From our Mailbag 12/20/03 - 01/20/04




by YOU

THE WORLD - [EDITOR's NOTE: The following letter appeared on our last VOX POPULI. It is reprinted with its response, which I apologize for misplacing. - RA]
From Max H. Perth, AUSTRALIA:

SUBJECT: GENE HARRIS

Hey Bob.

Can you help me please.?

I'm searching for a Gene Harris CD that includes the track "I'll Be Home for Christmas".

I would be most grateful to get the information.

Many Thanks.

Sincerely,
Max R. H.
- Perth, Western Australia


BOB POWERS RESPONDS: The majority of the late Gene Harris's albums are on the Concord label. It may take me a day or two to find the latest catalog, but I'll definitely look for it.

Merry Christmas!
Bob


From Lehnert R., (No City Provided,) CA, USA:

SUBJECT: Rod Amis - Unbound

Just finished ["Break My Hip or Bless Me"]. Absolutely marvelous in a wrenching sort of way. How appropriate you published it at Christmas, just when so many of us need the reality check of real people dealing with real things, not the sappy feel-goods that are so much around us.

May the sun be on your face and the wind at your back,

Lehnert R.

a history
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From Mike S., (No City Provided,) USA:

SUBJECT: Cow Food

Me again.

Have you looked into feeding practices for cows & cattle? Poultry litter (chicken s**t to you & me) is USDA permissible and is highly favored by some growers because of it's low cost. There are other that are on the USDA Approved Ingredient list that are equally repugnant. Until their act is substantially cleaned up I am going mostly vegetarian, no beef or poultry, and minimal dairy if it seems safe. I will have to examine porkÝfeeding practices. I shudder to guess.

Mike S.


From Darryl C., Hershey, PA, USA:

SUBJECT: Greetings

Hi Rod,

I¼ve just finished reading your "Glass House" Piece. ÝI¼m sure that it was very painful to write but you desperately need an editor. ÝI will have to reread it again to try to make sense of the implications you make and then seemingly take back etc. ÝStuff this painful and true needs to written in a more direct and poetically terse fashion. Ý

Rod, you have been severely damaged by two people who, judging from you wrote, were seriously whacked and whose relationship only increased the amount of vitriol they could produce. ÝI wish I could give you a hug, brother. ÝI think you are letting your mother and father win out over you. Ý
--
Darryl C.


From HippieRae333, (No City Provided,), USA:

OK, that article written on anorexia sites was totally biased.... you probably didn't pay attention to the fact that these girls - and boys - really suffer.... they cant get away from their ED, it's like their friend. it helps them feel more in control of their life in a way. what does it matter that the guys don't like "razor ribs"? they don't care! they dont do it for guys! really they aren't doing anything wrong. they're just supporting people that are already Ana or Mia to help them either recover or lose more weight. they don't totally bash the idea of recovering. and what kind of an idiot are you?! you can be overweight and still have an ED!!!!! who says you have to be light as a feather to say you have an eating disorder.... obviously, someone ignorant like you. your article is more "absurd" than any of the pro-ED sites could ever be. its not "playing" either. these people are serious about it, and they don't want people without Ed's to start because they know it causes suffering and possibly death. and having anorexia is not like having cancer. anorexia is an emotional disorder, people choose to have it in the beginning.


From Clarence R. (No City Provided,) USA:

Raheem -

I am responding to an old opinion article you wrote about Dr. Steele back in 2002 - well a day late and a dollar short. I have just recently delved into this subject with my orginization and would be interested in corresponding with you on several issues. I work for a major child care organization in the midwest, Girls and Boys Town. Yea Mickey Rooney and all. I would like to able to provide some insight to the folks here on the care and development of teenage African-American males and females but I don't seem to have the "juice" as they say. Don't get me wrong I am willing to go the distance in getting my point across but I could use some support - with no strings attached. I don't want money or fame just some effective strategies to get my point across. Well I don't want to waste your time but would like to know if you are still at this address.

Clarence "Tuck" R.
Program Coordinator
GH/RS NRTC


RAHEEM RESPONDS: Mr. R., thanks for writing me! I'd be more than happy to assist you and your organization in any way I can. I'm just a working guy, so don't expect brilliance, but I'll always give you a quick and honest response.

Peace out.


From Sophia, (No City Provided,), USA:

hi!

I'm doing a thesis on the wisdom of the vow of celibacy today and i'd like to ask you of your source when wrote that "evidence to support the relationhip between celiacy and sexual abuse has been found in studies that reveal drastic differences in the ways that clergy sexual abuse is played out". Can you pls pls send me sites that will help me in claryfying my study?

Thanks.
sophia


ROD RESPONDS: Sophia, thanks for writing. I've referred your request on to KIMBERLY BLAKER, the author of the passage you quote. I'm sure she'll be in touch.


From Robert P.,, (No City Provided,) PA, USA:

SUBJECT: Get over Dad!

"You know, Baby, that's a letter that people have been telling me I should write for years. But you can't write the letter until you are done. So you can stick a fork in me now, as the colloquial saying goes. It took me over thirty years to get all that out of my system. My Dad used to tell me that I was dumber than dirt and that I would amount to nothing. He said I wasn't a real man, at all. So it took this long for me, after - I hope - proving him wrong, to stand up to him and tell him the facts as I see them today. (I might see them entirely differently tomorrow.)

Does this remind of you of anyone? Maybe you?

Until next time. "

There's no next time for your Dad, Rod. He's done, you're not.

You're Rod, he's not.
You're alive, he's dead.
You're a man, he was -- in his own mind -- a man wannabe.
You see the facts, he never did.
Dirt is dumb, you're not.

Did I mention that you're smart, that you know what he didn't know, that acting on what you know and that he didn't is called "evolution" (in Teilhard's noosphere) -- and that what's expected of you is only what you expect of yourself? And that your expectations are far beyond anything that he could have known?

Replace his expectations with your own and you can live.

Yours,
Bob


From Robin M., Bradenton, FL, USA:

TO: Charlie the Tuna

Frails?


CHARLIE RESPONDS: Yeah! Good 'un, ain't it? If I recollect correctly, I picked that term up from some old 1930s or '40s gangster movie and held onto it tight. Some words deserve a second life. It's kindah like referring to guys as "schlubs" if you know what I mean.

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