I have "fallen down on the job" this week - "neglected my duties" "shirked my responsibilities" ..... I was supposed to keep you all entertained while my sister was away.   What can I say - I am a slacker, I have always been a slacker, I will most likely always BE a slacker.

Terri and her family are happily enjoying the attractions of Orlando Florida.  I've spoken with her a few times this week and each time heard stories of "Goofy hats", "virtual reality rides", great places to eat and how wonderful the condo is - one thing I know for sure is that 'Momi is having a good time. 

She sends her affection to all of you and I am sure will be updating like a madwoman when she returns home and sees the pathetic job I have done.

Hope you all have a good weekend -

signed, Fugi

Vacation Lazies -

We arrived at Granddma's house last night about 5:30 - not a moment too soon.  We (meaning Tim and I) were definitely developing an us/them feeling about the people in the back seat.  I packed handheld video games for them.  (We have an old sega gamegear and an old atari lynx.)  What we are missing is HEADPHONES.  499 miles of that plinkety plinkety game music was about to drive us up a wall.  

I don't know how much opportunity I'll have to check in over the next few days, but I will be sneaking peeks as I can and posting updates.  Our vacation package in Orlando includes FREE TICKETS - but nowhere in the literature can we find where it says tickets to what.  So if it turns out that we have free parking . . .  I made the arrangements for this trip almost 18 months back and it's most probable that I just didn't want to commit to which park or attraction we'd prefer that far in advance.  We know when we get to Cocoa Beach we have tickets to the Kennedy Space Center.  I think we could probably winter in South Florida and not see or do everything we want, so I don't imagine we'll squeeze in more than a couple high notes over the next ten days. 

Fugitive has promised not to allow my Xanga blog space to be empty even if I can't check in often.  So I'm kind of looking forward to seeing what "I" might be posting here in the next week.   

**addition 3:15pm **

Sister dear - you sound a bit concerned!!  I have no idea why the thought that I may take free reign of your site while you are away has you the least bit worried.    After all ..... it is only me - you have known me my whole life .... what could there possibly be to be afarid of??? (don't forget - naked slumber party at Terri's place tonight at 9:00!)

signed - Fugi

On the Road Again -

Whooo Hoooooo!  The Traveling Verrette's are on the loose, and not a moment too soon.  We are heading out for Florida!  Our ten day stay in the Sunshine State includes a visit to the Grandparents, the Kennedy Space Center, and Mickey Mouse. 

If you see my band of gypsies rolling down the highway, you'll recognize us by our distinctive touristy look.  We'll be the outlandishly dressed people standing beside the road with the map spread out on the hood arguing about whether we should have take a left or a right in Nashville ("it's a right I tell you!")  My sons will be wearing strait-jackets since I'm pretty sure they are going to violate at least 12 of the "no tolerance" laws we've passed.  ("The next thing that hits the back of my head better be my pillow in the hotel tonight or I'm pulling this car over and you guys are going to finish the trip in the trunk!")  And my spouse will be looking at me with that look over the top of his shades.  ("What possessed you do do the shopping for car snacks at the Russell Stover's Outlet!")

Burden of Truth -

I've written before about the variables that go into deciding whether or not a propostion is true.  I've even written a blog or two on what it means to say that anything is true.  Usually when I talk about truth I'm talking about spiritual, moral, or philosophical Truth.  You know the Truth with the really really big T on the front.

Most of the time we don't deal with Truth, we deal with truth.  Truth with a little t is the value we assign to a proposition we think is likely to be true, so we act as though it's true even though we can't know beyond a shadow of a doubt.  When I was studying business law, my professor explained the difference between Truth, and the two types of legal truth.  Truth happens when you get the ball all the way into the endzone.  (I'm talking American football here.)  You've battled your way through all opposition and the barriers have all dropped behind as you sprint before the cheering crowd, cross the line and spike the ball.

In legal truth, criminal cases, a jury is asked to decide if a defendant is truly guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.  Reasonable doubt means that the prosecutor has moved the ball to the point where the endzone can be seen.  Obstacles remain, there are questions unanswered, but from this position the ball could be kicked between the posts for a fieldgoal.  In civil cases, truth is decided by preponderance of the evidence.  This type of truth is literally decided by which ever side has even the slightest edge at the end of presentation.  If the ball is on the 49 yard line - that's sufficient "proof" to assign guilt and assess penalties.

My sense of justice is frequently offended by the difficulty of obtaining proof beyond a reasonable doubt.  I've watched more than one case in which the prosecutor whould have been able to get a conviction but missed the one critical (to jurors) question that blocked the kick at the last minute.  But, I've also breathed a sigh of relief that in cases were there wasn't a smoking gun a conviction could be obtained on the basis of strong circumstantial evidence.  The circumstantial nature of evidence isn't enough to cause a jury to disregard it.  Barring a confession or a videotape, all evidence is to one degree or another "circumstantial."  A fingerprint may prove that the defendant handled the gun, but doesn't prove that he fired it.  DNA evidence sould prove that the defendant was in the house, but can't prove she was there on the night in question.

My sense of proportion is offended when I meet someone who demands (or claims) the standard of Philosophical Truth for a proposition upon which one must eventually act one way or the other.  Only a being with complete, infinite, all-encompassing, universal awareness and the complete, infinite, all-encompassing, universal ability to understand all the implications of any given proposition could ever claim to possess the Truth.  All the rest of us live to one degree or another in that shadow of doubt. 

Refusing to decide for because the Truth cannot be proven is the same thing as deciding against even if the shadow is faint.  I've done this a time or two when I didn't want to face the implications of the evidence before me.  But, in the end, my cowardice didn't make it untrue, it just led me to make foolish choices, mostly leaving me with the consequences of denial and self-deception. 

There have been times that I ran ahead of the evidence and made a decision before all the facts were gathered.  In this "rush to judgment," I've found that there is plenty of time later to regret the poor construction, the fine print, or the sly disclaimer.  My laziness up front means I usually have to work twice as hard in the end to cleam up the mess from the first go 'round and then do it right.

Claiming possession of the Truth is the same as claiming that you are in fact God.  This is one I've been accused of once or twice.  Invariably my accuser is someone who either has less information than I used to make my choice and assumes that I've taken a "leap of faith."  Or my accuser has made a different decision based on the same information and considers my choice to be an affront to their own.  (In other words, I've known a couple people who took it personally that I didn't agree with them.)  On the other hand, acknowledging that I don't have the Truth in my possession isn't the same thing as admitting total ignorance.  But, I've also experienced the occasional situation in which a person who really wanted the Truth felt that my failure to offer it was the same as a denial that it even exists.

Last weekend, I picked up a copy of Christianity Today magazine because the cover featured a author/teacher I particularly appreciate.  In the interview he discussed his feelings and reaction to a charge of heresy levied against him some years back.  I nodded and smiled in understanding of his position and tsked over the actions of his accusers.  I find it extremely distasteful that at any time members of any religious affliation find time and energy to worry about whether all their constituent members toe the party line.  Throughout history all attempts to squelch heresy have led to serious offenses on the part of the prosecutors whether they were Christian, Islamic, Hindustani or members of the first church of Purple Cowdom.

Also in the current issue of Christianity Today there is notice that a group of very well known and respected contemporary theologians (Open Theists) are facing charges of heresy from the Evangelical Theological Society.   The works of these men are well known to me, and I was surprised, a bit outraged, and then finally sad when I read of this action lodged against them.  I am also familiar with the works of some of the members who voted to launch the "inquiry."  I've read books written by the accusing men promoting theological positions based more on traditional church doctrine than on Biblical texts.  However, the charges they have written claim that the men in question undermine the "inerrancy" of scripture by teaching and publishing conclusions that diverge from the traditional position of the church.  {0-o}* 

So I'm led through my knowledge of both sides to conclude that in this case the accusers feel threatened by an alternative vision of truth.  There is an old saying among lawyers, "when the facts are against you, argue the law; when the law is against you, argue the facts; when both are against you, call the other side names."  How sad that we've come so far and yet have not come far enough to leave behind this reprehensible practice.

From the cowardice that rejects new truth,
From the laziness that accepts half-truth,
From the arrogance that claims all truth,
Deliver me, O Lord of TRUTH.

I've Been Reading -

Patricia Cornwell's new book, Portrait of a Killer, Jack the Ripper, Case CLosed.  {If you are planning to read it and don't want to see a spoiler, please stop reading now and go directly to the comments and eprops part of our relationship.}  It's a disturbing book.  I was first disturbed on page two when she named the killer without any indication of why she focused on this particular man.  She may have had very good reasons for picking impressionist painter, Walter Sickert as the prime candidate, but without giving us those reasons, her case begins with the unsettling feeling that we've come into the story sometime after the first commercial break.

Unlike many of the people who have taken a stab at the Ripper case over the years, Patricia Cornwell brings strong resources from her side.  She has a background as an investigative reporter.  Through the Virginian Institute of Forensic Science and Medicine which she helped to extablish and serves as Chairman of the Board, she has access to the most sophisticated equipment that contemporary science can offer an investigation.  Finally, she has her personal assets from the sale of her very sucessful novels and has reportedly spent over $6 million to pay for the investigation (which included the purchase and destruction of one of Walter Sickert's paintings.)

The descriptions of the murders themselves are horrific.  Ms. Cornwell includes all the details and then some.  She speculates about the degree of pain, suffering and terror the victims experienced.  She says in more than one place that the assurance the victim "died instantly" is a myth.  That even with the throat slashed and all the blood loss, the victims would have lived long enough to experience every excruciating stab and slash of the mutilations which are characteristic of the Ripper murders.  Everything she says is calculated to outrage the "juror" hearing the evidence.  Once that outrage is achieved, a natural human reaction is to demand an accounting from someone, and she posits Walter Sickert as the monster whom we should revile.

After 114 years, there is almost no physical evidence.  What little evidence was collected in the case was disposed of more that a half century ago.  There are huge gaps in the police records as  Standard procedure called for the destruction of a detective's files upon his retirement.  There are no living witnesses who can be interviewed, no opportunity to verify alibis or shake them.

Ms. Cornwell relies upon the letters (some long considered to be hoaxes) that were sent to the police and the newspapers, purportedly from the perpetrator of the crimes for her main evidence.  She then moves into the very controversial phsychological profile of the killer, and uses it to point to a man whom she says fits the picture.

She does a more than credible job of linking Walter Sickert to the letters and makes a strong case that he wrote many of them.  She has matched watermarks from stationary; paints, crayon, and other artistic medium used to create the letters; and she provides analysis of the sketches included on several of the letters which seems to indicate that they were done in Sickert's characteristic style.  Moreover, the lab in Virginia tested the extant envelopes that Ripper letters were sent in.  By swabbing the adhesive gum, small amounts of DNA material were retrieved.  Comparing this material to similar DNA material retrieved from envelopes in which Sickert sent his personal correspondence, she found that Walter Sickert couldn't be ruled out as a donor.  The weakness of the DNA evidence is that after 114 years, it wasn't possible to test nuclear DNA so they had to rely on mitochondrial DNA which is significantly less precise.  It eliminates approximately 90% of the population, but 10% leaves a huge pool of possibility.

When she moves to the psycholoical profile part, she moves off shaky ground right into quicksand.  Her profile of Walter Sickert relies heavily on details of childhood surgeries which are lost to us.  That he had surgery to correct a "fistula" (an opening where no opening should be), is not in question, but the specific type of surgery, whether or not he had any anesthesia, and the precise location of this fistula, etc. these details are unknown.  Yet, Ms. Cornwell makes sweeping assumptions and from these she builds her case.  Undoubtedly, Walter Sickert was an odd duck.  Friends described bizarre and sometimes frightening behavior.  His level of output was phenomenal as he wrote hundreds of letters a month in addition to producing sketches, drawings, and paintings.  These letters reveal a personality that argued, corrected and obssessed on details.  But, none of his letters comtain a confession.

Also, Walter Sickert has an alibi for at least two of the murders.  According to his official biographer (who relies upon letters Sickerts mother wrote), he was in France enjoying a vacation at the beach.  Ms. Cornwell obtained train schedules and ships' logs to demonstrate that it is possible that Sickert could have beeen sneaking back and forth across the channel in order to make it appear he was out of the country, but possibility isn't proof that he did it.  She does have evidence from his own letters that he was in London during at least part of the time the biographer supposes him to have been away in the form of performance reviews he wrote about various plays and theater productions he saw.  But, the exact dates of his travels to France have never been known, and none of the reviews rule out the possibility that he was out of town on the dates of the murders.

Her final round of evidence concerns the anaylsis of Sickerts work.  This is perhaps the most controversial part of the process.  He painted a series almost 20 years after the Whitechapel murders that are called the Camden Town Murder Series.  In some of these paintings, some art critics see striking similarities to the victims of the Ripper murders.  But, with impressionist work even the art critics are divided, is that supposed to be blood? or a shadow? is that line on her neck meant to suggest a wound, or a ribbon?  There is no question that some of the poses and features bear a strong resemblance to the crime scenes documented by police.  Is is possible that Walter Sickert somehow obtained photos?  Or did he paint from his memory of his victims?

In the end, Ms. Cornwell makes perhaps the strongest case that can be made with the lack of evidence and the amount of time that has passed.  But, her case is not strong enough that it removes from my mind that degree of reasonable doubt.  I doubt that Ms Cornwell will be that last person to look at the Ripper Case.  The vicious nature of the crimes and the knowledge that the murderer "got away" will continue to offend our sense of justice whenever the crimes are considered.  But, we may very well have to live with the knowledge that we can never really know what happened or who did it.

One of Those Days -

Did you ever have one of those days where your thoughts keep jumping back and forth between Emergent Phenomena/Chaos Theory, the Law of Karma, and Jack the Ripper?  And just when you start to focus in on something and you think you are going to form a coherent thought, the buzzer on the dryer sounds?   Or you hear the dog crunching something that sounds vaguely plasticky but he swallows it before you can stop him?  And you start looking for your favorite shirt to make sure it goes in the suitcase for the trip, just to suddenly realize that the 6 year old you absently waved to as he ran through naked, was . . . naked . . . for no reason you can imagine at 11:00 AM.

Did you ever head to the refrigerator to make lunch with the intention of "cleaning out the perishables before we leave on vacation" only to realize that means you'll have to convince the kids to eat something you make from cabbage, celery, carrots, sour cream, cottage cheese and a half a brick of Colby?  So you feed them nachos using the Colby and the sour cream and call it lunch.   (Dinner ought to be a LOT of entertainment.)

Did you ever put the fourth load of laundry in the wash, happy that there's only one more, only to have your son say "Mom, I forgot to clean under my bed (even though you asked him and he SWORE to you that he'd done it only an hour before) so you look and sure enough, there's at least 2 more loads of laundry hiding under there.  Where do they GET all those clothes!  And WHY are the ALL dirty!?!

Did you ever have one of those days when vacation is close, but not quite close enough?  Or is that just me?

You Have NO Time for Xangadu!

Thus spake Tim the Mister.  I'll be here later, never fear.  But for this morning, pedestrian type errands must be accomplished so that we can leave on our long awaited vacation this Friday evening.  (If you have a moment, a quick prayer that the weather in Florida will warm up about 25 degrees would not go unappreciated.) 

Living Nonviolently -

I'm still thinking about Martin Luther King, Jr. and his legacy of nonviolence. The basic idea of nonviolent living, nonviolent protest, or nonviolent politics isn't difficult to understand, on the surface. (Steven gave me a link to a website sponsored by the King Center that offers outlines of his ideas.) The thing is that like so many other ideas that look simple, they aren't easy.

I do not choose to be a common man.  It is my right to be uncommon - if I can ... It is my heritage to stand erect, proud, and unafraid; to think and act for myself, enjoy the benefit of my creations and to face the world boldly and say: This I have done. - Dean Alfange

Monday is Martin Luther King Day across the United States.  It would perhaps have been more appropriate to start this post with one of the many quotes from his legacy of eloquence.  But, I didn't want to make it sound as though he had named himself uncommon.  He was a humble man.

I was barely a year old when Dr. King won the Nobel Peace prize in 1964.  But, when I began school in the Malvern Public School system, I had both black and white classmates and no realization that this integration had been accomplished in my lifetime.  Even though I grew up in an area where many people were racist, my parents protected us from the racist infection.  Because I never heard my parents differentiate between people on the basis of race, I didn't know that there was any other way to look at people except as individuals.  In other words, I grew up in the long shadow of Dr. Martin Luther King and have only recently begun to realize how much I owe him as an American.

Dr. King faced threats from all sides.  He was hounded by the Federal Government through the directives of FBI Director, J. Edgar Hoover.  Volunteers laboring beside him in the Civil Rights Movement fell with him under the attack dogs, water cannons and police batons of the system that should have been protecting their right to free assembly.  Some of the fallen never got back up. 

King drew strength from a single experience he described often and referred to throughout his life.  "I discovered than religion had to become real to me, and I had to know God for myself.  And I bowed down over that cup of coffee [as he sat at his kitchen table].  I will never forget it ... I prayed a prayer, and I prayed out loud that night.  I said, "Lord, I'm down here trying to do what's right.  I think I'm right.  I think the cause we represent is right.  But, Lord, I must confess that I'm weak now: I'm faltering.  I'm losing my courage."
    . . . And it seemed in that moment that I could hear na inner voice saying to me, "Martin Luther, stand up for righteousness.  Stand up for justice.  Stand up for truth.  And lo I will be with you, even until the end of the world."  . . . I heard the voice of Jesus saying still to fight on.  He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone.  No never alone.  No never alone.  He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone. - from a sermon tape.

Three nights later as promised in the threat that drove him to that sleepless night at his table, his home was bombed.  Although the house filled with smoke and broken glass, no one was injured.  King took it calmly, "My religious experience a few nights before had given me strength to face it."

Dr. King also took as his example the nonviolent program of Mahatman Ghandi and visited India in 1959 to observe for himself the workings of a non-violent revolution.  King was inspired by the text of the Sermon on the Mount which Ghandi claimed as his creed.  He described Ghandi as, "the first person in history to live the love ethic of Jesus above mere interaction between individuals."

In our current climate with the President determined to wage a war of retribution for the slap of September 11 against a nation and a leader with no demonstrable ties to the atrocity, can we doubt that we have forgotten the lesson of King's nonviolence?   He was hit on the head with a nightstick, stabbed by a deranged woman in New York, and beaten by a white man in Birmingham who rushed the platform and struck King with his fists.  ("Dont' touch him!"  King cried to his supporters, who surrounded the attacker, "We have to pray for him!")  King clung to nonviolence because he believed that only a movement based on love could prevent the oppressed from becoming a mirror image of their oppressors. 

Historians describe an intense encounter between Chicalgo Mayor Richard Daley and King.  Daley had gone back on an earlier promise that he would permit a march through Chicago and provide Police Protection in exchange for the ending of a boycott.  Instead he obtained a court order banning further marches.   In that meeting, King sat quietly and allowed others to air their views first.  As it appeared the meeting would end in bitterness and hostility from both sides, King finally spoke.

Let me say  that if you are tired of demonstrations, I am tired of demonstrating.  I am tired of the threat of death.  I want to live, I don't want to be a martyr.  And there are moments when I doubt I'm goign to make it through.  I am tired of gettign hit, tired of being beaten, tired of goign to jail.  But the important thing is not how tired I am, the important thing is to get rid of the conditions that lead us to march.
     Now gentlemen, we don't have much.  We don't have much money.  We don't really have much education, and we don't hve political power.  We have only our bodies and you are asking us to give up the one things that we have when you say, "Don't march." - from the MLK biography Bearing the Cross.

Martin Luther King was a prophet to his generation.  Like the Old Testament Prophets he issued a moral appeal to change an entire nation.  He was honored by those to whom he held out the message of God's inclusive love.  He was hated by those in power.  He was an uncommon man.  He stood tall and faced the world boldy. 

Well done.

*****  The Sermon on the Mount can be found in Matthew, the first book of the New Testament, Chapter 5-7.

Perception Checking

I learned a long time ago that one of my chief weaknesses is "filling in the blanks."  I'm far more likely to finish one of Tim's sentences than he is.  I draw conclusions like Billy the Kid drew his six shooter.  I'm good at guessing where the story is going before it gets there.  But, I'm not always right.  I dislike being wrong the way that cats dislike water.  Any approach of wrongness and I'm hissing and spitting with claws fully extended.  Like cats, I've sought every way to avoid being anywhere near this bain of my existence.

So, I also learned long ago to engage in "perception checking."  In conversation, especially a conversation that's serious, I'll say, "I think that you just said, ______.  Is that what you meant?"  I've been told by people who try to actually speak to me that this is an annoying trait.  I'm sorry for that, but not sorry enough to stop doing it.  Time after time after time, I find out that what I thought I heard, wasn't what you meant to say.  By trotting out my little formula and checking my perceptions, I'm able to head off the unpleasantness that comes with ... being ...  wrong.

Earlier this week, I mentioned that I had done a scientific survey to see how many of the people who regularly comment on my site have in the past stated that they disagreed with me on one or more fundamental principles or values of life.  It was surpising to me to learn that over 63% of the people who comment regularly (by that I mean at least 3 times per week) fall into this category.  I got such pleasure out of blogging about this statistic that I decided to generate another one.

I have in past conversation with my sister, husband and multiple friends on Xanga noted the fact that it seems that a small percentage of the people who are subscribed to my site actually comment here.  Then my sister, my husband, and the multiple Xanga friends nod sagely and say, "tis true, the same thing happens at my site."

So the question I want answered is - is it true that only a small percentage of the subscribed comment.  I got thinking about my own commenting habits.  I comment on people every day, but not the same people every day.  So I counted the number of people who commented here over the past week.  In order to be included on the list, you only had to comment once.  But, you did have to comment, within the past seven days.

I learned something that was again surprising and pleasant.  When you get right down to raw numbers more than 50% of the people who are subscribed to me - commented.  Then if I factor out the fact that I'm subscribed to me (yes, I have another Xanga site, don't look shocked), my sister is subscribed more than once, my husband is subscribed more than once, and there are a number of people who have been subscibed to me for over a year who haven't posted anything on their site in that time, much less commented on mine.  (Have I lost you yet?  I love statistics.)  The percentage of active Xangans subscribed to my site who commented within the past seven days rose to ... 79%. 

(music from Hallelujah Chorus rises in the background)

Now numbers in and of themselves are nothing.  I have to attach significance to a number for it so have any meaning.  So here's the significance I give this one.  Xanga isn't just a place we come to leave our thoughts in a vacuum.  Xanga is a community.  We form relationships.  We get to know each other.  We support each other even if all the support we give is to leave a quick smiley or an eprop.  In a world where all the cultural indicators suggest that community is becoming an increasingly rare and difficult commodity to find, this proof of continuing community is precious and impressive. 

My perception that a large number of people subscribe and then never comment, turns out to have been - less than 100% right. 

(All persons wishing now to say that I have too much time on my hands are cordially invited to go directly to the comments section and do so.  )