HUBRIS: HUMAN NATURE HASN'T CHANGED

Wikipedia image of
Pentheus being torn apart by two of  The Bacchae

Euripides' Pentheus characterizes hubris in the classic Greek tragedy, The Bacchae. I've never considered the play to be sad only tragic, here's why.

Human beings, men and women, educated or not, continue to ignore their hubris--in simplified terms "pride." Whether they achieve greatness or not, humans instinctively believe that in the course of overwhelming obstacles they know what's best, even when told their tactics will eventually result in their demise.

No one is immune to hubris. This optimistic cynic has to tussle with her instinct to embrace cynicism and deny optimism on a daily basis. I'm sure I'm speaking in behalf of many people who face the same temptation. Politics, religion, medicine, environment and daily strife push us to the edge where we wish to raise our voices in anger and knock down the walls that keep us from living contented lives. And that's the problem: our pride, and modern media, lead us to believe we deserve to live an easier life especially as we age, an idyllic existence.

Pentheus, Euripides protagonist, sees the world as his manufactured oyster. Self-delusion also haunts Pentheus. He wants to taste the bitterness (war) and ignore the sweetness (love). Yet, anyone who lives near fresh oyster beds and gets to slurp the delectable bi-valve knows that oysters come in a wide variety to tempt the palate, degrees of sweetness to bitterness. Here on Cape Cod, the prized Wellfleet oysters taste differently depending on where they've been cultivated. If you attend Oysterfest, a yearly October tradition in Wellfleet, and sample oysters offered by different shellfishermen (and women) you will indeed taste the differences. No one can guarantee that their oyster will satisfy you. And that's the rub.

The Cape, and much of New England, sometimes reminds me of the Old West. Long time Yankees (not the team, this is Red Sox nation) "pride" themselves on being rugged individuals who can stand on their own and live their lives without depending on others. A sense of community does exist, sprinkled here and there, men and women willing to give back and help those in need. Yet, like the lone protagonists we find shouting out their defiance, especially on the national political stage, we have individuals here who strut their self-reliance and how they don't need anyone. These humans' overconfidence have undermined not only their own existence but also their family's, friend's and so on. How can this be?

Yes, free spirits have floated around since the rise of homo sapiens. From the ones that we know of in history made significant contributions, Alexander Humboldt or Emily Dickinson, to those who destroyed the people around them, Attila the Hun or Benito Mussolini. Whether they be past presidents or subsequent global leaders, if these men or women are unable to listen to others, to hear the voices of their people or in a micro example, heed advice from loved ones, especially when their world is falling apart, then their self-destruction will affect everyone around them.

Euripides, warns us in the The Bacchae I. 480:  “Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish." Or it's variant translation (which I prefer):  "To the fool, he who speaks wisdom will sound foolish."

Life for any human being will never satisfy regularly. The misconception that wealth, power, fame will solve our own fallacies continues to assert itself in our precarious world. And if, like Pentheus, we believe that we can prevail on our own without help from others or we can be citizens of the world without contributing to its future, its community, we too will be ripped apart by our own hubris.

MY FRIEND THE "KEEPER"

On Cape Cod, we have beekeepers, pond keepers (e.g. Orleans Pond Coalition), gardeners, nature volunteers and climate activists. And then there's my friend who does all those activities and more. Older than I, though most wouldn't believe it, with endless energy; determination, she commands your attention with quiet gravity but smiles with grace. Also, in today's jargon, she'd be called an ambivert.

B.'s also a wife, mother and grandmother. I get to see B.'s family on special occasions. Needless to say, she's garnered enormous respect from her children and their spouses; squeals of joy from the grandchildren.

Illinois Indian roots along with northern European: long, razor-straight dark hair, now sprinkled with salt; sharp eyes that open wide with defiance when challenged, there's no question that my friend has strong opinions. She occasionally adopts strays like her blind, arthritic mutt that sounds the alarm when visitors enter the house, yet calms quickly when he detects a friendly presence, and humans like me who don't fit society's mold but bring curiosity to the table.

More so, my friend has artistic precision. Her woven rugs (see above) and tapestries demonstrate fine attention to detail without clutter and great sense of color. This woman dresses in clothes that understate her personality and do away with fanciful accessories. Although she does accessorize, minimally, she saves her energy for her commanding personality and creativity.

Of all her interests, I'll call her B. to maintain her anonymity, something she'd want I'm sure, B.'s love of beekeeping mesmerizes me. How does one decide to take on such a challenge? After attending a workshop, B. became interested in preserving nature's pollinator's, particularly after learning about honeybees dying off in droves. Ever the nature-preserver, B. became a beekeeper. Clearly, to me at least, a hobby she has undertaken with inner calm and careful authority. Like a queen bee, no setback will deter B. from maintaining her colony.

Yes, B. can be a taskmaster: questioning, sometimes simple responses--a reporter fact-checking her source's story. Exacting standards sometimes bow even the normally unflappable, though her wanting perfection doesn't mean others will achieve it.

With that said, having a friend one can rely on to listen, do and act, if available, demonstrates an ability few people will embrace these days. As friends go, B. is a "keeper."

For a description of more of B.'s tapestries, read my book DARK SEA (Shadowwater II). www.shadowwater.net

PURPLE FLAG WARNING

When potentially dangerous ocean animals have been spotted, you'll see a dark blue or purple flag. These flags fly either on their own or with other colored flags. If you see a blue or purple flag, but the water is not closed to swimming, use extreme caution and keep a close watch for dangerous animals. (USA TODAY)

(Google Image)

A hidden, life-long goal had been to relocate to Cape Cod. I didn't come close until Summer 2002. Moved here permanently in 2007 and have felt lucky. Living near the sea has brought magic into my life that I never thought possible. Yet, there's always a "but," isn't there?

Walking Nauset Beach and watching seals popping their heads up to catch a breath and get their bearings delighted me, though my head told me the playful pinnipeds were eating all the fish, affecting recreational and commercial fishing. My heart savored every moment. Then, an ever-increasing threat, once a concern in other parts of the world has since been acknowledged here: climate change. I heard your groans and moans as you read those words. Today's blog will be more anecdotal than evangelical.

This time, I will focus on how climate change has affected my lifestyle and that of others who love to frolic in the waters off of Nauset Beach. Planet Earth is a living organism which, like shifting sands, changes at a moment's notice. Human beings have precipitated changes and we have to live with that. Still, beauty abounds even among danger and chaos, at least that's what I tell myself. My point? Sharks have invaded the Atlantic coast, off Cape Cod. At first, I joined the ranks of the curious. For example, Mary Lee and Katherine, regular visitors, have been tagged and studied by Atlantic White Shark Conservatory and Greg Skomal, PhD. Occasional visits by threatened Great Whites seemed fanciful and necessary to cull the overpopulated seals which, like me, had decided to move to Cape Cod. 

I'd forgotten why seals came here, however. The Atlantic Ocean temps have warmed, bringing sea-life not seen off Cape Cod and not in such record numbers. Well, nature has a way of restoring balance, so more and more Great White sharks have discovered their cornucopia. Damn. Purple flags, as described above, have been posted regularly at Nauset and other coastal beaches. One of the efficient predators was spotted in Nauset Inlet recently. That's right an inlet!

Left-side brain in charge: I'll approach the Great White shark phenom with a rational observation. The more sharks, the fewer seals, and more fish for our struggling commercial fishing industry. We who live on the Cape, especially those whose ancestors came here and our indigenous peoples, settled here because of the ocean's bounty. A way of life has been saved, right? Well, temporarily, but organisms must adapt to survive and based on predictions from the global scientific community, more drastic change will come. Besides, shark attacks are rare.

Right-side brain banging: no one would dare swim when purple flags have been posted. News and social media show people standing by the water's edge, waves brushing their toes, eyes looking out to sea wondering when they will be able to return. Overreaction? Not when last reported twenty-three Great White sharks have been seen trolling the coastline for seals, fish and a nibble of a bitter-tasting human. No longer being able to swim in the waters that my family and friends swam in cuts to the bone. Uh, unfortunate idiom, makes a point though. Thus, nostalgia has been wiped away by pre-historic predators. I feel for children, families that can't swim regularly off our coastal beaches. They at least have the Bay beaches (Cape Cod Bay and Nantucket Bay). 

Ironic. In my case, health issues--potentially caused by climate change (see earlier blog, dated 2/9/15)--keep me from stepping foot in the ocean. Feeling sorry for myself won't fix the problem for others. Therefore, I'll finish with these comments. I will take the changing marine environment as an opportunity to observe, to retain and then use the material for my writing. After all, human beings are animals, and like other species we must adapt.

Fascinated by the sea? Cape Cod life? Read my Shadowwater books. Details: www.shadowwater.net

"TRUMP L'OEIL" - DONALD TRUMP REDUX

First, apologies to mes amis français, art historians and those devotees of trompe l'oeil, the phrase meaning "to deceive the eye," for the above. Second, I'm a native New Yorker who grew up reading and hearing about, and finally seeing Donald Trump ever-present in the media. Also, I grew up in Cornwall, NY, important because the "on-the-Hudson" part of the town is home to the New York Military Academy, Donald Trump's alma mater. Last, I'm astounded how many people have forgotten that Trump has been and always will be a salesman or, in more basic terms, a shyster.

"To hell with the truth! As the history of the world proves, the truth has no bearing on anything. It's irrelevant and immaterial, as the lawyers say. The lie of a pipe dream is what gives life to the whole misbegotten mad lot of us, drunk or sober," spoken by Larry, a character in Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh.

Moreover, Hickey, the loudmouth salesman in the play enthralls his boozin' buddies with dreams of a better tomorrow. By the end of Act One, even the audience has been dazzled. However, like life, Act Two reveals what's beneath Hickey's propaganda. The result? All are deflated, including playgoers, and become silent with disbelief.

Donald Trump makes a great pitch but does he deliver? Trump has those qualities which, if O'Neill were alive, the playwright would recognize and probably put on paper. Donald Trump, the real estate mogul sweeps his audience away with clear talkin' platitudes. How quickly followers have forgotten Donald's foray into reality television with, The Apprentice. He and the show's producers convincingly bamboozled viewers into believing that show had real people, unscripted and undirected. However the devilish Omarosa later revealed otherwise: she displayed a much softer side, so much so the great, late actor Michael Clarke Duncan asked her to marry him. Known for his gentle, kind nature it's unlikely Duncan would fall for a she-devil. Still, the illusion continued. The Apprentice became the focal point for Donald Trump's larger-than-life personality and not a revelation of his real character.

Trump's outrage and nanosecond reactions, now seen on the political stage, do reveal his inability to stop, think and make rationale arguments for or against particular issues. Reactionaries rarely make effective leaders. Demonstrated in Trump's business practices, many in-the-know have reported that allegedly turn-over among Trump's staff rival Leona Helmsley's. As his empire grew, stories about Trump's ruthless management style have often seen in New York dailies.

We can't dispute that Trump knows what he wants and talks to the people without flourishes or stilted language. Qualities which helped him build his wealth and seen among many New York real estate moguls and brokers, too. These pitch-people have the street smarts and sales language to convince the most incredulous buyer to invest in properties. Hence, the major building boom which has attracted wealthy investors, many of whom rarely use their residences, and has pushed out regular workers from Manhattan properties.

And, like this picture, Trump has mastered the art of deception:

"Time is Money" by Gayle B. Tate (via Google Images)

Trump believes the hoopla which he speaks, making his fans believe in him. We can't dismiss an artist who creates convincing illusions, but we can look beneath the showmanship and see a candidate whose platform or stage lacks a solid foundation. Donald Trump's success has been giving his audience what they want to hear--as Hickey did in The Iceman Cometh, only to show his flaws when pushed to desperation. Lesson learned? Too dangerous to risk, enabling false idols such as a fictional character or a reality-show star.

I know you become such a coward that you'll grab at any lousy excuse to get out of killing your pipe dreams. And yet, as I've told you over and over, it's exactly those damned tomorrow dreams which keep you from making peace with yourself. So you've got to kill them like I did. (Hickey, Act III, The Iceman Cometh)

CORMORANTS UNDER ATTACK

Read my books and you'll find occasional references to tall, streamlined black birds which dive into and swim in the sea like Olympic athletes: their long beaks, spears that cut through the water as a chef's sharp knife through fish fillets, and their shiny wings stretch out like a lady's fan to dry. Cormorants often catch my attention when near their habitats: either off the shores or inland, where they congregate in large flocks.

If you look at my website, you'll see this pic above of the sophisticated "fishermen" along a Provincetown jetty. I took this shot as we "whale watchers" motored out of the harbor toward Stellwagen Bank in a large vessel. Most passengers were as oblivious to the seabirds as the double-crested cormorants were toward the human hordes dwelling on the decks.

The intended picturesque description above, a nod to my next book in the Shadowwater series, explains my admiration for these birds but, sadly, others don't share this fondness. Like their land-dwelling cohorts the common crow, cormorants have received a bad rap.

Many moons ago, NSTAR, now named Eversource, our electric utility on Cape Cod, decided to place towers on the north and south sides of Cedar Pond in Orleans, MA. Through the towers, the utility then threaded power lines on which cormorant flocks perch seasonally, from April through September. The avian multitudes' guano, however, has polluted the pond with nitrogen and phosphorus, creating algae blooms. Articles and editorials in The Cape Cod Times and other local papers that decried the deluge resulted in Eversource refusing to move or bury the power lines--too expensive--and the Orleans asking the USDA to come in to assess the situation. The department's solution? Shoot noisy rockets, or what officials euphemistically call "pyrotechnics" across the pond to scare away the offending cormorants. In fairness, the USDA had used this technique to frighten cormorants with some success. (www.capecodtoday.com )

Problem: cormorants knew better this time. They either left and returned in tentative waves of smaller flocks or moved to a nearby pond with power lines, Depot Pond. Meantime on top of the electrical towers, ospreys had nested, evidently ignored by the local officials and federal agency, for a friend discovered a dead osprey juvenile alongside the pond. I also read that a truck had been allegedly hit by a rocket but the driver not injured (Cape Cod Times, August 2014).

Now, I support the Orleans Pond Coalition and their fight to keep our town ponds clean. In addition, I can see the Orleans town officials' viewpoint by working out a solution that would be cost effective, expedient as well as harmless, in theory.

However, the basic problem has been overlooked: the utility placed the power lines, without considering the entire environmental impact. Moreover, the town's leaders didn't intervene at that time to raise objections--if there were protests they haven't been cited in recent reports--to the power lines. Now it appears the once endangered species, the osprey, have paid the price.

Scare tactics don't justify the end. Only accepting responsibility and correcting mistakes made in the beginning will solve the problem. And yet, the cormorants have been bullied but not beaten. Cormorants will return or move on but will always be here--at least I hope so.

NOTE: I chose not to submit this article as an editorial to local papers because I had an opinion piece published two weeks ago.

My passion extends to my books. Please check out: www.shadowwater.net for more information. Thanks!

HAPPENSTANCE & THE LOSS OF A LEGEND

Learned recently that Tony Stezko, Jr., a legend not just among those who follow fishing, but also as an Orleans fixture at Nauset Beach, had died in March. Surreal as Facebook still had Tony posted on my page as a "friend," including IM. As reported recently in the news, Facebook doesn't remove a user's account if the person has died. They assume a family member or friend will discontinue the account. In Tony's case, I'd like to believe that the person or persons chose to leave Tony Stezko's page open for others to post their condolences or stories, which they have. Readers may ask why didn't I know Tony had died through social media, the local papers or his Facebook page. No one posted a story via his site and I missed the announcement in the local papers about his death. Discovering therefore Tony Stezko had died, via a woman I hardly knew on a trip to Boston, floored me.

If I mentioned Tony mainly practiced catch and release, would you dismiss his past-time as being uneventful? Well, besides reading an earlier blog post of mine (FISHING REDUX, 6/23/14) which extols the joy of fishing, you might be interested in knowing that in the fishing world, and I mean the global community, Tony Stezko was and is a legend. He had a talent (holding the World Record at one point) for catching the largest, by weight, striped bass.

Why would someone whom I coincidently had met near his favorite saltwater fishing spot, Nauset Spit (Nauset Beach, Orleans), leave a sorrowful residue as I reflect upon his death? First, I have to credit my boyfriend for sparking the conversation about the best places to fish off Nauset. Neither of us had any idea that the man standing beside us with his clamming rake and bucket was an experienced caster, let alone renowned.

However, those reasons alone don't account for my sadness at his passing. After a brief conversation, he asked that my boyfriend--a fellow, passionate fisherman-- and I "friend" him on Facebook, leaving us struck by Tony's willingness to share. I would later take on the responsibility to befriend Tony as I follow social media, my boyfriend doesn't. Remarkably, Tony's few posts involved his family and friends, not, endless pics of his catches. I did IM Tony occasionally and as expected heard from him in a month or so. He didn't have ulterior motives--he had shared with us he had a girlfriend--he only wanted to answer questions about fishing

No, that day on the beach when I met Tony Stezko, his life-force struck me like a rogue wave breaking over me and catching me unawares. Affable, animated, genuine and generous, I couldn't stop listening to his stories and expertise. Like many notables, I have since heard about his vices and weaknesses which may have led to his untimely death at sixty-four (official cause: pneumonia after a long stretch in Cape Cod Hospital). Yes, a human elevated to legendary status for his passion, not necessarily for his personal behavior. That said, his pride when Tony spoke to us about his son, relatives that day on Nauset spit relayed Tony's endearing love for family.

As a writer, I wrestle with incorporating quirky characteristics Tony displayed and/or his tips about using lures, bait and other priceless information he imparted to my boyfriend about catching his prized stripers. Too soon, I think. Tony Stezko, Jr. died in March 2015. I have only had days to process the belated news. Then, I recall why I admired him. What made him different. He included me in his conversation as much as my boyfriend. I held equal weight, though fatigue had slowed me down and he noticed immediately I needed to sit, which I did. A keen observer, Tony Stetzko demonstrated a trait inherent to the best fishermen, and a skill any author would admire.

CRYSTAL CLEAR MEMORIES OF BELOVED LAKE - OPINION

LINK to article below: http://capecod.wickedlocal.com/article/20150803/NEWS/150809500

Via Orleans Pond Coalition