Loose Ends 2026
I have to start with Barry Lyndon. It turned 50 at the start of this year and normally I would write a review about an all-time favorite film, but I never developed a thirst for this one all year long. I can’t believe I apparently haven’t seen it since 2011. So much time gone, I need to work in 3+ hours and, more importantly, the head space to take this marvelous film in again. At the time, I was all timed up in Proust and other writings and never got back to it.
You don’t just up and watch Barry Lyndon the way I did with One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest or Jaws. Kubrick’s film does not entertain in that manner. There’s no easy hook. Instead you have to be willing to become mesmerized on its terms. There is a story but it isn’t remotely compelling. The pacing is deliberately, relentlessly slow. You are to existentially immerse yourself in 18th century Europe and that just didn’t jibe with me this year for whatever reason. Nevertheless, I have seen it enough to know it is the most beautiful film in cinema. I really need to make more of an effort to watch it again soon.
I had high hopes for the Netflix production of The Electric State, a great dystopian art book. But those were dashed and it sucked as badly as Amazon’s Rings of Power barf-fest. Had they stuck to the actual story it would have worked though there would be far fewer characters (robots) and action, which, of course, is fatal on the flat screen unless you have something better to offer. The book offers more, the movie did not. It is the most expensive TV movie ever made. Terrible.
Avery had to put down Millie early in the year. The talkative mutt stopped barking, she became unable to use her back legs sometimes, would twist and fall randomly, then she stopped wagging her tail. It was a painful process for Avery to go through. She was way too emotionally invested. But that’s her style. And to her credit she had the strength of character to do the right thing when it came time to do the right thing. She had given that dog intravenous fluid washing to keep her kidneys going, all kinds of treatments for this and that. It was hard for Avery but she is stronger now. And has a cat named June-bug.
Charlie left us a few months later. Jennifer had been through a similar story with him. He stopped going on our usual afternoon walk through the woods before spring. He was developing dementia. His back legs were barely functioning. The vet came to our place, which was nice. We were there together as Charlie left. Frankly, it was more of a struggle for him than we would have hoped. But you only get one shot at this stuff. I teared up and said a little eulogy about him running through our front yard wide open as a young dog. Just running running running until he just plopped on the ground and started hacking. He couldn’t breath fast enough. He was a good dog all his long life. No regrets there.
That leaves my dad on the Elder Report. He’s been in and out of the hospital but it doing well overall. Has almost no use of his legs and is otherwise unsteady but his sense of humor is still intact. So important for everyone concerned.
I bought my first pair of Hoka running shoes this year and I’ll never go back to Niki for running. They are wonderful, sturdy, comfortable, supportive, ergonomic. So here I am doing the “consumer” thing and talking about my purchases. It’s inescapable really.
It was a dry year overall. We had a mild drought this summer and not many decent rains since summer. The ground is wet due to the mild temperatures but the water table remains low. There are several nearby ponds that are empty. Remarkably, we had a day in March with 6% humidity. I obsessively check temperature and humidity on my HAVC and have never seen humidity that low at Twin Oaks. The previous low was like 12% which is desert dry anyway.
I was chosen for jury duty late-spring and was ultimately dismissed after being asked a bunch of questions by the respective attorneys and responding publicly when I had a question about the proceedings. But, for three days I was isolated in various rooms with these 20 or so other people. I didn’t know any of them. Every chance they got they all gripped their smartphones and started either texting or scrolling. They did this for hours through the times we waited to be moved to whenever the judge deemed it necessary to put us. It is interesting watching strangers at close proximity when they are strangers to everyone and they more or less expect to be observed by others. The smartphone activity did not surprise me but it affected me to be among it like that.
I read Identity by Milan Kundera. A wonderful novel from the 1990’s. It was my third time through it, I think. I last read it before I started this blog. So, it had been a long time, though the novel impressed me and I have reread a certain section of it many times, even quoted it in my essay on Being. These characters really breathe for me in the contemporary world. The novel feels as fresh today as it did 30 years ago.
The pope died. I remember talking about “the New Pope” when he arrived and now he’s dead. Many years have past. I’m starting to outlive popes. It is a strange world for me. Now we have a new one, which I know very little about compared with previous popes. I am not Catholic and Catholicism has never interested me less, though I respect it overall. Hence, the mention of it.
The Atlanta Braves sucked in 2025. You can always say injuries did it or whatever. All the excuses are cliché even the truest ones, they never scored enough runs to support their not horrible pitching. A bunch of yawning, sub-par years. The result is Brian Snitker is out. I hate to see him go. Maybe Walt Weiss won’t disappoint. Jesus, I remember when he was a shortstop. Now he’s a manager. A lot of years. Snitker was an admirable successor to Bobby Cox. I think the move was a bad one. They used to say “don’t quit on Snit.” I would have given him one more year to make things right, but whatever. As my friend Jerry says: “That’s baseball!”
Charlie Kirk was brutally murdered in front of his children. You don’t have to know who Kirk was to know how to react to that statement. No one should be murdered in front of their young children. Can we at least agree on that? This young man’s murder just showed all the many things wrong with the culture wars. The whole thing (Kirk and his fate) multi-level tragedy. History suggests that ultimately, the surest way to enshrine any dogma is to create a martyr. A primitive fact.
No less primitive was an enormous infestation of spiders in the early-fall. They were everywhere with their large, often elaborate and artful webs. I never walked through my woods without a hat because inevitably I would run into several webs along the course of the path each morning. Bu the end of fall my cap was encased in spider webs. You could still easily see through it but you could also see countless spider webs. My tree guy said I should just leave it on and I think I will. Turns a marketing cap into a natural artwork.
I reached the conclusion that I knew way too much about everything going on in the world. I don’t want to become suddenly ignorant but, at the same time, I think it was contributing to my anxiety with little reward. I was following a half dozen wars, climate events, neuroscience, space, the future, history, the distant past, music, art, Putin, Trump, MAGA, China, wellness, movies, reading, language, UFO's and numerous other topics on at least a weekly if not daily basis. I did all this through the Flipboard app. I had 129,000 followers of the magazines I curated. So what. I realized I was more relieved when I let Flipboard go. I have opened it a couple of times and arranged it so I only see articles on philosophy and the brain and wellness, but generally I rely on notifications to keep me informed if anything major happens. Otherwise, I have enjoyed the last part of this year unplugged from that particular way of receiving information. It was highly efficient and kept me on top of everything. That was the problem, as I have said.
Likewise, I quit all my weather guys on YouTube. They never enter my feed anymore. I knew way too much about the weather which is really crazy because no one actually knows what it is going to do. None of the models are 100% correct and you can have devastation from winds or rain and cold or heat literally anywhere. I watch the 14-day forecast on my two weather apps. That’s it. I stay ready for whatever it tells me and forget the various probabilities and possibilities. I don’t need to know anything outside of a few days from now. That makes for a saner life.
I bought red daylight glasses to use about two hours before bed. Trying to resent or sync up my circadian rhythm. I don’t read in the evenings after dinner. I listen to music or maybe a lecture and I wear those glasses. I go to bed with the glasses still on and listen to a YouTube documentary or lecture without watching the screen. I also take 3mg of glycine at night and that works wonders on lower your body temperature and relaxing you about an hour later. Great stuff. Finally, I got a Daylight Lamp for Christmas and read by it every morning. That’s only been added the last few days, obviously. No immediate difference.
For some reason, the YouTube algorithm feed me mini-documentaries about William Friedkin’s Sorcerer from 1977. I watched it in the theater back then. I knew all about the incredible driving the truck full of explosive across a swinging bridge during a violent driving rain. It is an insane shot but it does not a movie make. These guys were all saying, “No, it really a great film.” So, I rented it on YouTube and rewatched it. That scene is still cinematically unique and very well shot. But, no, it is not a great film. It also isn’t a bad film. Roy Scheider is strong, the directing is often excellent though inconsistent, and hearing the soundtrack by Tangerine Dream was a cool blast from the past. I'd give a 6 with one 10-calibre scene in it. Worth watching once.
Other than my rather hopeful Supreme Court posts (see here and here) earlier in the year I have managed to avoid politics. Trump made that extremely difficult. So much infrastructure has been damaged, checks and balances aren’t working so far, and the level of disinformation is staggering. Truth really is being tested by story. MAGA is the most potent political force of the 21st century so far. It eclipses, and in many respects is reactionary to, the Obama phenomenon 0f 2008. No dystopian fiction can top political fact in 2025.
What, me worry? Hahaha. I look forward to rereading The Brothers Karamazov in 2026. As with In Search of Lost Time this year, I already started it in December and am several hundred pages in as the new year begins. I have some other books I want to work in. I have read many books on Napoleon's 1812 Campaign and on the Russian perspective against Hitler in World War Two. I have more to read on both those subjects coming up, though I am thinking of pausing Napoleon for now. I will doubtless read much that I won’t comment upon here.
I also hope to work in a full tour of Witold Lutoslawski's compositions. I'm looking forward to watching Network for its 50th anniversary. I'll definitely blog about that masterpiece. I would like to learn a lot more about the life and philosophy of Thomas Aquinas. So, as usual, lots of room for philosophical fine-tuning.
I have written three books of my own in 2025, since April really. It is the most disciplined act of writing I’ve ever attempted. It is rewarding, inspiring, frustrating, disappointing and needs some revision. But it is out there. It says what I think needs saying though I’m sure I can improve the way it says things. I may do that. But I also have other ideas...
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