Little bits of beauty

I have a curious hobby.

Well, at least an uncommon one.  I collect old nature field guides.  My somewhat flexible cutoff date is publication before 1950, but I'll make an exception for something really beautiful.  My favorites are the ones with the striking line drawings, woodcuts, or lithographs illustrating the entries:

A page from F. Schuyler Mathews's Field Guide to American Trees and Shrubs (1915)

I'm fortunate to work as a sorter for the largest used book sale in the eastern half of the United States -- we process a half a million books a year -- so I always pick up one or two new ones each time the sale comes around.

Leafing through the pages, for some reason, makes me ridiculously happy.  They're old and beautiful and were created with love and care, and they have that unmistakable smell of old books that is pure magic to us bibliophiles.

It's also an escape from the real world, which seems pretty grim at the moment.  I relate to my friend who posted on social media, "My desire to be well-informed is at odds with my desire to remain sane."  I can only immerse myself in the news for a short time before I saturate, become overwhelmed, and drown in despair at the greed and imbecility of the people we're allowing to steer the course of the entire human race.

But then I retreat into books, and for a little while at least, everything's okay.

It may seem like a cowardly refusal to keep my eyes open -- but merciful heavens, we need things like that.  We need to keep creating, we need artists and musicians and writers and dancers and everyone else who remains determined to continue bringing little bits of beauty into this poor, damaged world.  There's an apocryphal quote, often attributed to Winston Churchill, which (although almost certainly not his words) bears a message we should all take to heart.  The story goes that some military leader or another during World War II was giving Churchill a hard time because he refused to cut governmental financial support for the arts and music.  The general claimed every cent should go to munitions and the war effort.  Churchill responded, "Then what are we fighting for?"

Yeah.  Exactly.  If we creative types stop creating -- become so bogged down by the daily horrors in the news that we put down our pens, brushes, musical instruments, whatever medium we work in -- then the evil men and women who for some reason are trying their best to tear down and trample every good thing in the world will truly have won.

Please.  Don't let your voice be silenced.  Especially not now.  We need to show them that the small joys they disdain add up to something beautiful and immense and unstoppable.  We need to live up to the standard set by Sam Gamgee in The Two Towers:

"It's like the great stories, Mr. Frodo, the ones that really mattered.  Full of darkness and danger they were, and sometimes you didn't want to know the end, because how could the end be happy?  How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad has happened?  But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow.  Even darkness must pass.  A new day will come, and when the sun shines, it'll shine out the clearer.  I know now, folks in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't.  They kept going because they were holding on to something."

"What were they holding on to?" Frodo asked.

"That there's some good in this world, and it's worth fighting for."

It is indeed, Sam.  And it's worth remembering that even little bits of beauty -- flowers in the garden, throwing the ball for your dog, listening to your favorite piece of music, watching the way the wind moves the tree branches, or leafing through the illustrations in an old field guide -- can recharge our souls to continue the fight for another day.

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Interesting times

A few days ago, I started reading Michio Kaku's wonderful book Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize the 21st Century.  The book is fascinating, buoyed up by Kaku's ebullient writing style and endless optimism about our future, touching on the possibilities of artificial intelligence, planet-wide information systems with unfettered access for all, medical advances that could extend (healthy) life span to perhaps twice what it is now, and the ability to harness clean energy sources that are for all intents and purposes inexhaustible.  He suggests that our species, in a time that on the grand scale is a snap of the fingers, will be heading for the stars.

At the same time, here on Earth things are looking pretty awful, as if we'd finally succumbed to the Chinese curse "May you live in interesting times."  Only a few hours ago, we here in the United States had yet another senseless mass shooting, this time an attack on a center for the developmentally disabled in San Bernardino, California.  The attack left fourteen confirmed dead and an equal number injured; the suspects are, at the time of this writing, still at large, and their motives for attacking the center are unknown.  Just a few days ago, an ultrareligious right-winger killed three people and wounded nine at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs.  Many have linked the attack to vitriolic rhetoric from so-called Pro-Lifers like Joshua Feuerstein, who has suggested that doctors who perform abortions deserve to be murdered.  We have one presidential candidate who has openly praised noted conspiracy theorist loon Alex Jones; another claimed yesterday that "the majority of violent criminals are Democrats."  Further afield, the UK Parliament has given the go-ahead for bombing Syria, ISIS has murdered a Russian captive in retaliation for air strikes against ISIS-held areas, our "allies" in Saudi Arabia are very likely in the next few days to behead Ali Al-Nimr, a protestor who was arrested when he was only 17, and in general the world just seems to be a fucked-up morass of misery, hatred, horror, and death.

I'm an optimistic guy, for the most part.  I have always been firmly convinced that most people, most of the time, are doing their level best to act morally and responsibly.  I've also been a strong believer in the idea that you don't have to agree with someone in order to get along with them.  I've had more than one cheerful pint of beer with a friend whose political views are (to say the least) opposite to mine.  I'm a staunch atheist, but have dear friends who are Jews, Christians, Buddhists, and Wiccans. (I'm not leaving out Muslims deliberately; I just don't happen to be close pals with any.)

But in the current atmosphere, when the tenor of the news seems to be paralleling the diminishment of the light as we approach the winter solstice, it's hard to keep those ideals in mind.  It becomes increasingly easy to give in to despair, to decide that humanity isn't really worth saving, that any good we do is outweighed by the tremendous evils that we visit on each other for reasons of religion, race, belief, and sometimes for no reason at all.

Still, we do some beautiful things sometimes.  Billionaire Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has pledged 99% of his share revenues to charities connected with personalized learning, curing diseases, connecting people and community building.  The Planned Parenthood clinic that was attacked has been the focus of two separate fundraising drives, one through GoFundMe and the other through YouCaring.

But I keep coming back to the heartache of why we, here in the 21st century, are still having to face people being murdered for wanting control of their own bodies, for wanting to be able to speak freely and criticize their governments, for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.  It's so far from Kaku's idyllic space-age wonderland that I find myself wondering if the human race will survive long enough to meet even one of his high-flown predictions.

I think the solution lies with the like-minded sticking together, and telling each other that there are still good people in the world, that we will make it through these dark times.  That the days will lengthen, winter will warm into spring, and (perhaps even!) the news will one day be dominated by positive stories.  We have to remain optimistic; if we don't, if the good people of the world give up and succumb to despair, then the evil really will have won.

[image courtesy of NASA]

I will leave you with a poem that I first discovered when I was 13 years old.  I still can't read it without choking up; not too long ago I tried to read it out loud to my son when he was going through a rough patch, and we both ended up bawling.  I think it's more relevant now than when it was written by Max Ehrmann, almost a hundred years ago.

Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be critical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings;
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be careful. Strive to be happy.