Ambrose & Elsewhere

“All citizens take notice that Carnival is decreed for tonight. Turn back the clock. There will be music, dancing, happiness at the Carnival. By order.”

Starting the middle of the academic year at the beginning of the calendar year always seems weird to me. But weird isn’t bad, so I’m getting ready to (as Horace and Ellison recommend) “begin in the middle and later learn the beginning. The end will take care of itself.”

Breaking radio silence here so that I can wish a merry Christmas to those who celebrate it–and a happy weekend to all.

Went down to the Black Swamp Arts Festival.

Going to see my baby there.

Actually, I went down there with her:

so sweet, so warm, so fair.

We saw/heard these guys there, among others: Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears. They were great.

Ten years ago today I was teaching a Latin class when the news came in about the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington. I felt then that we should have gone on with the class, although it didn’t work out that way. (People had people that they were worried about, and that has to come first, even before things as important as Latin.)

But I still kind of feel that way. I don’t believe, I never believed, the “9/11 changed everything!” slogan. That was used by a political faction who wanted to ram through a partisan program of high deficits, perpetual war and the slashing of both civil liberties and social services. They succeeded, and we are not better off for it. We should have avenged our dead, kept them in memory and moved on.

9/11 changed some things but not others. One of the things it didn’t change was this: living well is the best revenge. Music is a part of that and, in extreme cases, dancing.