, we are a society of graven images, whether it’s touchdown Jesus, a meme coin of an orange god, or a poster of the latest pop idol. And we certainly do bow down and serve those idols, especially if there is money to be made doing so.

The second half of this Commandment (Exodus 20:5) will certainly be excised. How can we explain to kids that even if they keep the Commandments they are in deep doodoo if their Grampa slipped? Doesn’t that defeat the purpose? Plus, it doesn’t fit well with the idea of a loving God we like to project. Let’s face it. The God that promulgated these Commandments was not cuddly. Best to skip over that.

Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain. Make it useful, Gosh Darn it!!!

Keep the Sabbath holy. It’s a day of rest. No tee ball games. Close the mall. Don’t go to restaurants, but have something at home, preferably made the day before. No football on the telly. They’re working and that’s forbidden. On second thought, let’s not get out of control.

We can all agree that honoring your mother and father is a good thing, can’t we? (Unless your parents are worthless heathens who voted for the wrong party, and object to us posting these commonsense rules of behavior).

Thou shalt not kill. It gets no more basic than that. However, as the Genie would say, there are a couple of provisos and quid pro quos. While you cannot kill, the state can do so on your behalf. Oh yes, and you can kill if we put you in a uniform and point you at someone we call an enemy. Otherwise, it’s a no, no.

I think it is a wonderful idea to introduce adultery (No. 7) to elementary school children. I can imagine the following conversation:

Tommy: Mrs. Snodgrass, what’s adultery?

Mrs. Snodgrass: Why that’s what your father does with his floozy of a secretary when he goes on [air-quotes] business trips.

Tommy: I get it. Like what you and Principal Principle do in the janitor’s closet when you think no one’s looking.

Mrs. Snodgrass: Shut-up Tommy.

There can be no argument with Number 8, can there. We should not steal. Failure to pay contractors who have done work for us or buying a painting of ourselves with money set aside for charitable donation doesn’t really count. Then again, most legislators are probably relying on kids not going that deep.

The prohibition against “false witness” also makes sense. Children should be taught that claiming something untrue is true with the intention of hurting someone or ruining their reputation is wrong. You know, like alleging that your neighbors are capturing pets and eating them when you know that’s false. No decent person could support that.

The final Commandment raises the inevitable question as to who our neighbor is. Moses could not have meant just the family next door. Might he have meant only those in our “tribe”? Possible, but certainly by the New Testament this was understood more broadly. That’s the whole point of the Parable of the Good Samaritan, isn’t it?

Putting that side, this is a good one. It is almost Buddhist. Striving is the source of suffering. Envy eats at the soul. For your own sake, and that of your community jealousies should be put aside. I think we have a winner!!!!

So, if we just pare these Commandments down, ignore the bits that are problematic and the hypocrisy of those pushing for their display, we have some decent guidelines for living a virtuous life. We could display these and explain away the difficulties, or we could look to another set of precepts that are not so laden.

I would suggest the Seven Social Sins, a list promulgated by Anglican Minister Frederick Donaldson, and popularized by Mohandas Gandhi. These sins are:

1. Wealth without Work

2. Pleasure without conscience

3. Knowledge without Character

4. Commerce without Morality

5. Science without Humanity

6. Religion without Sacrifice

7. Politics without Principle

These I can get behind. They apply to everyone, regardless of gender, race or creed. No provisos and quid pro quos are needed. Put them up in every classroom. Make it mandatory that a week is spent reviewing and discussing them. Of course, for that to happen we would have to have legislators that avoid sin Number 7. Good luck with that!!

In the meantime, we have to fight to uphold the secular Commandment embodied in the First Amendment separating church and state. There should be no backdoors or loopholes to this Commandment. The beliefs of religious sects do not belong in our classrooms, no matter how you mask them. As my Father would say, “And thus ends the reading of the word”.

Once again, Time has picked it’s Person of the Year. Once again, it is the most banal and obvious choice possible. Does anyone really want to rehash the 2024 antics of He Who Will Not Be Named in This Blog? We have been inundated with his insanity to such an extent that the thought of reliving his buffoonery is more repulsive than Saw VII. At least that movie would get my blood pumping, which is preferable to getting my blood pressure soaring.

To rectify this travesty, I feel compelled to nominate my own person of the year. (I can feel the collective anticipatory intake of breath). My nominee is Gisele Pelicot. (I can now hear that intake of breath coming out in a collective, “Who?”). If you are not familiar with her story and her courage, you should be, as horrific as it is. I promise that it is much more enlightening than the drivel from Time.

Gisele Pelicot was, by all outer evidence, a normal housewife living in Avignon, France. In 2020 her husband Dominique was arrested for filming up the skirts of female customers at a local store. While investigating this crime police seized his computer, laptop and phones. What they found was mind-boggling.

Dominque’s electronic devices contained hundreds of images and videos of his wife being raped while unconscious. They revealed that he had solicited men to assault her and that over 50 had taken him up on that proposition. Gisele was faced with the nightmare reality that her husband had drugged her and then sold her lifeless body for other men’s “pleasure”.

Naturally Gisele felt the impact of the drugging and assaults. She went to see a doctor on numerous occasions, often accompanied by her husband, complaining of memory loss and pelvic pain. I don’t know whether the Doctor dismissed her symptoms or failed to do a thorough exam, but nothing came of those visits.

All of this brings to mind the 2022 movie Women Talking, and the book it was based upon. There too women were drugged and raped. Their physical complaints also led nowhere until incontrovertible evidence uncovered what was happening. After those responsible were arrested the women had a choice to make on how to respond. They chose to leave their community and head out to an uncertain future.

Gisele Pelicot faced a similar dilemma. French law offered her anonymity as the state pursued her husband and her rapists. She could testify behind closed doors. Her name and image would be kept out of the papers. “Justice” could have been pursued without public scrutiny.    

The choice that Gisele made, and the aftermath of that decision, is what sets her apart and leads me to think that she deserves to be honored. As horrific as her experience was, she recognized that being a silent victim achieves nothing. She went from being a casualty to being a crusader.

Gisele waived her right to anonymity and a closed-door trial. She not only agreed to testify in public but put herself forward as a spokesperson for victims of sexual assault. She did so with her head held high. She refused to be ashamed of something she had no control over. Instead, she proclaimed “The shame is theirs”.

In support of her plight and in recognition of her firmness and tenacity, thousands rallied around her. People gathered at the courthouse. Supportive slogans were pasted on walls around the courthouse. Demonstrations were held in her honor.

The trial resulted in the conviction of 50 of the 51 charged defendants, with the last convicted of having drugged and raped his own wife with Dominique. Moreover, it put the spotlight on a culture that enabled the abuse of women. The coverage made clear that while the nature of this crime might be exceptional, the attitudes that let the defendants act as they did was not.

Pelicot’s testimony put the spotlight on French women’s mistrust of the legal system and the perception, borne out by statistics, that judicial punishment of sexual assault was inconsistent and generally light. The result is that the vast amount of rapes cases reported to police (94% according to Euro News) are dropped. That discussion spread throughout Europe and beyond.

It is hard to say whether Gisele’s heroism will have any lasting impact. Other high-profile cases – Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby – have engendered similar outbursts which have died down as time has passed. One can only hope that the repercussions here are more permanent.

Even if not, I would choose to celebrate someone who bravely stood up for what is right and for a better world. Too often we recognize only those that are the most divisive and selfish-centered because they are the loudest. It takes someone like Gisele Pelicot to remind us of what is really important.    

I will leave the last words to Gisele. “I wanted when I started on September 2 [the opening day of the trial] to ensure that society could actually see what was happening and I have never regretted this decision. I now have faith in our capacity collectively to take hold of a future in which everybody, women, men, can live together in harmony, in respect and mutual understanding”.   

Year-end lists are proliferating. Click bait explodes so that we can re-experience the best new restaurants, most impactful technological breakthroughs or the craziest Housewife moments of the last 12 months (had to be the lunchtime brawl in New Jersey). Who am I to buck this trend? So here goes.

Best Movies Watched in 2024:

10. Infernal Affairs/L.A. Confidential – Two diverse films from different countries that show how much drama, tension and creativity can still be wrought from within the over-done world of the police.

9. Godzilla Minus One/Tetsuo the Iron Man – Divergent Japanese takes on the Monster genre. One affirming that you can make a Godzilla film where you actually care about the people as much as you do about the big lizard. The other going off the surrealistic deep end to show what a monster man can be. Both great fun.

8. Carnival of Souls – Somehow, I had never seen this small, unsettling horror gem. Now that I have it will be hard to get out of my mind.  

7. Playtime – Jacques Tati is unmatched in wringing comedic chaos out of the modern world, and he never did it better than in this film.

6. The Host/Memories of Murder – Early films of Bong Joon-ho that demonstrate what a master he is in creating memorable characters. I cannot wait for his new film.

5. Speed Racer/Heat – These should really be termed Best Movie Theater Experiences. Speed Racer is not a movie I would recommend you watch at home on TV. However, if you get to see it on the Big Screen in a packed theater do not hesitate. The non-stop buzz is visceral. Heat is a much better movie, and well worth seeing in any setting, but in a crowded theater you can feel the tension both on the screen and in those around you.

4. Conclave/Dune: Part 2 – These were the best of the 2024 mainstream movies that I saw this year. Both should generate Oscar buzz. Both deserve it.

3. Certified Copy/Seed of the Sacred Fig – I continue to be amazed by the vibrant movies emerging from Iran. Over the last few years, I have seen film after film from that troubled country that are as powerful as any. Certified Copy is an older one, while Seed of the Sacred Fig is as topical as it could be. Unfortunately, it also sent the Director into exile.

2. Portrait of a Lady on Fire – There is a reason that this movie was ranked so high in the recent Sight and Sound 100 (no. 30). It is beautiful both cinematically and thematically.

1. David Lynch – When I looked at the movies I watched in 2024 (thank you Letterboxd) I realized that it has been a Lynchian year. I saw 7 of his films (Inland Empire, Lost Highway, Eraserhead, Blue Velvet, Elephant Man, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, Twin Peaks: The Return). Most I had seen before, but each had so much to offer that it was like seeing them for the first time.

Best Non-Fiction Read in 2024:

10. An Iron Wind: Europe Under Hitler (Fritzsche) – By focusing on individuals who find themselves subject to a venal regime, Fritzche illuminates how we cope, or don’t, when the world around us has gone mad.

9. House of Government: A Saga of the Russian Revolution (Slezkine) – Fed my never-ending fascination with the Russian Revolution by going beyond the well-known leaders to illuminate how the apparatchiks who made the revolution lived and what they believed.

8. The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies (Russo) – Amazing what lay just below the surface of Golden-Age Hollywood for all to see if you just looked.

7. Loose Balls: The Short, Wild Life of the American Basketball Association/Why We Love Baseball: a History in 50 Moments (Pluto/Posnanski) – I read a fair amount of sports books this past year. These were the two best. The insane story of the ABA, which had no right to exist as long as it did, and a paean to Baseball that brings out the essence of the game in vignettes, some well know, some obscure.

6. The Library at Midnight/Read Dangerously: The Subversive Power of Literature in Troubled Times/Where I’m Reading From: The Changing World of Books (Manguel/Nafisi/Parks) – I am a sucker for books about books.

5. Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Riot of 1971 and It’s Legacy (Thompson) – I love when books reveal the relevance of something that happened a while ago and it makes you so angry you want to scream, though it’s not necessarily good for my blood pressure.

4. The Blood of Emmett Till (Tyson) – See last comment.

3. Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty (Keefe) – See last two comments.

2. Killing a King: The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin and the Remaking of Israel (Ephron) – A good argument can be made that the last real chance of peace in the Middle East died with Rabin and this book makes it well.

1. Time’s Echo: Music, Memory and the Second World War (Eichler) – The intersection of art and tragedy resonate in this exploration of post-WWII works by four very different composers from very different backgrounds – Strauss, Schoenberg, Britton and Shostakovich. The result is breathtaking.

Best Fiction Read in 2024:

10. Children of Time/Ancillary Justice (Tchaikovsky/Leckie) – This was a year for Science Fiction. These two stood out. As with all great Sci Fi, both created a unique world and incorporated themes that went beyond that world into ours.

9. The Three Body Problem (Liu) – There is a reason this book was embraced. It was thoughtful and unique, though it’s strongest asset might have been its setting in Communist China.

8. The Neon Rain (Burke) – Nothing like a taut thriller that with an interesting lead Detective battling corruption and many levels of crime.

7. My Brilliant Friend (Ferrante) – While this is not my normal genre, the characters and cultural setting made this a wonderful read.

6. Life: A User’s Manual (Perec) – A sharp veer into modernism that was challenging in so many ways but rewarding in just as many.

5.  Zorba the Greek (Kazantzakis) – Few books celebrate life as much as this one does by presenting a lead character that is wholly unforgettable.

4. Circe (Miller) – Focusing on a side character in a familiar story seems to be a trend. It is especially perilous to do so by drawing on an epoch like the Odyssey, but Miller makes it work.

3. Nobody Walks (Herron) – Any fan of the Slow Horses series knows that Herron can create an engrossing set of characters and place them in compelling situations with numerous twists. He doesn’t disappoint here.

2. The Glass Bees (Junger) – Almost prescient in its depiction of a future where the technological dwarves and perverts the human.

1. Cloud Cuckoo Land (Doerr) – Pulls off the difficult task of blending three stories from different times, without losing the intensity of each, eventually drawing them together. A captivating read.     

Anyone who navigated airports in the 1970’s knows the drill. Walk along with your head down trying to get to the gate without being assaulted by seedy looking representatives of various organizations wanting your money, and, if you could believe the rumors, your soul. Among the more notable supplicants you had to dodge were Hari Krishna zealots with their shaved heads and saffron robes and the followers of Sun Myung Moon. The Moonies were the most annoying because they were less conspicuous, making them harder to avoid.

The approach was not subtle. Some token was shoved into your face, whether it was a book or flower. If you were silly enough to stop and engage you were hooked. I once got a copy of the Bhagavad Gita that way. The acolyte who approached me started talking about George Harrison and before I knew it, I was $20 poorer. I must admit, however, it was a nice-looking book. It sat on my shelf for many years, though I don’t remember ever cracking it open.    

Even before our airports became mini war zones with restricted areas abounding, the powers that be banned these annoying petitioners. While I never regretted the loss, it makes the airports more sterile. Luckily, before that happened “Airplane” captured perfectly the annoyance of most patrons by having Robert Stack take out solicitor after solicitor seeking contributions for everything from scientology to Jerry’s Kids and “more nuclear power”. (Everybody remembers Leslie Neilson for that movie – and rightly so – but Robert Stack was every bit as funny).

While the Moonies appear to be long gone, and saffron robes are a rarity, I have recently encountered a new wave of devoted panhandlers ready to accost you on street corners throughout Philadelphia. These are clearly a different sort of animal. They are young people who are presumably getting paid to collect on behalf of recognized charities. The basis of their remuneration is unclear.

Some of the charities represented are ones we know well, like the SPCA or the ACLU. Others have names that sound legitimate, like Children International, but seem to be counting on their generic names to assure you that you’re giving to a good cause. Kind of like George Castanza telling his co-workers that for the holidays he had contributed on their behalf to “The Human Fund”. It sounded good, so why should they care that he was the only human benefiting from the “contribution”.  

Since these kids are not true believers like the airport denizens the ardency of their solicitations varies. Most seem content to merely ask for a moment of your time. Others look at you pleadingly and only follow up if you respond somehow, with a raised eyebrow or twitch. In any event they give up quickly in response to a polite refusal.

However, I have had some more aggressive encounters. I was once approached in Washington Square by a vested schnorrer who was collecting on behalf of some children’s charity I had never heard of. She prefaced her pitch by asking me if I liked children. So many wise-ass responses flooded my brain (“Obviously, you never met my kids.” “Yes, at least until they can talk.” “No more or less than the rest of humanity, and that’s not saying much.”) that I froze. Finally, I merely spit out something insipid like, “Do you really think that will get you a donation?” I hate those missed opportunities.

(This exchange did remind me of when my son Will ran for Mayor of Allentown while a student at Muhlenberg College (“Where there’s a Will there’s a Wamser”). He took an ant-vax position. His explanation made perfect sense).

Another solicitor approached me by asking where I would rate myself on a scale of 1 – 10 as a nice person. I immediately shot back “0”, though I admit I did it with a smile. Having been asked this asinine question the “0” was honestly how I felt at that moment. The smile was disingenuous.

The problem is that I probably do rate higher than a “0” on the nice scale, though where I would not want to guess. I feel a twinge of guilt passing these kids by, especially when I know the organization they represent to be meritorious. I am tempted to stop and explain that I do give to charity, but not to street solicitations.  

I never had this problem with the Moonies. They were easy to blow off without a second thought. I just can’t do that with these fresh-faced youngsters who look so damn sincere. Believe me, I fight the urge to engage. I just don’t feel great about it.

Plus, I feel some commiseration with these street urchins. Likely they are more akin to the long-gone door-to-door supplicants selling magazine subscriptions to earn money for college. Like those dear departed mendicants, they are probably only making a pittance of what they need to survive. That alone is worth our empathy.

The irony is that the airport ambushers were true believers, or at least I assume so. I doubt if the Krishnas were paying anyone to shave their heads, don the saffron and troll the Philadelphia International walkways. Maybe they deserved more of my sympathy than this new crop of solicitors. Nah!!!

Solicitations will always be with us, whether it’s these patrons of the sidewalk, or in the flood of mail that comes daily, especially this time of year. Most are from worthwhile organizations doing important work. Picking and choosing those who you want to support can be agonizing. However, one thing is for sure. Come-ons more likely to elicit testy responses is not the way to go.  

The other day I was thinking about The Andy Griffith Show – as you do. In particular, I was pondering an episode where Ralph, the brother of Otis Campbell, the Mayberry town drunk, is coming to pay a visit. Otis is in a tizzy because he believes his brother to be a success, and he is ashamed that Ralph will see what a failure he is. To help Otis out Andy agrees to let him pose as a Deputy while his brother is in town, much to the antic chagrin of Barney.

All seems to being going well until Ralph comes staggering into the Mayberry jail three sheets to the wind. It turns out that he is the town drunk where he lives, and tops off his evenings, like Otis, by letting himself into the jail to sleep it off. In one of the most ironic moments in sitcom history, Otis lectures his brother on proper decorum. Back slaps occur all around, and a lesson seems to have been learned. Until the next episode.

There are numerous avenues to explore arising out of this 22-minute classic. Consider the concept of a town drunk. It appears that every small North Carolina town has one, but only one. No one else wobbles into the jail after a night on the town, just Otis, and apparently Ralph. You know they aren’t the only drinkers. Are they akin to the proverbial scapegoats, taking the alcoholic sins of the community onto their backs? Is this truly a public service?

Before I could answer these sociological queries, I became consumed with what led Otis and Ralph to this vocation. Why did they feel this need to not only drink copious amounts, but to display their inebriation to the world? Otis certainly could have headed home to pass out. It was rare that Barney and Andy went looking for him. He came to them, as did Ralph.

Having been raised on a shallow understanding of Freud, Bettelheim and Erikson, I naturally assumed that childhood trauma had to be the cause. The fact that they are brothers is instructive. I think it is probable that Ralph and Otis’ father was a drinker as well. Like them, he was a big man and when he was in his cups the fists would fly. Their mother wanted to protect the boys but was ineffectual.

As the brothers grew, they began to imitate the only strong role model they had. They too took to drink. They also realized, whether consciously or not, that the only time their father even noticed them was when he was drunk, so they imbibed in public to get the attention they longed for.

Their drinking led to endless trips to the Sherriff’s office in the dry town where they were raised. Oddly enough, it was only there that someone paid heed to them. Maybe it was not loving care, but it was more than they ever found anywhere else. They had located a haven, and a lifelong pattern had set in.

I realized that you could do this backseat dissection with many sitcom characters. They are perfect for analysis. With few exceptions, they are one-dimensional, letting us avoid the nuances involved in the personalities of real human beings. How many of us know that Otis works as a glue dipper, whatever that is? I didn’t and I have seen every episode countless times. He is one thing and one thing only – the town drunk.

Take Buddy Sorrell, Rob Petrie’s co-writer on the Alan Brady show. His nickname was The Human Joke Machine, but how did he become this person for whom jokes were everything? Undoubtedly, he was picked on as a kid for being both small and Jewish. He didn’t even have a Synagogue community to fall back on (he did not have his bar mitzvah until he was adult). Making people laugh was his defense mechanism. It became more than a way to distract his tormentors, it became an obsession. He had to have a joke for every occasion, just to feel safe. Luckily for him he found a professional outlet for his neuroses. Otherwise, he’d be sitting in a Bronx drunk tank, a Northern Otis, trying to make Deputy Barney O’Flaherty laugh.

Sally Rogers, Buddy and Rob’s office mate, provides additional fodder. Why is her whole life focused on corralling a man and getting married? My guess is that she was doted on by her father when she was little. Her mother, however, was cold and distant. It got worse when her parents divorced and her mother blamed Sally. Ever since Sally has been searching for a substitute father figure. This fixation made her unpopular with other girls at Herbert Hoover High, fueling her lifelong inability to make friends with other women (secretly she hates Laura), as well as her caustic wit. Tragically, this same caustic wit has driven away the object of her obsession – a man to marry.   

As I thought about this, I realized that this could be a new parlor game. Players would be assigned a sitcom character and the one that comes up with the best psychological history wins. Extra points could be awarded for creativity, like opining that Otis’ mother became preoccupied with mah jongg as a way to escape her loveless marriage, further isolating Otis and Ralph. It could be called “Bonkers Backstory Bonanza”.

I think I have a winner here. Finally, a justification for all those years in front of the boob tube. Just so someone doesn’t decide to turn the tables on me and ask why I would watch the same sitcom episode so many times that I can remember it in detail 50 years later. But who would want to do that?