IN SUMMER, WHEN THE DAY HAS FLED:

A June Night - Poem by Emma Lazarus

Ten o'clock: the broken moon

Hangs not yet a half hour high,

Yellow as a shield of brass,

In the dewy air of June,

Poised between the vaulted sky

And the ocean's liquid glass.

Earth lies in the shadow still;

Low black bushes, trees, and lawn

Night's ambrosial dews absorb;

Through the foliage creeps a thrill,

Whispering of yon spectral dawn

And the hidden climbing orb.

Higher, higher, gathering light,

Veiling with a golden gauze

All the trembling atmosphere,

See, the ray-less disk grows white!

Hark, the glittering billows pause!

Faint, far sounds possess the ear.

Elves on such a night as this

Spin their rings upon the grass;

On the beach the water-fay

Greets her lover with a kiss;

Through the air swift spirits pass,

 Laugh, caress, and float away.

Shut thy lids and thou shalt see

Angel faces wreathed with light,

Mystic forms long vanished hence.

Ah, too fine, too rare, they be

For the grosser mortal sight,

And they foil our waking sense.

Yet we feel them floating near,

Know that we are not alone,

Though our open eyes behold

Nothing save the moon's bright sphere,

In the vacant heavens shown,

And the ocean's path of gold. 

June Nights -

Poem by Victor Marie Hugo

 

In summer, when day has fled,

The plain covered with flowers, pours out

From far away, an intoxicating scent;

Eyes shut, ears half open to noises,

We only half sleep in a transparent slumber.

The stars are purer, the shade seems pleasanter;
A hazy half-day colours the eternal dome;
And the sweet pale dawn awaiting her hour
Seems to wander all night at the bottom of the sky.

5-Letter Men: that's what I'd say...

TWO DIFFERENT MEN for upcoming discussion;

FIVE 'SIMPLE, ORDINARY LETTERS' TO EACH NAME:

In spite of his inauspicious upbringing, "a Sicilian boy born into indisputable poverty", some would opine that Mr. Capra truly represented the ultimate personification of the American dream. As proof of this, he would go on to receive a life-time achievement award in 1982. Capra’s films were said to be his "love letters" to an idealized America – a cinematic landscape of his own invention. Some of his more memorable quotes remain these:

That's what I'd say

             www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rggldf1c6c 

THE END OF SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL ...

   THE END OF SOMETHING BEAUTIFUL ...

... can't say we didn't see it coming, but it's anyone's guess how the very final episode will 

draw its last breath (albeit a smoky one)

So what transpired in the early 70s that might be featured? Wasn't this when the finishing touches took place via the north tower of the World Trade Center?

Janis Joplin died of a drug overdose that year, as well...

So we're out of the land of 'milk and honey' and now "person to person"... is this a veiled reference to Judgment Day?

I guess we'll soon know after 10:00 P.M. finally rolls around and MadMen gives up the ghost for good (sigh!). Until then I simply can't figure out that very last piece of the puzzle!!!

Post script:

ABOUT LAST WEEK'S FORECAST:

IT WAS RAINING BOTH

MYSTERY AND MADNESS !

The MadMen episode that aired 4-19-2015 opened with Don Draper wrapped up in bed sheets, though I suspect his somnolence had less to do with sleep-deprivation than it did a sub-conscious desire not to vacate his residence just yet. He doesn't really want to SELL; the carpeting's still stained (as the realtor maliciously points out) and he's not sure of the future FORECAST. In other words, he knows where he's BEEN, but he's not entirely prepared to say a final adieu to living in the PAST. Later we see him soulfully muse..."A lot of wonderful things happened here".

Furthermore, we cringe as the realtor remarks that the Draper residence "reeks of failure" but this is in starkly explicit juxtaposition to young intern Mathis' subsequent office-rant about "the unfairness of life". He opines that Don had it easy in life because he was handsome. Draper summarily quips, "Everyone has problems...some people just know how to deal with them better". He fires Mathis. Mathis doesn't have half a clue about Draper's REAL past! It's not 1969 anymore (either), I surmise. Moreover, Peggy is no longer acting as a "secretary". Eveyone has to say goodbye to something, don't they?

Though should anyone's GOODBYE necessarily include saying 'HELLO' to Viet Nam? Glen Bishop has returned ... older, but not yet fully mature. He's a boy-man of sorts, like whiskey and milk sharing the very same drinking glass.

I also noticed how many times either buzzers or telephones rang during last week's episode. Several people had to say goodbye in a very metaphorical sense...and hello to something else: those antiquated communication devices drove the message home in case we blinked! The half-way point between the goodbyes and hellos "of life" are unknown, however, all the while everyone's "praying to God" that there's something better on the horizon (e.g., Sally on the bus, Glen off to war, Betty off to college, Joanie in a new relationship).  

Even as Betty tells Sally how she broke 'light-bulbs' on a similar trip when she was her age, I think Sally gets the drift...it wasn't about light-bulbs. Those metaphors again!!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvg4n8Txgdc 

[SIGH] I really thought I guessed what song would be played at last episode's parting shot (particularly because of remarks Sally made about Kent State) ... and I was sooooo wrong. I guessed that ditty about "tin soldiers and Nixon coming [4 dead in OHIO]".So how does one successfully tie that beautifully haunting Roberta Flack melody, the one that DID play, to the FORECAST theme? Here is my best estimate: although we all desire to leave behind something of everlasting value in this world, which requires many to steadily continue on in their journey, it is still so very difficult to stop living in the PAST. Even when given opportunities for "second chances", the known sanctuary of the past forever holds fond memories and, sometimes most of all, a firm measure of SECURITY. And it's the thinking back to those beautiful nostalgic times that evokes a reminiscence of a "first": i.e., actually, a first of "anything"; anything that gave us the warmest of warm fuzzies in earlier times. I think the writers sensed this...and THAT (my friends) is why they chose the song that they did.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Go9aks4aujM 

ONLY THE [FOR]SHADOW[ING] KNOWS !

            

As a young child, my late father would reenact a radio skit known as The Shadow for my sister Carol and me, often at bedtime. We both pretended to be scared as his voice dropped a few octaves and he sinisterly intoned ..."Only the Shadow knows"!  For reasons that are hard to pin down, I had a restless sense of shadowy foreboding while taking in the latest MadMen installment approximately six days prior. Also, I can never blog  with any authentic gravitas (i.e., about a recent episode) until a requisite amount of time has passed. I kind of like things to coalescence a bit; in other words, to "gel" sufficiently prior to formally penning my very personal after-thoughts. So here it goes:

Where do I even begin? My inner wisdom firstly settles on Mimi Rogers' character  "Pima". {For those who didn't initially recognize this veteran actress, I surely did: her first cousin is a Neuroradiologist under whom I trained at HFH. Actually I knew Eric when Mimi was still Mrs. Tom Cruise!}. Now the name Pima sounds like puma... which makes me think of cougars. And this cougar-gal metaphorically dug her lady-claws into Stanley, didn't she?  Stan Rizzo may have had a creative block going on "upstairs", but definitely not [so] "downstairs".  Moreover, Stan thought he scored BIG in more ways than one, but he was a less nimble dance partner in that dark-room hustle than he ever imagined. 

And then there's Diana. I keep looking for a phi beta kappa key dangling around her neck to suddenly emerge, the perfect juxtaposition to her tawdry waitress ensemble. She obviously represents a combination of opposite sentiments. In Roman mythology, Diana (meaning "heavenly" or "divine")  was equated with the Greek goddess Artemis.  In last Sunday's episode I initially saw her as a subdued Illuminatrix, a Magdalene in search of a Jesus Christ to anoint with spikenard. Her reference to her daughters also evoked a Sophie's choice reaction, as well. Yet, she was so detached at times that it was as if she were dissociating...which also had me seriously wondering if she suffers from BPD.

The latter would make sense  because I intuit that there is a steely but maudlin "intent" coupled to her  robotic affect, one associated with what can only be described as abject nihilism tinged with jaded masochism. You could read it in those far away eyes of hers, "You can't hurt me, no one can hurt me, because I've already experienced the worst that life has to offer... Don't think you'll really get to know me, either, because I won't let you and I don't need you". The problem is, Don is on her level in one sense (i.e., they're both like proverbial rolling stones who've not garnered a thick enough layer of moss), but in another  way he remains totally mind-blind to her darkest angst and sordid sense of destiny. She is NOT Nietzsche's uber-man and doesn't wish to be so... 

Don is not so sure; his wife has cast him as an "aging, sloppy liar",  the very antithesis of esteemed Nietzschean dreams. It's his obstinate vulnerability in assuming  that everyone thinks the same way he does that the preternaturally discerning Diana might  also  subliminally wrestle with. The problem is, his detectable "just always simmering below the surface, even when he acts nice" narcissism mentally horrifies her, for it could lead to the very abandonment she truly fears far more than even death itself.  In her exceptionally stark reality ... she has already dined with death, plastic utensils and all.

O.K., let's talk 'Harry Crane'. Harry is a blend of Big  Bang Theory super nerd-dom and Jack the Ripper. Two seasons prior, he squirmed awkwardly in the Draper living room [in a feathery boa, no less] while flirty chanteuse, Megan Draper, teasingly executed  a bump and grind recital to the coquettish strains of Zou Bisou Bisou. Since she unintentionally overheard his "blue" comments the very next day in the little coffee room at SCDP,   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z47MfkSHX44 and vows to  despise him for all eternity, I was somewhat taken aback that she would put together a career-themed meeting  with HIM (of all people) under any condition! Hence, one deduces that a woman's scorn can somehow thaw into an act of clemency when desperate circumstances  arise. But Harry just can't help himself! He makes a predictable slime-ball move on her and then has to cover his tacky tracks in case she reports back to her soon-to-be ex-husband. Harry actually tells Don that she's 'unstable'. Naturally, this must stir up a whirlwind of complex emotions in the multifarious heart of Don Draper. Roger Sterling likens her to his own ex, Jane, "a consumer". On the one hand, Don is sad to see Megan walk away and would likely wish to punish her financially. However...this is also his chance to be the knight in shining armor. If he can't completely fix his own life, perhaps he can provide a measure of bonhomie toward hers. Money solves everything, doesn't it? Isn't that what this whole existential rat-race is really truly about?  Money buys happiness!...  [But for whom?]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx4rA9i93uQ

Lastly, Marie Calvet and Megan's comely sister, Marie-France: Mrs. Calvet lives through Megan. When Megan is up, she's up; when Megan is down, she's down; and when Megan appears destroyed, SHE'S DESTROYED! Yet, Marie cannot  afford  to be destroyed!! Life has already s*** all over her  via her loveless marriage to Emile. She's still beautiful, well in a way...or at least she imagines herself so. Megan (i.e., well actually Marie) must have ALL the furniture in the Draper home as part of the divorce settlement...that would make Megan (i.e., Marie) so very happy, don't you see?  And to get someone else to pay for the handling and hauling is the quintessential cherry on top. Marie gets to take advantage of someone; isn't that endearing? Gaul can truly be divided into three parts with the Calvet gals: Marie represents covetous sociopathy; Megan's sister, Marie-France, the hypocrisy of religiosity; and Megan, the lucky babe who garnered a cool million without ever really asking. Marie thinks she won the battle; Hah! , it was purely a pyrrhic victory.  When Megan meets up with Marie-France in the final minutes of this episode, she  sports a freshly minted nonchalance that must have her middling convent-school bred sister completely baffled. Who cares that Mama has run off and left Father?  C'est  la vie! Dysfunction sounds so very charming in the Gallic tongue,  but the gaping abyss we dare not peer into widens with each fiery outburst. Though little does the sanctimonious sibling realize, Megan can fiddle (or croon) all she wants right now even while Rome (or New York, for that matter) is engulfed in flammable liquid... hell, she can even do it to the tune of Zou Bisou... she's a millionaire (and this is still 1969!) . 

But somehow I feel a chill coming on... Megan, don't go back to the Hollywood canyons, particularly should this be the beginning of August!    

   There's something shadowy in them there hills!!!

                          [Pssssssst... and we hear his name is Manson] 

                                                [all content written by L.P.-G.]  4/2015