On Halloween

Fear and trembling

By Moristotle

Daily walks for days now in my neighborhood have made me witness to blow-up ghosts, goblins, ghouls (and cartoon Goofy’s) that neighbors paid hard-earned dollars for at Target or wherever these flimsy, quickly deflating toy balloons can be found. Are they competing with each other for ghouliest, or gaudiest?

Goines On: His last thought

Click image for more vignettes

With the morning’s snow came a sense of foreboding. Was it a premonition? Goines couldn’t reliably say he had ever had a premonition – that he could remember anyway – a sense of disaster that came to pass. What did a premonition feel like? And did he even want to know that his sense of foreboding was a premonition? Wasn’t it better just to be afraid? Surely the feeling would pass; the disaster might not.
    Taking out the bird feeders, Goines almost slid and fell on the Goineses’ snow-covered northwest patio. Each hand held a feeder, so he gingerly shuffled his feet to the lawn before walking more safely to the stanchions.

From the Scratching Post:Fear and trembling

By Ken Marks

[Originally posted on The Scratching Post one month ago today, on October 23, 2021. Extracted here by permission of the author.]

Now and then I’m accused, usually for goods reasons, of being insensitive. At the year’s end, when the subject of new year’s resolutions comes up, I don’t write anything down, but I remind myself that insensitivity is a demon I haven’t exorcised. It’s a lifelong struggle.

Putting on a show

    So I counted it a personal victory when I realized how insensitively we celebrate Halloween. Of all our yearly observances, it’s the cruelest and most misguided. Millions of adults annually go out of their way to scare the bejesus out of little kids. They delude themselves by imagining that kids enjoy it, but the small fry have misled them. To save face, they’ll tell you, “Yow! I think my heart stopped! Ha ha ha!” Fright is supposedly fun. Just ask any roller coaster junky.
    I sense you doubting me....

[Read the whole thing on The Scratching Post.]

Copyright © 2021 by Ken Marks Ken Marks was a contributing editor with Paul Clark & Tom Lowe when “Moristotle” became “Moristotle & Co.” A brilliant photographer, witty conversationalist, and elegant writer, Ken contributed photographs, essays, and commentaries from mid-2008 through 2012. Late in 2013, Ken birthed the blog The Scratching Post. He also posts albums of his photos on Flickr.

Fear for family and motherhood

My greatest fear for the future

By Christa Dean

Just when, exactly, do you become a mother? Is it the moment you get that first positive pregnancy test? The moment of conception? When you hear the little one’s heartbeat or when you hold him or her in your arms for the first time?

Do you have a fear for the future? What is it?

Sharing our fears with others

Edited by Morris Dean

We recently asked the members of the staff of Moristotle & Co. whether they had a fear for the future, and, if so, what was it? Today we are sharing the responses we received.
    But we are also asking readers the same questions. And we hope that you will take the time to tell us. We wonder, for example, to what extent your fears are like ours. Please let us know.

Fear in time

Be here now

By Bob Boldt

Thinking about fear brings a whole series of ideas and impressions to mind. I invite you to follow me through the following disjointed ramblings. Because many critics have abused my writings, I do have a great fear that you may get lost or mistake my meaning.

Fourth Saturday's Loneliest Liberal: The things we worry about

Almost none of them will happen

By James Knudsen

Back when I was in high school, I received some of the best advice I would ever get. I think it was in Leadership class, definitely not the place for me as it was filled with student council types, and that wasn’t me. But my girlfriend was in the class, so what more reason could I need?
    One day one of the school counselors addressed us about stress. She said, “You know, 95% of the things you worry about never happen.”

Thor's Day: What fosters religion?

From Theological-Political Treatise

By Baruch (Benedict de) Spinoza (1632-1677)

Men would never be superstitious if they would govern all their circumstances by set rules, or if they were always favored by fortune, but being frequently driven into straits where rules are useless, and being often kept fluctuating pitiably between hope and fear by the uncertainty of fortune's greedily coveted favours, they are consequently, for the most part, very prone to credulity. The human mind is readily swayed this way or that in times of doubt, especially when hope and fear are struggling for the mastery, though usually it is boastful, over-confident, and vain.

Wassail!

Very good condition. 5-speed manual transmission. 159,000 miles. 2009 radio with AUX jack. Dog-friendly (poodle shown inside car in photo isn't included, however).

I told a friend this morning that my wife and I had had good luck selling our 1992 Volvo through Craigslist. "I posted the ad Tuesday afternoon, and we accepted a $200 deposit yesterday."
    "It wasn't luck," my friend said.
    "Oh, then what was it?"
    "The divine mercy of God."
    Thank you very much!
    She said that if I was killed in an automobile crash, that too would be the divine mercy of God.
    Thank you very much indeed!

"This fear of things invisible, is the natural seed of...religion." –Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, 1651.

Word of the Day from dictionary.com:

wassail \WAH-sul; wah-SAYL\, noun:

1. An expression of good wishes on a festive occasion, especially in drinking to someone.
2. An occasion on which such good wishes are expressed in drinking; a drinking bout; a carouse.
3. The liquor used for a wassail; especially, a beverage formerly much used in England at Christmas and other festivals, made of ale (or wine) flavored with spices, sugar, toast, roasted apples, etc.

Wassail is from the Middle English expression of festive benevolence, wæs hæil!, be well!, from Old Norse ves heill, be (ves) well (heill).

Wassail! As in "Good luck" or "May your deity richly bless you and kill you in a car crash today only if 'he' really thinks that's what you most need."
    Seriously.