A couple of weeks ago I sketched our travels from London, England, to Hampstead, New Hampshire, via Barcelona. As I prepared to publish that post, we were hearing reports of winter conditions predicted for the path of our upcoming train trip home via Boston and Chicago.
As it turned out, we traveled in great comfort (despite being in coach seats the whole three days), but winter weather did cause several delays, particularly west of Chicago. By Malta, Montana, outside temperatures were down to -6 F.
At one time, technical problems and "congestion" got us five hours behind schedule, but we pulled into Portland, Oregon, only four hours late.
I brought an 800-page book with me, and nearly finished it on the train. It was Anne Rivers Siddons's Peachtree Road, a fictionalized social history of 20th-century Atlanta, Georgia, mostly from the point of view of its midcentury elite families. It's a sweeping cultural epic combined with close-up accounts of family dysfunctions and episodes of social failure worthy of Tolstoy. In any case,the book had plenty to keep me occupied.
One moment in Peachtree Road was particularly poignant for me. The author described the impact of President Kennedy's assassination on the idealists in Atlanta's emerging leadership of the early 1960's. I remember the assassination vividly, but at age ten, I had not had any sense of the "Camelot" aura around the Kennedys' White House.
Now, reading the novel, I remembered an incident in my Russian history class at Carleton University. The professor was Carter Elwood, a central figure in Slavic studies in Canada and the world, and an inspiring instructor in the classroom. (And Carleton had no lack of inspiring instructors in Soviet studies—Vladimir Grebenshchikov, Paul Varnai, Halina Stepanovna van de Lagemaat—see last item here, Edward Lee, and others.)
On November 22, 1973, the tenth anniversary of John F. Kennedy's assassination, Elwood set aside his normal themes. He talked to us about that brief period of new ideals, energy, and elegance, that Kennedy's presidency seemed to bring, and that were ended so cruelly by Oswald's bullets. With tears in his eyes, he contrasted the Kennedys' Camelot with the state of affairs in 1973, Nixon having just gone on television the previous week to tell us he was not a crook.
We have made this particular three-day railroad trip several times before, but it's not the longest train trip we've taken. That happened in 2011, when we spent four days on the train from Moscow, Russia, to Sukhbaatar, Mongolia. Some pictures from that trip are here, and I described the book I read on that trip, Crazy for God, in the following week's post.
One final note on travel. This year I marked the fiftieth anniversaries of two trips that helped shape my life. The first one was to Mississippi, and the second, to Moscow and Leningrad. More on those trips at From Mississippi to Moscow.
The Friends Incubator for Public Ministry presents an online conversation with Windy Cooler and historian Tom Hamm on bold Quaker ministers. It's this Saturday at 11 a.m. Pacific time. Register through the link on this page.
Two Washington Post items on religion in the USA: "A hidden trend" (new fascination with faith among young people); and Senator Warnock's warning to all of us, particularly Democrats, of the cost of ignoring faith. (Video of Warnock's presentation is available here.)
Is there a moment of truth coming for the USA's NASA and its moon-landing project? Ars Technica's Eric Berger describes a recent congressional hearing in which one credible scientist made his doubts very clear.
I cannot, cannot press "publish" on this post without noting the vulgar inhumanity of Trump on Somalia and Somalis. It is a festering scandal that such a man occupies the White House. Words fail me, so I'll link to The Guardian's Moira Donegan.
In keeping with the travel theme, I'm closing this week's post with a classical pianist from London, Nataly Ganina. She began her musical education at age 5 in Riga, Latvia. We first heard her at a lunchtime concert at St. Olave's Hart Street, London, three years ago, and then again at the same place last month. I couldn't find a video clip from that location, but here she is at Holy Trinity South Woodford last October, playing one of my favorite impromptus from Schubert, as she did again a couple of weeks later at St. Olave.
(I've selected the segment that starts with Schubert's fourth impromptu from Op. 90, but if you have the time, listen to the whole concert.)
"A flag of peace and freedom"—a design for a post-colonial Russian flag. Source.
Since the death of Alexei Navalny, I've not written much here about the theme of the "beautiful Russia of the future." I continue to think about Russia often, and am in touch with some of our friends and colleagues of our years in Elektrostal, but the ongoing war, and the repressive political context, has complicated these relationships, to my sorrow and frustration.
However, I was reminded that this state of affairs won't last forever, Here's the communication I received today, written by two old friends, that reminded me:
Planting Seeds for Healing
A brutal war is raging in Ukraine and near the border with Russia. Will there be a winner in this conflict? I think not. In war, everyone loses. Both sides have lost many lives. The destruction in Ukraine is immense.
All wars eventually come to an end, and this one will not be an exception. When this war is over, the reconstruction begins.
However, it is not just the infrastructure and buildings that must be rebuilt. It is the lives of the people that will need restoring and healing—a return to mental and physical health. For every soldier who is killed, many lives are affected—parents, children, siblings, spouse, friends—and their lives will never be the same. Some sources estimate over one million killed plus many other wounded. There will be a great many people on both sides with unimaginable losses who suffer from trauma, stress, depression, hatred, grief, shame, regret, and many will carry unthinkable physical injuries for the rest of their lives.
Healing is a long-term process which will require dedicated professionals and volunteers who believe that, with compassion and understanding, it is possible to do healing work with individuals and groups. This process begins now in anticipation of the eventual end to this terrible war and the normalization of travel: willing professionals must be located; a sustainable program developed; volunteers
trained; money raised for transportation, office space, supplies, outreach.
There is a registered non-profit in the US that has been supporting projects in Russia and Ukraine for 29 years. Its supporters believe that an intense effort will be needed to answer the call for help from both sides in this war. They want to be involved and are looking for others who want to engage with the creative and inclusive process of assessing needs, connecting with the people in both countries, developing programs, raising funds, and implementing such healing.
Knowledge of the Russian or Ukrainian language is not necessary.
I can vouch for the authors of this invitation and hope that, if something stirs in your heart, you'll get in touch with the authors through that e-mail address.
Quakers have been involved in Russia and Ukraine for many years, dating back to Peter the Great. I know personally some of those who now carry these concerns for healing, but the majority of them are now 70 or more years old. If there are younger Friends with a concern for this part of the world, I'd love to hear from you. (johan@canyoubelieve.me.) And so would those who wrote the invitation above.
When I started studying the Russian language in high school in Evanston, Illinois, I didn't feel alone. It was great fun to go to the University of Illinois campus in Chicago on May 15, 1971, for the Illinois State Russian Contest, and see a whole lecture hall full of high school students with similar enthusiasm. (I won a "Superior" certificate!)
Stats for high school students of Russian then and now are hard to find, but college level enrollments have taken a dive since those years. At their peak (1990), there were about 44,500 students of Russian in the USA. (I wasn't one of them; I majored in Russian at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario.) By 2021 the number had gone down to 17,598. And that's before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which I'm sure made the language even less popular among those from non-Russian backgrounds. In my high school years, the Cold War (and the alarm over Sputnik I) gave some of us a sense of urgency, but the current grievous situation hasn't had the same effect.
As writer and critic Dmitri Bykov noted back in 2022, commenting on the full-scale invasion,
It is clear that Russia crossed many red lines. It cannot live any longer as it did in the past. The world will no longer see [in Russia] a place of spirituality, a place of great culture, a place representing victory over fascism.
That may all be true, now and for some time to come, but all the severe judgments, indictments, cultural boycotts, social and economic isolation, and other consequences that this nation has brought down upon itself through coercion, passivity, and toxic cynicism, I can't help continuing to cherish the vision of a "beautiful Russia of the future." And a key component for recovering that beauty is the gift of healing.
It may well be the case that young adults in the United States view Christianity as an impediment to women’s equality, a view amplified by the “Orthodoxy as Masculinity” narrative. But that is not what Orthodox Christianity proclaims.
I'm grateful for a wonderful time in London with our son, and for safe travels back to the USA on two airlines I'd never heard of. Both airlines—Vueling and LEVEL—are owned by the same company that owns British Airways, Iberia, and Aer Lingus, and both serve Barcelona, Spain, through which we flew to get to our transatlantic destination, Boston. Although Vueling's A320 had the tiniest pitch of any airplane I've ever flown in, with my knees pressed into the seat in front of me, I was thankful for a reasonable fare for a one-way transatlantic trip.
I'm grateful for the wedding that was the occasion for coming back to the USA through Boston. Our nephew Ben Cabezas married Chris Rainville last Saturday, in Hampstead, New Hampshire. Among the many blessings resulting from the wedding was the biggest reunion of extended family that I've experienced for decades. Best wishes to Ben and Chris, and thanks for the wonderful occasion and reunion. On the most basic level, I'm incredibly grateful for family, wherever they may happen to be today.
Our next stage of travel is planned to start tomorrow: Amtrak trains from Boston to Chicago and then Chicago to Portland, Oregon. We made this trip several times during our Russia years, and are looking forward to those days of continental sightseeing through train windows and the Empire Builder's observation car, along with plenty of time to read and to do my daily Norwegian language homework.
One wintery wrinkle: significant snow predicted along our Amtrak route.
I'm grateful that this is a holiday post, and I can end this post a bit early, compared to my usual length! It's time to celebrate.
Diana Butler Bass: "This Thanksgiving, we do not give thanks. We choose it."
Becky Ankeny on having trust that is based on the character of God.
Micah Bales on adulting in the Kingdom. "This is really good news for us who are just trying to be adults in a world that feels like it’s flying apart."
A tribute to sweet potatoes (one of Judy's Thanksgiving specialties).
My first passport photo, with Oslo district police stamp.
My German grandparents and brand new me, at my Norwegian grandparents' home in Oslo.
It was a year ago, on November 21, 2024, that I began the process of regaining my Norwegian citizenship. Two days ago, I received a notice from the Norwegian government that began with the word "Congratulations." It was a notice that I'm once again a Norwegian citizen.
I was born a Norwegian citizen, but when my parents both became U.S. citizens and, later, had me naturalized as well at age 10, I became subject to the Norwegian rule that didn't permit dual citizenship. When that rule was changed, they set up a procedure for former citizens to apply for citizenship once again.
So I applied and paid the fee on that day in November last year, and on the same day I began the search for the necessary documentation of my or my parents' U.S. naturalizations. Most of the year was taken up looking for those documents, but we finally got them, thanks to the genealogy department of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. That was the most expensive part of the process, but ultimately successful.
It would have been easier if I had inherited my parents' own copies of their naturalization papers, but somewhere in all the drama of their lives after I left home, those papers were lost.
I also had to apply for a certificate of conduct from the Norwegian police. I left Norway before the age of two, and have been back for only brief periods since, so I haven't had an opportunity to be noticed by the police, but all the same I was glad to get it in writing. (I'm thankful for their patience with me; having optimistically—twice!—misjudged the time it would take to get naturalization records from the U.S. government, I ended up applying three times for that certificate, each of which was good for three months.)
Then I gathered up all these documents. and Judy and I took Amtrak to the Norwegian consulate in San Francisco to hand them in. About five weeks later, I received the good news.
Now that I'm a dual citizen, it's fair to ask why I went to all this trouble. After all, I'm already a resident of my favorite planet, and a grateful subject of the Prince of Peace. All I can say is, all my life I've had Norway in my heart, and I've always believed that one's public connections ought to reflect one's inner reality. (Furthermore, I never realized as a child that this particular outward connection would be cut. I just knew that my alien status delayed our family at the U.S. port of entry whenever we returned to the USA from abroad.)
Maurer family grave, Old Aker Church, Oslo.
I remain very loyal to the USA and its values. In the language of my parents' naturalization documents, I remain "... attached to the principles of the Constitution of the United States and well disposed to the good order and happiness of the United States." I see no conflict in gratefully claiming, at the same time and with equal loyalty, my deep roots in the place where I was born, and the joy and completeness I always feel when I return to that birthplace.
And finally, with a Norwegian father, and with a German mother who was born and grew up in Japan, and other relatives in Norway, Germany, Canada, and South America (at least!), I will always cherish all of my favorite planet.
We're about to be on the road on Thursday, so I'm posting this a day early. Hope to post again on (U.S.) Thanksgiving.
Journalist Elena Kostyuchenko loves her country, according to the title of her very moving, often distressing book, but it's a complicated love.... I recommend the book, but it's not fun material. Maybe this review will help explain. I'm not sure Kostyuchenko's book conforms to my foreign ideas of how to write about Russia, but then she has seen and endured many things I've not, and she's not on a mission to correct us.
Heather Cox Richardson: "Sugar dating," Epstein, and Abraham Lincoln's warnings about "the same old serpent."
On her blog, Life in an Old Growth Forest: Reflections on Aging, Nancy Thomas is exploring the dark part of the forest the way she knows how, by writing.
Marcelle Martin and Windy Cooler on the role of discernment in public ministry: an introduction to faithfulness groups on the Friends Incubator for Public Ministry Web site, and more information on their January 7, 2026, online conversation.
Reposted, with permission, from Kevin's post on the Facebook group Christian Quakers. The titles above are mine.
This past First Day I felt a leading, as I often do, to invoke the memory of Abraham Lincoln in my vocal ministry. Lincoln is a hero of mine, and he steered the United States through the worst crisis in its existence up until that point, and arguably its most dire state ever in our nearly 250 years of existence.
Christians find themselves increasingly divided into factions these days. I'm speaking primarily about American Friends in this post. Quakers on the right adhere to their own strongly held beliefs and the same is true with Quakers on the left.
Friends are called by different names. Some are Evangelicals. Some are conservative, in the Quaker sense, meaning they seek to conserve the old way of doing things. Some are Hicksite Friends, usually closely allied with FGC—and are by in large liberal unprogrammed Quakers, who may or may not consider themselves Christian.
And who can say which of us has the correct answer, the correct verse of Scripture to invoke in debate, the most accurate usage of the Quakerese we know so well and love so much. I adhere to my own interpretation, but so does someone else who, while we might share the moniker "Quaker", we don't share very much besides that.
Lincoln observed a similar dynamic in his own time, a country torn asunder by Civil War. And he was struck by the many ironies. Thinking of what North and South had in common, Lincoln spoke,
"Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other...The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. 'Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.'"
The passage of Scripture with which Lincoln concludes the above passage with is pulled from the King James Version of the Bible. Put into more contemporary language, it states that suffering is inevitable. Some will always lead others astray. And though that suffering is inevitable, how terrible it will be for the person or persons who create it. They will experience harsh punishment.
We live in an era where many seek to lead others astray. Some through ignorance. Some through misguided zeal. Some with an agenda to advance. And I can't determine the complete truth in any source I consult. It all seems slanted to suit someone's self-interest.
Lincoln took a radical view about the American Civil War. A pox on both your houses! Both sides were equally at fault, in his reckoning. Though the South's plantation owners kept enslaved people, and maintained the system that kept it profitable, the North indirectly made money from the products produced by slave labor.
Maybe levying fault isn't as important as changing the status quo. I don't pretend that people with such wildly divergent views will ever come together under a common purpose. For example, the only thing an Evangelical Friend and I will likely ever have in common is the fact that we are a product of the hard work of George Fox. Beyond that, we are as different as chalk and cheese.
So rather than let this demoralize us, I suggest we work within the people who will hear our message and strive to push past the propaganda that passes for news, not just on the right and left, but everywhere. Provided that those who disagree with me don't deny my right to worship as I please and what I please, I have no grievance with them.
But wouldn't it be wonderful if we ended up on the same page, eventually. That's an idealistic goal and one that seems increasingly unlikely the older I get, but it is a solution for us, not just as Friends, but also as Americans.
Kevin Camp (they/them), a member of Birmingham (Alabama) Friends Meeting and Camas (Washington) Friends Church, published an excellent book of short stories last year, Thanksgiving on Meth Mountain. Fuller biography on their Amazon page here.
Kevin's post gave me a lot to think about.
First of all, their quotation from Abraham Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address once again reminded me of how unusual it is for a politician not to refer to God as 100% WITH US. Elton Trueblood referred to Lincoln as the "theologian of American anguish," and this speech makes the case. In the U.S. Civil War, the North prevailed, as Trueblood pointed out, not "as a consequence of the supreme wisdom or righteousness of the citizens of the North." When Lincoln spoke of "all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil", the settler colonial beneficiaries of that toil were in both North and South.
In one of the most sublime passages in English-language political speech, Lincoln yearned and prayed for reconciliation:
With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.
What was always clear to some of us, and has now become glaringly obvious as racism makes a roaring comeback in today's USA: the nation's wounds have not been bound up, a just and lasting peace has not been achieved. All the more reason to recall Lincoln's words and remind ourselves of this vision, stubbornly not giving it up for lost.
We Quakers haven't exactly gone through a civil war, but we have had a number of severe divisions, as a result of which (as Kevin pointed out) we're often appealing to the same history and the same Quaker language and drawing very different conclusions. Kevin's post urges us not to let divisions demoralize us, and I agree.
In two periods of my service with international Friends organizations—ten years with Friends World Committee for Consultation and seven with Friends United Meeting—I visited hundreds of Friends communities, and I found among them many Friends who, with varying degrees of stubbornness, would fit Kevin's descriptions of people as different as chalk and cheese according to their preferred interpretations of core Quakerism. But over all those years, I caught glimpses of progress as well. Maybe we won't be reading from the exact same page anytime soon, but there are many Friends who are at least looking at each other's favorite pages....
Some of us in our tight categories simply haven't heard that there are other ways of being Quaker. Among other important accomplishments, Friends World Committee for Consultation consistently offers Quakers opportunities to meet and consult across the traditional lines that Kevin's post cited, but how many of us are even aware of these opportunities? Looking at our theological divisions from my home on the Christian side of things (dare I even say "evangelical"?), I've run into many so-called liberal or universalist Friends who haven't deliberately rejected a Christian Quaker testimony, but simply haven't even had a decent chance to encounter and consider it. (Let's face it: authoritarian religiosity, toxic biblical malpractice and Christian nationalist heresies have not helped.) If we get to know each other better, you might still not agree with my spiritual priorities, nor I with yours, but at least it won't be from ignorance...
... and there is no reason we can't work for peace and justice together along the priorities we do share, which is important in a world with so much pain and bondage. Friends in Portland, Oregon, for example, are crossing categories in advocating and acting for refugees, immigrants, and asylum seekers.
When I was at Friends United Meeting, I remember being startled at how often the occasions when liberal and evangelical Friends were irritating each other actually boiled down to differences between urban and rural communication styles, and not just theology. Learning to accommodate these differences in styles won't overcome every theological gap, but at least we can clear away some of the misunderstandings.
Few divisions are absolute. Some of us live in the overlaps. I began my life as a Friend in the unprogrammed side of the Quaker world, among predominantly liberal Friends (though my mentors in that community were deeply Christian), but now I've spent most of my fifty years as a Friend in pastoral, programmed meetings. I'm not alone in my dislike of being defined by conventional categories. Over the last 21 years I've been writing this blog, I've seen more and more bloggers, traveling Friends, retreat and workshop leaders, authors, and others helping expand opportunities for lively Quaker conversations and new understandings of leadership, community, and calling. (Emily Provance and Windy Cooler, just for starters, and, as always, Martin Kelley helping us stay up to date.)
Are genuine seekers, waiting on the Holy Spirit (whether in quiet receptivity or in total desperation!), ever all that far from God and each other, regardless of their worship styles? When we resort to faking it for the sake of conformity, and either start hiding in the silence or retreating behind our Sunday routines, the differences in style and language are most obvious—and matter the least.
We share other significant challenges. Liberals and evangelicals alike suffer from widespread ignorance about our spiritual and intellectual roots in the "hard work of George Fox" mentioned by Kevin. Sometimes we prefer to stick with a few selected sound bites if we know even that much. We allow our internal conceits and conflicts to obscure our most important audience: those who have never heard of us. We sometimes tolerate lazy mediocrity in our administrative systems and communications, a mediocrity we would not accept in our secular lives. Sometimes our Quaker exceptionalism makes us unaware of other faith communities that have pulled ahead of us in addressing our signature concerns. Saddest of all, too often we can describe Quaker ideals eloquently but can't point to a church or meeting nearby that actually lives them out.
What do you think? Will we continue to drift apart, or will the overlaps increase? Tell us about meetings and churches where newcomers and long-timers say "I'm so glad I'm here!"
Here's an item that takes me back fifteen years, to the summer of 2010. That was the year I stayed in Elektrostal, Russia, the whole summer, not attending the Northwest Yearly Meeting sessions in the USA, and thereby able to experience the smog caused by that summer's fires in the region's neglected peat fields. The item: "How Peat Elektrified the USSR."
"By far the greatest Cafe the world has ever seen."
I was walking past a familiar storefront this afternoon, the Classic Football Shirts London shop, and happened to notice this claim in huge letters (how could I not?) on the front glass.
The cafe at this store is indeed nice, as Judy and I have experienced more than once. Does it live up to that claim? (Is it even in the same class as Chapters in Newberg, Oregon?)
I'd rather ask, does it matter?
My theme this evening is manipulative exaggeration. The "greatest Cafe the world has ever seen" may be exaggerated, but it's not manipulative. It's so over the top that nobody is likely to argue the point.
"Communist, not socialist. Communist." Screenshot from source.
A few days ago, I watched a video clip of the USA's president say straight into the camera that New York City mayoral candidate is a "... communist, not socialist. Communist. He's far, he's far worse than a socialist."
I realize that as a rule the current U.S. president is not a reliable source of facts nor a defender of the biblical commandment against false witness, but I want to stick with this one case for a moment. Trump's assertion is an exaggeration (yes, Mamdani is on the left end of the USA's political spectrum, but not that far!) but also an outright falsehood (Mamdani is not a Communist either politically or philosophically, and this is a matter of public record).
The leader of what we used to call the Free World is guilty of manipulative exaggeration.
I realize that he's not the first U.S. politician to engage in this variation of false witness. As just one case study, I've just spend some time in a mixed experience of fascination and horror, reading about the 1884 presidential campaigns of Grover Cleveland and James Blaine. As American Heritage summarized it, "Grover Cleveland had seduced a widow; James G. Blaine had peddled influence [and] lied about it. In 1884, voters had to choose between two tarnished champions."
(My favorite line from Cleveland supporters: "We should elect Mr. Cleveland to the public office he is so admirably qualified to fill and remand Mr. Blaine to the private life he is so eminently fitted to adorn.")
Compared to the raging MAGA bulls in the china shop of democracy, it may seem like indulging in trivialities to point to the cesspool of manipulative exaggeration that makes up much of the Internet. But is this wider context just making it harder to raise a red flag when the president himself indulges? Might we become so cynical that we give up on seeking truth and unmasking manipulation even when it's conducted by our chief executive? And ... when it's conducted by "our own side" as well?
I'm sad to see that people on the left, where I generally find myself, are now constantly using these techniques of manipulative exaggeration, often in the form of "clickbait," in the supposed service of getting our attention for their message. My e-mails and my phone's text messages feature such lines as...
Re: Taylor Smith...Donald Trump's DISGUSTING rant.
re: Portland's polling location [Johan won’t respond??] (Portland, Oregon, doesn't have polling locations! Only drop-off points for our ballots, which can also be mailed in.)
We can't believe you're a Republican!!!
NOT asking for money, just your signature. (For the record, they did ask for money, too.)
Impeachment COMING SOON [MUST READ >>]>
And in addition, there are those frequent "surveys" and "polls" which both major parties send out constantly, with questions worded to make it obvious how we should answer.
He is starting to worry about me.
If there's anything unique about the text messages and e-mails from the Republicans, it's how stupid they think their audience is. A frequent theme: the president has been checking with his staff to hear how I've personally responded to their latest plea.
If there's any blessing in this Internet/phone blizzard of manipulative exaggeration, it might be that the formulas (including senders' addresses, CAPITAL LETTERS, shocking headlines, etc) are so absurd that we're probably all learning how to filter them out. The sheer volume of such traffic may also reduce my patience with even using these devices as much as I've done in the past. SHOCKING! It's WIN-WIN. GAME OVER!
Four years ago, I posted the following essay on clickbait. I find my YouTube feed to be slightly calmer these days. Is it because I've somehow trained it to reduce this kind of traffic, or are content providers themselves realizing we're burning out on manipulative exaggeration?
Youtube has figured out that I like videos about space travel, so they serve me up with lots of suggestions about the latest rockets and their builders.
Many of those videos have calm, interesting titles and descriptions, and the day is not long enough to view even a small portion of those. That's especially true for a video like this, modestly entitled "Crew-3 Mission | Approach and Docking," that takes more than six hours to watch from beginning to end.
Six hours may seem like a long time, but it's a lot shorter than the preceding video, "Crew-3 Mission | Coast and Rendezvous," which clocks in at nine hours. Strangely enough, that title completely omits the dramatic centerpiece of the video -- the launch!
Many of the videos I'm invited to watch are exactly the opposite: the titles are far more dramatic than the content. Often the titles reflect today's equivalents of the overused superlative "extreme" of a couple of decades ago.
These overly dramatic titles and descriptions are sometimes called "clickbait." This word entered the Oxford English Dictionary in 1999, longer ago than I realized. (According to the OED, clickbait is "Internet content whose main purpose is to encourage users to follow a link to a web page, esp. where that web page is considered to be of low quality or value.")
In our classes at the New Humanities Institute in Elektrostal, Russia, we occasionally presented our students with carefully curated cutting-edge lists of buzzwords and jargon (and sometimes asked them to predict whether those words and phrases would still be in use in five years), but I don't remember "clickbait" being in those lists. I think one of the last classes we did on this topic included the word "binge-watch" ... in case that helps you deduce what years I'm talking about.
Far from exciting my interest, clickbait titles and descriptions of videos relating to space travel usually repel me. Here are the top five words and phrases practically guaranteed to prevent my click:
game over! (which it never is!)
insane! (meaning, as far as I can tell, audacious)
humiliated! (usually comparing one tech entrepreneur/celebrity's success to another)
this is huge! (probably not)
it's happening! (and so is everything else)
I watched one of these videos, out of sheer curiosity and to maintain a shred of integrity for this screed. (What if it really was "game over" and my protests were just ill-informed?)
The video on the "insane" partnership of Elon Musk and Google was underwhelming. The commentator simply described the Starlink/Google collaboration, which was already public news five months earlier, using video clips that were only vaguely related to the narrative, not a single voice other than his own, and no analysis that could not be found in corporate press releases. Youtube doesn't mind, of course -- the video was preceded by two ads.
More samples from one evening's Youtube browsing:
Original post and links for that day, November 11, 2021, are here.
A History of Rock and Roll in 500 Songs. Many thanks to Steven Davison for writing about this podcast. I've been sampling it. It lives up to Steven's praise. And if you think that rock music is a bit of a trivial subject for our difficult times, I can point out how multidimensional the podcast's coverage is, taking into account racial politics, business ethics, technical innovations, generational influences, in short, all the ways that music reflects life. What's more, we may need a thoughtful podcast on rock music while we're in detox from all that manipulative exaggeration.
While I'm at Steven's blog, here's a more typical post: a new look at "that of God" through the eyes of George Fox (of course), Lewis Benson, Rufus Jones, and Michael Langford.
What's going on in Richmond, Indiana? Two institutions closely related to Friends report troubling financial news. Here's an item on Earlham College and another on Friends United Meeting. (Part two of the FUM document is here.)
According to FUM's Weekly E-news, FUM has scheduled an online information session on the financial situation and the 2026 budget on Thursday, November 13, at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time. Register here. Lloyd Stangeland, FUM’s Acting Chief Financial Officer; Shawn McConaughey, Clerk of the Finance Committee; and Emily Provance, Clerk of the Advancement Committee, will facilitate the session.
"Responding to the calls of Palestinian Christians": a statement and petition campaign arising from the 2025 Church at the Crossroads campaign. Thanks to Kristin Du Mez for the link.
Blues from Brazil: Little Walter's "Sad Hours" performed by Sacha Gamarra. Below: From Dnipro, Ukraine, Kostiantyn Kolisnychenko with the same instrumental.
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