Skyward for March 2022 by guest blogger David Levy

 

Once again, here is our guest blogger, Dr. David Levy.  This post is dedicated to the memory of our friend, Terry Dufek, avid astronomer and aficionado of action figures.

Skyward for March 2022

 

Picture Caption:  Eureka, one of my telescopes, is probably s bit
better than the one referred to in Wordsworth's 1806 poem Star Gazers.

Star Gazers

What crowd is this?  What have we here?  We must not pass it by;

A telescope upon its frame, and pointed to the sky…

n      William Wordsworth, 1806

 

While I was working on my master’s degree at Queen’s University in Canada some 42 years ago, I came across this poem, loved it, and decided to include it in my thesis.  Norman MacKenzie, my thesis advisor, a scholar and a genius, pencilled one comment at the bottom of this poem:  “Wordsworth wrote some wretched verse.”    Norman did not have much of a sense of humour, but I am still laughing at his written comment.   

In his poem, Wordsworth complains about how many people who look through a telescope are disappointed in what they see.  At no point in time is that idea more cogent than now.  If a telescope we look through cannot offer us a view as good as a space telescope, then that telescope is a failure. 

By the end of the poem, the crowd abandons the telescope:

 

“One after one they take their turns, nor have I one espied

That doth not slackly go away, as if dissatisfied.”

For me, the night sky is far more than our imagined perceptions of what we can see through a telescope.  Some of us can look at an internet photograph all day long, but not I.  The beauty of the sky lies in its reality. The planets I see are real worlds.  The constellations I point out to young observers contain real stars.  One evening I asked a group if they had seen the recent eclipse of the Moon.  “Yes,” answered one, “I saw it online.”  No, he didn’t.  Eclipses are real only if you see them in the sky, while they are happening.

It is a given that a back yard telescope will never show us Jupiter as detailed or as colorful as a telescope out in space will.  What that telescope does show us is the genuine sky, a sky without artificial color enhancement, a sky as it really exists on top of our heads on every clear night.   It shows us a sky untarnished by the trivial events of the day, and unspoiled by petty concerns that are bothering us.  Our own telescope truly shows us the Moon as it was a third of a second  ago,  a star as it appeared thirty-four years ago, or a galaxy as it appeared  twelve million years in the past.  Our back yard telescope shows us what is there, and unlike the crowd from 1806 that left dissatisfied, the people of today can understand that the sky they see is real.

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Pym was not a stranger to toys and recreation.  A father Christmas figure, soap animals, "bits and pieces" antiques, Cycladic idols stuffed animals, and more appear in her novels.  Our museum is open, and some of her books are there, too.  We even have a Pym doll and a Virginia Woolf nutcracker. Don't forget her fellow writer Denton Welch loved doll houses!

Pymian Material Culture

 

Material Culture

 

Happy Mother’s Day, a day I can no longer celebrate since I lost my mom and my aunt, but all the same.

 

I was pondering human individuality, and what our things and what we do with them say about us.  One famous art teacher and collector likes to pick up discarded grocery lists.  The contents of shopping lists, and the tasks we write on our daily planners says a lot about us.  Like snowflakes, no two are alike. We all write mini autobiographies when we pen a list, especially for the super market.  How we do it is also telling.  I used to write mine in my daily planner; now I text it to myself.  No time to write it down.  I’ve also used neat little pads like my aunt, or scraps of paper.  My mom write lists for dad, or cruised the aisles working from memory.

 

It’s telling what things we put over and over; coffee, oatmeal, cat food, Clamato juice, coke.

 

The books on our shelves, or lack thereof, also say a lot about us.  Some artists do portraits of people by painting the books on their book shelves.  If we collect, or not, also says a lot.  What we collect says even more.  No two collections are every alike.

 

People who save nothing make a statement, too, as do those who painstakingly arrange their shoes and wardrobe.

 

Stuff matters.  It defines us.  It lives after us to describe who we are.  Think King Tut, the Emperor’s Tomb, the Snettingham Horde.

 

People in Barbara Pym books all have their bits and pieces.  Marcia her bags, milk bottles, and string.  All have their books.  Leonora Eyre has her perfect antiques.  Older women their flea market finds, or bits and pieces.  Clergyman have soap animals and Faberge eggs.  Norman his stuffed animals at the Brit Museum.

 

Some characters mentally collect license plates.  They would love Pinterest.  Jewelry is important to some, others have hobbies like caring for cats and hedge hogs.  Jumble sales and Bring and Buys are routine. All have their books and magazines.

 

Even in simple things, what we chose to keep and discard from the material world defines us.

 

Thoughts to ponder.

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Here it is after 17 years of research and constant editing and rewriting; Thank you Dr. Roald Tweet.  This is the story of us, our museum, me, my friends and family, and of course, the dolls.

What I learned from Dr. Tweet

 

What I learned from Dr. Tweet

 

Around this time of year, late fall or early winter, during the late 70s, we were studying Moby Dick in Dr. Tweet’s American Renaissance class.  The theme of “heart’s honeymoon” was prevalent.  Here were all these sailors, from all over the world, some barely “civilized” according to 19^th century American mores, all depending on each other certainly for survival, but also for companionship and fellowship.  Some couldn’t speak English, but that didn’t matter.  They were still tied together in a common endeavor, “brothers in Christ”, if you will.

 

I saw the same theme in Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad, my favorite writer.  The thrill of it all, that despite our differences, we are human, and we need each other for love and for survival.

 

That’s a powerful message to remember at the end of this terrible year, where I fear we still are not out of the woods.  This past week, I learned of the deaths of two more friends, not Covid 19 related, but devastating all the same.  In the last six weeks, that’s, five people for me in the last six weeks alone.  I don’t know how many altogether this year, but my Aunt Connie’s death stands out above all.  Swift, terrible, sudden.  In the last 2.5 years, I’ve had three funerals for family, several deaths on the same day, lost three of my closest friends, people I depended on.  I lost my mother, too, and that seemed to start all of it.

 

While it’s true many of my friends were older, it is also true that I know people of extreme old age who are hale and healthy and who, yes, work.

 

It’s almost over, and many of us are still alive.  My cousin, disabled, but still young, endures in a nursing home, with her devoted brother visiting on the other side of plexi glass every two days. Parents of other good friends and family languish in their assisted and even independent living establishments, trapped indefinitely till this nightmare is over.

 

It bothers me we forget who we are as Americans; that no one, on either side of the aisle, reads The Constitution. It bothers me that something as trivial as politics can cause an intellectual and philosophical civil war.  

 

Forgive me for rambling, but for 13 years, I’ve watched my family suffer and die, often because of mistakes of incompetent hospitals and so called health care professionals.  Yes, I’ve spoken up, reported, watched, done my due diligence.  It didn’t help.  My comfort is what goes around comes around; what happened to my family will happen to them, or even better/worse, to someone they love.  I wish I could be there to laugh in their faces when that happens.

 

Despite the fact that my Mediterranean personality demands the vendetta, I try to live in memory to take comfort, especially during the holidays.  I honor my family with cemetery flowers, but I try paying it forward to people with small gifts and contributions, by remembering our charities and church, by saying prayers, like “Thank you, Lord, for this day”, each morning.

 

I try to move forward, and have forgiven much of the past.  I try to be kind to someone, even a stranger, to remember how fleeting life is, to try to enjoy what I can. Yet, I know that now, when I set our holiday table, I also prepare a place for the Angel of Death, who walks with me everywhere.

 

This holiday season, may your loved ones’ memories be eternal.  Take comfort in Him who died for our sins, and whom we celebrate this time of year.  As you take your ornaments out, treasure your memories, and remember that no one who is remembered really dies.