Passions Aroused/Meet the Flintstones!

Tuesday and only three days left, right? That whole Mayan calendar end of the world thing. It's on our radar, or some of us at any rate. Surprisingly, when I've brought it up recently to a few friends they somehow missed it entirely - they didn't know this was their last week! Wonder if they would have changed their plans! Last night, the final night at Petterino's until end of January (hiatus). 'Twas packed and we had a merry table with six singers - we all sang great. Judy sang a beautiful medley, Bernie an original song that he accompanied himself to, complete with kazoo, Carmen sang something from her extensive raunchy repertoire, Janet sang a tune from her upcoming show and I surprised everyone by singing a parody of "Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire." I don't usually do funny stuff. And really, funny might be stretching it a bit - maybe only funny to music geeks - maybe the rest of the non-music-literate audience was at a loss but that's OK. Mark, my music coach, gave me the song on Saturday - he was over the moon about it. I loved it too and set to memorizing it for last night - only had two days.  Here are the lyrics - would help if you would sing it with the Chestnuts tune:

Octave moving to the mediant

Major 6th stepping down to Do
Major 2nds being sung by a choir
Chromatic alterations of the scale.

Diatonic scale, descending scale to minor third

Major 6th, "2 - 5 - 1 of 4"

Major 2nds with their ears open wide

will hear a pretty tritone tonight

There's minor 7ths in the bridge

There's also lots of minor 2nds in the bridge

And every minor 6th is gonna try

to hear the supertonic over 5 of 5

A motif used to build this simple phrase

Major 6th five walks down to 1

Although this phrase rises to a high leading tone

Drop a perfect 5th

Meet the Flintstones

Sing a perfect 4th, two one

Yesterday I responded to a critical comment on my post about the Connecticut shooting. The writer took exception to the idea that we all bear responsibility for what happened. And while it did get my dander up, I am grateful for the discourse - glad to bandy ideas about with each of you. Going forward I'm going to work on softening my responses because, for dialogue to exist, it's really important to take that deep breath before writing and write in a way that the other person can "hear" versus just reacting to criticism. And who knows? - maybe they're right and I'm wrong! What the hell do I know anyway? I also got a couple of on the side e-mails and had a discussion with Kirk (Luke) who had a totally different vantage point on the event. What's emerging for me is that there is a lot of feeling smoldering - this event seems to be giving those feelings a voice. We are talking (sometimes disagreeing) and that is a good thing. Over the next few days, I'll relate and paraphrase some of what has come to me from thoughtful friends whose passions have been roused.

Friend Anna wrote to me last night:

I don't understand why people are only focusing on the gun issue.  The man was mentally ill!!!!!  Did you know government, in an attempt to "save money", pulled most of the funding from mental institutions and clinics?   Where are these people to go for help/resources?  I'll tell you where they go. . .back home to a family that's afraid of them & have no clue on how to help their loved ones out.  Once the family is too exhausted to deal with all the emotional/physical attributes (i.e. violent outbursts) associated with mental illness they literally push that person out the door in an attempt to save their own sanity and lives.  It's a hard cold truth and no one seems to want to go there to discuss what I believe to be the real root of this tragedy - a man left alone to deal with his demons (mental illness).  Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending Adam Lanza's actions - his actions caused me to literally cry & almost throw up.  But, I don't like it when this issue is brushed aside & guns take the spotlight.  There must be more done to pin point those that are on the fringe of society & we can only do this if there is more help made available.    

Kirk also focused on the mental health issue - felt, like Anna, that the gun control discussion was off the mark. He went on a rant about how we are failing as a society by not "naming and shaming". He would have us keep tabs on the fringe members of our society, stop coddling them and making excuses for their anti-social behavior, remove their ready access to weapons, lock them up if they posed a credible threat. He went on to say we fail our citizenry when we hold people to anemic standards - cited statistics about the black community and how they are held to a lower standard of education and behavior than whites. Somehow the discussion became about accountability and societal standards and ways of setting the bar higher for people living on the fringe. Hmmmmm......interesting.

This week I will share my own journey with the whole gun control issue. If this were politics, I'd be one of the coveted "undecided" with one foot in each party. I have enjoyed shooting a handgun on the firing range. Being a Revolutionary War buff, I have an appreciation for the role armed private citizens had in winning our independence from England - the well equipped English armies marching from Canada under the leadership of over confident British general Burgoyne were defeated by quickly banded together farmers carrying their own muskets.  And I've wondered if the uprising in Iran a few years ago was too easily squashed - too one sided - the citizenry there not armed. Would they have been able to overthrow their government if they had access to weapons?

Your challenge today could be to appreciate that a floodgate of passionate thinking has been unleashed by these events - the recent tragedy has created a forum for us to converse and examine our own positions, maybe change our positions. From discourse, change may occur.  So be part of the discussion. Listen well to what other people have to say and be open to learning more and maybe even changing your opinion!

Peace,
Sarah