Ramblin' with Roger

1: One book that changed your life: Probably mentioned before, but “Lying” by Sissela Bok. I’ve stolen outright this Amazon review, because it captures the book so well: “Sissela Bok challenges the reader to consider the effects of lying on the individual, relationships and society. The author systematically covers the spectrum of lies from ‘little white lies’ to avoid an unwanted dinner invitation to the arguably moral lies required to survive in a totalitarian state – taking the reader step by step through a journey of increasingly complex moral questions. The book argues that lying, as it is often conducted in society, often lacks the moral basis of those few cases where it can be justified.”

2: One book you have read more than once: When I was a kid, I had this “I Spy” novelization I read repeatedly. It was where I learned the phrase “hoist by his own petard”. There was also this 1931 sports anthology called “Play the Game”, which featured Rogers Hornsby and others on baseball, Red Grange and others on football, legendary writer Grantland Rice on golf, plus a whole lot more. It’s 350+ pages, and I still have it, though I haven’t read it in decades.
As an adult, the ONLY book I’ve read all the way through more than once is the Bible, and I don’t know if that counts, because one time was the King James and the other time was the Revised Standard Version.
I assume we’re not talking about children’s book, since Scott said he didn’t have any, and I suspect he’s read the same stories repeatedly to his son Nigel. A children’s book I’ve read a lot BEFORE Lydia was “Bartholomew and the Oobleck” by Dr. Seuss.

3: One book you would want on a desert island: Almost assuredly, the Bible, the NRSV. Quoting Scott: “Considering I would be there quite a while and have time to think, it would a good opportunity to try and digest all of it.”

4: One book that made you laugh: I have four Doonesbury anthologies, trade paperbacks. Maybe one of those. Although I remember borrowing one of Erma Bombeck’s books from my mother on a visit, maybe “Septic Tank”, and finding it surprisingly more entertaining in the collective than her daily column, even though the book was culled from them.

5: One book you wish had been written: “Growing Up” by Russell Baker. I always liked his style.

6: One book you wish had never had been written: Probably some neocon diatribe, but truth is, I tend to shut them out of my mind rather quickly.

7: One book that made you cry: I’m sure there have been some, but none come to mind.

8: One book you are currently reading: “The Genesis of Ethics” by Burton L. Visotzky. Our former pastor, Joe Shook, was giving away many of his books, and this one intrigued me. It’s about why a bunch of not-necessarily-religious folks got together to read the first book of the Torah.

9: One book you have been meaning to read: Only one? “The Gnostic Gospels” by Elaine Pagels is one on my bookshelf.

Similarly, Scott at Scooter Chronicles noted how he ONLY spent a couple hundred bucks on his car. Since I suppose there will always be car repairs, getting off cheaply feels like good news. But let’s take a more recent example in his blog: the bad news of his son Nigel’s inability to sleep through the night. When he (actually, they – Nigel, Scott and Marcia) finally go back to sleeping through the night, it will surely seem like good news.

Someone has some sort of growth, but it turns out to be benign. Someone’s in a car accident, but he or she suffers only minor cuts and bruises. Good news, yes?

I went to the Good News Network this week, and what do I find?
On this day in History, August 8:
John McCarthy, the British journalist held hostage in Lebanon for more than five years by Islamic Jihad was freed after more than five years in captivity (1991)
A cease-fire between Iran and Iraq was announced by The United Nations (1988) Good news following five years as a hostage and eight years of war, respectively.

A couple nights later, on an extremely muggy Monday night/Tuesday morning, I was lying down in the guest bedroom, directly under the ceiling fan, but was not sleeping. Carol came in and thought there might be a bat in our bedroom. I got Carol my spare racquetball racquet from the office. Suddenly, the flying mammal was in the hallway, circling Carol, with her using the racquet to keep it at bay, AND to close the other bedroom doors. I found a shoebox in the office, which I used to change the bat’s pattern. It flew towards the now-closed bedroom, flew back towards Carol, who (there’s no better word) batted it down, and put the racquet on top of the bat. I took the shoebox and kept the bat on the floor while removing the racquet, slipped the shoebox top under the bat, and we sealed up the box, poking some holes in it. In the morning, Carol took it to the Health Department lab, where it was verified it was not rabid.

Those of you keeping score at home will note that this is now the FIFTH live bat in our house in five summers. You’d think we’d actually do something like this. We actually did the standing outside looking for the bats to return thing one night last year after that incident, but never saw them. Maybe we’re just too impatient to wait around looking towards the roof for two or three hours for several nights at dusk or later trying to see a fast-flying creature.

We DID get our then-contractor to agree to bat-proof the attic last fall, but he never followed through (thanks a lot, guy). Carol talked to our new contractor about it. He thinks it’s all a bit silly. After all, the chances of contact are minimal, and the chances of rabies are even more remote, he correctly noted. Carol replied that the chances of an untreated contact from a rabid bat being fatal is about 100%.

The first commentary was Jane Fonda talking about her father Henry, and how their relationship in On Golden Pond (a film I’ve never seen, though I’ve watched stage productions of it) between their characters paralleled their real-life relationship, how he got his only Oscar for that role, how he was unable to receive it himself, so she had to receive it in his stead, how she was so pleased to present the award to him personally, and how he died five months later. I knew these facts before, yet I found it surprisingly poignant in the retelling.

The second commentary was Sidney Poitier talking about Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, and how he became cognizant of channeling the relationship with his real father in playing against the man who played his cinematic dad. Talking about this made him a bit emotional.

I’ve long been a sucker for the scene in Field of Dreams when the Kevin Costner figure asks his dad to play catch. But I was surprised how moved I was of the scene in To Kill a Mockingbird when the black folks in the balcony direct Scout to stand up: “Your father’s passing.”