Chariots of Death (or Herod the Great, Herod the Dead)
By Kathy Applebee
First Julius Caesar is murdered and now Herod the Great. Right after the 4th and controversial chariot race. Who killed him?
Mystery party games are an engaging alternative to studying life in the Roman Empire and make wonderful drama activities. Add spice to Bible classes or youth group activities while immersing everyone in Roman customs of the first century. Acting experience and knowledge of police procedures are not necessary for a party no one will forget. Each guests serves as both a suspect and investigator.
Kit includes character dossiers for 6-13 players (and as many extras as you wish), a host pack with complete instructions, menu suggestions, and the clues needed to solve the murder.
First Julius Caesar is murdered and now Herod the Great. Right after the 4th and controversial chariot race. Who killed him? Add spice to Bible classes or youth group activities while immersing everyone in Roman customs of the first century. Dossiers for 6-13 players (and as many extras as you wish), a host pack with complete instructions, menu suggestions, and the clues needed to solve the murder.
Check out royalty free Christian drama skits at my Fools for Christ website at http://tiny.cc/rkaz2
***** Arinbide v3.0 ************************
Metodología de desarrollo de aplicaciones software que contempla:
* Enfoque predictivo (basado en Métrica v3)
* Enfoque adaptativo (Scrum y XP)
Documentación complementaria:
>>> ARINbide-Adaptativo
Guías:
- Gestión de proyectos e Ingeniería del software: ARINbide – Adaptativo
- Gestión de proyectos e Ingeniería del software: ARINbide – Adaptativo. Anexo: Conceptos básicos
Plantillas:
- Visión del producto
- Normas, participantes y procedimientos
- Plan de entregas
- Pila de Producto
- Pila de Sprint
- Pila de Impedimentos
- Retrospectiva
- Manual de usuario
- Diseño técnico
- Acta de reunión
- Monitorización
- Defectos y errores
Chariots of Death (or Herod the Great, Herod the Dead)
By Kathy Applebee
First Julius Caesar is murdered and now Herod the Great. Right after the 4th and controversial chariot race. Who killed him?
Mystery party games are an engaging alternative to studying life in the Roman Empire and make wonderful drama activities. Add spice to Bible classes or youth group activities while immersing everyone in Roman customs of the first century. Acting experience and knowledge of police procedures are not necessary for a party no one will forget. Each guests serves as both a suspect and investigator.
Kit includes character dossiers for 6-13 players (and as many extras as you wish), a host pack with complete instructions, menu suggestions, and the clues needed to solve the murder.
First Julius Caesar is murdered and now Herod the Great. Right after the 4th and controversial chariot race. Who killed him? Add spice to Bible classes or youth group activities while immersing everyone in Roman customs of the first century. Dossiers for 6-13 players (and as many extras as you wish), a host pack with complete instructions, menu suggestions, and the clues needed to solve the murder.
Check out royalty free Christian drama skits at my Fools for Christ website at http://tiny.cc/rkaz2
***** Arinbide v3.0 ************************
Metodología de desarrollo de aplicaciones software que contempla:
* Enfoque predictivo (basado en Métrica v3)
* Enfoque adaptativo (Scrum y XP)
Documentación complementaria:
>>> ARINbide-Adaptativo
Guías:
- Gestión de proyectos e Ingeniería del software: ARINbide – Adaptativo
- Gestión de proyectos e Ingeniería del software: ARINbide – Adaptativo. Anexo: Conceptos básicos
Plantillas:
- Visión del producto
- Normas, participantes y procedimientos
- Plan de entregas
- Pila de Producto
- Pila de Sprint
- Pila de Impedimentos
- Retrospectiva
- Manual de usuario
- Diseño técnico
- Acta de reunión
- Monitorización
- Defectos y errores
Twenty-Sixth Annual Conference
Baseball in Literature and Culture,
March 24, 2023 (Postponed from July 7-9, 2022); On the campus of Ottawa University, Ottawa, Kansas
Why I Love Baseball - powerpoint slide showOsopher
27th annual Baseball in Literature and Culture Conference presentation: "Why I Love Baseball"...
(complementing and contrasting with Joe Posnanski's eponymous book)
"No Justice in This World": David James Duncan's "The Brothers K" -- presentation, 25th anniversary meeting of the Baseball in Literature and Culture conference, originally scheduled for April 3, 2020... postponed to July 16, 2021
Spring training & the perennial renewal of lifeOsopher
Slideshow for the 20th Annual Conference on Baseball in Literature and Culture, at Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU), Murfreesboro, Tennessee - the last to be hosted by MTSU. (In 2016 the conference moves to Ottawa, Kansas.
HW-3 Tomorrow’s World CE 1120 Introduction to Engineering.docxadampcarr67227
HW-3 Tomorrow’s World
CE 1120 Introduction to Engineering
HW-3: Future of Engineering/Tomorrow’s World
Write one-page summary on: Tomorrow’s World
Sources
BBC Horizon Special - Tomorrow's World (2013) (Space, Nanotechnology, Energy, Environment]
http://vimeo.com/95063478
58:34 min
http://vimeo.com/95063478
Save paper and follow @newyorker on Twitter
Books
AUGUST 3, 2015 ISSUE
I Can’t Go On!
What’s behind stagefright?
BY JOAN ACOCELLA
S
The key thought accompanying the physical response
seems to be a feeling of exposure.
ILLUSTRATION BY NISHANT CHOKSI
ara Solovitch, in “Playing Scared: A History
and Memoir of Stage Fright” (Bloomsbury),
says that while she was a good pianist as a child, she
fell apart—sweating, trembling—when she had to
play for an audience. She got through the Eastman
School of Music’s preparatory program. Then she
quit studying piano, grew up, got married, had
children, and became a journalist. In her late forties,
though, she drifted back to the piano, taking a course
at a community college. By this point, she had no
professional ambitions. Surely, she thought, she
would now be able to perform calmly. But when her teacher asked her, one night, to play
in front of the class, her hands began shaking so hard that she could barely strike the
keyboard: “I gazed down at myself from a distance high above the keys, watching a body
that was no longer in charge. My fear was at the controls, like an independent organism
emerging from inside me, my own Rosemary’s baby.”
Stagefright has not been heavily studied, which is strange because, as Solovitch tells us, it
is common not only among those who make their living on the stage but among the rest
of us, too. In 2012, two researchers at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, Karen Dwyer
and Marlina Davidson, administered a survey to eight hundred and fifteen college
students, asking them to select their three greatest fears from a list that included, among
other things, heights, flying, financial problems, deep water, death, and “speaking before a
group.” Speaking before a group beat out all the others, even death.
Stagefright has been aptly described as “self-poisoning by adrenaline.” In response to
stress, the adrenal glands pump the hormone epinephrine (adrenaline) into the
bloodstream, causing the body to shift into a state of high arousal. The person’s muscles
tense, he sweats and shakes, his heart pounds, his mouth goes dry, he has trouble
breathing, he may become nauseated or dizzy, and his throat constricts, making his voice
rise in pitch. This is the so-called “fight or flight” response, which our species is thought
to have developed because it helped prepare the body for forceful action in response to a
threat. But what Cro-Magnon man needed upon finding a bear in his cave is not what a
modern person needs in order to play King Lear. Without the release of abrupt action,
the hyperactivation becomes, basically.
Healthy Minds, Flourishing Lives: A Philosophical Approach to Mental Health a...Osopher
Honors College lecture, April 8, 2024. Phil Oliver, Dept of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Middle Tennessee State University
"Healthy Minds, Flourishing Lives: A Philosophical Approach to Mental Health and Happiness"
“Character(s) of the game: virtue, integrity, and eccentricity in our pastime” -- 26th annual conference on Baseball in Literature and Culture, on the campus of Ottawa University, Ottawa KS... slideshow UNDER CONSTRUCTION, conference postponement announced June 2022, new date tba (probably Mar/Apr '23)
"Promoting Happiness, Demoting Authority: Richard Rorty's Pragmatic Turn Revisited"/"Pragmatism and the Pursuit of Hope and Happiness"... presented Feb.25-26, 2022, American Philosophical Association Central Division, Palmer House Chicago--William James Society/Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy (SAAP)
Twenty-Sixth Annual Conference
Baseball in Literature and Culture,
March 24, 2023 (Postponed from July 7-9, 2022); On the campus of Ottawa University, Ottawa, Kansas
Why I Love Baseball - powerpoint slide showOsopher
27th annual Baseball in Literature and Culture Conference presentation: "Why I Love Baseball"...
(complementing and contrasting with Joe Posnanski's eponymous book)
"No Justice in This World": David James Duncan's "The Brothers K" -- presentation, 25th anniversary meeting of the Baseball in Literature and Culture conference, originally scheduled for April 3, 2020... postponed to July 16, 2021
Spring training & the perennial renewal of lifeOsopher
Slideshow for the 20th Annual Conference on Baseball in Literature and Culture, at Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU), Murfreesboro, Tennessee - the last to be hosted by MTSU. (In 2016 the conference moves to Ottawa, Kansas.
HW-3 Tomorrow’s World CE 1120 Introduction to Engineering.docxadampcarr67227
HW-3 Tomorrow’s World
CE 1120 Introduction to Engineering
HW-3: Future of Engineering/Tomorrow’s World
Write one-page summary on: Tomorrow’s World
Sources
BBC Horizon Special - Tomorrow's World (2013) (Space, Nanotechnology, Energy, Environment]
http://vimeo.com/95063478
58:34 min
http://vimeo.com/95063478
Save paper and follow @newyorker on Twitter
Books
AUGUST 3, 2015 ISSUE
I Can’t Go On!
What’s behind stagefright?
BY JOAN ACOCELLA
S
The key thought accompanying the physical response
seems to be a feeling of exposure.
ILLUSTRATION BY NISHANT CHOKSI
ara Solovitch, in “Playing Scared: A History
and Memoir of Stage Fright” (Bloomsbury),
says that while she was a good pianist as a child, she
fell apart—sweating, trembling—when she had to
play for an audience. She got through the Eastman
School of Music’s preparatory program. Then she
quit studying piano, grew up, got married, had
children, and became a journalist. In her late forties,
though, she drifted back to the piano, taking a course
at a community college. By this point, she had no
professional ambitions. Surely, she thought, she
would now be able to perform calmly. But when her teacher asked her, one night, to play
in front of the class, her hands began shaking so hard that she could barely strike the
keyboard: “I gazed down at myself from a distance high above the keys, watching a body
that was no longer in charge. My fear was at the controls, like an independent organism
emerging from inside me, my own Rosemary’s baby.”
Stagefright has not been heavily studied, which is strange because, as Solovitch tells us, it
is common not only among those who make their living on the stage but among the rest
of us, too. In 2012, two researchers at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, Karen Dwyer
and Marlina Davidson, administered a survey to eight hundred and fifteen college
students, asking them to select their three greatest fears from a list that included, among
other things, heights, flying, financial problems, deep water, death, and “speaking before a
group.” Speaking before a group beat out all the others, even death.
Stagefright has been aptly described as “self-poisoning by adrenaline.” In response to
stress, the adrenal glands pump the hormone epinephrine (adrenaline) into the
bloodstream, causing the body to shift into a state of high arousal. The person’s muscles
tense, he sweats and shakes, his heart pounds, his mouth goes dry, he has trouble
breathing, he may become nauseated or dizzy, and his throat constricts, making his voice
rise in pitch. This is the so-called “fight or flight” response, which our species is thought
to have developed because it helped prepare the body for forceful action in response to a
threat. But what Cro-Magnon man needed upon finding a bear in his cave is not what a
modern person needs in order to play King Lear. Without the release of abrupt action,
the hyperactivation becomes, basically.
Healthy Minds, Flourishing Lives: A Philosophical Approach to Mental Health a...Osopher
Honors College lecture, April 8, 2024. Phil Oliver, Dept of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Middle Tennessee State University
"Healthy Minds, Flourishing Lives: A Philosophical Approach to Mental Health and Happiness"
“Character(s) of the game: virtue, integrity, and eccentricity in our pastime” -- 26th annual conference on Baseball in Literature and Culture, on the campus of Ottawa University, Ottawa KS... slideshow UNDER CONSTRUCTION, conference postponement announced June 2022, new date tba (probably Mar/Apr '23)
"Promoting Happiness, Demoting Authority: Richard Rorty's Pragmatic Turn Revisited"/"Pragmatism and the Pursuit of Hope and Happiness"... presented Feb.25-26, 2022, American Philosophical Association Central Division, Palmer House Chicago--William James Society/Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy (SAAP)
"The Spirit of Modern Philosophy" Revisited: A Committed Jamesian Reconsiders Royce (Again, at the William James Society session at the APA Central DIvision meeting in Chicago, 2.26.20.
Who cares?
Reflections on caring about baseball, sports, life, the universe, everything… and why we should...
Presented at the Baseball in Literature and Culture Conference hosted by Ottawa University, March 29, 2019
A presentation to the Middle Tennessee State University chapter of Students for Environmental Action (SEAofMTSU), in celebration of Earth Week 2016, April 21, 2016.
Serbia vs England Tickets: Serbia's Return to Euro Cup 2024, A Look at Key Pl...Eticketing.co
Eticketing.co offers UEFA Euro 2024 Tickets to admirers who can get Serbia vs England Tickets through our trusted online ticketing marketplace. Eticketing.co is the most reliable source for booking Euro Cup Final Tickets. Sign up for the latest Euro Cup Germany Ticket alert.
Spain vs Croatia Euro 2024 Spain's Chance to Shine on the International Stage...Eticketing.co
Euro 2024 fans worldwide can book Spain vs Croatia Tickets from our online platform www.eticketing.co. Fans can book Euro Cup Germany Tickets on our website at discounted prices.
Belgium vs Slovakia Belgium Euro 2024 Golden Generation Faces Euro Cup Final ...Eticketing.co
We offer Euro Cup Tickets to admirers who can get Belgium vs Slovakia Tickets through our trusted online ticketing marketplace. Eticketing.co is the most reliable source for booking Euro Cup Final Tickets. Sign up for the latest Euro Cup Germany Ticket alert.
According to the report, the consumption of video content related to IPL 2024 has seen significant growth, nearly 3 times more than the previous season, reflecting an increasing interest of fans.
Boletin de la I Copa Panamericana de Voleibol Femenino U17 Guatemala 2024Judith Chuquipul
holaesungusto.- Boletín final de la I Copa Panamericana de Voleibol Femenino U17 - Ciudad de Guatemala 2024 que se realizó del 27 de mayo al 01 de julio, en el Domo Polideportivo Zona 13.
Fuente: norceca.net
Match By Match Detailed Schedule Of The ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2024.pdfmouthhunt5
20 Teams, One Trophy: What to Expect from the ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2024
The ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2024 is set to be an exciting event, co-hosted by the West Indies and the USA from June 1 to June 29, 2024. This edition of the tournament will feature a record 20 teams divided into four groups, competing across 55 matches for the prestigious title.
Netherlands vs Austria Netherlands Face Familiar Foes in Euro Cup Germany Gro...Eticketing.co
The Netherlands are in Group D in Euro Cup Germany - and, unpaid to this, they will be coming up against familiar foes. Remarkably, they have played France, who have fashioned some of the greatest players of all time, 30 times throughout history. Despite France being more effective in major competitions, including captivating the World Cup in 2018, Holland have the greater head-to-head record.
We offer Euro Cup Tickets to admirers who can get Netherlands vs Austria Tickets through our trusted online ticketing marketplace. Eticketing.co is the most reliable source for booking Euro Cup Final Tickets. Sign up for the latest Euro Cup Germany Ticket alert.
UEFA Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro 2024 Tickets | Netherlands vs Austria Tickets
However, in 2023, they played one another twice, with France endearing both matches 4-0 and 2-1 individually. Against Poland and Austria, the Netherlands also have a stout record, winning just under half the matches. They faced Austria at Euro 2020, engaging 2-0, and they haven't lost to Poland since 1979.
The lettering is on the wall for Holland to qualify for the knockouts, but nothing is failsafe. The Netherlands kickstart their Euros campaign against Poland on Sunday, June 16th. In Hamburg, they will have to go up against one of the best strikers in the world, Robert Lewandowski.
Netherlands vs Austria: Tough Challenges Await the Netherlands in Euro Cup Germany
Five days later, they travel south to face France in Leipzig, a side led by Kylian Mbappe - one of the finest players in the world currently and one of the most impressive players in his nation's history. To conclude, they face Austria in Berlin, knowing it could be the end of the road if they don't perform.
Ronald Koeman is widely considered one of the more successful Dutch managers in Premier League history, considering the nation has a reputation for struggling to replicate their talents in England. The former Everton manager went against that script and shone — and now he is back managing his nation.
UEFA Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro Cup Germany Tickets | Netherlands vs Austria Tickets
Euro fans worldwide can book Euro Cup Germany Tickets from our online platform, www.eticketing.co. Fans can book Euro Cup 2024 Tickets on our website at discounted prices.
Netherlands vs Austria: Ronald Koeman's Tactical Approach For UEFA Euro 2024
As well as being the highest-scoring defender in history, Koeman is a man with immense tactical knowledge. He returned to manage Holland at the start of 2023 after it was announced Louis van Gaal would retire. His life back in the dugout with the team wasn't easy, as he lost his first match 4-0 to France after going 3-0 down within 21 minutes.
However, he eventually helped them qualify for Euro Cup Germany. The 61-year-old likes to organize his team with a defensive mindset. Some might call it pragmatic as he defends with minimal space between the lines, but that's often needed for international football.
Croatia vs Italy Can Luka Modrić Lead Croatia to Euro Cup Germany Glory in Hi...Eticketing.co
Euro 2024 fans worldwide can book Croatia vs Italy Tickets from our online platform www.eticketing.co. Fans can book Euro Cup Germany Tickets on our website at discounted prices.
Belgium vs Romania Injuries and Patience in Belgium’s Euro Cup Germany Squad....Eticketing.co
Belgium coach Domenico Tedesco will wait for several key players to recover from injury. Even if it means they miss the opening Euro Cup Germany stages of the European Championship in Germany this month. Veteran defender Jan Vertonghen, midfielder Youri Tielemans and defender Arthur. Theate are being given time to play in the tournament because they are considered vital to Belgium’s cause, Tedesco said on Tuesday.
We offer Euro Cup Tickets to admirers who can get Belgium vs Romania Tickets through our trusted online ticketing marketplace. Eticketing.co is the most reliable source for booking Euro Cup Final Tickets. Sign up for the latest Euro Cup Germany Ticket alert.
UEFA Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro Cup Germany Tickets | Belgium vs Romania Tickets
"Of course, you prefer to take players who are fully fit, but that's okay. We want to wait and be patient for some players even if they cannot play in those first matches," he told a press conference. The 37-year-old Vertonghen, Belgium’s Euro Cup 2024 most-capped international with 154 appearances, is struggling to shake off a groin injury.
"He will be there normally. This also applies to Youri Tielemans and Arthur Theate. The latter's position is very sensitive. We don't have many choices at left back. "It will only change if it turns out that they will only be available when, say, the final of the Euro 2024 Championship comes around. That's too long to wait. "However, I am confident that the injured boys are on track for the Euros.
Belgium vs Romania: Radu Dragusin Prepares for Crucial Role in Euro Cup Germany
Some of them have taken not one but two steps forward in their rehabilitation," he said. None of the injured players will feature in this week’s warm-up friendlies against Montenegro and Luxembourg. Romania centre-back Radu Dragusin found chances limited at Tottenham Hotspur in the second half of the 2023-24 season.
But is crucial to his country's cause at UEFA Euro 2024 where his aerial ability, physicality and hard graft make him a standout player. The 22-year-old moved to North London from Italian side Genoa in January but was kept on the sidelines by the form of another new arrival for the season, Mickey van de Ven, something Romania coach Edward Iordanescu admitted was a concern.
It will mean limited game-time going into the finals, but Dragusin, who cites Netherlands defender Virgil van Dijk as a role model, started every Euro Cup Germany qualifier as Romania went through the campaign unbeaten in their 10 games. He will be among their most important players in their first game in Germany against Ukraine in Munich on June 17, taking the right centre-back role in what is likely to be a back four.
UEFA Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro 2024 Tickets | Euro Cup Germany Tickets | Belgium vs Romania Tickets
Euro fans worldwide can book Euro Cup Germany Tickets from our online platform, www.eticketing.co. Fans can book Euro Cup 2024 Tickets on our website at discounted prices.
Gabriel Kalembo A Rising Star in the World of Football Coachinggabrielkalembous
Gabriel Kalembo is a player's coach who connects with his teams on a deep level. With a strong background in sports science and a passion for the game, Kalembo has developed a unique coaching philosophy that emphasizes player development and tactical flexibility. His ability to connect with players and create a positive team culture has led to success at every level he has coached.
Turkey vs Georgia Turkey's Road to Redemption and Euro 2024 Prospects.pdfEticketing.co
Euro Cup Germany fans worldwide can book Euro 2024 Tickets from our online platform www.eticketing.co.Fans can book Euro Cup 2024 Tickets on our website at discounted prices.
Narrated Business Proposal for the Philadelphia Eaglescamrynascott12
Slide 1:
Welcome, and thank you for joining me today. We will explore a strategic proposal to enhance parking and traffic management at Lincoln Financial Field, aiming to improve the overall fan experience and operational efficiency. This comprehensive plan addresses existing challenges and leverages innovative solutions to create a smoother and more enjoyable experience for our fans.
Slide 2:
Picture this: It’s a crisp fall afternoon, driving towards Lincoln Financial Field. The atmosphere is electric—tailgaters grilling, fans in Eagles jerseys creating a sea of green and white. The air buzzes with camaraderie and anticipation. You park, join the throng, and make your way to your seat. The stadium roars as the Eagles take the field, sending chills down your spine. Each play is a thrilling dance of strategy and skill. This is what being an Eagles fan is all about—the joy, the pride, and the shared experience.
Slide 3:
But now, the day is marred by frustration. The excitement wanes as you struggle to find a parking spot. The congestion is overwhelming, and tempers flare. The delays mean you miss the pre-game excitement, the tailgate camaraderie, and even the opening kick-off. After the game, the joy of victory or the shared solace of defeat is overshadowed by the stress of navigating out of the parking lot. The gridlock, honking horns, and endless waiting drain the energy and joy from what should have been an unforgettable experience.
Our proposal aims to eliminate these frustrations, ensuring that from arrival to departure, your experience is extraordinary. Efficient parking and smooth traffic flow are key to maintaining the high spirits and excitement that make game days special.
Slide 4:
The Philadelphia Eagles are not just a premier NFL team; they are an integral part of the community, hosting games, concerts, and various events at Lincoln Financial Field. Our state-of-the-art stadium is designed to provide a world-class experience for every attendee. Whether it's the thrill of game day, the excitement of a live concert, or the camaraderie of community events, we pride ourselves on delivering a fan-first experience and maintaining operational excellence across all our activities. Our commitment to our fans and community is unwavering, and we continuously strive to enhance every aspect of their experience, ensuring they leave with unforgettable memories.
Slide 5:
Recent trends show an increasing demand for efficient event logistics. Our customer feedback has consistently highlighted frustrations with parking and traffic. Surveys indicate that a significant number of fans are dissatisfied with the current parking situation. Comparisons with other venues like Citizens Bank Park and Wells Fargo Center reveal that we lag in terms of parking efficiency and convenience. These insights underscore the urgent need for innovation to meet and exceed fan expectations.
Slide 6:
As we delve into the intricacies of our operations, one glaring issue emer
1. Baseball in Literature and Culture, 2009 MTSU, 3.27.09 – The Inevitable Last Pitch: Fans Bid Rabbit Adieu Thank you for welcoming a philosopher, to speak to you of a great (but mortal) slugger and a literary lion whose philosophically-rich musings on mortality and the fullness of life I so much admire. [E] But as a resident of this university I feel as though I should really be welcoming you to our campus and to Murfreesboro (specifically, the corner of College and Spring) – where it really does matter most how you play the game. [E]
2. It was my privilege and pleasure to participate in the Cooperstown Symposium in June 2001. I presented a little talk on baseball and transcendence... [E] Trans-end-dance , the ability to move beyond the end, otherwise called the dance of death. -Peter Ackroyd, The Plato Papers
3. The Inevitable Last Pitch: Adieu to John Updike Abstract "He had met the little death that awaits athletes. He had quit." John Updike's classic 1960 tribute to Ted Williams, "Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu," ended on an appropriate note of mortality. Williams homered in his climactic last at-bat at Fenway Park, and then chose not to accompany the team on a last road-trip to meet the Yankees in New York. It was a "little death": Williams enjoyed many more years of vigorous, eventful life, before a sordid and "cryogenic" exit embarrassingly pocked by public family dysfunction. But before then, he became an even larger-than-life figure as baseball's version of John Wayne. The baseball world revered him, for his persona and his mastery of the art and science of hitting. He collected accolades and tributes aplenty, and his reputation survived the indignity of managing another small death: the Washington Senators' terminal season. But despite the inelegance of his ultimate big death, his Cooperstown pedestal is intact, his legacy remains one of mastery and self-possession. Here I take a close look at Updike's famous essay, and consider it in the light of his own recent passing in January. Our lives are punctuated by many little deaths and capped by the big one, and - as has been observed before - despite baseball's open-ended, un-clocked invitation to a game that in theory might never end, it is in fact one of our best sources of wisdom about how to handle the fact of our own inevitable mortality. John Updike was still swinging for literary fences at the end, and went out on top of his game. Someone should write an appreciation. "Lit Fans Bid Rabbit Adieu..."
4. Contemporary literature is a rich mine of insight in dialogue with older terminal wisdom. Epicurus said death does not concern either the living or the dead, since for the former it is not, and the latter are no more. More recently Wittgenstein said death is not an event in life. There's NOTHING to be frightened of. Jules Renard: “The word that is most true, most exact, most filled with meaning, is the word 'nothing.'” Julian Barnes, Nothing to Be Afraid Of
5. Memento mori, “remember death” and seize the day. That's the counsel of most wisdom traditions, not just modern Existentialists. Life does not seem like it is going to end. It is, though, and for your own happiness, you have to train yourself to accept it and keep it in mind. Conventional wisdom. But once you school yourself in the awareness and acceptance of death, you have to try to forget it again. We worry about death because we worry we aren't living. Pay attention to living fully and you won't worry about death. Carpe vitam. Seize the life. Jennifer Michael Hecht, The Happiness Myth
7. I have published a few other scattered thoughts on the philosophical significance of baseball. For instance - [E] There is a marvelous moment in the film Manhattan when Woody Allen's alter ego wonders why life is worth living. He compiles a list including, among other "things that make it worthwhile," Willie Mays … [N]
8. But the simple truth is that I am a baseball fan. I would have pushed my way into this venue whatever my particular academic or other vocation, and even if I'd had to travel further to get here than just down the hall.
9. The literary and cinematic worlds have long attended to baseball. Think of Bernard Malamud's – or is it Robert Redford's? - Roy Hobbs.
10. Poets have channeled the baseball muse. Whitman was probably the first to champion “our game”... William Carlos Williams celebrated its marvelous "spirit of uselessness" - The crowd at the ball game Is moved uniformly by a spirit of uselessness which delights them...
11. Updike's own evocation of the Fenway crowd on that autumn afternoon a half-century ago compares favorably to WCW's. Two girls, one of them with pert buckteeth and eyes as black as vest buttons, the other with white skin and flesh-colored hair, like an underdeveloped photograph of a redhead, came and sat on my right. On my other side was one of those frowning, chestless young-old men who can frequently be seen, often wearing sailor hats, attending ball games alone... [LOA 311]
12. Tao in the Yankee Stadium Bleachers by John Updike Distance brings proportion. From here the populated tiers as much as players seem part of the show: a constructed stage beast, three folds of Dante’s rose, or a Chinese military hat cunningly chased with bodies. “ Falling from his chariot, a drunk man is unhurt because his soul is intact. Not knowing his fall, he is unastonished, he is invulnerable.” So, too, the “pure man”—“pure” in the sense of undisturbed water... Tao in the Yankee Stadium Bleachers by John Updike Distance brings proportion. From here the populated tiers as much as players seem part of the show: a constructed stage beast, three folds of Dante’s rose, or a Chinese military hat cunningly chased with bodies. “ Falling from his chariot, a drunk man is unhurt because his soul is intact. Not knowing his fall, he is unastonished, he is invulnerable.” So, too, the “pure man”—“pure” in the sense of undisturbed water... (More baseball poems and songs )
13. For some of us that is when it stops , in the salutary sense of transcendence. ( Transcendence , again, as I think of it, is about coming to terms with death in a way that allows one to enjoy and celebrate life.)
14. Perhaps the most obvious way to describe nature time is to call it baseball time, referring to a game in which the clock technically plays no role and which conceivably could last to infinity, tied to the end... Sitting in the afternoon sun in Wrigley Field provides the urban dweller a natural cranny, nestled among the tenements and elevated trains, a space in which time is defeated, halted and sent scurrying. -John J. McDermott “ Let's play two!”
15. Academics and scholars in many fields have been drawn, like the late Renaissance scholar and baseball commissioner Bart Giamatti, to the “green fields of the mind.” [E] Writing with un-scholastic passion of the inner fields of play, he entreated us all to “take time for paradise.”
16. What is the special appeal of this game, for intellectuals? Giamatti said it may be the only game slow enough for them to understand. (No insult intended.) [E] Some grow out of sports. Others were born with the wisdom to know that nothing lasts. I am a simpler creature... I need to think something lasts forever, and it might as well be a game... in a green field, in the sun. A. Bartlett Giamatti (1938-1989)
17. Roger Angell notes a remarkable similarity between baseball and reading, as acts of reflective delight. Angell is a baseball philosopher, as much as literary light (and Updike's editor at The New Yorker. ) Updike’s writing is light and springy, the tone unforced; often happiness is almost in view, despite age or disappointments. He is not mawkish or insistently gloomy. Death is frequently mentioned but for the time being is postponed. Time itself is bendable... The Fadeaway , 2.9.09
18. "The game is a repository of age-old American verities . . . and yet at the same time a mirror of the present moment..." Ken Burns [E] A short lineup of baseball intellectuals - Robert Frost A. Bartlett Giamatti Doris Kearns Goodwin Stephen Jay Gould David Halberstam Donald Hall Christopher Lehmann-Haupt Bernard Malamud John Updike William Carlos Williams Morris R. Cohen...
19. Among the literary stars featured in the Library of America's baseball volume: Damon Runyan Carl Sandburg William Carlos Williams Thomas Wolfe James Thurber Nelson Algren Bernard Malamud Robert Frost Willie Morris Philip Roth Annie Dillard Richard Ford Don DeLillo
20. What I do know is that this belonging and caring is what our games are all about; this is what we come for. It is foolish and childish, on the face of it, to affiliate ourselves with anything so insignificant and patently contrived and commercially exploitative as a professional sports team... [But] caring deeply and passionately, really caring— is a capacity or emotion that has almost gone out of our lives. [ENTER] Naivete—the infantile and ignoble joy that sends a grown man or woman to dancing and shouting with joy in the middle of the night over the hap-hazardous flight of a distant ball—seems a small price to pay for such a gift. -from Five Seasons
21. Satchel Paige said that maybe he would "pitch forever," and in the sense of a naturalized concept of eternity maybe he did . [E] 1. Avoid fried meats, which angry up the blood. 2. If your stomach disputes you, lie down and pacify it with cool thoughts. 3. Keep the juices flowing by jangling around gently as you move. 4. Go very light on the vices, such as carrying on in society. The social rumble ain't restful. 5. Avoid running at all times. 6. Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you. —Satchel Paige's "Guide to Longevity"
22. Popular song has mythologized ballplayers, usually to their perplexity. DiMaggio himself did not understand, telling Paul Simon: "What I don't understand is why you ask where I've gone. I just did a Mr. Coffee commercial. . . . I haven't gone anywhere." (New York Times, 9 March 1999).
23. Some philosophers have also taken a special interest in the game. (Others have not... William James, for instance.) [E] The pragmatist Morris R. Cohen (1880-1947) published an essay entitled “Baseball as a National Religion” and reported actually bringing the idea to James's attention. "When my revered friend and teacher William James wrote an essay called The Moral Equivalent of War , I suggested to him that baseball already embodied all the moral value of war, so far as war had any moral value. He listened sympathetically and was amused, but he did not take me seriously enough. All great men have their limitations.” The Dial , 26 July 1919).
24. Annie Savoy's “Church of Baseball” took Cohen's idea seriously. I believe in the Church of Baseball. I've tried all the major religions, and most of the minor ones. I've worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms, and Isadora Duncan. I know things. [E] For instance, there are 108 beads in a Catholic rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I heard that, I gave Jesus a chance. But it just didn't work out between us. The Lord laid too much guilt on me. I prefer metaphysics to theology. You see, there's no guilt in baseball, and it's never boring... [slow, reflective, linear, meditative at times, but NEVER boring]
25. The game (if not always its players) is a repository of wisdom. One essay in this Open Court volume is called “Socrates at the Ballpark”... Another, about Ted Williams, is “The Zen of Hitting ”...
26.
27. Theodore Samuel "Ted" Williams (August 30, 1918–July 5, 2002) TED, KID, SPLINTER, THUMPER, TW, MISTER WONDERFUL
28. The other simple truth accounting for my topic today: I am an Updike fan.
29. Updike may appear to yearn for the supernatural, but in fact his books are full of appreciation for the natural, simple satisfactions of everyday life. He would love nothing more, it seems, than to "be a self forever." That's still how I read him. I wish he could be a self forever, here amongst the selves we're sure of, for my own selfish reasons as one of his most admiring readers; and because he was the theist whose charm and intelligence and humanity most tempered my inclination to dismiss theism as nothing but the residue of pre-scientific superstition.
30. JOHN UPDIKE March 18, 1932 - January 27, 2009 Winner, PULITZER PRIZE for Fiction 1982 (RABBIT IS RICH) & 1991 (RABBIT AT REST)
31. April 26, 1968 Updike gained public notoriety for his frank chronicles of the salacious suburban sexual revolution of the '60s, but his interests and enthusiasm ranged far and wide, and included our game. Inexplicably, he may have loved golf more. He called himself more a fan of Williams than of baseball .
33. Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu by John Updike October 22, 1960 NYker Fenway Park, in Boston, is a lyric little bandbox of a ballpark. Everything is painted green and seems in curiously sharp focus, like the inside of an old-fashioned peeping-type Easter egg...
34. Youth, Maturity, and Age; or Thesis, Antithesis, and Synthesis; or Jason , Achilles, and Nestor* Hegel Society *[see Updike in Cincinnati ]
35. If this was a tragedy, Williams was Hamlet. But – ironically, appallingly, repulsively – he would become Yorick...
36. Updike in 2002: Ted took his time leaving this world, and he's not quite out of it yet. He is cryonically frozen in Arizona, drained of blood and upside down but pretty much intact, waiting for whatever resurrection technology can eventually produce...
37. Ted Williams Frozen In Two Pieces Meant To Be Frozen In Time; Head Decapitated, Cracked, DNA Missing NEW YORK, August 12, 2003 (AP) Ted Williams was decapitated by surgeons at the cryonics company where his body is suspended in liquid nitrogen, and several samples of his DNA are missing, Sports Illustrated reported. The magazine's report, appearing in the issue that hits newsstands Wednesday, is based on internal documents, e-mails, photographs and tape recordings supplied by a former employee of Alcor Life Extension Foundation. After Williams died July 5, 2002, his body was taken by private jet to the company in Scottsdale, Ariz. There, Williams' body was separated from his head in a procedure called neuroseparation, according to the magazine. The operation was completed and Williams' head and body were preserved separately. The head is stored in a steel can filled with liquid nitrogen. It has been shaved, drilled with holes and accidentally cracked 10 times, the magazine said. Williams' body stands upright in a 9-foot tall cylindrical steel tank, also filled with liquid nitrogen.
38. “ Amortality ” - recently spotted by Time as one of “10 ideas changing the world right now” - The defining characteristic of amortality is to live in the same way, at the same pitch, doing and consuming much the same things, from late teens right up until death. Amortals don't just dread extinction. They deny it. Ray Kurzweil, Aubrey de Grey...
39. After a prime so harassed and hobbled, Williams was granted by the relenting fates a golden twilight. He became at the end of his career perhaps the best old hitter of the century.
40. "I feel terrible," he confessed, "but every time I take a swing at the ball it goes out of the park." [N] He was ancient in 1957: 39 In 1960:
41. He struck the pose of Donatello's David, the third-base bag being Goliath's head.
42. As he slid across the plate, the ball, thrown with unusual heft by Jackie Brandt, the Oriole center fielder, hit him on the back. "Boy, he was really loafing, wasn't he?" one of the boys behind me said. "It's cold," the other explained. "He doesn't play well when it's cold. He likes heat. He's a hedonist."
43. Whenever Williams appeared at the plate—pounding the dirt from his cleats, gouging a pit in the batter's box with his left foot, wringing resin out of the bat handle with his vehement grip, switching the stick at the pitcher with an electric ferocity— it was like having a familiar Leonardo appear in a shuffle of Saturday Evening Post covers. This man, you realized—and here, perhaps, was the difference, greater than the difference in gifts—really intended to hit the ball.
44. Understand that we were a crowd of rational people. We knew that a home run cannot be produced at will; the right pitch must be perfectly met and luck must ride with the ball. Three innings before, we had seen a brave effort fail. The air was soggy; the season was exhausted. Nevertheless, there will always lurk, around a corner in a pocket of our knowledge of the odds, an indefensible hope, and this was one of the times, which you now and then find in sports, when a density of expectation hangs in the air and plucks an event out of the future.
45. Fisher, after his unsettling wait, was wide with the first pitch. He put the second one over, and Williams swung mightily and missed. The crowd grunted, seeing that classic swing, so long and smooth and quick, exposed, naked in its failure. Fisher threw the third time, Williams swung again, and there it was.
46. The ball climbed on a diagonal line into the vast volume of air over center field.
47. The ball seemed less an object in flight than the tip of a towering, motionless construct, like the Eiffel Tower... Last at bat ...
49. It was in the books while it was still in the sky. Brandt ran back to the deepest corner of the outfield grass; the ball descended beyond his reach and struck in the crotch where the bullpen met the wall, bounced chunkily, and, as far as I could see, vanished.
50. Like a feather caught in a vortex, Williams ran around the square of bases at the center of our beseeching screaming. He ran as he always ran out home runs—hurriedly, unsmiling, head down, as if our praise were a storm of rain to get out of. He didn't tip his cap. Though we thumped, wept, and chanted "We want Ted" for minutes after he hid in the dugout, he did not come back.
51. Our noise for some seconds passed beyond excitement into a kind of immense open anguish, a wailing, a cry to be saved. But immortality is nontransferable. The papers said that the other players, and even the umpires on the field, begged him to come out and acknowledge us in some way, but he never had and did not now. Gods do not answer letters.
52. The Sox won, 5-4.* On the car radio as I drove home I heard that Williams had decided not to accompany the team to New York. So he knew how to do even that, the hardest thing. Quit. *Baltimore Orioles vs Boston Red Sox September 28, 1960 Box Score
53. May 26, 2008 "The Full Glass ", by John Updike: A look back over a drink of water Approaching eighty, I sometimes see myself from a little distance, as a man I know but not intimately. Normally I have no use for introspection...
54. Having been once on earth—can it ever be canceled? Rilke I think not. Celebrate! -John J. McDermott “ The Inevitability of Our Own Death”
55. Tribute Farewell It is the live performance we remember, the unduplicable presence, the shimmer and sparkle and poignance, perceived from however far back a seat in the audience... The crowd and Ted had always shared what was important, a belief that this boys' game terrifically mattered. -John Updike, “Ted Williams” ( New York Times Magazine) He seemed the concentrated essence of baseball Updike’s sentences are fresh-painted... he is a fabulous noticer and expander
56. How shall I think about death ? From an evolutionary perspective, death is not a problem at all; it is a solution... Loyal Rue ...the body becomes redundant and eventually dies. But the germ line continues immortally onward in subsequent generations. The death of the body is an essential part of the system.
57. How Should We Think About Immortality ? Immortality is [best] seen not as an extension of one's life but, rather, as a deepening of it... For a life to be judged immortal in this sense does not mean that it has become invulnerable to death but, rather, that it cannot be rendered meaningless by death. (Woody Allen, by contrast, famously insisted “I don't want to achieve immortality by my work (etc.). I want to achieve it by not dying.”) The objective moral character of the person may endure to inspire meaning in the world [whether or not there is personal “life after death”]... The immortal life is therefore not a life that defeats death but one that defies it by placing each moment in the service of ideals that transcend the person .
58. The inevitability of my death is now beheld as a necessary condition of my life: a mere entrance fee, to be paid on the way out. If there were no death, there would be no soma line; and without a soma line, there would be no possibility of an embodied person - no memories, no loves, no joys, no wonder or wisdom, no longing or learning. These are among the many splendors of the soma line, and for these we must die.
59. How then shall I think about death? With gratitude.... I will try to understand my grief as a measure of my gratitude I will attempt to think large. I will try to see that a soma-centered story of the self is a small and impoverished view... Turn grief into gratitude
60. Ronald Aronson, “Thank Who Very Much?” ...there is much to be grateful for... gratitude to larger and impersonal forces... dependence on the cosmos, the sun, nature, past generations of people, and human society.
61. All lives, no less my own, are instruments of life itself. I will submerge the gravity of my own death in the long, stern grace of evolution.
62. Baseball fans understand implicitly the profound generational links that connect us all. “If you build it...”
63. JOHN DEWEY: A COMMON FAITH 1859-1952 The things in civilization we most prize are not of ourselves. They exist by virtue of the doings and sufferings of the continuous human community in which we are a link...
64.
65. But because being here amounts to so much, because all this Here and Now, so fleeting, seems to require us and strangely Concerns us. Us the most fleeting of all. Just once, Everything, only for once. Once and no more. And we, too, Once. And never again. But this having been once, though only once, Having been once on earth—can it ever be canceled? Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies
Editor's Notes
the second movement of the Jupiter symphony, and Cezanne's "incredible apples and pears." The compilation of such a list, far from trivializing transcendence, instead presses the Jamesian point that we do not discover the importance of things without first discovering which things actually are important to us. Listing the things that make (my) life worth living is a way of professing the belief that it is, and so of "helping create the fact." This reverses the Platonic order of procedure that would have us conform our affinities to an objectively prescribed and conventionally esteemed canon of excellence.
, and 10,453 others, had shown up primarily because this was the Red Sox's last home game of the season, and therefore the last time in all eternity that their regular left fielder, known to the headlines as TED, KID, SPLINTER, THUMPER, TW, and, most cloyingly, MISTER WONDERFUL, would play in Boston. "WHAT WILL WE DO WITHOUT TED? HUB FANS ASK" ran the headline on a newspaper being read by a bulb-nosed cigar smoker a few rows away.
The affair between Boston and Ted Williams has been no mere summer romance; it has been a marriage, composed of spats, mutual disappointments, and, toward the end, a mellowing hoard of shared memories. It falls into three stages, which may be termed Youth, Maturity, and Age; or Thesis, Antithesis, and Synthesis; or Jason, Achilles, and Nestor
In 1946, Williams returned from three years as a Marine pilot to the second of his baseball avatars, that of Achilles, the hero of incomparable prowess and beauty who nevertheless was to be found sulking in his tent while the Trojans (mostly Yankees) fought through to the ships. Yawkey, a timber and mining maharajah, had surrounded his central jewel with many gems of slightly lesser water, such as Bobby Doerr, Dom DiMaggio, Rudy York, Birdie Tebbetts, and Johnny Pesky. Throughout the late forties, the Red Sox were the best paper team in baseball, yet they had little three-dimensional to show for it, and if this was a tragedy, Williams was Hamlet.
Ray Kurzweil... recommends a regimen to forestall aging so that adherents live long enough to take advantage of forthcoming "radical life-extending and life-enhancing technologies." Cambridge University gerontologist Aubrey de Grey is toiling away at just such research in his laboratory. "We are in serious striking distance of stopping aging," says De Grey... For all the optimism about how science may prolong life, mice and humans keep turning up their toes. No matter how much the government bullies and cajoles, amortals rarely make adequate provision for their final years.
The dividing line came between the 1956 and the 1957 seasons. In September of the first year, he and Mickey Mantle were contending for the batting championship. Both were hitting around .350, and there was no one else near them. The season ended with a three-game series between the Yankees and the Sox, and, living in New York then, I went up to the Stadium. Williams was slightly shy of the four hundred at-bats needed to qualify; the fear was expressed that the Yankee pitchers would walk him to protect Mantle. Instead, they pitched to him—a wise decision. He looked terrible at the plate, tired and discouraged and unconvincing. He never looked very good to me in the Stadium. (Last week, in Life, Williams, a sportswriter himself now, wrote gloomily of the Stadium, "There's the bigness of it. There are those high stands and all those people smoking—and, of course, the shadows. . . . It takes at least one series to get accustomed to the Stadium and even then you're not sure.") The final outcome in 1956 was Mantle .353, Williams .345.
The next year, I moved from New York to New England, and it made all the difference. For in September of 1957, in the same situation, the story was reversed. Mantle finally hit .365; it was the best season of his career. But Williams, though sick and old, had run away from him. A bout of flu had laid him low in September. He emerged from his cave in the Hotel Somerset haggard but irresistible; he hit four successive pinch-hit home runs. "I feel terrible," he confessed, "but every time I take a swing at the ball it goes out of the park." He ended the season with thirty-eight home runs and an average of .388, the highest in either league since his own .406, and, coming from a decrepit man of thirty-nine, an even more supernal figure. With eight or so of the "leg hits" that a younger man would have beaten out, it would have been .400.
He struck the pose of Donatello's David, the third-base bag being Goliath's head. Fiddling with his cap, swapping small talk with the Oriole third baseman (who seemed delighted to have him drop in), swinging his arms with a sort of prancing nervousness, he looked fine—flexible, hard, and not unbecomingly substantial through the middle. The long neck, the small head, the knickers whose cuffs were worn down near his ankles—all these points, often observed by caricaturists, were visible in the flesh.