A Sort of Chestnut Circle Overview

40 YEARS OF GALEN IN 80 WORDS -- FOR PAT HOGAN


TODAY'S QUOTE:

"Nothing in education is so astonishing as the amount of ignorance it accumulates in the form of inert facts."

-- from THE EDUCATION OF HENRY ADAMS (1918)


Friday
July 27, 2007

Dear Pat,

Thanks for your e-mail of June 14th to our other address (msmith2210@aol.com). I apologize for not getting back to you sooner -- and promise to try to do better in the future.

First of all, it was wonderful to hear from you after . . . how long? I was at the 10th and 20th East High Class of '67 Reunions, but must confess in all candor that I have little recollection of whom I saw or visited with or danced with, etc. Would love to hear all about what you're doing these days. Will attempt to condense my own past 40 years for you here to bumpersticker size, depending on how much text space my limited little mailstation gizmo affords me this evening; although the surest way to this end would be for you to go to my blog and simply scroll through it at your leisure. I think that there's even a recent resume in there, as well as the first 30 or so pages of the rough draft of my memoir-in-progress, tentatively titled THE TOOLMAKER'S OTHER SON. Simply google me at:

mythoklast.blogspot.com

Of the folks you mentioned in your e-mail, I know precious little. Lucy & Gaylord moved to Kansas City long before I did, had a daughter and divorced. Both are attorneys. I spoke to Lucy by phone, perhaps 13 years ago. Virginia had passed away a few years earlier. (My own mother died in 1990, my father in 1982, both in Wichita.)

My last contact with Bill, Paul, Virginia, Molly, Abbey, and any of the others would have been at "Uncle Dick's" (V's brother's) memorial service, circa 1988. Regarding Mar, Collins, Helmick, Wood, Princell, Consolver, Dugan, etc., I'm clueless. Benjamin got married, lived several years in Germany, and has settled with wife Ann in Davenport, IA as an extreme right-wing Fundamentalist. (I'm dead serious!) Rick Craycraft is still up in Portland area, working hard at many things, as nearly as I can make out. I visited briefly with Dr. Trombold, perhaps 4 years ago, but he's moved back to Wichita.

My guess is that you've had access to more recent and more accurate information on all them than have I. My cousin, Dr. Jane Stone, who is an anthropologist, has convinced me that the sort of social fracturing and fragmentation (Diaspora?) we're looking at here is simply the norm in modern America. Very few shades of THE BIG CHILL, except among the bourgeoisie.

In 1993, I made a paradigm shift in my "career" (such as it ever was), gave up on whoring after a tenure track college teaching job and decided on a life of almost certain penury, so as to experience, observe, research, learn from, take in . . . a vastly more valuable body of "real world realities" and wisdom than mere conventional academia was ever going to afford me . . . by going "undercover" (as t'were) in the field of security. After putting in two years as a notetaking "art guard" at The Nelson, I move into armed hospital security for 9 years, arriving here in the KC School District with my .38 and my writing implements in early '06. Am learning faster than I can write. Fascinating stuff.

Meanwhile, Marie & I have been domestic partners for 15 years. She's a bit older, but bright and enjoyable. I'm happy.

Would love to correspond. Also, my cell is: 816-807-4957. Leave message anytime and/or write . . . please.

LOOKING FORWARD,

Galen Green