Breakfast With Russell Baker

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

Russell Baker
August 14, 1925 – January 21, 2019

I was awake well before sunrise that Friday morning. A limousine was waiting for me in front of my building in Bloomfield, New Jersey, because commuter trains don't run that early. I had no time to brew coffee, so I had to make do with a chilled Pepsi offered by the driver. I am not a morning person, but it was part of my job as a publicist to escort my authors to their New York media appearances. I had booked Russell Baker on Good Morning America. 

I really didn't know what to expect from Mr. Baker, having only chatted with him briefly on the phone a few times. I had read The Good Times, for which I was doing publicity. It was a delightful memoir about his career in journalism. But I had not yet read Growing Up, his first memoir, for which he'd won a Pulitzer. Our department assistant had rustled up a copy for me only the day before.

I had learned a bit of the history, the unexpected success of Growing Up. The book had gone back for a second printing even before the publication date. The original publisher hadn't anticipated huge numbers on this sweet, understated memoir about coming of age in the shadow of the Great Depression and going on to become a New York Times columnist. The Times reviewed it, of course. It was a rave, and the book had started flying off the shelves, deservedly so.

In my youthful ignorance I hadn't really understood why it was so easy to book media for Russell Baker. It began to dawn when I saw how warmly he was welcomed at the GMA studio. They seemed thrilled to talk to Baker again, even for a mass market reprint of his second memoir. I began then to understand just how beloved he was. As the day wore on, I began to understand why.

If Thine Eye Be Single

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

Some synchronicities are ickier than others.

This is the first news story I read this morning.

South Florida beaches are usually places where people find sea shells, tiny crawling creatures and a shark tooth here and there, but a man walking on Pompano Beach Wednesday came across something out of the ordinary.

A giant eyeball.

Later today, a sneaky neighbor left a bucket of these on our doorstep.
 

Full Circle

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

I've written before about my near obsession with this basic form. First it possessed my inner vision, so that I seriously considered doing a giant, and I mean giant, canvas... except that I don't paint. Then I began to recognize it in a variety of contexts, penultimately in the giant obsessional painting of Battlestar Galactica character Kara Thrace. And it slowly dawned on me that it appears in a great deal of spiritual iconography. Now it's taken to stalking me.

Rightly or wrongly, Dan Brown calls the stripped down version of this symbol a circumpunct.

Brown has this to say in his novel [The Lost Symbol]: "In the idiom of symbology, there was one symbol that reigned supreme above all others. The oldest and most universal, this symbol fused all the ancient traditions in a single solitary image that represented the illumination of the Egyptian sun god, the triumph of alchemical gold, the wisdom of the Philosopher's Stone, the purity of the Rosicrucian Rose, the moment of Creation, the All, the dominance of the astrological sun, and even the ominscient all-seeing eye that hovered atop the unfinished pyramid. The circumpunct. The symbol of the Source. The origin of all things."

. . .

It is true that the circumpunct symbol has been around for millennia, albeit more often known as "the circle with the dot in the middle". It can symbolise everything from gold in alchemy to a European road sign for city centre. It is commonly used as a solar symbol and reputable sources date this to ancient Egypt, where the symbol has its origins in Ra (or Re), god of the midday sun. In fact, the circle with a midpoint, plus a vertical line is the hieroglyph meaning "sun".

So how did an Egyptian symbol rise to shine again as a token of the ancient mysteries among 21st-century Freemasons in Brown's novel? Langdon's exposition is as follows: "The pyramid builders of Egypt are the forerunners of the modern stonemasons, and the pyramid, along with Egyptian themes, is very common in Masonic symbolism." Very neat. Well done, Brown.

Brown is frustrating to read. I keep expecting there to be more of the depth hinted at by the subject matter but it's never forthcoming. And even in this case, the assigning of lineage and intrigue does nothing to address the pull this symbol has on the imagination or its underpinnings in sacred geometry. But it does flesh out a little context.

Past and Portents in Graham Hancock's Mexico

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

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Well, this could explain all the piercing tones I've been getting in my head for the past couple of weeks. (Of course the supermoon hasn't helped this weekend. I mean these pics are pretty but, oh, my head.)

North America's second-tallest volcano recently rumbled to life, putting authorities on edge. Big eruptions of Mexico's massive Popocatepetl volcano are "few and far between," as one geologist says. Yet even without any dramatic fireworks, 17,800-foot (5,425-meter) "Popo" has the power to wreak havoc.

. . .

Popocatepetl lies about 40 miles (70 kilometers) southeast of Mexico City. The mountain reawakened in December 1994 after five decades of silence. Yet in the nearly 20 years since, the volcano has rarely exhibited the kind of vigorous activity that began the week of April 12.

Minor earthquakes have rocked the mountain, it has spewed out plumes of gas and ash, and multiple explosions have shot glowing rocks from the summit. [ Images of Popocatepetl in action.]

The mountain has the potential to erupt magnificently once every 2,000 or 3,000 years. "It has big eruptions, but they are so few and far between," Sheridan said. "But they have been pretty big. So that is the scary part."

I have a particular affection for the Mexico City area and tend to be sort of dialed in to earth changes there. It is an area rich in history. One of the most transformative experiences of my life involved a trip to Mexico City. And I owe at least a little of that to Graham Hancock. I was reminded of that yesterday morning when I stumbled on this lecture he did some years ago.

More Earthquakes and Weirdness

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

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Someone George Ure refers to as "Deep Source" did some unusual calculations on the Virginia and Colorado earthquakes. Ure describes the dialogue:

“Did you notice the Colorado quake was 111-miles from the border of Mineral County, Colorado? he began.

No, I hadn’t.

“Notice it…it’s important…”

“Uh…OK…”

“And what was the first Virginia landmark referenced in the USGS report?”

“Well, the quake was 5 miles from Mineral, Virginia. So what?”

“And how far is it between the quakes?” he continued.

Uh…1,460 miles, or so, I guess, just eyeballing it on Streets & Trips.

“Add up all those numbers.”
 
“11.”

“Hold that.  And how far from the Colorado quake to Mineral Well, Mississippi?”
 
“841 miles.”

“And from Mineral Wells, Mississippi to Mineral, Virginia?”


“About 700.”

“So here’s something to think about then:  Doesn’t it strike you as a synch-wink that the quakes happened approximately equally spaced from Mineral Wells?”
 
“Hadn’t really thought about it.”

“Then look 111 miles North and slightly East of Mineral Wells, Tennessee.  Tell me the name you see up there…”
 
New Madrid.

“Must I do all your work for you, George?”  Click.

Yes, I Felt It Here ~ UPDATED

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

Well, that was a little scary. No major damage to report here. A couple of small things fell. But I've never experienced vibration like that in my life. How's that for irony? Several years in Southern California and the worst quake I've ever experienced was in Virginia. I thought it must be at least a 4 but it turns it was close to 6 at the epicenter; it was downgraded to 5.8 from 5.9 over the course of the afternoon. This was a fairly shallow quake and it was close to a minute before the rattling completely stopped. I grabbed my hysterical 9 year old daughter and stood in the doorway until the house completely stopped jerking around.

But this isn't about me. I just find it a little odd that there were two quakes in the US of over 5 point magnitude almost exactly 12 hours apart. Late last night Colorado had experienced a 5.3 -- also very unusual for the region. The quake there centered in Trinidad was clocked at 11:46pm MT on 8/22. Ours, about 50 miles from here in Mineral VA was at 1:51pm ET on 8/23. That's a little too close for comfort in every sense.

The one in Colorado was the strongest in over forty years. As near as I can tell, this was the first quake in Virginia of such magnitude in over a hundred years. There was another 5.8 in 1897.

Dendrolatry

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

Monday evening during a rather intense thunderstorm I sat watching an albeit somewhat pixilated Kill Bill Vol. 1, for the umpteenth time, and noodling on the computer. I didn't realize just how a bad a storm it was until an incredibly loud crack of thunder shook the wall next to me and something shiny flew across the living room a couple of feet from my face. What I thought must have been a shard of glass from a broken window turned out be lightning. There was no damage at all to the window or to me. The tree outside the window, however...

Our phone lines also got a good jolt that night and we've been replacing things all week, starting with the router which was magically transformed into a paperweight. So I've been offline for a few days. Turns out that thing about turning off and unplugging all your appliances during thunderstorms might have some merit.

We've been learning a collective lesson about the frailty of our technological society. In our endless to quest to subdue and control nature, nature keeps winning. Just ask the good folks in Japan who thought loading up one of the most seismic areas on the planet with nuclear plants was a good idea. There's power and then there's power.

Rest in Peace, Lynn Redgrave

Crossposted from Reflections Journal.

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Tomorrow night they will dim the lights on Broadway to honor the passing of Lynn Redgrave.

I find myself deeply saddened and somewhat startled at my own sadness. I did not know Lynn Redgrave well, but I spent a good bit of time with her when I handled publicity on her book "This is Living." She was a lovely, gracious, and unpretentious woman. It was that genuine, down-to-earth quality that so distinguished her work as an actress.

I was only a child when I first saw "Georgy Girl" on television. The warmth, vulnerability, and accessibility Redgrave brought to the character of Georgy made the film an instant classic. But that was Lynn Redgrave; sincere, open, and unabashedly honest. She brought that incredible presence and integrity to every project she undertook.