Pandora's Other Box

Originally, this blog was meant to touch on memories… times long past and moments of joy … or sadness. Or, whatever came to mind… As usual, last one won out... As it often happens, when I come face to face with the computer all plans go out the window. Usually taking with them all the words and thoughts I had … oh, so ready… they all seem to fly out the virtual window in the back corner of my mind… as I watch, totally powerless, and see them disappear into the vastness of nothingness… Oh My! … What should we write about? … Notice as the royal “We” gently rolls out of my fingertips while these deftly play the letter keys of this non-musical piano-like board on the computer…   So, which way to go? Should I fall gently into the past and dig a bit deeper around those repressed memories that still abound? Or go boldly into the future and create memories to be? … Perhaps these last can be a bit sweeter and warmer than some of the ones life has actually created… but then...

What Happened in Cuba?        This is a question we have asked ourselves for the better part of a half a century. We still don’t have an answer. A friend (not Cuban) sent me a list of what he called “historical Cuban achievements” he had found on a website, of which the following is a partial listing, and asked the same question… I still did not have an answer…        First Iberian American country to use vapor powered machinery and ships was Cuba in 1829     The third country in the world (after US and England) to have railroads was Cuba, in 1837     First ether based anesthesia applied in the Spanish speaking world was by a Cuban MD in 1847.   The first public electric light system in the Spanish speaking world was completed in Havana in 1889   Cuba eliminated bullfights before the end of the 18 th century, because they were “unpopular,        sanguinary and abusive with the animals” ...