An Obit That Made Me Stop Dead In My Tracks

I try to read "The Economist" every week, at least a few articles here and there as time allows, and I usually just gloss over the obituaries.

This past week was different.

I was first taken by the humble photograph they printed of a woman with beautiful wrinkles in her forehead and around her eyes. The rest of her face looked smooth. Her eyes appeared compassionate, yet holding back worlds of information that could bring many a world leader to their knees.

I am speaking of Alison Des Forges, a human rights activist and historian, who worked tirelessly in the early 1990's and beyond to bring to light a growing crisis in Rwanda. She died February 12, 2009 in the Buffalo plane crash from Newark where ice build up was a factor.

The thing that really struck me about Mrs. Des Forges was just how early she'd figured out what was happening in Rwanda, while the rest of the world waited.

In 1993, she documented a smaller scale version of Rwanda in neighboring Burundi. She gave a detailed account of what happened and her title, "Leave None to Tell the Story" came from a killer's utterance during the horrors of that event.

Her life was and is an inspiration to telling the story of the human experience, both grotesque and beautiful. The world has lost a wonderful example of how to live your life with meaning; betterring the condition of those humans who are consistently forgotten.

Thank you, Mrs. Des Forges, you will not be forgotten.

An Amazing Documentary

Chihiro and I just finished up a very long documentary on World War II called "The War" by Ken Burns. It was produced in 2007, and ran on a number of PBS stations.

It's going to take you a while to get through these DVDs for sure, but it is SO well worth it.

Burns tells the story of World War II through the eyes of people directly affected by it, the soldiers, their families, their friends, and townspeople who knew the soldiers. The focus is on people affected by this great conflict living in four U.S. cities; Waterbury, CT, Mobile, AB, Luverne, MN, and Sacramento, CA. Each city has its own unique history of contributing to the war effort during 1939 to 1945.

There is a fair amount of graphic violence (mostly in the way of photographs), but Burns displays these photos with tact, and chooses them carefully to tell the story of how horrible war really is. I'm not sure I would want someone under 12 or 13 watching it without an adult to supervise and answer questions. It is both heart wrenching and elating the stories told in this film. Some are so unbelievable you'd swear Hollywood got to them first. Most of the soldiers interviewed lose best friends in battle, a number lose hope altogether during those battles, and all who survived the brutal conflicts still have to live with the vivid memories of those years.

These stories and the people involved should be known to all, and never be forgotten.

In this day where the U.S. is still involved in international conflicts, the story of World War II as told by Ken Burns has many lessons for our future and current world leaders, as well as you and I who give the power to these leaders to make the choice to go to war.

I hope we never have to repeat what happened between 1939 and 1945, but in small ways it appears that we have: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda, the Sudan. People still fight, and fight savagely.

This movie really affected both Chihiro and I.

I hope it will affect you too.

Please share your comments if you have seen or plan to see this documentary.

Chihiro and I would love to hear them.

Re-Reflecting on 'Reflections' and Happy Thanksgiving!

Here's to you and yours on this day of Thanksgiving in the U.S.

I've had some interesting comments and emails from a number of you about my last blog post pertaining to ending this blog.

Seems like the majority of you want it, Reflections from Wyoming, to continue. And for your comments, posted and unposted, I want to sincerely thank you.

I gave it some serious thought and came up with the following...

1. No need to report on things of a personal nature on the blog. As mentioned in my previous post, would like to reserve that for emailing all of you that I am close with.

2. Big need to continue to share, if only for myself, the stories I find interesting on a 'near' daily basis. I realize I haven't been too near that 'near' daily deal, but will edge closer in the coming months (especially since New Year's Resolutions are almost upon us).

So...going forward, my posts will be a blend of stories in science, history, religion, philosophy, technology, education, and the like that I find interesting. Some will key in on Wyoming, others will just be of an international/national approach to things. I hope you will find these new post themes interesting as well.

With no further ado, and in the spirit of bipartisanship, reaching across the aisle-ness, a quirky 'mavericky' feeling, complete 'vetted-tude', and just flat-out pure democratization...here is the return of Reflections from Wyoming.

New posts with the new theme will follow in the days ahead...

Thanks again for checking in and have a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday!

Drew

A Farewell to Reflections, with a nod to a new...

I've come to the conclusion that my original concept of Reflections has been a bit ill-conceived.

My intent was to "keep in touch" with family and friends through this blog, hoping that discussion and comments would ensue after I posted something.

What I have found though is more of a one-sided conversation.

In retrospect, I think the public nature of blogging scares a certain population away from posting. I wish I had seen that sooner. Thinking it through though now, it's not really all that inviting to have someone share events personal to them, and then expect family and friends to all respond in the public domain as if you were having a friend-to-friend conversation.

So...

...in the aftermath of these past 2 years of blogging, I have not been very good at keeping in touch with the people I care about the most. I left my "keeping in touch" with family and friends in a bit of a "latch-key situation" with the Reflections from Wyoming blog playing the role of inept parent.

Now for those of you who read the blog and posted, I offer up a sincere thanks for letting me know you were out there reading. Some didn't post, and would simply email me that they read one of my blogs. That meant a lot as well. Thank you!

Which brings me to my next conclusion...

Even in this day of blogging and social networking, the best communication tool for me remains sending and receiving emails, phone calls, and face to face meetings from people I deeply care about. Ideas, websites, podcasts, music and the like can all be shared through these mediums, same as I would do in any Facebook page or blog. I just have less hassle and less public displays of display.

Not that I don't like these new avenues...I think they are fine for what they are. I just have decided that for me, at this point in my life, with my goal of keeping in touch with family and friends, that to really have a decent discussion about something, sending an email out and waiting for a response is better than broadcasting it to the world in a blog or on MySpace.

Before you go running for the exits though, let me explain that I am not deleting this site. It will remain Reflections from Wyoming and all the archived blogpostings will stay right where they are. This post will simply be my last post on this particular avenue of cyberspace.

Which brings me to my final point...

As many of you know, I work in the environmental field. I've started up a new blog called The Soil Scientist to speak to some issues that I find interesting in the particular career field I find myself. It's a work in progress at the following link for those interested in checking it out:

http://thesoilscientist.blogspot.com

Many thanks to everyone for checking out my Reflections blog.

I look forward to talking to you all more through emails, phone calls, and hopefully face-to-face meetings.

Don't be surprised if you get a personal one of these from me in the near future.

Cheers!

Drew

Sportswannabes launch new site and podcast!

My roommate and best bud from undergrad, you know him as the Misanthrope, Rob Archer, has teamed up with his old buddy from Greenville, SC, Dan Watters, to become the Sportswannabes.

Being a closet podcast geek, I agreed to help produce their new podcast and webpage.

It's been alot of fun so far. We just produced our first show last weekend, and I am just now getting around to putting it up on my own page (long week of field work, even have to pull a Saturday today to finish up the fiscal year in stride...ugh!).

Hope you'll check these guys out!

They're at http://sportswannabes.blogspot.com.

There's a link there for downloading the podcast (and on my "Podcasts of Note" links to the left).

Have a great weekend!

Drew

Some great news!

It's official...Chihiro's pregnant! I know, we still can't believe it.

After nearly 5 years of trying, we are blessed with a little growing kidney bean ;) inside of Chihiro's belly.

Click on the picture above or HERE to view the video.

Enjoy!

Drew

Placing the Placebo Effect on a Pedestal

Rarely does a podcast shift my focus so dramatically that I talk about it for days with my wife. The podcast "Placebo" from an episode of WNYC's Radio Lab program did just that. You can download it by clicking HERE.

I just started listening to this podcast with hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich about a month ago. They do a fantastic job with the show, setting the bar pretty high for all those podcasting. The show is very much like a This American Life with Ira Glass, just more of a science bent.

I was particularly struck by the Parkinson's disease patients and how they responded to a placebo effect trial. Wait for it...there is a twist at the end of this subfeature of the episode. There was also a boy with warts all over one of his arms who undergoes a particular type of placebo effect trial to amazing results. It's just truly remarkable how much our words and our literal touching of others play in being healthy and happy.

After hearing the show, I can feel myself making more of a concerted effort to use words that convey care and concern (not all the time, but I'm trying). Obviously, and probably like most of us humans, I wish I could take back some words I've used in the past with people I care about deeply.

Would love to hear your comments after listening.

Have a great weekend!

New Book on the Front Lines of Education

My old roomie from undergrad and best bud, Rob Archer, you know him as The Misanthrope, has just published his first book!

Rob, over the years, has given me some of his chapters to look over, and now, after years of simmering in the crockpot of writes, rewrites, hashes, and rehashes, he's put out his first paperback!

Disclaimer-I'm actually getting Facebook-like advertising coin to blog this today. I report, you decide...

Further disclaimer- Ok, not really, but MySpace is seriously considering giving me my own channel to crank out Youtube-ish videos at the rate of 3 per hour involving skateboard crashes (if I actually skateboarded) on school railings!

Seriously though, I think you won't be disappointed checking out his musings on life behind the lines of public and private secondary education.

Links to his new book and blog are below:

Click HERE for the book.

Click HERE for the blog.

Enjoy!