Digitally Visualizing Reality 

Standing at least 500 feet away, with a 30 powered optical zoom camera, I was able to capture the basic lines of this formation on the Icicle River this afternoon.  In my mind, it looked more like this, but because of the later afternoon flatter light, it was more of a monotone, like this:

The Little Time Bombs of Memories

Open a cigar box with old lead pencils, and a mysterious odor from another age wafts below my nose.

My engineer father before CAD Machines actually drew blue prints with pen and pencil, and even in post-war Amsterdam, where everything was sparse after the war, my father would bring me some of these pencils to play with, and I'd color while he drew hexagons and pentagons with his compass and ruler, or he would draw perspective in such things as ships.  We bonded around these pencils, we were at our best together...he the engineer, I the artist but both of us loved to play with the pencil, and I, a lad of 6 was permitted to be free to draw and color as I wanted.  

This stamp brings all that up, because it was one of the first stamps I ever paid money for.  I loved stamp collecting, because it gave me an understanding of the world, history, propaganda, time periods, colonialization, a word once the ring of a century, now no longer in the spelling checker.  So then books and knowledge creative play, Montesorri values, and an appreciation of beauty all began to sink in.  

The memories that moment of opening the box, the ambience of 1950 in the room, the ambience of my father, the mood of the moment, for a deep sniff into the box that all came alive...now I know how the dog experiences the moment...and then, from a drawer slip an old stamp album, and the many letters from my grandfather to remind me of them, and The Low Countries of my birth and early upbringing.

To Whom it May Concern:

             

             I’m in shock, disbelief…denial…of the tragic feelings I associated with Kennedy’s and ML  King’s assassinations, 9-11, and now the power grab of Donald Trump. What consequences will the imposition of this character on the world stage have?

              As an instructor, I taught citizenship classes to immigrants in the nationalization process, including my parents, who came legally in 1956.  We learned of the Balance of Powers of the Three Branches Of Our Government, the value of a Constitution and that the majority should rule, within a framework of a republic, not a democracy.  We were expected to be positive that this system would work.  There was a consensus that this government was about as good as we could have, and that there were a Bill of Rights and other amendments that we were told, would predict a more open, multi-cultural society with equal respect and Rights Regardless Of Race, Gender, Ethnicity Or Religious Belief. 

              As a historian and product of WWII, in Europe, I learned of the disasters that a psychotic dictator like Hitler or Mussolini inflicted on the world, and the power that came so easily because of the German depression caused by the punishment the world inflicted on Post WWI Germany, leading  to The NAZI rise.  My German sister-friend, endured the first years of her life in Eastern Germany listening to bombs and scrambling through the trenches to find food.  On the first day of Trump’s campaign she yelled,” Oh God, he reminds me of Hitler”, as she fought off her Post Traumatic Stress.

              The Devil Dragon of Patriotic Isolationistic Nationalism, which has been breathing fire for a while, has finally burned through the common sense of an interdependent mutually sharing species living on the same life raft requiring us to cooperate to save our planet, and not appeal  again to the xenophobic gene to get wealth from war preparation.  My father warned me in my youth, having survived two world wars himself, that the nationalistic gene fires up when there is too much competition for resources or wealth.  Machiavelli had it right: “Divide and conquer!” .  It worked, so in 1938 the smoldering European continent once again found fuel in religion, language, ethnicity and national identity to start another profitable war for the corporate class. Thus the pattern of fascism repeats: Create scapegoats through false accusations and appeal to hate and divisiveness.      

        Postwar, the Marshall Plan was America’s ingenuity to stabilize a war torn continent and create a mutually dependent economy that would lead to the need for uniting under one banner.  A United Nations was founded by America to help diplomacy overcome that warrior testosterone impulse to fight, with all of its divisive and horrific consequences.  Eisenhower, too, warned us not to let corporations and warfare set our agenda.

              Now, we suddenly find ourselves (in the words of David Brooks, a Republican himself) with a ‘narcissistic egotistical 5 year old’ brat who suckered enough of the lower white working middle class to give the 1% plutocrats the opportunity to retreat from the hard won civil rights of our history, and dig back into the “Take care of yourself, we’re not responsible, we don’t need you, stay where you are.” Yet, every step of both industrial and financial progress was made possible by those waves of immigrants from all over the world looking for something like the peace, stability, employment, and necessities their home country no longer afforded them.

              Besides toppling The Statue of Liberty, he also has designated the most contrary staff to manage the very department they despise.  The blatant ignorance of an already educational dysfunctional system, which she will privatize,  and then home schooling and including religious schools back in play in a country of ‘Separation Of Church And State”  Suddenly we’re back to arguing over evolution and science, logic and reasoning, and the cognition necessary to distinguish a world of “alternative facts” from truth.

              Then add suggestions he could get away with shooting someone, insulting patriots like John McCain and the Kahn Family losers, resorting to ‘pussy grabbing’ and shaming the handicapped.   The “system” has either been paid off, or is too cowardly to pursue Trump University, and several rape charges not to mention huge conflicts of interest. 

              Sure, I could definitely support returning key industries to be more accountable to local taxation, and I do believe that a sustainable future will require more and more local adaptations to a rapidly changing planet.  But if that’s going to be accomplished with coal, logging, petroleum and other harmful chemicals then this man is in violation of the one divine command that life requires, Each Specie Should Be Seeking The Most Positive Future To Further Its Own Species, To Find Habitat And Resources.  Now I know most homo sapiens are never satisfied but if there is no leadership willing to educate and act upon ‘facts and truth’, then we have entered another era that will only further the collapse of global civilization and our very planet.

              So, the challenge for those of us who are horrified, and we are the majority of the population, if not the Electoral College “Cowards”, we find ourselves in a world where even speaking up for the rights of others has almost become a crime, and the line between peaceful and violent protests virtually disappears.  The very technology upon which our world is dependent is vulnerable to a loss of our control, yet like 1984, we’re being monitored.  What does that leave?

              We must defend our right to speak our mind, and to defend the fundamental Bill of Rights upon which this nation agreed to unite.  Somehow, our checks and balances must be strengthened so that one administration cannot simply overturn the last 75 years of progress making all humans equal..

              Meanwhile we need to overcome the denial that we have entered a new era in American history, one that 1984 and Brave New World had prophesied:  Propaganda and distractions as a means of brainwashing the populace into apathy and resignation.  At last the sales of “1984” are surging again.

Peter M. Prehn

A supermoon deserves respect as my need to  express my frustration with an appropriate sense of sarcasm

The decision to drive this model of governance by a majority of electors removes all faith I had in the checks and balances o

To expect, to wait, and to hope are all meanings for the Spanish word, esperar.

I’m grieving the death of the final remaining illusions I had of the inherent value of a republic, or an electoral system where the minority actually got to rule.  The success of the racist divisive party to achieve the control they now have over our nation, and the threats to our human rights, education, labor unions, women’s rights, gay rights, and national health care, not to mention corporate deregulaltion and deglobalization.  Then there's to complete disregard for life on earth, or the future generations with no viable path to success.

These threaten the foundations of all I was taught as a student becoming a citizen of America in 1960 as an immigrant kid from Holland.

Obama gave us some hope.  We expected more, but now we shall definitely simply have to wait.

My gut tells me we’re on the threshold of a new era in human relations, and I fear it may be a reversal of the humanism of the past.

The globally intertwined world is trying to sever some ties by propagandizing nationalism and by appealing  to the tribal gene.  Divide and conquer.

I sense the feelings that my Dutch parents must have had when Adolf Hitler came to power…a man who used  the crowd tactic and hate to gain power over others with the superman German propaganda.

I myself have found tears draping forth, despite my seven decades of political disappointment, and can only compare these feelings with the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated, or  the news of 9/11.

Certainly the lack of respect, abuse, civility in American politics has been trumped by this candidate, the worst in American history, and yet the uneducated white males of our more rural regions were able to overcome the actual majority of Americans .

I have definitely had anxiety with every election and rarely have things been as on edge as they are now, as our society is already lashing back at those fighting for equality, but rarely has a president sponsored racial and ethnic divisiveness so directly in his words.

It is the end of my own American dream, as a child immigrant to America, in the McCarthy era and patiently watch equality spread to every race, culture, and gender…finally recognizing women as equal humans, and struggling to implement the ideal of the American Dream ‘equal opportunity and respect for all’  which our teachers tried to implant in our values.

Every step forward and backward has been observed, and just as we thought we had reached respect for every sub-culture in our society but are working on giving equal opportunity to all.  

We have gotten caught up in the overpopulation, globalistic economics, resource diminishing, climate change, and the results are sparking the tribes and clans to claim their own turf, culture, life style...

Uncertainty drives innovation, and innovation in times of crisis is to hook up with locals and neighbors and share resources.

The future has always had a dark side, from the atomic bomb, to immigrants taking over Americ from the natives.  Consequences are not always understood until they take affect...Karma is the term for that...our generation has had some of the moste prosperous and luxurious life styles, mostly white, educated and preferred.  Now we shall have to account for those who do no longer see themselves as members of the same society.

Another Victim of Human Convenience

The rings of the past speak volumes of other eras, eras in which chain saws had not yet appeared, eras when even natives had to work very hard to obtain their wood...and then came Euroman and Western Forest became a commodity, rather than an ecosystem of value.

Hopefully, rain, pollen, seeds, lichens, soil, dust, bird poop, etc will fall into the cracks enough, that some form of life can make use of this wood, created by sunshine and carbon dioxide making one of the most sustainable energy source, 

What to say?  What to do? cut back somehow, redefine wants and needs, pay more attention to the consequences of our lifestyle...speak up for life, whenever you have a chance...support to underdog....our planet.

     Once upon a time, when I was just 9 years old, an immigrant kid from Holland, who'd just spent his first year in Canada, in Vancouver, when his father found work as an engineer in a remote corner of British Columbia, named Oliver.

A Company called Trump Limited was developing the concept of a mechanical giraffe for picking and pruning and electrical work, and so we moved to paradise...here I could swim in a lake a few blocks from home, walk through a cactus patch on my way home from school, fruit was abundant, as were lakes and hikes, but best of all, my family made friends that lasted.

     Today, the town of Oliver still means something special to me...a town with some pride, where many of the buildings of my childhood are still standing, access to the river is abundant, bike trails along the river, and the pleasure of finding some of the best wine I've ever tasted, which isn't saying much, because I usually avoid the snobbery of wine tasting, but have to admit, Silver Sage in Oliver made even me sip every variety...my only event ever.  (-:

      Being out of the USA for a few days, without a computer, the news, fleeing from a country devolving into its own terrorism as the rift of economic classes and fundamentalism untie the "United We Stood".

     For a few days I could day dream back to another era before modern technology, when food was grown locally, and families still owned the farm...fruit stands everywhere...because here in the Canadian Okanogan, that's still the way it is...and they're actual Canadian youth who migrate to the valley from the big cities, both French and English speaking,  to make some money, and explore.  When I first moved to the Wenatchee Valley in 1978, we, too, had a sort of hippie youth movement in the valley during fruit picking times, and many of us stuck around to build new lives.

     We stayed at a small resort on a small spring fed lake, called the Lakeside Resort, where a simple cabana was affordable, and the beach was only a few hundred feet away.

     People smiled and even the youth wasn't constantly staring at their phones...

Memories of my childhood like seeing a rattlesnake for the first time, sitting around a campfire singing folk songs with friends, being able to hang out with some friends after several years of school after school...

     Most of my childhood home towns have changed drastically since my stay there, such as Amsterdam, Vancouver, Seattle, and even the Wenatchee Valley...they hardly remind me anymore of my time there,

but Oliver still exudes a spirit for me that comforts me, almost makes me, too, want to escape Trumpland.

     If you'd like to see the view from this region, you can check out the video below.

     

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is27Dyb6Qis

     Once upon a time, when I was just 9 years old, an immigrant kid from Holland, who'd just spent his first year in Canada, in Vancouver, when his father found work as an engineer in a remote corner of British Columbia, named Oliver.

A Company called Trump Limited was developing the concept of a mechanical giraffe for picking and pruning and electrical work, and so we moved to paradise...here I could swim in a lake a few blocks from home, walk through a cactus patch on my way home from school, fruit was abundant, as were lakes and hikes, but best of all, my family made friends that lasted.

     Today, the town of Oliver still means something special to me...a town with some pride, where many of the buildings of my childhood are still standing, access to the river is abundant, bike trails along the river, and the pleasure of finding some of the best wine I've ever tasted, which isn't saying much, because I usually avoid the snobbery of wine tasting, but have to admit, Silver Sage in Oliver made even me sip every variety...my only event ever.  (-:

      Being out of the USA for a few days, without a computer, the news, fleeing from a country devolving into its own terrorism as the rift of economic classes and fundamentalism untie the "United We Stood".

     For a few days I could day dream back to another era before modern technology, when food was grown locally, and families still owned the farm...fruit stands everywhere...because here in the Canadian Okanogan, that's still the way it is...and they're actual Canadian youth who migrate to the valley from the big cities, both French and English speaking,  to make some money, and explore.  When I first moved to the Wenatchee Valley in 1978, we, too, had a sort of hippie youth movement in the valley during fruit picking times, and many of us stuck around to build new lives.

     We stayed at a small resort on a small spring fed lake, called the Lakeside Resort, where a simple cabana was affordable, and the beach was only a few hundred feet away.

     People smiled and even the youth wasn't constantly staring at their phones...

Memories of my childhood like seeing a rattlesnake for the first time, sitting around a campfire singing folk songs with friends, being able to hang out with some friends after several years of school after school...

     Most of my childhood home towns have changed drastically since my stay there, such as Amsterdam, Vancouver, Seattle, and even the Wenatchee Valley...they hardly remind me anymore of my time there,

but Oliver still exudes a spirit for me that comforts me, almost makes me, too, want to escape Trumpland.

     If you'd like to see the view from this region, you can check out the video below.

     

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is27Dyb6Qis