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Tuesday, Oct. 22, The Old Men of the Mountain met at the Knox Country Café in the town of Knox.

This meeting was minus this scribe (fortunately or unfortunately). However, the scribe’s little book is full of notes that did not make the paper from previous meetings. It is just a matter of going back and catching up.

Some of the notes will never make the paper for one reason or another because they are libelous, raunchy, too political, too religious, and many are suspicious as to the truth.

One thing the Old Men of the Mountain are great at is storytelling and sometimes it is hard to discern which is truth and which is fiction. At the ages the OFs are, most of this is an honest contest between mind and body.

The mind thinks and says one thing, but the body says, “No way, monsieur; don’t even try it.” Once one OF came into a breakfast wearing a T-shirt that read, “If I wake up and nothing hurts I would think I was dead.” To the rest of the OFs this rang true.

TV not a draw

At some of the breakfasts, the OFs talk about the TV shows they watch. Some say the best channel on TV is the Cartoon Channel.

Many say they do not watch much TV, including the local basic channels. The news is hardly watched except for the weather. Some do watch the weather channel.

Sports are the big thing — football and baseball. Then come the DIY-type channels and for a few it is “Pickers,” “Pawn Stars,” and the Discovery Channel.

In essence, this is an eclectic group because this scribe is sure that at tables not heard from there are those who do watch the news, PBS, and some of the other channels that are politically bent one way or another to the particular OF’s way of thinking. I really don’t know if any OFs watch QVC.

When discussing this topic, one OF mentioned that the advertisers know old folks watch certain channels. On these channels, we take notice that most of the ads are geared to OFs like us.

Then one OF added. “Not me! On my channels, the ads are for cereal, candy, toys, and games, both whack-a-mole and video games. I am not going to get all worked up about how the world is going to hell in a handbasket. I’ll watch Bugs Bunny!”

Furniture: The right fit

One time, the OFs started talking about furniture and trying to find a comfortable chair. This may sound simple but, when the OFs were younger, comfortable furniture was not a problem.

These YFs would just fold their legs and flop. And many were so active they never even knew what a chair was; they even ate on the run.

Then, when the day was done, it was time to eat again, do homework, and go to bed. Types of chairs and sitting in a chair never entered their heads.

The most the younger OFs thought about chairs back then were not even chairs. They were tractor seats, car seats, truck seats, and wagon seats. Some of these were not designed for comfort, just there to keep the operator from having to stand up.

Now the OFs who get leg cramps and muscle aches realize types and kinds of chairs are very important. A couple of the OFs said that soft chairs are out and they are more comfortable in hard chairs.

One OF complained that all recliners are out for him because they are not long enough and, when extended, his feet hang over the end about two inches behind the ankle and that shuts off the circulation.

Most of the OFs said they need chairs with arms so they can push themselves up when they want to stand. Then there were the OFs who said they had their own chair at home where they spend a lot of time and were really comfortable.

One OF mentioned that for some reason he even felt “safe” in his chair and could take nice long naps while in that chair. The OF said, if he had trouble sleeping at night, he could get up and get in that chair and fall fast asleep.

One other OF mentioned that where he is the most comfortable is not in a chair but the front seat of the car. The OF said his vehicle’s seat is heated, and has side and back lumbar supports and tips way back. When the “ole lady” is at Kohl’s. he is in the car either reading a book, or taking a nap.

Overheard

According to a few of the OFs who were cozily crammed into the Knox Country Café in Knox to partake of their first breakfast there, one OF reported on what he overheard from a different restaurant he was in recently. 

In the booth next to him in this restaurant, the story he heard suited him to a “T.” This stranger, who was not as old as the OF, was telling the lady and other gentleman with him that he “didn’t drink or smoke anymore, or do that other thing either. I am like a dead man walking.”

The OFs who could match that at the Knox Country Café were:  Roger Chapman, Robie Osterman, Miner Stevens, George Washburn, Glenn Patterson, Mark Traver, Marty Herzog, Harold Guest, Wally Guest, John Rossmann, Mace Porter, Jack Norray, Lou Schenck, Warren Willsey, Russ Pokorny, Gerry Chartier, Elwood Vanderbilt, Bob Donnelly, Joe Rack, Paul Nelson, Rick LaGrange, Harold Grippen, and not me.

This Tuesday’s breakfast was at a type of the old-fashioned railroad dining-car diners in Princetown, called the Chuck Wagon Diner on Route 20. The Chuck Wagon-style diner first appeared in the early 20th Century along with many of the Old Men of the Mountain who this Tuesday morning had breakfast at the Wagon.

The OMOTM noticed the full moon, and many had a reaction to it by prowling the halls at night. Some were up especially early and out looking at the moon.

As most of us age, like OFs, the tendency is to lose hair. On a full moon, some of the OFs do go out and hope for the werewolf effect to grow hair, but hair on the knuckles is not that attractive.

The OFs roaming the halls are looking for the bathroom, because, as you know, the full moon does have an effect on the tides. Seeing as the bladder is full of water the full moon has an effect on that gland also.

Mice seek Warm homes

Now is the time the pesky little field mice start looking for a place to stay for the winter. These critters start to check in at their apartments in the house, barn, shed, or garage.

The OFs began talking about keeping these critters from moving in. The OFs mentioned how small a hole they can get into.

This changed the conversation to what they can do and what they actually do once they get into other places than the house. Rumor has it that peppermint oil is helpful in keeping them out. Mice don’t like the odor, but humans find it quite acceptable.

The OFs mentioned cars, truck, tractors and other pieces of equipment that are prime targets for these rodents to hole up in. One OF who is repairing a dozer for another OF said he has the engine all done and it runs perfectly.

However, the dozer can’t go anywhere because mice have made a home in the dozer’s clutches. The OF doing the work told the other OF who owns the dozer that it is a ton of work to get these varmints out.

The pathway to the clutch encasement is a maze, and exceptionally small, yet the mice found a way to get into this clutch. One OF mentioned storing a car that is run only in the summertime in a barn; an OF can find mice anywhere, in the exhaust, in the engine, even inside the car.

The question was asked, how can the mice get in where even water can’t?

One OF said that his father — way back when — not only fed milk to the cats but he also had a saucer outside the door to the granary for the snakes. Most OFs said they didn’t know snakes drank milk; this OF said they did.

The OF said that his father kept the snakes happy because they kept all of the mice out of the granary because they would chase them right into their holes. The only problem was occasionally a cat would grab a snake.

Laundry duty

The OFs discussed basically the women’s role in housekeeping. The following sentence will cause some consternation among readers, but in many cases it is the truth.

The quandary is doing the laundry. The OFs have to admit there are a few OFs who do their own laundry but it is only a few.

Then conversation was on how the laundry was dried when the OFs were young. To this day, some of the OFs remember how the sheets felt, and their aroma when they were dried outdoors, even in the winter time.

A few OFs still have the laundry dried outside but most do not. Their clothes are dried in a dryer. J. Ross Moore, an American inventor from North Dakota developed designs for automatic clothes dryers during the early 20th Century. This scribe’s wife thinks Mr. Moore deserved a Nobel Prize for his efforts.

One OF said that he remembers the clothes being dried on racks around the stove in the wintertime. This OF said this served two purposes; not only did it dry the clothes but it added moisture to the air and was the early form of a humidifier.

To take care of the house when the OFs were young was work. The OFs’ moms did the laundry, took it outside, hung it up, and then brought it in and put it away. Some did the laundry in a tub with a plunger-like thing and lye soap.

“A lot of work but we were clean,” one OF said.

Another OF mentioned today all the household gadgetry we have. For instance, there are different kinds of washing machines and dryers, usually side by side. Wash the clothes in one and, when done, stand in one spot and throw them in the dryer. One OF said there is a secret to doing laundry that he could never figure out, and that is what goes with what.

The OF said his wife has clothes all sorted in piles and the OF has no idea what is in each pile, and his wife has a fit if he throws something on the wrong pile. To this OF, laundry day is still work, but he has clean clothes thanks to a lady.

The Old Men of the Mountain who were showered, most shaved, and in clean clothes gathered in clean vehicles, and then drove to the Chuck Wagon Diner in Princetown, were: Miner Stevens, Roger Chapman, Bill Lichliter, John Rossmann, Harold Guest, Wally Guest, Robie Osterman, George Washburn, Rick LaGrange, Glenn Patterson, Pete Whitbeck, Roger Shafer, Duncan Bellinger, Chuck Aelesio, Richard Frank, Joe Rack, Warren Willsey, Russ Pokorny, Wayne Gaul, Ted Feurer, Mace Porter, Jack Norray, Lou Schenck, Mike Willsey, Gerry Chartier, Elwood Vanderbilt, John Dabrvalskas, Harold Grippen, and me.

Approximately seven-and-one-half billion people wake up on a Tuesday morning but The Old Men of the Mountain know where about 45 OFs wake up on a Tuesday morning. It’s a little pinprick on the planet’s surface in one of the prettiest places the planet has to offer.

On this particular Tuesday morning, Oct. 8, some of these OFs woke up and headed to the Duanesburg Diner in Duanesburg to have breakfast.

One particular OF complained that the chairs were too heavy and they should have rollers on their legs. It is not that the chairs are too heavy, it is the OFs are getting so weak, i.e., to many of the OFs, five pounds is now 25 pounds. Other OFs chimed in on this and the waitress took this grumbling very well, in the nature it was intended, and she knew it.

The OFs didn’t care whether the chairs were five pounds or 50; they were just commenting on something, anything to pick up on what one OF said.

Then one OF said, “These coffee cups are too small.”

Yeah right! In fact, they are just like any other cup. The OF just wanted to add to the discussion, only this time the waitress was ready for him.

She said, “If they are too small, next time bring your own cup; we will fill it for you.”

Now the OF should remember this and the next time we are at the Duanesburg Diner he should bring his own cup.

The waitresses are as much fun as the OMOTM.

Get your flu shot

It is time to get your flu shots, and some of the OFs have already gotten theirs. One thing we should take seriously is that young children, and the elderly don’t want to do is get the flu.

The ability for these groups to fight off the effects of the flu is not like some 25-year-old. The OFs do give advice, as was said before, but this particular advice is surely good to follow.

Take it from the OMOTM who have had some suffering with the flu. They speak from experience.

Fame

One OF, who is on his computer a lot, came into the breakfast and announced that the OF with the pirate ship and skeleton crew were on the internet. It seems some passer-by took pictures of ship and crew and posted them on the net.

The OF who has this display already has people stopping and taking pictures — now he is afraid he will have more. This OF said he is going to put out parking meters. Not a bad idea.

Frustrating phone menus

Quite often, there are ads on television that depict something of interest, or it may be an ad in the paper. On television generally it shows a room full of people answering the phone.

The OFs say this is classic false advertising. The OFs say there really is only one guy in a closet with a couple of phones, a can of Blue Ribbon beer and wearing worn-out sneakers and no socks, answering only a few calls a day because no one can understand the menu to get through to whatever company it is.

One OF said he feels some of the biggest offenders are doctor’s offices and insurance companies.

Another OF said all he wants to do is ask a simple question. An example would be: If he wants to change A to B (regarding his insurance,) how should he go about doing that?

The OFs say he is given a litany of departments, each with its own number, none of which are relevant to what he is after. This scribe could go on with all the “if you want this, press 1, if you want that, press 2, etc.” but it would fill up the column, and the OF said none of the selections apply to what the ads either print, or television portrays.

Still another OF said one time he was talking to his doctor about these frustrating telephone menus and the doctor told him he hates to call his place because the menu doesn’t help at all.

The doctor went on to explain, “After I select what I think is right, it turns out it is wrong. I have trouble calling myself,” he said.

Flushing out a new topic

The OFs began talking about a subject they are all familiar with (and, as the OFs get older and older, they become even more familiar with) and that is toilets. This topic did approach the OFs conversation and the OFs were not discussing their use, but their function and how they are changing.

Their change is only physical. The process of power and vapor trap has not changed since the 1500s. The idea of the toilets has not changed since the construction of the Roman Coliseum which was started in 70 AD. 

“Now,” the OFs said, “We have a choice.” The toilets are either high or low, loud with a swoosh, or quiet, even ones that have electronic eyes that know when you’re on and off, or in front and leave and then they flush themselves.

One OF said many newly constructed buildings install the high ones. But, as technology advances, there are now the electric ones that turn everything to ash.

Now, that one has nothing to do with Rome and the Coliseum.  And to think that the wives believe we have nothing remarkable to talk about.

Those OFs who were at the Duanesburg Diner in Duanesburg and would like to go back to the days when the phone operators picked up the phone and all the OF had to say was, “Doc Walker please,” and the next thing you know you were talking to Doc Walker, or the phone operator would say he was out getting his hair cut, were: Roger Chapman, George Washburn, Robie Osterman, Miner Stevens, Wally Guest, Harold Guest, John Rossmann, Pete Whitbeck, Chuck Aelesio, Richard Frank, Karl Remmers, Joe Rack, Roger Shafer, Wayne Gaul, Jake Lederman, Ted Feurer, Lou Schenck, Mace Porter, Jack Norray, Rev. Jay Francis, Mike Willsey, Warren Willsey, Russ Pokorny, Gerry Chartier, Elwood Vanderbilt, Harold Grippen, and me.

Someone once described the goldenrod that seems ubiquitous this autumn as “quill pens signing summer’s eviction notice.”  Whether it was the blooming of goldenrod or some other harbinger of summer’s end that inspired the autumnal imagery of his classic, melancholy “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard,” English poet Thomas Gray wandered through a rural cemetery “Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife” and in the evocative silence brooded over the lives of the souls interred there.

From their names and fleeting scraps of information carved on their tombstones, Gray inferred details of their triumphs and tragedies, their loves and losses, and their aspirations and failures, now marveling at the longevity of some or mourning the brevity of the lives of others. He read more into the moss-encrusted stones than most observers would — or would care to.

But it is a little-known fact that, to generations of geology professors, country cemeteries have frequently served as outdoor laboratories for the demonstration of many aspects of the cycles of weathering and erosion.

These are points that can, of course, be easily made using a textbook with its graphs and photographs.  But geology — perhaps more so than any of the other natural sciences except for biology — is best taught as a field science.

This is a fact that I can personally attest to from memorable courses I have taken at Acadia National Park, the Grand Canyon, Mammoth Cave, and other venues in which the complexities of the effects of mineral content, climate, exposure, and age on the weather-erosion cycle are clearly displayed.

And in a number of those courses, the professors packed students into vans and shuttled us off to old country cemeteries in which whatever geologic principle being taught was clearly and sometimes dramatically displayed.

The idea for this article came to me on a hot day in late August during a visit to the Town of Rose Cemetery in western New York in which some of my mother’s ancestors are buried. The cemetery sits on the slope of a drumlin, a glacially-deposited hill that is one of hundreds scattered across much of western New York and the Northeast. 

Drumlins and related glacially-formed hills called kames have frequently served as the locations of cemeteries, partially because their elevation above the surrounding landscape has symbolic meanings, but also because their composition of an unconsolidated mixture of soils and rocks makes them well-drained — ideal for burials.

One thinks of the high and windy hill that is the site of the Grover’s Corners cemetery in the melancholy third act of Thornton Wilder’s classic play “Our Town.”

Perhaps it is partly the inevitable association of cemeteries with Halloween that evokes their solemn atmosphere, and in this one even on a bright late-summer day there was a particular monument that has always saddened our family.

It stands a little over five feet tall and is carved from white Vermont marble, a very ancient rock formed during the Ordovician Period, some 450 million years ago, during the event known as the Taconian Orogeny.

The ancient ocean known as the Iapetus that lay off what is now the east coast of the United States was beginning to close as the process known as plate tectonics brought small land masses into collision with it, pushing up mountains and forming marble through metamorphism of pre-existing limestone.

Next to the monument, a bronze receptacle holds a flag, indicating that two of the dead memorialized here — my mother’s great uncles — died in the Civil War. The young men were inspired by the powerful words of  “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” — “As [Jesus] died to make men holy/Let us die to make men free.”

Their tombstone records that one of them named James Otto starved to death and was buried in Andersonville, the infamous Confederate prison in Georgia; the other, his brother Guilford, is actually interred here.  He and a fellow soldier were murdered by a Pennsylvania farmer with pro-slavery sympathies when they were sent to him purchase horses for the troops.

The memorial must have been splendid when it was erected around 1865. Today, the graven inscriptions recording the young men’s sacrifices have become difficult to read. In a decade or two, the inscription will be obliterated and it will stand as do so many other old marble headstones and monuments, their honored dead anonymous.

Marble is a very hard, dense rock that resists the absorption of water from rain or melting snow and therefore does not easily break down due to freezing and subsequent thawing in the process known as physical weathering; however, marble is composed of calcium carbonate, and as any high school chemistry student knows, calcium carbonate dissolves in acid.

Falling rain and fog pick up minute amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, producing a mild solution of carbonic acid. Ordinarily, carbonic acid of this strength is harmless to plants and animals but over many years it will slowly but relentlessly dissolve any calcium carbonate surface in a process known as chemical weathering.

Consequently, given that the monument was erected in Rose Cemetery over 150 years ago, it is surprising that the inscriptions are legible at all. But their saving grace has been the fact that the monument is situated on an open slope facing south, which means they are exposed to sunlight virtually all day when the sun is not obscured by clouds.

This results in the constant warming and drying of the surface, preventing its rapid dissolution and largely preventing growth of lichens and moss — the same factor that causes them to grow mainly on the north side of trees. They secrete small amounts of natural acids that in a damper, more sheltered environment can wreak havoc on organic or mineral surfaces — such as marble headstones.

Farther up the slope is another monument marking the graves of some other ancestors — in this case, my mother’s great-grandparents, whose surname was Briggs.

It was carved from gray granite, an igneous rock brought perhaps from New Hampshire or Maine and formed during the Devonian Period, in an event known as the Acadian Orogeny, some 380 million years ago; at that time, an ancient landmass known as Avalon — which would eventually become Europe — was subducting under North America and creating massive amounts of igneous rock through explosive volcanic action.

The monument stands over five feet tall and its rectangular base holds a massive sphere, an unusual design in this relatively modest graveyard. But although it, too, is over 100 years old, from its appearance one might think it had been placed there last week.

The sphere and the sides of the monument were highly polished and on a sunny day the reflection from the sphere can be blinding. Granite’s two major constituents are visible crystals of feldspar and quartz, both of which are capable of appearing in a spectrum of colors, though varying shades of pink and gray are most common.

The important fact is that neither of these minerals is easily susceptible to chemical weathering and given the extreme hardness and density of the stone and its openness to sunlight, even after a century the monument looks as fresh as if it had been erected very recently.

Almost all of the older headstones and monuments in the Rose Cemetery are carved from either marble or granite and their presence tells another story. Neither of these stones is found locally near the Rose Cemetery; they must have been imported from out of state and their inscriptions carved painstakingly by hand — which bespeaks the affluence of many of the cemetery’s silent residents and their families.

Contrast this one with many of the mossy pioneer cemeteries scattered throughout the Helderbergs in which many of the headstones of the hard-working people buried there were carved either from the native limestone or the local somewhat porous sandstone — both dating from the Devonian Period — and observe how the names of the deceased and their memorial inscriptions have largely vanished.

However, the High Point Cemetery above Altamont on Old West Road with its elegant entrance gate and meticulously-constructed stone wall is another example of a southerly-facing country graveyard in which both marble and limestone monuments a century or more old are still well-preserved.

Many of these stones are carved from marble but they face the southwest, and the view across Old West Road to a wide field is unobstructed by trees; consequently, the stones are dried and warmed from sunrise to sunset on days when the sky is not mostly overcast.

Many of the headstones are on a gentle slope and apparently were never set into concrete bases, and as a result they show the tilting common among monuments in older cemeteries caused by the slow, steady downward movement of the ground known as soil creep.

Frequently, in older cemeteries, this can cause the stones to topple, but High Point Cemetery is obviously lovingly maintained, its grass trimmed and even its very old headstones mostly upright. 

However, a collection of toppled, heavily-weathered markers in the shaded rear of the cemetery has been set aside against the old stone wall, their inscriptions mostly vanished along with record of the deceased they were intended to memorialize.

And, in a few cases, small, closely-spaced, rough-cut markers without inscriptions — harvested, perhaps, from tilled fields or pulled from stone walls — tell sad stories of deceased infants.

Shade can help to speed the forces of weathering and erosion in a humid, changeable climate such as ours — and a prime example is the venerable old cemetery near Reidsville.

With its ancient, very tall balsams and spruces, the cemetery is situated behind an evocative, slightly rusted cast-iron fence — the stereotypical locale for a Gothic ghost story. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, Reidsville was a village with a population of over a thousand.

Largely due to the quarrying activities that supplied the attractive sandstone known as Helderberg bluestone to many localities in the Albany area, the village grew, at one time boasting a hotel, a popular tavern, two churches, two retail stores, and a blacksmith shop — traces of which have largely disappeared.

The quality of the granite and marble stone monuments in the cemetery is once again evidence of the relative affluence of its occupants. Yet, although the majority of the headstones face east and could therefore be expected to get drying sunlight at least in the morning, the immense trees cast much of the cemetery into shadow and their thick boughs steadily drip moisture from rain and melting snow.

Some of the trees show the growth of the lichen commonly known as “Old Man’s Beard,” which resembles Spanish moss and flourishes in very humid boreal forests, especially those near great bodies of water such as the Acadian Coast of Maine and Canada. The damp, pitted ground surrounding many of the old headstones is deep with mosses, which do not flourish in sunlight.

As a result, even some once-stately granite monuments show evidence of heavy chemical weathering and are stained by dark lichens.  The contrast between them and some equally old, much-less-weathered stones in the more open rear sections of the cemetery is sharp.

And especially on a gloomy autumn day, the scene epitomizes Thomas Gray’s lines:

“Beneath those rugged elms, 

   that yew-tree’s shade

Where heaves the turf

   in many a mould’ring heap’

Each in his narrow cell

   forever laid,

The rude forefathers

   of the hamlet sleep.”

(In Gray’s time, the word “rude” had nothing to do with manners but rather denoted “unsophisticated.”)

In recent decades, upright stone grave markers have largely gone out of fashion due to the great expense of preparing them and in many newer areas of cemeteries they are prohibited, replaced by bronze markers which lie flat upon the ground.

An alloy of copper and other metals, bronze tends to resist chemical dissolution although after decades of exposure to moisture it may weather to a dull shade of green like a copper penny. But being at ground level, if not carefully maintained, these markers can soon be covered by grasses and weeds, hiding their inscriptions as surely as if they had been dissolved away.

A walk through a cemetery, especially one with familiar names on the memorials, may bespeak many aspects of the history of a town and its inhabitants along with many other profound thoughts that cemeteries are supposed to bring.

But a close examination of its location, the composition of its monuments and their condition reveals much about its geologic history as well: accounts of continental collisions, ancient rock changing through metamorphism, new rock forming from violent volcanic eruptions, and the much more recent passage of the great ice sheets. In all — a veritable textbook of geology.

In a dozen different ways I heard people say, after Hurricane Dorian visited death upon the Bahamas, “I can’t imagine what that’s like.”

Of course I, too, was deeply concerned about the devastated souls there, but my thoughts turned to the imagination. Did those people mean that the suffering they saw was so great that their imagination couldn’t take it all in? Were they saying the imagination had limits?

Sometimes when people say they can’t imagine something, they are speaking figuratively but I think what folks were saying about the Bahamas is that they lacked the means to project themselves into the shoes of another.

Again, were they saying the imagination has a ceiling? What are its powers? And what is its purpose in life?

Google “imagination” on Wikipedia and you’ll find a dozen reference works that expound on imagination from a variety of angles — cognitive, poetic, psychological, economic, and political — but that list might be my gloss on the text.

If I had to define “imagination” this very moment, I’d say the mind has an ability to make images, or to combine images that previously appeared and were lying dormant until called upon. Like soldiers in the reserves.

But there are times when images crop up on their own and parade themselves before the mind’s eye — the oculus mentis as the Roman writer Cicero called it. A man can be sitting under the shade of a tree taking in the summer breeze and all of a sudden images of his grandfather appear and start running across his mind like the frames of a movie.

When I taught school years ago, I used to ask students where the imagination resides and they struggled to come up with an answer; they had a hard time placing consciousness too. The question was: Does our awareness of our self in relation to that self, and in relation to other selves, have a locality?

Whatever your answer is, we need to keep in mind that the imagination is a tool of consciousness put into play when we feel a need for a new conceptual world view — to remedy something that’s missing from our lives. The imagination is the daughter of scarcity.

That is, the imagination arose, developed, and continues to exist, because homo sapiens needed a tool to invent, reinvent, capture, project, introject, images to help people meet their needs. In this sense, the imagination is related to dream. When John Lennon chanted his peroration “Imagine,” he was asking the human community: What is keeping us from treating another’s needs as our own?

Historically, the Roman Catholic Church responded to this question with a “mystical body,” a paradigm that says the imagination is an agent of utopia, an envisioner of a world in which the needs of all are met, structurally. Nobody’s left out, they say, according to the gospel of Jesus.

Such a view is an antidote to the static and ill-will people generate when they minimize or dismiss the needs of others. Some do it with insolence and go nuts when they hear the word “utopia.” They flush it from consciousness like a bug pestering their wits while calling the bug a “nut job.”

But nut-job language is a smoke screen; it reflects a deep deep fear of the depths of one’s soul.

Walt Disney — the Walt of Mickey Mouse — demonstrated his utopia by creating animals, people, worlds, and fantasies and then — across the vast multi-acre venues he built — showcased the lives of those animals and people with life-scripts he wrote for them.

When the maestro launched his famed Fantasyland in the summer of 1955, he told those who gathered there that this was his “world of imagination,” a world where “hopes and dreams” come true.

Sounding like a poet, he spoke of a timeless land of enchantment, a land “of chivalry [where] magic and make-believe are reborn and fairy tales come true.”

But he let the crowd know that this land is accessible only to “the young at heart — to those who believe that, when you wish upon a star, your dreams come true.”

What a sales pitch! Imagine: not living on a star but just wishing on it, and you wind up in the lap of eternity.

Keep in mind that Disney — and utopianists of his ilk — let his imagination take him where it had to go; or maybe he needed to go somewhere and called upon it to bail him out. How else could he meet Snow White, Peter Pan, Pinocchio, and the ever-endearing Thumper?

As a scholar of the human condition, I’ve been long interested in the imagination’s ability to allow a person to project its self (consciousness) into the life-circumstances (consciousness) of another, and feel sympathy for that other. Ethicists say that, when a soul gets good at this, it finally has a moral compass.

A lot of people know the Adam Smith who penned “Wealth of Nations ”— a core capitalist manifesto — but earlier in life Smith showed interest in the imagination’s ability to help one person connect with another through feelings of sympathy, what today we’d call empathy.

In “The Theory of Moral Sentiments,” he said such a process is radically transformative — I see no other way to read the text.

One wonders how the Smith of a nationally-sanctioned-private-wealth-production ideology squares with the Smith of empathy, his version of a mystical body, that there’s only one boat.

Utopia is a world, a country, and local communities where people treat the least as the richest among them. In a somewhat oblique way, that’s what the radical American documents of the 1770s were reaching for.

Some of the 2020 candidates for the presidency of the United States seem to reaching for the same thing. It’s certainly a far cry from a political economy where one person can drive another in the ground and live unimpeded.

Some say the driven-down deserve such treatment because they’re losers, lazy, dumb, and lacking pedigree. Maybe they’re a Mexican working in a cement plant breathing in deadly dust or a dark-skinned fellow wearing a dastaar in the front seat of a cab.

The Walt Disney in me says hogwash to those who deny that human worth is based in need — not age or gender or race or any other demographic accident: but need — and that all quid pro quo economies are non compos mentis.

Never mind $15 an hour; let’s put everyone down for a $100,000 a year (including students), and let’s provide everyone with a modest shelter of choice, and let’s guarantee the means to stay alive (health) without imposing tariffs.

Of course in such a society there’s paperwork, there are conflicting differences, and cheaters of ill repute, and those who’ll pull the wool over the eyes of a child for a measly sawbuck.

But, in the world of Walt Disney, the world of a world he brought into being, at least everyone says: I know how you feel. And lots of them do something about it.

Or is that a dream too hard to imagine?