Aesop: The Dog & His Shadow

One of my favorite fables by the famed story teller Aesop is one called the Dog and His Shadow. As written by Joseph Jacobs it goes like this:

 It happened that a Dog had got a piece of meat and was carrying it home in his mouth to eat it in peace. Now on his way home he had to cross a plank lying across a running brook. As he crossed, he looked down and saw his own shadow reflected in the water beneath. Thinking it was another dog with another piece of meat, he made up his mind to have that also. So he made a snap at the shadow in the water, but as he opened his mouth the piece of meat fell out, dropped into the water and was never seen more.

The moral of the story

Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow

Nose: A Dog, Man's Best Friend

A few years back I found myself standing along the east bank of the Catawba river near Belmont, North Carolina. It was a chilly December morning and a light mist was in the air that soon turned into a cold drizzle. I took shelter under the railroad trestle and watched the rain come down. I had packed a lunch in a brown paper bag which consisted of a turkey sandwich, some carrot sticks and an apple. I found a nice dry spot and started munching on the carrot sticks when I noticed a skinny brown dog standing in the reeds by the riverbank eyeing me carefully. He was a mutt with perhaps a terrier ancestry. I whistled softly and his head cocked to the side and his ears popped up like a couple of flags at a carnival shooting gallery. I motioned for him to come closer which he did carefully, not trusting the biped, but at the same time sniffing a morsel and hoping to partake of my generosity.
"Come on my friend, help me break my fast." I said to  him not too loud.
He gradually built up his courage and creeped a little closer. I tossed him a piece of my turkey sandwich. He stopped, his black rubber nostrils flared,cautiously sniffing the morsel as if i might be out to poison him.
"Go ahead and eat it old boy, it sure is in no position to eat you!"
He finally snatched it up and jumped back away from me as if I, the giver, would somehow attempt to wrest it from his jaws. Who knows what goes on in the mind of a savage creature. I imagine that it is similar to what goes on in the mind of a non-savage as we like to think of ourselves. I can't say for sure. I am no Jack London that can somehow penetrate into the recess' of a dog's mind.

After swallowing the morsel the beast turned its attention back to the source of his nourishment. His hollow dark eyes pleaded with the source for more. As I am by nature fond of these beasts I could not deny him. Soon, the dog was sitting in front of me wagging his tail, my best friend, as if it had never harbored a suspicious thout about me. I started to call him "Nose" because of his large, black, wet snout which seemed to be too big for his head. It was the caricature of his being. Nose, was obviously homeless. His rusty coat was matted and he seemed to be in want of everything a creature of this world should have by right of birth. It wasn't long before I realized that I had given the poor creature my whole sandwich, and I sat staring glumly at the remainder of my carrots and apple that would serve as my part of this wonderful lunch down by the river. Nose sat on his haunches, an inquisitive look on his his face as if he wanted to ask "well old boy, how about it? Is there any more where that came from?"
I tossed him a carrot and his nose went into action, but there was no surprise when i found him looking at me again with what I perceived to be a doleful expression. The carrot remained where it landed. Perhaps a rabbit found it later...I do not know its fate.
"Sorry Nose, old buddy...but I am fresh out."
I guess that nose finally realized that I was not kidding and he took a seat beside me, his head in the direction of the river which was now being pelted by a freezing rain. He seemed to be staring off into the eternal...I don't know, but I do know that at this moment of his life he was content. My turkey sandwich sticking to his ribs. I promised him that I would be back tomorrow with more. I had to leave. I stood up and tried skimming my apple core across the water...no soap. I started to walk back toward my truck and Nose followed me, but when I began to scramble up the river bank he stopped and watched me climb to the top. He did not follow...as if his fate were entwined with the river. I stole a glance over my shoulder and could see him looking after me, watching...wondering...He started as if he were going to attempt the bank, but stopped again and turned his head toward the river. The last glimpse I had of him was of his regal form sitting on his haunches and looking after me perhaps wondering if I would return.

 

I promised Nose that I would return, and indeed, I kept my promise. The next day I was back at the river. It was still cold and overcast, but at least the rain had stopped. I had packed two turkey sandwiches this time, one for me and one for my new friend. When I returned to the same spot I had taken my lunch the day before I called out hoping to see Nose. I whistled a few times, but there was no response, only the wind rustling the reeds. I walked along the shoreline for a ways...calling out....whistling....nothing. I climbed the embankment and found myself walking along the railroad tracks. That is when I saw it...A rusty brown speck laying on the tracks. It was Nose...I walked up to him...He was clean as if he had just fallen asleep. His head was turned up toward the sky as if he had seen the infinite...the heaven that this noble soul deserved. I felt sad, and carried his body back to the river where we had enjoyed a lunch together only the day before. I placed the turkey sandwich down next to him. It made me feel better anyway. I had kept my promise.  At least I remember him...and always will, even if our paths crossed for only a brief time...by the river.

The Plymouth Lions: Peter Browne & John Goodman

The Plymouth colony was only two months old when two of its founding settlers found themselves in a bit of a predicament. It was a cold January day and the settlement was in its incipient stages. A few days earlier the walls of the common house had been completed, and lots were drawn up for families who would be building their own houses. Peter Browne, and John Goodman along with two other unidentified men were working about a mile from the settlement cutting thatch when a cold drizzle began to fall. Browne and Goodman decided to move further inland and the other two men would follow after binding the thatch. They took with them two dogs, an English mastiff and a spaniel. After the other two men completed their work they attempted to find their two fellow settlers, but could not locate them so they returned to the village. A search party was sent out, but they too were unsuccessful in locating the two men. When they still had not returned by morning it was feared by all that they had been waylaid by some of the natives. Another search party consisting of ten men or so was sent out to locate the men in the morning. In Mourt's Relation, a journal of the first months of the Plymouth colony it was written:

These two that were missed, at dinner time took their meat in their hands, and would go walk and refresh themselves. So going a little off they find a lake of water, and having a great mastiff bitch with them and a spaniel, by the water side they found a great dear; the dogs chased him and they followed so far as they lost themselves and could not find the way back. They wandered all that afternoon being wet, and at night it did freeze and snow. They were slenderly apparelled and had no weapons but each one his sickle, nor any victuals. They ranged up and down and could find none of the savages' habitations. When it drew to night they were much perplexed, for they could find neither harbor nor meat, but, in frost and snow were forced to make the earth their bed and the element their covering. And another thing did very much terrify them; they heard, as they thought, two lions roaring exceedingly for a long time together, and a third, that they thought was very near them. So not knowing what to do, they resolved to climb up into a tree as their safest refuge, though that would prove an intolerable cold lodging; so they stood at the tree's root, that when lions came they might take their opportunity of climbing up. The bitch they were fain to hold by the neck, for she would have been gone to the lion; but it pleased God so to dispose, that the wild beasts came not. So they walked up and down under the tree all night; it was an extreme cold night.

     The next morning after a cold, dreary night the two hungry and tired men set off once again in an attempt to find the settlement. They finally chanced upon a hill where they were able to locate the harbor, and from there followed the shoreline back. The rest of the colonists had almost given them up for dead. John Goodman's feet were terribly frostbitten. A few days after this encounter with the lions Goodman once again had an encounter with some wild beasts. This time he was walking along with his spaniel when the dog was chased by two large wolves. Goodman picked up a stick and threw it at one of the wolves hitting it on the head. The wolves drew back but soon returned. This time he found a fence-stave and and waved it at them. The two wolves then left Goodman and his terrified spaniel to themselves.

      It has often been suggested that the lion screams heard by Browne and Goodman on the evening of January 12, 1621 were caused by a mountain lion, or a bobcat. They also could very well have been caused by a lynx. It is interesting to speculate as to what they might have heard that night. could their imaginations have gotten the best of them? After all, they were cold, tired, hungry and scared. any noise in the night might have sounded like a big cat. A lynx has a very distinctive scream which John Burroughs, the naturalist, describes as "a cry or scream so loud that I could distinctly hear the echo in the woods about 400 yards away, a cry that tapered off into a long-drawn wail, which for despondency and agony of soul I have never heard equalled."(Rue, pg.194) The lynx is also a night hunter which the author of this post knows only so well! In the summer of 1980, whn I was 12, I rode my bike from my house in Massachusetts to Mt. Monadnock in southern New Hampshire. I was with my father and cousin, and we made camp in the woods near the the base of the mountain. Sometime during the night I noticed a glaring set of eyes staring at us from the treeline near our camp. It was a lynx on the hunt, and it must have took an interest in our food for we were forced to chase it off with sticks. Peter Browne and John Goodman could very well have encountered an ancestor of my lynx wailing into the primeval New England forest on that night long, long ago.

Fragonard: The Swing

A few months back in another post on this blog I made a few comments about Thomas Cole's Voyage of Life paintings. Although I am no art critic, and would not even attempt to pass myself off as one, I still enjoy commenting on various works that happen to interest me. One of these works comes from the Rococo Period. It is called The Swing painted by the French artist Jean Honore Fragonard in 1765.

     Jean Honore Fragonard was born in France in 1732. He became a student of the artist Chardin who was known as a master of still life painting. Fragonard was heavily influenced by the Dutch school of painters and set to work on his own unique style. There are various versions of The Swing painted by Fragonard. The most famous of these is in the Wallace Collection in London. It depicts a young lady on a swing being watched by a would be admirer who lurks in the foliage in gleeful anticipation. There is however, another version of The Swing that I find more to my taste. it is located in the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.

                                         Jean Honore Fragonard The Swing 1765

     It was a gloomy, rainy day in Washington in February of 1992. I found myself staring helplessly at the almost minuscule image of a young lady sitting on a swing with the ominous backdrop of a mountain, puffy clouds, and trees. The lady is a member of a garden party where the participants have come to enjoy the rural atmosphere and the adrenaline of their youth. As I become entranced I suddenly find myself a young man dressed in knee breaches with powdered wig. I glance furtively with admiration and interest at the beauty on the swing. Everything comes to life...in action...I am now part of this 18th century garden party and I advance from the treeline, the tails of my grey coat trailing behind me. The swing is in motion as I take a seat near one of the stone lions and find myself smiling. she is smiling too, exuberating youth and flushed with the rosy red cheeks of life that are by nature part of her vibrant spirit. A gaunt servant approaches and offers me tea from a dainty china cup which i gladly accept. Placing the cup to my lips I take a sip and my mind soon wanders from the girl to the trees and smoky white mountains in the background which I still see as brush strokes from the artists tool. What is this place? Is it heaven? I still smile knowing that this is not real...but I am soon asking myself, what is real? The dreary smog and hustle and bustle...the mad rush of humanity towards something unattainable outside of this canvas? Or this...whatever...wherever I was, sipping tea somewhere in the artists imaginary realm where only beauty and bliss reside. I suddenly feel a great pull and find myself struggling against it, wishing to remain captured by the artists brush. Please! I will gladly trade my vapid corporeal existence for the eternal brush strokes of Fragonard's garden party. I call for Fragonard to assist me...paint me into the landscape! But alas, I sorrowfully recall that
the great painter has been mouldering in his grave for two centuries. I am now standing on the sidewalk in front of the Gallery. Humanity all around me...horns honking their selfish madness, faceless souls putting one foot in front of the other marching to the beat of their own realities.

The White Line

I travel the white line. Its never ending presence beckons me forward while time makes a mockery of the productivity of my existence. It takes a certain amount of time to get from point A to point B. The time occupied in accomplishing this linear achievement is dead time...or is it? A number of years ago I found myself sitting at a roadside diner in Van Horn, Texas wondering where I was going. I was young and mobile, no responsibilities except the care and upkeep of the Self. I poked at the scrambled eggs and bacon with my fork and thought about the future, and of course the past. I had talked to a police recruiter in Anaheim, but this was a rather absurd notion. I was not cop material...I was possessed of a different mind set. I was too rebellious. There was some sort of innate desire in me to take a different path, perhaps one that would lead to freedom of mind and body from the swells of societies norms. Of course I was not thinking like this at the time. Things have a natural tendency to work toward the most comfortable state of being. I wasn't sure what I wanted, or where I wanted to go. And then suddenly I did. A pretty blond waitress appeared at my booth holding a pot of scalding coffee in her pretty white hand. She was probably about my age, but seemed to be possessed of a more noble state. She was smiling at me.
"More coffee hun?"
I merely nodded, smiling back, not knowing what to say, or even if I did... how to say it. I wondered where she came from, because she was not the crusty, line hardened, world weary waitress who had taken my order only a short time before. Perhaps she had been on break? Or perhaps the other waitress' shift ended. I don't know, and I didn't really care. She was here.  She left my table, but ventured back a short time later to check on me. This time I was ready to engage in conversation. She sat down across from me in the booth looking at me with her pretty blue eyes. I forgot what the conversation was about. It has been two decades, and I did not record it, but we talked for some time, two restless spirits drawn together, if only for the length of time it took for me to drink my coffee. I have never forgotten this girl, even if our paths crossed for a momentary blip. I often wonder where she is? Or what became of her? Not that it matters, for I didn't even get her name, or she, mine. Time has taken care of anything that transpired on that day. All that remains is a fragmentary illusion of what might have been.

     There were only a few other customers in the diner. A rough looking rancher who resembled Charles Bronson sat at the counter working over his plate of vittles, and every now and then he gave me a suspicious glance as if he well read my intentions. A few other cowboys sat at a table with their jeans tucked into their boots as if they might be going to a rodeo. Of course, being an Easterner I don't know much of such things. I suppose I could have held there indefinitely drinking cup after cup until I began shaking the caffeine from my system, but it was time to go, and reluctantly I paid the pretty waitress, leaving a substantial tip, and like a cowboy rode off into the sunset...or in this case sunrise as it was morning, and I was headed East... following the white line...or does the white line follow me? It is all the same.

Bede: The Mystery of the Barking Fireball

In the early 8th century there lived in the tiny village of Jarrow, in Northumbria, England a monk named Bede. Bede, who would later acquire the title of "Venerable" was the author of a work entitled An Ecclesiastical History of the English People. It was first published in the year 731. It traces England's history from the time of Julius Caesar up until the age in which Bede himself lived. Bede's work is filled with fascinating accounts of early monarchs and leaders of the church of England. this includes a detailed narrative of the life of Augustine of Canterbury who is sometimes regarded as the father of Christianity in England, just as St. Patrick is in Ireland.

                                             Engraving by Henry Robinson (ca.1783)

       Bede was fond of recording miracles and other portends that supported the tenets of the christian faith. One such account takes place in the year 675 in the town of Barking. This small hamlet at this time in history boasted a cloister which housed a number of nuns. A plague had spread into the men's monastery but had not yet claimed any victims in the nunnery. The head sister was a pragmatist, and knew from experience that it was only a matter of time before the deadly disease took its toll on them as well. She therefore prepared her fellow sisters by asking them where they wanted to be buried when they passed on. The nuns were ambiguous, and could not decide where they wanted their final resting place to be. Bede relates that heaven then decided to solve their dilemma for them. He states that "a light from heaven like a great sheet suddenly appeared and shone over them all." This light caused a degree of anxiety among the sisters, for they were unsure of its meaning. The nuns and monks both watched this light which seemed to linger for a minute before descending toward the south side of the convent where it seemed to pause for yet another short spell before doing something which defies explanation. It shot upwards and out of sight. There was no longer any question in regard to where the nuns were to be buried when they passed. The holy order of Barking would bury their deceased on the south side of the convent just as the light had signaled them to do. They were also somewhat more at ease to learn that their souls would be heading skyward just as the light had.

                                                   Saint Bede (672-735)
      
       This is one fireball that is hard to interpret. It was definitely not some common bolide breaking up in the rough turbulence of our atmosphere. Meteors do not linger, or pause, or change directions, and neither do they defy the Earth's gravity by shooting skyward. A meteor could explain part of this enigmatic early fireball report. If the object seen by the nuns of Barking was a natural stellar body, it is possible that this was an early eyewitness account of what is called a "near miss." It could have been a large asteroid or even a comet that came a hairs length of slamming into the Earth, but because of its tangent with the planet, and its phenomenal rate of speed, it somehow escaped the Earth's gravitational field. We can safely say that this object would have been seen by a great many people, and in all likelihood would have been extremely bright. This is probably why Bede described it as a "great sheet."

       A good example of a "near miss" was the famous fireball seen on August 10, 1972 over much of the western United States and Canada. This object was identified as a good size asteroid which would have caused great devastation if it had actually struck the earth. This fireball was so bright that it was seen in the daytime, and was witnessed by hundreds, if not thousands of people. The Barking fireball could have been one of these monsters, but there is one thing about Bede's report that needs to be explained before we jump to any impetuous conclusion. Remember, the fireball seemed to linger, not just once, but at least twice. How can this be explained? The answer is...it cannot, at least by any natural means. The law of inertia proves this. Simply put, it states that  "A body remains at rest or moves in a straight line unless acted upon by some external force." Now a rock  travels through space at a constant speed. however, when the rock enters the Earth's atmosphere it would encounter turbulence which would slow it down somewhat. This would not be perceptible to the viewer on the ground because the change of speed would be minimal never mind that the rock does not take on its glow until it reaches the Earth's atmosphere and would not be visible anyway until then. The time it takes for the human brain to process this difference in speed, in relation to the eye would make it impossible to detect. This seems to put Bede's report into question. If the Barking fireball was a meteor, either the eyewitnesses were mistaken in some of the details, or Bede screwed up his job of reporting it properly. So if it was not a meteor, what was it? I remain perplexed. If the report is accurate, I can only conclude that the Barking fireball, whatever it was, was of intelligent design. I will say no more on the matter except to refer it to the ufologists who might be interested in examining it further.

www.fireballhistory.com

Asphalt

I spend a lot of time on the road. Most of the time is spent behind the wheel of a motorized vehicle. some of the time is spent pedaling my Trek mountain bike or pounding the pavement with a run. Pavement, asphalt and me are synonymous terms. We congeal like ice in the arctic. I can stand on the asphalt in front of my mailbox and walk to the White House without ever having to leave the pavement. I can walk from the White House to Alaska with the same results. What would Lewis and Clark have thought of my odyssey? Asphalt, pavement, the road...ubiquitous...interlinked by an intricate web of arteries, veins, and capillaries that form the grand highway of human connectedness. I can no more avoid these man made links than a turtle can avoid its shell. They are there as long as we are there. When will it end? When will it come back to nature?

     Many years ago when I was 16, I held a part time job at a local market. I did not have a car, or even a drivers license so when I got out of school I had to find some way to get to work. I lived in a rural community. Typically I found a school bus that would take me to the town line and from there I would walk, run, or hitchhike the remaining few miles. Rain, sleet, or snow I would find myself on that road. One spring vacation I found myself without any transportation except my bike. It was 12 miles or so and I thought nothing about it. One day, however, since there was no school, I was asked to come in early. It was a dreary, foggy morning with a mist in the air. Since I could not see more than 20 feet in front of me I decided that it would be safer to walk the distance rather than risk being bowled over by some driver lost in the fog. By walking I reasoned that I could keep safely on the shoulder of the road. I started off and soon found myself walking over the causeway that ran across a reservoir a few miles from my house. The fog was so thick through here that I could not see a cars headlights until it was right on me. I kept to the shoulder hoping that the fog would lift. I was about halfway across when I heard a noise in front of me that sounded like someone breathing heavy. I stopped to listen, and scanned the immediate area in my front, but could see absolutely nothing but the grey...that interminable grey that seemed to me at this moment to have always been there...a permanent fixture never to be moved. I called out, "hello is somebody there?" but there was no reply, only the lapping of the water along the shore, and that breathing...or whatever it was in my front. I envisioned a monstrous kraken emerging from the water through the fog to take hold of me and carry me to a watery grave. I walked toward it, but it always seemed to be in front of me, though the noise now started to become more distant as if it were receding. After walking about a half a mile the fog began to lift as if by some hand of providence, and my eyes settled on a dark figure ambling forward. I determined that it was human, at least I think it was, but strangely shaped with a long head...or was it a long neck with no head? The fog was playing tricks with my mind. I could see its head, or neck turn around toward me never once losing its long stride. It then started to trot as if it were a horse on two legs, and finally disappeared into the mist. I never saw IT or HIM again.

                                                                   Kraken
                                                        
    It is strange how the human mind imagines things that cannot possibly exist. It has been almost three decades since since my my imaginary encounters with a phantom kraken, and a faceless man, yet I often dream about this experience. Why? I cannot say. Perhaps it is the innate superstitious spirit that is part of everyone no matter how you might consider yourself within the boundaries of reason and scientific thought. Maybe it is a defense mechanism against an overly bold spirit who might otherwise perform some impetuous act detrimental to existence? I don't know. Only the road knows...the asphalt that takes me on my journey forward where Krakens and faceless men exist...if only in the dream state.