the times they are a-changin'

Cue Bob Dylan. If the times are not changing, at least the weather is.

I have spent the last few days writing about the hubris of a certain New York politician -- who just as easily could be an Idaho politician -- or a star athlete. And I think I am getting my own payback -- even if it is in small change.

I have been bragging about our early spring this year. The font is barely off the tips of my fingers, and we are holding an open casting for a remake of Genesis 7. I started to draft a posting earlier today, but out on the lawn there arose such a clatter that I suspected Saint Nick and 200 reindeer were falling out of the sky. But it was just hail. Not your South Dakota I-will-never-recognize-my-pickup type of hail. Just good old pelt-the-daffodils-to-the-ground hail. And then a surge of rain water. Winter - 100; spring - 2.

The picture I posted at the top was meant to give a little impression of how wet we were this evening. But it looks more like an advertisement for the wet brick look.

But there it is again: that symbolic fork in the road. I spent part of the evening looking at long-term rentals for next year. It seems a long way off, but my trip south is going to be here in a mere 11 or 12 months.

As I look out my window watching the now-soft drizzle falling on the hot tub, I can imagine that this may be where I will be living in less than a year:

Or this:

my own private Oregon

Mother Nature is in full labor in the Willamette Valley. Daylight savings time. Sunny days. Short sleeves. The perfume of daphne (the flower, not the deceased author). What more could a boy and his dog ask for?

We Oregonians are accustomed to the false spring of mid-February. One of those little tricks that the weather plays on us every year. The drizzle stops and the sun makes a Norma Desmond entrance -- for a day or two.

We lack groundhogs. Perhaps an opossum noses around in the daylight and is frightened of his shadow. In any event, our day of delight quickly turns into a Cruise-with-Noah marathon. Eventually, the clouds part and the rain stops -- and we have the type of summers others lie about. I would take a summer in Oregon over any other place.

But this year, we have been literally luxuriating in what appears to be a true spring in March.

During the past week, I have taken a series of pictures to illustrate the walk that Jiggs and I usually take. Michael Dickson has posted a similar series of his walk routine in Michoacan -- to great effect. I will do that -- soon.

But right now, I just wanted to share a few of the vignettes that have brought pure joy to me -- and The Professor.

bases loaded

Over the weekend, I finally finished Morton Keller's most recent book, Three Regimes: A New Political History. The book has several virtues, but I would recommend it because Professor Keller presents a novel look at our current political situation in America.

My friends on the right are frustrated because government power seems to grow no matter who is in control. My friends on the left are equally frustrated because government is not tackling the real issues that hamper social progress.

Professor Keller does not pretend to have solutions to those questions. He merely provides the tools to analyze the questions. And his approach is certainly unique.

Almost all historians pick an era and slap a label on it. We are thus left with a list of slogans -- and very little analysis to help us apply historical lessons: the Federalist era, the Republican era, the age of Jackson, the Jazz age, the era of good feeling.

Professor Keller tries something new. He divides the American epoch into three periods: (1) the post-colonial deferential-republican regime from 1789 through 1830, (2) the party-democratic regime that began in 1830 with the Jackson Administration and continued until the Great Depression in 1933, and (3) the populist-bureaucratic regime from 1933 through the present.

The constitution has set the pattern in each of the three regimes. The built-in tension between the three branches of government, between the states and the federal government, and government (in general) and the people gave each regime its own character.

Even though the founders claimed they did not support the formation of political parties, the electoral system in the constitution inevitably caused the creation of parties. The early years of the republic saw far more tension between the Supreme Court and the other branches of government because the court was the only institution that was not controlled by the Jeffersonian republicans.

Parties came into their own with the election of President Jackson and the inevitable Civil War following Lincoln's election. Up until the Great Depression, limited government was the general goal of both parties -- even though they each strove to reward their voters and friends. The only exception was the Wilson presidency when the federal government took on additional powers in World War One.

That model arose again in the depression when the limited government model was abandoned in favor of turning over many economic and civil liberties to the national government. That model, of course, carried through the Second World War, Korea, and the Cold War, until today. Populism became the basic political style.

Professor Keller devotes half of the book to the third regime: the one in which we now live. He begins by noting that prior to 1930, our political institutions focused primarily on constraining the power of government; during the 1930s, the public began asking the question that John Adams dreaded: How can the majority use the power of government to serve them and their friends -- at the expense of the minority? Congress became an institution to redistribute money and goods, rather than merely a body to protect individuals in pursuing their own dreams. Similarly, the court system went from telling the government what it cannot do to telling society what it must do.

The book provides a very interesting perspective. I had to to step back from our partisan populism and take a look at our current political situation within its historical context. My limited government Republican friends long for an era that has, most likely, disappeared. My liberal Democrat friends rail against loss of liberties that were eroded long ago. They both see the advantages of a mobilized government for their respective policies, but they both worry that the system cannot (or will not) be controlled.

The hope that Professor Keller offers is that the system itself is resilient. It has survived over 200 years of crises. It will stand.

mental sabbatical

It appears that my mind took a vacation from the Mexico project. Last week was extremely hectic at my job. In addition to our regular duties, the section I work with (three of us) were assigned the job of reviewing all contracts for content and style. That task added about 30% to our workload and dominated all of our week last week. The goal is great. We just need time to work out the process.

As a result. I did not get much else done. I completed my read of Morton Keller's Three Regimes: A New Political History. I will post a review within the next few days.

I also started a serious sorting of my possessions. Getting rid of things is not going to be a problem. I considered following Nancy's (Countdown to Mexico) model of garage sales and e-bay listings, but I do not have the patience for that. If I cannot give something to family or friends, it will go to the Salvation Army. At the rate I am sorting, I should be just about done by the time April 2009 rolls around.

On Friday I ran across another interesting piece of real estate. (See the picture at the top of the posting.) This one is in Boca de Iguanas -- on the Pacific coast just north of La Manzanilla. Even though I have decided that I would like to rent for at least a minimum of 6 months before I buy any real estate, it certainly is an interesting-looking place. But the price is a bit high for what I want.

Maybe I can get to a regular pattern of posting -- though that sees unlikely: the cruise from Brazil to Portugal is almost upon me.

mothers and burrs

"It's better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money."
~ P.J. O'Rourke

Mothers and dogs. Well, at least, my Mom and my dog.

My brother and I finally had a serious conversation about how we can help Mom to make the decisions she needs to make about: 1) whether to keep running her real estate business; 2) where she should live; and 3) how she will handle her financial needs. Following the advice of several of you, we are going to leave the decisions to her. We will be there merely to help facilitate the decisions -- and to put more cash on the table.

All of this will happen when she returns from Mexico. She swings back and forth from loving Mexico to fearing Mexico. I doubt she would ever feel comfortable living there full time.

I thought I was going to have a bad news report concerning the dog. When I came home from work tonight, Jiggs had trouble supporting himself on his rear left leg. I was positive that the nerve in that leg had been entrapped in his damaged vertebrae. It was almost as if he could not tell if his foot was touching the ground.

We started on a walk, but he fell several times. So I took him back to the house where he started licking his leg. Then I noticed the problem on the carpet: a sweetgum seed pod. Apparently, it was stuck in his paw, but he managed to pull it loose.

And there is the lesson. I have pulled seed pods out of his paws many times over the past 12 years. His actions were always the same as they were tonight. But I have allowed my worries about his declining health to blind me to a reality I need to learn again and again: stop worrying that the worst will happen; life is far more mundane than that. That is true for both Mom and Jiggs. The relationship matters. All the other issues will resolve themselves -- with a helping hand to remove the burrs.

the lanyard -- another billy collins poem

About two months ago, I started working on something special to say about my mother at her 80th birthday party.

I tried several toasts, but they were either the epitome of rank sentimentality (think of Hallmark on steroids) or starkly clinical (not unlike those introductions that begin: "a woman, who needs no introduction" -- and then turn into eternal ramblings).

I then tried some poems, but each was worse than the one that went before. I ended up without enough wadded paper to fill a full complement of gift bags at a Kennedy baby shower.

And then it hit me. No one can combine good writing with universal truth better than my favorite poet: Billy Collins. I read the following poem to my Sunday school class for mother's day. And I pressed it into service Friday night at my mother's birthday. Do I need to add that nothing I wrote would have been appreciated as much as --

The Lanyard

The other day I was ricocheting slowly

off the blue walls of this room,

moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,

from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,

when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary

where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist

could send one into the past more suddenly—

a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp

by a deep Adirondack lake

learning how to braid long thin plastic strips

into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard

or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,

but that did not keep me from crossing

strand over strand again and again

until I had made a boxy

red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,

and I gave her a lanyard.

She nursed me in many a sick room,

lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,

laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,

and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,

and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.

Here are thousands of meals, she said,

and here is clothing and a good education.

And here is your lanyard, I replied,

which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,

strong legs, bones and teeth,

and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,

and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.

And here, I wish to say to her now,

is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,

but the rueful admission that when she took

the two-tone lanyard from my hand,

I was as sure as a boy could be

that this useless, worthless thing I wove

out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

~ Billy Collins

blazers 119, lakers 111

The Cotton family eccentric holiday weekend is drawing to a close.

On Friday, we had dinner at Huber's in Portland (noted for its fantastic turkey dinners) to celebrate my mother's 80th birthday. Apparently, I have been living in a cave (probably populated solely by aging males) because I was totally unaware that big birthdays call for big events -- where halls are rented, calves are fattened and slaughtered, and walls are festooned with pictures that would be at home in a celebrity's biography. In other words, celebrating a birthday should have the annoyance factor of a modern wedding.

Instead, I opted for a family dinner where we could actually talk to one another without needing to put on a performance. (OK. I put on a performance, but it was for 8 other people. There are some personality traits tat seem to be out of my control.)

The list was short: my mother, her best friend, my brother, his wife, his daughter, his son and wife (plus their 3-month old baby), and me. It was an evening of flowers, cards, and small gifts. And great conversation.

At one point, Mom left the table. When she did not return for about 15 minutes, we started to get worried. We found her watching the basketball game cheering on her Blazers. Apparently, pro basketball players have more magic than the rest of us.

This morning I drove back to Portland to celebrate Christmas in March with nearly the same cast of characters (minus the baby and his mother). We have had a rule for several years now that gifts are forbidden at Christmas. My mother has never followed the rule. As a result, I left with my swag in tow -- four high-quality pans just right for the trip to Mexico, two new shirts, a book, a Starbucks card, a puzzle mouse pad, and something else that slips my mind. But it was the fellowship that made the day.

Mom and Ruth (her friend) leave for a week in Mazatlán on Monday. I should personally warn Nancy that the two of them are invading her new home town.

You will note two items are missing. First, my brother and I were unable to arrange a time to fly to Mexico together. I may need to take a trip down in May on my own. Second, we did not have the opportunity to talk with Mom about what she is going to do when she winds down her real estate business. That will have to wait until she returns from Mazatlán.