One year ago, I prayed this prayer for my father in law Frank Barone who was in the hospital. As today would have been his wedding anniversary to my mother on law Raffaelina Barone, I repost it anew at this time and request prayers for the eternal repose of their souls...

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Old age should burn and rave at close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,

Because their words had forked no lightning they

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright

Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,

And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight

Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,

Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light [Dylan Thomas (published 1951)]

It's empty now, no friendly face
And nothing lives within
I look around and I find no trace
To tell me what has been

So far I've come to find there's no one here
No life and fear
I came for nothing, they have gone
And nobody's home

I am contemplating a name change for this site. Whether it will be as an add-on to the current name or sonething different altogether, on that I do not currently know. But something will be changing, it is only a question of when on that front, not if.

I came to learn, perhaps to teach
But I can tell somehow
The world that I was sent to reach
Has got no future now

All things change and this site even in its nearly nineteen years of existence{1} has undergone numerous changes in layout, topics covered, etc. 

The one constant is that this site has served as a kind of journal of sorts where subjects of interest to me were published here. I referred to written projects once as writing photographs and this site in its older materials does serve as a kind of writing photo album. As with picture albums, there are non flattering shots in the book along with the more favouring ones but that is life. And life has a way of going on and in directions one does not expect. I have certainly had probably more than my share of that over the years. But I look at several things differently now than when this site began. 

Across the galaxy to spread the word
And no one heard
I came for nothing, I'm alone
And nobody's home

Muhammed Ali once said "a man who looks at the world at fifty the way he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of their life." I have certainly avoided that and thank God I am not like those who have not if which there are sadly, many.{2}

A requiem was never sung, no elegy was read
No monument was carved in stone in memory of the dead
For those who made this place do not remain
They feel no pain
A stranger fate was never known

This site started as a part of a community that basically does not exist anymore. Whatever one thinks of that or wishes, it is what it is. And for that reason, one must operate in accordance with what is and not on the basis of what one wishes. 

Notes:

{1} We debuted on August 22, 2002 and were in operation until an indefinite suspension in operations on December 19, 2009. We then resumed operations on April 4 2017 to the present day.

{2} To the degree I have avoided this is due to grace and I therefore cannot claim the credit.

Insomnia 3: Beyond Thunderdome!

As the rain tapdances on the roof and I lay wide awake, today's shipwreck is the SS America. Built in 1939 and launched in 1940 by United States Lines, the 723 foot 11 deck luxury liner had a brief stint before being commandeered by the military in 1941 after Pearl Harbor. Renamed the USS Westpoint, the ship served in many roles until discharged in 1946 when it resumed the name SS America under United Stated Lines and its luxury liner status. For a brief period, the SS America was the queen of the American fleet until 1952 when the much larger and faster SS United States was launched. 

The SS America remained in service cruising the transatlantic routes from 1946 until 1964 when it was bought by Chandris Group who renamed it the SS Australis. It then ran the circuit from Southampton, England to Australia from 1964-1977 when it was sold to Venture Cruise Lines in 1978 where it was renamed the SS America but attempts to relaunch the ship were an abysmal failure. Chandris Group reacquired the ship in 1978 renaming it the SS Italis where after a few renovations, it was chartered in 1979 for three 14 day cruises out of Genoa and Barcelona to Egypt, Israel, and the eastern Mediterranean. After those cruises, it was laid up in Piraeus, Greece in September of 1979. 

From there, the ship was bought by Intercommerce Corporation in 1980 and renamed the SS Noga underwent a dizzying array of name changes and plans for use while the ship was laid up in port. (Including converting it to a prison ship to be anchored in Beruit.) It was then bought by Silver Moon Ferries who got nowhere with it except to change one side of the ship to Alferdoss and after a busted bilge pump had to move the ship to avoid it sinking while it could be repaired. Once fixed, it was taken back to its original mooring place in Piraeus. The ship was then sold for scrap in the late 1980s but after they barely got started, the scrappers defaulted on their loans so they pulled out. So the now-named Alferdoss or Noga (no one knows which!) remained until 1993 when it was bought a final time.

Now the plans were ambitious: refit her to become a five-star hotel ship off Phuket, in Thailand. Despite years of drydock neglect, the hull was found to be in remarkably solid condition so her propellers were removed, the remaining funnel painted red, and she was renamed American Star. She left Greece under tow in late December 1993 but bad weather forced a return to dock. After things calmed down, American Star left Greece under tow. It was estimated that the tow would take 100 days but not long after, the tugboat and liner ran into an Atlantic storm and the tow lines broke. Six crew members were sent aboard the American Star to reattach the tow lines while two additional tugs assisted. The crew members were rescued by helicopter on January 17, 1994 while the ship was left adrift.

On January 18, American Star ran aground at Playa de Garcey, off the west coast of Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands. While the owners were furiously deciding what to do, the ships bow got wedged in a sandbar. Two days of pounding sea broke the hull in half and the ship was declared a total loss. The stern collapsed to port and sank in 1996 while the now section remained intact and deteriorating. 

The port side collapsed in November of 2005 which caused the remaining hull to break up and nearly collapse the ship to port side. In April 2007, the starboard side collapsed and the remaining wreck broke in half and sank at sea. A very small section of the bow and keel are visible now at low tide but after thirteen years of pounding waves, the remaining wreck of the once great SS America is no more.