Steve’s Newsletter Volume 1: Issue 1
Welcome to the first edition of my newsletter. I wanted to create a space where I can reach out directly to people who might be interested in what I have to say. I have relied primarily on Facebook for the last several years, but their algorithm buries anything that is more than a few hundred words. Both my prose and my commentary generally exceed that. In exchange for invading your inbox, I will provide exclusive content that no one else as seen. I hope you enjoy it.
La Fée de l’Urine
In the fall of 2024, my family moved to the French Alps in the area surrounding Lake Annecy. I have written a few short essays on cultural comparison. They are generally lighthearted. Here is one of them.
This is one of the most photographed shots of Vieux Annecy (Old Annecy). Since the time of the following writing we moved further south to the Commune of Doussard.
An occasional claim by US tourists abroad is that the French are cleaner, neater, better put together. The truth is more muddled. Certainly, those who stray no further than the Louvre and the Arc de Triomphe in a weeklong trip to Paris will see clean streets, assuming that sanitation workers haven’t gone on strike. This also assumes that an ensuing mob of white nationalists and anti-vaxxers hasn’t set fire to the three-week-old piles of garbage. (This happened during the pandemic during a normally clean Paris.
Truth be told, the sanitation worker strike does reveal one cultural difference between the US and France in that the France relies much more heavily on public workers to combat problems such as litter. It is less about civic pride that keeps trash out of the gutter and more about the fact that some person making a living wage will eventually pick up the garbage. Litter removal is so robust that at one point, major cities experimented with a specialized motorized scooter that focused solely on dog poop pickup. (These were later disbanded to my dismay in a later piece.)
There are other cultural aspects that reduce litter, but it is again not directly related to civic pride. French have an aversion to fast food generally, and they also have a greater reliance on public transportation. This means that less people buy a Big Mac in the first place, and when they are finished eating two all boeuf galettes, they can’t simply lower the car window and chuck it onto the shoulder.
The one difference in which the US is clearly the cleaner of the two countries is in the field of public urination. Though technically illegal, it is virtually unenforced during the late hours of the evening and come morning, the sides of buildings are dotted with the tale-tale signs of the late-night reveler or night shifter who didn’t care to track down the relatively rare public restroom.
In the morning, shopkeepers splash off the urine with a carafe of water and go about their business.
Heading to the market with my three boys, I pointed to the little rivulets of yellow-green liquid streaming from the storefronts and warned the boys to step over them.
“That isn’t water, it’s pee.”
“But why is it here?”
“The urine fairies leave it.”
The white lie was easier than explaining French hygiene habits which I don’t care the kids to repeat at school. Go along to get along as long as you can. Also, we were in a tourist-laden area of town and I didn’t really want my conversation overheard by someone who might speak English well.
Thusly it was a few minutes later when pointing out yet another rivulet among the cobblestoned street of Old Town Annecy, my middle child, Bear began to sing a little jingle.
“Is it water or is it pee; I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”
A group of middle-aged women immediately began to giggle and then I giggled and then in a Midwestern accent, they bid us good morning and complimented Bear’s singing voice.
Contemporary Observations
I was recently reading Robert Leckie’s Helmet for My Pillow, one of the sources for the Emmy-winning HBO miniseries, The Pacific.
The book is mostly objective observations of his surroundings, rarely inserting himself into the story—a classic fact reporting style that Leckie picked up from his time as a sportswriter before WWII.
One of his fellow enlistees identified only as “Red” was a former catcher for the St. Louis Cardinals. Red’s celebrity held a certain gravitas with other passengers on the miserable train ride from New York to Parris Island in the winter of 1942. Once the passengers ran out of baseball questions, they moved on to other subjects for which Red was entirely unqualified e.g. commentary on Japanese culture and what the conditions would be like at their destination, Marine Corps basic training.
Leckie’s observed that “[i]t is an American weakness. The success becomes the sage. Scientists counsel on civil liberty; comedians and actresses lead political rallies; athletes tell us what brand of cigarette to smoke.”
Moreover, because Red had already become accustomed to the spotlight, he fielded the questions with confidence and poise, even without any real knowledge of the things he discussed.
Some 83 years later, these observations seem particularly poignant when considering the rambling one-liners of our current game-show host president. The only difference is that we no longer demand poise for unqualified answers. (See for example the inanity from his first term in which he appeared to suggest injecting bleach into the body to treat Covid-19.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zicGxU5MfwE
We have more Reds than ever before. The last 20 years have been a steady rise of D-list celebrities hoping to cash in on a memeworthy candidacy. (See for example Herschel Walker who is so concussed he can rarely muster a coherent thought nearly becoming a US Senator.)
So far, success has been rare. However, just as no one expected Trump to win in 2016, it’s only a matter of time. The media are complicit in the debacle, because the spectacle is good for selling ad space, but every time a charlatan gets free press solely because they are a celebrity, it only reenforces the idea that one can rehabilitate a career simply by submitting a filing.
To be clear, the mere fact that one is a celebrity should not be an exclusion from public affairs. Celebrities such as Ronald Reagan and Al Franken proved to be competent in their respective positions and in the case of Reagan, he had already been an administrator of a major organization prior to becoming a governor. (Regardless of your feelings about their political beliefs and personal life, one must cede the point that they were at a minimum, competent.)
Disregarding the occasional outlier, we should view with great suspicion the motivations of celebrity campaigns. Moreover, we should not allow media to unfairly elevate their candidacy at the expense of more qualified candidates, simply because it is lazy copy.
Hermit Crabs
In the fall of 2023, my wife retired from the US Navy and we shipped out in a 21-foot travel trailer for a one-year trip of the lower 48 to see the national parks. I wrote a daily account of adventures with our three young children named Wolf, Bear, and Lynx and posted them under the title “Hermit Crabs”. These accounts will eventually be published in a book format pending the compilation and editing process that takes longer than one might expect.
As with Petrified Forest, White Sands is easily accessible from a main road. It is much smaller and with only 8 miles of road each way, can be done in a matter of an hour if in a hurry.
The origin story and mineral makeup of White Sands National Park is wholly different from Great Sand Dunes where we visited a few weeks ago. This sand consists of gypsum crystals from the bottom of a dry seabed. With no mountain range to contain them, the prevailing winds grind down the crystals into sand and then push them north and east over time, never accumulating into the massive sand dunes of Great Sand Dunes. (The highest dune in the park is perhaps 40 feet.) Another difference is that the gypsum does not absorb heat in the way that a quartz-based sand would, keeping the ground cool to the touch year-round no matter how hot the temperatures.
The only downside to White Sands is that it is inside an active missile range and can be shut down with little warning should missiles be fired on a given day. They don’t deliberately target inside the park, but one never knows how a missile test will go. This is a proving ground for whatever new systems are developed.
The visitor center has a great display of various plant and animal life including a yucca that grows with the slowly moving sand dunes, gaining length as the dune grows in height. Once the sand dune has departed, it has nothing to support its 30-foot long root system. The yucca collapses and dies. Other plants are able to adjust their roots and stay with the top of the dune, surviving with it as it moves.
As with Great Sand Dunes, sledding is allowed, though the dunes are much smaller. Because we had only a little time, we declined to rent sleds but allowed the kids to slide down on the slippery gypsum sand in their clothes which they still enjoyed. Prior to sliding we walked a short nature trail but I gave the boys permission to run back to the large dune beside the parking lot on their own provided they looked before crossing the street. The dune was one of the highest and had a steep side facing the road. Adults on sleds were coasting down and coming to a grinding halt as they hit the pavement.
As the boys climbed and explored, I could hear some other patrons conversing.
“Is this allowed right next to the road?”
“Well, the ranger said it wasn’t recommended but didn’t say it was illegal.”
“Oh.”
Prior to being run off by the ranger: From left to right, Steve, Bear, Lynx, and Wolf. (Lynx is at the top)
Yes, the hill ended on a road but with a speed limit of 15 and lots of people in the road to serve as a warning, danger was minimal. It certainly didn’t bother me as a parent, albeit I was a little hardened on the issue of sandy hills when compared to 3,000-foot drop-offs previously found in the trip. The boys took their turns and I did one big belly slide. By then the aforementioned ranger came back.
“Guys, I told you not to do that.”
“Well sir, actually you said that you didn’t recommend it.”
“Well… that was my polite way of telling you not to do it.”
“…”
“I’d like you to leave.”
“…”
“I’m giving you an order to leave.”
“Okay guys, let’s go.”
During all of this I was on top of the hill with the boys out of sight from the ranger. Of course, the ranger hadn’t said anything to me so we continued to play for a few more minutes, the boys deciding it was too cold to continue. It was only 75 degrees but I didn’t care to argue.
Four miles into the park the pavement gives way to a graded dirt road made up of the same white gypsum sands. In this section there is little to no vegetation and the park has the feel of being in a snowfield after a blizzard, dunes piled higher than the vehicle on all sides. The road forms a loop and after a few minutes I pulled over and asked the boys if they were ready for an adventure.
“Yeah!”
“Alright, look at the map. We are here. That dune is there. On the other side is a road.”
“Okay.”
“Start walking that way. When you get to the road wait for us there and we’ll be by shortly.”
“Okay!”
“Stay together and don’t cross the road.”
I was admittedly nervous but the kids had been very well behaved as of late. Lauren said nothing for or against this impromptu plan. We drove around the loop and started looking for them.
“Think they will follow instructions?”
“I bet we are about to find out.”
“Right.”
“Okay, start looking for a little boy in a blue shirt with a little boy in a teal shirt.”
“We aren’t close enough yet…”
“Sure, but who knows if they sat still like they were… “
“There they are!”
They were sitting beside the road just as we asked them to be, excitedly smiling.
Bear had “treasure” a plastic spoon with a broken handle and asked if we could come back to the park someday to look for more treasure.
A Brief Biography
Steve lives a meandering life that leads him to interesting activities such as cycling across country or running for Congress against Matt Gaetz. Currently a professor of law for Purdue Global Law School, focusing on Constitutional Law and Professional Responsibility, his goal is to eventually take up writing full time. Steve enjoys ultramarathons, reading, writing, and living in the French Alps with his wife, Lauren and three boys, Wolf, Bear, and Lynx.
After receiving a BS in Journalism from the University of Florida, he enlisted in the Air Force and served in Operation Enduring Freedom as an Airborne Cryptologic Linguist. While serving, he earned an AA in Pashto from Defense Language Institute and an MA in International Relations from American Military University. After a year in Afghanistan as a contractor linguist, Steve earned a Juris Doctor from the Florida State University College of Law. He later returned to FSU Law for an LLM in Environmental Law and Policy.
Steve has eight books on a wide variety of subjects. Check out his Amazon author page here. https://www.amazon.com/stores/Steven-Specht/author/B0CJKGT1N2