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Whittling Away: My, how things have changed
By Dick Brooks
For Capital Region Independent Media
In spite of my advancing age, there are still those rare moments when things snap into focus. It’s at these times that I realize that things are missing or not the same.
Watches for instance — have you noticed they are disappearing? Very few folks under the age of 25 wear one. Ask them the time and they pull out their cellphones — if they weren’t already talking or texting on them.
What ever happened to those bell hoses at gas stations? I can’t remember the last one I saw. I used to love jumping on them until the station owner came out and chased me away. They’re probably stored away with the old Texaco uniforms, bow ties, hats and all. When was the last time you went to a gas station and someone came out, pumped your gas, washed your windshield, checked your oil and gave you a glass or a plate and Green Stamps?
For that matter, what happened to Green Stamps? They used to be everywhere. I can remember my mother sending me back into a store because I’d forgotten the Green Stamps. They were taken home and pasted carefully into their little book. Twenty or so books taken to the Green Stamp store would get you a washcloth or an ashtray.
Remember ashtrays? Another object that’s disappeared. They used to be everywhere, every home had a selection, the fanciest one was always on the coffee table in the living room. The better homes had a cigarette lighter next to it that matched the ashtray. Our public library had ashtrays on the tables where you read your books.
I don’t remember when glass milk bottles went away. Those little paper tops with the pull tab on the side were so much easier to use than those paper cartons with the pull and pinch spouts that drive me crazy.
Some of these things are hard to explain to those who have never experienced them. I tried to explain The Empire State to a youngster the other day. Do you remember The Empire State? You don’t hear much about it nowadays. It seems to have gone the way of the bell hose and the ashtrays.
We learned all about it when I was a mere lad. It had the biggest city in the world. Its education system was the envy of all the other 47 states. It was the financial center of the world. It had the tallest building on Earth. The highest standard of living and the best medical care anywhere was found there. Of all the busy and beautiful places on this old planet, this was the biggest, the brightest and the best. Everyone wanted to live in The Empire State. People came here from all over the world and we welcomed them because that’s what you do when you’re The Empire State.
Yep, I wonder where all these things went. I miss them, but that’s what life’s all about. I guess change is a good thing but sometimes a glance backwards is a good thing. A rearview mirror gives you a clear vision of where you’ve been and is a useful thing.
I would like to have some things back the way they were though, like my former abs that now hang over my belt buckle.
Thought for the week — “As I grow older, I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do.” ~ Andrew Carnegie
Until next week, may you and yours be happy and well.
Reach columnist Dick Brooks at Whittle12124@yahoo.com.
Positively Speaking: Finding meaning in life
By Toby Moore
For Capital Region Independent Media
A life that exemplified triumph over the deepest abysses of despair is that of Dr. Viktor Frankl. During World War II, Dr. Frankl was stripped of everything amidst the unimaginable horrors of Nazi concentration camps.
Frankl was born in 1905 in Vienna, Austria, into a Jewish family. By the time he was a young man, the Nazis rose to power, and their grip tightened on Europe; they enacted anti-Jewish laws in Austria, imposing severe restrictions on the Jewish community. These laws affected every facet of Jewish life.
Frankl, a practicing psychiatrist and neurologist, was barred from treating non-Jewish patients due to these oppressive policies. However, instead of being entirely sidelined, he took on a crucial role at the Rothschild Hospital in Vienna. This establishment became the sole haven in the city that continued to admit and treat Jewish patients amid the growing anti-Semitic environment.
In 1942, he could have escaped to the United States and avoided the Holocaust’s encroaching menace. However, unwilling to leave his beloved wife Tilly and his parents, he chose to stay with his family.
That year, the Nazis arrested Frankl, his wife and his parents, uprooting them from their regular lives and forcing them into the Jewish Ghetto.
The Nazis deceitfully paraded the Ghetto as a “model” Jewish settlement. Of course, that was just a facade. It was overcrowded, with scarce food and clean water. Diseases ran rampant; fear and death were a constant companion.
The ghetto primarily served as a transit camp, directing Jews to imminent killing centers and concentration camps.
The Frankl family faced their darkest hour when authorities ordered them to the notorious concentration camp, Auschwitz.
Upon arrival, authorities forced them to relinquish all possessions, shed their clothing, shave every strand of hair, and don the crudest rags.
“We really had nothing now except our bare bodies — even minus hair; all we possessed, literally, was our naked existence,” Frankl later remarked.
After the devastating loss of Frankl’s mother to the Nazis’ brutality, he and the love of his wife, Tilly, found fleeting solace in their shared embrace.
Tragically, the Nazis separated them, sending Tilly to meet her death in a distant camp.
Despite his grief, Frankl noticed those who held onto a sense of purpose managed to endure their days with a hint of strength. In contrast, those who lost touch with meaning quickly fell apart, their spirits shattered, and they died faster.
He noticed that even a simple dream, a memory, or the hope of seeing a loved one again could fuel an individual’s drive to endure another day.
Despite losing his family and possessions, Frankl realized that one thing remained untouched: his power to choose his attitude, the truest possession anyone holds.
Miraculously, in 1945, allied soldiers freed Frankl from the concentration camps.
His experience inspired him to write “Man’s Search for Meaning,” a seminal work in existential literature that resonated with readers worldwide.
Despite facing immense suffering, he found purpose in it all. He argues that life has meaning even in the most dehumanizing and pitiless conditions. He argued that the primary motivational force in humans is the pursuit of that meaning.
“Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom,” he famously reflected.
After returning to Vienna, Frankl created a new psychiatric therapy named logotherapy, rooted in the belief that humanity’s primary drive is the search for meaning.
Logotherapy posits that individuals find purpose and fulfillment not in avoiding suffering but in how they respond to it. Through this lens, even the gravest challenges can be met purposefully, underscoring the innate human capacity to extract meaning from any situation.
Frankl’s journey forces us to confront our existence and the situations that bind us. Perhaps your chains aren’t as visible or as oppressive as those of a concentration camp, but they are chains nonetheless.
Can we, like Frankl, find that space between stimulus and response? For in that space, we too can decide.
The world, at times, seems devoid of meaning.
The life of Victor Frankl can be a guide to finding meaning in your life, helping to fuel your purpose with strength.
Toby Moore is a columnist, the star of Emmy-nominated “A Separate Peace,” and the CEO of Cubestream Inc.