by Richard Subber | Nov 12, 2022 | Book reviews, Books, Human Nature
you don’t have many close friends…
Book review:
Friends: Understanding the Power
of our Most Important Relationships
by Robin Dunbar
London: Little, Brown, 2021
424 pages
This is a great book.
Robin Dunbar fans will recognize his deeply informed, very readable prose, and his comfortable and spectacular familiarity with quite a number of well-researched points of view.
Friends will confirm what you already know, on some level: friends and close family members are essential in your personal and social life, and you don’t have very many of them.
Typically, a person has five close friends/family members with whom she can share anything and everything, as often as possible. These five intimates are part of the circle of about 15 “best friends” who are nurtured and enjoyed in the greater part of the time you spend socializing, that is, being with and being in contact with other people.
Impersonal contact via social media is not a substitute for actually spending time with your friends. (By the way, nobody has 897 “friends” on Faceboook or SnapChat—if you think you do, try calling them and getting them to meet you for coffee or anything else to drink.)
Staying in touch with friends is especially important for old-timers. You can literally live longer if you maintain some active friendships.
The basis thing about friendship is trust: you know the other person well enough to understand how he thinks, and you trust him to act accordingly, and you know you can ask him for help if you need it.
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Book review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2022 All rights reserved.
Book review:
Moral Tribes by Joshua Greene
sincere, but off the mark…
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Writing Rainbows: Poems for Grown-Ups with 59 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Nov 6, 2022 | My poetry, Poetry
…he picks his hopscotch way…
Singleton
Too much of winter remains
to rehearse a song of spring…
The wetland flaunts its barren peat,
its withered stems,
a wastrel tree…
The debris of winter is a dowdy mantle
on the tired earth,
a bleak board for the lean pilgrim
as he scouts my yard,
he picks his hopscotch way,
his red breast dabbles color
in the last of autumn’s arid leaves…
…as he turns to me,
I whisper: “welcome”
February 26, 2020
Mr. Robin was too early, but I happily waited to see him again.
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2022 All rights reserved.
Book review: The Snow Goose
…sensual drama, eminently poetic…
by Paul Gallico
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In other words: Poems for your eyes and ears with 64 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Nov 2, 2022 | Human Nature, My poetry, Poetry, Reflections
a life story…
What the hangman hears
I’m scared
will it hurt?
can you make it quick?
I can’t hold it much longer
the rope is so big
my mother is coming
she’ll pay you
she won’t let me die
can’t you wait?
I’m scared
the rope is tight
I know Johnny will get here
I know he’s coming
he’ll bring you money
wait another minute
where are they?
I’m scared
I didn’t do it
October 28, 2021
My poem “What the hangman hears” was published in my fifth collection of 53 poems, My first name was rain: A dreamery of poems. You can buy it on Amazon (paperback and Kindle), or get it free in Kindle Unlimited (search for “Richard Carl Subber”)
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My poetry. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2022 All rights reserved.
Boz indeed! Sketches by Boz
Charles Dickens delivers,
in a fastidiously literary kind of way…
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My first name was rain: A dreamery of poems with 53 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
Your comments are welcome—tell me what you’re thinking.
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by Richard Subber | Oct 31, 2022 | American history, Book reviews, Books, History
the navies were second priority…
Book review:
Under Two Flags:
The American Navy in the Civil War
by William M. Fowler Jr.
New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1990
352 pp.
I imagine most Civil War buffs will learn something by reading Under Two Flags.
Most standard histories don’t emphasize the naval elements of the Civil War fighting. Both Northern and Southern leaders thought the navies were important, and so they were.
Stephen Mallory, naval secretary of the Confederate States, had a job no one would have wanted in 1860. He came up short in most respects, because the Confederacy just couldn’t afford to build and maintain a potent navy.
Gideon Welles, his Northern counterpart, had only a somewhat easier job.
The naval commanders never managed to convince their respective commanders-in-chief that the navies were as vital as the armies in the Civil War conflict.
The sailors on both sides were brave men, but Fowler gives them second billing.
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Book review. Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2022 All rights reserved.
Common Sense by Thomas Paine (comments)
it wasn’t strictly business, but…
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Above all: Poems of dawn and more with 73 free verse poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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by Richard Subber | Oct 29, 2022 | Reflections, Tidbits
Pop-Pop’s point of view…
Being the grandfather just fills up my point of view, and the horizon gets pulled in pretty darn close, too! My beautiful granddaughter, our first, is here with me and my beloved, Barb, who is now Gram. This is our first journey of exploration as overnight babysitters in tandem—my son and his beloved, the Mom, are enjoying an interlude of adult conversation in another state.
…and when I say “pretty darn close,” I mean pretty DARN close because Gram won’t countenance my occasional unheeding sailor talk and so I try not to utter the other “D” word, although why we call it sailor talk instead of soldier talk or airman talk I do not know, most of the soldiers I knew could swear like drunken sailors, you betcha…
Anyway, I also try to concentrate on NOT doing baby talk, I never talked baby talk to my son, I intend to model the most correct version of the King’s English with this little girl because I am very well aware that she is already learning language even if she isn’t saying anything intelligible yet. She IS talking, I just don’t know what she’s saying, and I guess she’s in the same boat. So, we both do the best we can in the circumstances, and we smile a lot…and I think she likes to hear singing, so I’m doing some of that too, and it’s OK if I can remember only the chorus of “On The Banks of the Wabash, Far Away,” and she doesn’t mind if I sing it several times in a row.
I think it’s quite refreshing that babies don’t judge, they simply observe, learn, and imitate (or not), it would be a nicer world if more people acted like babies more often…except for the doo-doo diaper part, I confess there’s no thrill in it for me, but as the Pop-Pop, I’m prepared to do my duty when this young lady does the doodie, but, well, you know…
I’ve done some reading about language and the fully-wired facility that all human babies have at birth to learn language, so I’m fascinated to listen to her verbalization at the age of 8 months, she clearly is NOT making sounds at random, and so I am sympathetically responding to her, saying “I know you’re talking but I don’t know what you’re saying yet.” I know she’s working hard on understanding what we say to her. I can’t wait for my first opportunity to listen to my sweet granddaughter and say: “I understand!”
Stay tuned…and if you’re already a grandparent, you know how this story turns out!
September 2, 2011
In case you were wondering: Paul Dresser published “Wabash” in 1897, and his wildly popular ballad was one of the earliest pieces of music to be recorded…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Banks_of_the_Wabash,_Far_Away
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Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2022 All rights reserved.
Movie review: Same Time, Next Year
all-American adultery, oh yeah…
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In other words: Poems for your eyes and ears with 64 free verse and haiku poems,
and the rest of my poetry books are for sale on Amazon (paperback and Kindle)
and free in Kindle Unlimited, search Amazon for “Richard Carl Subber”
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