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The Harmonies of our World – From Costa Rica’s Bellbird To Joshua Bell

‘Twas a dizzyingly moveable feast of music.   Within barely more than one brief rotation of our terrestrial orb I have had my soul opened to the finest music that we humans and the Divine have to offer.

The morning sun’s lifting over the Osa Peninsula in southern Costa Rica once again orchestrates a fugal flood of God’s most elegant song birds.  Our guide Abraham slings his scope and tripod over shoulder, leading Lorraine and me down slender trails through the leafy jungle.  Somewhere, amidst this dense ramage, bellbirds cello, pink-legged woodrails trill, tanagers staccato, and the clay-colored thrush lets loose the sweet stab of a call that has won him the honor of Costa Rica’s National bird.  Thousands join the chorus – even sun-dappled pairs of macaws lend their raucous cries to this symphonic surge of life.

Compared to Abraham, Lorraine and I cannot find a lion in our living room, but with his tutelage and our binoculars we try to poke our eyes where bodies could not possibly penetrate – to spy the sources of this symphony in the bush.  With each bird sighted comes an almost disenchanting ease at their songs.  Such magnificent rhapsodies so effortlessly, so spontaneously brought forth – and yet enchanting beyond telling.

Then, suddenly – thanks to the near-magical mechanics of today’s travel, and scores unseen assisting hands –  here Lorraine and I sit: a mere tanager’s swoop from virtuoso violinist Joshua Bell and the Academy of St. Martins in the Fields Orchestra performing Paganini’s Violin Concerto No. 1.  (After landing at Newark airport, a friend raced us home with enough time to pick up our tickets and arrive back at Newark’s NJ Performing Arts Center for the 8 p.m. curtain.) Poised concentration etched Bell’s face and passion poured through his agile fingers and on into the 1713 Huberman Stradivarius which delivered his mastery.  That same awe of the Avian’s morning’s symphony returned.  Again, we paused, still, amazed that such beauty was ours for the hearing…reveling in the sounds and letting our souls crescendo and descend with the moment of the music.

But with this second concerto an additional emotion kept creeping in: admiration.  Joshua Bell had labored admirably, astoundingly, to achieve this pinnacle of performance.  The untold thousands of hours of practice, the hundreds of thousands of hours of his fellow musicians in the orchestra, had prepared them for this soul-enriching experience we were sharing.  And even during the performance, each measure of music hung precariously on that instant’s expertise.

The entire house rose to its feet and applauded the artists – none more enthusiastically than Lorraine and I.  To compare the morning’s vs. the evening’s symphony would be ludicrous.  Both transformed and uplifted me.  Both were divinely inspired.  Yet walking out of NJPAC into the evening air, the truth of this beauty became clear: whatever the source we are better for seeking it; we should accept it with gratitude; and while beauty’s creation comes with easy spontaneity for some and only with sweat for others, it always God’s best within us.

             – Bart Jackson

Bid Our Sad Divisions Cease: A 2020 Recipe- Happy New Year

So this knee-jerk, flaming liberal walks into a biker bar and turns to the guy wearing the “Trump for 2020” leather jacket and says…..

December 28; on Del/MD’s the eastern shore flatlands.  It looked like a homey tavern, with just enough mild dilapidation on its clapboard front to seem inviting.  So my wife Lorraine and I parked our hybrid beside a long row of shining Harleys and entered in search of some good, home made chow.  The busy waitress at the bar frantically served under fluttering dome of dollar bills – each individually clipped to some carefully strung web overhead.  The fabulous home cooked food was richly appreciated by us and by the leather-clad bikers heartily hunkered down on all the bar stools and around most of the small tables.

At meal’s end and Lorraine headed for the restroom, I began chatting with a few of the bikers.  Most of the men, like the majority of club riders I’ve recently encountered sported white or graying hair and jackets with an array of intriguing emblems.  Turning to the “Trump for 2020” biker, I thought of Dr. Dale Caldwell, a guest on our The Art of the CEO radio show and author of Intelligent Influence.  Dale insists that we all formulate our aims and opinions based on that array of influences which surround us from birth, and until you gain some understandings of a person’s influences, you will never be able to work with him.

“So where’d ya ride from today,” I asked the biker as he sipped his beer.  Eric told me of his home down on eastern shore Virginia.  We chatted briefly.  He fixed engines for bikes and cars.  I told him fix words for books.   We shared a few nods of commiseration on the hassle of working for someone else – and the almost-as-bad hassle of working for yourself.  Before leaving, I asked if he thought President Trump was giving him a good deal.  Warily, he answered in the affirmative – giving a couple of reasons.  Then he asked what I thought.  In a sentence I replied.  I bid him a good new year and hoped that he didn’t run into anything large on his bike.  “Back atcha,” he smiled.  Neither of us did, or could have, converted the other, but a few seeds of understanding from that other side got planted.  Gotta start somewhere.

Oh, and the dollar bills?  Back in the day when most of these bikers sported their original hair color, the R&R Grill & Bar had developed a justified reputation as a rowdy biker & hard-bitten local bar. Finally, the new owner, I was told, decided to keep folks in line by announcing, “The first time I hear you use the ‘F-word’ or the ‘N-word’ you are going to have to hand over a dollar and I’ll pin it above.  The second time I hear you employing those words, you will be invited to leave.”  The idea stuck; tolerance came to R&R; and now folks have gotten into the habit of signing and posting dollar bills in support of keeping this watering hole on friendly terms.

As wished for in the haunting verse of O Come O Come Emmanuel:

O come desire of nations bind

In one the hearts of humankind

Bid thou our sad divisions cease

And let us join the Prince of Peace.

May we sample a bite of hopeful idealism this coming year,

– Bart Jackson

 

Nomination Call for Prometheus Awards

The Prometheus Awards recognize those exceptional individuals who by their personal example and their inventive enterprises enrich the human community and shed light into our world.

Right now Prometheus publishing is conducting a call for Nominations – so if you know an

individual – an idealist who is putting his or her creative sweat and energy into a project that is enriching some corner of the human community, for-profit or non-profit we invite you to share their rays of hope and nominate them as candidate for a Prometheus Award.

You may  nominate a candidate by visiting https://bartsbooks.com/businessess-best/ and complete the short nomination form.  Or you may email info@bartsbooks.com sending your name and contact info, the candidate’s name and a brief description of their accomplishments.

For further details on the Awards ceremony,  what honorees receive etc. or to – or to nominate a candidate – we invite you to write to Info@bartsbooks.com

Prometheus was the ancient Greek Titan who defied the gods and brought to humankind the gift of fire.  From that light onward, there was no going back.

 

 

2018 Governor’s Cup Garden State Wine Awards

Friday, November 16 Bart and Lorraine joined the guests as Governor Phil Murphy and his wife Tammy as they opened the doors of their Drumthwacket residence to celebrate Governor’s Cup Garden State Wine Awards.  ‘Twas a glorious opportunity to celebrate & sample New Jersey’s exploding, world class wine industry, and for Bart & Lo to meet so many old friends they made in authoring The Garden State Wineries Guide.

Bart & Garry Pavlis  NJ’s Prime Wine Judge and Guru toast the state’s winery explosion – now up to 50. Gary, who penned the forward for The Garden State Wineries Guide, runs tours statewide.  

Bart congratulates Louis Caracciolo, wizard vintner of world class Amalthea Cellars for winning the Best Red and Best Wine Overall in 2018

NJ Secretary of Agriculture Doug Fisher (left) and Bart prepare a bottle swap of their own homegrown wines.

Bart & Lorraine enjoy Drumthwacket’s gubernatorial hospitality, and celebrate The Governor’s Cup Awards with many wine-making friends.

Election Day Were the Founding Fathers Right About You?

Yesterday, 11 days prior to the midterm election, I joined in a spirited discussion about whether the US needed an electoral college.   What made it enjoyable was that this was a discussion of gentlemen earnestly seeking an honest answer, none of whom came armed with an intractable opinion.  As we hammered at the issue, one historical element came up several times: the founders of our nation felt that the great mass of people were too easily swayed and not quite bright enough to elect the best possible leaders in a straight popular vote.  Their decisions would not, our nation-framers felt, be trustworthy.

I have no intent here to debate that assessment, or whether it was indeed the founders’ consensus.  But allow me to hold out one warning: a whole host of forces involved in the political process seem actively intent on dragging you down to that level of incapability.

* Alas, too much of the media election reports focus on presenting the spectacle and speculation of the horse race.  Discussion of issues, apparently, lack the byte-size appeal of your minimal attention span, and are shouldered aside for the latest news of who is nudging ahead of whom in the polls.

* The political parties, who amongst themselves currently refer to John Q. Public as “Joe Six-pack,” too often operate as if slime most motivates you.  The more desperately they can tar the opponent, the more likely they are to settle for their candidate.

* Too many of our would-be public servants – those individual candidates tossing their hats in the political ring – have, I fear, swallowed a terrible myth:  they believe the money alone wins elections.  Your precious vote is for sale to the individual who can gather unto her/himself the grandest war chest – regardless of the source.

But you – the voter – still retain the power.  And this fellow citizen begs you to take heart.  Too much of media – too often political parties – and too many candidates are not all.  Appearing on ballots everywhere are excellent, astute individuals dedicated to the public’s welfare.  You have the ability and the time (oh, yes you do) to find those beneficial, devoted people who can and anxiously will strive to make ours a better nation.  Special interests thrive only when there is a vacuum.  So why don’t we fill the vacuum and take our citizenship seriously and show who really runs this nation?  Shall we each individually prove to our founders and leaders that we’re a lot more capable of running our nation than they believe we are?