I read the New York Times this day and was not surprised. On the left side, all the way down the front page, they began a story about protesting Catholic Nuns. There are about sixty thousand of them left out there in the world. At one time there were many many more than that. They, apparently, do not wear the revealing (and respect demanding) habits of the past. I kind of knew that from somewhere, but it hit home with this article. The substance of the article was about how the leadership of the Catholic Church (read Pope Ratso) is opposing the Nuns because they have kind of gotten together to argue against a few idiotic things still supported by the Roman Catholics of Rome. They oppose, for example, the required celibacy of priests. The Pope is still big on this malformed and unsuccessful doctrine. And it is not, or at least I do not think so, that the sixty thousand remaining nuns are simply horny and want all those priests for their own. No, I am afraid that the nun's logic is more factually grounded (however fun it might be to think otherwise). It seems that, over time, the celibacy thing just has not worked at all. Priests have been out there screwing just about any human they could get their hands on for many many years. The Catholic Church is currently paying out billions in reparations because of the failure of celibacy among its priests. It seems that the pent up sexuality of these guys has led them to exploit young boys under their care. But the payouts have not fazed Ratso. He contends that celibacy works and must be kept in place. All priests must be male and they must not have sex. The male only thing is another piece of studied stupidity that the nuns oppose.
I was raised a Catholic and went to Catholic schools all the way up through my undergraduate degree in college. My elementary school nuns were the most noteworthy of my teachers. It was Hawaii right after the big war. The nuns at St. Augustine Elementary School, just off Waikiki, had just returned from surviving the entirety of WWII in Japanes prison camps. Those nuns were in no mood to take any garbage from elementary school children. Later, I was to train and then serve in the United States Marine Corps. The Corps had nothing on those nuns. My D.I., SSgt. Baines, could not have gone one round with Sister Michael Marie (a.k.a. Sister Joseph Louis), much less the dreaded Sister Gregoria (called the 'Flying Black Axe' for reasons unknown).
I am a writer today because of those nuns. I miss their disciplined learning techniques. Techniques no longer applied to school children anywhere. I learned the ABC's, how to decline a sentence, phonics, and the Chicago Style Manual of English. I learned them by trial and error, and the studied application of attentive pro-active pain. Those nuns did not have to strike often. They used a form of willful psychology and parental support no longer existent within the confines of our culture. I learned to speak in front of groups and to overcome embarrassment and failure. I got a C Plus in English at the end of 5th grade. And I still write very regularly to Sister Michael Marie and Sister Gregoria. In fact, when my book was recently published, I sent Sister Michael Marie a copy of the book (lovingly inscribed) and a copy of my fifth grade report card. I high-lighted the C Plus I received in English with a yellow marker, to point out the error of her conclusion. That was a month ago. I got a letter yesterday. She sent me the report card back with a note stuck to it. "You have improved" it said, and there was B Plus written in red over the crossed out C Plus. She also noted a few grammatical errors in the final production hard-cover novel! I suppose that is why I, and my publisher's editors, did not get an A.
The Catholic Church has not supported nuns in any way for fifty years. The older ones live in near poverty under poor conditions in run-down care facilities. The few younger ones do not even get habits to wear. They are allowed to work for the Church for free and get by as best they can. It is a shame. The value those women provided to millions of children across the world goes unrewarded and barely even thanked. Yes, they did it for the love of God, but come on! The Catholic Church is run by men. By White old men living in splendor inside stone chateaus. They are just like human leaders everywhere on earth. There is no difference, and there is about the same level of compassion exercised and exhibited toward those whom worked to put and keep them there, as exists in the civilian world outside.
I loved those nuns and tried my heart out for them. I did that because I knew, down inside, near the bottom of my little well of souls, they wanted the best for me. I really believed that they wanted me to succeed and enjoy life, and a good measure of bliss. They wanted me to be successful, simply because, well, in their prayerful and hallowed way, they loved me. They loved God above all, and then all the children in their charge. They still do. Their belief in me, and my belief in them, sustains me to this day.
The numbers of nuns are dwindling rapidly, as the older ones die off and no new ones come aboard. This is part of the design of the Catholic Church. I do not know why. Maybe, like most male leaders everywhere, Ratso and his Italian Mafia fear women. I just don't know. But I lament their passing. They have been a force for good and love out here, across the surface of this troubled earth. Those nuns left now deserve honors and a great retirement. The young ones, the few, deserve our endearing support...financially and emotionally, because it is good for us all. I am not much of a Catholic anymore, but I know a good thing when I experience it. I love those nuns, and you should too.
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The viewpoint to the stars. Lay back, look up and reflect, not on the meaning of life so much as all of the insanely complex devices used to provide deceptive means to viewing it. I use the word 'tupungato,' which means exactly what the first sentence of this paragraph says. Tupungato is also the third highest mountain in the Andes range, down South in Argentina. Writing of a viewpoint, let's review what Google has pulled with the trotting out of their latest little 'information' gimmick. The gimmick is called Google Latitude. This tentacle of the Google octopus allows people, who have compliant cell phones, laptops and desktop computers, to register a code so that the devices can be followed. The location of the devices is then transmitted to their friends or 'followers,' as Twitter and Facebook describe them. All of the people so designated are then able to know where the device, or devices, with the code is located. There are issues with this new gimmick. Privacy issues. What if your 'ex' puts the code on to your cell phone? Then follows you through one of his or her friends who have turned traitor. Never had any of those, have you? Then you have never been divorced. And what about little kids, who have no clue that they may be giving away their constant location (triangulated automatically by cell phone towers) to any manner of predator out there. But I am not writing about 'a viewpoint to the stars' with respect to those issues. Those are merely on the back burner of my mind. Right out front is Google, and the way they have chosen to introduce this new gimmick.
They are standing there, a huge information company, holding to a self-described code of integrity and honor. Yet they are directly telling us that they are lying to our faces! That is a sort of convoluted honesty, I guess, in of itself. They are verbally promising that the locating data is a 'one time only' information packet. The location information generated will be destroyed and never seen again (as in tracking records) once the location has been given to any one of the people who may want it. The media listened to this Google verbal presentation, and then, for the first time in years, followed up by reading the Google written policy statement with respect to Google Latitude. The statement makes no bones about indicating that all of information Google gathers, on any computer or cell phone position, belongs to Google alone and that they can do whatever they feel like with the data. They can store it forever. Access it at will. Sell it, or give it away. So this newfound investigative press, after reading the 'privacy statement,' confronted Google with the results. Here is what Google said: "Our position is exemplified by our verbal presentation. That is what we intend, as a policy. Our written statement is what we intend to follow in order to live up to our legal obligations." In other words, they are telling us one thing, to get us to use the gimmick, and they are going to keep telling us this, while they are going to do another. And they are telling us that too. So they are basically stating: "We are lying to you. So there. Tough!" Or maybe: "You are dumb as donkeys so what difference does it make?"
What do we do with people like this? These are the same clowns, the young guys that own Google, who made such a big deal about the fact that they were not going to get involved buying an expensive large corporate jet, like other successful large companies before them. They were going to be green, responsible, eco-friendly, and non-arrogant in selecting their air transportation. So, after six months of evaluation, they bought a Boeing 757!!! This is like Dick Cheney, when he took over to head up the committee to find and select the new Vice President for George Bush. He trashed every candidate who might have come close to qualifying. Then he announced that he himself was the only one who was qualified to serve. Pope 'Ratso' in Rome, watched Cheney closely, then stroked his non-existent beard for effect. "Hmmm," he murmured to himself, thought about it and then headed up the committee to find and select a new Pope. And there we have it. So we got stuck with Dickless Cheney, Pope Ratso and remain stuck with these teenage clowns who run Google. Aren't we just having a great time?
Tupungato is also the name of a wine. Yes, I am back to my Argentinian Valley in South America. The Mendoza Valley where those ungodly wonderful Malbec grapes are raised. I found this Tupungato (2005) at Whole Foods, of all places. It was sixteen bucks, which runs right down the center of my wine budget. It is not a Malbec, this stuff, however. No, it is something else again. These guys and gals at this winery have taken the local cabernet, merlot and Malbec grapes, mixed them together in some formula, and come out with this weird fantastic wine. It has all the best of the three grapes. And I mean all. The 'attack' of the wine, when it hits your palate, is like nothing else I have ever tasted. Smooth and tensely solid at the same time. Dry sweet taste, but buffered in some way that just wants to make you guzzle some great large swallows. It is shameless stuff. You can drink half a bottle before you realize that you are supposed to be pouring for everyone. So you give everyone an inch, then drink the rest down. The hell with them. Let them reach back and drink the expensive nectar from Val de Flores or the superb stuff of Don David. But don't let that bottle of Tupungato out of your hand. You'll never get it back. Not even empty. One of my guests stole the bottle so he could track down where to get it himself. Low life cur. But I remember the name Tupungato, and I am going back to my gold-digger broken wine merchant to get it. He will soon need a lot of money, if he doesn't right this minute. I'd go back to Whole Foods in Deerfield, but the 'mean-faced-women (MFW's) who inhabit that place are so aggressive that I will only face them one a month, or so. The cart bruises on my ankles take that long to heal.
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