Monthly Archives: June 2005

What music do you like?

The book I’m in the middle of right now is called 20/20: 20 New Sounds of the 20th Century, by William Duckworth. It’s a book about classical music of the 20th C., including composers like Aaron Copland, John Cage, Arnold Schoenberg, Laurie Anderson, and Philip Glass. Very readable book, by the way, and it comes with a CD.

It has a great quote by Meredith Monk:

I’ve always loved medieval music. I love music through Bach and then [I] go to the twentieth century.

Me, too. I know it’s heresy, but I could easily live without Beethoven or Mozart. At one church I served, I worked with a music director who felt the same way. Sure, he played the usual Mozart-Beethoven-Brahms stuff, but he’s slip in some Gershwin, some jazz, Erik Satie, John Cage — once he played Cage’s “4′ 33”” as the prelude to a worship service. It was one of the most memorable performances of music at any church service I’ve ever been to. (If you don’t know the piece, look it up on the Web…if you know where to look, you can find the complete score and good critical commentary and in addition recordings in a variety of formats with bad commentary.)

At the other end of Meredith Monk’s timeline, Lynne McCanne played Variation 22 from Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” a couple of weeks ago here in Geneva. I was in heaven. Wouldn’t it be cool to do a series of each of the variations from the “Goldberg Variations” over the course of a church year? You could run it in parallel with a series of improvisations based on songs by the Ramones.

What kind of music would you like to hear in worship services?

Midsummer’s evening

The meeting at church ended just after 9:00 p.m. It was a mild evening, with a breeze just strong enough to get your blood moving. I took a long walk.

I wandered around downtown Geneva, and got to the depot as the 9:46 from Chicago was just in. Not many people on the train. I headed back home along Second Street, and stopped to listen to a large bird squawking way up in a tree. (I have no idea what it was.) By the time I got to the Lutheran church, it was 9:55, and it looked like some meeting had just gotten out. It’s always good to know that another church’s meetings go longer than those at one’s own church.

Got across State Street in a break in the traffic. The Old Towne Pub there on the corner was mostly full. As I passed the back of the pub, a car went slowly by headed towards State Street, and someone said, “Hi!” I turned to look, but they were talking to a woman who came out the back of the pub just then. “Jesus!” she replied, in one of those Spanish accents that has a slight lisp.

No lights were on in the Methodist church on Second Street. (Maybe they got out even earlier than we did. Or maybe we’re a more active church than they. I’ll pretend it’s the latter. Not that I’m competitive or anything.)

No more thoughts of church the rest of the way home. No real thoughts at all Just: –It’s a beautiful evening.

Summer time

Ryan T. came into church last night for Game Night, and announced it is mulberry season. Ryan is enthusiastic about such things, not just because he’s five years old, but because that’s the kind of person he is. I share his enthusiasm for mulberries.

I first knew it was mulberry season three days ago because of a sidewalk near our house: I saw a bird dropping that was strangely purple. I puzzled over this for a while, suddenly realizing that it’s mid-June and time for mulberries to be ripe.

I kept watching the sidewalks on my evening walks around downtown Geneva. Within a day, I came across a short stretch of sidewalk covered with little purple squished fruits, and here and there a purple bird dropping. A mulberry tree! I picked a handful (all I could reach) and ate them. They were sweet and good.

Since then, I’ve discovered two more mulberry trees, and Ryan told me about yet a third less than a block from the church on Second Street. Ryan is fortunate enough to have a mulberry tree growing over his driveway, and he was gracious enough to bring me a small bag of his mulberries this morning when he came to church.

Mulberries are a little eldery-tasting, and usually you can’t reach the really ripe ones because they’re too high, or too clearly over someone’s yard. But most years they’re the first fresh local fruit I eat each year — for about a week each year, they are my favorite fruit.

Midwestern savannah

Oak savannah, up until 150 years ago one of the dominant ecosystems around here in the Tri-Cities, has fascinated me ever since I first saw restored oak savannah over at Nelson Lake Marsh natural preserve. Contrary to the stereotypes I’d been fed, the prairie was not the only major ecosystem in Illinois.

The earliest settlers found almost half the State in forest, with the prairie running in great fingers between the creeks and other waterways, its surface lush with waist-high grasses and liberally bedecked with wild flowers. Here occurred the transition from the wooded lands of the East to the treeless plains of the West…. The pioneers admired the grasslands, but clung to the wooded waterways…. The waterways furnished timber for fuel and building, a convenient water supply, and protection for the settlers’ jerry-built cabins from prairie fires and windstorms. Fires invariably swept the grasslands in the late summer, when the Indians burned off the prairie to drive out game….” Illinois Descriptive and Historical Guide: Compiled and Written by the Federal Writers’ Project of the Work Projects Administration of the State of Illinois, 1939.

Where did the woodlands go?

Lumbering activities and the pioneer’s early preference for the woodland reduced the forests from their original extent, 42 per cent, to little more than 5 per cent. What is now commonly thought of as prairie is often the increment gained from the clearing of the woodlands. –Ibid.

The oak savannah is neither prairie nor forest, but a separate natural community, a transitional zone between forest and prairie. According to one definition, oak savannah has more than one tree per acre, but less than 50 per cent coverage (some authorities allow up to 80 per cent canopy coverage). The widely-spaced oaks rise out of the grassy undergrowth, giving a park-like appearance. This makes for a beautiful landscape, which feels open yet protected by trees.

How much of Illinois was savannah? According to a 1994 North American Conference on Savannas and Barrens, “No estimate of the presettlement extent of oak savanna has been developed for Illinois.” Since even modern definitions of oak savannah vary, it’s not surprising that no such estimate exists. Yet the reports of early settlers talk glowingly about the park-like settings of early Illinois, so we can be sure they knew and enjoyed oak savannah.

Funnily, the suburban landscape of downtown Geneva superficially resembles oak savannah, with its widely spaced trees and the grassy lawns. But the community of plants and animals is quite different in the suburbs than in true oak savannah, and it is a transitional zone between shopping mall and housing development, rather than a transitional zone between forest and prairie. Some early accounts say the Indians kept the oak savannah open by burning away undergrowth periodically; to shape today’s suburban savannah, humankind uses power lawnmowers and tree services.

You can see a contemporary image of oak savannah at photographer Miles Lowry’s Web site. Link The top two images are of a restored oak savannah about three miles due east of Geneva. Or if you want a technical discussion of oak savannah as an ecosystem, you can find it at the EPA’s interesting Web site on Great Lakes ecosystems. Link

Not midwestern

Living in the Pacific Rim city of Oakland, California, last year, we got immersed in an entirely different culture. For example, ukuleles are not exotic in the San Francisco Bay area — there are plenty of Pacific Islanders in the area, and lots of Asian Americans have picked up the instrument as well. There is a ukulele orchestra in Oakland. There was a fellow in the UU church I served out there who made his own ukuleles. Ukuleles are normal.

Here in the Midwest, the ukulele is mostly an oddity, a toy you give to kids. Which means Jake Shimabukuro is not exactly a household name around here. If he were white, or black, and played an electric guitar, we would have heard about him. But he’s Japanese American from Hawai’i, and he plays ukulele.

Midwestern culture is wonderful, but cross the boundary into Pacific Rim culture for a moment, and go check out Jake’s version of While My Guitar Gently Weeps. He’s incredible.

Summer time

On Memorial Day weekend, we still had the comforter out. A week and a half ago, we were sleeping under blankets. Not any more. Summer is here. Other signs of summer:

  • Robins are molting. Robins are spring breeders who don’t start their molt until their young have fledged (raising young and molting at the same time would be just too stressful). Yesterday, I saw a Robin who had molted the first two tail feathers.
  • Chiggers are out. On Sunday, one bit me. Fortunately, only one managed to bite me.
  • The humidity is back.
  • We leave the ceiling fans going pretty much all day and all night. (We’re too cheap to turn on the A/C.)
  • The people who live to the northwest of us have opened up their pool. We know this because sometimes they leave their very loud pool pump going night and day for days at a time.

But the real sign of summer for me is days that go on forever, and short nights that bring memories of past midsummers, memories which stretch back before I can remember. The world pauses for a moment at this apex of the year, and I find that I can’t sleep deeply, or for long.

A propos of nothing…

Have you ever noticed how many names of philosophers and theologians sound like someone choking or coughing?

  • Kierkegaard (someone choking on a fish bone)
  • Schleiermacher (someone coughing to clear their throat prior to speaking)
  • Hegel (one of those deep, wheezing coughs you get with bronchitis)
  • Kant (repeated, someone choking on crackers: “Kant… Kant… Kant!…”)
  • Nietzsche (sounds like a baby choking on baby food; so does “Niebuhr”)
  • Tillich (a sip of water going down the wrong way)
  • Cox (kind of like a death rattle)
  • Hartshorne (what the Robitussin people call “an unproductive cough”)

    • I could go on. But I will spare you.

Bridging ceremony

Yesterday, we had a bridging ceremony here at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Geneva, for all those young people who are finishing up with high school this year. For those of you from UUSG who couldn’t be there (and for those readers who live far away), I thought I’d put the text of the ceremony up on my blog. If you don’t know what a bridging ceremony is, it’s explained below, in the text of the ceremony.

I’ve appended a few comments at the end of the ceremony, as well….

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Bridging Ceremony

UU Society of Geneva, June 4, 2005, 9:00 a.m.

Each year, a few young people from this church end their time in high school. Usually after they are through with high school, they head off to find a job, to join the military, or to attend college or further education. And most often that means that these young people move out of town, or have busy schedules that don’t permit them to come to church as often.

I believe our young people enrich the life of this church immeasurably. They bring their own perspective to church life, they bring their own talents and enthusiasms. Sometimes, they can help to challenge the assumptions of older generations, and that can inject new energy and life into this church. So when the end of high school requires some young people to move on, it’s a real loss to the congregation.

But it’s also a time of excitement. We are so pleased that these young adults are entering a new phase of life! They may not be around as much as in the past, but we want them to know that we will always be glad to see them here, and that we hope they continue to be a part of this church. We want them to know, too, that we will support them as they make the big transition away from high school and into something new — we will support them in their dreams, and their emerging new lives.

This is our chance to recognize these people in what has become known as a “Bridging Ceremony,” bridging the gap between youth and adulthood. And I’m glad the children are here to see this ceremony this morning — some day you, too, will finish up with high school, and will have your own bridging ceremony, and I want you to look forward to that.

To start the bridging ceremony, I’d like to ask anyone who, like Lindsay [Bates, senior minister at UUSG] and me, spent part or all of their growing-up years in a Unitarian, Universalist, or Unitarian Universalist church, to join us up here at the pulpit.

Next, I’d like to ask everyone who is still in high school, and those adults who have served as youth advisors, to come stand up here in front of the pulpit.

Now I’m going to read the names of those people we know of who will be ending their time in high school and moving on to new things. When I read your name, please join us up here at the pulpit….

[names omitted for privacy]

[minister turns to face those who are bridging]

Welcome to each one of you! We welcome you into the community of adult Unitarian Universalists.

Those of us standing here at the pulpit also grew up as Unitarian Universalists, and we have either stayed, or we have come back. It can be done! We hope you, too, decide to remain a Unitarian Unviersalist. Know that you will be welcomed into other Unitarian Universalist congregations, as many of us were — and if you aren’t welcomed in, you can do what some of us did and demand to be welcomed in!. Know that you will always be welcome here in this church — come back and visit, or best of all remain here as members.

[minister turns to face the rest of the congregation]

And I deliver this charge to all the adults in this church: whenever you meet a young adult who grew up in a Unitarian Universalist church, you have the privilege and the responsibility to welcome them here to this church — just as other Unitarian Universalist congregations will have the privilege (and responsibility) to welcome some of our young people into their congregations.

One last word to you who are bridging this year. As you know, I’m headed off this year to a new church in New Bedford, Massachusetts. If you ever find yourself in New Bedford, Massachusetts, stop in at the Unitarian Universalist church there, and I can promise you will be welcomed there!

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Comments about the ceremony: (1) The bridging ceremony took place as part of the intergenerational flower service. (2) Lindsay and I gave each person bridging a copy of the book, “With Purpose and Principle,” telling them that way they’d have a reference guide whenever anyone asked them, “So you’re a Unitarian Universalist — what does that mean?” (3) After the worship service, someone who is a twenty-something remarked that the comment about demanding to be wlecomed was appreciated — this person’s experience in two UU congregations was that young adults did have to demand to be welcomed, adding, “I haven’t given up yet on UUism, but sometimes it is frustrating.” (4) Our small sanctuary does not allow the elaborate staging of the bridging ceremony at General Assembly, but that didn’t really matter.

Millenium Park in Chicago

We were coming back from the Seminary Coop Bookstore’s annual members-only sale last night. Eco-freaks that we are, we took the train to Hyde Park rather than drive. So when we got off the South Shore electric line at Randolph Street Station with half an hour to spare before catching the train out to Geneva, Carol said, “Let’s go look at Millenium Park.”

I had heard a good deal about the Pritzker Pavillion, the stage designed by Frank Gehry, and I had seen it from a distance, but I had not walked through it. In a word, it was disappointing. The curvy stainless steel proscenium arch around the stage was typical Frank Gehry, except more banal than usual. At first it looks wild and new, but pretty soon you realize he’s using a centuries old architectural vocabulary. Basically it is just a proscenium arch that’s not much different from Baroque arches — except in stainless steel, and without the rich detailing of Baroque architecture. After a few minutes, I started laughing sadly at it because it has such an unfortunate resemblance to the hair styles of late-career Elvis — the bloated, sweating, drug-hypnotized Elvis. And after a few more minutes, I began to see the lack of attention to details, which made it look like one of those Western store fronts that looks really big from the front, but which turns out to be a sad, tiny building from the back.

Worse is the trellis of stainless steel pipes over the lawn seating area. Designed to support loudspeakers, the trellis has the unfortunate side effect of making you feel as if you are in a cave. One of the reasons Chicago is such an extraordinary city, architectually speaking, is that buildings in the Loop soar to the sky, taking your spirit with them — it’s the opposite of a cathedral where your spirit soars only to be stopped by a roof, because in Chicago it’s the open sky over your head. But Gehry’s trellis stops that feeling of soaring dead. The trellis hovers oppressively over you, controlling your spirit and channeling it the same way a closed shopping mall does.

Next we walked over BP Bridge, also designed by Gehry. The bridge is almost quite nice — almost. The problem is, Gehry tries to be sculptural, but can’t quite pull it off. The bridge looks kind of cool from a distance, but when you get closer you see there are dead spots in the curves of the bridge, places where the curves are interrupted by an unintentional flat spot, or where the curves don’t quite flow right. Other details of the bridge are badly done, too. (Maybe the architect did not adequately oversee the building contractor?) It’s covered with what looks like stainless steel shingles on the outside, but as you walk across it the walls lining the walkway are dead flat — which is incongruous at best, confusing at worst. And ultimately, the massing of the bridge just curves around and doesn’t say much of anything.

The worst thing about Gehry’s contributions to Millenium Park is that they seem to completely ignore the incredible wealth of architecture to their west, and the glorious natural beauties of the lakeshore to their east. There is no sense of place, no sense that you are in CHICAGO! — instead, you could be in any generic city center or shopping mall from Bahrain to L.A.