My professional work is that of a Licensed Professional Counselor in Virginia and much of my training has been in Family Therapy. This blog is an attempt to reflect on the work I do both as a trained profession in the mental health field and as a human being who struggles with living an intentional and meaningful life. It is meant to be both personal and professional since I am unable to separate the two.
I recently, and I'm not exactly sure how it happened, came across the music of Kevin Gordon. I think I heard him on Pandora, liked what I heard, went on-line and bought his most effort, Gloryland. Then I actually forgot I had it. I discovered it again today and was amazed by what I heard and saw (thanks to YouTube).
Here's a biographic piece I found on him:
"Over the course of twenty years of writing, recording and touring, singer-songwriter Kevin Gordon has built an impressively consistent catalog of songs, a critically acclaimed stack of albums, and a reputation for dynamic live performances that make first-time listeners dedicated fans. His new full-length album, Gloryland, released in early 2012 has garnered praise from, among others, highly respected author and American music scholar Peter Guralnick:
"There's nothing else around today quite like Kevin Gordon’s music. I'm a huge Kevin Gordon fan. Think of John Lee Hooker tied to the hard, imagistic poetry of William Carlos Williams, and you get a little bit of an idea. It’s something like trance blues, I suppose – but then you encounter the tangled, complex story lines of 'Colfax' or 'Trying to Get to Memphis' or 'Bus to Shreveport.' There really is no way to sum it up neatly – you just have to listen. And listen again. For the pure emotional pleasure of it. For the unmistakable, hard-driving passion of words and music, rocking together in rhythm."
Well, I agree completely with all of the above, but in spades. How is it possible that this guy is unknown? And has been recording for twenty years, not in studios but in the homes of his friends. The song, Colfax, may be one of the great rock songs I have ever heard. It is just stunning. Just watch the video below.
He's going to be playing a small club outside of Richmond, Va on March 31. The price of admission is $12/head - $17 at the door. There is no justice in the music world.
At the French Film Festival held recently in Williamsburg, we saw a film released early in 2011, Of Men and Gods. It is a film of faith.
On the night of 26-27 in March 1996, seven Trappist monks from the monastery of Tibhirine in Algeria — Dom Christian de Chergé, Brother Luc Dochier, Father Christophe Lebreton, Brother Michel Fleury, Father Bruno Lemarchand, Father Célestin Ringeard, and Brother Paul Favre-Miville — were kidnapped and held for ranson for the release of rebels of the Armed Islamic Group being held in prison by the government. They were held for two months, and were found dead on 21 May 1996. In the film. their deaths are caused by rebels but in reality, as is often the case, the causes of their deaths remain in dispute. It may be that the deaths were accidental in a botched rescue attempt by the Algerian army.
The fate of these monks was the subject of a book by John Kiser, The Monks of Tibhirine: Faith, Love, and Terror in Algeria (2003). The film we saw has received many awards and glowing reviews. America‘s Fr. James Martin SJ has lauded it “the greatest film I’ve ever seen on faith.”
One of many themes in the movie, and one that is so relevent today, is the continuuing conflict between the Muslim and the Christian communities. The Trappist brothers present an example of a working attempt to bridge that conflict and through faith in God form a mutually supportive, integrated community. Brother Christian, the prior of the monestary, prior to his death which he saw as inevitable, writes a testimory to his work and his asks that the world try to understand that coexistance was possible and necessary. The movie ends with their deaths and his prayer.
Brother Christian’s testament:
‘Should it ever befall me, and it could happen today, to fall victim to the terrorism which seems to now want to engulf all the foreigners living here, I would like my community, my church and my family to remember that my life was GIVEN to God and to this country.
May they accept that the Unique Master of all life could not be a stranger to this brutal departure. May they be able to associate this death to so many other violent ones, consigned to the apathy of anonymity.
I've lived long enough to know that I am complicit in the evil that, alas, seems to prevail over the world and even of the one that would strike me blindly.
I could never desire such a death. In fact, I don’t see how I could ever rejoice in this people I love being indistinctly accused of my murder.
I know the contempt the people of this country may have indiscriminately been surrounded by. And I know which caricatures of Islam a certain Islamism encourages.
This country and Islam, for me, are something else. They are a body and a soul.
My death will of course quickly vindicate those who hastily called me naïve or idealistic, but they must know that I will finally be freed of my most burning curiosity and will be able, God willing, to immerse my gaze into the Father's in order to contemplate with him his children of Islam as he sees them.
In this THANK YOU, where from now on all is said about my life, I include you of course, friends of yesterday and today, and you as well, friend of the last minute, who knew not what you were doing.
Yes, for you as well, I want this THANK YOU and this FAREWELL which you envisaged.
And may we meet again, happy thieves in paradise, if it pleases God, the Father of us both ‘AMEN INCH’ALLAH!’."
I came across this NYT article recently which, in a lively, fun way, poked fun of cultural divide between black and white, "have some and want some" cultures. In the article Charles Murray, American intellectual and author recent cited in this blog, and Baratunde Rafiq Thurston, American comedian, interview each other. As it turns out, both are bright and both are funny.
FEBRUARY 10, 2012, 1:41 PM
Black and White: Charles Murray and Baratunde Thurston Quiz Each Other
By GREGORY COWLES
Charles Murray’s book “Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010” about the class divide in white America, hits The New York Times hardcover nonfiction best-seller list at No. 9 this week. Mr. Murray — whose previous book, “The Bell Curve,” spent 15 weeks on the list in 1994-95 — devotes a chapter in “Coming Apart” to a quiz measuring how much his upper-middle-class readers know about “the rest of America.” (It includes questions about domestic beer, Nascar and “Desperate Housewives.”)
As it happens, Baratunde Thurston’s book “How to Be Black,” at No. 24 on the e-book nonfiction best-seller list (and No. 21 on the extended hardcover list), also features a set of questions about cultural identity, including “Where did you get that name?” and “How black are you?”
In the spirit of journalistic mischief, Cowles invited Mr. Murray to answer Mr. Thurston’s questions and vice versa, letting Mr. Murray substitute “white” for “black” where appropriate.
Now, I'm not going to print the interviews on this page but you can see them here.
What I am going to do is to print the interview questions here and you can answer them for your selves. I'm sure that's what you wanted to do anyway.
Thurston's Questions For Murray (White People or 1%'ers)
Q.Where did you get that name? A.
Q.When did you first realize you were white? A.
Q.How white are you? A.
Q.Do you know what an Oreo is? A.
Q.Have you ever wanted to not be white? A
Q.Can you swim? A.
Q.How’s that postracial thing working out for ya? A..
Murrays's Questions for Thurston (Black People or Working Class Whites)
Q. Have you ever lived for at least a year in an American neighborhood in which the majority of your 50 nearest neighbors probably did not have college degrees? A.
Q.Did you grow up in a family in which the chief breadwinner was not in a managerial job or a high-prestige profession (defined as attorney, physician, dentist, architect, engineer, scientist or college professor)? A..
Q.Have you ever lived for at least a year in an American community under 50,000 population that is not part of a metropolitan area and was not where your college was located? A.
Q.Have you ever lived for at least a year in the United States at a family income that was close to or below the poverty line? A.
Q.Have you ever walked on a factory floor? A.
Q.Have you ever held a job that caused something to hurt at the end of the day? A.
Q.Have you ever had a close friend who was an evangelical Christian? A.
Q.Do you now have a close friend with whom you have strong and wide-ranging political disagreements? A.
Q.Have you ever had a close friend who could seldom get better than Cs in high school even if he or she tried hard? A.
Q.During the last month, have you voluntarily hung out with people who were smoking cigarettes? A.
Q.What military ranks do these five insignia represent? A.
Q.Choose one. Who is Jimmie Johnson? Or: Have you ever purchased Avon products? A.
Q.Have you or your spouse ever bought a pickup truck? A.
Q.During the last year, have you ever purchased domestic mass-market beer to stock your own fridge? A
Q.During the last five years, have you or your spouse gone fishing? A.
Q.How many times in the last year have you eaten at one of the following restaurant chains? Applebee’s, Waffle House, Denny’s, IHOP, Chili’s, Outback Steakhouse, Ruby Tuesday, T.G.I. Friday’s, Ponderosa Steakhouse. A.
Q.In secondary school, did you letter in anything? A.
Q.Have you ever attended a meeting of a Kiwanis Club or Rotary Club, or a meeting at a union local? A.
Q.Have you ever participated in a parade not involving global warming, a war protest, or gay rights? A.
Q.Since leaving school, have you ever worn a uniform? A.
Q.Have you ever ridden on a long-distance bus (e.g., Greyhound, Trailways) or hitchhiked for a trip of 50 miles or more? A.
Q.Which of the following movies have you seen (at a theater or on a DVD)? “Iron Man 2,” “Inception,” “Despicable Me,” “Tron Legacy,” “True Grit,” “Clash of the Titans,” “Grown Ups,” “Little Fockers,” “The King’s Speech,” “Shutter Island.” A.
Q.During the 2009–10 television season, how many of the following series did you watch regularly? “American Idol,” “Undercover Boss,” “The Big Bang Theory,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Lost,” “House,” “Desperate Housewives,” “Two and a Half Men,” “The Office,” “Survivor.” A.
Q.Have you ever watched an Oprah, Dr. Phil, or Judge Judy show all the way through? A.
Q.What does the word Branson mean to you? A.
As you can tell, this is done in fun. Murray's questions are some of ones he actually uses in his reseach. I've left the answer key out but you can get a sense of where they both are going with it. Go and read their answers. Murray, in his responses, comes across as very human, funny and complex, more then I would have thought. Not that Thurston doesn't but that's his job.
In an sobering, gritty personal witness, NYT columnist Paige Bradley Frost, writes in a piece published today, Whitney Houston, My Mother and Addiction, about the devastation of addiction on women across the world.
Some facts:
- there are more than 79,000 deaths attributable to excessive alcohol consumption per year in the U.S. alone each year
- alcohol abuse is now the 3rd leading cause of death and disability in the world
- alcohol abuse in women leades to higher rates of breast cancer, weakens the heart, reduces brain function and ultimately destroys organs
We live in a culture that glamorizes "partying", cocktail hours and associates alcohol with independence and success particularly in young women. Groups, like "Girls Gone Wild" and programs like "Jersey Shore" are classic examples of this cultural trap. But as Frost points out, "There is nothing glamorous about it".
And it is often the children who are left in the wreakage, confused and overwhelmed.
"Alcohol and drug addiction are deadly diseases with the power to destroy relationships, families, and lives", she writes and our denial prevents addicts, particularly women, from seeking the help they need.
The Houston version of the song, "I Will Always Love You", now has a special meaning for us all, especially her young children. I hope she has found some peace and that we can use her death as a call for continued treatment and reform in addiction care.
I've been watching with some interest the reaction of critics to a new book by social scientist Charles Murray, Coming Apart: the State of White America, 1960-2010. I haven't read the book yet since it was just published about ten days but I will probably read it in the next month. This is a huge compliment, which means it has been bumped up through a tall pile of very good books I am slowing plowing through.
What is the big deal about this book?
First, Murray (born 1943), is an Americanlibertarianpolitical scientist, author,columnist, and pundit currently working as a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservativethink tank in Washington, DC. He is best known for his controversial book The Bell Curve, co-authored with the late Richard Herrnstein in 1994, which argued that intelligence plays a central role in American society. They proposed in the book that intelligence is a better predictor of many factors including financial income, job performance, unwed pregnancy, and crime than one's parents' socio-economic status or education level. Also, the book argued that those with high intelligence (the "cognitive elite") are becoming separated from the general population of those with average and below-average intelligence, and that this was a dangerous social trend. Murray's ideas were roundly criticized by liberals, in particular, as racist and simplistic.
Second, the new book addresses the issue of class in America at a time when many people, especially Republicans, have been claiming that raising the issue of "class" is a liberal divisive political strategy. And now we have a conservative Republican, devoting 400 pages to the subject.
As you might expect, writers have been all across the political contimuum in their responses. Charles Brooks, columnist for the NYT said, "I'll be surprised if there is another book this year that so compellingly describes the most important trends in American society''. While Brooks is not a commentator I am particular fond of, I suspect he may be right on this.
It seams that Murray's basic premise is that the "white working class is no longer a part of a virtuour silent majority; it has become increasingly alienated from the "founding virtues" of American civic life." He goes on to say, "our nation is coming apart at the seams, not ethnic seams, but the seams of class."
My first response is that finally we can begin to talk about the state of the American family again without being politically incorrect.
This seems to be primarily a book of scholarship, not politics. Murray has approached the topic as a work of scholarship, full of charts, footnotes and regression analyses. He uses the data to create an imaginary white world of two classes, the new upper class, "Belmont" and a new lower class, "Fishtown". And what he sees for America in the new, emerging social construct should make us all shiver. The two worlds are so vastly different in so many ways, includeing income, illegitimacy rates, crime, and joblessness, with Fishtown slowly sinking. What are we going to do about it?
The controversy seems essentially to be found in the response to Murray's description of this sad, new American world, and along the classic political lines. Murray makes suggestions for change in the last chapter of the book and these are being roundly challenged. Good. It sounds like a conversation is breaking out. I hope that this book stimulate a huge, non-political conversation.
As a psychotherapist whose early training was in family systems, I have for years been concerned about many of these same issues, and the slow decline of the quality of life in working class communities has troubled me. As health care availability has eroded for the working poor, fewer and fewer services have been utilized by them and the help necessary for them to challenge the trends being reported here were/are missing. If we are looking at real solutions to some of these issues, adequate, affordable health care is imperative.
Andre Dubus III: Townie: A Memoir Growing up blue collar in old mill towns in N.E. and under the shadow of a famous father, this painful story of how a young man deals with the violence in his life and with his father is searing.
Witness.org "Witness" uses video to open the eyes of the world to human rights violations. See it, Film it, Change it
GoodGuide | Find safe, healthy, and green products You want non-toxic, environmentally friendly products from companies with good social and safety records. GoodGuide rates over 65,000 products based on these factors.
AtGoogleTalks ... is a series of on-going presentations by invited speakers, sponsored by Google and given at various Google offices throughout the world. The series has other feature categories such as Authors@Google, Candidates@Google, Women@Google, Green@google.
Hulu - Documentaries A link to the documentaries available through Hulu, a free on-line media source of various ( major independent film and television) types of documentaries that you can watch at home on your computer.
This American Life: Inside Job This American Life is a weekly hour-long radio program produced by Chicago Public Radio and hosted by Ira Glass. Primarily a journalistic non-fiction program, it has also featured essays, memoirs, field recordings, short fiction, and found footage.
Authors@Google The Authors@Google program brings authors of all stripes to Google for informal talks centering on their recently published books.
TED: Ideas worth spreading TED was founded in 1984 as a one-off event, and the conference was held annually from 1990. TED's early emphasis, consistent with a Silicon Valley center of gravity, was largely technology and design, but as popularity of the talks spread, so has the range of subject matter, to cover almost all aspects of science and culture. Those who have given TED talks include Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Gordon Brown, Richard Dawkins, Bill Gates, the founders of Google, the evangelist Billy Graham and various Nobel Prize winners.
