We hurtle through our lives at such a rate and pace that, to me, it's a miracle anything at all is remembered for more than an hour.
But some things should truly never be forgotten, such as the scale and scope of the atrocities committed eighty years today ago at Babi Yar.
Only human beings can be this monstrous.
 |
| A memorial in Kyiv in memory of those murdered at Babyn Jar. |
As I mentioned last week, we've arrived at that season where the only space on your front lawn NOT covered by autumn leaves probably has a sign urging others to vote for a specific candidate for City Council, Mayor, or member of the Board of Education.
And while we’re all waiting for some form of debates between
and among the candidates for Mayor as well as among those running for City
Council, let me advocate and agitate for letting those who are Board of
Education candidates be heard. Frankly, when was the last time we heard a
debate among those folks?
I endorse the notion that there's no such thing as a
Republican or a Democratic Party method to educate third graders, but in recent
years the City Council has made decisions on policemen versus firemen versus
building inspectors versus infrastructure repairs versus long-delayed pension
contributions, etc., because of reduced tax revenues and an ongoing rise in
municipal expenses in which the operating budget for the Board of Education is well
north of 50% of the entire City’s.
We fixate on this twice every year: during budget deliberations
and when we receive our tax bills. The
rest of the time we seem to think paying for municipal goods and services is
someone else’s problem when we are, in fact, the someone else with that
problem.
I'd like to hear what those whom we choose as members of the
Board of Education think our priorities should be, and learn a bit more about
what, if any, ideas for economies and/or enhancements (and how to pay for them)
they wish to share.
Be warned: I’m looking for a candidate who pledges to
organize children for weekend redeemable-can-and-bottle drives to pay for field
trips and administrator salary increases. Obviously, I was trying to be
humorous, though you may have only gotten the trying part.
Meanwhile, with a little more than a month until Election
Day, there's NOT a debate by anyone, anywhere on the horizon in Norwich when there
should be at least one once a week, anywhere, because we have the blessings of (informed)
choice and need to know as much as we can about those who have offered their
time and talents in our service.
In recent days I’ve had people tell me to support various
people because ‘they love Norwich, and they mean well.’ I had already assumed
the former; as for the latter, I’m tired of people who mean well and would like
some who are willing to do well, for all of us. Just as a change of pace.
Here's my point (thanks for reading this far hoping I might have
one): Lawn signs/letters to newspaper editors supporting candidates are well
and good but we need to pay closer attention to all those ‘for sale’ signs
which signal that more and more of us have decided there are no more happy
endings, or beginnings, left around here.
Each one of those signs is a surrender that does just a
little more damage to the fabric of our neighborhoods, and I wonder and worry
that we may never know from any of this year’s crop of candidates how they intend
to stop the rush to the exits even as the moving vans circle the block.
-bill kenny
I spend more and more of my life online. Just the evolution of both our society and how I live in it (or try to, if I'm being honest). On a daily basis and more frequently than I first realized until I concentrated on counting the instances, I am asked by a website to prove I'm human.
You've seen these things.
Sort of like that joke about why the thermos is the world's greatest invention. You think I jest?
To review, it keeps hot things hot and cold things cold. But that's NOT why it's the world's greatest invention.
It's the world's greatest invention because I want to know how it tells the difference.
-bill kenny
The New York Dolls were legendary without, in my opinion (perhaps only mine), actually being very good at any aspect of rock and roll. I've chosen to believe many of us decided that because they were so stunningly different from anything and anyone we'd ever seen, they must be great.
Feel free to use that same logic when pitching kale ice cream to an investor and let me know when you'll be starting up production.
Anyway, as someone (maybe a kale ice cream investor), once told me everything comes from something else; which, three bowls in (and I don't mean kale ice cream) sounds a lot more profound than it actually is.
If the New York Dolls were performance art, I'm not sure who this is.
Except she's brilliant.
-bill kenny
One of the few things that we have in common across the globe (aside from our hatred of those unlike us) is our passion for sports. You name it, and someone plays it and someone else has it as their national pastime.
But what if we extended the similarities and parallels just a tiny bit more?
Hypothetically, let's say we were to take all the sports everywhere that were played with balls and standardized the ball.
With me so far? Good.
Now, let's make that ball we're going to play all our sports with a bowling ball.
I call dibs on the shoe rental franchise.
-bill kenny
If you tell a lie often enough it becomes the truth. That's not a lie; that is the truth.
I enjoy holidays as much as the next person, and when I worked, I took them off whether I deserved to or not, so if you have time off for th...
