Missive #410

Century’s Ebb travels a course of American history from the late 19th century, largely courtesy of Walt Whitman, to the moon landing, but concentrates on the 1930s, 40s, 50s, and the first years of the 60s.Dos Passos tried to write this book in the same style as his USA trilogy that has hailed by the liberal left when he was a liberal. Unfortunately, he moved right and this right leaning book, published after his death, has been virtually ignored. I didn’t like the USA trilogy style very much. This book would have been better if published as two separate books; one a fiction and a second one as a series of essays. There are emblematic fictional narratives that feature a corporate boy wonder who over-reached his creative management of funds, causing him to face arrest or flee the country, a young couple of liberal politics who come to Washington and lose their way, and the autobiographical sections of Jay Pignatelli. These latter sections read like a roman a clef—you recognize Hemingway, Hellman, Parker, Picasso, Sidney Franklin, the Brooklyn-born bullfighter, and others. As they did in USA some of the narrative threads come together in places (Jay helps Danny Delong escape from Spain during the civil war when he unwittingly faced purging; decades later Delong tries to enlist Jay has his lawyer). Because the novel was not finished there are awkward structural moments and bits of prose that would have (and should have) been cleaned up and things missing but what they are is anyone’s guess, only the holes are visible not what would have occupied them. But, if you’re a fan of Dos Passos, of 20th Century American literature and history, there are rewards, and frequent ones, here. The writing is often first-rate. The breadth of field is impressive. And the iconoclastic, yet compassionate, perspective unique. — Edited customer review @ goodreads.com

My trip to the Tucson VA was a long tiring day. Drove 200 miles round trip and spent about two hours getting my identity verified with id.me. About 30 minutes of the two hours were spent finding the Patient Advocate that was to help me. I was told she was across from the eye clinic which I knew it’s location. Went there and asked for her and was sent on a long hike to the end of a long hall where I was told that I needed to go back to where I had just come from. The Advocate that I was looking for was no more than 100 feet from the reception desk where I had first been and asked for her.

We then got down to the business of getting me identified. They have a bank of computer to work from however my security key would not work in them and their Internet connection was down. So the Advocate that was helping me had a smartphone which we used as a ‘hotspot’ and I was able to connect to id.me through it using my laptop with my security key. The next hurdle was to get pictures of my drivers license and passport transfer to id.me. Again, we were able to take pictures using the Advocates smartphone and then send them to my email address from there I downloaded them to my laptop files and uploaded them to id.me.

We were then ready to do a visual call with an id.me representative that would ask me some questions. With the laptop speaker volume turned up to the maximum I could not hear anything that the representative said so the Advocate repeated the questions and I replied with my answers. We got through that and my identity was verified!

Before leaving I made sure that I could connect with MyHealthVet and the VA websites through id.me as I’ll have to do as of 25 January 2025. I was able to do that so packed up and drove back to my Campground. After getting there I signed on to id.me again and repeated that test plus I was able to access my Social Security account and verify that the mailing address had been changed. I was also able to read a message from them that said my SS check had been increased by 2.5% as a cost of living increase. For anyone that thinks that the cost of living year over year from 2023 was 2.5%; I have a bridge for sale.

This quote is from the first article, Life on the Abandoned Canal, that I read from the Hickman’s Hinterlands Archives. I’ll be reading more of his articles and providing links if I find more of them that I think are worth reading. His first posting said “what I intend [is this] to be an ongoing series on precipitating a revival of our forgotten American hinterlands”.

Yet more than a biographical note in my own life, the thicketed ruins of Black River Canal offer a worthy lesson to all Americans — that the metaphysical substrate from which our forerunners’ dreams were born is fundamentally good and beautiful. The bizarre delirium of industrial prowess and post-WWII homogeneity is not the sum total of what America is, was, and can again be. The slowness of the mule-towed barge or packet boat can set the pace of our lives and history; the guffawing of the lock-tender can and should remain a key aspiration in our professional lives, over and against an obsessive life of overtime and garrish consumption. Doubtless, any soul who feels dispirited about these United States is still free to take a ramble along the canal’s overgrown banks — and in so doing, they may find their faith in our country and its storied hinterlands restored.