Snapshot

 [second version]

[1860 HERSCHEL in Photogr. News 11 May 13 The possibility of taking a photograph, as it were by a snap-shotemof securing a picture in a tenth of a second of time.]
(Quoted from the Oxford English Dictionary online)


Snapshot

By any means, steal an image,
mark an instant's interplay between
light and facial shape. Shuffle it
off to memorabilia, through which
someone may rummage some day
not soon, in boxes or in Cloud.

Whoever it is will wonder
whose image got swiped
back here, where at the gathering
we think we know who's here, what
they're wearing, what they show. So
yes, of course, seize a sample
the flow, stabilize it in one of
the ways we know. Store it, for it
may be of interest one day, could be.

hans ostrom 2014/2021

Snapshot

The OED online tells me that "snapshot" (as a noun) goes back to the early 1800s in print and referred then to a more-or-less un-aimed shot using a gun. However, the word took on its photographic meaning not long thereafter, whereas I'd expected this connotation (now a denotation) to come from the early 20th century:

[1860 HERSCHEL in Photogr. News 11 May 13 The possibility of taking a photograph, as it were by a snap-shot{em}of securing a picture in a tenth of a second of time.]

(Quoted from the OED online)


Snapshot

By any means, capture an image,
mark an instant's interplay between
light and facial shape. Shuffle the image
off into memorabilia, through which
someone may sort or rummage some day
not soon. Whoever it is will wonder
whose image was captured back then,
back here, where at the gathering
we think we know who's here, what
they're wearing, what they show. So
yes, of course, take an image from
the flow, stabilize it in one of
the ways we know. Store it, for it
may be of interest one day, could be.


Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Summer Squash

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'Tis the season, in the Northern Hemisphere at least, for squash. I grew up calling yellow or crook-necked squash "summer squash," and I prefer it to zucchini, the hide of which is a tad bitter, and the meat of which can be watery. I used to like to pick yellow squash because in the garden, it often had some fuzz on it. One reason to plant a garden, I submit, is that it produces imperfection, such as the fuzz, which is rubbed off by the time squash makes it to a super-market super-slickly. For instance, the cucumbers I just harvested look pretty gnarly. They're fat and fine inside, but the hide looks like it's been in a scuffle, and one of the cucumbers has an odd twist to it. You just can't find that kind of imperfection in a produce-department, no matter how hard you look.

In case anyone asks, and I'm sure someone will do so, "squash" as a verb can mean not just to press down or in upon but also to join in a crowd of people--to squash about in the city, as it were--this according to the OED online. "Squash" as a noun may refer not just to zucchini, etc., but also to the unripe pod of a pea, and in this iteration, the word was often used insultingly. One would call someone a "squash," a mere unripe pod. "Hey, pal, as far as I'm concerned, you're an unripe pod." And here's news: "squash" as a noun used to refer as well to a muskrat--or "musksquash." Wow.

My desultory research did not go so far as to tell me how the racket-game, squash, got its name. Squash seems like the upper-class version of racquet-ball, but I could be incorrect in that impression.

When something feels as if it has been squashed, we sometimes say it appears squishy, don't we? What was squashed was squished, or squishified. ;-) I seem to remember that "squish" was also deployed as a verb, back in grammar (or lower) school: "Squish that spider, Irving, will you? Thanks."

I wish you a good summer of unsquished squash, eaten raw, steamed, or roasted, and may the squash you harvest be perfectly imperfect.

Reciprocity

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According to the OED online, here is what "eavesdrop" means (not a surprising definition):

"To stand within the ‘eavesdrop’ of a house in order to listen to secrets; hence, to listen secretly to private conversation."

The earliest quoted example in the OED is from 1606, in case anyone asks or happens to be eavesdropping when you are discussing the word.
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Reciprocity


A man stepped out of a cafe,
holding a telephone-wafer
to one ear. I assumed he
left so as to be polite,
to secure a less fully
public space, and/or to
align the wafer with a
floating satellite. I
was already outside.

"In life," he said to
someone--and to anyone
within earshot, including
me, "there is a concept
called, 'reciprocity.'"

He paused to listen before
defining the term for his
intended interlocutor. Before
I began seriously to eavesdrop,
I left him to his conversation.

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Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Spuds

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After a three-year hiatus, I'm going to plant some potatoes. Yukon Gold is the choice, ordered (as "sets") a bit late from a Midwest nursery-company. For some reason, I like having spuds in the ground out there. Looks like we'll have lettuce, carrots, and (green) onions, too, as well as tomatoes, although the latter ripen rather late in our global niche.

I grew up hearing potatoes sometimes referred to as "spuds." According to the OED online, this slang-term for potato emerged rather late, preceded by "spud" (as noun) as referring to a variety of tools, mostly small ones used for digging but also kinds of knives. Here is an example of the potato-reference:

1860 Slang Dict. 225 In Scotland, a spud is a raw potato; and roasted spuds are those cooked in the cinders with their jackets on.


In spite of the syntax, the spuds are the ones with their jackets on, not the cinders. One whom I know well has always found the reference to "potatoes with their jackets on" most humorous; it's a reference that appears in many cook-books, and it is charming to think of spuds going to a tailor to get fitted for potato-blazers.

Spuds
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Potatoes grow out of potatoes like an
underground dynasty while the rest
of agriculture bustles above-ground
with blossoms, pods, and fruits.
Potatoes multiply themselves in sequestered
arithmetic. They send up gestures
of leaves to appease sunlight. Meanwhile,
they populate their tomb, glow inwardly,
will stand for harvest or sit tight--possess
a kind of divine patience, an honest secrecy.
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Spuds aren't glamorous, decorative,
geometric, or vibrant. They're lumpy,
plain, idiosyncratic, and common. They
get along with rocks, advise moles, ignore
frost, and huddle in carbohydrate caucuses.
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Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Mongrel

(image includes Italian Greyhounds)


There's a pet-store a few doors down from where I usually get coffee on a retail basis. I like pet-stores for supplies, but the display of animals in the window bothers me. There were some rabbits there around Easter time, and only one of three were purchased. Do I want to know what happened to the remaining rabbits? They aren't there anymore.

What are there are two "pure-bred" (whatever) Italian greyh0unds. Extremely cute, of course: that's the point of the window-schtick.

So it was with some surprise that when I looked up "mongrel" on the OED, an example included in the earliest example was "greyhound." Pure-bred Italian mongrel? As I said, "whatever." The OED [online]....

A. n.

I. The offspring or result of cross-breeding, miscegenation, mixed marriage, etc.

1. A dog having parents of different breeds (in quot. c1460 a heraldic representation of such a dog); a dog of no definable breed resulting from various crossings. Also: the offspring of a wolf and a dog (obs. rare).

c1460 Bk. Arms in Ancestor (1903) 4 250 [Azure a fesse gold between ‘quatre mains’ of gold quartered with silver] ij mongrelys of goulys. 1486 Bk. St. Albans sig. fiiij^v, A Grehownd, a Bastard, a Mengrell, a Mastyfe.


Wow, who knew that, at one point, grehound, bastard, mongrel, and mastiff were all synonyms? Of course, humans quickly if not immediately transferred their mistaken notions of dog-breeding to insane notions about human "races."

Of course, part two: the more allegedly "accidental" breeding goes on (with dogs, let's say), the more likely the gene-pool gets stronger, yes? Genetic diversity = genetic strength, or a greater likelihood thereof? Perhaps this is my own insane notion, but I doubt it.


Mongrel

Our operatives have determined he's
probably not worth our operatives' time.
He's anti-social but polite. He has problems
with authority but a Puritan's work-ethic.
He's a well-traveled, well-read hick. And
he's extremely loyal but can't grasp
the concept, patriotism. Alas, he's

a hot-tempered pacifist and a cloistered
utilitarian. He's often observed in the company
of anarchists, contrarians, the shunned,
the shy, the maladjusted, and the eccentric.

He is not to be trusted unless he's your friend.
He's jaded and guileless, optimistic, morose,
habitual, and unpredictable. He is by turns
too loud and too quiet. Our operatives,
who do a lot of listening and watching,
report he does a lot of listening
and watching. These latter are his most
worrisome traits, but our operatives
have determined he's no threat to the State.


Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Zombie

(image: cover of Zombies album, from Decca Records)









Here's the first definition of "zombie" from the OED online:

1. In the West Indies and southern states of America, a soulless corpse said to have been revived by witchcraft; formerly, the name of a snake-deity in voodoo cults of or deriving from West Africa and Haiti.

1819 R. SOUTHEY Hist. Brazil III. xxxi. 24 Zombi, the title whereby he [chief of Brazilian natives] was called, is the name for the Deity, in the Angolan tongue... NZambi is the word for Deity.


The second definition, the figurative one referring to seemingly lifeless persons or Hollywood versions of zombies, is pegged to H.L. Mencken in 1936, when he complained in print that the only roles Hollywood had for non-Caucasian actors were for "zombies." Things have certainly improved for Black, women, Asian-American ( et al.) actors--but how much?

But I digress, as almost always.

Quarter to Five

He works as a zombie from 9 to 5. He climbs
into a catatonic state and performs duties
as are assigned to him. He's under the spell
of employment. (It could be worse.) His
co-worker, Barton, said, "You scare me.
You look like the living dead." "Don't worry,"
he said, "I'm just behaving professionally. After
work I become vibrant and garrulous."
"But I don't get it," Barton said, "--what
job-title around here requires a person
to behave like a zombie?" "In my particular
case," said the man, "it's Chief Deputy for
Zombic Affairs." "And what is it exactly
you do?" asked Barton. "Barton," he said,
"you don't want to know." With his blank,
unnerving, but professionally appropriate
affect, he resumed his duties, for the clock
read only quarter to five.


Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Herrick's Poem, Reader's Face, Let's Party

(image: Likeness of Robert Herrick [1591-1674])

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To the Sour Reader

by Robert Herrick

If thou dislik'st the piece thou light'st on first,

Think that of all that I have writ the worst;

But if though read'st my book unto the end,

And still dost this and that verse reprehend,

O perverse man! If all disgustful be,

The extreme scab take thee and thine, for me.

Well, then! Here is poetry as a bit of a contact-sport. Instead of invoking the muses, Herrick invokes the reader, and, as I interpret the poem, he gives the reader two options: 1) If you don't like the first poem you read in my book, then simply assume that that poem is the worst poem in the book and move on from there (to what will, by definition, be better poetry). 2) If you don't like any of the poems, then you are perverse, and I curse you; specifically, may an extreme scab afflict you and those whom you know.

A poet and poem with attitude: not bad. Also a poet who probably wore a wig, judging by the image above. He looks like he could have played in a 1980s rock-band. Or maybe 1970s: He looks just a bit like Tony Orlando from "Tony Orlando and Dawn."

The use of "reprehend" is nice. We're used to "reprehensible." I don't hear or read "reprehend" much if at all anymore, though.

"Scab," I assume, in this case refers more to a disease than a single scab (crusted-over wound), per se. Here is an example from the OED online that may obtain (from anotheer poet, George Herbert, although not from a poem):

G. Herbert Jacula Prudentum 1137 The itch of disputing is the scab of the Church [transl. of the saying Disputandi prurigo est ecclesiæ scabies].

"Scab" also, of course, has come to refer to a worker who takes the job of a union-worker on strike. I haven't looked into the origins of that figurative use yet, but I probably will.

In the meantime, here's to Robert Herrick and his aggressive opening gambit toward is audience, even though the audience could have simply closed the book in outrage--and hoped the curse would not come to pass.

In a preface or foreword to one of his poetry-books, William Stafford was somewhat more subtle. If memory serves he wrote, "And to my critics: thanks, anyway." Lovely.

Snoring

According to the OED online, one of the earliest appearances of "snore" and/or "snoring" in print occurred in 1140, but an arguably more entertaining quotation comes from the 18th century and essayist Richard Steele:

1710 STEELE Tatler No. 208 6 We have a Member of our Club, that when Sir Jeffery falls asleep, wakens him with Snoring.

The etymological trail of "snore" also runs through such variations as "snork" and "snort." There's just too much to like about those two words.

Snoring

A motorcycle gaggle guns its snarlers

into Larynx Tunnel. Then a nearby sea

seems to sigh. The engines rumble once

again. The process repeats itself in a crude

rhythm as the one lying next to you or

the you who listens to you subconsciously

waits for a crescendo to seize the terrible

song. Whoever is listening waits for a gulp,

a swallow, a sigh--a break of some kind

that will invite soft silence to settle

like a dew on the slumbering cacaphonic

heap of prostrate weariness. How

can tired be so loud?

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Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Naps

(image: Kindergarten students taking a collective nap)

The OED online lists and defines a dozen different versions of "nap" as a noun, ranging from a type of wool fiber to a cup to "a baby's nap"--that is, a diaper (as it's called in the U.S.) or a "nappy," as the English call it. There's also "nap" as an adjective and five different versions of "nap" as a verb. Of course, some of these incarnations of nap are now obsolete, but nonetheless, who knew "nap" was such a various-and-sundry word? The OED did, it seems. One quotation is from Dickens:

DICKENS Dombey & Son (1848) xxiii. 240 He..refreshed his mind with a nap

Through 8th grade, I went to school in a town 12 miles away from where my family lived. We road the bus there, and on the bus were kids from age 6 to 18. Because the high-school "day" was longer than the first-grade one, the teacher had us first-graders take a nap on the floor of the classroom. I gather that still goes on in kindergartens, judging by the photo I found on the web (above). We had to sleep on these bizarre naugahyde mats, and I do wonder now about the hygeine-factor, but as to the comfort-factor: children can sleep anywhere.

Anyway, the main idea, I think, was for the teacher to take a break and restore some sanity to herself while she waited for 3:30 to roll around, whereupon we'd board the bus and travel 12 miles up the mountain--on a winding highway next to a canyon: kudos to the bus-driver (usually it was one Neil Foster), who never had an accident in the 8 years I rode the bus. I recall one flat-tire, which Mr. Foster promptly changed.

Napping may be a crucial key not just to a teacher of young children but to civilization itself. It might help Americans' sanity, for example, if the U.S. were to construct its culture more along the lines of Italy and Latin America, where the afternoon nap still seems to be central.

I was reading this book, Rules of Thumb, yesterday, and according to it, a one-hour nap is equivalent to three hours of sleep at night. The book didn't explain in what way the nap was equivalent, but I assume the authors meant that body and mind were provided as much restoration by a one-hour nap as three hours of night-sleep. I have no idea whether this information is accurate, and there is the famous REM-sleep-factor to consider, but I can say that naps seem to work just fine for me, when I can fit them in. The world just seems to be a little more manageable after one takes a nap. And then there's . . .the double-nap.

The Double-Nap

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He woke up from a nap,

stared at light left by

a gap in curtains, thought

of ambition as an acquaintance

who never repays personal

loans, enjoyed the pleasure

of second weariness, the lure

of lassitude, and lapsed once

more into napping, which

he considered to be a most

constant, reliable friend

indeed, one with an interest

in his restoration. Oh, Lord,

thought the napping man,

subluminously: a day off,

crowned by a double-nap.

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Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Mayor

(image: Mayor Richard J. Daley)











According to the OED online, "mayor" springs from the French, "mare," and used to be spelled "mair," among other ways. The governmental post seems to have been a feudal one originally, but it soon changed into the municipal-related one we think of now. Probably the most notorious mayor in my experience was Richard J. Daley of Chicago, famous for his dictatorial style, his "machine" ("vote early and often"), his bigotry, and his over-reaction to protesters at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. His son is mayor now. Probably there are many reasons for his having been elected and re-elected, but one of them must be that some people were more or less nostalgic for "the old days."

I met a woman once who had grown up in Spain when Franco was still dictator but who then moved to the U.S.--in her late teens or early 20s, I think. She recognized that Spain's government, etc., was better now than then, but she also recalled feeling "safe" in the city she lived in--because Franco ruled militaristically: no street-crime, etc. I doubt if this woman ever would have voted for Franco, assuming he'd stood for election. Nonetheless, she experienced a degree of nostalgia when thinking of her childhood when he was dictator. The current Daley is no Franco, of course, but I do wonder if some people prefer "familiar authority" sometimes.

Anyway, I've been messing around with a mayoral poem.


A Brief Message from the Mayor

I'm the Mayor of No-town,
Population: One. However,
others live here seasonally.

I like to tell people I won
the election in a run-off.
I disagree with myself,

can't decide what to do,
and change my mind a lot,
so government suffers here.

True, I don't get many
complaints. I've threatened
to resign in protest. Still,

it's a good place to live.
I might create an ad-campaign
to boost tourism--something

like "No-town: home of
the Big Yes" or "No-town . . .
for a Tiny Vacation."

This democracy of one--
I have my doubts. I think
I'll change the charter.

Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom

Plumb Crazy or Plum Crazy

Mostly on "western" or "cowboy" TV shows, I used to hear the word "plumb" used as an adverb, as in "That feller (fellow) is plumb crazy," meaning very crazy. Or "I'm plumb full," meaning "I can't eat another bite." Only occasionally did I hear such a phrase in real life.

According to the OED online and other sources, "plumb" got to mean "very" because it was related to a level or "plumb" line--a line that is (in theory) absolutely level . So plumb = absolutely or at least very. But of course people got it confused with "plum," as in the fruit, and indeed the first citation with regard to the American colloquialism "plumb [crazy]" cites "plum":

1588 T. HUGHES Misfortunes Arthur II. iv. 21 The mounting minde that climes the hauty cliftes..Intoxicats the braine with guiddy drifts, Then rowles, and reeles, and falles at length plum ripe. 1738 J. J. BERLU Treasury Drugs Unlock'd (ed. 2) 67 The best [jujubes] are plumb-full of Pulp, and come from Italy.

There's even a blog out there called "Plum Crazy," which bills itself as the home of the Vast New York Yankee Conspiracy." It's at www.houseofplum.com.

As late as 2002, according to the OED online, "plum" was used to refer to "testicle" in a piece of American fiction. I didn't expect that one, but I guess it makes some sense.

More interesting to me is that "plum" (in England) used to refer to the sum of 100,000 pounds--that is, a monetary "fortune," as the OED notes. I wonder if P.G. Wodehouse, whose nickname was apparently "Plum," earned a plum from his writings. If so, he did indeed earn it with all the laughs the writing generated.

This has all been a shamefully circuitious introduction to a poem that's focused on one kind of plum, the green gauge plum, which is rather large, has a firm "meat," stays the color green even after it ripens, and happens to be my favorite plum, just in case anyone asks.

Treasure

Walking on the gray road toward the place

where the yellow school-bus stopped,

I used to pause and pick a green-gauge

plum to add to my silver lunch-pail, which

I took to school every day. That had to have

been in Septembers. Nobody else seemed

to harvest the plums, which hung on trees

that no one tended to. So little pleased me

then. So much surrounded me: mountains,

water, air, and time, for instance. Also immense

pines and cedars. --Interesting how we learn

to want mostly the wrong things in great

quantities. One ripe green plum tucked into

a metal box next to a lunch my mother had wrapped

in wax-paper, a bit of wire holding the Thermos

full of milk in place: these particularities pleased

me. I picked the plum and packed it away

and had the feeling it was treasure.

Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom