Author: dispatchesfromtheformernewworld

How St. Nicholas Became Santa

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ 1 Comment
img_1321b
Russian Orthodox Icon

When I was a small child growing up in England we didn’t have Santa Claus and we didn’t hang up stockings or set out cookies on Christmas Eve. Instead, following the tradition of my mother’s Flemish homeland, my sister and I put a pair of wooden clogs by the fireside with carrots in them for St. Nicholas’s donkey. In later years as my mother absorbed English culture we abandoned St. Nicholas in favor of the very English Father Christmas. Our celebrations were complete with Continue reading “How St. Nicholas Became Santa” →

Alternate History

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ Leave a comment

51p3vkiw6vl-_sx323_bo1204203200_

Can history make a mistake? Can it veer off track from what was meant to be? That is what it felt like late on the night of November 8th 2016. The inevitable future foretold by prognosticators of every persuasion, the inexorable progress towards a society of more fairness and inclusion, the final shattering of that glass ceiling empowering women everywhere. But it was not the crack of broken glass we heard. It was the sound of history cracking apart, suddenly lurching off those gleaming rails and plunging into an unknown darkness. Continue reading “Alternate History” →

My Spa Visit or How I Dealt With Election Stress

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ 2 Comments

aaa94906_938

I shuffled into the dimly lit room in ungainly rubber slippers and shrouded in a voluminous white robe. The first thing I saw was a thick black rubber hose coiled on the far wall. Ominously, there was a drain in the floor beneath it. In the center of the room stood a bed rather like one you would see in an operating room. It was covered in plastic wrap with a small folded towel laid in the middle. Above the bed a strange device hung from the ceiling. Continue reading “My Spa Visit or How I Dealt With Election Stress” →

The Trigger-Warning Election

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ Leave a comment

angry_trump_0

Trigger Warning – this Presidential Election contains material that may be disturbing and traumatic for women who have been the victims of sexual abuse or rape, for immigrants who feel unwelcome in our country, for African-Americans who face racial discrimination, for Hispanics who face the assumption that they are not real Americans, for Muslims who fear that they are perceived as terrorists, for children who are victims of bullying… oh heck, this list is getting cumbersomely long, lets just say this election may be disturbing and traumatic for anyone who possesses a shred of humanity. Continue reading “The Trigger-Warning Election” →

Braggart in Chief

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ Leave a comment

97b496cafa4e37bfcfebac8340a193d9

It has come to this. Among the cacophony of opinion pouring forth from editorials, blogs, columns, and endless TV chatter this Presidential Election season, the one that really seems to get to the heart of the matter comes from a primatologist. Yes, Jane Goodall, famed for her studies of chimp behavior, is now the foremost political analyst in the land.

In the October issue of Atlantic James Fallows writes that Goodall told him “Trump reminds me of male chimpanzees and their dominance rituals.” What, I wonder, made Fallows seek Continue reading “Braggart in Chief” →

On My Bookshelf – Make Do and Mend

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ 2 Comments

make-do-mend

This little book is a new addition to my bookshelf, acquired on this year’s summer trip to London. After a walk around St. James’s Park we visited the Churchill War Rooms, the secret underground headquarters where Winston Churchill and his staff planned the war effort, safe from enemy bombs. The place is a claustrophobic rabbit warren of tiny rooms where Churchill and scores of staff often slept overnight during the Continue reading “On My Bookshelf – Make Do and Mend” →

Please, Not in the Cathedral!

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ 1 Comment
IMG_2491
Connections
IMG_2493
by Galia Amsel

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It looked like an enormous vacuum cleaner part – a black plastic tube emerging from the stone archway of an upper gallery, coiled into a knot in midair, and dangling just above our heads. A cluster of clear claw-like objects protruded from the open end of the tube. I stood in the transept of Salisbury Cathedral puzzling over the purpose of this contraption. They must be involved in some kind of cleaning or restoration project, I thought. Perhaps the tube was a chute for removing debris from the upper gallery. Or perhaps when it was uncoiled the tube reached to the ground and the claws became a tool for cleaning the stone floors. Neither idea was very convincing. At this point I turned to see my husband chatting to a cathedral docent,  Continue reading “Please, Not in the Cathedral!” →

Body Language in Black and White

~ dispatchesfromtheformernewworld ~ 1 Comment

Screen Shot 2016-07-14 at 2.51.52 PM

President Obama was speaking, his image almost filling the television screen, but my eyes were drawn to two people in the group behind him. They sat in the front row, one on either side of the President at his shoulder level. Two white police officers, a man and a woman. Together the image of the podium, President Obama, and the two officers formed a kind of triptych of mourning. It was Dallas on Tuesday July 12th 2016, the memorial service for the Continue reading “Body Language in Black and White” →