Tag: Musings

BIAS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

Pejorative labels do nothing to advance public discourse. Rather, they’re intended to stifle it. Even worse, they inhibit clear thinking or positive outcomes.

Consider the charge of “liberal media.” Or even “the media,” especially when used in the singular rather than the plural. In reality, American newspapers, magazines, and commercial broadcast stations have long been corporately owned, with the focus on some very profitable bottom lines. Corporations, as the epitome of capitalism, rarely fit neatly into the liberal end of the political spectrum. And so “corporate media” would be far more accurate than the “liberal media” mirage. A closer look would also find most of the editorial pages are of a conservative slant – and nearly all of the political and economic columnists syndicated in the past quarter century have been openly conservative. I’d like to hear of any liberals. In addition, in my experience, the media are highly competitive – there’s no collusion or conspiracy regarding what we’ll cover or ignore, Fox News excepted. For that matter, the media extend into the entertainment media as well – Hollywood, Nashville, Madison Avenue, and Broadway, among others.

Professional reporters and editors, meanwhile, learn to keep their own political and social views out of the way: the goal is to listen carefully and respectfully to all relevant sides of the issue and to present that as clearly as possible, especially in determining what’s new in the event being covered.

I’ve come to the conclusion that those who accuse news organizations and personnel of bias actually have no interest in objective reporting – what they want is bias, of their own right-wing persuasion or even more blatant propaganda. Ideology, rather than fact. The truth be damned, in their hearts.

Perhaps nothing should be more telling than Spiro Agnew’s rabid attacks on a free press, especially when we consider he had every reason to keep reporters off the track of his own criminal actions – and those of his boss, Richard Nixon, all the more. All the while, we covered his attacks on us verbatim and uncontested – had we been anything like he accused us of being, his words never would have seen the light of day, or blasted by critical comment as he spoke them.

If anything, I think of all the years when I willingly suppressed my own convictions – and the price that’s imposed. At last, finally out of the trade, I can truly speak and write freely.

CELLARS VERSUS BASEMENTS AS A DIMENSION OF NEW ENGLAND

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Where I grew up, we had basements. They rarely flooded. Some were even finished into spare rooms, with TVs, carpeting, or best of all, a pool table. Here in New England, most of us instead have cellars, where water seeps through the walls after heavy rainfall (some even spurt).

And so, under the house, confusion. Mold. Dampness. Leakage. Not the order of a basement, with dry walls and solid floors, but a cellar. With small garden snakes and a sump pump. Rick, our carpenter, says you find the soul of a house there. Its support. The wiring – we’ve removed many strands of stray threads overhead, each staple a bear of resistance. It wasn’t the same as the secrets we found in the kitchen walls, the 1928 newspapers, during that renovation, but secrets all the same. You sometimes read about bodies being buried in the cellar. Instead, we have trenches along the wall – and maybe some stray tree roots. I need to replace the bottom stair, the one broken from rot. And soon, I would hope, the sump pump itself with something smaller, more powerful, and more reliable.

Yes, an old New England house is always a project. Even one only little more than a century old.

ABOUT THAT ADVANTAGE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Where I live, you’ll often hear about the “New Hampshire Advantage,” which argues that the state’s economic growth is a consequence of its lack of income and sales taxes. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy not paying extra at the store. But I also know that the sharp difference in my rent in Manchester, when I arrived, and what I was paying in Baltimore was caused by the property taxes here. When I added my Baltimore and Maryland income taxes to my rent there, it equaled what I was paying here. Voila! You’ll pay one way or another. The question is where and who bears the brunt of the cost.

The real New Hampshire Advantage is its proximity to Greater Boston and the economic powerhouses connected with the Harvard Business School and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Nearly half of the New Hampshire population that has a job commutes south each morning to workplaces across the border. The better-paying jobs, in fact. It’s largely a one-way flow, too. If lower taxes were a real stimulus, the entire Granite State would be booming, which is hardly the case in our economically depressed North Country or the Connecticut River’s Upper Valley. Just take a look around Berlin or Claremont and all their devastation.

Still, public services cost money, and the dynamic is that anything requiring labor is going to cost increasingly more. In economics, it’s called the Baumol effect, after a study of performing arts institutions.

New Hampshire is no exception. The real question is just where the additional state revenue will come from, and that always returns us to ill-fated proposals for an income or sales tax.

But complicating any income-tax discussion in the Granite State is the matter of reciprocity: normally, you pay a state income tax where you work rather than where you live. And normally, there are roughly equal numbers of workers commuting between two states to balance the equation. But that’s not the case in New Hampshire. So an income tax to lower property tax bills, as it’s usually framed, would mean either that the cross-border commuters would have to pay twice, both at the workplace and then at home, or that those folks who both live and work within the Granite State would have to subsidize the break given to the others.

It’s a genuine conundrum. Advantage? Beggar-thy-neighbor works only so long.

WILL THE REAL ME PLEASE BRAND UP

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 3 Comments

Branding, we’re told, is everything. It’s not just marketing, or even just a product. It’s the whole lineup. A slogan for differentiating one Big Box Store or high-end boutique from another (including everything inside). Even academia wants a label as a way to file a writer or artist away for easy reference, however awkwardly into one slot or another. It’s ultimately a word game, with or without an actual referent. But what if you’re a misfit, as many truly are?

In literature, the labeling relates better to those who stay within a genre or stick to a manifesto or particular technique or remain in a specific locale – an Oklahoma gothic mystery crime writer, for example – than to my favorites, especially those whose work ranges over many subjects and forms and continually grows. Likewise, I’m bewildered by how often the labels applied to them are downright erroneous, if not simply glib. Or matches one part of their output while ignoring all the rest.

This turns up repeatedly when I attempt replies for those who wish to pigeonhole me. I do what I do. The writing goes where it goes, and the revisions follow. I try to be faithful. So far, I’ve been a part-timer and non-commercial. Neither by choice, but both by fidelity. My opportunities for literary writing (in contrast to the daily journalism that’s paid the bills) have never been that easy or as sustained as I’d wish. I’ve envied those who set out knowing the direction they would pursue for a lifetime, those whose work presents a continuous focus and tone. Especially those who mature as they progress, rather than repeating a facile formula.

Looking back over my poetry and fiction from across the years – and, for that matter, across the continent – I’m struck by the ways so many of the pieces differ, at least outwardly. How varied the subject matter and approach. Here I keep intending the plainspoken, direct, clearly focused piece, and keep winding up with Mixmaster compounds and distillations. Maybe my mind’s rarely that unified; instead, a multitude of mental and emotional activities have kept occurring simultaneously and the most I could hope for is some convergence. Besides, so much of my writing has arisen in some opposition to my daily employment, with all of its own dulling repetition – my writing keeps veering toward the “experimental” fringe, if only in reaction to the daily grind of news stories and headlines. Or, in the past decade, obituaries. Through much of my adult life, I’ve felt torn and uprooted, from Ohio and Indiana to the East Coast and then Washington State and back again. To say nothing of my love life and social environment. The nature poems stand in contrast or discord with the police blotter love poems or, in turn, with my current home setting. That, before I even consider my fiction or the genealogy or Quaker expressions.

(Have I performed the daily journalism to pay the bills while I pursued my literary endeavors? Or had I pursued the literary work as a way of keeping my journalism skills sharpened? What started as one wound up the other, and then shifted back again.)

The writing, in turn, has been an attempt to bring some understanding to all the eruption I’ve experienced. The turns in the road, the setbacks, the advances. A quest for understanding and, if not clarity, some meaning or permanence. I tend my personal journal because I forget so much, and often record observations I will not comprehend until years later. Am baffled, because I have yet to define my mission with a label that sells. Write, then, to discover myself in this morass.

Still, I’m open to suggestions. If you can.

LOCAL, LOCAL

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Ever since Watergate, daily newspapers have devoted more and more of their resources and attention to what they consider local news. Editors and publishers look at surveys where readers say the want local, and decide that’s what we’ll give them – at least until the news business tailspin.

Never mind that the readers’ definition of local news might be quite different from what happens at city hall or even the school board. Or that what happens in one town holds absolutely no interest to the readers living in 99 other localities.

In fact, most of the time, there’s nothing more boring than local news.

When Thomas Jobson led the Asbury Park Press in New Jersey, he relied on a different definition – not “local news,” but “news of local interest.” And so a Mike Royko column out of Chicago just might run on the front page. Circulation at Jobson’s paper soared, while at least one of its neighboring rivals withered.

I’ve taken the lesson well.

ONE PHONE CALL TOO MANY

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Journalists learn the importance of covering all the bases they can before the deadline cutoff. You learn the risks of running a single-source story. Even when you’ve talked on record to several people, you’re urged to make one more phone call. Just to make sure.

Sometimes, that’s when the reporter tells an editor, “There’s no story.”

“What do you mean?”

It was simply a rumor. It didn’t happen at all. The problem was fixed long ago. The guy we were going to praise has a serious drinking problem. The person who called in the tip is a crook or simply dishonest. You get the picture.

As for what had seemed to be a hot story, there was just one phone call too many.

POLICE CALLS, 10 P.M.

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

“Have you read Crime and Punishment?” the guy at the next desk says on the phone. “I think you’ll like it.” A little later, I hear, “It’s by Dostoyevski.” Still later, he turns to the editor at an adjoining desk, “She’s into chick lit.” Meaning the small-town police dispatcher.

AN ANNUAL PRACTICE, A SPECIAL YEAR

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

I don’t know how far back it started, this custom of drafting an annual memo to myself reflecting on the previous year and outlining my ambitions for the next. The practice has somehow included a review of my journal entries covering the last 12 months, the writing of my Yule letter to family, friends, and colleagues, and the revision of my monthly to-do master lists for the coming year. (You know, the one that includes “renew driver’s license,” “call for firewood,” “schedule annual physical,” and other items that too easily fall through the cracks.) The memo’s continued, even after my wife and daughters fired me from the holiday letter itself, arguing they could make it more creative or at least more interesting. Alas, many of our correspondents have agreed. And, reluctantly, so do I, even while trying to hold it to a single page, if we can. Still, I think the annual review is spiritually healthy. We have a similar practice in Quaker circles called the State of Society Report or, as I prefer, the State of the Meeting Report, and it helps us record our strengths and weaknesses. Besides, I’ve never been convinced of the value of New Year’s resolutions, which usually seem to be recipes for failure. Much of my past decade has been an extended repetition of trying to balance home and family, the office, Quaker activities, literary efforts, some kind of physical exercise and personal care, and always coming up short.  With the to-do lists, that simply meant putting off some projects for another year or two. And then 2012 hit with a vengeance.

*   *   *

As I noted to myself at this time last year, 2012 was to be a time of transition. Even so, what’s unfolded was nothing like I’d mapped out. Rather than laying the foundation for a traditional plunge into retirement, I instead accepted the company’s abrupt buyout offer and quit full-time employment. This wasn’t retirement, per se, but it did liberate me from much of the escalating tension at the office while opening up more time for all those other efforts. And, as the horoscope predicted, 2012 turned out to be a year of unanticipated surprises. And yes, just before that, at the end of 2011, I leapt into a project that had been on the backburner for months – several projects, actually – beginning with the launch of this blog and extending into Quaker writings and presentations. Jnana’s Red Barn has allowed the release of much of my backlogged writing, especially on the creative non-fiction front, and led to the addition of three related blogs – As Light Is Sown, for lengthier Quaker theological work; Chicken Farmer I Still Love You, for lengthy down-to-earth chapters from book-length projects, beginning with the holistic money workbook; and the Orphan George Chronicles, for my genealogical research narratives. In essence, by the end of 2014, these will contain the equivalent of at least a dozen original books. And yes, it’s become far more time-consuming than I had envisioned.

The year began with the climax of the first-in-the-nation presidential primary and the buyout, which came about abruptly. February and March turned into a period of retreat, decompression, and release as I hunkered down without the required daily commuting. My wife was quite supportive while I indulged in a reading orgy, adapted her old laptop for my online connection (my PC on the third floor has no Internet connection), and resumed poetry submissions after a five-year hiatus. I engaged in a more balanced lifestyle and diet, with regular exercise and early-morning rising. Wednesday afternoons we walked to the Barley Pub for live jazz guitar and a microbrew. How civilized it all seemed, however briefly!

Purchasing an entry-level Kodak digital camera (seriously on sale) in April has allowed me to finally indulge in a pent-up passion for photography. After all of these years of being dependent on other photographers, I’m recording the ways I view the world in so much of its quirkiness. But by May, my goal of working one or two shifts a week as an on-call editor began escalating to three or the maximum four. The money’s helped, of course, but I found myself frustrated in my desire to establish a daily and weekly rhythm of living. Summer’s swirl included a delightful overnight trip to Rutland, Vermont, on a Groupon deal, soon followed by the week I led a five-day workshop at Friends General Conference at the University of Rhode Island and another week at New England Yearly Meeting of Friends at Bryant University, also in Rhode Island. In addition, a Christmas present finally kicked in – a season pass to an oceanfront town park in Kittery, Maine, and swimming sans lifeguard, tidepooling, basking, and photographing from its pristine shoreline. And that’s before we get to the rest of the household. The season also brought emotional closure on some lingering deep-history as I learned of the deaths of a close friend from the Baltimore years, an event more than a decade ago, at age 51; my two mentors from Indiana University, the husband-wife team of Vincent and Elinor Ostrom; a high school colleague in February; and more. Somehow, these culminated in the appearance in August of my first independently published chapbook, Harbor of Grace. The newly freed time prompted me to accept positions on Dover Friends Meeting’s Ministry and Worship committee and New England Yearly Meeting’s Ministry and Counsel committee, which I now see are going to require more attention than I’d anticipated. Still, they dovetail nicely. Autumn included a four-hour bout of Greek dancing followed, 2½ months later, by surgery. In between, we had a delightful visit with my landlords from the Yakima years, a brush with Hurricane Sandy, which was largely only stiff gusts here, and (finally!) the replacement of the roof on the kitchen and the barn. So I end the year still hoping the establish that rhythm and direction, but no doubt much closer to actually accomplishing it.

*   *   *

Full retirement comes in February, and the pension conditions demand the end of any newspaper work on my part. Since I see this change as an opportunity to focus more fully on the Real Work (in Gary Snyder’s marvelous phrase), the matter of establishing a realistic system of time management is essential — I have no desire of simply drifting. I want to the newly opened 45 hours a week as being released just for more writing-revising/submissions/schmoozing but rather for time with my wife, house and garden projects, exercise and day trips, socializing, reading, meditation/prayer, Quaker work, and similar lines.

I had wondered about establishing “regular office hours,” but that pushes me back toward the writing-revising/submissions/schmoozing trap  I hope to control. What might make more sense is to slot in blocs of “project time” to be rotated as necessary among house, garden, travel and hiking, writing, reading, and related projects. Thus, I could piggyback two or three blocs, as needed, say for a day trip. And, as the year ends, that approach seems to be making great sense.

*   *   *

And that’s how it goes. Perhaps this puts some of my earlier postings in perspective. Perhaps it will also encourage you to a similar personal reflection. Maybe I’ll even get around to attempting an alternative version, looking at things I did wrong or badly or failed to address at all. Hmm. Even so, what has surprised me is seeing how much actually happened in a year where I often felt put on hold. And that’s been a special blessing.