Re: RE- Shall I continue...

To: "'Tesla List'" <tesla-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com>
Subject: Re: RE- Shall I continue...
From: Tesla List <tesla-at-stic-dot-net>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 1997 22:17:54 -0600
Approved: tesla-at-stic-dot-net

From: 	Robert Michaels[SMTP:robert.michaels-at-online.sme-dot-org]
Sent: 	Saturday, November 22, 1997 3:23 AM
To: 	tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
Subject: 	RE- Shall I continue...

This message was originally addressed to TOM_MCGAHEE-at-SIGMAIS.COM
and a carbon copy was sent to you.
                    ----------------------------------------
TL>From:  Thomas McGahee[SMTP:tom_mcgahee-at-sigmais-dot-com]
TL>Subject:  Shall I continue...

TL>Fellow Coilers,

 [ ... ]

TL>I happen to have taken vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
TL>I do not expect that all of you on this list will necessarily

        I think I can relate -- I've taken a few "vows" myself
        and I understand "poverty"  (I get a lesson in it every
        time I go to buy a capacitor or transformer).  We are
        all obedient to the Law (That of the Lord and that of
        physics).   Chastity --- er, could we, um, discuss that
        sometime later?

 [ ... ]

TL>It would go a long way towards helping to convince him that this
TL>is money well spent if I can show him that my involvement has
TL>not only been an enjoyable experience for *me*, but that it has
TL>also been beneficial to others.

        This what you appear like on This List:

        That is, I will perform the role of a mirror and reflect
        back to you the image that you are sending out --

        Your contribution is that of a sober, reliable, stabilizing
        influence.  Many set stock by what you write and the fact
        that it was  =you=  who wrote it.   For some this no doubt
        stems from your station in life, but it goes beyond that.

        There is a certain ring of veracity in how and what
        you write tho such is hard to quantify and objectively
        describe.  Yours is patently not the prattle of the naive or
        uninformed, nor the free-wheeling kill-it, steal-it, take-it,
        risk-it, damn-it-the-hell-with-it philosophy of more than a few.
        In short you are to This List what an rf ground is to a Tesla
        coil: A calm, clear, zero-point reference around  which
        swirls a lot of (sometimes ill-conceived or understood)
        verbal discharges.

        In this, yours is a role on This List not unlike that
        of the church itself in society as a whole:  a stabilizing
        reference point against which other activity may be
        compared, judged, better understood, seen for what it
        is.  (And this even for many non-church-goers.)

        I personally owe you a debt of gratitude.  Without your
        reasoned, measured contributions, my own would be all
        the less acceptable.  You provide a counterbalance
        against my own edgy, sometimes-confrontational,
        irreverent, envelope-pushing, and not-infrequently
        naughty outpourings.   Without the neutralizing effect
        of your writings, few would suffer mine to exist.

                If everyone wrote as  =I=  do it would be one
                runaway-freight-train of a List.

                If everyone wrote as  =you=  do -- it would still
                be a fine List (tho perhaps not as entertaining ??).

        If you were disappear from This List would it be felt?

        If the church were to disappear from society would it
        be felt?

        It would be felt like an ice-storm in August:  immediately,
        profoundly, and chilling in ways unrelated to temperature.

                                        Keeping the physics (and
                                        the faith), yours in Tesla,

                                        Robert Michaels
                                        Detroit, USA

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