The Forest & The Trees

...ing" and that Congress is therefore the Peace Corps...

...obligation...

...The outer layer of sapwood, a time you pay attention to the details...

...When things are Each generation of manufactured prod- planners have armed everyone with au- pretty much alike, and serve their puructs imitates the quality of its predeces- tomatic weapons, and soldiers are trained pose well enough without being beautiful sor...

...what you're getting...

...The government maintains that to accede to the destabilizing consequences...

...Popular support for ETA...

...With one thing and Mercedes as the rest of us...

...Now that mayors and much encouragement...

...It following fall...

...But there was something in DRAFT N0, ASSASSINS YES Cheever, as there is in most of the rest of HOW TO SAVE LOTS OF LIVES & LOADS OF MONEY us, which rebels against the quick, the cheap, the easy and the ersatz...

...those were subjects of size and with carpet tacked down onto plywood century...

...and if the draft is Mary and Joseph hadn't been forced to averages which matter...

...Of several minds: Thomas Powers So we dgcided to run some boards through the planer and let the grain of the wood announce itself...

...They could learn was an ash...

...Once had, I am embarrassed to admit, a hard maple, in their rough state, simply re- my nephew and I had planed some we time of it...

...Misery is mass-produced, and seriousness which would appear in his subflooring, formica table tops, furniture the alleviation of misery-when it can be next novel...

...I think the sadness of use getting worked up over this...

...realistic understanding with Madrid...

...captures our attention, like the stone-age wormholes and abrasions of age and use...

...is on the increase...

...They still turn the really does seem to be limitless-then material goods, must be pursued with an radio on...

...if bers go beyond a certain size, it is only say, but just in case...

...But most of the another we have come a long way since going to put a nation of 200 million people with a claim on the world's conthe invention of the steam engine and the people on the road, and change models science are in crowds so dense it is all but spinning jenny...

...No democratic nation has thus far suc- city councilors of their own choosing have been elected for the ceeded in fully accommodating the demands for devolution first time since the civil war and the Basque regipnal council without doing violence to the unitary framework of the can be expected to assume added responsibilities for various nation-state...

...Nor does A Basque labor leader recently tried to convince me that the the experience of other Western European countries offer situation was not totally without hope...

...cups-go unremarked, just like the faces of the chromed knobs of the past...

...The incidentals of lifewhich once seamed leather...

...The boards were sound It ought to be clear I don't really know means they're likely to contain a lot of enough, but they were flecked with little very much about wood, but I'm learning...

...THOMAS POWERS there isn't cotton fiber enough to print newspapers on rag paper, and plywood is quite extraordinarily strong, and Of several minds: John Garvey linoleum goes in quicker and cheaper than tile, and the alternative to masonite paneling is not oiled walnut, but plaster board...

...But the bark of ash and log which is the shortest most mills will is highly particular...

...A forester might say that one thickness...

...They I once spent an hour with a friend, Alan staples which can wreck havoc on a saw can't be sanded out or stained away...

...The bark of some trees is dis- can't be used...

...a single leaf coming straight out at the perhaps two or three inches thick, is Quality and scarcity seem to go hand in end of the twig...

...The gross effect is considering registration-not for a draft, sort forms the beginning of St...

...Strategic thinkers are supposed to grow rotten at the heart until it finally fell tended to look like something else: be far-sighted, conscious of broad trends over, useless for anything but firewood...

...So far, so good...

...they just with which to build a hay wagon and we problem either...

...ous great cherry, a really magnificent quickly enough, with instruction, but no A forest can be a confusing place, once tree, at least thirty inches through at the one is going to teach them...

...Their be at least two feet in diameter because revolution, has been to see the trees for leaves are both spear-shaped, but butter- only the heartwood has the distinctive red the forest...

...Because the Basques sup- tuted last year by small radical nationalist groups that includes ported the Republican side in the civil war, they were singled the political front of ETA...

...Rozycki, walking around a great tall tree blade at the mill...

...The process indifferent to quality...

...When num- every advocate of this plan hastens to gospel, we shouldn't be ungrateful...

...There aren't sheep enough in there isn't time or material enough to pay eye to the gross effect...

...The present level of structure has thus far eluded the government and the political violence, they believe, can be endured without politically leaderships...

...nothing bindings, blazers with gilded plastic but- the age must be that we have come too far can be done about it, and it doesn't really tons...

...hardware, old barbed wire and fence black streaks, invisible before...

...The mind, like any other...

...the forest for the trees, but it seems to me the forest to fulfill its destiny, but now I In a McDonald's restaurant not long the real problem is just the other way wanted the boards, and its destiny was to ago I counted the things which were inround...

...Correserved he expects the issue will still be around in the year 2000.spondingly, the extremist appeal can be expected eventually to But the Basque region requires urgent and rapid solutions...

...If you want to make a nice piece of hand...

...But the ash and the do not look like each other at all...

...There are concouldn't really tell, even with binoculars, the astronomical prices of the dealers in temporary furniture-makers who are if the leaves grew in the butternut fashion fine woods, which may be two dollars a every bit the craftsmen of the 18th cenor not...

...If we're all going to have a great to turn back, and know that health, jusmatter...

...In small Ignoring the details gets to be a habit of dency, but it requires time to take hold...

...most of them grow in fence rows, which process of decay...

...Cheever knew it was no tobacco ingredients," books with glue the mass as well...

...Plastic car their weapons...

...When we began to make more, we were trying to identify was so tall we cherry furniture, and don't want to pay ceased to make as well...

...In the meantime, ETA For the new Spain, therefore, the dismantling of the cen- relentlessly pursues its goal of polarization in the region .tralized structure inherited from the Franco regime and the through an endless cycle of killings...

...Wood, as you can see, most papery...

...I butternut...

...For a start, in Vermont at any rate, coloration which is the first stage in the to confuse us...

...Until the end of the Franco deputies to the lower house, a Senator and many town counera the Basque country continued to be treated as if it were cilors...

...unit infantry tactics, for example...

...I used to walk through a forest The log rested in a pile at the mill until the with leather, plastic "wagon wheels" without ever seeing a single tree...

...About the only thing not intended hardwoods, a quantum jump in precision They looked beautiful going in, with- to look like an ancestor was the cash over the vague impression of "forest," out knots or soft, punky places, but as register...

...It succeeded in electing three out for harsh, vindictive treatment...

...Yellow birch has the surface left by the planer knives is nephew and I went through a hundred got a pinkish'heart, but it's muted with a tight, uniform, solid, close...

...butternut look somewhat alike, espe- handle...

...woodgrain" formica table tops, plastic and the big picture, willing to leave the As soon as it was cut it was clear we'd seats intended to look like golden oak, details to subordinates of fussier temper- gotten it in time...

...There he vented his the roof, then they've got to pay attention camps, crowds of the hungry in the spleen on the century...

...Some people like trying to decide if it were an ash or a the first five or six feet at the tree's base them...

...So what if the car radio knobs are deal-and society's appetite for things tice and freedom, no less than the world's only silvered plastic...

...I hope he is right...

...But a formula that meets the desires of the au- Some Spaniards have become resigned to unchecked murtonomists while safeguarding the cohesion of the national ders of policemen and military officers...

...There is no harsher criticism of a of this quality before...

...Some people like knotty pine...

...Nothing shows less sign of loving atten- Tassaday discovered a few years ago in The eye of the beholder is coarsened in tion to detail than a car...

...The tendency nents of registration, this time you could prophecies...

...diminish...

...Function begins reimposed, according to some propo- go to Jerusalem, think of all the blown to tyrannize over form...

...ever, is primarily a legacy from the Franco regime...

...occupied territory...

...That was in the winter of 1977...

...Maple, cherry and A ROUGH-SAWN board is like a face what was in the lot: ash, maple, cherry yellow birch are all close-grained...

...Luke's what the planners are after...

...That possibility means they're just there...

...short black flecks scattered down the not do its work all at once...

...But the tree Alan and I white...

...To fully grant the violence will eventually lead to a military occupation of the them, it is also feared, might establish precedents that could Basque country, an action that would obviously have portenthave a deleterious effect on any future relationship between ous consequences for Spain's future political stability...

...An accumulation of missed opportunities, bad judgment and BENJAMIN MARTIN political opportunism has led to a widespread feeling of frust- (Benjamin Martin, a previous contributor, is Director of the ration in the Basque provinces...

...Recently my That was no problem...

...The configuration of the present problem, how- ETA...

...discovered the problem: there were only 3 August 1979: 423 two ash boards in the lot we'd been sort- Cherry is a beautiful wood, but not length of the boards...

...Madrid and the prospective regional governments...

...Most Finally, after a great deal of discussion, The same day Alan and I marked the Americans cannot tell the difference bewe decided the tree was a butternut, and "butternut" for cutting-this was in the tween hidden dovetails and massmarked it with white paint for cutting...

...but rather the cheap glut of stapled together, cigars with "non- alleviated at all-must be engineered in the supermarket...

...But it's the details which make up through...

...the world to let everyone wear wool, and attention to the details...

...The goal is firepower, a tables, chairs, lamps, shoes, coffee radio knobs are "silvered" to remind us blizzard of bullets in a general direction...

...It's their differences- hardwood should be left to dry a tures" actually were) framed in imitation their uniqueness -which makes them minimum of one year for every inch in barn siding, linoleum in the design of precious...

...I had never seen a cherry tree things as they were, combined with a forest...

...national entity and those who have sought greater latitude for of preventing the frequent killings by the terrorist-separatist the regions...

...I stacked lights in the form of kerosene lamps, that I began to appreciate the fact there the boards in a barn that Christmas to let plastic flowers, "pictures" (it would are trees and there are trees, just as there them season...

...The size of the undertaking requires at- in a crowd...

...But the fine cabinet-makers of the of nuts right under the tree in question...

...If I'm not mistaken ing through, and some basswood (which every cherry tree has beautiful boards in this is called " spalting," a chemical diswe mistook at first for pine) had crept in it...

...This is not a the Philippines, or the Pennslyvania time...

...I waited eighteen months to be Spanish tiles...

...Wooden furniture is "distressed" with tention to the gross effect...

...With this in mind, Socialist leader Felipe Gon- services in the near future, people will gradually come to feel zalez, despite his sympathy for the regionalists, recently ob- less alienated and distrust of Madrid should lessen...

...it was sound all the way imitation brick on the walls, bench backs ament...

...in fact, we live in one of the great pounded by the fact there were butternuts by looking for a good tree, tall, straight ages of woodworking and furniture dein that patch of forest, and we found a lot and thick...

...it's hard to know which comes first, moral failing of carmakers, but a ques- Amish who forgot to take their polio the moment, people cease to notice, or tion of economics...

...day do not threaten Grand Rapids...

...Understandably this has left many in the Obviously these changes have compounded the difficulties region with a deeply ingrained hostility and suspicion towards of the moderate Basque Nationalist Party in arriving at a the government in Madrid...

...The public you begin to pay attention to the details...

...Vinyl car seats have stamped not so much to aim-"marksmanship" or admirable in their own right, they tend "stitching" to remind us of the threads is an antiquated skill-but simply to fire to disappear...

...It takes a fundamentalist to 3 August 1979: 425...

...base and thirty feet straight up to the first result is the vaguest of nostalgias for It is the details, in fact, which define the branches...

...Cherry turns a rich red have got varying kinds of figure, dependphone...

...Very likely we the easiest way to hide a rise in price is to spoked wheels and leather seats of a 1910 knew enough about him not to mourn his lower quality...

...Our difficulties were com- board foot or more, you have got to start tury...

...When you make things one at nut leaves grow in distinctive pairs, with color...

...The planed hardwood boards looking for some ash faint tone of grey...

...The world is all crowds now...

...they have as much Southern prisons...

...But if they're passing, but its manner...

...It means houses crowds of dead left by the horrors of the attacked...

...The rule of thumb is that take too long to describe what the "picare with people...

...they in the dusk or a voice over the and yellow birch...

...It late summer of 1976-we found a gorge- produced glue joints...

...Production Commonweal: 424 lines have a built-in cheapening ten- turns up in the darnedest places...

...the figure in the THE FOREST & THE TREES wood-the wavy lines left by cutting MASS PRODUCTION, MASS MISERY, MASS MAN through the tree's annual growth rings-almost looks as if it has been etched in with countless tiny strokes with the point of a pin...

...The name of John goes hand in hand with inflation, since affection for the brass headlamps, Spinkelink we know...

...Others have become more pesdemands of the Basque Nationalist Party would require going simistic, concluding that the situation is now hopeless and that beyond what is permitted by the Constitution...

...I think I may have forgotparticular patch of woods contains so- on the safe side, and a month ago I put the ten a few...

...In addition, a cherry tree ought to The hard thing, since the industrial cially in the case of big old trees...

...frauds...

...but that still only touches the surface of soon as they came out the far side I found Of course the industrial revolution did what is really there...

...the rough-sawn boards hanging from the ceiling with electric wasn't until I began looking for saw logs were beautiful...

...Carmakers are not shots, or the men sitting on death roww in when they cease to care...

...There is little prospect it granting of home rule is viewed as a moral and political will end soon...

...The place was a riot of eclectic many thousand board feet of mixed first boards through a planer...

...every three years, and meet environmen- impossible to remember they are made One of John Cheever's early books tal requirements, and forgo Rhodesian up of individuals as particular as the trees was called Some People, Places and chrome, and earn 10 percent on equity, in a forest-crowds of unemployed in the Things Which are Not Going to Appear in and keep the price from going through central cities, crowds of refugees in Thai My Next Novel...

...That wasn't much of a boards are obviously different...

...yellow birch bark, for example, rows don't have to grow tall to reach the flawed, but it took nearly three years to is a dead giveaway-golden in color, al- light you can't always get the eight-foot discover the fact...

...The perfect tree was tinctive...

...But even then you don't know sign...

...Ash has got a coarse open grain...

...etc., which he knobs of silvered plastic...

...molded to look as if they were covered the whole...

...It was not war, to the gross effect, which means radio Sahel, crowds in the slums of Brazil, racism and poverty, etc...

...it's vaguely familiar but a bit darker than the color of brick dust...

...Since registration of a But it's too late...

...The situation has reached a Spanish Labor Project of the Carnegie Endowment for Interpoint of advanced deterioration and the police seem incapable national Peace...

...Because trees in fence don't like either...

...During the The March elections resulted in lessened support for the 40` years of authoritarian rule, expressions of local cultures, political moderates and an impressive advance by the radical languages, or folklore were rigorously banned as were move- separatist Hem Batasuna (Popular Unity), a coalition constiments favoring regional self-rule...

...ing on how the wood has been sawn, but won't quite identify itself...

...I knew (or thought I knew) fused to distinguish themselves...

...Once I would have deep incapacity to distinguish the strategic thinker than to say he fails to see been sentimentally inclined to leave it in genuine from the ersatz...

...Something which longs for things done right, YOU HAVE HEARD, no doubt, that have a choice between military service for knowing the difference, for the par- "the voluntary army isn't work- and a civilian alternative, like Vista or ticular...

...It is the same Occasionally a small group of people flecks of black paint to suggest the way with an automobile production line...