Showing posts with label Russia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Russia. Show all posts

Friday, January 6, 2017

Wordplay Says "Auld Lang Syne"

When I started this blog in January 2010, I was beginning my dissertation, so Wordplay was one of two creative ventures occupying my thoughts. I saw it as a sort of journal accompanying my dissertation research and writing; sometimes I worked out my thoughts in the blog and later went back to see what I had written once I was deeper into the research. Besides that, though, it was a way to put into practice what I'd been taught--how to look at the world through a mythic lens. I was very excited about it then and still am. When I talked to people about depth psychology and mythology, it usually seemed to strike some kind of a chord, and I felt a wider audience might also be receptive . . . so that's how Wordplay came about. I was having fun with what I was doing and thought I'd have even more fun writing about it.

At some point, I wrote a description of the blog that included a lot of the "descriptors" or buzz words that I thought would help people find it, but when I read that summary now (whether or not it helps in search results) it seems too wordy. If you were to ask me now, I'd just tell you that, pure and simple, this is a blog about the mythology of everyday life. The idea that ordinary life, and not just the doings of legendary figures from the distant past, is the material of mythology was one of the most exciting ideas I ever came across, and I think other people have also found that to be true.

Reading mythic texts from various traditions with a depth psychological eye was one thing; we spent a lot of time on this in my program, and it was a transformative experience. Learning how to look at the present-day world to see the myths and archetypes underlying current events was something else, at least for me. With an English degree in my background, I'm used to analyzing literary texts and can talk about the archetypes of any given book or film with a fair degree of comfort. But it seemed to me that for a degree in myth studies to be useful, it would have to encompass more than academic and literary subjects: it would have to provide insight into the world we live in.

The concept of reading events for meaning the same way one reads a literary text takes great skill, in my opinion, and subtlety--a certain amount of fearlessness doesn't hurt either. After all, real life moves and flows and doesn't stay still; it's not fixed on a page. There is no way to "prove" that one's reading of a particular event or phenomenon is "the" correct one, and chances are there are other ways of looking at the same event that are just as useful. We learned the term mythopoesis in my program, which to me means looking at the world the same way you look at a poem. In other words, you're alive to not only what's in front of you, the actual "words on the page," but also the implications of the words, the story that unfolds in between, beneath, and around them. This requires intuition and understanding; knowing what's there is only the first step.

Reading the world mythopoetically is complicated by the fact that, based on my experience anyway, it's often hard to know what the facts are. On any given day, I can read the news and think, "Hmmm, is that what really happened, or is that just what someone said happened?" It's much easier to read events when you know what they are, which may sound like a truism, but as recent events on the U.S. political scene have shown us, basic facts are often in dispute. Much of the news is colored by assumptions and written from a certain point of view. I'm firmly in favor of people expressing their opinions, but first I want to know what the facts are so that I can form my own opinion.

That brings me to an unexpected role I sometimes find myself playing on this blog, the role of mythojournalist. This happened because I often searched in vain for news sources that seemed to dig deep enough and connect the dots between events. Sometimes the what would be there but not the why; often, even the what would be hard to discern in a sea of opinion and misinformation. If an event left me scratching my head, I tried to understand the implications behind it. I certainly never pictured myself as a crusading journalist (book reviews and a little humor are more in my line), but my forays into mythojournalism were born of frustration. I often felt something was missing in other people's reporting, and I tried to fill in the gaps. After all, politics, business, and world affairs are a part of everyday life, too.

And speaking of trying to read events, I feel that our nation, and perhaps the world, is actually in a bit of a precarious position at the moment. I had hoped that when the election was over, things would seem calmer, but that hasn't happened. There's a lot of name-calling and saber-rattling and plenty of people ready to point the finger at anyone but themselves, and if you want me to say what I think the problem is, I'll give you my opinion: I think our nation has a deep unwillingness to look at its own shadow. This translates into: "We are pure; it's other people who have problems."

We seem to be sliding by degrees closer and closer back to a Cold War, which I don't suppose anyone views as desirable. I'm an American, and I support the Constitution, but still I find myself wondering: what's behind all the hostility between Russia and the United States? Is it barely possible that Russia has some legitimate concerns, too, as I have heard one or two American officials suggest? Does it really have to be "us or them"? I don't know who hacked the DNC, and I sincerely hope we find out, but even the facts of the who, what, when, where, and why seem to be in dispute. There are plenty of opinions being expressed, though, and since most of us have been taught to fear Russia, there seems to be a lack of balance to some of the coverage. I'm not saying that allegations of hacking and interference shouldn't be taken seriously; I'd merely like a little more light and less heat.

I will tell you that long ago, when I worked for a newspaper, I was assigned to write a Newspaper in Education supplement on Russia. This was right after the fall of the Soviet Union, and the supplement was meant to give students some background on Russian history. I didn't know much about Russia before I started, and as the country has over a thousand years of history, I feel that what I did merely scratched the surface--but I did come away from the project with a sense of respect for the Russian people, who have survived many difficult periods and apparently have great resiliency. It's a huge country, with many borders to defend, just like the United States. I am neither defending nor condemning Russia, but I am wondering what their point of view is in all the recent fracas. And I'm still not entirely sure I understand what happened in Ukraine.

Once you start looking at the world mythopoetically, your capacity to see things from more than one point of view increases, which I hope is a good thing and not a bad thing. Being understanding of someone else's viewpoint should tend to increase the chances of solving conflicts, not make things worse, according to my understanding of conflict resolution. I'm sincerely hoping there's a willingness on all sides to be honest and open about the real issues, as it seems to me that the world is much too small for this kind of conflict to be a good thing.

Well, six years of Wordplay, and there's much more to come, I hope. Perhaps someday soon I'll be able to get back to more lighthearted subjects, though I reserve the right to speak up on any subject if I feel the need. One thing I can tell you for sure is that Joseph Campbell was right: mythology is a call to adventure, though as is the usual way of things, the adventure may be different from what you imagined it to be. I was a writer without a topic before I started my study of mythology, and that blew my imagination wide open. It also helped me discover some personal qualities I didn't quite know I had. If you're feeling an interest in it yourself, my only caution is to be prepared: once you open your mind, things never quite look the same way again.

Thursday, January 21, 2016

What's With All the Beards?

What passes for a typical day in the life of a blogger/mythologist? You may be wondering, in case reading my blog has ever made you think of trying out the lifestyle for yourself. Just in case, as a public service, I'll share some of my experiences with you so you can decide if it sounds like something you'd ever want to do. (If you do, I'm going to be shocked, but I'll let you make up your own mind.)

Might as well use today as an example. I don't always get online first thing, but today I did, since I had an email to answer and have also been keeping an eye on my wireless connection, which--for reasons the telephone company cannot explain--keeps getting dropped. I was glancing at the Internet news headlines, reading articles here and there, when I saw a Reuters item about the investigation into the death of Alexander Litvinenko, the former KGB officer who became a British citizen and was working with authorities to uncover the activities of the Russian mafia. You may remember that he died in 2006 after drinking tea poisoned with polonium-210, which he said was the work of Russian agents.

In terms of human interest, that story stood out. According to the article, the British government believes his claim was true, that he was in fact murdered, and that Russian authorities are responsible. I got a little lost after that because, even though Britain is acknowledging that this man was murdered in cold blood, there doesn't seem to be any big move to arrest anyone due to the political situation vis-a-vis Syria, the importance of Russia's role there, etc, etc. Russia is making noise about how pushing the matter is going to poison the waters (pun intended, I guess), but if there's such a thing as international law, I don't see how that prevents British authorities from arresting the men they say did it and pursuing justice. That's if they're as committed as they say they are to punishing the guilty. For the sake of argument, let's assume they are.

Well, that's a disturbing story. Actually, it put me in mind of how, a few years ago, I seemed to have all of these Slavic-looking neighbors upstairs. There were two couples, both consisting of a short blonde woman and a tall dark-haired man, and for the longest time I thought there was just one couple, since they were similar in appearance and both had dogs. That was around the time things got kind of weird in and around my building, back in 2010, and I had to go up several times to ask the one couple (who lived above me) to cool it with the excessive noise. Asking did no good, but eventually they left on their own, sometime the following summer.

Going up to complain is how I found out there were actually two couples. Once I was up there talking to the man, and I could see this little blonde chick through the crack in the door, standing behind the man, though she didn't show herself directly. I had seen the other woman in my hallway once, talking to someone on her cell phone about, of all things, 9/11. She had a rather rude and peculiar manner in my brief encounters with her. Actually, she reminded me a lot of--well, I guess I shouldn't mention any names. I'll just say she reminds me of someone connected with the Western branch of my family. They could actually be sisters.

But I'm getting off track a little. Today, after reading the news, eating lunch (a pear salad with yogurt, a hard-boiled egg, cottage cheese), and taking a shower, I got ready to go out. I was dusting off my snow boots--which hadn't seen action since last winter--in the hall and decided to go back in for my lint brush. When I went back out into the hall, there was someone in the vestibule at the other end, knocking and smiling for all she was worth, and gesticulating that she needed to get in. I proceeded to ignore her. Our door is opened by a security code known to all residents, and if she didn't know it, my assumption is she didn't need to be here. (I couldn't tell if she looked Slavic from where I was standing, but heck, who knows who's keeping track of people reading articles about former KGB agents. Ha, ha--just a little humor!)

I wasn't going anywhere unusual today--just Starbucks. We're expecting snow armageddon, or something close to it, and I had decided to go today because the weather is predicted to make travel risky for the next couple of days. Before leaving, I tried the phone company again to let them know that their re-set of my channel hadn't helped my connection, and I was asked if I have a microwave (I don't) and then told that for a fee, I could get additional technical assistance. Huh? You want me to pay extra to get to the bottom of a problem with the service I'm already paying for? I told the service guy, Ron, that that wasn't my idea of a solution. I guess now I'll have to write to someone on top of making the phone calls--but we'll leave that aside for the moment.

I put on my newly brushed boots, bundled up, and went out to meet the cold. The sun tried briefly to come out while I was cleaning the snow from my car, and it wasn't much, but it was nice to see a little brightness. I drove to Starbucks on streets that were pretty clear but kind of dirty, especially near campus, and had to detour around a traffic jam on Euclid Avenue. Starbucks was less crowded than usual (I was surprised, as it seemed like the kind of winter afternoon tailor-made for a long coffee break) but no complaints about that from me.

I do have to observe that, as is often the case, there were a number of what I call "characters" hanging around. As much as you might want to sit with normal people and just enjoy a simple cup of coffee, the atmosphere there often goes against it. I jokingly refer to the place as the CIA Starbucks (inspired by an article I read about an actual Starbucks in the DC area)--and there certainly is a markedly international flavor to the place.

Hey, I'm not there to make any political statements; I usually just opt for any open seat. Today, I had the misfortune to sit near someone, who, I don't know, struck me as a little out of place, but what do I know? I hadn't been there long, sipping my coffee and looking out the window, when he tried to get my attention. I tried to ignore him, but he persisted, and when I finally looked at him, he said, "Is my music too loud?" (What music?) I pointed to my ear warmers, which I hadn't taken off, and said, "I can't hear anything." I thought of pointing out to him the illogic of asking someone who's obviously not responding to you whether or not you're bothering them, but in the interest of not prolonging the interaction, I decided not to.

So I read a little, watched the world go by, drank my coffee (which I trust was polonium-free), and enjoyed, so far as possible, a little fresh air in the hope of warding off any cabin fever that might ensue over the next couple of days. After that, I came home, fixed dinner (a scrambled-egg panini), and jumped online to check my connection (still not working properly). The rest of the evening will consist of: proofreading my blog, washing the dishes, fixing a cup of tea, and possibly watching a few more sessions of The Fall of the Pagans, the latest Teaching Company course I've been enjoying, before going to bed.

So, a day in the life of a blogger. Not my ideal life (far from it, actually), but I try to record things as they are, not as I wish they were. If you've been eaten up with envy, thinking, "Wow, I wish I could be just like Wordplay--she must have it made!" maybe this will serve as a reality check. I count my pennies and worry about the future. I've always lived a fairly ascetic life, but this is getting into monastic territory. There's very little glamour to it and a lot of aggravation. I enjoy blogging, but it doesn't pay much.

As for the world events mentioned here, I'll point out that I do have an unusually high number of readers in Russia (as I've said before), so I'm not unnaturally taking an interest in them. If I wanted to write a spy thriller in the current climate (I don't want to, but if I did), I might start with the Russian royal family--remember them? The Romanovs. Nicholas and Alexandra were cousins to half the European royals, including George V of England. I learned long ago in World History that they all died, but what if there had been a surviving member somewhere? That would be the stuff of real international intrigue.

Perhaps it's the feeling of living a secluded life that gives me a little sympathy for their final plight. Nicholas was not, apparently, a capable ruler, and as an American, I have no admiration for inherited power. We may not always do well by our leaders, but at least we get a chance periodically to change them and give someone else a try. What makes an accident of birth suitable qualification for leadership? Nothing that I can see. To me, it's a little unseemly for Americans to get too starry-eyed over royalty, when we fought a revolution to get away from all that and to start over with the premise that all men are created equal (glaring failures to put it into practice notwithstanding). Never forget what a quantum leap forward that was. If other countries have a different view of things, that's up to them to work out.

It's probably the fact of all the Russian beards I keep seeing that brings all this to mind, along with those mysterious neighbors of mine and the news in general. The Russian look seems to be very much in vogue these days, and not a day goes by when Russia isn't in the news. I don't write the news, but I do read it. And sometimes I blog about it.