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Hey, Kiddo

18 Dec 2020 by KRAG

I get annoyed when people mispronounce their own surnames.

Growing up with a last name like mine—a name that somehow survived intact its journey through Ellis Island’s patented Name Mangler—meant that I had ample opportunity to correct the spelling and pronunciation of others who, it seemed, were determined to succeed where Ellis Island failed.

Giambastiani starts with a soft “g” and has a wave-like rhythm: JYAHM-bas-TYAH-nee.

Not “guy-am-bass-tee-ANN-ee.” Not “guy-am-baa-STEE-nee.” And certainly not “Sebastiani.”

Nor is my name John Bastiani.

(And do NOT get me started on the written permutations I’ve received over the years.)

So, when friends of mine would give their own surnames an inaccurate pronunciation, I used to get a bit pedantic.

Like Lisa Yakubowski, whose family (at some point) decided that “yah-koo-BOV-ski” should be said “ya-ka-BOW-ski” where the “BOW” rhymes with “COW.”

Or Bob Boccaccio, namesakes of the great 14th century Italian writer, whose family inexplicably swapped the pronunciation of the c’s from “bo-CA-chyo” to [shudder] “buh-CHYA-ko.” Why, oh, why?

I’d try to show these folks the error of their ways, saying, “Hey, kiddo, you’re obviously ignorant of the proper way to pronounce your own last name,” which I’d follow with a remedial lesson on how it should be pronounced.

This rarely went well.

Correction: This never went well.

Because a person’s name is their name to say as they wish, and no one dubbed me (or anyone) the arbitrator of surname pronunciation.

I eventually learned this lesson, and though I continually cringe at the way newscasters butcher any Russian patronymic (especially the feminine forms), most of my complaints remain unaired. By way of example, consider this: Prima ballerina Natalia Makarova was famous for lecturing on the pronunciation of her surname, because Ms. “ma-KAH-ro-va” heartily disliked being called Ms. “MA-ka-RO-va,” as the latter pronunciation sounds like the Russian equivalent of “my cow.”

But that battle was for Ms. Makarova to fight, not me, and if she wanted it to be pronounced in a different way, that was her right and her choice. If she wanted us to pronounce Makarova as “Marky-Mark,” that’s how we would have said it.

It’s the same as with a person who, after years of study, earned a non-medical doctorate. If that person wanted to use the title “Doctor,” there’s no reason for us to question or deny this.

Even if the title wasn’t earned (e.g., Colonel Sanders), people with manners will use the title if the individual prefers it so.

A person gets to choose their name, their pronouns, and their titles, whether earned through toil, bestowed as an honor, or made up out of whole cloth. It is their identity, and their choice, and while we might have opinions about the validity and necessity of those choices, it is simply common courtesy to acknowledge the choice and use the names, pronouns, and titles that they choose for themselves.

And that, kiddo, is all I have to say on the matter.

k

Posted in Culture | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments »

Make It Stop

10 Dec 2020 by KRAG

It’s one thing for my rabid right-wing-nutter Uncle Earl to run about in his tin-foil hat and go on and on about stolen elections and massive fraud at the polls. It’s entirely another thing when elected officials do the same. Crazy Uncle Earl didn’t take an oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution. Elected officials did. 

If, at this point, they do not admit that Biden won the election, then they must believe that:

  • all the federal judges and Supreme Court justices (including Republican/Trump appointees) who have dismissed the fifty-odd (and counting) lawsuits filed, are lying to us
    • and
  • all the state elections boards, secretaries of state, and governors (including Republicans) who have certified Biden’s win in their elections, are lying to us
    • and
  • the complete lack of credible evidence is irrelevant to the process of determining fact from fiction
    • and
  • thousands upon thousands of people across fifty states, people who have worked for decades in jobs and processes that, in 2016, delivered Donald Trump the presidency, have all suddenly, secretly, and without evidence of collusion or conspiratorial intent, decided to cooperate in such a way as to deny that same Donald Trump a second term, and have done so without a single credible leak, whistle-blower, email, or text (all while delivering many down-ballot offices to the GOP).

In short, they are willing to believe the fabulists who concoct stories that support their fearful wishes, rather than accept the evidence that surrounds them, to wit:

  • a majority of voters who have decried this man’s performance for years simply voted against him,
    • and
  • the explanations as to how “day of” and “mail-in” ballots differ demographically are uncomplicated, unsurprising, and totally predictable,
    • and
  • multiple recounts and investigations and audits and canvasses have consistently shown the reported results are accurate.

The behavior we’re seeing from these elected officials:

  • is a disgrace to their oath, their office, and their country
  • is a blatant accession to the current administration’s worst autocratic impulses
  • is damaging to our institutions, our democracy, and our national security
  • is emboldening an indoctrinated and violence-prone faction within our populace, encouraging this faction to act out, terrorize, and even hurt people they see as “the enemy” 

This should hang around these politicians’ necks like a dead albatross.

But I’m sure we’ll forget all about it.

This is why we can’t have nice things.

k

Posted in Politics | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Firefly: Generations – Book Review

18 Nov 2020 by KRAG

As I mentioned a while ago, my mind is once again calm enough to allow me the enjoyment of reading fiction. In fact, I’ve read four novels in the past few weeks, which is about three more than I read in all of 2019.

Seriously. It was that bad.

The first books had been in my TBR pile for a while, but this latest one was a recent arrival, and it was a serious break from the “literary” works I’ve been reading. Written by Tim Lebbon, Generations is not only science fiction, but (gasp!) a television “tie-in” novel, the fourth novel set in the Firefly ‘verse.

The previous titles in this series, all written by a different author, were (to put it mildly) a tremendous disappointment. I reviewed the first two (here and here), but frankly, I didn’t see the point in bothering you with a review of the third one, so I read it and tossed it aside.

Seriously, they were that bad. Continue Reading »

Posted in Books, Writing | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments »

One For the Box

12 Nov 2020 by KRAG

In my house there are four boxes.

Four special boxes.

First, there is the God Box, a small cardboard box covered with embossed white paper. It contains the prayers my step-mother wrote to her deity during the last years of her life. It’s a difficult box to visit.

Then there is the Poem Box. It’s flat, the size of a billfold, and it contains the poems my father wrote after my stepmother died. It, too, is a difficult box, filled with despair and dark thoughts written in days’ early hours as he precessed from a broken future toward his own demise.

Recently, I received an incongruous box. A wooden half-moon with a clasp, japanned and decorated with 19th century-style chrysanthemums, it fits easily in two hands. It is from the estate of my recently deceased brother, and while it is totally not like him in style, its contents—pipes, Malian artifacts, a bracelet of broken silver—most definitely are. But, like the other boxes, visiting this one is also a sad journey.

The fourth box, though, is different. Continue Reading »

Posted in Culture, Politics | Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments »

America Stumbles

05 Nov 2020 by KRAG

As I write this, we are all caught in this liminal condition, this “state between states,” as votes that have been cast continue to be counted. Regardless of which campaign is eventually judged the winner, though, there is a clear loser: America.

Continue Reading »

Posted in Culture, Politics | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Hallowe’en Wedding Bells

31 Oct 2020 by KRAG

Today, I married my sister.

I’ve been to many weddings, a good few more than you, I’d wager. As a musician, I’ve been to scores, suffering through endless repetitions of Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major. As a groomsman, I’ve been to a handful, often a bit green in the gills, sweating vodka and swaying with my fellows in a shared hangover that hung around us like a fog. As a guest, there have been at least a dozen, some where I just sat and enjoyed the spectacle of hope, and others where I read remarks, made a toast, or simply helped with setup and tear-down. My sister and I were in a wedding before—my first—with me as groom and her as bridesmaid. Continue Reading »

Posted in Culture | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments »

Book in Hand

21 Oct 2020 by KRAG

For most of my life, if I was awake, I had a book in my hand.

Riding the bus, walking to school, in the quad between classes, lounging at home, I’d have a book open, thumb in the crease, my nose buried in its leaves. Novels, anthologies, treatises, memoirs, history, science, poetry.

Anything.

Everything.

I read it.

Then, about a dozen years ago, life went off the rails. Book deals dried up. Friends and family began to die (at least ten during this period). We fostered a young woman, giving her a place to live for a year. Work became a stress factory. The economy tanked, causing the Great Recession. Then along came Trump. And then this pandemic.

In response, my reading habits changed, radically. They became constrained, limited to news articles, political analyses, and works of non-fiction. Instead of a dog-eared book, I carried my tablet with its instant-on, 24×7 access to current events and a front-row seat to our increasingly divided society.

Even so, every now and again, I would return to my fiction books, the stacks of TBR novels that inhabit every room in this house. I tried, repeatedly, to read one of them, hungry for that immersive experience, that miraculous wash of words that would sweep away reality and bathe me in the light of a different sun.

But the miracle never came. I didn’t have the patience, lacked the power to focus., and was unable to drive away the here-and-now with worlds of what-if. Book after book I picked up, opened, began, and abandoned within a few days, the only evidence of my attempt, a bookmark left somewhere in the first thirty pages.

With all this as preamble, one might wonder why, during my recent time off, I decided yet again to pick up a novel and give it a try. I mean, there I was in the last month of the most turbulent election cycle of my sixty-plus years, with a pandemic raging beyond my door, a daily gush of political scandals and turmoil filling the airwaves, and everywhere people shouting and crying and grieving and protesting. Was it hope? Obstinacy? Desperation? Whatever compelled me, it was in this moment, amid this maelstrom of chaos, that I chose to try again, and opened up a 150-year-old book.

And I read it. Cover to cover, in record time.

And then . . . I picked up another book, and read it, too.

And now, here I am, wondering what to read next.

. . .

Do yourself a favor.

Turn off the television. Put down the phone. Leave the tablet in the other room.

Pick up a book. A real book. The one you’ve been meaning to read for so long.

Take a seat near the window, where the natural light will be over your shoulder. Settle in, book in hand.

Open it up. Stick your nose in it. Smell it. Feel the pebbled surface of the printed page, the tension of the spine.

Chapter One.

Read. 

I tell you, it’s like coming home.

k

Posted in Books, Low Tech | Tagged , , , , , , | 6 Comments »

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