Days of Yore

Sunday we visited Old Sturbridge Village. After all these years in New England, this visit was our first. It's a step back into the past, where I have been living lately , partly with Oglethorpe in Georgia. That was 1735. Sturbridge is more like 1835. Again, one asks oneself can the people of our time, the Bridezillas, the Darth Vader hockey parents, the worshippers of American Idol, the computer game addicted, the gamblers who trek to the casinos weekly: do they have the right stuff that our forefathers and mothers had? I don't think so. It's kind of scary.

For a look at a few people not that far away from the farm, and the necessity to work hard, take a look at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/tremain_calm/

Of course, some of the photos are from the 60's and those people already look sort of useless, in a comme il faut sort of way. I don't know. I don't know.

We took a bunch of books to the book drop at the dump on Saturday, and unfortunately picked up a few, too. Hard to resist books. I found a moderately old (1968) encyclopedia and brought home volume "A" and read what it had to say about Afghanistan, unpolluted by Taliban, Russians, and the like. A whole new view, as it were. NO mention of the opium poppy back then. Pashtuns mentioned, along with nebulous border, also bad feelings about where the border with Pakistan was and tribal lands being split. What goes around comes around and stays for dinner.

At the dump book drop I found a Helen McInnes book. I used to devour those, all the good chases across Europe with the bad guys invariably a few jumps ahead of the running couple. It didn't quite grab me yet, but I'll read a few more chapters.

Enjoying Three Trapped Tigers. Wondering if there's a plot anywhere or just a babble of voices. Time will tell. Right now I just listen to the voices, which have a vibrancy and life that is very compelling. Three Trapped Tigers indeed. Pre-Castro Havanna. The decay and the debauchery. Yes!