We Remember

The Sound of Silence

written by Paul Simon 1964



Portion of the World Trade Center North Tower
 antenna displayed at the Newseum
Washington, DC

Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
'Neath the halo of a street lamp
I turn my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never shared
No one dared
Disturb the sound of silence


"Fools," said I, "you do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you"
But my words like silent raindrops fell
And echoed in the wells of silence


Various newspaper front pages

from 9/11/2001

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said "The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls
And whispered in the sound of silence

Pedestal Problem

I forget the first time I heard the warning about putting anyone on a pedestal - that the only direction they could go from the perch was down - but I remember feeling surprised by my ignorance. The more idealized we make someone, the greater the fall.  We sometimes want to forget about our clay feet because their banality doesn't lift us up. The same goes for those we admire. Admitting they are human derails our fantasy.  To stretch the current vernacular - keeping it real, keeps it real.

In his recent NYTimes essay titled "An Empty Regard," author William Deresiewicz presents a reflection on the over-sentimentalized regard we Americans have for our soldiers. It is a concept I have long considered but have just as quickly dismissed it.  Mr.  Deresiewicz offers a clear, well thought out position about what he calls the 'the cult of the uniform.'  He sees the unnecessary positioning of those in uniform onto a pedestal as dangerous and goes deeper into how we Americans could be better citizens. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/opinion/sunday/americas-sentimental-regard-for-the-military.html

From the outset, Mr. Deresiewicz is crystal clear. "There is no question that our troops are courageous and selfless.  They expose themselves to inconceivable dangers under conditions of enormous hardship and fight because they want to keep our country safe."  What the author challenges is a film of hyper-reverence by Americans who place those in uniform on a platform almost without question.

As we near the tenth anniversary of the events of 9/11/01, it is worth taking an unemotional look at how we view our military.  Mr. Deresiewicz  believes in the discourse of questioning and choosing transparency that makes the truth visible.  "Pieties are ways to settle arguments before they begin," he writes. If we worship it, then there is no reason to question it.  It seems we are overfeeding a national need to cling to a belief that we haven't been knocked off our patriotic pedestal.


Like most Americans, I recall the enormous outpouring of patriotic symbols after 9/11. Our psyche was mortally wounded. We raced to our flags and waved them with vigor. My daughter and her friend made and sold patriotic pins shortly after September 11 donating the proceeds to a fund to help victims' families. Americans united viscerally and sprung into action at all levels.


Traveling back from Pakistan in late October 2001, "Three Cups of Tea" author Greg Mortensen recalls the conversation with his wife as he describes the visual impact upon emerging from US Customs in Denver. He writes:

"It was Halloween. Walking through a forest of American flags that had sprouted from every surface, adorning every doorway and hanging from every arch, he wondered if the explosion of red, white, and blue meant he hadn't arrived on a different holiday."What's up Tara? It looks like the Fourth of July here.  'Welcome to the new America, sweetie,' she said."

Was it the new America?  Our wounds were fresh then but ten years later, do we demand a narrow patriotic view still? Mr. Deresiewicz notes, "The cult of the uniform began with the call to 'support our troops' during the Iraq war. The slogan played on a justified collective desire to avoid repeating the mistake of the Vietnam era, when hatred of the conflict spilled into hostility toward the people who were fighting it." I grew up during the Vietnam War.  While my immediate family had no sons drafted into that conflict, my strong memories are of a country deeply divided over it.  The returning soldiers were unwitting victims of this violent national rift.  

My daughter's recent high school summer reading included "Letters from Vietnam." Her remarks about this compilation of soldiers' letters home included surprise at their youth and shock at the horrors they witnessed.  Imagine their return to an ungrateful nation.

It does not surprise me that years later, in 2003, President Bush's premature swagger under a "Mission Accomplished" banner on the USS Abraham Lincoln answered our immediate need to be victorious, but its ultimate untimeliness and naivete served no one in the long run. Traditional symbols of victory did not add up this time and yet dissent was not tolerated.  Americans who questioned the post 9/11 burst of patriotism were summarily silenced. Comedian Bill Maher's comments regarding cowardice and the terrorists resulted in the cancellation of his show aptly named, Politically Incorrect. 

What to do?
"It seems little doubt that our armed forces today are more professional, and at the small-unit level, at least, more effective, than they were in Vietnam," Deresiewicz states.  Yet fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan continues.   Deresiewicz notes, "At the very least, our generals ought surely to come in for some criticism as they did when it was appropriate in other wars.  Yet the cult of the uniform has immunized them from blame, and inoculates the rest of us from thought."   


The term "hero" also receives attention by the essayist, noting, "Perhaps no word in public life has been more thoroughly debased by overuse."  He cites the skewed accounts of Jessica Lynch's rescue and Pat Tillman's death as examples of a duplicitous, overreaching by government and military leaders to manufacture heroes or heroic fiction and bury the truth to feed a nation of hungry patriots. 


"The irony is that our soldiers are the last people who are likely to call themselves heroes and are apparently very uncomfortable with this kind of talk," the author notes.  "The military understands itself as a group endeavor."  Maintaining a balance of appropriate praise and persistent questioning removes us from a juvenile posture and empowers us as citizens.  Deresiewicz adds, "It was wrong to demonize our service members in Vietnam; to canonize them now is wrong as well. Both distortions make us forget that what they are are human beings."  It is this kernel in the author's argument that resounds most for me. 

We need to stop looking to Daddy for the fix.  We need to look inside ourselves for strength and be better citizens instead of citizen cheerleaders.  Deresiewicz adds, "What we really need are citizens, who refuse to infantilize themselves with the talk of heroes and put their shoulders to the public wheel instead." Military families have their shoulders to the wheel.  We must continue to honor their sacrifices with constructive citizenship that looks unflinchingly into the eyes of a country at war.  There is no room or need for pedestals here.

William Deresiewicz is an essayist, critic, and the author of "Solitude  and Leadership," an address delivered at West Point in 2009 and widely taught in the armed forces.

Hands and Heart

(I wrote this piece last summer as a final project for a Public Speaking class.  Elizabeth was born on this date in 1901.  Her husband Vincent also had a 29 birth date in December and my birth date is also a 29 - in July.  For this little reason and many greater ones, I remember her today...and always.)

It is said that the eyes are the windows to the soul, and in the case of my beloved maternal grandmother, her hands were the doorway to her heart.  Elizabeth Labate’s hands mesmerized me.  

The Seinfeld episode which introduced the term “man-hands” is somewhat emblematic of Elizabeth’s hands because they were masculine in size.  However they were a contradiction because Elizabeth’s hands ended with feminine flourish; they had long and strong fingernails that were usually covered with nail polish. I remember holding those powerful hands and painting those feminine nails when Elizabeth’s arthritis made it difficult for her to do it herself.  


Elizabeth’s hands tended to life’s experiences with robust, meaningful purpose.  Her hands did what her heart felt. 

Elizabeth’s young life knew love, loss and love again.  She was one of eight children who were well loved, yet when her mother died, Elizabeth and her younger sister were sent to an orphanage by their immigrant father.  The nuns took on the job of raising Elizabeth and taught her many things. 

Two things which stand out were her love of the rosary and knitting.  Elizabeth found solace in quietly praying the rosary.  Her hands would caress those beads and she would be transformed through her meditation as she sought the comfort of prayer.  I keep a set of her rosary beads on my nightstand, not because I pray the rosary, but simply because they bring me solace and remind me of her.

While the rosary kept her hands still, knitting moved them in a frenetic motion as Elizabeth made baby bonnets, booties, sweaters, hats, scarves and blankets for family and friends. She even made an afghan for my older brother with a peace sign on it.  In the era of peace and love, Elizabeth proved she was hip to the times!  She loved the creativity in making these items and, in this manual effort, happily gave of inner herself.

Elizabeth found love and married.  Her wedding photo shows a young, beautiful bride whose hands are wrapped around a substantial bouquet of flowers.  I marvel at how those young hands look like the same hands I knew so many years later.  

Those hands also cradled her three children.  In the 1940s, Elizabeth worked in the old Gimbel’s Department store in Philadelphia in, ironically enough, the wrapping department.  Her hands would wrap packages to be shipped elsewhere, with some headed overseas to loved ones fighting in World War II.  She loved this job because she could talk with families who had soldier sons defending our country. This connection brought her some comfort since her two sons were also soldiers in Europe.

 

Elizabeth’s hands opened a telegram in November, 1944 that contained news of her son, Pete.  He was fighting in Germany and was missing in action.  For many months, she and my grandfather waited for news of their son’s fate and in June, 1945 Elizabeth’s hands opened a second telegram confirming her worst fears; Pete had died in battle.  

Every night Elizabeth would gently raise her hand to her lips, kiss the tips of her fingers, and lovingly place those fingers on a military photo of Pete that hung at the base of the stairway.  I watched her do this many, many times and saw it as a sweet ritual but did not emotionally attach to it.  I did not know Pete and I had my grandmother with me, so I did not feel any sadness.  It wasn’t until I became a parent that I understood the depth of Elizabeth’s tender gesture.  She was doing what every parent loves to do each evening – Elizabeth was kissing her child goodnight.   

While Elizabeth ached for her son who was lost in battle, she had no idea she was preparing for a battle of her own when she was diagnosed with colon cancer.  Colon cancer was a death sentence in the 1950s.  She survived but not without some scars.  Elizabeth’s colon and a part of her large intestine were removed and for the rest of her life her hands would have to tend to the results of that surgery.  Elizabeth would wake up early each morning and her hands would remove her colostomy bag, irrigate what was left of her bowels, and reattach a new bag for the day.  My grandmother showed us that in caring for herself, it was not only a benefit to herself but one to us, because the more her hands tended to her needs, the longer she was in our lives.
  
Elizabeth loved life! She was feisty and fun.  She enjoyed playing bingo and would often take me with her when I was a youngster.  I would marvel as I sat next to her and watched her hands glide over what seemed like a hundred bingo cards, seamlessly placing chips on the correct numbers.  She would talk with her friends who sat nearby and keep track of her bingo cards effortlessly.  She would sometimes let me have a bingo card of my own.  I loved that.  Elizabeth’s hands would rub my head for good luck (which I never brought her) and her friends would do the same.  I bathed in the attention and chatter of this gaggle of women and loved the feeling of belonging. 
  

Elizabeth was also a wonderful cook and baker.  She made cinnamon bread year-round but especially at Christmas time, however, she never wrote down the recipe. 

 So, when I was in my early twenties, she and I spent an afternoon together baking cinnamon bread so I could record the ingredients and instructions to make this sweet treat on my own.  I watched as her hands kneaded that dough and bent it to her will.  Her strength amazed me and the aroma of the end result was long lasting. I remember thinking, “I want to be able to do that!” Each Christmas  I make many cinnamon loaves and give them as gifts to friends and family in honor of Elizabeth’s natural generosity and excellent baking skills. 
     

When Elizabeth was much older, my brother took her to see Longwood Gardens for the first time.  It was a chilly day and her arthritis made walking difficult. My brother pushed her throughout the gardens in a wheelchair supplied by Longwood as she covered her legs with one of her knitted lap covers.  She was awestruck by the splendor of the gardens and returned home full of wonder at having seen such a beautiful spot.  

A week later, Longwood Gardens received a package from my grandmother containing several of her handmade lap covers. She wanted other wheelchair users to have the same comfort she did in the cool temperatures.  This gesture was yet another reason Elizabeth was given the nickname by her grandchildren as of “Grandmom Give.”  Longwood Gardens, in return, sent a thank you note containing a membership pass to the gardens so she could enjoy future visits at no charge.

A year later, in 1979, Elizabeth died.  In her coffin, her hands held rosary beads, knitting needles, a photo of her son, Pete, and her Longwood membership.  It was our fervent hope that as she crossed the doorway to whatever lay beyond this life, Elizabeth’s hands would continue to be busy doing the productive work of her generous heart. 

(Elizabeth is the subject of a 12/17/11 post about the game of Bingo. http://asubjectforconsideration.blogspot.com/2010/12/b-one.html)

Color Her Barbra

I am a shameless, passionate, sappy Barbra Streisand fan. When I was 12 years old I listened to her albums in my friend Joan's bedroom - we were (and are) Barbra zealots. Whether it was classic 1968 "Funny Girl" music or this hipster, beat thumping homage to Barbra by Duck Sauce http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu_zwdmz0hE, the feeling is the same - Barbra's timeless talent is tops.

"I'm The Greatest Star" from the motion picture Funny Girl

This is where I believe childhood is so powerful because hearing her softens and transports me to my pre-teen daydreaming self. It is a visceral response to something I'm not sure I even understand. I just know that she (and Joni Mitchell) do this for me. (Barbra did record Joni's "I Don't Know Where I Stand," but I digress.)

Today Barbra releases her 36th studio album, "What Matters Most" and I am once again transported in time but only five years back when I finally, finally saw her sing live.  In October 2006  Barbra opened her tour in Philadelphia. I saw her twice; first at her Philly dress rehearsal, seated in Section 1, Row 1, Seat 1 and again the next day in section 112 for the concert.  And if that does not make you ache with envy or joy, I understand.  But if it does resonate with you, then we share a deep musical appreciation. 


What hit me hardest as I reveled in all things Streisand was how much I missed my concert-going self.  From my senior year in high school when I would savor performances at the intimate Bryn Mawr Main Point, through the college circuit of performers then onto larger arenas in my twenties and early thirties, I loved attending rock, jazz, and folk concerts. 

And then, it stopped.  No grand finale…just a redirection of my life…marriage, house, kids. Somewhat numbed to this evolution, I sought out other avenues. Many kid themed concerts, ice shows and the like filled the void in a twisted sort of way.  Finally subscribing to People’s Light and Theater Company in Malvern helped satisfy my need for live performance and it still does.  But music continued to beckon. 

And then Streisand………

Barbra's 2006 concert tour

If giddy describes my feeling as I purchased my single ticket for Barbra’s concert, then wildly insane best illustrates my good fortune at receiving front row seats to her dress rehearsal on the day before her opening.  I could feel the concert mojo recklessly flowing my way. 

Memories of listening to Barbra’s albums in my friend Joan’s bedroom emerged from my youth. Joan was the enviable owner of a stereo and we spent countless afternoons hearing that voice and those songs.  We referred to Barbra as our “best friend” pouring over her album covers and contents.   It was teen rapture.  

Trying to explain this feeling to my then teen and pre-teen aged daughters was most challenging. As I told anyone who could bear to listen, I described my great fortune in that I would actually be breathing the same air as Barbra! My perplexed youngest daughter said, “Mom, I’ve never seen you like this!”  And she was right.  My concert self was emerging from its Rip Van Winkle coma.


Happily, after purchasing my ticket, I made an out-of-the-blue call to Joan only to discover she, too, was going to see Babs for the first time – a  50th birthday gift from her husband.  Could the gods be more benevolent?  We, who shared this childhood passion for Streisand 40 years ago, would see her together so many years later. 

That week my personal mantra was, “If it does not start with Barbra and end with Streisand, I don’t want to hear about it.”  This was business.

Concert and Dress Rehearsal tickets

My mom attended the dress rehearsal with me. As the music began (the Funny Girl Broadway Overture) and Barbra emerged on a platform rising from below stage, my mom squeezed my hand like a vice grip in her utter disbelief that Barbra was really there. We were stunned and then exhilarated as Barbra sang, joked, and caressed us with her unmatchable talent.  It was more rapture.            

Knowing I would see Barbra perform the next evening gave me the giddy reassurance that I could float in this bubble with no worry of let down – not yet.

Thanks to Joan’s suggestion, I wrote down the set list for review.  Joan did not want to see it but thought it would be a fun keepsake and she was right.  We met early the next evening for a pre-concert dinner in South Philly.  We reminisced and reveled in our great fortune to see our childhood idol – breathing the same air. 

Walking around the venue before the concert, I smiled at the collection of fellow attendees thinking how we all shared this thing for Barbra.  It moved me and is one of the precious memories of that evening. (Whenever I attend a sporting event or concert at this venue I look at section 112 with quiet joy). 

I savored each morsel Barbra offered. As the saying goes, she could have sung the phone book and I would have been riveted. A favorite song for me was “Starting Here, Starting Now” – so hopeful.  That voice. Those notes. That style. She delivered melodies with her signature vocal sincerity and mightily awoke the sleeping concert spirit within me.  I have attended numerous performances since, thrilled to be reacquainted with my concert self. 
 
Equally pleasing was sharing such a night with a dear childhood friend and fan. It is a highlight of my life.

For a review of "What Matters Most" http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/23/arts/music/albums-by-pistol-annies-barbra-streisand-and-zee-avi.html?scp=2&sq=barbra%20streisand&st=cse

CBS Sunday Morning featured Barbra this past Sunday in anticipation of her new album and here is the link to that interview: http://www.youtubehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?

"Music elevates life.  When you have certain emotions that are larger than life you want to express them in a larger way.  Music is so rich in being able to identify with feelings.   

It is powerful to the soul."  B. Streisand.

Be Curious

Ask questions.  Seek answers.  Don't stop.
This seems to be the essence of Philip Leaky's seventy-plus year old life. David Brooks of the NYTimes shares his recent visit with the son of famed paleoanthropologists Louis and Mary Leakey and comes away with one exceptional example of a life well lived. 

The backdrop to Philip's life in Kenya soars with frontier-like adventures that are everyday events in the African bush.  Brooks sums up the family dynamic when he explains, "The Leakeys are the sort of people who, when their car breaks down in the middle of nowhere, manage to fix the engine with the innards of a cow."

Philip, and his wife Katy live atop a mountain in Kenya and are involved in multiple ventures that use what is around them to provide employment, appreciation, and sustenance.  Immersed in their environment,  Leaky's sense of wonder and respect for the land seems limitless.  But it is Philip's insatiable curiosity that is the focal point of the article.  He does not seem to draw a line between work and interests - he melds them so that his work is comprised of improving and questioning things that cause him wonder.  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/19/opinion/brooks-the-question-driven-life.html?_r=1&src=ISMR_AP_LO_MST_FB

This makes me wonder how much do I nurture my curiosity?  How much do I nurture curiosity in my daughters? In this 21st century moment, does curiosity get enough attention and fuel? Philip Leaky, born and raised in the Kenyan bush has married his nosiness with action resulting in many successes and I imagine an equal number of failures. Is this possible while living in suburban Philadelphia? 

I read and re-read the article trying to untether myself from Leaky's exotic locale so I could focus more on his motivation. Curiosity is not a location based drive.  We all have it. How much do we use it?  I recall my youngest daughter's questions about our car when she was a toddler. I called it our version of NPR's show 'Car Talk' because every single time we drove together for a few months she asked question upon question about how our car worked.  She was relentless, even in light of my weak answers. 

That's the beauty of having an inquiring mind - the answers don't drive you, the questions do.  (Now that she is 16 with a learner's permit, we are in a different stage of car questions like "Can I drive?")

Those early years contain the percolating persistence of questions like who, what, when, where and why.  This perfect cocktail blending expression and curiosity fuels young toddlers as they find their voice and spend the majority of their early conversation in questions and observations.  Philip Leaky never submerged this primary drive. 

I wonder how much I have asked "What do you think?" or "Why do you think this is so?" not only of my kids but of myself? While Philip Leaky's life has not one similar ingredient to mine in time and place, we share the primordial human instinct of curiosity.  I marvel at how accessible this makes his remarkable life. 

While he literally sits atop a mountain in his wonderment, Leaky is an active life participant.   Contemplation combined with action works anywhere, not just in the far reaches of Africa. Brooks has managed to write about Leaky's remote life as an example of how we all have power to exercise our inquisitiveness.  This article reminds me to place curiosity at the forefront of my thoughts and actions and to nurture/appreciate it in others.  

A Facebook Birthday

The sentiments may be redundant, but c'mon, who doesn't love feeling the full burst of Facebook friend well wishes on their birthday?

Even with my paltry double digit number of Facebook friends, I become giddy as each wish appears. This year I was out of town for my birthday, so seeing those greetings come up on my smartphone while I was far away from home held sentimental sway for me. I am an easy target.

A piece in today's New York Times elaborates on the Facebook birthday and the comments that follow it reveal reader discontent that got my attention. Virginia Heffernan's Opinionator piece titled "The Social Economics of a Facebook Birthday" causes me to emerge from a birthday wish stupor to once again be reminded that every point has a counterpoint and catch myself saying, "Hmmmm..didn't consider that."
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/14/the-social-economics-of-a-facebook-birthday/?ref=opinion

Ms. Heffernan's article captures the efficiency of Facebook greetings and expands on the pluses and minuses. Yes, there are minuses. The disjointed Greek chorus of comments is in full voice and I find myself agreeing with some of the points made.

Part of the allure of reading articles on line is the collection of comments they consistently attract and the 120 comments as of this writing that follow the Times article did not disappoint.

Concern about personal information floating across the internet and in fear of identity theft were popular warnings from some readers. One reader stated that "Facebook is not social. It's financial." I argue it is both. Jennifer from New York referred to the networking site as "Fakebook" in her terse tirade.  I think she's had a less than good experience.

It was the remarks regarding friendship and how friends reach out that interested me the most. It seems to some that the FB posts represent a bare minimum outreach from folks on the perimeter of our lives, making the volume full but insincere. If someone knows its your birthday and purchases a card that resonates, writes a personal note, addresses it and remembers to mail it, the effort made outperforms some quick keystrokes and exclamation points. Yet, FB has a message feature that allows me to write a personal message to any friend which is just seen by them - this also shows sincere effort even if it is intangible. (The fact that the US postal service is planning to cut one third of its workforce, some 120,000 workers, by 2015 confirms the impact of the electronic message).

I am consistently hopeful that the mailbox at the end of my driveway will contain something personal each day that I collect the mail. I am disappointed 95 percent of the time (I repeat, an easy target am I), but on those few occasions when a note, a card, or, gasp- a letter sits among the hodgepodge of junk mail and bills my spirit lifts.  No amount of emails or FB posts can match that feeling for me. 

David Plotz, whose article from Slate was the basis for Ms. Heffernan's piece, spits lightening barbs as he tests the insincerity of FB birthday wishes calling FB "a form of social lubrication that makes a mockery of everyone connected to it."  He changed his birthday three times during July to see if anyone noticed and by far he received three days of good wishes with just a few 'friends' recognizing his greed. (His birthday is really in January). http://www.slate.com/id/2300637/pagenum/all/#p2   Mr. Poltz's FB account is a work page so his 'friends' are mostly Slate readers, not real friends.  I did appreciate his point and his methods of proving it even if he is a bit of a curmudgeon.

I am not a FB malcontent.  As we star to some degree in our little reality shows by posting on FB, it does raise the question of what purpose is really being served here?  Many comments sighed with a shrug wondering what harm was being done to receive a pleasant "Happy Birthday."  "It's nice. It's gracious. It's low-key and civil," noted one reader.  Why squeeze a negative out of a simple good wish?

I think the Mad Hatter had the most original approach as he and his friends greeted Alice in Disney's "Alice in Wonderland" by wishing her a very merry Un-Birthday. It's different yet sincere. And no one gets hurt - well at least not until the Queen of Hearts shows up but that is for another day - certainly not a birthday! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InSn2BLDwfQ

Electronic or Paper? Sync or Script

In our syncing world of electronic everything, I still use a paper calendar. 

There is no compelling reason behind the choice.  I've had an iPod for several years, a smartphone for one year and received a Kindle yesterday as a gift.  None of these devices came into my life out of necessity. They entered as either a birthday or Christmas present and, except for the new Kindle, as the song says, "they're second nature to me now."

My calendar, however, continues to be a pen and paper thing.

In her Sunday Times article "A Paper Calendar? It's 2011," Pamela Paul writes about leaving her paper personal organizer at work over a weekend, prompting some soul searching about life's anchors.  After a weekend of unsettling schedule ignorance, Sunday evening arrived with the the author also deprived of a look into her upcoming week. She offered this reflection: "I had nothing to worry about except what I didn't know I should be worrying about." http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/31/fashion/calendar-wars-pit-electronics-against-paper.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=A%20paper%20calendar?%20it%22s%202011%22&st=cse

Not surprisingly Ms. Paul's reporting noted that colleagues who sync their personal and work calendars electronically, referenced paper calendar users as opting for a "horse and buggy" and "dinosaur" choice.  Their synchronized consolidation has merit if blending is what you seek. 

Christena Nippert-Eng, a sociologist at the Illinois Institute of Technology, studied 
work/life balance and states in the Times article, "People who merged their home and work keep all their keys on one chain and all their home and work commitments on one calendar."  She went further to investigate any affect this might have on privacy and concluded that while "it is a good way to break down the boundaries between different parts of your life," it equally challenged how to keep different slices of our lives apart.

I would love to offer well thought out reasons for keeping a paper calendar - some higher level of understanding and awareness that helps me maintain an individualized stance in the age of clouds, tablets, and all consuming friending. Alas, my only retort is, well, I like my paper calendar.  It has been my companion for almost 20 years.  Each December I purchase the new year of pages (yikes! not a green choice) and happily switch them three months at a time.  I find particular pleasure in viewing the month at a glance - life in one look. Every date also has some pithy quote (I read them all). A favorite, coincidentally from Ben Franklin upon whom the Franklin Covey name is built, resonates with the writer inside me struggling to gain some footing:

"If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead,

either write things worth reading or do things worth writing." 

Days after I returned to work after having my first child in 1991, I found myself in a hotel meeting room with a hundred or so colleagues for a full day of training on using the corporate adopted Franklin Covey system.  Imagine! An entire day to learn how to plan and organize a calendar - all paper!  It seems unreal now.  Today Franklin Covey naturally offers multiple software versions of its systems.  The only change I've made is to downsize from the hefty classic planner to a pocket sized version.  My leather, deep burgundy, organizer is a small bundle of scratched softness with a snap that still works. 

And it does not crash.  The only error is human if I lose it.

Just to cement my uncool calendar attachment, I have kept several months-at-a-glance pages from over the years.  They are, in the spirit of A Christmas Carol, the ghosts of events past and they give me an odd sense of comfort.  I realize this "keeping" is all possible in the digital form but it does not speak to me.  I can't defend or explain my paper preference.   

Excuse me now while I figure out how the paperless world of Kindle works. Don't get me started on changing to ebooks.   

How about you? Paper or Electronic?