signs of possession

On the side of St. Philomena School, East Cleveland

This was painted on the back of a current church on Ashbury Avenue Cleveland. There are many bible passages that are quoted, but yet, sometimes one thinks "why that one?". This was before David was king, and Siceleg (Ziklag) was sacked by the Amalekites. David then went to slay them. Why is this an important passage? 

music over the weekend

Ethnic parishes can draw talent from visitations from the old country. February 23ʳᵈ the 40 girls of the St. Stanislav Girls' Choir Slovenija sang at St. Mary's Collinwood. Seating did not allow a good foto, but here half of the girls are seen, and in part they were coincidentally mirroring the painting of the Apostles around Mary's Assumption. The performance was more often Balkan sounding (even unto an ancient Greek chorus) than Alpine. They are wearing white choir robes accented with two shades of green that are of the linden tree [a national symbol]. They're going to a conference in Kansas City.

Cleveland has a world class orchestra, and...other orchestras. Cleveland has area colleges with fine music programmes that have graduated musicians for generations, and they and others form many groups. Sometimes they have fifty performers, and sometimes they are trios and quartets. Sometimes they are college students, and sometimes members of the Cleveland Orchestra. A number of these groups have churches as venues. Heights Chamber Orchestra played Sunday at St. Paul Episcopalian Cleveland Heights.

Erik Satie's Parade (1917) included a typewriter, and several different items to be played by percussionist. A revolver was one of the items, it was replaced by wooden clapper in this performance. Here is a video of another orchestra's version of a portion of the piece [click]. Satie's piece was part of the new movement of surrealism.

Language has its purpose

Some days ago i read the last six chapters of Michiko Kakutani's "The Death of Truth: notes on falsehood in the age of Trump". A big part of the book is about anti-intellectualism, and post-modernist deconstruction and how these two, along with nihilism have prepared America for Trump and his political cohort. Two important writers who identified the evil banality of Soviet socialism (communism), and fascism are Hannah Arendt and George Orwell. Those two systems made no distinction between truth and lies, so power could be executed for the sake of power. To-day we have a regime that creates 'alternate facts'. Kakutani mentions a writer i am not familiar with, David Foster Wallace, who wrote about post-modern irony in the 1990s. She sees his mention of the advertising fictional Joe Isuzu ["You have my word on it"], and Rush Limbaugh [and his dittoheads] as precursors to Trump.

I suppose when i was in college was about the time the post-modernist deconstruction writers and disciples were about to switch on the political spectrum. Those in books at the time were far leftists, and those for more than a generation have been far rightists. Then i thought them pretentious bullshit artists that only existed in their circle of effluvium and flotsam; now they are a fascist peril. 

If i were to write that book, yes i would have used some of her sources and historical episodes. But i also would have used "2 + 2 = 4", this is Aristotelian logic; it is also mentioned by Dostojevskij and Orwell. A rational, and a free man can say this. You have freedom if you can say this without penalty. Dostojevskij also had Fr. Zosima say in "The Brothers Karamazov": 

"...The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love, and in order to occupy and distract himself without love he gives way to passions and coarse pleasures, and sinks to bestiality in his vices, all from continual lying to other men and to himself. The man who lies to himself can be more easily offended than anyone. You know it is sometimes very pleasant to take offence, isn't it? A man may know that nobody has insulted him, but that he has invented the insult for himself, has lied and exaggerated to make it picturesque, has caught at a word and made a mountain out of a molehill -- he knows that himself, yet he will be the first to take offence, and will revel in his resentment till he feels great pleasure in it, and so pass to genuine vindictiveness. ...". 

I also would have quoted from Solzhenitsyn's Nobel speech: "...Any man who has once acclaimed violence as his METHOD must inexorably choose falsehood as his PRINCIPLE. ...".

Cleveland Judaica

Superman was created by two Jewish teen-agers in Glenville Cleveland [click]. In Beachwood [a Cleveland suburb] there is a Museum of Jewish Heritage. One of the exhibits [supra] in the An American Story Gallery is Superman. Jewish immigration to Cleveland is well documented, and also in the national and global historical context. 

One of the many pieces is a button lit map of the location of Jewish houses of worship in Cleveland over time from 1840 to now. What one sees is the migration from the city to the suburbs. There are many everyday items from the commercial world. Of course, there is a World War II and the Holocaust presence; but also American hate groups including the Ku Klux Klan.

Tzedakah offering 'box'

Behind the museum is the present Temple-Tifereth Israel. The museum has the Temple-Tifereth Israel Gallery of art and ritual objects. Some of the items could easily be displayed at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Some of the items i recognised, and others expanded my vocabulary.

Etrog [citron] box

And you shall take to you on the first day the fruits of the fairest tree, and branches of palm trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the Lord your God.—Leviticus xxiii. 40.

Citron is the ancestor of the lemon, and it is presumed to be the fruit mentioned. The other three species of plants are weaved together, and the four are waved each day of Sukkot.

'Miriam cup'[not pictured], is a new addition to the Seder meal to recognise women in the faith. Moses' sister, Miriam, was a prophetess. There is a cup of wine for Elijah at the Seder, for he is expected to return to announce the Messiah. Miriam's cup has water.

By serendipity, last night's Stephen Colbert [who is Catholic] pretended to use a yad to read a Torah portion, and then carried the scroll out. [click here,video beginning at 4:49]

Parma lookout

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,
ché la diritta via era smarrita.

Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.

In the last couple of days, Cleveland Plain Dealer has informed us of the winter work done on trails of Cuyahoga Metroparks. In Parma, Lookout Ridge has been upgraded to make a smoother path. It is not quite yet done.

One will be able to get a view of the tall buildings of downtown, and the lake beyond on a clear day [thanks to air quality regulations of the EPA]. The platform has a little work left.

 If one goes beyond, there appears St. Sergius Russian Orthodox.

When our ascent ended, snow began.

Next Friday awaits

Once, i worked for a contractor. At times, it was the largest electrical contractor in the city. A big non-paying customer broke them, and they were going under. Every Friday, at lunch, the men would name and talk about who was getting layed-off that day, and whether it was particularly embarrassing. For some names, it brought smiles since the guys who came with the name, were despised. Well, now i feel the anticipation every Friday to see if Mueller has indicted anyone new. So far there has been plenty of indictments, guilty pleas, sentences, and one time served. Many people waited for Flynn, Manafort, and Stone. Many have been waiting for Corsi, Nunes, others, and family of Trump. This Friday past, nothing was announced. Next Friday awaits.

some of East Cleveland

Windermere Lodge #627

East Cleveland Masonic Temple on Belmore. 1927-83, now The Living Truth Center Church. 
After Howard Carter found the tomb of Tutankhamun in November 1922, there was an Egyptian fashion for a few years. Several movie theatres, and other establishments used an Egyptian theme. On of the Masonic founding myths were the building of the pyramids, and the pyramids were burial places, and one of their chief rituals is to have the initiate under go the third degree inside a coffin, so as to be raised.

the ornament still retains its color

band of lotus blossoms

The lotus was a symbol in ancient Egypt of re-birth, regeneration, and resurrection. The flower would close, and sink beneath the surface, and in the morning re-emerge and open.

Rosalind, a residential street with two solid cement Corinthian columns with acanthus capitals

On Euclid Avenue (an extension of Cleveland's former 'Millionaires' Row is this donut shop sign,

and on the side of the donut shop is the 2016 presidential result.

photographs of abandoned places #19

Laura DeMarco has two books on places that had been Cleveland. She speaks at libraries and elsewhere. The three places she is asked about most are Euclid Beach amusement park, the downtown Higbee's store, and Hough Bakeries. Hough had good food, and a good logo of a sky blue shield with white lettering. They had many neighborhood shops. The big bakery was hellishly hot to work in.

Lionel Pile came to Cleveland in 1902, and opened a bakery on Hough Avenue. Before bankruptcy in 1992 the Hough bakeries were the largest chain in the state.

 Perhaps under these painted signs there are stone ornament and lettering

 Reminders that the building was originally Star Baking Company before 1941