It’s Sunday and time once again for these thoughts that wander through Kitsap County.
Uppermost
in my mind this week is an email I received from a long-lost classmate
back in Delaware. We’re both looking forward to reuniting at our 50th
high school reunion at the end of the month, and he wanted me to know
how sorry he was to learn of the death of my wife.
To paraphrase
Mark Twain, the reports of my wife’s death are greatly exaggerated. I
immediately wrote back, affirming that Mrs. Palm is alive and well and
likely to outlive me. As it turned out, on October 4, the News Journal,
Delaware’s paper of record, had run an obituary for a Barbara Berry-Palm
— formerly of Newark, Delaware — who was survived by her husband,
Edward Palm.
Since we hadn’t stayed in touch over the years, I can
see how my classmate would have assumed that I was the widower
mentioned in that obituary, especially since “Palm” is not a common name
in America. It’s the German version of “Palmer,” which is much more
common than “Palm.”
In 2004, I chanced to pass through Hamburg — from
whence my father’s grandfather had come — and looked for “Palm” in the
Hamburg phone directory. There were two pages of them. But not so in any
of our major cities in America.
And what a difference one little
syllable can make. Over the years, in phoning various agencies and
companies, I’ve learned to pronounce my surname name loudly and
distinctly and even to spell it. Otherwise, the customer service
representative is likely to hear “Tom,” or “Pam,” or “Baum.”
Moreover,
I’ve also had occasion to wonder if someone highly placed in television
writing or production has something against me. In one episode of the
long-running police drama “NYPD Blue,” two of the detectives were
discussing a particularly loathsome petty criminal named “Eddie Palm.”
The writers could at least have made me a criminal mastermind.
As
it just so happens, my wife and I are expecting our first grandson on or
about the 24th of the month. We’re especially happy about that.
Otherwise, our line of Palms would have ended with our one son Daniel.
I’ve been suggesting some first names: Ethelred, Thurston, Throckmorton,
Smedley, Poindexter. But so far our daughter-in-law doesn’t seem to be
receptive.
In any event, as soon as our grandson is old enough, I’ll urge him to say it loud and say it proud when asked for his last name.
But wait! There’s more, as they say in infomercials. Two more semi-serious topics this week, and all for the price of one:
After
45 years, you’d think I would know all there is to know about Mrs.
Palm. But a piece of mail she received from a veterans’ organization
last year suggests she is indeed a woman of mystery. Who knew that in
addition to being a wife, a mother and a registered dietitian, she was
also a major general? That’s the way the letter was addressed — to
“MajGen Andrea Palm.”
While still in high school, she rose to the
rank of cadet major in the Civil Air Patrol, but she never served in any
branch of our regular or reserve armed forces. Still, maybe Freud was
right in maintaining there are no accidents. In terms of character,
judgment, and temperament, I could credit Mrs. Palm with being “the very
model of a modern major general.”
Would that I could put her in command of public education here in Washington, if not nationally.
Last
Saturday, one of the local TV stations reported on an initiative
undertaken by some precocious well-meaning junior high students. These
youngsters have been lobbying Seattle’s City Council to require placing
so-called “warming labels” on gas pumps. These labels would remind
motorists that “burning fossil fuels contributes to global warming.”
According to that news report, all but one of the council members is in
favor of the plan.
I have no problem with the message per se. I
believe that automobile emissions contribute to global warming. But
what, if anything, we can do about it remains a difficult scientific,
social, and economic problem. We should not be enlisting children in
such crusades.
The adults encouraging these young people may think
they’re molding them into concerned, responsible citizens, but they’re
much more likely to be turning out self-righteous zealots and
ideologues.
The better course would be to encourage these children
to question all received truths, whether proffered by the right or the
left. That’s the essence of liberal education.
Much of what passes
for education today, unfortunately, is actually indoctrination. We need
to be teaching our young people how to think, not what to think. We
also need to instill in them the wisdom to understand that “a little
knowledge” can be “a dangerous thing.”
Contact Ed Palm at efpalm@centurylink.net.
