Back when I was a youngster, there was a certain... cachet associated with Being Published. Indeed, one of the forces that traditionally depressed (or completely eliminated) payments for written work in some markets was the desire on the part of many want-to-be writers to simply See Their Name In Print™, to the point where they were willing to give their stuff away if only someone would publish it!
I was one of the lucky ones, who got to experience that thrill - and I'll admit that the first time it happens, it's a thrill - back in high school, with the local paper, which was happy to publish my reports of the track team's victories and defeats, bylined, and
pay me a quarter per column inch of text. Alas,
The Locust Valley Leader is no more, although there is a project under way at the local library to index references to people over the many years of its publication.
Since then, I've become rather nonchalant about my name in print, as I've seen it often enough (two books, several hundred articles). Indeed, I am more... moved by the fact that a search on my real name in Facebook turns up enough people to populate a football team - if not a small league of teams - than by Yet Another Publication. (Sour grapes for not having made the Big Time? Maybe, but I don't think so.)
In any event, Russian Information Services, Inc., publishers of
Russian Life magazine, has published a collection of items written under the rubric of "Survival Russian," and my contribution - from somewhere in 2003 - is among them.
(Naturally, I immediately start to wonder if this publication can somehow be twisted into Continuing Education points for the ATA, but it's too early to start thinking about that.) * * *Speaking of Facebook, I was online editing my work profile a few minutes ago, and doing so happened to jog my memory of being laid off at Borland, the date of which I often struggle to remember, sometimes concluding it was December '92, and at other times December '91 (which is the correct date).
While it was certainly one of the most painful professional days of my life, I have come to realize that it was also one of my finest moments as well, because after a few seconds of surprise, confusion, hurt feelings, and anger, something deep within me caught hold and - by the time I had fished my corporate American Express card from my wallet and put it on my boss's desk next to my building access card key - those feelings were gone and I was feeling very confident of my future.
* * *Everything went well on the job today, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that hardly anybody else was coming in to work today (yeah, I know... Memorial Day). As I drove throught the gate, I took a moment to recapture a thought, and once I got to my work station, I took a few minutes to try to find a poem, recalling only the snippets "couch thy form" and "we will remember." I had tried searching on "we will remember" some time ago and failed; today, for whatever reason, my search succeeded. The words come from a poem written by an anonymous Marine, apparently for a fallen comrade at Tarawa:
To you, who lie within this coral sand,
We, who remain, pay tribute of a pledge
That dying, thou shalt surely not
Have died in vain.
That when again bright morning dyes the sky
And waving fronds above shall touch the rain,
We give you this—that in those times
We will remember.
We lived and fought together, thou and we,
And sought to keep the flickering torch aglow
That all our loved ones might forever know
The blessed warmth exceeding flame,
The everlasting scourge of bondsman's chains,
Liberty and light.
When we with loving hands laid back the earth
That was for moments short to couch thy form
We did not bid a last and sad farewell,
But only 'Rest ye well.'
Then with this humble, heartfelt epitaph
That pays thy many virtues sad acclaim
We marked this spot, and, murm'ring requiem,
Moved on to Westward.
Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis.Cheers...
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