Bernie and Mary Ellenbogen

master gardener

Mary EllenbogenMary Ellenbogen was an elegant lady of 85. She lived five doors down from us. Mary was a master gardener and the front of her house was meticulous.

She was spry, walking all over the neighborhood. Her husband Bernard, a well-regarded retired lawyer over a decade her senior was less robust. They’d both head for the street corner. She’d get there then go back and walk the rest of the way with him. She was very vital and extremely devoted to her spouse.

Our daughter was just a baby, but Mary would talk with her when we met on the street. Mrs. E. was very interested in our daughter’s well-being.

I met her before my wife did. When introducing our neighbor to my wife, I said, “This is Mrs. Ellenbogen.” My wife heard, “This is Mrs. Ellen Bogen,” which is understandable. When I went door-to-door carrying petitions for local political candidates, she’d usually invite me into her home, and we’d chat a bit.

The Ellenbogans wintered in Florida for about half the year. On March 12, 2005, Mr. Ellenbogan fell into their pool down in the Sunshine State. She jumped in after him, and they both drowned. Her death was a particular shock to us and to the neighborhood.

The house was sold but it quickly fell into serious disrepair. It went through a couple people’s hands. We recently noticed that the current owner has brought the house back. It’s nowhere near Mary Ellenbogen standards, mind you, but better than it had been.

Dual obit

When I was looking for my father’s death certificate in late January, so I could get his birth certificate, I also came across the obituary for Bernard and Mary Ellenbogen.

Bernard went to Albany High, NYS Teachers College (the precursor to SUNY Albany), and Albany Law. He was the oldest practicing attorney in the area, and also had some years worth of experience as a brain injury lawyer. Mary, nee Hershkowitz, was a founder of Women’s Interfaith in Albany. She volunteered at the Cooperative Extension and engaged in other horticultural endeavors.

They were both founding and active members of Congregation Ohav Shalom. The couple was married 66 years.

Coincidentally., March 12 was my parents’ anniversary, though dad had passed away back in 2000. My folks were married only 50 years.

Manage communication breakdown

texting

telephone-1822040_640One of my friends, who I’ve only known for a quarter-century wondered how we manage communication, She has four different email accounts, three WhatsApp groups; texts via mobile phone and Facebook account and DMs on Twitter and Facebook.

I’m exhausted just reading the trimmed list.

There were times in the past, it seems, that most people we wanted to reach could be accessed by a single methodology, first by letter, then by phone. As technology has grown, and users’ learning curves differ, it seems more difficult to contact everyone.

Most snail mail I throw into a drawer and leave until it’s nearly full. Then once a month, the great purge, sorting the recyclable from the shreddable material.

Our olde cellphones

Both my wife and I don’t text much because our phones, hers most especially, are old. When my sister became injured a couple years back, the conversations on my phone came through, but not the graphics. Incidentally, I don’t know how old my phone IS. I know it’s less than five years, from something I blogged. Subsequently, I lost that phone in a hotel and had to get a new one, which drains battery power far too quickly. So the phone is off unless I initiate its use.

My wife was added to a text chat and didn’t even know it. She missed some info about a topic of import to her. Now her phone is prehistoric, more than a decade old, possibly older than a certain teenager we know. Actually, my wife will be getting a new phone soon, but we had to wait for the service provider to change hands.

People who text don’t understand folks who don’t.

There was the mom of a friend of my daughter. I could call her on the phone, leave a message, but never get a response. If I Instant Messaged her on Facebook, nearly instant response. But when my daughter IMs me, and I’m not online, she’ll call me to scold me to check my Facebook. Why she can’t just TELL me the info, now that she reached me?

The landline phone answering machine is iffy. I’ll get a message, but if my wife plays it back, I might not notice until the number of recorded messages gets long enough.

I know people who have email but check it only sporadically. It appears to be my primary form of communication. But it will be overwhelmingly crowded until November because every Democratic candidate for President and their common opponent contact me constantly. I delete most of them quickly, but still.

Oh, I should check my AOL account every three months. I keep it as a “recovery for passwords” email. What IS my AOL password? I’ll need to get a recovery text.

I have Twitter and Instagram and LinkedIn, but I seldom actually look at any of them. At least I don’t have to manage communications at the job anymore. No work email or phone mail or snail mail messages. <?strong>

Gender gap on climate change

“green rage”

gender gap on climate changeThere is a gender gap on climate change issues. This ought not to surprise me, and yet it does. The New Republic ran an article in 2019 “citing research that suggests climate science, for skeptics, becomes feminized.

“Many men [in the United States] perceive climate activism as inherently feminine, according to research published in 2017. ‘In one experiment, participants of both sexes described an individual who brought a reusable canvas bag to the grocery store as more feminine than someone who used a plastic bag—regardless of whether the shopper was a male or female,” explained researchers at Scientific American.”

The resulting “green rage” safeguards male dominance by punishing women who challenge the existing social order. I suspect it is at least one factor in the demonization of climate activist Greta Thunberg.

All around the world

And it’s not just an American phenomenon. One reason may be that women are more likely than men to feel the effects of climate change. “Women make up more than 80 percent of people displaced by climate change, according to United Nations data, and air pollution is a top threat to the health of pregnant women and their children.

“Women also typically hold less socioeconomic power than men, making them more vulnerable to such environmental disasters as floods, droughts, hurricanes and wildfires… Across 130 countries, women in government positions were more likely to sign on to international treaties to reduce global warming than men.”

This 2016 United Nations report states: “Women’s empowerment is key to the success of climate actions… Meaningful participation by women will enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of climate change projects and programmes and help address existing inequities while working towards fulfilling the respective international agreements calling for the equality and empowerment of women.”

When the world experiences the warmest ever January in 2020, when it hits a record 68F (20C) in Antarctica in February 2020, there’s no room for such parochial divisions. We need to fight climate change, yesterday. And in the main, it appears that women and girls may be best suited to lead the way.

Music. Birthday. Roger. Chaos. 67.

Annie Haslam, Judy Collins, Odetta

Roger.babeWe have the convergence of Saturday, when I generally write about music, and March 7, which is my birthday. Save for the obvious, there is isn’t much I play every year.

Now there WAS a song I played on March 8, a lot. Have a Good Time from my favorite Paul Simon album.

Yesterday it was my birthday
I hung one more year on the line
I should be depressed
My life’s a mess
But I’m having a good time

I’ve been trying to remember what music I have received on my birthday. A couple years back, I received an album of Odetta singing Bob Dylan. A couple of those tracks appear here.

There was an album I got on my 16th birthday called Who Knows Where the Time Goes by Judy Collins. I wrote about it back in 2008, but somehow all the YouTube links got mucked up. So here it is again.

I was thinking about a particular song from the album, The Story of Isaac, written by Leonard Cohen. It’s because my Bible guys have been rereading the book of Genesis. Specifically Genesis 22, when Abraham is tested by God.

In 1977, I was in Charlotte, NC, crashing on my parents’ sofa. What I wanted for my birthday was the album Scheherazade & Other Stories by Renaissance. I played it. Don’t think my family appreciated as much as I did. So it goes.

Anyway, 67 suggests sixes and sevens. Chaos. Or at least that’s how I’ll remember how old I am.

For the need of money, it seems

What’s that about?

moneyThis happened, six or seven years ago. I was riding on my Trek bicycle that I had purchased a few months earlier. I happened to stop outside of my current church.

A person who I did not know told me that I ought not to have had the bike I owned because I was “too fat and poor.” Yow.

I was too stunned to come up with a treppenwitz response. I’ll own the fat part. But poor? What’s that about? Underpaid, yes. Did he think that because I was overweight, I must also be impoverished? Is there a racial component? I dunno.

This happened last summer. I went to a Friends of the Albany Public Library book discussion by an author. During the Q & A, I asked what I thought were some cogent questions. Afterward, I pulled out a $20 bill to buy his first book. He asked if I sure I could afford it. He then also gave me his third book for nothing.

Also last summer, my wife went to see our financial planner. It’s REALLY boring stuff for me. He sounds like the adults on any Charlie Brown TV special, and I’ve told him so. Still, what he said was that we had a 99% of having a “successful” retirement, based on the money that we – mostly my wife – have saved.

I actually had some extra money in my checking account because I started collecting Social Security a few months before I retired. The teller at my bank recommended I talk to one of their financial people. As it turns out, after meeting two different people, unless I had $15,000 to invest – I did not – the best rate I could get was 0.1% interest.

The next day, I took out $5000 and put it into a 9-month CD at my credit union at 2.13%, not great, but it’s something. I guess I’m NOT “too poor” to buy that book or even that bicycle. So THERE.

Ramblin' with Roger
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