A THOUGHT FOR TODAY

Religions that categorize individuals based on their beliefs ARE divisive, harmful, and potentially dangerous. Love is inclusive.

A THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

The most difficult aspect of not believing in some divine judgment of our behavior is that evil goes unpunished.  Goodness shares a bench with evil, each existing for its own sake, and that is hard to accept.

THE VALUE OF WINE

Armed with a glass of wine, I am ready to do battle in the cultural wars over the issue of “values”.  Forget the role of wine in the New Testament, since it is clear that only really crazy people take the bible literally, and some of them still use grape juice in their sacraments.  I will make my case solely on my own personal experience, which, with all humility, I consider to be very valid.

Wine to me means family.  As a young boy I helped my father and grandfather pick the grapes in our vineyard.  I wish I could say that I stomped around on them in my bare feet, but alas, that pleasure was denied me.  I did however play in the huge upright barrel that remained from the commercial wine making days; access was through a small door that opened near the bottom.  I remember it as huge, but it was probably about 8-10 feet tall and 5-6 feet across.  But I digress.

Like so many first generation Italian-Americans, my father made wine every year, even long after the grapes were gone.  In fact he did this his entire life excluding the few years his health prevented him from doing so.  There were always 5-6 barrels of wine in our cellar.  In later years 5-gallon glass and plastic vessels replaced the wooden barrels.  A gallon of red wine was a fixture in our kitchen, often on the floor by my father or grandfather at dinnertime and the wine was sipped from small juice glasses, never the stemmed wine glasses we see today. 

When aunts, uncles, and cousins came to visit they never left without first having coffee, wine, and more often than not, food.  Until he died, all of my visits to my uncle Ferrar, dad’s older brother, began with a glass of wine along with some bread, cheese, and perhaps peppers and/or salami.  Of course he made his own wine, as did my uncle Ren, another older brother, who left the farm and moved to Long Island. (His name was Communardo, but everyone called him Ren...quite understandable.)  He had his own grape arbor in the back yard.

Wine means the warmth of friendship and sharing.  I do enjoy a glass of wine alone, at the end of the day, but I enjoy it more when I am sitting with one or more friends and neighbors in our kitchen or on our porch.  It is a quiet way of saying, “I am glad your here with me”.  It is a gesture of friendship and hospitality.

Family, friendship, hospitality...sounds a lot like love to me.

THE MAN IN BLACK, and other friends I never knew

 

The following journal entry was written in response to the death of Johnny Cash, but the sentiment applies equally to the other friends I have lost. I have mourned the loss of these artists whose work has, in ways I cannot explain, inspired me to pursue my own creative dreams. Their music, their voices, their stories, all reach deep into a place within me that unleashes sentiments and will that were previously unfamiliar to me. I miss them dearly.

Harry Chapin, John Lennon, John Denver, Johnny Cash, Jerry Orbach, and now,
Luciano Pavarotti.

9-13-03

Amy called me at 7:30 in the morning to tell me Johnny Cash died, and sadness and melancholy quietly settled in and accompanied me for the rest of the day. The man whose music has been so much a part of my life for over 25 years is gone, and I feel like I have lost a friend. I saw him perform twice in my life, but never met him.  He was present to me in his music, looming larger than life, representing what I admired - strength, independence, sensitivity, and creativity, a fragile and vulnerable man, taking life on his own terms. In my mind, the man in black felt the worlds pain, and responded to it with love, for only love could allow someone to create such an abundant body of work, spanning generations and cultural divides, as his has done.

Whether or not Johnny Cash really possessed these attributes is immaterial, what matters is that through his music and his life they were made real, and shared with me and countless others. .

His music encompasses wide range of emotional experiences, but the common denominator is the evocation of all that is human and personal. There is nothing abstract in his songs, only the presence of the personal, and I admired and respected him for that. His music makes me feel what I want to feel.

Johnny Cash was a man who successfully pursued a creative life, doing what he wanted to do, on his own terms. For that he was my hero.

OH SO BUSY

Sharing a studio newsletter today.

 This will be a brief newsletter because I am quite busy with other commitments at this time.

You would not believe how busy I am.  I am so busy not doing all the things I have to do that there is no time for me to do them.  I currently have four works in progress, two watercolors and two acrylics, and avoiding them leaves me no time for all the other stuff I think I should be doing instead.  It is not easy juggling this workload, and honestly, I think a lesser man could not do it.

Adding to my difficulties is the writing I’ve been trying to do between the times I am not spending on the paintings.  I am overwhelmed by all that has not been written these past few weeks because I know that it will all have to be revised once it is written.  But being the tiger that I am I soldier on, undeterred by all of this.  I could just sit in my room all day and work in my head but that is not who I am.  I insist on going into the studio every day where I have arranged a space for me to write and not do the work there.  The key to productivity is to remain busy.

You can understand why I look forward to retiring into the kitchen at the end of the day to enjoy a glass of wine while I think about dinner.  You would not believe some of the great new pasta dishes I have not prepared.

I must end this newsletter now because I have a desk full of tax related paper work waiting for me that I don’t plan on doing today.  But please don’t worry about me; I know enough to take a break from my work and get the necessary rest I need.
I wonder what the chance are of this email ever being sent.

Busy Bill

To sign up for my newsletter email me at wfrenzulli@mac.com

MEMORIES - THE THREAD OF LIFE

The past is not something we can leave behind.  Even when we think we have, our memories, those remembered and those not, remain tucked away in the attics of our mind.  Some are buried deeply in boxes never opened and covered with years of dust, and others are strewn about, easily retrievable on demand.  Then there are those special ones, carefully kept in gilded, ornate boxes that we lovingly open from time to time, and finally there are those well-worn memories that we hold close to us and keep by our bedside as a constant companion.  Remembered or not, these snippets from our lives are always with us.  Memories create threads running through our lives, weaving a fabric of continuity and meaning that help us navigate the future.  If our lives were books, memories would be the table of contents, directing us to a particular place and time.

It seems to be universal, the older we get the more we want to remember our past, and the events and circumstances that helped create who we are.  They become increasingly important, and we cherish them, albeit selectively.  Psychologists remind us that our memories are filtered by time, and cannot be taken as literal historic truths.  Filtered or selective, their importance to understanding our selves cannot be denied, and they remain a vital part of the journey.

It was only after I reached adulthood that I realized how fortunate I was to have the parents and family that I did, and as a result, with very few exceptions, I have only good memories.  Not everyone has been so fortunate, and I wonder how people deal with the pain and sorrow of bad memories as they make their way in life.  Can they coexist with happiness and better circumstances, or do they have to be repressed and forgotten. 

Memories help us understand who we are, by showing us where we have been, revealing how the person we are has unfolded from what we were.  They enable us to see the past with the wisdom of gathered years, often revising our impressions and allowing us to see what we may have missed the first time around.

I cherish my memories, holding them fast and close to me, even more as the years accumulate (something they inevitably do).  I’m aware that the very old seem to go back into time, reliving the distant past.  That gives me comfort; I look forward to pulling up long forgotten stories.

THE ME GENERATION, NARCISSISM, AND ANOTHER HALF TRUTH

I recently read commentary addressing what the writer sees as a growing phenomenon, narcissism in the “me generation”, a generation characterized by narcissism and a sense of entitlement, where the interests and well-being of the individual come before those of the group.  Impatience and a desire for instant gratification were also assigned to this generation, and reference was made to the book, Generation Me, by Jean Twinge, who describes young people as being more assertive, confident, entitled, and more miserable than ever before.  When things go wrong in their life they tend to project the blame on others, which in turn results in frustration, anger, and eventual rudeness.  The end result is increasing stress levels. 

Not a very complimentary description of this generation (folks born between 1981 and 1999, according to Twinge).  My skepticism evolved to anger and frustration when the writer disparagingly described parents raising their children to feel special, to believe they could be anything they wanted to be, and to believe in themselves.  Here was another example of someone taking the easy way out by seeing only extremes and failing to examine all of the intricacies of an issue. 

I don’t know of a greater gift that a parent can give their child than the gift of self-esteem and the belief that they can aspire to realize whatever dreams they may have.  A child who grows up believing he or she is special, believing in themselves, is someone who will be emotionally prepared to address the trials and tribulations of life.  It is only after an individual understands and accepts whom they are that they can then effectively serve others and the community.

But there is more to this than instilling these character strengths in the child.  It is equally important for children to know their role in the community, to learn from their parents that they are part of a world larger than themselves.  It is the absence of this lesson, and not the instillation of self-esteem and self worth that leads to narcissism.  A critical point that many popular social commentators seem to overlook. 

Revised from a 2099 post