Eastside, Westside (Via the big picture)

 

My “Thinking Tree”

Since nearly everything that I “own” is a hand me down from someone who has decided that they no longer need/want the item, my decor and my tastes in belonging are somewhat eclectic. Now you might think that this is an odd starting point for a discussion, but be patient, it takes a touch of time and effort to tie this kind of thing together.

Today’s piece is a discussion of music, which is kind of odd as JMG was discussing the same kind of thing over at his place today, but I am going to go a different direction with my thoughts in this piece.

The first tie together is a HUGE shopping bag filled with CD’s that arrived on my doorstep yesterday accompanied by a recliner.  Both were given to me via circuitous routes that began with the death of their original owner.  I won’t go into the details, but I do want to have you aware of the provenance.

I went through the CD’s yesterday with a jaundiced eye.  Nearly half of them were collections of classical(?) Christmas music performed by Eastern European Orchestras in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, when you could buy a recording performance for a song during the period when we were attempting to strip mine Eastern Europe for pennies on the dollar.  These went back into the shopping bag for delivery to the Goodwill.  This was not because they are “bad” but because I truly hate Christmas music and the means that they were put together was emblematic of the attempted rape of anything east of Germany.

You see, I suppose that I am old enough to remember the pure greed that happened when the Berlin Wall fell.  Capitalism swept into the void left by the retreat of erstwhile communism and took advantage of everything that wanted a better quality of gruel.  There is a bunch of music, mostly sold by the likes of Costco to poseurs trying to have something around to give credence to snootiness.  The Musician in Eastern Europe got some meals and the music scumbags here in the US added to their real estate holdings.

I think that what is currently happening in Eastern Europe is emblematic of the ongoing set of troubles we are experiencing.  The world no longer wants to play our game and we are not able to back off and mind our own business.  

I am keeping some of the classical music for myself.  Mostly as a reminder.  Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances does seem to be the most appropriate.