Who Killed Him? Fear?

At the American Magazine Conference (AMC) the American Society of Magazine Editor’s unveiled its selection of the top magazine covers from the prior four decades 1965-2005.  Out of the thousands of covers reviewed  in 2005, forty were selected and ranked from 1-40 respectively.

 

Awarded number one cover was Rolling Stone’s,   January 21,1981 issue exposing a vulnerable, naked John Lennon being reborn from the side of Yoko Ono.  Ironically this photo was taken by Annie Leibovitz just hours before Lennon was shot and killed on December 8th, 1980 as he left his New York apartment.  

 

Go back in time December 8th, 1980; in my time travels I remember exactly where I was, what I was doing and even wearing when the news of Lennon’s death hit the airways.  Like all moments of passionate significance the memory was etched in my brain for later total recall.  Really, does anyone care where I was or what I was wearing when the news came, I doubt it seriously.  But to the generation that grew up with John Lennon the impact of his tragic death made him an iconic god.   A god now immortalized by the Leibovitz photo on the Rolling Stone cover.

 

Magazine art has become a powerful medium expressing the heart and pulse of modern culture.  Though it may be a relatively new form of art, it carries the same significance as its predecessors from Gothic to Renaissance and Realism.   Art is a recorder of history, culture and the moments we as a society find important enough to be passed on to our children. 

 

Let us travel back in time even further, to a place and a young artist as passionate about his work and subject as Annie Liebovitz .    1498, Rome, Italy a 22-year-old Michelangelo  commissioned to sculpt a life size figure of the crucified Christ in the arms of his mother.   Placed before him a large block of marble uncut, untouched by time for millions of years  waiting for the right moment and hands to reveal the secrets of the god hidden in the stone.  With clear vision Michelangelo methodically brought to life what was hidden from the rest of the world.  Being heralded throughout Italy within weeks of its unveiling as a masterpiece, the Pieta has been viewed by many at as his greatest work.  It records for those not present at the crucifixion of Christ the emotion of the ultimate sacrifice - that  of  God in human form. 

 

Art, be it marble or a magazine cover tells the world what humanity values, it truths at that moment in time.   And when those truths are challenged or cut down by a bullet, a cross or act terrorism it is the artist who baptizes them into immortality.  Each generation has or will have its own significant moments of “I remember” etched within the vortexes of their brain, from Pearl Harbor to September 11^th, 2001 and beyond.   Some have already been recorded in the listing top 40 magazine covers.   One symbolizing the loss of someone the world held dear, another an  iconic symbol of freedom, both having been placed in the pretext of god or goddess, (i.e. Princess Diana, People, September 15, 1997  and the blacked out shadow of the World Trade Centers , The New Yorker, September 24^th, 2001.)    The one cover that went so far as to ask, Is God Dead?, Time’s April 8^th 1966 cover, this was the only cover out of the 40 where the probability of God was questioned.

 

Whatever your beliefs or non-beliefs may be or not be there will be a page recording them somewhere in history.   If one is a true iconoclast or self proclaimed atheist this iconic history may have little or no place of value, because belief is commitment.   And with that belief in someone or something there is always that underlying fear that someone will kill that which we believe in.  Maybe that is where faith steps in.

 

 

 

Is there Soul in Science?

I believe that there is a search for Soul in all aspects of life - Science included.  Some of the greatest Scientist’s of the 20th Century were seeking answers to questions far beyond what the physical world had revealed to them.   For a deeper look at these scientists- Bohr, Pauli, Ehrenfast, Einstein and more (including the passion of one women scientist Lise Meitner) I highly recommend Gino Segre’s, Faust in Copenhagen.
 
 It is well worth reading, for science lovers and soul seekers.  Enjoy.

No Ordinary Partnership

Today the media is filled with the looming possibility of a serious recession and high unemployment rates.   The housing industry has done a meltdown throughout the country and airlines are calling it quits.   Banks likeWachovia that were once considered household names are running for cover and doing everything within their means to raise money; and topping off the cake the gas prices just keep rising and rising.   These are uncertain times with a crystal ball that seems just not willing to reveal what in store in the near future.

 

For a younger generation this is the first time that the fear of hard times may be resonating within their households.  A home foreclosure, a layoff slip and the inability to pay gas prices have come to roost in their dreams.  A younger generation may believe that this is no ordinary time in history, but these times only stand in the shadow of a much darker economic time.  That time was 1929-1945.

 

Stories of this time have been run into the ground by grandparents and parents until the words are no longer heard.  They have been replaced with the sound of cell phones and downloaded songs on MP3 players; but even if no one is listening the history still stands. The Great Depression and World War II were no ordinary time.   It was a time that excelled ordinary people into becoming exceptional, and exceptional people into greatness.

 

Do you see emptiness, or do you see possibilities?…

 

Two of these exceptional people were Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt.  Their story has been told in numerous biographies, on film, and television, yet it seems no matter how are we try, we can not capture the full measure of these two people.  Each on their own have written history, each on their own fill volumes, but apart from their separateness was their partnership, a partnership that kept the United States believing in better times and the return of peace in the world.

 

Franklin became president of the United States in 1933 but it was not without misgivings from Eleanor; for by the time he started back into political life the two had basically come to lead separate lives.  With Franklin’s affair with Lucy Mercer, which Eleanor discovered in 1918, she realized that she had been naïve to life and set out on her own course.  They never divorced but their relationship was forever changed.   In that change she found a new freedom, a freedom to immerse herself into the causes she had always felt so strongly about.   Her views on human rights, civil rights and women’s suffrage were now to be publicly heard.   

 

Her full freedom was short lived when in 1921 Franklin contracted polio and was paralyzed from his waist down.  He would never again walk on his own.  For the handsome, athletic Franklin that was something he could not readily accept; his process of recovery was long and introspective.  The arrogance of his youth was now redirected; his energy was taken to the nation and common man with greater purpose.  For Eleanor acceptance was a mute point, she did what needed to be done and at his side she became his not only his caregiver but political confident.  It was during this time she took on probably her most important role, the role of Franklin’s and the nations “eyes and ears.”  

 

The bond between the Franklin and Eleanor was solidified.  Their responsibility was to the nation, its people, and regaining stability in an unstable world.   During Franklin’s four term presidency, Eleanor though not always at his side was always in contact with the president.   His paralyses most of the time left him confided to the White House so he would send her on trips across the country talking to the people, visiting hospitals, making speeches; nightly she would report back what she saw, heard, felt and even smelt for Franklin wanted all the details, he wanted to know what was happening in the country and what the people were feeling.   When Eleanor spoke, Franklin listened; the trust and commitment in the alliance they had formed and its impact on the recovery of the United States can not ever be overestimated.

 

Where many during the Era of the Great Depression saw Emptiness–

Franklin and Eleanor saw Possibilities —

 

What do we see?    

 

 

For more information on this partnership I recommend reading  —- “No Ordinary Time” by Doris Kearns Goodwin