Trust in US Institutions at an All-Time Low, Death Cafes are a Good Idea, Backlash about Closing Splash Mountain, Jane Kristen Marczewski Sings “It’s OK”
Gee Kareem - I am sorry to hear that you have lost another friend/idol. This has been a bad trot but I hope you are bearing up well? I am sure I am not alone in wishing you the best.
The Maori people of New Zealand have a saying:
Kua hinga he totara i te wao nui a Tane.
A totara has fallen in the forest of Tane.
A totara is a huge native tree that grows for hundreds of years in New Zealand. For one of them to fall is a great tragedy. This proverb is said when someone of importance passes away. Just as we value our great trees, we must value our great leaders
Your stories this week were very emotional and also inspiring.
I too was a huge Willie Mays fan. I’ve had Dodgers season tickets for 45 years, but in the 60’s I wore a Giants hat because of Willie.
One time when I was 12 year old kid, my mom let me ditch school to take a 25 cent bus ride down Sunset Boulevard to see the Giants play at Dodger Stadium.
I was chided on the bus ride for wearing the wrong hat, but I didn’t care.
I got there early, got a bleacher ticket in left field for a buck and a half and moved down to the front near centerfield to be close to Willie who was warming up.
I was hollering and waving to Willie and he looked to stands and saw me with my Giants cap on and he waved back. He then took a pen out of his back pocket and signed a baseball and threw it up to me.
It was one of the early highlights of my life and I will never forget that day. On the bus ride home anyone who said anything about my Giants hat, I would just show them my baseball and they would just say ‘wow’!
As far as that performance by Miss Jane on AGT, it got to me as well. I lost both of my parents to lung cancer and I remember my mom always being cheerful to the end.
Always reminding me to take good care of that baseball that Willie signed for me.
I did, I still have it today, right next to my Giants hat!!
Right on! So kind of you to remember Stormin’ Norman Cash and the rest of the gang! Gates Brown, Duck McAuliffe, Jim Northrup… I thought the batteries were named after Al Kaline when I was a little kid (“alkaline”). The air raid sirens went off when we won! Bob Gibson was a great pitcher for the Cards but we were just so darn happy, especially after what Detroit went through in 1967. So great to win with an integrated team.
I was struck about your comment that preparation is everything including preparing for dying. My experience, not with dying, but imagining losing one of my children was not a preparation at all. What I imagined was a woman curled up in a ball unable to function if any of her kids died. What really happened was our beautiful 3 year old died very suddenly. I was pregnant with our third child and though the loss of our dear boy remains a black hole in my soul, I did not curl up into a ball. But continued hobbling through our tragedy and remained true to our boy’s love of life and the sunshine he brought to all he met
From that day onward I decided that I couldn’t prepare for that one time experience and have ceased trying to. I know I will die sometime but preparation for me is wasting my living time. It will come and I will deal with it
Thanks for getting my critical thinking juices going
I’m so sorry for your loss Pauline. Thank you for sharing your tragic story here. I’m in awe of your resilience and am inspired to know one can carry on afterward .
If someone told ten-year-old Boston me that as an adult I would turn off watching preparations for the Boston Celtics championship parade because it was distracting me from reading Kareem Abdul-Jabbar talking about death…
Willie Mays ball boy! ⚾ What fun that must have been for you. I can only imagine. He was so greatly loved and adored in San Francisco. His statue at Oracle Ballpark is deluged with flowers. One of the Immortals. Perhaps now MLB will put his likeness on their uniforms as the greatest ever.
I was 4 years old when I saw Song of the South. Loved Brer Rabbit & Brer Bear. Uncle Remus, the stories Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah. Being so young & of course not knowing what I know now still doesn't diminish the absolute delight of that movie. Nothing to do with race or class or anything else. Just pure happiness. Mr. Bluebird's on my shoulder.
Somethings from childhood we will always remember.
Rock Around the Clock tap. So fun. Never could dance like that.
Never been to Splash Mountain, so no comment there.
Full moon is tonight. Go out and gaze in wonder.
Thank you Kareem. You are so fortunate to have known Willie and to have great memories of him. Peace & Love to you.
I love your thoughts on Willie Mays and on morality. They pressed my reset button. They inspired me. I feel better than before I read them. You remind me that we can make a lasting change of direction in our lives and lift each other up too.
The beautiful song and backstory definitely have me in tears this morning. But I’m incredibly grateful that you brought up death. And Immanuel Kant has been on my mind because he had a large forehead to hold all that brilliance (which has personal significance). Your Willie Mays story is also heartwarming. We’re all going to die, so living one day at a time with love and compassion (and the occasional kvetch) seems a good philosophy. Thank you as always, Kareem.
I was teaching enlightenment thinkers to my year 11 modern history class and just had to sing the song… you can guarantee I will get at least one essay response saying ‘Rene Descartes was a drunken fart, I drink therefore I am’.
Willie- West-Walton......What wonderful role models of courage and grace, each in different and unique ways, but all to be admired for what they brought to our lives. Add Jane Kristen Marczewski to that group for her grace and courage in the face of Cancer. Having lost a sister to Cancer when she was only 26, there was no way tears were not going to flow while listening to her sing. Thanks for sharing....and now off to celebrate another day of life!
Thank you for the thoughtful words about Willie Mays. I still cannot believe he is gone. He has been a fixture in the giants clubhouse for years, mentoring young players and giving us fans a reason to love the Giants even in bad years.
In the mid-1960s, when my uncle would get tickets for St. Louis baseball games, we'd most often see the Cardinals against the Giants, Braves or Pirates. "Mays, Aaron, Clemente. They're the best."
Your very personal eulogy for Willie Mays is touching and illustrative of your deep respect for him and his legacy. What a delight to have this glimpse of his interaction with fans and with you his “ ball boy” for the night.
I was stumped by Immanuel Kant as a college political theory student. I’m now impressed by your distillation of some of his thinking and wishing for that musical on Broadway to learn more.
Your high school design for US elections reminds me of a book entitled “ The Nine Nations of North America” by Joel Garreau, circa 1981.
( I understand he updated the book with an essay around 2014 .) Essentially he decided the US into regions based upon shared culture, geography, and industry, honing his analysis of the social results therein.
I’m interested in your discussion of death cafes and the normalization of death as a part of life. One’s comfort with the subject does calm the fear associated with what’s unknown.
Clearly Ms Jane M had the clarity of one intimately acquainted with that unknown and chose to make the most of her remaining time.
Overall, today’s somber offering gave me comfort , not dread.
Oh, thank you for reminding me of the Nine Nations of North America! When I started working at a bookstore in 1984, the manager insisted everyone on staff read it. I’ve been looking for it, unaware that there was a newer edition.
I loved Willie Mays. I spent summers as a child watching him play with the San Francisco Giants on television, The guy could do everything. He could hit, steal bases, and make phenomenal catches with his basket catch style. Thank you for this celebration of his life and the sweet memories.
Kareem, I look forward to reading all your posts, and this was no exception.
Re death:
When my mother was dying of cancer we took care of her at home and she died at home.
The cancer eventually went into her brain which blessedly somehow relieved her of pain. It also made her blind, but she didn't know it. She lived in a world of her own, doing this or that, going here or there and we would go along with it as a way of being with her.
She became bedridden, and one of us was always with her.
One day, she was quietly lying there dusting, washing dishes, whatever and I was sitting next to her in bed, reading. Suddenly she stopped and said what?? Oh, ok, yes yes, as if someone was talking to her.
She continued....ok, uh-huh, oh I get it, yes, I understand. So this is what it's like.
I asked...this is what what's like, mom.
She said..so this is what it's like to die.
I can't tell you how that went through me, but I laid down next to her and asked...what's it like.
She said as clear as a bell..tell everyone not to be afraid. It's wonderful.
And that has stayed with me for 47 years, it's my preparation.
Thank you, Anne. What a lovely remembrance. We, too, kept Mum and her husband in their home until death—with a lot of great caregivers afforded by their money (not wealthy by any means but they didn’t outlive what was available). And Mum mostly still recognized me through her Alzheimer’s, although she would sometimes look at me quizzically. I cherish the years we hung out together.
How does a little girl living in Illinois in 1960 something come up with the name “Willie Mays!” when asked who her favorite baseball player is? I have no idea but that was and always will be my answer.
You have exceeded yourself and entered the pantheon of The Wise:
"Being the person you want to be is the root of all happiness. Knowing who the person is that you want to be is the root of all knowledge."
I will have to think about that and see if I completely agree with it. What I am sure of is that you have given me (and all of us, I'd say) an enormous bite to chew upon. Thank you!
Gee Kareem - I am sorry to hear that you have lost another friend/idol. This has been a bad trot but I hope you are bearing up well? I am sure I am not alone in wishing you the best.
The Maori people of New Zealand have a saying:
Kua hinga he totara i te wao nui a Tane.
A totara has fallen in the forest of Tane.
A totara is a huge native tree that grows for hundreds of years in New Zealand. For one of them to fall is a great tragedy. This proverb is said when someone of importance passes away. Just as we value our great trees, we must value our great leaders
That is beautiful. Thank you.
Your stories this week were very emotional and also inspiring.
I too was a huge Willie Mays fan. I’ve had Dodgers season tickets for 45 years, but in the 60’s I wore a Giants hat because of Willie.
One time when I was 12 year old kid, my mom let me ditch school to take a 25 cent bus ride down Sunset Boulevard to see the Giants play at Dodger Stadium.
I was chided on the bus ride for wearing the wrong hat, but I didn’t care.
I got there early, got a bleacher ticket in left field for a buck and a half and moved down to the front near centerfield to be close to Willie who was warming up.
I was hollering and waving to Willie and he looked to stands and saw me with my Giants cap on and he waved back. He then took a pen out of his back pocket and signed a baseball and threw it up to me.
It was one of the early highlights of my life and I will never forget that day. On the bus ride home anyone who said anything about my Giants hat, I would just show them my baseball and they would just say ‘wow’!
As far as that performance by Miss Jane on AGT, it got to me as well. I lost both of my parents to lung cancer and I remember my mom always being cheerful to the end.
Always reminding me to take good care of that baseball that Willie signed for me.
I did, I still have it today, right next to my Giants hat!!
Thanks Kareem!!
Willie Mays was an idol for so many of us… I was a diehard Tigers fan, but then there was Willie Mays. He stood apart from everyone else.
Yeah I remember 68 Tigers when they beat Mighty Cards in WS. They had Cash, Kaline, Horton, Freehan and Denny McLain.
Then Mickey Lolich was the star pitcher in WS!
Baseball was great back then.
So many teams now has diluted the talent pool!
Right on! So kind of you to remember Stormin’ Norman Cash and the rest of the gang! Gates Brown, Duck McAuliffe, Jim Northrup… I thought the batteries were named after Al Kaline when I was a little kid (“alkaline”). The air raid sirens went off when we won! Bob Gibson was a great pitcher for the Cards but we were just so darn happy, especially after what Detroit went through in 1967. So great to win with an integrated team.
And the 2006 series was the Cardinal revenge for 1968. Go Cards. :)
I was struck about your comment that preparation is everything including preparing for dying. My experience, not with dying, but imagining losing one of my children was not a preparation at all. What I imagined was a woman curled up in a ball unable to function if any of her kids died. What really happened was our beautiful 3 year old died very suddenly. I was pregnant with our third child and though the loss of our dear boy remains a black hole in my soul, I did not curl up into a ball. But continued hobbling through our tragedy and remained true to our boy’s love of life and the sunshine he brought to all he met
From that day onward I decided that I couldn’t prepare for that one time experience and have ceased trying to. I know I will die sometime but preparation for me is wasting my living time. It will come and I will deal with it
Thanks for getting my critical thinking juices going
I’m so sorry for your loss Pauline. Thank you for sharing your tragic story here. I’m in awe of your resilience and am inspired to know one can carry on afterward .
If someone told ten-year-old Boston me that as an adult I would turn off watching preparations for the Boston Celtics championship parade because it was distracting me from reading Kareem Abdul-Jabbar talking about death…
Thou spoketh for many.😆
Dear Kareeem, Your are an Atlas in our world. Lifting many souls on one back. Thank you again and again.
Willie Mays ball boy! ⚾ What fun that must have been for you. I can only imagine. He was so greatly loved and adored in San Francisco. His statue at Oracle Ballpark is deluged with flowers. One of the Immortals. Perhaps now MLB will put his likeness on their uniforms as the greatest ever.
I was 4 years old when I saw Song of the South. Loved Brer Rabbit & Brer Bear. Uncle Remus, the stories Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah. Being so young & of course not knowing what I know now still doesn't diminish the absolute delight of that movie. Nothing to do with race or class or anything else. Just pure happiness. Mr. Bluebird's on my shoulder.
Somethings from childhood we will always remember.
Rock Around the Clock tap. So fun. Never could dance like that.
Never been to Splash Mountain, so no comment there.
Full moon is tonight. Go out and gaze in wonder.
Thank you Kareem. You are so fortunate to have known Willie and to have great memories of him. Peace & Love to you.
I love your thoughts on Willie Mays and on morality. They pressed my reset button. They inspired me. I feel better than before I read them. You remind me that we can make a lasting change of direction in our lives and lift each other up too.
The beautiful song and backstory definitely have me in tears this morning. But I’m incredibly grateful that you brought up death. And Immanuel Kant has been on my mind because he had a large forehead to hold all that brilliance (which has personal significance). Your Willie Mays story is also heartwarming. We’re all going to die, so living one day at a time with love and compassion (and the occasional kvetch) seems a good philosophy. Thank you as always, Kareem.
Unfortunately every time I hear Immanuel Kant I feel compelled to break into the philosophers drinking song...
Yup - and the philosophy football match....thank god for Monty Python....
So I had to look it up and very pleased to know it’s from my fave Monty Python. Thanks, Geoff.
I was teaching enlightenment thinkers to my year 11 modern history class and just had to sing the song… you can guarantee I will get at least one essay response saying ‘Rene Descartes was a drunken fart, I drink therefore I am’.
🤣
I too had to look it up. Hilarious!!
Willie- West-Walton......What wonderful role models of courage and grace, each in different and unique ways, but all to be admired for what they brought to our lives. Add Jane Kristen Marczewski to that group for her grace and courage in the face of Cancer. Having lost a sister to Cancer when she was only 26, there was no way tears were not going to flow while listening to her sing. Thanks for sharing....and now off to celebrate another day of life!
Thank you for the thoughtful words about Willie Mays. I still cannot believe he is gone. He has been a fixture in the giants clubhouse for years, mentoring young players and giving us fans a reason to love the Giants even in bad years.
In the mid-1960s, when my uncle would get tickets for St. Louis baseball games, we'd most often see the Cardinals against the Giants, Braves or Pirates. "Mays, Aaron, Clemente. They're the best."
Your very personal eulogy for Willie Mays is touching and illustrative of your deep respect for him and his legacy. What a delight to have this glimpse of his interaction with fans and with you his “ ball boy” for the night.
I was stumped by Immanuel Kant as a college political theory student. I’m now impressed by your distillation of some of his thinking and wishing for that musical on Broadway to learn more.
Your high school design for US elections reminds me of a book entitled “ The Nine Nations of North America” by Joel Garreau, circa 1981.
( I understand he updated the book with an essay around 2014 .) Essentially he decided the US into regions based upon shared culture, geography, and industry, honing his analysis of the social results therein.
I’m interested in your discussion of death cafes and the normalization of death as a part of life. One’s comfort with the subject does calm the fear associated with what’s unknown.
Clearly Ms Jane M had the clarity of one intimately acquainted with that unknown and chose to make the most of her remaining time.
Overall, today’s somber offering gave me comfort , not dread.
Thanks.
Oh, thank you for reminding me of the Nine Nations of North America! When I started working at a bookstore in 1984, the manager insisted everyone on staff read it. I’ve been looking for it, unaware that there was a newer edition.
I hadn’t read it in a few years , but was reminded of it by Kareem’s high school voting plan.
I loved Willie Mays. I spent summers as a child watching him play with the San Francisco Giants on television, The guy could do everything. He could hit, steal bases, and make phenomenal catches with his basket catch style. Thank you for this celebration of his life and the sweet memories.
Kareem, I look forward to reading all your posts, and this was no exception.
Re death:
When my mother was dying of cancer we took care of her at home and she died at home.
The cancer eventually went into her brain which blessedly somehow relieved her of pain. It also made her blind, but she didn't know it. She lived in a world of her own, doing this or that, going here or there and we would go along with it as a way of being with her.
She became bedridden, and one of us was always with her.
One day, she was quietly lying there dusting, washing dishes, whatever and I was sitting next to her in bed, reading. Suddenly she stopped and said what?? Oh, ok, yes yes, as if someone was talking to her.
She continued....ok, uh-huh, oh I get it, yes, I understand. So this is what it's like.
I asked...this is what what's like, mom.
She said..so this is what it's like to die.
I can't tell you how that went through me, but I laid down next to her and asked...what's it like.
She said as clear as a bell..tell everyone not to be afraid. It's wonderful.
And that has stayed with me for 47 years, it's my preparation.
Thank you, Anne. What a lovely remembrance. We, too, kept Mum and her husband in their home until death—with a lot of great caregivers afforded by their money (not wealthy by any means but they didn’t outlive what was available). And Mum mostly still recognized me through her Alzheimer’s, although she would sometimes look at me quizzically. I cherish the years we hung out together.
How does a little girl living in Illinois in 1960 something come up with the name “Willie Mays!” when asked who her favorite baseball player is? I have no idea but that was and always will be my answer.
You have exceeded yourself and entered the pantheon of The Wise:
"Being the person you want to be is the root of all happiness. Knowing who the person is that you want to be is the root of all knowledge."
I will have to think about that and see if I completely agree with it. What I am sure of is that you have given me (and all of us, I'd say) an enormous bite to chew upon. Thank you!