Tag: US Memorial Day

Lest we forget!

Today is Memorial Day for all Americans that have died while serving their country.

Just a short preamble.

I was born in London six months to the day before the day on which the second world war ended.  On that day in early May, 1945 my mother breathed a sigh of relief and knew I was going to live!  The fact that I am writing this post does rather confirm that! 😉

Not only is this the year of my seventieth birthday (but, PLEASE, don’t remind me!) but my mother is also still alive and well and is coming to see Jean and me in our Oregon home in ten weeks time.

I served as a Radio Operator in the Royal Naval Reserve between 1963 and 1968. That is the totality of my military experiences.  Ergo, I have been more than fortunate not to have experienced military conflict at any time in my life.

So today’s post is just something gentle to remind us all of the advantages of freedom for humans and animals alike.

The Bear

An orphan bear cub hooks up with an adult male as they try to dodge human hunters.

Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud
Writers: James Oliver Curwood (novel), Gérard Brach (screenplay)
Stars: Tchéky Karyo, Bart the Bear, Youk the Bear

See full cast and crew details here.

Sometimes less says more: a growl or a snarl can be worth a thousand words. Without any verbal dialogue, the raw emotions of the wilderness are vivid in this segment of The Bear, a film about the actions of animals in relation to humans. In this suspenseful part of the story, a cub is hunted by a mountain lion who shows no mercy. Without any verbal dialogue, the raw emotions of the wilderness shine through.

Film Reviews:

Storytelling doesn’t get much purer than this–a film with virtually no dialogue and not a minute that isn’t fascinating, either for the plot it pursues or the way director Jean-Jacques Annaud gets his ursine stars to do what he wants. The story deals with a young cub who, after his mother is killed in a landslide, bonds to a lumbering male Kodiak. The two of them then must cope with an invasion of hunters into their territory – and Annaud makes it clear whose side he’s on. Aside from stunning scenery, the film offers startlingly close-up looks at bear behavior. They say the best actors are the ones that let you see what they’re thinking, a trick Annaud manages with his big, furry stars. – Marshall Fine

The Bear has all the marks of a classic. Lauded by animal rights groups for its respect for the integrity of all species, it manages to speak out eloquently against the senseless hunting of wildlife without having to depict killing to make its point. Instead, it emphasizes the ties that bind the human and animal worlds together. – Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat

May your day wherever you are in the world be a peaceful one.

Postscript.

Planet Earth; just a grain of sand

In my last essay on love that was published on Friday, I quoted Carl Sagan, “For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love.Carl Sagan” My conclusion about love was:

… that if we don’t love our planet with all the ardour and passion of a teenager’s first romance, all those other loves in our lives will ultimately become irrelevant.

In researching for that essay, I visited Carl Sagan’s website, a rich source of information and materials for anyone interested in the far Cosmos right down to our future on this planet.

Just a little over three months ago, I wrote a post with the title of Carl Sagan with the objective of promoting his beautiful and awe-inspiring film called Pale Blue Dot.

Back to the present. On YouTube I came across this short video that seems so relevant to our need to love the only planet we have.

Carl Sagan explains the immensity of space and time in this clip is from Carl Sagan’s Cosmos episode 8, “Journeys in Space and Time.

“Those worlds in space are as countless as all the grains of sand on all the beaches of the Earth. Each of those worlds is as real as ours. In every one of them, there’s a succession of incidence, events, occurrences which influence its future. Countless worlds, numberless moments, an immensity of space and time.

And our small planet, at this moment, here we face a critical branch-point in the history. What we do with our world, right now, will propagate down through the centuries and powerfully affect the destiny of our descendants. It is well within our power to destroy our civilization, and perhaps our species as well. If we capitulate to superstition, or greed, or stupidity we can plunge our world into a darkness deeper than time between the collapse of classical civilization and the Italian Renaissance.

But we are also capable of using our compassion and our intelligence, our technology and our wealth, to make an abundant and meaningful life for every inhabitant of this planet. To enhance enormously our understanding of the Universe, and to carry us to the stars.”

Today, in the USA it is Memorial Day. The day of remembering the men and women who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces.  It doesn’t seem out of order to reflect that all those courageous men and women died with a belief in the future.  That belief in the future surely must embrace “… using our compassion and our intelligence, our technology and our wealth, to make an abundant and meaningful life for every inhabitant of this planet.“