A Piece Of Dry Bread

 "Once I asked an American who visited me at the Kalvyi  'What has this great nation of your accomplished?'  

'We went to the moon', he replied.

'How far is that?' I continued.

'Oh, perhaps half a million kilometers away', he replied.

'How many millions of dollars did you spend to get there?'

'Since 1950,' he said, 'we haver spent rivers of dollars.'

'Did you get to God?  How far is he?'

'God', he said, 'is very, very far.'

'Well,' I replied, it only takes us a piece of dry bread to get to Him!'

- Paisos the Athonite, With Pain and Love for Contemporary Man

Reaching For The Dead

 On Wednesday's post on the anniversary of the death of TB The Elder, Friend-Of-This-Blog Bob made the following observation:

"Dates affect people different ways.  My mother died first, and I remember on the one-year date, it really made no impression on me.  I called my dad, and he was much the same.  He acknowledged yes, it had been one year, but that was about it.  I think we both realized we didn't miss her more on that date than any other."

His comment, as I thought about it (and eventually responded), brought to mind a consideration of the finality of death and how we have come to view it.

Death, at least death viewed by cultures, is a funny thing.  I am no anthropologist, but it occurs to me that most cultures historically had some concept of an afterlife and that in some way or form, the personality we define as a "soul" continued on - be that as an individual or by being recycled.  Another thought that occurs to me was fairly universal is that death was a viewed as a sort of termination of the relationship, at least temporarily.  Communication was largely cut off from the dead except by things like necromancy (communicating with the dead) and special times where the spirit world and physical world of the living became very close, such as Samhain or Obon or even in more modern culture, Dios de Las Muertos. 

But underlying all of this was the sense that however it might be possible to communicate with them, it was some kind of effort.  There was a gulf, a wall, that could not easily be breached (if at all).

Thinking about how we view things in a modern sense, it strikes me we now see such things very differently.

In the modern world (and here I make very vague, generalizations about Western Culture), death is both something shocking and a revelation:  shocking in that for so many, we forget that death can happen literally at any moment (which was much more a perceived reality in times past) and that death creates a wall we cannot pierce. 

For the first part, we have come to accept that modern medicine and modern society keep death at bay in a way that it did not in days of yore.  That is true in the Western world although not so true in the developing world; once upon a time it was true everywhere (go look at an old cemetery and see how many young men and women died early).  For the second part, perhaps this is an outcome of our modern communication technology, where we assume that we can contact anyone at any time.  

And, perhaps, the fact that we - thanks to our entertainment and changing world view - see death as something other than what it really is:  an end, at least on this plane of existance.  

We have become used to people living a long time and being able to talk to them; the fact that this is not so - sometimes in shocking immediacy - seems to catch so many off their guard.  Reading of the death of young or old, too often some version of the words "I never thought this would happen" makes an appearance.

No matter what one may believe about the afterlife, I think it is fair to say that communication - meaningful communication, not "Guided by the memory of " or "What would X do?" - ends with end of life.  Would that we as a society paid attention to this more often.

And would that we, as individuals, sought to treat every communication as potentially the last one.

Greece 2023: Hadrian's Library

 The Library of Hadrian was built at the behest of the Emperor Hadrian in 132 A.D.  Hadrian was a lover of Greece and Greek culture and visited Greece at least three times during his reign:  124 A.D., 128 A.D., and 130 A.D (he traveled significantly throughout his reign, a difference from his predecessors). The library was designed, literally as a library (not just a pretty name) along with a series of lecture halls.

Entering the library (it had a single entrance):

The "books" (rolls of paypri) would have been stored in rolls in small slots.  The corners (as below) would have been lecture halls while the space between would have been reading rooms.

The back side of the entrance:

The center of the library would have been open and a long pool in the middle.

A mosaic from the period:

Sadly, the library struggled:  after its completion in 132 A.D., it lasted a little over 100 years years until it was burned in the invasion of the Herculi in 267 A.D.  It was formally repaired in the 5th Century A.D., but in Byzantine times lost its library functions as three separate Byzantine churches were built there over time.

The Collapse CXI: Weather

June 08 20XX+1

My Dear Lucilius:

Stepping out the door this morning, I stepped into damp grass.

Rain is not unknown here at this time of year, a far cry from where I grew up where the season had a hard end. Here, it can linger into June and even beyond a bit. It was always welcome in my book and even more so now, when the criticality of water (and not having to otherwise transport it) has achieved a greater importance.

An odd thing, the weather. Once in the not too distant past, we had weather at our fingertips. We could get forecasts by the hour, by the day, or by the week. We could watch (via models) the projected weather coming in. I have to confess that I always found a certain amount of interest in watching the computer models of projected storm fronts, focusing in on where we lived at the time, trying to see if we were inside of the zone or outside of it (of course I was never correct in my guessing).

It is absurd, of course, to say that we have no weather forecasting now: people have been forecasting the weather for thousands of years, just with much less technological means: cloud watching, nature signs, even the use of body parts to predict rain – while I have never been one to have my joints hurt just before a storm, I have known others and them have almost always been spot on.

And history and seasonality, of course. Live somewhere long enough, speak to people that have lived there and keep records, and in time one will form a generally effective weather climate record – not precise of course, but generally accurate in large swaths.

I do not have much skill, of course. I have learned to see a front coming in (even if it does not bear rain) and now know with reasonable accuracy when the first day to plant is and when, more than likely, the first frost will hit. And perhaps, given the situation I find myself in, that is enough to know.

After all, in the old world we had access to weather down to the minute – but so many spent their times in climate controlled buildings that the weather itself was nothing more than a sort of background entertainment, the equivalent of a computer screen saver that went on in the background and which was experienced by most in quick dashes and short trips out, only to return to the comfort of regulated heat and cooling. We knew the weather, but did everything we could to not actually experience it.

We now find ourselves in the opposite position – having to experience and live with the weather in a real way, we limited ability to know it before it happens.

It does, I suppose, give one the opportunity to enjoy walking in post-night rain as a true surprise instead of a foregone conclusion. I find it comforting to know such minor joys still exist.

Your Obedient Servant, Seneca

One Year On: The Death of TB The Elder

 As I was sitting reading on Sunday afternoon, something about the upcoming week nagged at my brain.  Relenting at some point, I went and did a little review.  Today is the one year anniversary of the passing of my father (if one can use the word "anniversary" for such an event).

It is clear enough where the thought came from: the program from his service is there on the desk in my room; I see it every day and it has become ingrained into my unconscious.  

It is an odd thing, this sudden realization.  It is one of those moments that is stuck in time - my time anyway, and those of my sister and our families.  But a time that will dwindle away in significance as we, too, pass beyond and his pictures become just another image in a family album that someone can vaguely identify.

It is odd as well to look at where I was last year and where I find myself this year.  There is so much that I would have liked to talk to my father about, to get his perspective on.  We talked quite often after my last layoff and the job search.  He would likely have said he thought things would work out and not to worry in the event that they did not, they would be able to help.  And he would have enjoyed seeing the pictures of Greece.

It strikes me as almost unreal that I have not spoken with him is such a way since January of 2021.

His gravestone remains the same in the cemetery where it is placed now. I try and go by every time I am out - not so much for him I suppose as for me.  I do talk a bit, but nothing like I would have on the phone.  There is a sense that I am talking to stone and grass instead of any sort of lingering presence.

For his wisdom and conversation, I have to resort to memory and imagination and fill in the blanks of what I think he would have said.  Hopefully I do him justice.

Indecision And Wrong Decision

 

Tales From Produce (A)Isle: Closing Time

 The last part of the day of working produce takes on a schedule all its own.

The generalized procedure, if there were to be one written down, is to front the produce/packaged produce with especial attention to things like berries (strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries) which have two to three different "kinds" (regular, organic, hydroponic), bananas, roma tomatoes, and avocados, perform a random inventory check, a final floor sweep - all to be followed by a manager check.  Ideally we are out the door by 2200 or a bit before.

It is odd how, even after working there a short time, a schedule locks in.

At 2030 I start pulling in the onions except for a single bin of each variety (fruit fly issues). I will then sweep by the berries - if I have stacked pulled everything forward (ensuring the oldest is on the top and all the newer ones are back) it becomes an easy job of just pulling things to the fore and backfilling.  Bananas are usually filled two to three times during the shift, so perhaps some spot filling there as well.  Tomatoes and avocadoes are just pulling forward and adding to existing bins or putting a new one up.  If I am paired with someone else, they often do the inventory check.  Front the packaged products and sweeping is the final step.  

There are always some issues of course, like something being completely stripped out or a lack of a particular thing that means that whatever is left needs to be spread out to cover the space.  But largely the last 1.5 hours of the day have been the same, shift in and shift out.

It strikes me as interesting that this "schedule" has come together so quickly - to be fair, I am basing my work on the work of my coworkers that do things in an established manner and there are fixed tasks, but this is the most quickly that a schedule has established itself, especially since I am only working part time.  

Would that so many jobs had such straightforward adjustments.

"We Must Not Open Up Too Many Fronts"

 "People today have many distractions because they do not live simple lives.  They open too many fronts and are overwhelmed with worries.  I only try to take care of one or two things at a time, and then move on to something else.  I never try to do too many things at the same time.  Let's say that I am thinking of doing something.  I will have to finish it before I start thinking about doing something else.   When I cannot finish what I started, I feel uneasy.  Too many things going on at the same time can drive us crazy.  The alone could turn us into "schizophrenics.

....

When I lived in a coenobitic monastery, there was a monk, Old Isidore, who served together with me in the carpenter's shop.  He had no patience at all.  He would start working on a window.  Then he would get worried and stop.  Next he would start working on a door, only to get upset and quit.  After that, he would go up on the roof.  He used to stop in the middle of a job, and leave everything unfinished.  He cut some logs the wrong way, or cut them to the wrong size.  This is how hard work can break one's back without achieving anything in the end.

There are some people who have limited abilities and can only do one or two things at a time well.  When they get involved in too many jobs, they end up doing nothing right and drag others down along with them, too.  As much as possible, one should do one or two things only, do them right, and then with a clear mind and a rested body start working on the next job.  What spiritual work can be done with a scattered mind?  How would we remember Christ?"

- Saint Paisos the Athonite (1924-1994), With Pain And Love for Contemporary Man

Greece 2023: Ancient Underground Athens

 One of the comments that our tour guide made more than once is that Greece is a country run by the archaeologists.  That is not quite the surprise that statement might seem:  with so many settlements built on ruins of older settlements and so many surviving historical buildings, Greece in a way is a museum  that is tied to its past in a way not every country is.  Especially in Athens, history is literally layered on history.

At the site of the Acropolis Museum where all of the original stonework and archaeological finds of the Acropolis are located, there is an excavated portion of ancient Athens which was found at the site of the build - and is now part of the exhibit of the museum.  The pictures below represent homes, workshops, toilets, and storerooms which were in use between 500 B.C. and 500 A.D.   

The narrow channels below represent a sewer system.

At our last hotel in the basement level (where breakfast was served), excavations had discovered part of the wall of Themistokles (479 B.C.), built after the Persians had burned down Athens.  There is a story about this wall that at the time, the Spartans had not wanted the wall rebuilt so Themistokles, the master mind of the battle of Salamis (480 B.C.), went on an embassy to Sparta and told the Athenians to build a wall with whatever they had.  He prevaricated, delayed, and put off the Spartans until the wall was built.  Seeing this was a special touch point for me between the history that I had read and the history that still exists.

Greece 2023: The Stoa of Attalos

 The Stoa of Attalos was built at the Athenian Agora by Attalos II (ruled 159 B.C. to 138 B.C.) of Pergamum.  The stoa was intended as a gift by Attalos for the education that he had received there in his youth.

As Classical Athens was subsumed into larger and larger political units - Alexander the Great's empire, the successor state of the Kingdom of Macedonia, The Achaean League, and the Roman Empire - it continued to enjoy favor based on its reputation for philosophy and culture.  A number of monuments and memorials were gifted over the years (The Odeon, the great amphitheater of the Parthenon, was one; we will see more done by Romans soon). The givers sought both to bring honor to Athens as well as themselves by their gifts.

The Stoa measures 377 ft x 66 ft/115 m by 20 m and is unusual in that it has two levels, not one.  The original was largely destroyed in 267 A.D. by the invading Heruli and was excavated in 1931.  The Stoa was rebuilt, using original materials where possible and marble from Mt. Pentelicus used to fill in the gaps (as was true of the Parthenon as well).

A view of the reconstructed Stoa from the Temple of Hephaestus:

Looking along the side:

Interior of the Stoa:

Original inscription from the Stoa along with a figure that shows the letters in question.  2000 years later, one can still clearly see they are the Greek alphabet.

One of the reasons for rebuilding the Stoa was to create a museum to house artifacts found in the Stoa.

A Greek shield.  We know the date of the shield, 425 B.C.  It is one of the 292 that were captured from Peloponnesian hoplites (including 120 Spartiates) at the Island of Sphacteria (we know this as the information is inscribed on the shield).

Ostrikons, or shards of pottery used for voting whether individuals were to be banished from Athens under the law of ostracism.

An ostrakon for Themistokles, victor of the Battle of Salamis, banished in 471 B.C.

Ostrakons for Themistokles, Kimon, and Arestides. I knew of all this characters; seeing this link to their physical existence was very exciting.

A ceramic cup:

A view from the second story of the Stoa back towards the Temple of Hephaestus:

The Collapse CX: Of Civil Wars And History

06 June 20XX +1

My Dear Lucilius:

As I was working in the garden today, my mind turned to civil wars.

I am sure I arrived here mostly by the recent outlying attacks and the even more recent sighting. That said, I do not really have the background – practical or historical – to truly understand or deal with this sort of criminal civil unrest, if that is what it can be called (I suppose it could named other things as well, but I should like to pretend that there is still a hope for civilization somewhere).

I do, however, have the background to deal with civil wars.

My “preference” with civil wars, if one wants to name such a thing a preference, is with wars that occurred in the long ago. A great deal of that is simply familiarity with history: to me, the Peloponnesian War or the Wars of Alexander’s successor The Diadochi or the Civil Wars of the Republic (or the later disturbances of the early Principate) are far more familiar to me. The other is, perhaps a preference in historical views: one could safely argue that the Civil War in America has far more relevance and impact on my own life, but it is something I have never really had the least bit of interest in. I cannot really explain why; perhaps simply looking at the civil wars of others with a much more significant lapse in time is easier if for no other reason than the outcomes are much clearer.

Not that they are any cleaner, of course. To read of ancient civil wars is merely to bury the violence and brutality under narrative texts and words in black and white. To read of populations decimated, lives tortured, looted, and ended, entire cities destroyed and their populations enslaved – this is no easier for me to read of than reading of the modern news, when it was a thing. In a way, it is much worse because the ancient texts often capture only the most significant events or most famous of people, when in fact the common sort of folk suffered just as much – but they are lost to history.

I wonder if we find ourselves at the same point, Lucilius, in this age where a temporary halt in our learning and recording of history could very well be a much longer sort of thing. A thousand years hence, will any read of a history of The Collapse of North America? What would it say if it existed? Would it focus – as the ancient texts often do – only on the urban centers and the famous? Will “field historians” write works that relate how life in “the provinces” went on? If there are battles, will they even be recorded? Or will they simply disappear into the grass and dust of history?

How remarkable to realize one is in the midst of a historical event, even with the realization that likely no-one will actually know it as history.

Your Obedient Servant, Seneca

I, Claudius And The Cost Of Insanity

In the course of putting things into my parents' master closet for later transport to The Barn for storage and packing up four boxes of books (I did try and streamline the collection), I came across the books I, Claudius and Claudius The God.  I, Claudius was familiar to me as a title as it was a rather famous BBC dramatic adaptation in the 1970's (interestingly, still considered to be one of the best of all time).

The book itself by Robert Graves was published in 1935 (I had no idea it was so old) and was actually written by him not because of an abiding interest in Claudius (although he held a degree in Classical Studies) but that he needed to generate income after a failed land deal. He did generate that income, so much so that it is still considered a classic.  It takes the form of an autobiography written by Tiberius Claudius Germanicus (10 B.C. to 54 A.D.), a grandson by adoption of Octavian (Augustus) Caesar and a member of the Julian-Claudian dynasty - a not impossible theory as it turns out (historically) that Claudius was quite a prolific historical author, although we currently have almost none of his works remaining.  The period of time covers the end of Augustus' reign (27 B.C. - 14 A.D.) through the reign of Tiberius (14 A.D. - 37 A.D.) and Caligula (37 A.D. - 41 A.D.).  It includes not only these men, but the larger family - wives, brothers, sisters, grandchildren - of the Julian-Claudian dynasty.  Graves based his work largely on the works of Tacitus and Suetonius (which I have read).  Cassisus Dio may not have been used as much, although his writings also contribute a great deal to our understanding of the period (Almost all of Tacitus' sections on Caligula have disappeared through time, for example).

Claudius was born with a series of physical issues:  he had weak knees, stammered, and his noise ran when he became excited.  Considered almost sub-human by his grandparents and parents, he eventually came to use this to his advantage, learning to conceal his intelligence (which appears to have been not impacted at all) behind a potentially played up facade of a physically weak and confused man.  It worked in that it helped to preserve his life through the reigns of Tiberius and Caligula until in 41 A.D. he is virtually the last member of the Julian-Claudian dynasty and is thus proclaimed Emperor.

The story is very well written and plausibly fills in the gaps that history has left us - with a little imagination, of course.  What is does in a sort of living color is paint the picture of insanity.

Not the insanity of Claudius; in the book he remains a sort of beacon of reason. No, it is the rest of what came to be the royal family of the Julian-Claudians. Power needs to be clung to and once achieved, is not easily let go.  The fact that the Caesars had power meant that over time, they came to see every whim as something that could be acted on, every potential threat to their power as someone that needed to be shaken down for cash, exiled (rarely), or murdered (more frequently).  It even reached the point that Caligula saw himself as divine and thus, above human law.

Graves, through Claudius, notes that at the start of the issues, the problems were invisible to the public.  The proscriptions and intrigues (and murders) occupied a very small and narrow segment of Roman society.  To the average Roman citizen the bureaucracy still functioned, the Games still went on, and the corn arrive from Egypt.  It was only over time as Tiberius and Caligula became more and more reckless in their behavior and their spending that the common citizen felt the pinch of taxes and hunger.  By then, to show any sort of disagreement or discontent with the current policies was to invite death.

You might assume that I am speaking about a particular modern subject. That is not the intent (everyone is quite good about what we do and do not discuss h here). My point - the point that Graves makes so eloquently - is that insanity in any sort of societal, political, religious, philosophical or economic arena unchecked comes to create insanity in all of those categories.  

One might say that if the pinch has not yet come in an insane society, it is only because things have not worked themselves out sufficiently yet.  The pinch will come, inevitably - because insanity always seeks to pay today's accounts with tomorrow's income, leading to an inevitable bankruptcy of the whole thing.

18th Blogiversary

 GOOD MORNING TB

Good morning HAL.  To what do I owe the pleasure of this interruption?

HAPPY BLOGIVESARY

What?   Hold on....well, what do you know? It is my blogiversary.

YES I KNOW  THAT IS WHY I SAID IT

No one likes impertinence, HAL.

THAT IS A LOT OF YEARS OF WRITING

Yes it is HAL, yes it is.

SOME OF IT IS EVEN ACCEPTABLE WRITING

Please see the note about impertinence above.  

HOW WILL YOU CELEBRATE

Probably write a post.  I think that is what you are supposed to do in the situations.

WILL I BE IN IT

I will see what I can do for you.

Greece 2023: The Agora Of Athens

Where the Greeks lived and traveled, they took with them the Agora.

We often translate agora as "marketplace" and it was in fact that, but it was much more.  It was the center of the Greek polis city life.  Business was conducted there, certainly - but other activities occurred there too: social, political, religious.  Men (it would have largely been men and free men at that) conducted there business and discussions beneath collonaded porches (called stoa).  Philosophers taught in the Agora:  Socrates is often found there in his discussions and Zeon of Citium started his teachings beneath the Stoa Poikile (Painted Stoa) of Athens.

The Agora of Athens has been excavated; walking it one can walk the the same streets and lanes as Perikles, Alkibiades, Sokrates, Plato, and a host of historical Greek figures.

The road on the left hand side is called The Panhellenic Way, and was the path by which the annual Panhellenic Festival made its way to the Acropolis.

This sign shows the reconstruction of the Athenian Agora.  There were many of these throughout our travels, which were very helpful in trying to visualize what we saw against what had previously existed.

The Bema, or Speaker's Platform.  We know of the location of such things from various sources, including the Greek Travelers Pausanias' 2nd Century A.D. journey through Greece.  Often on sites, this is the sort of thing one would see:  A simple note of what was there, leaving the viewer to their imagination.

The Athenian Mint:

A row of what would have been stalls, workshops, and businesses.

Looking back towards the Stoa of Attalos (2nd Century B.C., and worthy of a post all its own):

Looking up towards the Temple of Hephastion:

If I recall correctly, this was the location of an altar:

The Temple of Hephaestus.  Hephaestus (anglicized as Hephaestion) was the Greek god of crafts and forging.  The original temple was destroyed by the Persians in 479 B.C. and was rebuilt in its current form from 440 - 415 B.C.  The ruins are original (e.g., they have not been reconstructed).  Around the 7th century A.D. it was converted into a church.

Looking back towards the Agora and Acropolis.  One thing that strikes the viewer is how small the Agora really was.

Statues/Columns:

It was humbling to realize that in some small way, I trod the same historical paths as the great men I have read of.  The architecture and surrounding lands were obviously different and I had to use my imagination, but even now, faint traces of them remain, merely by the fact that people come from all over the world to see where they lived.