Still don't believe in New Year's Eve!

Yep, I'm still not a believer in New Year's Eve!  As I was telling a colleague in the office, it all has to do with when I learned enough astronomy to know a year is not 365 days long!  It's 365.24 days (approximately), so this New Year's Eve at midnight is not exactly 1 year since last New Year's Eve at midnight 

The whole New Year's Eve midnight thing is just a hoax!

But, if you enjoy the evening anyway, have a good one!

(For more of my ramblings on this topic, see my post from 2009.

Transgender Day of Remembrance

This Sunday (Nov. 22, 2015) in Boston is the Transgender Day of Remembrance, a day to remember the many people in Boston, around the US and around the world killed only because they happen to be transgender, and someone deeply hated them for that fact.

I live a rather protected, straight, middle class life and no body harasses me or shows overt hatred (that I know of).  I simply can't image what it would be like to be so hated that someone would want to go as far as kill me.

Still, I think it's good - it's necessary - to take time to remember those who have been the victims of such hatred, that their lives cut short continue to value, and that each of them was a person of great and unique dignity.

Today, we see much of the western world focused on terrorism, and that hatred that kills so randomly.  This is indeed a great evil in the world.  But not the only evil.  The evil that implants hatred in the hearts of those who would kill (or even bully) people because they happen to be transgender, or gay, or black, or Jewish, or Christian, or Muslim, or any category of persons - this is also a great evil.

Our world is filled with the evil of hatred.  But we must not be defeated.  We must remember those who have died, uphold their dignity, and live in the belief that the light we can share can overcome the darkness of this evil manifest in hatred that would go as far as the murder of innocents.

Spring at Mt. Auburn

Often I've taken a late fall stroll through the beautiful landscapes of the Mt. Auburn Cemetery, here in my home town of Cambridge.  Usually I do it around November 2nd, which is known as El Día de los Muertos or All Souls' Day. This is a time to remember the departed, and think of the transience of our brief lifetime.  In the Northern Hemisphere, we have the juxtaposition of this day of remembrance in the very season where we experience the colors of death in fall foliage.

But, this year I was thinking, what would it be like to take a spring stroll.  What would the contrast of rebirth, as seen in the flowering and budding of trees and shrubs, feel like in the context of a sacred grounds consecrated to the eternal rest of those who have passed on before us?

Spring includes the celebration of Easter, the resurrection from the dead of the Son of God, and the hope for eternal life.  "If we shared in Jesus' death by being baptized, we will be raised to life with him," so it is said in Romans 6.

What is this eternal life?  When does it begin?  Is it like this life?  These are questions that people have asked for centuries, but we still lack certain answers. My pastor has suggested that eternal life is something that has already been going on, even before we were born, and will continue after we die.  Our life in this world is but one chapter in it all.


When I was young, I remember thinking about this idea of eternal life, as something after the death of our body.  What would it be like to go on and on and on and on without end?  Day after day after day after day?  I couldn't fathom it.  But nor could I fathom it just suddenly stopping and then there would be nothing more.  In those days I felt that eternal life was obvious.  We could never just stop being.

As I got older, I've gone through stages of new, more complicated thoughts and, with them, doubts.  Also as I get older, I have started to get the sense of being "tired" a lot of the time, which has led me to think that, maybe at a time to come, I'll feel that I am ready for a long rest, much like we feel tired and go to bed.  Is it possible that life ending is like falling asleep a final time and then that's "a wrap?"

But much as spring is a sign that life is reborn after the winter of dormancy, the idea of life after death is persistently present in both religious teachings and philosophies around the world from ancient times to the present.   Rebirth in the spring inevitably comes about each year, no matter what we do.  So is this something about the nature of life itself that it is self-rejuvenating?  Is rebirth inherently part of the fabric of life?  Is all this an indication that life is, in some way, eternal, that death is not the end?

For now, I'm don't know for sure.  But, then again, spring is the season of hope - hope in rebirth and life itself, a life that is renewed and renewed and renewed, and therefore never ends.

I ended up with a bunch of good photos, some of which are included in a blog post in my photography blog, Urban Vistas.

A Train Trip Along the Frosty Coast

This has been a brutal winter up here in the Boston area. (Come to think of it, it's all been in February!) Well, in the midst of snow on snow on snow on snow, I traveled to Philly an a frosty day. You know it's been cold when the salt water of the bays and estuaries freezes.

Getting around Boston had become tough, with the transit system we call the T essentially having a melt-down:  shut down for days and limited services when it was up and running.  But fortunately, Amtrak was still running, so I got to Philly and back with some reasonable days.

I always take a seat on the left side, so I can see the coastline:  the beaches and saltmarshes and estuaries that stretch from Rhode Island through the meadowlands of Jersey.  

Even the sky was frosty on the 18th of February, rendering the photos in a natural sepia tone.  Despite the cold and snow all around, there was special beauty in frozen waterscapes that passed by my window.

Since many of these vistas are far from urban, I'm sharing them here (instead of my photo blog, Urban Vistas).

A diffused and haloed sun shines through a frosty sky in Rhode Island

Crossing the frozen Pawcatuck River, leaving Westerly, RI and entering Pawcatuck, CT

High above the frosty waters, a bird of prey has a great view of the Little Narragansett Bay approaching Stonington, CT

Frozen estuaries near Stonington, CT

A weak sun shines over a sepia landscape of bare trees and frozen waters.

Open waters near Mystic, CT

Riverfront walkway next to the tracks at New London, CT

Reconstruction the Boardwalk at Niantic, CT

Frozen estuaries near Guilford, CT

Another frozen stream approaching Branford, CT

Crossing the Hutichenson River, entering the Bronx

Steam clouds rise from power plants in Queens, seen from crossing the viaduct to the Hell Gate Bridge

Frozen  Jersey meadowlands with the Pulaski Skyway in the background