In Memorium: Jay-Ottawa

 It's with great sadness that I announce the death of John Janitz, whom the regulars here at Sardonicky knew very well as the prolific commenter "Jay-Ottawa."

He passed away in hospice care at the age of 87 in his home town of Gatineau, Quebec (which is right across the river from Ottawa proper) only a few weeks after being diagnosed with stage four cancer. 

As his quite entertaining obituary recounts, John had a "checkered career" beginning with a stint in the US Army and later with teaching at the college level, university library research, and work at the New York State Labor Dept. then finally switching permanently to ICU nursing before his retirement- if you can even call it a retirement. His last job, undertaken well into his 80s, was translating a book about Swiss Catholic philosopher Maurice Zundel from French into English. When I agreed to proofread and edit the manuscript, I found that very little of it needed any finessing at all.

It was only late last month that he told me - in the last email that he ever wrote to me, following up on my question about his last blog comment referencing Thomas Merton - that he himself had entered a monastery upon leaving the army. He stayed in the cloister for two years, opting not to take his final vows due to the requirement for absolute silence in the order.

 As he has displayed so often right here in these pages, staying silent was never an option for John!

Besides penning many hundreds of acerbic, refreshingly angry and often hilarious comments on this blog (there are few of the more than thousand pieces I have published that didn't contain a comment from him) John also wrote several guest posts which I will excerpt or link to at the end of this entry.

As a matter of fact, I never even would have started this blog 11 years ago had it not been for John's prodding. He'd written to me after reading my own comments in the New York Times and encouraged me to expand my political writing into a less restrictive and censorious venue. I will always be grateful for his ongoing support and friendship and suggestions over the years.

My condolences go out to John's wife Leticia and to his extended family. He was one of a kind, and will be deeply missed by what I know are his many, many friends and admirers and discussion-mates and fellow iconoclasts right here on Sardonicky.

Now, without further ado, here are just a few excerpts from, and links to, Jay-Ottawa's Greatest Hits, the Early Years.(For the complete library of Jay-Ottawisms, just scroll back through the month/year roster on your right, and hit any given entry published in last 11 years. Chances are, he'll be there in the comments section!

The Varieties of Pride (12/11/15)

"WASHINGTON — One key indicator of the health of the US aerospace and defense sector, foreign military sales rose to a record high of $46.6 billion for fiscal 2015, but US officials are warning of a dip in sales next year."

Dollars and contracting officers may be standard measures on the progress charts, but there are other indicators that the business of war is booming.  The arms export business is a fillip to sectors found on the fringes of war, many of them nonprofits, like Doctors Without Borders (MSF) or the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).  They also complain about not keeping up the pace.

Nothing changes.  All year round planes loaded with small arms and ammo lift off from the States and head east to the most lucrative trouble spots.  Ships loaded with the heavier stuff  cast off and head east with tanks, howitzers and drones, batteries included, some assembly necessary upon arrival.  All in time for Christmas if you order now.  Some of us wonder whether these exports will ever end.  Bon voyage, exports, down to the last round for whomever you're aiming to take out tomorrow.

Musings of the Lucky Man Who Thought He Was Self-Made (1/5/14)  This is modeled after Hamlet's soliloquy. A sampling: "What blameworthy fools/Those born unlucky/Short of physical wholeness/Short on intellect/Short of connected friends/Blind to the balanced view/What fools to have picked/As their Starting Line/Of all places/The doorstep of Want."

Where Is the American Anna? (8/20/11)

Something more is needed to whip up an effective level of attention.  I’m about to tell you what that is.  Given the nature of the world and the needs of politics, what we sorely lack is a hero.  To turn the country around we need intelligence and justice and commitment incarnate in human form – we need an ‘Anna’ -- a hero of integrity who is a visionary, who is not reluctant to use power, who is determined to turn the ship of state around before the current crew runs it up on a sand bar to be cut up and carted away.  Progressives need a person of the first rank in the front ranks of reform.  Until a hero steps forward the intellectuals are as doomed as the ignorant.  Awareness never saved timid kings from the falling axe.  Why should it spare us who wail and wring our hands in the bottom half of the economic pyramid?

The Right Stuff, 1/26/2012. An appreciation of the late Czech president Vaclav Havel, contrasting his vision of hope and change and truth with the shallow rhetoric of the then-US president.

The Allegory of the Wise Counselor, 7/3/11: John often used the moniker TLote (the Lesser of Two Evils) rationale for voting Democrat in his commentary. Here he does a full-on riff on the concept, pairing "Lote" with his abused spouse Columbia (Colie) The piece is as fresh now as it was 10 years ago. Until you get a chance read the whole thing, here's a teaser:

To hope forever is hell. So Colie, now in rags, ran off to the last shelter in town. Its motto was: “Do Not Complain” -- or DNC for short. Winnie Poop, the head counselor, heard Colie’s story and told her to run back to Lote’s arms.

“Really?” Colie was incredulous.

“Be realistic,” said the counselor. “Can’t you see your future will be even more bleak apart from Lote? You will end up on welfare, lose the kids, and spend your last days under a bridge. Do you realize you need major party affiliation to secure the best spots under bridges? Lote was committed to you. Count the emails begging you to come back. That’s more than you can expect from most guys these days. Believe me, in these times, you should not depend on the kindness of strangers.

And last but not least, here is John's valedictory, written from his deathbed at 4:30 in the morning on January 16th. He was eloquent to  the very end::

Sardonicky does well in its aim to shine light on the false values and illusions that immiserate and destroy life. Thomas Merton did the same in his late writing. His output was tremendous and he covered the horizon. His writing had room not only to say NO, but to say YES.

He was also an authority on James Joyce and published articles and reviews about Joyce in leading scholarly publications, even as a monk. I find it amusing that he copied the template of a naughty passage near the end of Ulysses to temper his NOs with many passionate YESes.

If I say NO to all these secular forces, I also say YES to all that is good in the world and in human beings. I say YES to all that is beautiful in nature, and in order that this may be the "yes" of a freedom and not of subjection. I must refuse to possess anything in the world purely as my own. I say YES to all the men and women who are my brothers and sisters in the world, but for this "yes" to be an assent of freedom and not subjection. I must live so that no one of them may seem to belong to me, and that I may not belong to any of them. It is because I want to be more to them than a friend that I become to all of them, a stranger.
Quoted in William Shannon, Silent Lamp, 262.