The Basement of Time

Today as I work to clean up my office as they are carpeting our building, I am able to go through many things that have been a long time in coming. One such piece is a 2006 work by a good friend of mine that lines out middle management at my college. She equates it to the excellent movie, the Great Escape and links the middle managers of the Institute with characters in the movie. When it was written in 2016 I took time to read only my own piece of the puzzle. Today I took the time to read the entire piece and it is incredible. Many of the managers on campus that were interviewed have retired or moved on, some are still here and continue to fight the good fight. What is most incredible is that to a letter their personalities have continued in the same vein as they were written about in 2016.

I have to say that is one lesson I have learned through life, that people tend not to change. Now, there are events that cause significant change, but in each of these cases where the writer considers the positive aspects of the personality of these middle managers, they remain their strengths and often simultaneously their weaknesses today. Time passes and things happen, but they are still who they were and I am still who I was…albeit with a few more scars and a little less Pollyanna.

Indeed I believe that while our personalities don’t change that our life experiences impact us greatly. Each day we have the choice to determine if what has happened is going to help us become better, stronger people or if it will drag us down to the point that we are no longer able to be impactful. This is a constant struggle. In the piece the author notes that either prayer or meditation are necessary to keep middle managers on the right path. I wonder if both aren’t necessary and ultimately as you age you grow.

I hope in the end that I am like my Grandad who was an MP in WWII and saw things as the Allies liberated Europe that he would not speak about aside to say, “Those poor people”. He took everything in stride and really only got mad when it mattered (two times in the 18 years I knew him). He mustered out, came home to New Mexico and spent his life farming. We have great stories from his life and in the end he would sit with his Grandson (nicotine patch, oxygen tank and smoking a Kool cigarette) and through mostly silence teach life lessons that impact me every day.

The lesson I have used most lately is a great saying, “It takes all kinds to make this crazy world go round”. Certainly in life, middle management, not to mention in the Great Escape, it takes all kinds. If we take a minute to count our friends and our victories we can move in his direction rather than counting our enemies and imagined losses. You see, he never said an unkind word about anyone to me, but often through his silence you knew what he felt.

No one is getting out of here alive, so lets enjoy today and appreciate those who appreciate us. Gotta go…I have some old friends to catch up with.

Citation redacted to protect the author (if permission is given it will be listed here)

To see

To know

To be

To sew

To hope

To need

To cope

To weed

To start

To end

To smart

To mend

To grow

To know

To be

To sow

I shall pass this way but once; any good that I can do or any kindness I can show to any human being; let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”

Etienne de Grellet QUAKER MISSIONARY

www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-07-30/china-set-its-sights-on-taiwan-after-hong-kong-crackdown

Taiwan is now the last bastion of democracy in China. We seem to have failed Tibet and now Hong Kong. If we don’t stand here, what comes after Hong Kong, Taiwan? This is a struggle that can no longer bear further retreat. What makes it close to home is knowing students who are on the front lines in their struggle against this totalitarian rule. Those in Hong Kong have either fled or, if caught, are subject to life in prison without a trial.

Sound is amazing. The world would be very quiet if there was no sound. Here are some fun facts about sound.

Basics of Sound

Sound Waves

 There are two types of sound waves, transverse and longitudinal. The difference is longitudinal-the wave are traveling parallel (like wiggling a string back and forth) and transverse-when the wave vertically points perpendicular (light or radio waves).

Graphic representation of a sound wave

Figure 1: Graphic representations of a sound wave. (A) Air at equilibrium, in the absence of a sound wave; (B) compressions and rarefaction that constitute a sound wave; (C) transverse representation of the wave, showing amplitude (A) and wavelength (λ). Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

Wave Altitude

The height of the wave measured in volume or energy.

Wave Frequency

You have to see how many waves occur per second.

Wavelength

A measurement that measures from peak to adjacent peak or a trough to adjacent trough.

Relationship between frequency and wavelength

As frequency increases wavelength decreases.

Pulse wave is a wave form that includes square waves and similarly periodic waves.

Harmonic waves are a variation with position at one time.

Wave Absorption and Transmission

Wave absorption goes through a medium such as water, the sound gets absorbed, so then it is harder to hear the sound anymore, like noise cancelling headphones except this is water.

Wave transmission you can hear because it has more vibrations than water so you can hear better when the sound is transmitted rather than absorbed.

How do you determine the speed of sound?

The peaks or the speed of any single point on the wave shape to figure out a formula for the velocity of sound.

Speed = wavelength * frequency

Speed of Sound

Speed of sound =767 miles per hour

You have to break the sound barrier to go into space. The first person on earth to break the sound barrier was Chuck Yeager on October 14, 1947 in an airplane he named after his wife.

The speed of sound has to be the wavelength of the wave divided by the period of the wave. The speed of sound means the rate at which the disturbance is moved through the air molecules.400 × 400

Changing the Speed of the Sound

To change the speed of sound, you will have to change the temperature or the density of the room you are in.

The wave has to overlap the initial shape after the period because the molecule has to be back where it started after one period.

Displacement of air molecules

We can see as the wave travels, the shape travels to the right in the picture below.

“Seeing” Sound

Voices produce sound wave. As an example, the picture here is the sound wave of me saying my full name. You can see that there is only one place where there is no sound, so my first and middle name run together.

Here is an audio recording of me saying the Pledge of Allegiance.

Here is the picture of what that looks like.

Notice how they are all different shapes. If we could see sound, then we would probably see this everyday because we say the Pledge everyday.

Conclusion

This is how amazing Sound can be. You can use sound for many things. But don’t use it too brutally.

References

Our notes from class

http://www.brittanica.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgE2GIQwUCw&feature=youtu.be.

https://www.explainthatstuff.com/sound.html

space.com/26204-chuck-yeager.html

Ultrasonics – Sound – Effect of Speed of Sound on Wavelength

As I sit in my game room, which has now become my office there are so many changing emotions as we reach day 25 of lockdown. This all started with a notice from the New Mexico Governor’s Office on the 19th of March that she was going to lock down the state, so we left Phoenix where we were spending time with family, lost about $600 on the final night of the house we had rented and headed back home to Roswell. We made it back in the state within 24 hours of her announcement and since we have not left Roswell. We have gone out for exercise for what had to be done at work and to get groceries and household supplies. We have ordered delivery a few times, but mainly we have hung out around the house and gone through lots of old boxes, planted some things and had a good time with family. I don’t know what will come out of this long term, but in the short term it has been a bit of a reset. Before this lockdown event we were planning a March trip to Germany, but that eventually changed to the UK, a May trip to visit family in California, a June trip to go camping and a July trip to visit family in Kansas City. We moved our UK trip to June, met halfway to visit the family from California and we are still planning to go to Kansas City in July. The future travel plans have changed a bit. I don’t know when we will head off the continent again after our June trip, and likely plan more discoveries in North America for the foreseeable future. Maybe when my kids get to high school or college in 2-6 years from now we will rethink (or if we get a crazy cheap fare) then we may consider other options, but aside from that I think this continent is enough for me.

1 Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia!
Earth and heaven in chorus say, Alleluia!
Raise your joys and triumphs high, Alleluia!
Sing, ye heavens, and earth reply, Alleluia!
2 Love’s redeeming work is done, Alleluia!
Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia!
Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia!
Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia!
3 Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia!
Where, O death, is now thy sting? Alleluia!
Once he died our souls to save, Alleluia!
Where’s thy victory, boasting grave? Alleluia!
4 Soar we now where Christ has led, Alleluia!
Following our exalted Head, Alleluia!
Made like him, like him we rise, Alleluia!
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies, Alleluia!
5 Hail the Lord of earth and heaven, Alleluia!
Praise to thee by both be given, Alleluia!
Thee we greet triumphant now, Alleluia!
Hail the Resurrection, thou, Alleluia!
6 King of glory, soul of bliss, Alleluia!
Everlasting life is this, Alleluia!
Thee to know, thy power to prove, Alleluia!
Thus to sing, and thus to love, Alleluia!