Elvis: A great story in a movie

 Elvis is one of the best dramatic movies ever, and I have no idea why it didn’t win any major Academy awards.  Taking the story of Elvis and creating, not just his life story, but also the pathos and tragedy of an international singer, who starts from nothing, becomes the most popular singer in the world and then falls from grace (Graceland), loses his marriage, takes illegal drugs, and then faces a coming financial ruin all by the age of 42.  How much more Shakespearean could someone’s life get?  

Like Mose Allison and Charley Pride, who also sounded black when they sang, Elvis too became popular with blacks. This film is a tribute to how a white kid, growing up in a black neighborhood obviously loved the blacks he knew and loved their gospel/church music.  His earlier music paid tribute to those songs, but later, which I did not know, he wrote many of his own. He became friends with B.B. King,  He made sure that blacks were part of his prominent lineup of singers in Las Vegas, because black groups like the Imperials were the best. . Earlier going against segregation laws in the South, he got on the wrong side of the Southern Democrats who wanted him jailed.  His activism was born of values that transcended the old-fashioned rhetoric of that time.

Austin Butler IS Elvis,and I was transported back to the 1950's easily with his character’s looks and voice.  Tom Hanks as Colonel Parker, Elvis’ conniving manager gets kudos for his excellence in body makeup a Dutch accent, tinged by the South and the part he plays..  Amazing characters, scenes, and story.  Best of course is the story.  You wouldn’t be taking a chance on this film now on Netflix. Press the button on Elvis.

LETTERS TO MY MOTHER AND FATHER

                          Letters to My Mother and Father

                         After Typewriters, Jeff Rovner Artist

    I am snipping the Sunday crossword from The Idaho Statesman to go along with a letter sent home.  It’s just to my mother now, but back in 1973, puzzles went along with the letters to both of them.
       At first, I wrote longhand and not very often.  At UCLA, even though I borrowed a typewriter to write the never-ending repertoire of papers for different courses--The Domestication of the Cat,  Irony in Porter’s Ship of Fools, Poison Imagery in Hamlet, I still wrote very short letters home.
    Then in graduate school, married, with a newly purchased Hermes portable typewriter, I completed papers on Renaissance literature, and I typed longer letters.  Still in graduate school on a Ph.D. program, I typed my way through papers on Oscar Wilde and John Hawkes.  Shifting keys and locking them in time and  place, I created papers on values and creativity on my way to finishing my degree.  I wrote letters telling my parents about my research, about our prolific gardens attached to married student housing at the UW-Madison, about the car battery freezing when it hit -30.
    The “a” key started to stick about l983, and I was propelled into word processing on an IBM computer.   My sporadic letters became weekly, single spaced sheets that I’d send with the  puzzle.  I could hear my mother’s voice as she sat, working a puzzle at her kitchen table with the white tablecloth, as if I were right next to her.
    “You were the English major, so who is the main character in For Whom the Bell Tolls, or what is the French word for “lake?”  Sometimes I filled in spaces with a few words in ink before I sent them.
    Although my teaching schedule was never the same, I wrote at six in the morning or on the weekend.  Somehow that personal writing cleared my head  for creative writing.  The letters became a way of enticing myself into writing manuscripts that later could become poems, stories, or novels.
    My father died in l99l.  I continued letters to my mother about family, my job, and events in my life.  In a short story that I was working on, I wrote that nothing was happening to my characters.  They were just standing there, oblivious to my ideas.  I was so angry at those characters that I wrote to my mother to tell her that I had placed them all on a raft out in the middle of a lake, and the raft was sinking.
    “What a terrible thing to do,” my mother said in a phone conversation back to me.  She called this time, did not write, and became part of the next generation without knowing it.
     I think now that my letters were limited monologues, with time for me to sort out my life  as my letters flew to California.  When my computer had user friendly graphics, I placed small images on the pages -- a rose (my father’s  favorite flower) and a woman golfer (for my mother who played into her eighties).
    On the computer, I learned to copy and paste images in sequence.  Now across a page, a row of horses galloped, cheetahs ran with the same exact stride, or wolves howled in the same sitting position.  Then once, a frantic cyclist, obviously me, a mountain biker here in the west, racing toward some imaginary finish line, writing more, publishing more.
    And so, along with the letters and the crossword puzzles, I finally sent my mother a short story.  Presto, ready to go.  Like magic, really.  I pressed the print button.  The one-page letter, the crossword puzzle, and the added short story.  Sent off.  No longer sinking on a raft, my characters were flying home.    

Published on THE AMERICAN THINKER BLOG: March 25, 2022

The Netanyahus: Heroes and their stories

By Norma Sadler

Once upon a time, I used “Let’s Bring Back Heroes,” an essay from Newsweek by William J. Bennett for a class in Literacy at Boise State University.  My idea was for students to talk about using magazine essays for their future classroom students and let those students riff on it.  One hero mentioned in the Newsweek essay was Yoni Netanyahu, who died in the hostage rescue mission at Entebbe. Could my students get past heroes like Superman and other fantasy figures and find real life heroes to write about that meant something to them?  They could.  Family, friends, those who made a difference in their lives took center stage.  For one, a grandfather who served in Vietnam became the hero in an essay.

Fast forward.  I am hooked on Bibi, My Story, by Benjamin Netanyahu.  Did I know 35 years go what I know now -- that Yoni was Benjamin’s brother?  Of course not. So another military hero who becomes prime minister of Israel crosses my path in an autobiography.  For me, Bibi, My Story is the clearest most comprehensive work on the history of Israel through the life of an extraordinary man who lived through much of it.  

Netanyahu takes us with him through the beginning of the state of Israel, the Six Day War and others,  the ordeals of freeing hostages, to the difficulty of dealing with propaganda on all fronts that diminishes Jews and attempts to destroy the country of Israel. It was hard for me to handle sometimes the anguish of the terrorist attacks, the loss of lives, and the struggle of Israel to survive surrounded by countries ten times its size, but I wanted to know more. I kept reading.

In 1979, Netanyahu arranged an international conference on terrorism in Jerusalem under the auspices of the Jonathan Institute, named for his brother.  Much of what came from that and later conferences helped the United States understand and take action against terrorists in countries that supported terrorist activity.   

I am halfway through Netanyahu’s book heading to the Abraham Accords, which have become a testament to the humanity of those around Israel who seek peace and recognize its legitimacy.  Much to read ahead.  I shall know more about Israel and a hero and a story than most citizens in this country. Others might consider this journey with Netanyahu and discover a hero and a story that is illuminating and worth reading.

So much to be learned from a play: Guest Opinion Capital Times Madison, Wisconsin June 12, 2022

https://captimes.com/opinion/guest-columns/opinion-so-much-to-be-learned-from-a-play/article_f9ebd478-b71b-54a9-b8e9-02e4def0bc25.html

The Scene: 1969, Sauk Trail Elementary School, Middleton, Wisconsin. With my fourth- and fifth-grade students, I am producing "A Midsummer Night’s Dream." It is right on schedule, as much as anything can be on schedule in an elementary school.

The rural landscape is the perfect setting, with huge rocks for Puck to leap from, woods for sprites to hide in, and lovely green grass for the court of Theseus. These students, the Sauk Trail Players, are the young local talent, becoming characters for one more play before their summer begins. Complicated names of characters, such as Hermia and Lysander, Oberon and Titania are no problem for them. An abridged play with the poetic meter of iambic pentameter, no problem.

The plot, a clever story, is filled with magical events that change lives. Children become their characters, suspend their own disbelief, as they hide among the rocks and behind trees. They create action, interpreting lines as they go. The play is the important thing, after all.

Going through scenes, children see what life is, feel what their characters feel, even if from old times and old places. They experience the vulnerability of being in a play, showing who they are by what they know about their characters. They figure out how to use gestures and pauses to make their characters "real.” They learn how to work together in order to create a play, and, at the same time, they learn how to keep their own characters’ identities intact.

The play is a huge success. The audience claps. The characters come out for bows. Standing off stage, in the grass, I am absolutely certain that drama is a way to show what it means to be alive in our time, in any past time. As characters, the students have gone through adventures, solved problems, and changed along the way. 

Scene: 1973. Evening. I am finishing up my Ph.D. at UW Madison. The phone rings. One of the former Sauk Trail Players, a junior high school student, is on the line. “I learned to read from being in the plays,” he says. “Do you remember me?” he asks. Of course, I did. But somehow I wasn’t aware that plays performed years earlier had helped him learn to read.

Scene: 2003, Boise, Idaho. The memory of the play is tucked away, far away in the past of 30 years. I see Mike Hoffman’s film version of "A Midsummer Night’s Dream." The film captures my interest, but I don’t expect it to capture my heart and carry it back to the 60s. Once again, I see my students as characters in the play, then lined up center stage front, bowing and ending their parts in a dream.

Such a dream of my own — that drama would make such a difference in their lives. Yes, I thought in l969 that drama would enrich their lives. Yes, I thought that they could learn to appreciate the form of theater and understand what actors went through to become characters. But students also became literate by reading to learn lines as they began to understand more about their characters and themselves.

The world of the play and their own worlds combined to change them in ways that I, as a beginning teacher, could not have predicted. And they did it all themselves, really. And so to the Sauk Trail Players, where ever you are, for what you learned about drama, about reading, about yourselves, more applause, like fragile notes on a butterfly’s wing. 

Norma Sadler is professor emeritus at Boise State University.

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At the Victory Girls Blog: my poem No Exit: Afghanistan Then and Now has just been published

I am the Guest  Poet at https://victorygirlsblog.com/ 

 

I have written a poetic piece about Afghanistan. The poem is an important one I think, entitled, No Exit Afghanistan Then and Now.   The first part of the poem I wrote in 2000 and the second part in the last two weeks 2021.  

Old Hiking Boots Gone

 Old Hiking Boots Gone

My hiking “boots were made for walking” (you could sing here) and hiking and they have bit the dust.  Long ago in 2007 I bought my La Sportiva boots the day before a several day 35 mile hike in the Seven Devils in Idaho.  They fit like gloves, but as I sat in a parking lot while fellow campers  went in to make sure the trails were open, lots of snow that year, I had the car door open.  A guy from Texas sat in his car. His door open too.

I asked him, “Did you just do the trails in Seven Devils?”

“No,” he said, “we just drove up to the top to see the view. “ I, of course, had to show someone my new boots.  “Be sure,” he said,” you leave them loose going up and tighter going down. Ah ha, tight in the toe going down, tight in the heel going up.  

So I did the 35 miles in several days, up and down, lots of switchbacks, high elevations, crossing streams. No blisters. Perfect.  That was the first trip.  The shoes became part of my life.

My boots have made history, my history, hiking around Idaho, traveling to Europe, England, tromping around Venice, always near canals, quietly surveying d’Avignon, sitting in St Chappelle in Paris for a concert, standing on the Bart in San Francisco, winding around the Sequoia National Park, hiking in Montana, climbing stairs in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, walking with Russians on May 9 Parade to celebrate the ending of the Great War.  Finally, so many years later in January 2021, the boots that even made it through the Pandemic, hiking most weeks in Wood Canyon gave out. How could they do that to me?  One separated sole, slightly worn heels, a hole in top from one of my hiking poles, yes, they were worn out, but they were supposed to last forever.  

So now, after trying La Sportiva which now has changed their shoe lasts, and the fact that my feet have also changed, I can no longer fit their shoes to me.  I try on a pair of Oboz, I can’t believe it.

The young woman who helps me at our local REI says she wears them hiking. She points to a guy working near by.  He has them, wears them every day.  I put them on.  Fit like gloves. I don’t believe it. How could they? But they do, and the next day, just like in 2007, I hike many miles, through live oak, sycamore, near a stream, up to the ridge and around the circular route and back down.  It is great to be with my hiking friends, great to be hiking again, great to be in my brand new boots.  My history continues.  My boots are keeping me healthy, physically and mentally, I am sure,

You Don't Leave Your First Amendment Rights at the School House Door or "Gate" as Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas Said.

 You Don’t Leave Your (First Amendment) Rights at the School House Door
                      or “Gate” as Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas said.

You don’t leave your First Amendment Rights at the school house door.  You don’t leave your rights at the door of a college or university either.

You take your First Amendment Rights with you, and you may call on local, state or federal government officials to protect you as you profess those rights through the freedom of speech, which can take many forms, but you shouldn’t have to go to court to preserve your rights.

One of the most important Supreme Court decisions that dealt with freedom of speech was Tinker vs. Des Moines, 1969.   Mary Tinker, a 13-year old, argued that wearing a black armband to protest the war in Vietnam was her right, an expression of free speech.  The court ruled in her favor.  Wearing the arm band did not cause “substantial disruption” to her school, and the rights of students to express political  opinions were upheld.

Recently, in  Florida, an l8-year old in high school, with a painted wooden elephant in his truck in his school parking place, (which they could decorate as they wished) was told he had to remove the elephant because someone or some people didn’t like an elephant, Republicanly-painted with Trump on the side.

At the University of Kansas recently, a woman in a sorority was being “disciplined” for questioning on social media and in speech where the money for black lives matter was going.   Someone she lived with was offended and made a complaint. The student was not breaking any rules for her sorority or for her university in expressing her opinion. 

But these kinds of incidents are not new:  At Orange Coast College in California, immediately after the 2016 election, an instructor called out students in the class who had been wearing Trump t shirts.  She demeaned students who expressed their support for President Trump and used her classroom for her own forum, attempting to silence dissent, by her position and authority. I mean she did give out the grades after all.

Today, universities (most of whom receive federal funds, even for construction of buildings on campus or student aid) could be violating students’ first amendment rights. Surely, the universities are aware of 
Tinker vs. Des Moines, and that federal funds could be withheld for violating student rights.

Nothing good can come of those in authority who are unaware that students have rights to express their own point of view.  Do schools and universities really want to go to court every time a student exercises a first amendment right?  Universities pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for officials, who seem to be glued to positions that outlaw some sort of speech they don’t like.  Perhaps those officials are not aware of Tinker vs. Des Moines.  Could someone please let them know?