Is there a there, there?

"Somewhere out there beneath the pale moonlight someone's thinking of me and loving me tonight." from An American  Tail 

During every election cycle some phrase takes on a life of its own and is repeated ad nauseum.  Back in 2012 somebody said, “At the end of the day” and it caught like wildfire.  I couldn’t watch any news or listen to it on the radio without hearing “At the end of the day.”  The best I could figure hearing it over and over in context, it  meant about the same thing as “when the dust settles” or “when all is said and done.” But what they all said was, “At the end of the day.” 

During the 2016 election cycle another phrase caught fire.  I didn’t hear this one as often as “at the end of the day” but I heard it quite a lot.  Somebody said, “Is there a there, there?” and then everybody said it.  Again in context it seemed to mean “I can’t tell you for sure that there’s anything to this story, but I’ll tell you just in case.  There may or may not be a there, there.”  Whether any of those saying it knew it, they were all quoting from a book published in 1937 by Gertrude Stein.  In her autobiography “Everybody’s Autobiography” she tells the story of going back to Oakland, California to see her home place after being gone for decades. When she got there instead of her farm house and seventeen acres of farmland, there was a commercial development.  Out of nostalgia and sadness she said in her book, “There’s no there, there.” 

When you think about it, there’s no “there” anywhere.  Everything is “here.”  Where I sit I’m “here” and you’re “there”. But where you sit, you’re “here” and I'm "there".  But I’m telling you, I just checked and I’m right “here”.   I had a dramatic lesson in location in June of 1975. Until that trip I had never been in a “foreign country.”  And there I was in Zurich, Switzerland.  I was “there” in a foreign country.  The problem came when I got turned around in downtown  Zurich.  I spoke no Swiss and the people I talked to spoke no English.  Nobody was able to give me directions and I had a choir bus to catch in twenty minutes.  I was in the twilight zone. The thing that quickly became painfully clear was that I was not in a “foreign country.”  I was a foreigner in their home.  They all knew exactly where they were and understood each other perfectly well. I was the one who didn't belong.

Astrophysicists will also tell you that you are “here”.  They say that since nowhere is the center of universe then anywhere and everywhere is the center of the universe.  Imagine that you have an enormous map the size of the universe on your wall and there’s one of those arrows that says “You are here.” And when you move, the arrow moves with you.  When American Indians perform those tribal circular dances, they are celebrating that they have become the center of the universe.  The universe is bowing to them. The dance doesn’t just represent the center of the universe, it is the actual center of the universe. There is in fact a there, there. But for them, it's here.

Maybe it's neither here nor there, but at the end of the day we all say things we think are original when we're just quoting somebody else. And I'll tell  you this. If you get lost in Zurich, find a policeman. He can  speak a little English.  Besides you aren't very lost after all. Your hotel is less than three blocks away and you won't miss your bus. And somewhere far, far away your grandmother is patting your shoulder and saying "There, there. That wasn't  so bad, was it?"