We spent the hour we had getting caught up on each other\u2019s lives as well as our spouses Robin and Jeanne (neither of whom, for various reasons, were able to join us at lunch), trading book recommendations, and simply enjoying each other\u2019s company. Marsue and November go together in my experience for a number of random reasons. When I got home, I was reminded of something I wrote in a November several years ago\u00a0 to mark a milestone in Marsue\u2019s life and our relationship\u2013I\u2019m happy to return to it today.<\/strong><\/p>\n Today is Saint Andrew\u2019s Sunday (which happens to fall this year on the actual Saint Andrew\u2019s Day). This essay is in honor of the patron saint of Scotland, as well as my friend Marsue, who today will celebrate her last day of five years as priest at Trinity Episcopal Church before beginning a well-deserved retirement.<\/p>\n Although I am a philosophy professor by trade, I believe William Shakespeare\u2019s body of work is more insightful about my favorite philosophical topic\u2014human nature\u2014than anything the Western tradition in philosophy has to offer.\u00a0The Merchant of Venice<\/em>\u00a0is a case in point. Greed, money, love, friendship, ambition, honor, racism, forgiveness\u2014all are on display in this masterpiece. In the dramatic Act Four court scene, Shylock insists that he be allowed to take a pound of flesh from the merchant Antonio, as the contract that Antonio freely agreed to guarantees if Antonio is unable to repay the loan he has taken from Shylock. Antonio\u2019s friends have gathered sufficient money to pay Shylock three, four, even ten times the amount that Antonio borrowed, but Shylock insists on the pound of flesh. When the defense demands to know why Shylock (who everyone knows is a money-grubbing Jew, after all) insists on the peculiar letter of the contract rather than more money than he could have expected, Shylock\u2019s response is both cryptic and illuminating.<\/p>\n Some men there are love not a gaping pig; some that are mad if they behold a cat; and others, when the bagpipe sings\u2026cannot contain their urine.<\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n People have strange preferences and dislikes. In other words, Shylock says, I don\u2019t need to explain why I want the pound of flesh rather than the money. I just want it, and the law says I can have it. People are like that\u2014we like some things, dislike others, and no further explanation is necessary. End of story. Not really\u2014a loophole discovered at the last moment leaves Antonio with his skin and Shylock in disgrace,<\/p>\n But Shylock\u2019s point stands. Our personal likes and dislikes frequently are indefensible\u2014yet they define who we are. I\u2019ve written in a previous post about my obsession with penguins and my inability to explain this obsession other than to say \u201cI like penguins.\u201d\u00a0Jeanne has a similarly intense obsession with Holstein cows. Shakespeare\u2019s choice of example in Shylock\u2019s observation is inspired\u2014he chooses a couple of things about which no one is neutral. It\u2019s possible that someone might not care one way or the other about penguins or cows, but\u00a0no one<\/strong><\/b>\u00a0is neutral about bagpipes or cats. You either love them or hate them.<\/p>\n Bagpipes:\u00a0<\/strong><\/b>Over the past couple of years I have had the opportunity to scrape two decades worth of rust off my organ skills and play at services, weddings and funerals on occasion.\u00a0One afternoon while practicing for an upcoming service that included \u201cAmazing Grace,\u201d I experimented with various settings on the pipe organ until I achieved a sound somewhat similar to bagpipes, without the grinding, scary elements\u2013call it \u201cBagpipes Lite.\u201d I used it at the service and received so\u00a0 many positive comments that I\u2019ve found a reason to use that setting just about every time I\u2019ve played since. I understand the inventor of the bagpipes was inspired when he saw a man carrying an indignant, asthmatic pig under his arm. Unfortunately, the man-made sound never equaled the purity of the sound achieved by the pig.\u00a0<\/strong><\/b>Alfred Hitchcock<\/b><\/p>\n In the calendar of saints, November 30 is St. Andrew\u2019s Day. Marsue, the rector of my Episcopal church, chooses to celebrate St. Andrew\u2019s Day\u00a0every year on the First Sunday of Advent (the first Sunday after Thanksgiving), even if November 30 doesn\u2019t fall on a Sunday. This is her prerogative, but St. Andrew is not a top drawer saint and Marsue doesn\u2019t similarly celebrate St. Peter or St. John or St. Anybody Else yearly on Sunday.<\/p>\n Marsue does this because St. Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland and she is a lover of bagpipes. St. Andrew\u2019s Day gives Marsue the opportunity every year to import\u00a0a bagpipe player to start the service by scaring the shit out of everybody as she winds the beast up in the back of the church and then processes. I heard once that when a new, very loud trumpet stop on the organ at St. John the Divine Episcopal Cathedral in Manhattan was used at a Sunday service for the first time many years ago, a woman in the congregation was so shocked by the unexpected noise that she had a heart attack and died. I hope this does not happen on some future St. Andrew\u2019s Sunday at Trinity Episcopal in Pawtuxet.<\/p>\n Some are inspired by the otherworldly sound of the bagpipe\u2014others, not so much. \u201cHow many of you like bagpipes?\u201d I asked my after-church Adult Christian Education seminar after the St. Andrew\u2019s Day service? Half enthusiastically raised their hands.\u201d How many hate bagpipes?\u201d The other half expressed their opinion just as vigorously; one of them commented \u201cI always vow that I will never again come to church on St. Andrew\u2019s Sunday, but I always forget!\u201d<\/p>\n Bagpipes\u2014you love them or you hate them.\u00a0A regiment of Scottish soldiers became known as the \u201cLadies from Hell\u201d or the \u201cDevils in Skirts\u201d during World War I, not just because of their enormous bravery and fighting spirit, nor just because they wore kilts into battle. They were led into battle by soldiers playing an instrument that both looked and sounded as if it had been dreamed up and constructed in some deep, dark circle of Hell that Dante forgot to tell us about. I\u2019m sure that many soldiers on the enemy side were unable to \u201ccontain their urine.\u201d<\/p>\n The Irish gave bagpipes to the Scots as a joke. The Scots still haven\u2019t gotten the joke.<\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n Cats:\u00a0<\/strong><\/b>I learned something very interesting the other day on NPR\u2019s \u201cWait, Wait, Don\u2019t Tell Me\u201d\u00a0(a Saturday noon tradition and the source of much of my current events information). Recent research indicates that domestic cats believe that their owners (people, fellow inhabitants of the house) are large, mostly hairless cats who are useful primarily because they have somehow figured out how to use a can opener. For those who have or have had cats in their lives, this is not a surprise.<\/p>\n In any group of more than five people, ask \u201cHow many of you like cats?\u201d Half will raise their hands. \u201cHow many of you hate cats?\u201d The other half will raise their hands. And cats know the difference instinctively.\u00a0A cat will pick the most dedicated cat-hater out of any room, go directly to her, and immediately start rubbing against her legs. To the cat hater the cat says \u201cYou don\u2019t like me? Fuck you\u2014I don\u2019t give a shit. Let me leave a bunch of cat hairs on your pant leg to remember me by.\u201d To the cat fans the cat says \u201cWhatever. Do you think I\u2019m here for your amusement?\u201d<\/p>\n Cat haters want to know why the hell cats think that 4:00 AM is a great time to run back and forth in the house as loudly as possible for no apparent reason. Cat lovers find it amusing and cute when cats decide that 4:00 AM is a great time to run back and forth in the house as loudly as possible for no apparent reason<\/p>\n Cats are low maintenance. Whenever Jeanne and I leave for a day or two, extensive coverage for our three dogs [update\u2013two of these family members have passed since I wrote this essay<\/strong>]\u00a0has to be arranged. The safe window for leaving the dogs alone and unsupervised is about five hours. After five hours, all three of them think \u201cI guess nobody\u2019s ever returning\u201d and all hell breaks loose, beginning with tipping over wastebaskets and relieving themselves in inappropriate locations. Cats are different. With sufficient cat litter, food and water, a cat can be left for a month with no problem. Upon return, the cat will look at its people and say \u201cOh, were you gone?\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s something edgy about even the most domesticated of cats, as if it just crossed the line from its wild ancestors and might cross back at a moment\u2019s notice. Their habits are random and individual.\u00a0My last cat, Spooky, was an introvert extraordinaire but would at least once per evening make a royal appearance in whatever room people were gathered to make a slow, always counter-clockwise stroll through the room, then leave without comment. Dogs are obsequious\u2014cats are not. Dogs need human affection and approval to assuage their natural canine insecurity\u2014cats have no such insecurities. Whether a person loves or hates cats reveals a great deal about the person. I was pleased to find out on yet another Facebook personality quiz the other day that liberals prefer cats and conservatives prefer dogs.<\/p>\n I love cats (a lot), and I enjoy bagpipes (in small doses).<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I had a lovely lunch last week with one of my best and most valued friends. I\u2019ve often said that Marsue is the closest thing to a spiritual adviser that I have; she\u2019s made an appearance frequently in this blog over the years as well as in each of my last two books. We live […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2938,"featured_media":18642,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,18,20,26,36,39,48,61,64,73,91,94],"tags":[222,287,750,383,434,463],"class_list":["post-18588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","category-cats","category-change","category-dogs","category-family","category-friends","category-human-nature","category-literature","category-marsue","category-philosophy","category-stories","category-teaching","tag-family","tag-jeanne","tag-marsue","tag-philosophy","tag-shakespeare","tag-teaching"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/766\/2019\/11\/piper.jpg\")
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