What Would Thoreau Say?

When I was a kid everything, and I mean everything, was closed on Sunday.  Now without getting into the question of why we don't do that anymore ($$$$$),  I want to explore the idea of setting aside a day, or at least part of the day for absolutely nothing. Wait... not nothing, actually setting aside a day for what matters. Sabbath days have been with us since the beginning.  In the Bible, of course, God rested on the seventh day (a questionable enterprise considering all he had created;  who's gonna manage that stuff?  No time for a day off God;  but I digress...).  But well before that God, history records that ancient societies have been resting purposefully often to honor their deity since people formed community. In certain cultures, Jewish for instance, Sabbath is taken seriously, as in no-excuses seriously.  I've written before on this blog how Chain Potok, he of The Chosen, Gift of Asher Lev and countless other classics, is my f...

Yes, I'm back... Pete Seeger died last night.  At 94 he spent a good part of his life wreaking havoc on the establishment and calling us all to a peaceful way of living. His passing hit me hard, I must admit.  I spent my first anti-Vietnam War protest with 'ol Pete' as he called himself.  We picketed the Ossining NY Post Office... that's right, the Post Office.  The logic was it was the only federal building within reach and as good as any in calling attention to the injustice of that war. It was also right on Highland Ave. across from the high school so all the traffic in and out of town had to pass us marching, carrying signs, chanting very pithy things like 'one, two, three, four, we don't want your fucking war,' a chant I remember ol pete not too happy with... we didn't do it long.  This was suburban America, after all and that's our parents and their friends driving by.  We were being radical... but not that radical. Later in life I had ...