Penelope’s Loom

  NOTE:  please accept my apology Dear Reader, for any who may have ventured forth on this blog of late.  It has been a long time since I last posted...my mother died, and I decided to live briefly on Venus.  But, I have returned, and hopefully you will still come along on some new adventures, even if they are bitter--as th is entry most certainly is.... I have written, in this blog, many warnings about  absolute power.  I have also dealt with the problems that come into focus, when individuals are seduced by that power, to the detriment of plebs.  So, there probably isn't that much left to say, excepting the fact that this seems to be an inexhaustible subject, due to the endless samples that continually present themselves. What I'd like to do in this entry, is to look a little bit at beginnings, and endings.  Hopefully, you might see a few parallels, and forgive me pointing them out along the way.  This is only my POV, however, please r...

DANGER--CAUTION--BEWARE. What follows here is yet another commentary on this year's presidential election, Dear Reader.  Believe me, I am more than bored with this subject matter, but the candidates keep shocking me into a catatonic state.  Honestly, we must be the laughing stock of the world. I shudder to think how the global community regards our lack of any political process.  Honor is out the window, and the election of 2024 has devolved into a cult of personality.  On the one side you've got a mainstream politician, spouting platitudes (Harris), while on the other you've got a reincarnation of Adolf Hitler. I am compelled to address comments made by the dictator wannabe, Mr. Asshole (i.e. Trump): "Immigrants are no longer welcome in Donald Trump’s America. Instead, the Republican presidential nominee posited that under his potential second administration, he would round up and mass-deport noncitizens based on their “serial numbers.”  https://newrepublic.com...

 I had a death in the family this week.  Will post again soon

American white people I meant in the title;  circa WW2.  Thus spake (title quote) Zarathustra, a.k.a. Mark Twain Jimmy Tsutomu Mirikitani, Cemetery, Tule Lake, 2002, mixed media on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum  Autumn foliage California has now become  a far country ---Yajin Nakao So, what were the camp conditions?  Military style, if anything.  Windows without restrooms, and no running water.   From March 10 August, 1942, more than 100,000 Japanese-Americans were forcibly interned in concentration camps.  The living conditions were less than ideal, as the above pictures indicate.  The houses were communal-style living, with little or no insulation against extreme heat, or cold.  Camp illnesses, like dysentery and typhoid fever were unwanted denizens.  Predictably, children and the elderly suffered more than other internees, in contracting these diseases. Of course the camps were built in remote areas, and of course they w...

  Be Like the Cactus Let not harsh tongues, that wag in vain, Discourage you. In spite of pain, Be like the cactus, which through rain, And storm, and thunder, can remain. Kimii Nagata https://japaneseinternmentmemories.wordpress.com/category/japanese-internement-poetry/ Manzanar, yesterday and today. When I was a kid, back in the Neo-lithic era, one of the books we had to read was entitled Farewell to Manzanar.   I don't remember it really, now that I'm in my dotage, but I do remember being shocked that the internment of Japanese Americans occurred during the second world war.  Here's a link to the book online:   https://www.rgandara.com/uploads/1/2/3/7/123702754/james_d._houstonjames_a._houstonjeanne_wakatsuki_houston_-_farewell_to_manzanar__2013_houghton_mifflin_harcourt_trade_and_reference_houghton_mifflin_harcourt_hmh_books_for_young_readers___1_.pdf   We also used to drive past what remained of the camp on our way to Mammoth Mountain--a ski resort....