Is it Safe?

The pandemic has certainly changed things. Left with little more than a pot to piss in, one wants to know:

“Is it safe?”

For late arriving Baby Boomers and early Generation Xers, the phrase “Is it safe?” will always be connected with the movie Marathon Man starring Dustin Hoffman as “Babe” Levy, a history Ph.D. student and avid runner. The movie has a real time gritty depiction in which the infamous Nazi war criminal Dr. Christian Szell comes to NYC searching for a diamond collection lost during WWII. Thinking Babe has some knowledge of the diamond’s whereabouts, he kidnaps Babe then tortures him by first probing a cavity in one of Babe’s teeth with a probe, and later drilling into a healthy tooth, without anesthetic, while repeatedly asking the question “Is it safe?”

The point of the torture is to extract information from Babe about a missing diamond collection. Babe is unaware of everything, and thus becomes a hopeless victim of the torture.

On the Beach

Explain the picture, Oz is asked.

To escape and sit quietly on the beach – that’s my idea of paradise.

Or let me leave you with a quote from Nevil Shute’s post-apocalyptic book, On the Beach:

“The news did not trouble her particularly; all news was bad, like wage demands, strikes, or war, and the wise person paid no attention to it.”

Then again, Oz must get the last word in.

Pandemics come and go. Things change. For the better it is hoped, if we learn our lessons. Otherwise, it is back to old, the tried and failed. But, Oz believes the young will learn from this experience and chart a new course, a wiser one, a safer one, one full of hope and promise.

“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain,” the wise and wonderful Oz says. He’s nothing more than a humbug.