Through outward shape to the essence

A trivial topic on Morse code...

 In Dec of 2014, I have posted the following sentences in facebook. 

 I have enjoyed QRQ navigation with Mitch WB0GKH and Bill W6QR on 40m this evening. About 35WPM. QRQ seems to effectively activate my brain. We should synchronize thinking with the movement of fist in QRQ. Much fun. I should sometimes train myself with that speed, even though I won't take it like a sport. I have forgotten that fun for a while. I have finished the session tonight with a bit slow bug with Don WB6BEE as usual haha.

This short message has brought me back to those days. Happy and pleasant. As if it were endlessly continuing.

A blog post I made in my Japanese blog around the same time as the post shown above reminded me of saying by a good old friend Bob Warmke W6CYX. I was calling CQ on 15m and he called me to tell he could not resist giving me a call when I ran "a bait". A straight key or a bug key sending is so attractive to him. He actually bit the bait at that time. I was almost forgetting this episode but now clearly remembered of that. Actually such a bait was often worth using when the band was deadly silent and there was no answer to CQ with an electric keyer or even a memory keyer!

What do these two episodes tell me? I enjoyed QRQ but was more interested in slow Morse code sent by hand keys. The latter is more unique for the sending individual. It is like agogic in music performance. It makes us more relaxed and feel the sender's personality. Or even the sender's psychological status. There used to be some friends who wanted me to send Morse code with a hand key in QSO with him, whether a straight or a bug. Now I fully understand why they wanted me to change the electrical key to a hand key.

Considering further, I should say what key to use is a kind of external issue. More important is what to talk about. That refers to an inner richness in communication. Del W8KJP used to be a masterful user of bug key years ago. But his health issue made him giving up using that bug key with fluence and fine nuance. He started using a key board. I have enjoyed talking to him even more after that.

Through the simplest system of mode in communication, we enjoy understanding each other and sharing things and experiences. It might be the ultimate goal of Morse code communication.

Being asked if I have achieved that myself, however, I must say I am ashamed and embarrassed to have been away from the goal.

"Is Paris Burning?"

A documentary program titled as "The 20th Century on Film" has been on the air from NHK from 1995 to 1996. It was without any unnecessary direction but in matter of fact style. That style rather impressed us. The first half of the century was a time of war. It has shown millions of people hurt, killed and starved in the war. 

The year 1995 was when I started own practice at a place unfamiliar to me. I made a big debt to a bank for that. For the coming several years, I have worked hard literally without taking a day off throughout a year. Around that time, I was annoyed by malaise such as low grade fever, which later turned out to be male menopause. With the debt and responsibility for work burdened on my shoulders in addition to that unspecified malaise, I have struggled at work. 

It was a few years since the bubble economy had ruptured. Our country was going into deflation, which later lead to the debt monetization by Abe administration. It has piled up an astronomical amount of national debt which could not be easily refunded. Neoliberal economy together with the monetization has caused a big economical disparity among the people, most of them going into poor. It was the time when this economical derangement started.  

Personally, the only good thing we had during the time was that we could live together with my parents. Hopefully, it has been one of the happiest terms in their lives surrounded by us and their grandchildren. It has not lasted too long, though. Father has died in 2004 while mother has in 2011. 

The theme music of the program titled as "Is Paris Burning?" after a renowned film of liberation of Paris in WWII is so poignantly dramatic. Whenever listening to this piece, I remember myself absent-mindedly watching the program on TV as well as what has occured with me and the society around that time. How would this time be recalled by another program "The 21st Century on the Film" in the end of this century? Hopefully, less conflicts and less injustice in the world, even if not completely in justice. 

Cancer in young generation is increasing

A japanese physician in the US has reviewed a few epidemiological studies regarding the occurence of cancer among young generation. 

Here. 

 https://www.mricg.info/single-post/cancer-before-age-49-increases-by-80-over-30-years-revealing-why-younger-cancer-patients-are-on?utm_campaign=00052660-c7c0-4517-9e01-a5d1b72ac75c&utm_source=so&utm_medium=mail_lp&cid=cb295832-5da4-4df1-9b7b-5c4884619177

These studies amaze me a lot. Those young generation have been believed to be far from cancer. Developing cancer should be their own problem but also a burden to the society. The patients might need social security for some time in stead of contributing to the society as work force.

Caricinogenesis is not a simple process but a multiple factor event. The cause of this increment of cancer patients among youth should be carefully investigated. As a general rule, they should avoid alcohol, tobacco or prcessed food etc and should be encouraged to do regular exercise and to take balanced kinds of food including vegetables. HPV vaccine should be given them to avoid cervical cancer.   

I am concerned about exercise deficit. One of the latest issue of JAMA has published a large scaled paper regarding the relationship between exercise and mortality rate. Of course, regular exercise lowers the mortality rate in every generation whatever the cause might be. It has not investigated on the reason of exercise deficit. I suspect the digitalization of life may deprive them of time/chance for exercising. The virtual world smartphone might make them feel they are living in the real world. 

I really hope some researchers would investigate what brings this low physical activity and on possible relationship with their immersion in the internet. 

It is a kind of self-reflection for myself as a recent post says. Discard smartphone and go outdoor for activity!

Miraculous potatoes

We have already had frost early in the morning for the past couple of weeks. Most vegetables except for onion, spinach or broccoli etc would wither by this time in a year. Potatoes are not exception for that. I have harvested all of the fall potatoes.

But there are a few plants of potatoes standing up and even blooming with green leaves at a corner of the garden farm. They are spontaneously growing there every year. 

                           

They were descendants of potatoes discarded there years ago. With continuos cropping such as potato, there could be proliferation of bacilli harmful to it or deficit of certain nutrients, and eventually the growth of the vegetable won't be good there. It is famous as monocropping difficulty in farming. I am intrigued how this plant of potatoes have not only evaded it but also grown even better than the other ordinarily planted ones. A big puzzle! 

With seed plants, as organic farming texts say, seeds contain microbiome within them, which derive from the soil the seed cropped plants. That is a reason why certain plants could grow better at the place wheere seeds were cropped. I am wondering, even though potato's "fruit" is not really fruit but a portion of root, if the same kind of mechanism is working with this potatoes in our garden farm. How could they be free from monocropping disorders? 

I am only amazed at this potatoes. It is beyond my understanding, and possibly, beyond knowledge of science. I would keep them at that place and see what happens with them next year. 

Our garden farm is almost in hibernation. I still have works to build the farm beds for next season.   

PS;When I looked at the potatoes right now, all of them were withered. The chillness was more than they could put up with and/or it was the time for them to die, I don't know. However, they have definitely lived much longer in this cold weather than the other ordinary plants and it was programmed in nature.

Free from intoxication of the internet for a day

 Yesterday, the internet was shut down at our home. Asked the provider, I was told that the carrier was responsible for that. They promised us to pass along the problem to the carrier today. No reply from either the provider or the carrier this morning. While communicating with the personel at the provider customer center for a few times, I felt desparate at solving the problem. But, all of sudden, while talking to him on the cell phone, without intervention by the carrier, I found the internet line was restored. The same kind of trouble with the internet might happen in the future. How should I do in such a case? I knew the customer center personel was not capable of finding solution to such a problem. I felt the infrastructure of the internet was not very resilient in our country or, at least, with the provider we contract with.

Without surfing the internet last night, I felt a bit helpless being shut down from the information sources. I have spent the evening hours reading a paper on psychopathology, given by a senior psychiatrist, an alumni of the same medical university. In the new classification of diseases, ICD11, he seemed to emphasize humanistic or philosophical psychopathology reinstated its seat in psychiatry. When I was a med student, I was going to major in psychiatry and might have been involved in such a change. 

In the rest of night hours, I listened to the whole nocturnes by Faure. Thirteen of nocturnes were composed spreading from his young age to the last few years in hi life. It is interesting how his style has been changed during that long span of life. Simple monophonic pieces like that of chopin to complicated pieces featuring more of dissonance. Consistently, there seems a feeling of elegy among most of them. Nr1 is typical for elegy beginning with downward melody accompanied with simple harmony in bass. Nr11, composed for a memory of Noeml Lalo, is an elegy itself. Another characteristic of them is that the later pieces sound abstruse in a sense with dissonance use. I used to be surprised the same in the piano part of the 2nd movement in his piano trio. 

Anyway, being free from obsession to wander around the internet, we could spend time for valuable things. The internet gives, on the other hand, a tool to communicate with others like this blog. I won't go away from this intoxicated world. It is still necessary for me to spend some time away from it, though.

Farming, season, SNS involved political movements

It is surprising that November is almost going away. It was the day of the earliest sunset here yesterday. In 3 weeks, it will be the wintersolistice. Not too far from starting spring. Before that, there are a lot of things to do. One of the tasks is preparing the greetings for the end of the year. Time is sure passing so fast that I am not really ready to do that. Despite of the mannerism, I would do it in a week or two.

I have harvested a half of potatoes planted in September. Not so prolific but sufficient for cooking until next harvest in June next year. Some of the potatoes will be used as seed in March. Over one hundred onions have been planted. I have built a farming bed with only pretty large amount of rice straw and dried grass plowed into the soil. The organic farming theory says chemical fertilizer would inactivate mychorrhizal fungi around the roots of plants/vegetables, which are essential for the latter growth. Too much nutrients would cause diseases/infections/infestations to the plants. Very interesting world. It is a bit too late for this old amateur farmer to practise it but never too late, I believe.  

The other day, CNN News said the young people in the US are apt to believe in the "Influencers" in the internet while neglecting mass media etc. They might not read books on politics/economics, either. Most of the Influencers are right winged. Consequently, young people should own the same kind of view regarding society and politics, I am afraid.

The same thing is going on in our country. The young generation approves the conservative right wing. Sometimes, even ultra right winged faction. They always criticize social welfare and blame those poor people who need social security. It comes from their firm belief in self-responsibility theory. They tend to sympathize the Influencers who assert on certain problems in the society, which actually require us deliberation and could never be concluded so easily. They tend to believe in conspiracy theory but not science or any academic considerations. 

The self-responsibility based pattern of thinking is identical to or comes from the neoliberalism. Survival of the fittest view. It is causing most of the disparities in the world. Yes, those young people have been born and grown up in the world the neoliberalism has ruled since around 2000 or earlier. Their tendency to simplify the problems in the society and to assert about them has an affinity to fascism. 

Thus, we are living in the era of post neoliberalism. The neoliberalism has left a large economical disparities among people as well as countries. It may bring us chaotic situation and, in the worst case, even another world war, I am afraid. I would tell young people that the self-responsibility theory would harm them but also the society/world. This situation is linked with the internet which echos among the same kind of people. Certain SNS is apt to be occupied by some politicians ambitious for dictatorship or politics oriented business owner/executive. It is highly challenging to the democracy, I am afraid

So that's the story at present. I should have fixed the photo uploading system with this computer. Or should I replace this old computer to a new one? Without uploading capability of photos, I am not very motivated to renew this blog. No, I won't put an end to it, though. Sorry for long winded address on politics/society. 

A very happy Thanksgiving to you all.  

The 46th anniversary

 It is our wedding anniversary for the 46th. I could hardly believe it has been that long since those days.

At the campus of the med school where we had the residency.

Repeatedly uploaded here.

Have we had any hope for future? Possibly, no. Just getting used to normal routine as doctors. Have spent the days of training. Everything was new to us. We owe much to the senior doctors or the patients themselves. Most of senior ones have already passed away. I should have said words of thanks to some of them. 

Most of all, I should thank my wife for her efforts as a wife, a mother and a specialist in psychiatry. It is more than an abstract idea of gratitude but memories of concrete facts. I firmly believe it is the time when I should support her. Who knows I, myself, could be the one who should be cared for by her.     

I don't know how long we could go on living this countryside. Maybe, until either of us could not drive a car or get seriously ill. For tht time being, I hope this days of Indian summer blessed with good health may continue.

Preparing special curry and rice with a piece of cake, a humble dinner, we would congratulate today. Forty six years have passed. 

Hatred to Microsoft and the earliest memory in my life

My camera is not recognized by the PC when I try to import pictures into it. I am trying to fix it with no success yet. When I inadvertently introduced the application of One Drive of Microsoft, everything seems to have started malunctioning. Deleting One Drive is not easy and could cause problems with previously imported pictures. Damn Microsoft!!

That's why I have not uploaded some new photos yet. When the problem is fixed, a number of posts will be up here.

This is a picture painted by a Russianm, Ivan Shishkin, in late 19th century. Already uploaded it in facebook. It sure reminded me of the sanatorium, which used to exist at this place. I was born and spent early childhood, and later latter half of my life. Among pine trees, there were small cottages for tuberculosis patients. My aunt has established it in the WWII in based on belief in Christianity when tuberculosis was not treatable and a fatal illness. Poor patients have gathered that sanatorium from all over the country. No effective medicine and no doctor at the facility. A few doctors used to visit there in certain interval. Maybe, I have already mentioned about it before.

My parents have known each other there and married when my father has come from the service in the military. We, three of siblings, were born there. My very first memory in my life is the hymn sung by the patients and the staff in acapella coming through the pine trees. It was breezy as well. Otherwise, only doves were sometimes singing. A very quiet and serene place.

At age 4 or 5 years, I have moved to Tokyo together with the rest of the family. The life in Tokyo is totally another story. I still fondly recall the life spent among the pine trees. It is literally the base of my life.

I have forgotten to mention why I wanted to upload this painting with my own memory. As I often wrote, I had been working in the farm garden in the most hours in the daytime, if not long enough like a real farmer. I know our children or any others won't be able to keep this property when I ceased working here in the near future. It was a kind of anxiety for me. However, now recalling of this pine tree forest, I am sure this place is destined to back to such a forest. Hopefully, it would be so peaceful and comfortable to visitors as it used to be, if any. Beyond my life, of course, it is of no use to worry as for own property or anything belonging to me in this world. 

A pine tree forest with gentle breeze coming through. Only doves singing in deep voice are echoing... Imagining of that, I am again captured by peaceulness. This painting has lead me to that consciousness. 

 

 

Harrell playing Arpeggione sonata

Lynn Harrell at a recital in Tokyo. It might be, judging from the stage and reflective board on the back, at the small hall of Tokyo Bunkakaikan in Ueno around 1980. A video of a program by NHK, possibly.

I have never listened to him in his young days. A true virtuoso. He played effortlessly such a difficult piece as Arpeggione sonata by Schubert. That piece should be played like a humming piece sung at a downtown street in Wien. His cello sounds like that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blALvCjzUIc

Tokyo Bunkakaikan is an old concert halls facility which is close to my mother school. It is located at a corner of Ueno park next to the Ueno station. The park was a walk place for me in student days. I used to attend there for a various concerts then. In my jr. high days, I was a regular member of Tokyo Philharmonic with my father for a while. It was in '60s. Still a lot of fond memories. Harrell, seemingly warm hearted person, has died 4 years ago. I seldom visit that concert hall and even Tokyo now. Time has passed.

GAZA 2035 project

I have heard that, if Trump takes the seat of POTUS, his son would be involved in the development of Gaza, nearly 90% destroyed and more than 30K Palestenians killed, into a resort area. I felt nauseous at it. Does this news mean that?

 

 https://www.thenation.com/article/world/gaza-2035-aec-neom-saudi/?fbclid=IwY2xjawGSJD5leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHfAt8tA-p9JHV_L5ULRY0Fc9KhCnCBK3uHUcRmJ6ule_GLp8b6FK5XU3Xg_aem_V0EqF33t8T0rJgTDwsrJVQ

I don't think such a project would come true. It would become a cause of further and more massive conflict. 

I still recall that a lot of industries in the US have been involved in the reconstruction in Afghan and Iraq after war. The biggest one was a division of Halliburton which was managed by the former vice president of Bush administration, Dick Cheney. 

The US still exports arms to Israel. I heard that it had been amounted up to 20 billion  USD. I know it has all started by the Hamas attack last fall. But Israeli counterattack has reached the level of ethnic cleansing as this report says. Endorsement and support to Israel by the US seem to aggravate the situation. If some faction of the US should be involved in this horrible project in the Middle East, it would leave incurable injury in the area and the faith in the US might fall down on the ground, I am afraid.

A missing comment

Scrolling down the previous posts in this blog, I found a comment by John AC4CA to a post regarding music of Piazzolla. Just did it by chance. It was a short but still considerate comment. I have mistaken reading it. Very sorry for that. It was 2017. As already written, he has had his wife in a facility due to her Alzheimer and was living alone at home. Whenever we met on the radio, we talked about music which we were playing as well as listening. He loved playing piano and said Chopin was his favorite. In each conversation, again not long enough but very impressive, I felt, even though he had lived a solitary life at home, he had himself fullfilled with ham radio, birdwatching or music. Of course, seeing his wife Jackie at the facility as well.

I should have talked to him more, especially on how he has grown up. He told little about such a thing. Suffering from neuroendocrine tumor, which has become treatment resistent year by year, and having his wife in a facility as told above, he must concentrate on the life at present. No room to recollect the past, I believe. 

How has he felt on Piazzolla? I have lost the chance to ask about it to him. Sorry but there have been full of such mistakes in life. He has passed in Feb 2023.

One of my Piazzolla's favorites. Already uploaded in a past post. 

I would ask anyone who would give me a comment in this blog as follows. I am trying to answer every comment and please be patiently waiting for that. If you have not got any answer from me, it could never be anything other than my mistake. Please identify youself in a way we both could understand if possible. If you are new to me, add that in your comment. Any comments will be much appreciated. 

On a rainy day

Having posted on poor growth of sweetpotatoes at a field last month, I found there were a little bit better harvest of sweetpotatoes in the other fields recently, despite of apparently overgrowth of the vine. It is always miraculous how they grow and are cropped. Before it gets too cool, the rest should be cropped. I should go on working hard in the farm.

Plants of taro are ready to be harvested as well. Potatoes, spinach, broccoli or carrots are growing. They may be harvested by Dec. 

The global warming is becoming closer to us. The summer vegetables have been affected by it. I have seen several vlogs of farmers who complain of poor harvest of summer veggies. They have been sold at higher prices at store. The fall/winter vegetables should be planted, they say, a week or two later than ususal. It seems the winter is coming quicker than before. The summer has been directly taken over to the winter. No long break of fall this year. 

Early in this hot summer, rice was run out at stores. There are a number of reasons why it has occurred. One of them was the relative crop failure due to the abnormally high temperature last summer. The price of rice has risen even by 50%. That high cost is still carried on despite newly harvested rice is in the market now. The cost of rice has been kept irrationally low. Rice farmers have had hard time with the cost for years. On the other hand, the main food for people in our country, rice, should be reasonable. It is an issue that politics should handle with. It should be argued at the other post.

I would point out that the government is trying to replace rice plants to a new spieces or its crossbred descendants. It is a newly developed one which absorbs Cadmium, Cd, much less than previous old spieces. 

As a researcher in agriculture says, there is an area which is polluted with Cd. The national agricultural research center has developed a new rice spieces, which irradiation of heavy particle beam inactivated the gene responsible for absorption of Cd. They are trying to replace the ordinary species to this new one or its descendants. Cd pollution is limited only certain areas in our country. The new species has another serious defect. It is genetically lowered in absorption of another mineral Mn. Mn has an important role in in photosynthesis as well as resilience against pathogens. When this new species is grown, they should add Mn as a fertilizer component. Relative Mn deficit could cause growth issue and liability for infections. Those new species might not grow well in global warming. 

Irradiation could damage the other genes unknown yet. It may cause the other serious issues. Natural selection occurs in a long time scale. Our ancestors have chosen species which work well for us. Artificial gene manipulation with irradiation could result in "magnificient" failure in the future. 

Why do they popularize this new species of rice in our country? To get more money! The farmers, subsequently the consumers of such rice, should pay for the pantent. There should be other factors involved in this new rice species. They are invariably related with money!

OK, that's about it. Even though I won't renew posts so often, I am getting along fine. Today, the rain has kept me indoor and let me write this post.  

Excessive vine growth of sweet potato and a dish of the hypertrophied vine

Plants' growth are told to divide two phases, nutritional growth and reproductive growth. In the former phase, a plant grows individually at its trunk, vine or leaves. In most cases, the latter phase follows it. It leaves crops or fruits. 

The former growth is accelerated with meteological factors and low carbon/nitrogen ratio in the soil. High nitrogen from too much fertilizer is often a cause of this phenomenon.

In the excessive vine growth with the sweet potatoes, the latter, that is, too much fertilizer won't be the cause. Regardless of the remnant amounts of fertilizer, it has occurred in the same manner at different fields. Another evidence that the weather, most likelily the hot spell in the past spring/summer, may be the fact some of Marie Gold planted at different places of the garden, of course, without any fertilizer has shown the same excessive growth of the trunk/leaves. They have bloomed very few flowers. The typical case is shown in the following photo. The two trunks have grown large in unusual way while some flowers are out in the other few plants. I have never seen this overgrowth in the past.  

This is only a hypothesis that global warming is influencing our tiny garden/farm. But we should be careful about such a thing. We are the crops brought by the reproductive growth of the crops. If those crops grow only in the nutritional growth but not in the reproductive growth, it may cause famine.

Last night, I have cooked the overgrown vine of sweet potatoes with chicken as this photo shows. My wife at first prejudiced that it could have been like a menu people used to cook in the war time without much food. But she was pretty happy at this dish when it was cooked. This recipe was published by a lady in Shikoku, my wife's birth place, as an old one from ancestors.    

 

Failure of sweet potato growth

It is the time to harvest sweet potatoes now. As a conclusion, the crop was not very good this year. 

Excessive vine growth has occurred. They say it is due to excessive fermentation and/or too much rain. One of the fields was due to hyperalimentation due to the remnant of fertilizer for the previous vegetable. I am not sure what has brought the problem at the other fields. A climate issue? It is beyond my capability to avoid this excessive growth in such a case.

Some of the poorly grown fruits were bitten by bugs. Vegetables or generally any plants have a system of immunity against such infestation of insects. Those subnormally grown ones are liable to the problem. 

The other day, I was surprised to know, in the case of famine or of war involving our country, our government had a plan to have golf course or school grounds converted to farm and to grow sweet potatoes. The self sufficiency rate of food is only 38% now. Considering of importing the farming materials like fertilizer and its resources or seeds etc, it drops below 10%. This fact has not well known to the people. The government won't do with this subtle crisis without such a terrible plan to grow sweet potatoes. 

As my experience with growing sweetpotatoes this year tells, it is not easy for amateur instant farmers to grow such as sweet potatoes which is told to be a rather easy crop. I would propose the administration officers/politicians to grow sweetpotatoes at the garden of the Diet by themselves.

Now some people are aware of this issue but still only a minority. Food security issue is going on in our country in subtle and serious way.

The over grown sweet potatoes's vine.

 

A T shirt and hectic days

It was 1991 when I visited Cambodia for ham radio operation of XU0JA, usually regarded as DX pedition. After a Hungarian team had operated there, the station was managed by a girl named Sokun, personnel of PTT. I happened to know her operating XU8DX by hersel n 15m SSB. She did not know anything of ham radio. It was necessary to support the station XU8DX there. In 1990, I asked Atsushi JF3NRI and James 9V1YC to visit there and to bring some support items like the PA tubes of the amplifier etc. They have done a good job. It was my turn to visit there a year after. I have spent a hectic as well as pleasant week over there together with a couple of JA friends, JH1OJU and JH0FBH. It was only a few years after the civil war had ended. There was curfew in Phnom Penh. I still remember the streets were vacant after the curfew from PTT to the Hotel Cambodiana where we stayed. I have already written about our trip there a few times already. 

Some friends were supportive to us. Eric W6DU, the president of NCDXF, has prepared T shirts with the logo of NCDXF for us before departure. We have worn it all the time throughout the trip. Mine has been found deep in a drawer recently. This is it;

My call as XU/JA1NUT was printed above the NCDXF logo. But it has disappeared in this 3 decades. XU0JA QSL is here. 

It was the days when I was crazy with DXing. With some free time and finance, I could spend much time for ham radio. This was one of the events I devoted to those days. 

Honestly, I sometimes wonder if it was a right decision or if I should spend time and energy for the other things in the middle of my life when I was able to do anything I wanted. Such as restarting practising cello earlier and so forth. I know it is of little use to reflect the past in that way but such an idea of reflection still often comes up in my mind.

I find myself trying to balance my mind convincing myself it was meaningful for me to have had good company through ham radio. Eric was one of them. Blood boiling experience in ham radio was also priceless for me. In this chapter of my life, the other pleasant things like farming or listening good music are being prepared for me. I should never complain of the past.

Now this T shirt is worn by me while I work in the farm. Another hectic days. 

Life's most important task

This is a poem a german missionary of Catholic, Hermann Heuvers, has introduced in his autobio. Heuvers has stayed in our country as a teacher at a university pastoring a church from 1920s through 1960s. When he once returned to homeland, a friend of his gave this impressive poem to him. In 1977, while he served Mass on wheel chair, he developed acute heart attack which lead to death. 

It sure leaves a lasting impression on me. I was going to put this into the previous post titled "The beginning of real retirement". I was too shy or even scared to compare our lives to this way of in devout belief. 

It is still an excellent wisdom of life in old age. I would share it to you here, not in relation to the previous post. I still would spend or try to live the retirement ahead with the motto this poem depicts. This translation comes from a site by Nobuko Muth.

Quote~~~

 What is this life's most important task?

To grow old with a cheerful heart,

To be still even when I would like to be active,

To be silent when I would like to talk,

To have hope in times of frustration,

To carry my cross in humility and serenity of heart,

To put aside envy even when I see younger people walking God's path full of health and energy,

To humbly accept help from others when I would rather work for the sake of others,

So when I can no longer be useful for others because of frailty I need to gently and humbly accept the heavy burden of old age as a gift from God.

I have an aged heart that has been in use a long time and now God is giving it a final polishing so that I can return to my true home all shining.

To gradually release myself from the chains that bind me to this world is indeed a wonderful work.

When I cannot do things let me humbly accept these circumstances in humility.

However for my closing years God has kept for me the most important work of all, and that is:

~~~End of quote

This translation is ended abruptly leaving a few more sentences untranslated. I dare finish it in my way as follows;

My hands could do little to the others

Only I could do until the end of my life is to join my hands in prayer

Praying for God's mercy over to all the people I love

When I have done all I could do, I may hear God telling me in dying bed,

"Come here, thou, you will never be abandoned."

~~~

I have learned about this poem from my sister 4 years elder than me several years ago. As I and the folks are getting older, this beautiful verse hauntingly comes up in my mind. My sister and borther in addition to my wife and myself are stepping into the elderhood. May all of us spend the last chapter of our lives as this poem indicates.

The beginning of real retirement

It is the 72nd birthday for my wife today. It's been a year since she closed her business. Things are settled down and regular routine is formed for her as well as for me now.

Signs of senility are looming to each of us whether we are aware of that or not. It is a reality. She has worked hard as a wife, a mother and a doctor for decades. I owe much to her. I would support her from now on, even though it might be me who should ask for her care. Who knows?

Wishing her peaceful and healthy retirement days even if it is only a brief period of serenity.

We have celebrated this day with a piece of cake last night.

Always the same photo. In the honey moon in 1979.

  

Mahler 9th Symphony and Claudio Abbado

Before going to sleep, I have listened to this symphony for a few days. 

I have posted about this music 8 years ago; here.

Getting older, I feel the theme of this music is getting more familiar or pressing to me.

This is the performance I listen to; Lucern Festival Orchestra conducted by Clauddio Abbado. It was 2010.

Abbado has suffered from gastric cancer in 2000 and has survived it successfully. I wonder how he was doing at this time of the concert. Later, in 4 years from this concert, he has succumbed from the same illness. Was it reccurence or another illness? Whatever health condition he was in at this time, the issue of death must have occupied his mind, I suspect. Once, he used to tell death is existentially an aspect of life. 

In the end of this performance, he has set a time of silence in darkness for a couple of minutes. It seems he has casted a message from the nether world. Reading too much into it?

Cool breeze is coming into the bed room. In otherwise completely silent environment, I listen to this music at midnight.

Obon

As I repeatedly mentioned, it was the season named Obon in the mid August. A lot of people have returned to their hometown from big cities and have gathered with their folks. In a tradition of Bhuddism, they were accepting their ancestors at home. Bon odori, that is, traditional dance in Obon, was performed to welcome their ancestors. A lot of festivals were held for the same purpose. I believe only few people were commemorating Obon in this sense. Getting together with family members or old friends is itself a precious event in our life. 

 https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2286.html

Our family is not concerned about this event. I have been pulling the weeds in the farm and garden. Doing that, I was recollecting my parents, an aunt who has started a tuberculosis sanatorium at this place and the other people who have passed. There used to be a lot of pine trees in the sanatorium. Breeze has gone through those trees. As already wrote somewhere, such breeze coming through pine trees is my oldest memory in life. Now, as a typhoon has passed by, it is getting cooler at least at night. I was surprised to have cool breeze touching my face while working in the garden this morning. Fall is not far from here now. This is the way I am spending this Obon. 

Two indices notebooks

I have a couple of notebook, tired and almost worn out, in a book shelf. Before I started using PC logging, I had sorted out after call signs with QSO data / their handle and had recorded them in either index notebooks. One for one or two letter suffices, the other for three letter suffices.

I had pretty good memory when I was young and it was not any sweat for me to recall someone whom I met before without those gadget. However, getting older and memory not reliable all after having made hundred thousands QSOs with the states, I decided to make those index notebooks. It was around '80s.

I was not very punctual keeping the records in them. But I guess I have recorded most of them from '80s through '00. They were taken over to the PC logging in '10s. PC logs are much more handy to record the content of each QSO. There was a space to remark about them in it. It helped me lot to recall of them. 

I could have digitalized the QSOs before PC logging was started. It was, however, too much work to do that. I have given it up. I feel fondness to those old fashioned notebooks. At present, whenever I see any call signs/names which look familiar to me, I look up for them in these notebooks. Unfortunately, it is quite rare for me to find their call signs for now. "My days have already gone", I am convinced. 

Turning the pages of those notebooks, I always find a lot of old familiar call signs. I could remember some of pleasant chats with them. It might only mean I was young enough to remember them. But it also means we used to have enjoyable chats those days.

It may be not my business but I sometimes wonder what those enjoying digital modes or contest style QSO would feel for his hobby in the past time when they are in the end chapter of their lives. I would keep these old notebooks until the end of my life.

Classical music

This story tells us a few important things.

Quiet environment and, with string instrument, appropriate reverberation are necesasry to have classical music appreciated by people.

Even more importantly, we should be psychologically ready to listen to it. A person, a passionate lover of classical music, with the history of severe depression used to tell me that she has lost will to listen to it, however she used to love it in the past. It is a process that requires our psychological energy to devote ourselves to classical music. To those who are too busy or are occupied by the other things, classical music won't smile. At first sight, classical music, especially that of Bach, sounds unfriendly to us. However, when we are willing to know of it, it always respond to us with prosperous gifts.

This story seems to have occurred in reality and was reported on a major paper.

Quote a post in Facwbook; 

 “ In Washington DC, at a Metro Station, on a cold January morning in 2007, a man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, approximately 2000 people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

After about four minutes, a middle-aged man noticed that there was a musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds, and then he hurried on to meet his schedule.
About four minutes later, the violinist received his first dollar. A woman threw money in the hat and, without stopping, continued to walk.
At six minutes, a young man leaned against the wall to listen to him, then looked at his watch and started to walk again.
At ten minutes, a three-year old boy stopped, but his mother tugged him along hurriedly. The kid stopped to look at the violinist again, but the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk, turning his head the whole time. This action was repeated by several other children, but every parent - without exception - forced their children to move on quickly.
At forty-five minutes: The musician played continuously. Only six people stopped and listened for a short while. About twenty gave money but continued to walk at their normal pace. The man collected a total of $32.
After one hour:
He finished playing and silence took over. No one noticed and no one applauded. There was no recognition at all.
No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the greatest musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written, with a violin worth $3.5 million dollars. Two days before, Joshua Bell sold-out a theater in Boston where the seats averaged $100 each to sit and listen to him play the same music.
This is a true story. Joshua Bell, playing incognito in the D.C. Metro Station, was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and people’s priorities.
This experiment raised several questions:
In a common-place environment, at an inappropriate hour, do we perceive beauty?
If so, do we stop to appreciate it?
Do we recognize talent in an unexpected context?
One possible conclusion reached from this experiment could be this:
If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world, playing some of the finest music ever written, with one of the most beautiful instruments ever made…
How many other things are we missing as we rush through life?”
The Love Rabbi-Yisroel Bernath

A small resolution

Getting older, I have been aware of losing knowledge of vocabulary and grammar in English or even in Japanese. It's just an aging process, I know. I wanted to resist that process by some means, even if it is destined to be defeated. Trying to read in English even oftener than before. But it is not so effective so far. 

The other day, I happened to listen to a radio program of Korean language lesson. It offered a training to repeat some sentences in Korean on a rap music. On the rap's rhythm, it sounded lively and attractive to me. Is it a popular method for language learning? Pronounciation as well as intonation sounded clearer with that rap dependent method. Articulated practise may help to master foreign language. Music or other experiences involved with our emotion, I know, could leave long term memory. Korean is an attractive language for me since I have a few Korean friends like Lee HL1DC. But I am a bit too old to start with a new language from scratch. 

Song and foreign language...it won't take me too long before "German for Matthew's Passion" has lit in my mind. I have learned most of the lyrics in German. It starts with the idea that the song of Solomon was realized in the life of Jesus. Toward the death of Jesus on Golgotha, the story will be intensified. With the words "Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachtani?" that is "Mein Gott, mein Gott, warum hast du mich verlassen?", Jesus died. It is the climax of this Passion. Then, recitatives and aria/choral calming down us ensues. It is worth learning again in German. 

I have a novel in German I would like to read in original language some day. It is "Unruhige Nacht" by Albrecht Goes. I might have written about this poignant and impressive story before. I still have a copy of this novel. Maybe, learning German again, I might challenge it someday. 

Even though it is often quite questionable if such a resolution may last long enough with me, I decided to learn German again with the text of St. Matthew's Passion. Making a note like I used to do in school days. I brought out this old German Japanese dictionary, which I learned with in my school days, from the college to the medical university. The cover is almost torn out. The biggest issue is that the fonts are too small to read with my old eyes. I have ordered a new dictionary. Everything is ready. Never ending study. I am excited to start it. No goal to be achieved but the process of learning itself is the goal. 

 

 

The antenna be down this fall

It was in 2006 when I renewed this antenna. I still remember assembling the parts before going for work in very chilly morning. I had used the same model since 1988, which I liked so much and wanted to have the same model. It is a kind of tribander for 40 through 15m, 3 element for 40m and 4 element for the other bands. Both of them have worked a marvellous job for me. Especially, on 40m, with this antenna, it was a big fun for me to work the long path in morning and evening in fall/winter months. What a joy it was for me to talk to friends all over the world with it! It was a real dream antenna for me. 

I have decided to take it down this fall after having wondered if I should maintain it or not for the past couple of years. I still have a wish to come back on the radio. But that wish is becoming smaller as time goes by. There are less friends on the air, whom I would talk to. It seems the digital modes which I am least interested in are becoming the main modes on the radio. Preparing for the case I may die all of sudden, I think it is a good choice to have it down very soon. 

Some may say I should do it without announcing it in this blog. But this announcement would make it a decision. 

I am not sad at all. Thanks to this fine antenna, I have enjoyed ham radio all my life. The first one for 18 years and the second one for another 18 years! Only grateful to this antenna.

 

How to avoid damages by insects

 For the past few years, tomatoes have been often eaten before harvest by larvae of tobacco moth, which dig a small hall on the surface and eat the content completely. Stink bugs are another pests for tomatoes, which aspirate the content through sharp mouth. The aspirated fruits are gradually degenerated and not edible. This kind of pest has been also a problem here.

A farmer who have been farming without chemicals after the method in Edo era told in an SNS that such insects would damage vegetables because of paucity of weeds in the farms. They would not damage vegetables if there are a lot of weeds for their lives around the farm. This is a kind of natural farming idea. They say the farms are a system of ecology including weeds and pests. With all of the weeds pulled away, there could be pests eating vegetables in stead. That natural farming farmer tells us to cut weeds at the height of a feet. Remainder of weeds would work as the environment for life for those insects. 

I have been pulling weeds around the vegetables completely and use them for grass mulch and for the source of compost. I don't think keeping weeds at certain height would solve the problem completely. But it may help to reduce the damages by the insects. I may try it from now. And seeding vegetables at the best time for them is another solution for this issue. In suboptimal conditions for vegetables to grow, for example, too early or too late sowing, they could be damaged by insects easily, I know from my little experience in farming. Too much fertilizer also makes the vegetables liable to damage by the insects.

A lot of learning in the farm. Very interesting. Being intrigued so much, I would go on farming.

Another fresh salad dish. Tomatoes and okras are the product at my farm.  

In elderly, we are apt to regret our pasts

At the age of 75 years, there are a lot of things in the past I should regret or scruple in the relationship with others. Sometimes, it makes me insomniac. Even though I know it is of little sense to recall the past things in that way, it still comes up in my mind. I sometimes wonder if it is a sign of elderly depression. Or is it the consciousness of sin in life? 

I could still eat, do daily routine and prepare for things in the future. It seems I don't need to consult to my wife yet. Maybe, it is a critical period for elderly which we should go through at some point of our lives. It is not advisible to do self-justification and deceive myself with it. There is no solution to such a problem. I believe I just accept it as it is and live the rest of my life with introspection after that.

In facebook, there was a thread regarding such a problem. I uttered something like this above mentioned. A comment has been given by an old friends of mine, David, N1EA, a professional radio operator on aboard, as follows;

"My only regret is that on my last sea voyage to Naha, Japan, I didn't try to visit one of the best Morse operators in the world: Dr. Onisawa."

To my mind worn out to the bone, this simple and still warm hearted comment was a real medicine. I was almost shedding tears at his comment. Even though he just told only his regret in his career or just a diplomatic comment for my skill on CW, his words have pnenetrated and warmed deep in my mind.

I think this feeling of scruple may make me more sensitive to the others' pain and let me appreciate deeper such a music as St. Matthew's Passion. And, hopefully, I would be like David who would send such encouraging words to the others even without aiming that. 

I only hope to catch David on the air someday and go on chatting as we did in the past, even though I know both of us are not able to operate radio at present. I thank you so much, David.

Crape Myrtle blooming

Crape myrtle has started blooming at the entrance gate of our home. In my view, it is a flower in late summer. Looking up about this tree, it seems to bloom from July to October. It may go on blooming until early fall from now.

I have cut the lawn in the garden yesterday. It was deadly hot. Feeling a bit nauseous possibly due to dehydration, I have had a blow of breeze on my back, making me feel comfotable for a second. 

For the coming month, we should undergo the cruel burning summer. Weeds may not grow so rapidly but it is still necessary for me to care for the garden/farm. Sitting in the garden/farm doing the work, I still recall of my father, who used to do the same thing for years. Quietly recalling of him while working in the garden/farm should be a commemorative ritual for him. As already written, I have not held any event for his 20th anniversary of passing this month. But this unceasing occasional remembrance in daily life should be a replacement for such a formal event.

Crustal movements and big earthquake/tsunami in our country

An interesting video movie by Geographical Survey Institute. It depicts the crustal movement in Japan continuously around the big earthquake in Eastern Japan in 2011.

 https://mekira.gsi.go.jp/movie/crustal_movement.mp4

The modern platetectonics tells two oceanic plates, Phillippine Sea and Pacific, are sliding below into the two continental plates, Eurasian and North American, and that movements are causing distorsion on and around our country. The distorsion could be freed as big earthquakes occuring here at regular interval. 

It is only a retrospective instropection but the crustal movements were predictive for the earthquake. Historically, it was known that there had been big earthquakes/tsunami in the Eastern Japan repeated in the interval of a few hundred years. 

The earthquake researchers had warned another big earthquake/tsunami. The power line companies with nuclear power plants were reluctant to accept the warning mainly from the economical burden. Only Japan Atomic Power Company took the warning seriously and, apart from the bureaucratic attitude of lining up in a line among the other power line companies, dealt with the weakness in cooling system of their nuclear power plant, Tokai Daini NPP, which later turnd out to be free from serious accident by the big earthquake in Eastern Japan.

It is amazing that the same power line companies and the administrative offices regulating them are hurrying up to rerun the other nuclear power plants all over our countries. They are far from taking out the debris from the crippled nuclear reactors in Fukushima. It has taken over 20 trillion JPY so far to proceed the decommissioning process of the reactors so far.

Twenty percent of big earthquakes in the world occurs in this small country. They won't care for that chasing only profit from nuclear power generation. People are cheated that nuclear power generation is cheap and is necessary for this country without any fossile fuel. Those propaganda are erroneous and are only to cheat them. 

Father's anniversary, Hilary Hahn with an arm nerve issue, Bach

 It's beeb a couple of weeks since I last updated this blog. Weeds are growing cruelly fast for now with much rain fall. It is still keeping me busy.

It was my father's 20th anniversary of passing on July 9th. I was aware of that but didn't do anything to commemorate the day. I still often remember how he looked on the bed in a hospital on the very last day of meeting when I had to leave for work. So worried and helpless. I iterated it in the past. I should have stayed with him. i could not help feeling bitter echo of regret. No sense to regret any longer, I know. But that feeling often unexpectedly hurt my heart. Caring for the garden/farm by myself, I often recall of him. Couldn't it be a way of mourning for him working that way as he used to do? 

My sister seemed to have held a commemorative meeting for father with her husband and their children. She has summarized father's bio in a brochure and sent it to me. 

I often listen to Bach's unaccompanied sonata and partita for violin played by Hilary Hahn. I have already written about her performance in the past. The best one for this great music. Impeccable technique and warmth in expression. I don't know how that "warmth" comes from. I still feel soothed as well as consoled whenever I listen to her playing this piece. With its profound structure, I feel as if wittenessed the universe creation but it still comes into the depth of emotion and appeases my mind. Hilary used to write in her blog that she started practising violin with one of this piece every day. Seems she loves this music so much. Her devotion to it might bring that appeasing emotion to the listener.

Last month, she announced she should cancel the recital trip to South America due to pinched nerve problem. She said it was doubl pinched nerve. I don't know what problem she has had. Maybe, compressed peripheral nervous system, possibly, median nerve at multiple points. As a violinist, it should be a serious issue. I hope good rest will get rid of the problem very soon. She has dedicated to the world of music so much. I wish her to continue her activity very soon. 

She often plays one of those enormous pieces as an encore.