4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2017
editor@dailyastorian.com
KARI BORGEN
Publisher
JIM VAN NOSTRAND
Editor
Founded in 1873
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Business Manager
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Systems Manager
OUR VIEW
Let’s have a happy, civil new year
A
s we wish all our North Coast
neighbors and subscribers
around the world a happy and
safe new year, we cannot help but look
ahead to 2018.
What will the year bring?
On the national level, it is an easy
prediction that the political rifts that
have divided the nation will continue.
Can we do anything about that here?
The turmoil that our nation has
endured since the divisive presidential
campaign and the outcome of the 2016
election is exacerbated by social media,
which either deifies or vilifies Donald
Trump and his like-minded party
Republican colleagues in Congress.
The ugly tone is not one any of us
would choose. The longer it lasts, the
worse it gets.
On the Democratic Party side,
Hillary Clinton remains in many peo-
ple’s crosshairs, though she holds
no office whatsoever. And President
Obama’s name is besmirched and his
accomplishments derided on a daily
basis by people motivated by political
opposition and the naked racism that
continues to divide this country.
At some point our divided country
needs to come together — and to do so
it must re-establish a positive tone for
communications. We’re not even close
to that right now. Beyond tarnishing
our reputation in the eyes of the world,
it’s also stopping us from getting vital
things done.
One speaker to a North Coast fra-
We should reach out to those with differences, and
maybe try listening instead of just reacting.
ternal organization last year called
for civility and offered some valuable
definitions. For him, civility means
politeness, showing tolerance, having
patience with neighbors with whom
you disagree, not talking about people
behind their backs, and following the
“Golden Rule.”
It echoed a concept exemplified
by Robert Fulghum in his memora-
ble 1986 work, “All I Really Need to
Know I Learned in Kindergarten.”
His book was subtitled “Uncommon
Thoughts On Common Things” and
one of its classic lines was, “Ignorance
and power and pride are a deadly mix-
ture, you know.”
Yes. We do know.
So, how about we start a campaign
for civility here? It has to begin some-
where; why not here?
The North Coast is a wonderful
place to live, work, get an education
and enjoy the bounty of the Northwest.
It is also a place where neighbors help
neighbors, despite their differences.
Our recent 10-year anniversary rec-
ollections of the area’s reaction to the
2007 Great Coastal Gale confirmed
that.
How about we take Fulghum’s
admonitions and turn the words into
action? We should reach out to those
with differences, and maybe try listen-
ing instead of just reacting. If we dis-
agree, let’s keep the tone polite. 2018
can be the year for that. Monday is a
great day to begin as we turn the cal-
endar over for a fresh year, a new start,
though, really, why wait until then?
Speeches and declarations might
put on record the direction we jointly
believe we should go. But they are use-
less unless they are followed by posi-
tive action.
As the writer said, “It doesn’t mat-
ter what you say you believe — it only
matters what you do.”
Let’s try it.
We suspect we have more in com-
mon than appears at first glance.
Let’s ring in a happy new year in
2018.
Let’s work toward a civil new year.
GUEST COLUMN
Nursery rhymes help define who we are
O
ur young minds are luminous jellyfish
swimming in a sea of words. Be they
magical and kind or cruel and corro-
sive, what we hear as babies wraps around all
the rest of our lives — as comfy blankets or
verminous shrouds.
Some considerable part of the joy we
derive from Christmas comes from rehear-
ing carols that conjure up living memories
of childhood. Though it’s hardly a timeless
masterpiece, Bing Crosby’s “Silver Bells”
instantly transports me to the squeaking Nau-
gahyde seat of my mother’s Buick at a par-
ticular intersection on a spe-
cific frigid, slushy December
day in my hometown. We’re
listening on AM radio to
“City sidewalks, busy side-
walks | Dressed in holiday
style | In the air there’s a
Matt
feeling of Christmas | Chil-
Winters
dren laughing, people pass-
ing | Meeting smile after
smile | And on every street corner you hear |
Silver bells, silver bells.” Today, thinking of
those lyrics isn’t so much nostalgia as time
travel: I can touch and smell and hear my
Mom as we bustle around buying last-minute
gifts for Christmas 1968 in our little cowtown
that was in no sense a “city.”
Nowadays, there are endlessly exploding
hurricanes of words, blowing up around each
of us as we gluttonously gulp language from
electronic gadgets and mass media tailored
to each person’s hungers, whims and biases.
I picture a furiously spinning machine, cast-
ing off glowing clouds of frizzy sparks with-
out illuminating anything. Too many words,
too many empty phrases are fed to us through
corporate hoses like the plastic tubes forced
down the throats of geese being fattened for
harvest.
Though the appeal of most rap and hip-
hop admittedly are a mystery to me, this isn’t
meant to be a rant or rejection of all popular
culture — how tiresome it would be to only
partake in what we liked when we were 12 or
20. There is much to enjoy in every decade’s
music and literature.
But I worry whether many little kids today
still learn the simple hymns and rhymes and
riddles of a half century ago. They are still
my essential words, the scaffold of who I am,
and in some ways the foundation of who we
all are.
Accidental treasure finder
One of 2017’s notable deaths was that of
Iona Opie, described by the Washington Post
as a “scholarly explorer of the lore and cus-
toms of childhood. … Mrs. Opie and her hus-
band, Peter, became accidental anthropolo-
ing. Especially at Christmastime, “They used
to have a lighted candle on the floor and two
of the old girls used to … pull their skirts up”
and sing the rhyme. To make the jump with-
out accidentally blowing the candle out was
good luck.
A rhyme I was unfamiliar with, and love,
is “Misty, moisty morning,” a phrase that
could easily be the motto of this coast:
One misty, moisty morning,
When cloudy was the weather,
There I met an old man,
Clothed all in leather;
Clothed all in leather,
With cap under his chin,
How do you do, and how do you do,
And how do you do again?
The dictionary includes 549 rhymes and
riddles, plus many more variations, such as:
If all the earth were paper white,
And all the sea were ink
’Twere not enough for me to write
As my poor heart doth think.
Not all good
Nursery rhymes like “Jack be nimble” are an important part of the scaffolding of our
imaginations.
gists of the rites and rituals of children and
devoted their lives to what was then an over-
looked field of study.”
Their lifetime of studying what they called
“the greatest of savage tribes — the world-
wide fraternity of children” turned into a trea-
sury of centuries’ worth of fundamental lan-
guage, including “The Oxford Dictionary
of Nursery Rhymes.” I ordered a copy from
England in early November just after read-
ing of Iona’s death. After a sluggish inter-
val in shipment that seemed as if it must have
included a trans-Atlantic voyage aboard a
wheezing 19th-century steamship, it arrived
around Dec. 1 and has been essential bedside
reading in the weeks since.
It rewards careful study, with voluminous
tiny footnotes that in some cases trace nurs-
ery rhymes back into periods when little of
what ordinary people said was otherwise pre-
served. “What I was looking for — what I
hope I have found,” Opie wrote, “are the
most mysterious fragments from our shared
memory: long-ago laughter of little meaning
and echoes of ancient spells.”
Some of the rhymes are as familiar as
your little brother’s voice, things like “Jack
be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack jump over the
candle stick.” This, the Opies explain, really
was both a sport and a form of fortune-tell-
There’s racism, sexism and every other
kind of “ism” in some of these old rhymes,
and plenty of violence and death: King
Charles the First walked and talked | Half an
hour after his head was chopped off.
Or just imagine any modern mother recit-
ing this to her kid:
Baby, baby, naughty baby,
Hush, you squalling thing, I say.
Peace this moment, peace, or maybe
Bonaparte will pass this way.
Baby, baby, if he hears you,
As he gallops past the house,
Limb from limb at once he’ll tear you,
Just as pussy tears a mouse.
Although I can’t advocate threatening
small children will be murdered by Napoleon
if they don’t shut up, the old nursery rhymes
acknowledge that childhood can be a bleak
and scary time. These frights — rhymed,
chanted and shared together — are defanged
and put in their proper place.
Encountering in the 1970s in my Tacoma
college library the original, unsanitized tales
collected by the Brothers Grimm was a simi-
lar revelation — a glimpse into the dark psy-
che of European tribal life — nightmares
given voice.
Partly, these rhymes and tales are a sign
people have always enjoyed being vicar-
iously scared, grossed out or simply silly.
Beyond this, they provide a common vocab-
ulary and way to envision the absurdities of
the world.
Leaving these old tales behind could deny
us the ability to actually understand one
another. Let’s endeavor to keep them alive.