You’ve probably heard Ogden Nash’s immortal observation on the relative merits of two different methods of seduction: Candy is dandy, But liquor is quicker. Unfortunately, he omitted a third well-known amatory aid, which I now offer you as a suggested last line: And FLOWERS HAVE POWERS. I myself have never been particularly susceptible to those […]
My home, since 1973, has been almost literally a stone’s throw from an area so celebrated for its beauty that calling it “picturesque” would be an understatement. In one sweeping panorama, you have the ocean, the mountains, a lovely rose garden, tall gracious trees, and a broad green sward leading up to the cloistered front […]
In a popularity-survey of some of my recent “Thoughts and Ideas,” the winning line said, “One advantage of living alone is that you never have to be reasonable.” Although these words expressed my own feeling, I was surprised how many others also apparently feel the same way. I suppose it means that living with other […]
How do we determine the value of things? Is it only the question of what people will pay? Some American railroad tycoon of the “Robber Baron” era spoke in terms of exacting “all the traffic will bear” – meaning that he charged not what seemed fair or reasonable, but simply as much as he could […]
The worst ice cream I ever had was in England, when my family had recently returned there from the U.S., just after World War II. As a special treat, my sister and I were taken by relatives to some kind of ice cream parlor. Whatever we had there came with a tasteless wafer. It was […]
One of the most popular words in the lexicon of modern society is “care.” People in general don’t like to be handled roughly. Of course, there are exceptions, such as arranged fights, or episodes of sexual passion. But we are delicate creatures, in comparison with the hard surfaces of our natural and man-made environment. When […]
One of the advantages of outliving people you knew is that you can write freely about them. The worst best friend I ever had was named Nathan Povich Mensh. We were kids when we met in 1941 in Washington, D.C., where our houses backed onto each other, with an alley between. I was eight, and […]
“It takes a heap of living to make a house a home” is probably the best-remembered line of Edgar Guest – even though – as I’ve often found when my own work is (mis-) quoted – that isn’t exactly what he wrote. The public has an ability to improve upon things it likes, often by […]
One of my earliest memories was of somebody saying to me, in a kindly tone, “MUSTN’T TOUCH!” I don’t recall anything else about the incident – but those words – and even that tone of voice – have lingered with me as a mild rebuke whenever I’ve been tempted to put a finger someplace where […]
One mark of a civilized society is a code of manners, part of which involves rules of hospitality. How should one behave when one is a guest or a host? We are not usually taught such things at school. There are books of “etiquette” – but, if we learn these rules at all, it is […]
Some people seem to need a “Supreme Being” in their lives. Others appear to get along quite well without one. If these were only private matters, the world of human society would have been a much less troubled place than it has always been over the past millennia. But unfortunately, such matters are anything but […]
Life is full of beginnings and endings – and sometimes they are so memorable that we tend to forget what comes in between. For example, I could not quote you any other words of Dickens’ Tale of Two Cities – but I know it begins with “It was the best of times – It was […]
Nature is so full of miracles that we tend to take some of them for granted, especially if they are there all the time – like our own bodies – or if they, at least, come and go with predictable regularity – like the sun and the moon. But there are others which tend to […]
Why is so much hair wanted where it isn’t, and not wanted where it is? Many of our ideas of beauty, of grooming – even of sexuality – are hair-related. It’s one of the things we have in common with our fellow mammals. (Many non-mammals – even some insects – may appear fuzzy – but, […]
No matter how much the world changes, buyers and sellers will always need each other. But what we have called “stores” were in a way like the dinosaurs – they got bigger and bigger until, so to speak, they ruled the earth, and then something happened, and now, in our own time, we see them […]
Until quite recently, when you wanted to destroy paper and make certain that nothing on it could ever again be read, the preferred method was to burn it. That is still your surest recourse – but burning is now generally in disfavor, because it means polluted air. So, a relatively new manner of destruction has […]
I may be the only kid on my block who can recite from memory the first words of the very first “Prince Valiant” comic. Actually, the term “comic” is totally inappropriate here, because “Prince Valiant” was very different from all the other features of that genre. For one thing, there were no balloons coming out […]
Among the jokes which clog my mind is the one about the young English woman who, after a shipwreck, had recently been rescued, from an island on which she and fifteen crewmen were marooned for several weeks. She is telling her story to a very strait-laced older woman, who can’t help exclaiming: “Oh, my dear! […]
In many cultures, there is a tradition linking the idea of a person’s fate with the concept of something being written down. In Jewish society, a favorite New Year greeting is the wish: “May you be inscribed in the Book of Life for the coming year.” A Persian poet, who lived about a thousand years […]
Many children’s games involve “counting out” rhymes for choosing one or more of the players for some special role. Everybody probably knows some version of the one that begins, “Eeny, meeny, miny, moe.” But there is just one other such rhyme of which I retain a possibly fragmentary memory. And although there are probably many […]
One of the epigrams I have written which I get most requests to quote – particularly from authors of “self-help” type books – says: “Sometimes the most urgent and vital thing you can possibly do is take a complete rest.” But not everyone agrees with this philosophy. One of my favorite poets, A.E. Housman, has […]
One of the things I remember from my days as a summer-camp counselor was a skit in one of our campfire entertainments, in which someone runs onto the “stage” shouting “The Viper! The Viper is coming!” Then someone else comes screaming, “The Viper! Oh, No! It’s The Viper!” followed by a third, echoing “The Viper! […]
About a century ago, a man named Apsley Cherry-Garrard wrote a book called The Worst Journey In The World. (The title was suggested by his friend George Bernard Shaw.) It was a true account of the author’s participation in the second Scott expedition to Antarctica, in which its leader, Robert Falcon Scott, lost his life, […]
Considering how many things we are warned not to “take for granted,” it is good to bear in mind all the others – of which, may I suggest, the most precious is someone’s love. Love is a gift we grant and receive with no expectation of return. We take it for granted. Therein lies the […]
A gastroenterologist is a doctor whose techniques nowadays include inserting an endoscopic light down into people’s intestines. One member of that elite community recently wrote a book about his work, entitled, The Tunnel at The End of The Light. If I may say so, the whole process of eating, digestion, and elimination is one that […]
My favorite Famous Last Words seem special to me not only because of the speaker (a President of the United States) but also because of the circumstances in which they were uttered. Here we might pause, and ask ourselves if we can recall the last words of ANY US President, whether or not still President. […]
We’ve all heard the expression “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” – and, if pressed for an origin, we’d probably say “it’s something out of the Bible.” But, as far as I can determine, those exact words don’t occur in any accepted version of the Bible. What we do find, in […]
Most of us are familiar with the term “The Rat Race,” and we probably have an idea that it derives from scientific experiments in which rats were, and possibly still are, raced against each other, especially in mazes. What was it all about? What was it meant to prove? Whatever the answers, some things are […]
An old Chinese adage says, “A journey of 1,000 miles begins with a single step” – to which I have added my own piece of wisdom: “So, to save 1,000 miles, don’t take that step.” For some reason, humans and birds are the principal creatures which walk on two legs – I have been privileged […]
Until some time in the recent past, the term “Software,” if it was used at all, probably referred to linens and drapes and other such “soft” merchandise, as opposed to the tools, building-materials, etc., which you would find in the “Hardware” section of a department store. But the Computer Era changed all that. It started […]
Apart from the so-called “Golden Rule,” no law or commandment compels us to be “good Samaritans,” and help other people. In fact, there seems to be a general prejudice against unabashed “do-gooders.” In most cultures, the idea seems to prevail that things in general should be left as they are. The Brits say, “Leave well […]
The United Nations Charter of Human Rights guarantees everyone a nationality – whether they want one or not. In “HMS Pinafore” (Gilbert & Sullivan) the Chorus sings the praises of being English: “For he might have been a Rooshan A French or Turk or Prooshan, Or perhaps Eye-tal-eye-an – But, in spite of all temptations […]
How can anybody own anything? The most popular methods are: by Law, by Custom, or by Force. And often they’re combined. But we all know that, ultimately, none of this makes any real sense, and that, in the broadest perspective, nobody can ever own anything. Take our bodies, for example – and surely that must […]
It’s a pleasant thought – being comfortable. The English make it even more pleasant by calling it “comfy.” On the Monty Python comedy show, in which much of the humor came from standing ideas on their heads – an old lady is threatened by the Spanish Inquisition with the torture of being forced to sit […]
Continuing the Ten Best Gifts Anybody Ever Gave Me: #6. AIRMAIL-EGGS In 1946, my family returned from an America, which, despite the war, had remained a land of abundance, to an England where “Austerity” prevailed for years after the war. One food in very short supply was fresh eggs. Our relatives in Canada knew about […]
A friend suggested that I should give you a list of my “Top Ten” – but he left it to me to choose a category. I think he had in mind something like movies or songs. But I’ve decided to tell you about the Ten Best Gifts I ever received. In each case the gift […]
Some time back, I told you about the Mohs method for dealing with certain skin cancers, which I once had performed, very successfully, on my right hand. But more recently I had to cope with another such malignancy in a much more prominent area. Not to beat about the bush, we are talking about the […]
As far as I know, there is no such thing as impatient dreaming. Sleep takes as long as it takes, and, when you wake, you have to consult your timepiece to be sure how long you’ve been away in that strange other world. But in this waking, conscious world which (for want of a better […]
When I first emigrated to America, from a Europe which was still recovering from World War II, one of my earliest impressions was that the whole society seemed to be built on the principle of wastefulness. I said to myself, “In this country, I could live on what people throw away.” For better or worse, […]
Inspiration is a very positive word and concept in our culture. Nobody doesn’t want to be inspired. The word, in its origin, conveys a “breathing in” – but not so much of sucking air into your own lungs (though that is never a bad idea) as of being breathed into by some benevolent power which […]