Thank you for sharing, Albert.

Oakland’s Mountain View Cemetery was also designed by Frederick Law Olmsted.  It is a "park" of old growth trees, wide avenues, fallen angels, long-dead millionaires, beautiful views, and oh, blessed be, quiet.  It is so quiet, in the midst of the 12 million people of the San Francisco Bay Area, much of which you can see from the upper ridges.  Part of my spiritual practice is walking there each day to remind myself that life is fleeting, death everywhere each day among us.  In my walks, I am not alone.  Dogs, kids on bikes, noon-time exercisers from the nearby Kaiser Permanente Hospital, stray cats, dope smoking teenagers hiding behind crypts from their parents and teachers, most of whom probably walk in the Cemetery with the rest of the neighborhood… It is one of the most lively places in Oakland, and each day I thank those wonderful long-dead folks who had the presence of mind to reserve this place and hire this talented man to design it, at that time to honor their dead, but in fact is a wonderful haven for the living as well.

The assumptions inherent in this question:  We could communicate.  They would be interested in me.  Perhaps I would be threatening to them (as the diseases Europeans brought to the new world were to the native people).  That their perceptions are enough similar to ours as to be aware of me as a "me-ness" that I recognize.  And so on.  Certainly they would be more likely to offer Ms Bergen a ride.

You mean like in Pelican Bay State Prison in California, James?

That it is best to do nothing and be complacent because it’s just too hard to try to do something.  Isn’t that usually the point of the naysayers?

Correction, of course:  When Elephants Weep:  The Emotional Lives of Animals

Stephanie, stop and think over what she said.  Where in urban zoos are there "thousands of acres" for these largest of land mammals to roam???  Where?  Do you know of one single zoo in the US where this is possible?  At the Oakland Zoo, years ago, a friend from Zimbabwe saw the elephants and demanded to see the trainer.  He informed her that she knew nothing about elephants, that he was the expert, and the elephant was fine.  She told him the elephant was insane and miserable.  They ended up in a shouting match which got nothing.  A year later, the elephant killed the trainer.  The elephant was killed in response.  Afterward, a number of voices from the community demanded change, and with the more than capable leadership of Dr. Joel Parrott, a new African pavillion was created.  The result?  Oh, better.  But still the elephants are having the health challenges Ms. Tomlin speaks of, and the zoo is struggling to create yet more land for them.  This is now one of the most enlightened zoos in America for elephants, and it still doesn’t work.  Stephanie, you might want to read When Elephants Wee:  The Emotional Lives of Animals, by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson and Susan McCarthy.  Certainly zookeepers believe they are doing their best by the animals, and in many cases they certainly are.  But their (and our) best doesn’t always mean good or right or humane.

No secret.  She’s a Swede.  CF., Ingrid Bergman.

Georgia, are you listening?????

I do suspect, Ms. M, that you have the appropriate wardrobe to accompany said parasol… literal translation perhaps "for the sun," ….

Oh, gawd, ain’t it the truth, ain’t it the truth.  The next great fortune will be made by someone who designs a beautiful bib for the baby boomers which tucks neatly into a little bag for the purse or pocket.  And if we all start wearing them at once, everyone will want them.  Just extend the lobster-eating bib to everything!

Since we paid for the destruction of the process in Iran in 1954 by the CIA, it is pretty much high time we stayed out of their process. 

No, Georgia.  I’ll go check it out.

And Sarah Orne Jewett, C White….  I went to Red Cloud one year and walked every inch of the town.  It is an astonishing place that I would recommend to anyone who is a Cather fan.

It means a lot to me to know that you’re out there, just slogging along, doing your art, giving life some light and meaning along the way, Josie.  (You too, Ms. Jane.  You too!)