I cannot comprehend the sense of loss that has overtaken Newtown, Connecticut. The very idea of 20 six and seven year old children shot repeatedly to death, along with six adults who lived their commitments to children every day, is more than I can or want to get my mind around. My life is about my children and granddaughter, and my wife who offers speech therapy in a school, my mother who taught elementary school, my sister who home schools her twins, my sister-in-law who teaches day school. I grieve for the families, but I cannot imagine what they are going through.
But we, in the broader American community, need to shut the hell up.
My president, for whom I have voted twice, just said to them that we are all heartbroken with them, that we are with them, that they are not alone. He is lying.
Barack Obama has had nothing to say or do about guns in this culture in four years as our president. The members of Congress have done nothing but the bought and paid for will of the National Rifle Association on the one hand, and cower for fear of an NRA-financed opponent on the other.
We have decided, as a nation, to sell out our ability to send our children to school safely, to go to a movie safely, to attend university safely, to meet our congressional representative or go the grocery safely. Those who still participate in public worship of whatever god they profess to believe in cannot even go about that worship safely any more.
We cannot go about our lives any more with any reasonable expectation of safety, because we Americans have chosen our god. It is guns.
Because we men have to have quick and easy access to what Dirty Harry threw around to compensate for our tiny penises, Adam Lanza was able to kill 26 people on Friday. He did all of it with legal, registered guns that his mom had. She liked to target shoot. She became his first target. He hit that target, repeatedly, before going to school.
Because we citizens have chosen an absurd, utterly bizarre reading of our Constitution that is based on nothing but pandering to the NRA and the mentally ill community that believes that we are mere moments from Stalin-like control by our government, we truly have no problem with what happened in Newtown. Or Aurora. Or Wisconsin, Or Columbine, Or Virginia Tech, or...or...or........
We have chosen to allow the world's most successful trade organization, the National Rifle Association, to sponsor, aid and abet every one of these mass murders and any that are percolating for the future, so that their clients can trade their product uninhibited. Because we have chosen to subscribe to a perverted notion of what constitutes freedom, we just really don't mind when this sort of thing happens. It is going to happen again. It probably won't be very far into the future.
And, once again, there will be fake hand-wringing, dishonest tears, a false show of grief and every other kind of bullshit imagineable and un. But what there will not be is one bit of action that will actually stop this sort of thing from happening again in the days to come. And happen, and happen, and happen.
Cause I'm a sum-bitchin' 'Murican, and I can have all the sum-bitchin' guns I want!
Bow before your god, America! And save your tears for something you mean.
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Books
I do not know where they came from. My parents may have bought them for me, or maybe my grandparents. They could have been from my mother's teaching materials. Perhaps they passed through the hands of one or more of my uncles before reaching me. They were my first books. They comprised a series of biographies of prominent Americans. Not the George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln-type pantheon; these books were on Robert Fulton and the steam engine, Eli Whitney and the cotton gin, great figures of American industrialization. And they were awesome!
In very short order, Fulton's engine powered the riverboats that led to Mark Twain, who led to The West and everything that was smart funny. Whitney's gin led to the world that cotton made: The South, plantations, the abomination of slavery, Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, The Harlem Renaissance, Jazz, lynching, Brown v. Board of Education, Thurgood Marshall and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who was murdered in my hometown right in the middle of my childhood, and all of this reading, all of these books.
I just never cared about Kidnapped or Treasure Island. The real world was always more interesting, scarier, more thrilling and more heartbreaking than things that anyone made up.
I have never asked them, but I have often wondered why my parents let me run. I cannot describe my good fortune in having those two wonderful people at home who, no matter what they may have thought or felt out of my hearing, never made me feel weird for reading all the time, or reading what I wanted to read all the time. I don't know how many first-graders were reading Strength to Love, and I certainly didn't get all those words, but what words they were! And still are. Anyway, when Mrs. Willis, first grade at Idlewild Elementary, objected to my reading during spelling tests, I never got in trouble at home.
As I am basically ignorant of the language of architecture, I don't know the proper name for them, but we lived in those years in a house of the type you still find all over mid-town Memphis. The St. John's associate pastor's parsonage was on Harbert, east of McLean. That meant two things: lots of nooks and crannies inside and out perfect for sitting and reading where little brother and baby sister weren't, and we were just a couple of blocks from the Memphis Public Library. The new, Hooks Library is great, but it will never be my library. Mine sat on Peabody at McLean. It was a wonderful old building to me, its modern style notwithstanding, with the whole world inside it, in the pages of what seemed like its miles and miles of books. The bike racks out front told me before I ever got inside that kids were welcomed there. The Library was my Fortress of Solitude, even though it was always full of people. I was fascinated at the feeding of the microfilm into the reader to reveal what had gone on before, seemingly to the beginning of time. The card catalogue seemed like an enormous treasure box, because it was, surrendering the next golden nugget of a book that would become the next adventure or port of call or shoes to fill for just a little while. I loved the way that the place smelled. Books had that odor-a little bit musty, slightly damp, that smelled like knowledge. I just wanted to know all that stuff that was hidden in those books that I didn't know. Yet. I doubt that children ever smell that smell today, with acid-free paper and total climate control. It is a tragic loss of the sense of place. A place of books.
I bought my first book in 1969. Eastside Elementary, like schools all over America, got the Scholastic Books fliers, handed out in all the classes in case we wanted to place an order. I did. For a couple of bucks, I became the extremely proud possesser of a copy of Strange But True Baseball Stories For Boys by Atlanta's great sportswriter, the late Furman Bisher. I can still remember turning it over in my hands, soaking in the weight and texture of my very own book. To this day, I get a rush holding a new book.
I can remember the towns by the libraries. Union City, Benton, Jackson, Covington, back to Memphis. In each one, very helpful librarians seemed very happy at being asked where the history section was, or the baseball, or the politics. Not so much, the work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. I was eleven during the 1972 presidential campaign. I understood that Nixon was a bastard. I was also very impressed with Senator George McGovern. I could not understand why stopping the war in Viet Nam would be a bad thing. I still don't. I could not understand why asking the wealthiest Americans to help a little more to provide for people in desperate need was a bad thing. I still can't
But my political education came in two pieces in the almost two years from when Tricky Dick the Crook got re-elected until he resigned, disgraced: the Watergate Hearings, and Hunter Thompson's furious Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72. Senator Sam Irvin's committee was fascinating. Thompson's book was mind-bending. Thompson's access was shocking. Did Nixon's people really talk like that? (Yes, and, if anything, he was worse!) Could McGovern really be that honest and decent? (Yes, and, if anything, better!) For Thompson, politics was ultimate reality. It was stranger than any drug trip. It was more absurd than any joke. The very fact that a man like Nixon could so resoundingly defeat a man like McGovern says everything that can ever be said about the intelligence of the average American voter. Or lack thereof. But Thompson's work, for all of its seeming cynicism, is a deeply idealistic book. The searcher doesn't give up. He just keeps looking, always believing that next time, the story will come out right.
Almost like a motto for a reader...
To Be Continued.
In very short order, Fulton's engine powered the riverboats that led to Mark Twain, who led to The West and everything that was smart funny. Whitney's gin led to the world that cotton made: The South, plantations, the abomination of slavery, Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, The Harlem Renaissance, Jazz, lynching, Brown v. Board of Education, Thurgood Marshall and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who was murdered in my hometown right in the middle of my childhood, and all of this reading, all of these books.
I just never cared about Kidnapped or Treasure Island. The real world was always more interesting, scarier, more thrilling and more heartbreaking than things that anyone made up.
I have never asked them, but I have often wondered why my parents let me run. I cannot describe my good fortune in having those two wonderful people at home who, no matter what they may have thought or felt out of my hearing, never made me feel weird for reading all the time, or reading what I wanted to read all the time. I don't know how many first-graders were reading Strength to Love, and I certainly didn't get all those words, but what words they were! And still are. Anyway, when Mrs. Willis, first grade at Idlewild Elementary, objected to my reading during spelling tests, I never got in trouble at home.
As I am basically ignorant of the language of architecture, I don't know the proper name for them, but we lived in those years in a house of the type you still find all over mid-town Memphis. The St. John's associate pastor's parsonage was on Harbert, east of McLean. That meant two things: lots of nooks and crannies inside and out perfect for sitting and reading where little brother and baby sister weren't, and we were just a couple of blocks from the Memphis Public Library. The new, Hooks Library is great, but it will never be my library. Mine sat on Peabody at McLean. It was a wonderful old building to me, its modern style notwithstanding, with the whole world inside it, in the pages of what seemed like its miles and miles of books. The bike racks out front told me before I ever got inside that kids were welcomed there. The Library was my Fortress of Solitude, even though it was always full of people. I was fascinated at the feeding of the microfilm into the reader to reveal what had gone on before, seemingly to the beginning of time. The card catalogue seemed like an enormous treasure box, because it was, surrendering the next golden nugget of a book that would become the next adventure or port of call or shoes to fill for just a little while. I loved the way that the place smelled. Books had that odor-a little bit musty, slightly damp, that smelled like knowledge. I just wanted to know all that stuff that was hidden in those books that I didn't know. Yet. I doubt that children ever smell that smell today, with acid-free paper and total climate control. It is a tragic loss of the sense of place. A place of books.
I bought my first book in 1969. Eastside Elementary, like schools all over America, got the Scholastic Books fliers, handed out in all the classes in case we wanted to place an order. I did. For a couple of bucks, I became the extremely proud possesser of a copy of Strange But True Baseball Stories For Boys by Atlanta's great sportswriter, the late Furman Bisher. I can still remember turning it over in my hands, soaking in the weight and texture of my very own book. To this day, I get a rush holding a new book.
I can remember the towns by the libraries. Union City, Benton, Jackson, Covington, back to Memphis. In each one, very helpful librarians seemed very happy at being asked where the history section was, or the baseball, or the politics. Not so much, the work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. I was eleven during the 1972 presidential campaign. I understood that Nixon was a bastard. I was also very impressed with Senator George McGovern. I could not understand why stopping the war in Viet Nam would be a bad thing. I still don't. I could not understand why asking the wealthiest Americans to help a little more to provide for people in desperate need was a bad thing. I still can't
But my political education came in two pieces in the almost two years from when Tricky Dick the Crook got re-elected until he resigned, disgraced: the Watergate Hearings, and Hunter Thompson's furious Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72. Senator Sam Irvin's committee was fascinating. Thompson's book was mind-bending. Thompson's access was shocking. Did Nixon's people really talk like that? (Yes, and, if anything, he was worse!) Could McGovern really be that honest and decent? (Yes, and, if anything, better!) For Thompson, politics was ultimate reality. It was stranger than any drug trip. It was more absurd than any joke. The very fact that a man like Nixon could so resoundingly defeat a man like McGovern says everything that can ever be said about the intelligence of the average American voter. Or lack thereof. But Thompson's work, for all of its seeming cynicism, is a deeply idealistic book. The searcher doesn't give up. He just keeps looking, always believing that next time, the story will come out right.
Almost like a motto for a reader...
To Be Continued.
Friday, September 21, 2012
Gun!
If you live in my neighborhood and last night watched what passes for news locally, you were informed that one of our students brought a gun to school yesterday. The story had the requisite outrage that parents weren't notified more quickly, this, in spite of the fact that the reporter had time to get to our campus and find people to interview IN BROAD DAYLIGHT. There was the one funny part of the story: citizens stunned by the report, claiming "This can't happen in _______________!" which is ludicrously absurd whether it is spoken in Collierville, Germantown, Memphis proper, or our little suburb. Kids find guns wherever there are kids who get angry or feel threatened, and guns. And, after all, that's the American Way. But I'm not here at the moment to tell you what I think of the money-grubbing, bullshit-spewing, death machine of a trade association called the National Rifle Association, which rules this country by fiat, leaving a mountain of corpses in its wake each year that the late Osama bin Laden could only dream of and admire. And, parenthetically, can you imagine the right-wing nutjobs' utter moral outrage if Al Qaeda killed all the Americans annually that the NRA does? Hey! That's got to be the explanation! That damned Moslem terrorist Obama hasn't taken all the guns away, so that Americans will kill each other FOR the terrorists! Yeah, that's the ticket!
Anyway, the point here is that our people handled it right. I never even knew anything had happened yesterday until last night's news, and I was in the building where and when it happened. According to the dopes on channel 3, a student had the good sense to tell an adult that a classmate had the thing, the teacher told the principals, it was handled and no one was injured or endangered. The police dealt with the student who brought it. End of story, no tragedy! Sorry, local news!
I quickly came to the conclusion, after coming to work here almost a year ago, that this school and community are fortunate to have this principal, these assistant principals, and this faculty and staff teaching and caring for their children.
Yesterday just underlined that conviction, and put a few exclamation points at the end of the sentence!
Anyway, the point here is that our people handled it right. I never even knew anything had happened yesterday until last night's news, and I was in the building where and when it happened. According to the dopes on channel 3, a student had the good sense to tell an adult that a classmate had the thing, the teacher told the principals, it was handled and no one was injured or endangered. The police dealt with the student who brought it. End of story, no tragedy! Sorry, local news!
I quickly came to the conclusion, after coming to work here almost a year ago, that this school and community are fortunate to have this principal, these assistant principals, and this faculty and staff teaching and caring for their children.
Yesterday just underlined that conviction, and put a few exclamation points at the end of the sentence!
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Religion, Outrage, Murder
Religion is absurd. Before anything else, let's be honest about that. "Treat other people the way that you want to be treated." Really? In this economy? Ludicrous! "If someone slaps you on one side of your face, offer them the other side so they can do it again." Riiiiiiiight! Just after I get through knocking their teeth down their throat. "Eat my body and drink my blood to remember me." Uh, thanks Mr. Donner, but my memory works just fine on its own.
"You're just another anti-christian liberal making fun of mypersonallordandsaviorjesuschrist!" Could be. But just to be fair and balanced..."OK, now all of you guys line up. We're going to cut some loose skin off your business. You'll never miss it. And this will hurt me more than...forget that part. Now, this will show...that...you are devoted to me! Yeah, that's the ticket." "Alright, good. Moses, I appreciate you doing this for me. Oh, and, no offense, but since you've agreed to make this little trip for me and risk your fugitive life mouthing off at Pharaoh, I'm going to try to kill you tonight, out of gratitude, I guess." "Hey, Abe, you know that kid I promised you? The one you waited so long for? Take him off by yourselves and slit his throat for me, just to kiss my ass a little bit, OK?" Still too close to home? How about this: a local good for nothing found golden tablets containing a third testament of Holy Words (two magic books not being enough) which just happen to tell him that god said he could marry as many women as he could con...I mean as many women as he wanted to marry. And he and his followers would be run out of every decent...I mean, make a pilgrimmage to...Utah (Freaking Utah!?!) where they will proclaim themselves the (way, way) lost tribe of Israel and start a really kick-ass choir, and..." Oh, shut up! And quit knocking on my door. And some of you people really want one of these nuts running the country? What, you couldn't find any of the Hale-Bopp crew? Oops, I guess they're all still dead waiting to be picked up by the comet. Anyway.
Here's the deal: to anybody who is not of your religion, you look and sound like somebody in need of a white coat and butterfly net. And you won't be holding the handle! And it doesn't make any difference what your religion is. Those who don't know your code or buy into your story think you are whacko.
But that doesn't mean you should be whacked.
Somebody made a tacky movie that made fun of Mohammed. Whoop-ti-do! I tend to find that whole "fly an airplane into a building, get eternity with 70 virgins" thing as ridiculous as anything humanity has EVER come up with. Except that 3,000 people wound up dead over it 11 years ago, and four more were murdered over religion last night. People in Libya killed the American ambassador and three embassy staff members. Because somebody made fun of Mohammed.
Mohammed must be one uptight bastard. Like that mormon asshole who declared that our christian American President had sympathy for the murderers of Chris Stevens and the other Americans, but didn't care beans about those people who'd been sent there by this same President. But, then again, you'd get the idea that jesus and his dad didn't have much sense of humor, either, if you just listened to the loudmouths on tv purporting to know the thoughts of whatever deity they claim to manage like Willard Romney is handled these days.
One thing I do know: if one or more of these gods actually exist, and actually have any power, she/he/they have an awesome sense of humor! How do I know? Because all these people who run all these religions into the ground are still running around!
Lighten up, Francis!
"You're just another anti-christian liberal making fun of mypersonallordandsaviorjesuschrist!" Could be. But just to be fair and balanced..."OK, now all of you guys line up. We're going to cut some loose skin off your business. You'll never miss it. And this will hurt me more than...forget that part. Now, this will show...that...you are devoted to me! Yeah, that's the ticket." "Alright, good. Moses, I appreciate you doing this for me. Oh, and, no offense, but since you've agreed to make this little trip for me and risk your fugitive life mouthing off at Pharaoh, I'm going to try to kill you tonight, out of gratitude, I guess." "Hey, Abe, you know that kid I promised you? The one you waited so long for? Take him off by yourselves and slit his throat for me, just to kiss my ass a little bit, OK?" Still too close to home? How about this: a local good for nothing found golden tablets containing a third testament of Holy Words (two magic books not being enough) which just happen to tell him that god said he could marry as many women as he could con...I mean as many women as he wanted to marry. And he and his followers would be run out of every decent...I mean, make a pilgrimmage to...Utah (Freaking Utah!?!) where they will proclaim themselves the (way, way) lost tribe of Israel and start a really kick-ass choir, and..." Oh, shut up! And quit knocking on my door. And some of you people really want one of these nuts running the country? What, you couldn't find any of the Hale-Bopp crew? Oops, I guess they're all still dead waiting to be picked up by the comet. Anyway.
Here's the deal: to anybody who is not of your religion, you look and sound like somebody in need of a white coat and butterfly net. And you won't be holding the handle! And it doesn't make any difference what your religion is. Those who don't know your code or buy into your story think you are whacko.
But that doesn't mean you should be whacked.
Somebody made a tacky movie that made fun of Mohammed. Whoop-ti-do! I tend to find that whole "fly an airplane into a building, get eternity with 70 virgins" thing as ridiculous as anything humanity has EVER come up with. Except that 3,000 people wound up dead over it 11 years ago, and four more were murdered over religion last night. People in Libya killed the American ambassador and three embassy staff members. Because somebody made fun of Mohammed.
Mohammed must be one uptight bastard. Like that mormon asshole who declared that our christian American President had sympathy for the murderers of Chris Stevens and the other Americans, but didn't care beans about those people who'd been sent there by this same President. But, then again, you'd get the idea that jesus and his dad didn't have much sense of humor, either, if you just listened to the loudmouths on tv purporting to know the thoughts of whatever deity they claim to manage like Willard Romney is handled these days.
One thing I do know: if one or more of these gods actually exist, and actually have any power, she/he/they have an awesome sense of humor! How do I know? Because all these people who run all these religions into the ground are still running around!
Lighten up, Francis!
Sunday, July 22, 2012
What we do and who we are
There was the farmer in Kentucky. A veteran of Omaha Beach in Memphis. A radiator man in an outlying county. A couple of retired preacher friends. A foreman in Raleigh. An attorney from Midtown. These old men stand out among a bunch of others who shared their struggles with identity over the years. In each instance, they were wrestling with the problem of who they were apart from their careers. Once the domain of men, now a plague open to women, too, we define ourselves by what we do. I've thought that it had to do with avoiding who we are, as much as anything.
The last couple of years I've wondered what I sounded like to them. In a couple of those instances, I was in my mid-20s. Young and stupid. They must have known it. All but one were far too gracious to say it. The one who wasn't, well, I lied my way through his funeral for the sake of his family, which is more consideration than he ever gave them.
In my 50s now, after the last couple of years, I know some things about their struggle that I could only imagine before. I ceased to be a contributing partner in my household two years ago. The vultures who were then in control of my life cut my income almost in half. A year later, they came back to do more and I walked. Always the courage of my convictions here! Anybody else notice there was an economic meltdown, with a jobless recovery behind it? I guess I didn't.
That, of course, isn't true. I knew times were bad. I just wasn't going to let the former employers make our times any worse. Finding any kind of job was a challenge. After several months, finally, one came along, but I hadn't worked a minimum wage job since I was 15. My parents helped out, but there are limits. We hit them.
Then came summer. Teachers aren't overpaid, by any non-Tea Party definition, but teachers' assistants don't look forward to summer the same way teachers do. I thought last year was tough. This summer has taught me about tough.
The toughest part of the whole thing has been our kids. One has arthritis in her back, aggravated by her work waiting tables. She has no insurance. One decided that the job he trained for isn't at all what he wants to do. That happens with young people. The other is heading back to school this fall and living with my parents. Those are all things I expected to be able to take care of by this stage of life.
Not so much.
A woman I was once married to caused a bit of a stir a while back when, after two marriages that produced children, she announced on Facebook that with the current boyfriend, she is "finally in love for the first time in [her] life." Even if it is true, I don't think I'd have thrown that out there in public for my kids to read. However, I believe it. Because I know what it feels like to be loved now. Grandmommie has held me, and our family, together through all of this time. She was the first to insist that I was worth more than the way I was being treated in the previous job. When I fall into guilty feelings, still, about not earning, not helping the kids, not making life a little easier for her, she is still the one who tells me to knock it off, as "We would never go back to those people!" She rides with me to put in the next application, telling me that something is going to work, it is going to be alright. I can't always see what she seems to be seeing, but she sounds like she knows what she's talking about.
I'm wrestling with these identity questions hour by hour. I have had days like that one George Bailey had in It's A Wonderful Life. The only difference is, I'm not worth more dead than alive, as I don't even have the life insurance policy. I lectured all those old guys about how their worth wasn't in what they did, earned or produced, but rather in the love their family carried for them. Turns out, I was right.
But it's still tough.
The last couple of years I've wondered what I sounded like to them. In a couple of those instances, I was in my mid-20s. Young and stupid. They must have known it. All but one were far too gracious to say it. The one who wasn't, well, I lied my way through his funeral for the sake of his family, which is more consideration than he ever gave them.
In my 50s now, after the last couple of years, I know some things about their struggle that I could only imagine before. I ceased to be a contributing partner in my household two years ago. The vultures who were then in control of my life cut my income almost in half. A year later, they came back to do more and I walked. Always the courage of my convictions here! Anybody else notice there was an economic meltdown, with a jobless recovery behind it? I guess I didn't.
That, of course, isn't true. I knew times were bad. I just wasn't going to let the former employers make our times any worse. Finding any kind of job was a challenge. After several months, finally, one came along, but I hadn't worked a minimum wage job since I was 15. My parents helped out, but there are limits. We hit them.
Then came summer. Teachers aren't overpaid, by any non-Tea Party definition, but teachers' assistants don't look forward to summer the same way teachers do. I thought last year was tough. This summer has taught me about tough.
The toughest part of the whole thing has been our kids. One has arthritis in her back, aggravated by her work waiting tables. She has no insurance. One decided that the job he trained for isn't at all what he wants to do. That happens with young people. The other is heading back to school this fall and living with my parents. Those are all things I expected to be able to take care of by this stage of life.
Not so much.
A woman I was once married to caused a bit of a stir a while back when, after two marriages that produced children, she announced on Facebook that with the current boyfriend, she is "finally in love for the first time in [her] life." Even if it is true, I don't think I'd have thrown that out there in public for my kids to read. However, I believe it. Because I know what it feels like to be loved now. Grandmommie has held me, and our family, together through all of this time. She was the first to insist that I was worth more than the way I was being treated in the previous job. When I fall into guilty feelings, still, about not earning, not helping the kids, not making life a little easier for her, she is still the one who tells me to knock it off, as "We would never go back to those people!" She rides with me to put in the next application, telling me that something is going to work, it is going to be alright. I can't always see what she seems to be seeing, but she sounds like she knows what she's talking about.
I'm wrestling with these identity questions hour by hour. I have had days like that one George Bailey had in It's A Wonderful Life. The only difference is, I'm not worth more dead than alive, as I don't even have the life insurance policy. I lectured all those old guys about how their worth wasn't in what they did, earned or produced, but rather in the love their family carried for them. Turns out, I was right.
But it's still tough.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
One Year On
I'm celebrating a full year of sobriety today. A solid 366 (leap year) since escaping from the church. Everyday that passes, I'm happier about the decision. I read an absurdly whiny blog today from a former friendly acquaintance who moved into a DS slot a year ago. Like 98.7% of the people who do that, he's now crossed the bar, and just suffering terribly from the hideous preachers who don't appreciate the suffering of the cabinet as that current crop of pompous asses screw with the lives of those who are lectured to "live up to their ordination vows" while injustice upon injustice is heaped upon them. I used to listen to one of those who chastised his district every time we were together about our unwillingness to leave Shelby County. Did I mention that the only appointment he ever served outside the Metro Districts was while he was a student at Lambuth?
Anyway, the gist always seems to be, "If we could just get rid of our workers (preachers), everything would be fine!" You folks "managing" the church, or Bain Capital? They continue down their path of immorality unto death, locally and generally. They are striving again to attach their financial problems to the retired clergy. If only we can strip them of their insurance coverage, then the books will automatically balance, the conferences can merge, and the lion shall lie down with the lamb! What is it that turns preachers of the gospel of jesus christ into republicans with a simple appointment onto a district? Or is it, rather, simply a revelation of the absence of anything christlike in their character that they had managed to keep hidden previously? (And before anybody tells me that I just don't know how tough it is, remember, I watched my grandfather and my father suffer through terms in that very work, sacrificing sleep and health to avoid abusing people the way that it is routinely done today.) Hey, geniuses, you're not standing on the shoulders of giants so you can more easily shit on them! And that's not even to mention the ongoing hypocrisy of this church with its "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors" PR campaign, which means, "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors, as long as you're not gay, don't want to discuss gays, and certainly don't believe in marriage for gays." The DS referenced above said in that same blog entry that resolving what, for many people is an enormous issue of historic injustice, won't fix anything for the church. To put it into terms of your morality: God won't bless anything built on injustice!
The whole "we're following the bible" cover that they now hide behind is simply code for "Tea Party meets here!" And a great deal of that mentality means little more than "We got to get the [black guy] out of the White House." Good luck with that!
And they can't figure out why young people as a whole don't want any part of them? Really?
I'm truly sorry that things have worked out this way. The church that my grandfather served is no more. They stand for nothing progressive, nothing prophetic, and ultimately, nothing faithful. I would never have believed, 30 years ago, that these forces could have such an impact on my church, much less take it over. I feel for the handful of good souls still fighting the good fight. But at this point, it needs to die, to get out of the way. The predicament of a faithful pastor in this conference of this church reminds me of LBJ's desk plaque: If you ain't the lead dog, the view never changes!
Or, in the church words of the Serious Theologian: Ultimately there are two kinds of people. Those who say to God, "Thy will be done." And those to whom God says, "Thy will be done." You're getting what you're asking for. Hope you're happy with it!
It was killing me, breaking my heart. No more!
Anyway, the gist always seems to be, "If we could just get rid of our workers (preachers), everything would be fine!" You folks "managing" the church, or Bain Capital? They continue down their path of immorality unto death, locally and generally. They are striving again to attach their financial problems to the retired clergy. If only we can strip them of their insurance coverage, then the books will automatically balance, the conferences can merge, and the lion shall lie down with the lamb! What is it that turns preachers of the gospel of jesus christ into republicans with a simple appointment onto a district? Or is it, rather, simply a revelation of the absence of anything christlike in their character that they had managed to keep hidden previously? (And before anybody tells me that I just don't know how tough it is, remember, I watched my grandfather and my father suffer through terms in that very work, sacrificing sleep and health to avoid abusing people the way that it is routinely done today.) Hey, geniuses, you're not standing on the shoulders of giants so you can more easily shit on them! And that's not even to mention the ongoing hypocrisy of this church with its "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors" PR campaign, which means, "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors, as long as you're not gay, don't want to discuss gays, and certainly don't believe in marriage for gays." The DS referenced above said in that same blog entry that resolving what, for many people is an enormous issue of historic injustice, won't fix anything for the church. To put it into terms of your morality: God won't bless anything built on injustice!
The whole "we're following the bible" cover that they now hide behind is simply code for "Tea Party meets here!" And a great deal of that mentality means little more than "We got to get the [black guy] out of the White House." Good luck with that!
And they can't figure out why young people as a whole don't want any part of them? Really?
I'm truly sorry that things have worked out this way. The church that my grandfather served is no more. They stand for nothing progressive, nothing prophetic, and ultimately, nothing faithful. I would never have believed, 30 years ago, that these forces could have such an impact on my church, much less take it over. I feel for the handful of good souls still fighting the good fight. But at this point, it needs to die, to get out of the way. The predicament of a faithful pastor in this conference of this church reminds me of LBJ's desk plaque: If you ain't the lead dog, the view never changes!
Or, in the church words of the Serious Theologian: Ultimately there are two kinds of people. Those who say to God, "Thy will be done." And those to whom God says, "Thy will be done." You're getting what you're asking for. Hope you're happy with it!
It was killing me, breaking my heart. No more!
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Music In the Grass!
The real reason for living in Memphis is the music. No surprise there. But a fabulous surprise popped up a few years (I believe three) ago. One of our cultural touchstones and flashpoints for years was the Overton Park Shell. The thing has a fabulous history, but it fell into disrepair. The city didn't have the money to fix it, or wanted to spend the money elsewhere. The Save Our Shell folk were largely folkies, which means that their heart was in the right place, but they had no wallets. Then, magically, the Mortimer Levitt Foundation appeared. Never heard of them? Me, either. And I had no great enthusiasm for a non-local not for profit taking over our Shell. I could only see a brief reprieve before it would be abandoned. Pyramid II, anyone?
Well, how wrong can I be? Pretty darned wrong! The Levitt Foundation is awesome. We are now entering (I think) our fourth season of free concerts every Thursday through Sunday, from mid-May until early July, and then again in September and October, fifty-plus shows in all!
The menu always includes every imaginable genre. Many performers are young and new, but name people are also included. This spring, Jimbo Mathus will be back. Todd Snider makes his annual appearance. Steve Forbert is coming, too. Then, in the fall, this year's benefit will be performed by goddess Emmylou Harris! To quote Matt Damon, "How 'bout them apples?"
This is a family experience for us, as most things are. That is to say, Dancing Baby loves the Shell. She has named this excursion "Music in the Grass." When she could barely walk, she was shaking her little booty to any/every beat in Overton Park. She has been asking for the last three weeks when Music in the Grass is. Tomorrow night, baby, tomorrow night! And the first show, Thursday, is The Stooges Brass, a New Orleans band with horns! That is DB's favorite music. On Friday, The Cedric Burnside Project will play the blues as only a grandson of RL Burnside can. Saturday will bring The Wandering, with Luther Dickinson playing and leading the band, and Amy Levere, Shannon McNally, Sharde Thomas and Valerie June doing the singing. Sunday, it's The Boogers, a group advertised as Barney's nightmare and the antidote for the Wiggles. They make those familiar kids' songs rock!
So, if you can make it down this weekend, and if you're within a hundred-mile radius you should be, look for the precious little three year old who's just jammin' out. That'll be Dancing Baby, in all her glory! And Grandmommie and Granddaddy won't be too far away.
Well, how wrong can I be? Pretty darned wrong! The Levitt Foundation is awesome. We are now entering (I think) our fourth season of free concerts every Thursday through Sunday, from mid-May until early July, and then again in September and October, fifty-plus shows in all!
The menu always includes every imaginable genre. Many performers are young and new, but name people are also included. This spring, Jimbo Mathus will be back. Todd Snider makes his annual appearance. Steve Forbert is coming, too. Then, in the fall, this year's benefit will be performed by goddess Emmylou Harris! To quote Matt Damon, "How 'bout them apples?"
This is a family experience for us, as most things are. That is to say, Dancing Baby loves the Shell. She has named this excursion "Music in the Grass." When she could barely walk, she was shaking her little booty to any/every beat in Overton Park. She has been asking for the last three weeks when Music in the Grass is. Tomorrow night, baby, tomorrow night! And the first show, Thursday, is The Stooges Brass, a New Orleans band with horns! That is DB's favorite music. On Friday, The Cedric Burnside Project will play the blues as only a grandson of RL Burnside can. Saturday will bring The Wandering, with Luther Dickinson playing and leading the band, and Amy Levere, Shannon McNally, Sharde Thomas and Valerie June doing the singing. Sunday, it's The Boogers, a group advertised as Barney's nightmare and the antidote for the Wiggles. They make those familiar kids' songs rock!
So, if you can make it down this weekend, and if you're within a hundred-mile radius you should be, look for the precious little three year old who's just jammin' out. That'll be Dancing Baby, in all her glory! And Grandmommie and Granddaddy won't be too far away.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Levon Helm
The generations that have been shaped by rock and roll have always known death as a close companion. Even before Sam Phillips, Little Richard, Elvis, Ike Turner and the others had the stove turned on, Robert Johnson was hoodooing up a vat of deep blues that would be distilled into one vein of rock. Mr. Johnson was poisoned. Was it a jealous husband? Maybe a boyfriend, or even the woman herself. Or was it the devil, come to collect on a bargain made at the crossroads? Whoever the perpetrator, Robert Johnson left way too much music unplayed.
James Dean seemed rock and roll. He wasn't a musician, but he was young, loud, angry and lonely. That's as rock and roll as it gets. Dean bought it in a fast car, going too fast around a curve. Life in the fast lane, indeed!
Buddy Holly and Richie Valens died in an airplane crash way too young. They were in Iowa in the winter, trying to get to the next gig. Hey, the show must go on, right?
The drug deaths that rock appropriated from jazz came later. Hendrix, Joplin, Morrison, Epstein, Jones, Moon, Bonham...live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse? Motto of the late 60's and 70's! But it didn't stop there. Fat Elvis lived every excess known to humanity. And died from them, too.
John Lennon's murder brought musicians' deaths into uncharted territory. Who'd have ever thought that a rocker would become the target of (depending on how you see John and his killer) a mentally ill obsessive, or an assassin. We learned about John's killing on Monday Night Football, from the ubiquitous Howard Cosell. It became an Event. We wrestle with it still.
The rappers took over the death biz. East Coast v. West Coast, the would-be gangsters shot off their mouths on their albums, and shot up the competition in the streets. Tupac, Biggie and about 197 of their colleagues whose names I don't know or care to know are dead for...what, the bling? Did any of them see 30? Nice work, morons!
There have been others and other circumstances, Cobain and Hutchence and on and on.
But a new day has dawned. We have reached the time when those who've made it through everything else are getting old, or sick, or old and sick. Cash, Dickinson, Zevon, gone from the issues that plague normal people. Just this last year, Sumlin, Willie Big Eyes Smith and Pinetop Perkins are gone at advanced ages. For crying out loud, even The Monkees' Davy Jones just died of a heart attack.
Now, Levon Helm is gone. Levon was homefolks, from just across the river in Arkansas. He grew up on the music we all did in this part of the country, and somehow took all that and fell in with a bunch of Canadians. They played as the Hawks. Backing Ronnie Hawkins. Hawkins and the Hawks. Get it? They were smart and funny but mainly tremendous musicians. So good that Bob Dylan asked them to back him. They were on the scene as Dylan blew music up in 1965 and 1966, being accused of everything in plugging in and, allegedly turning his back on the folkies. Death threats, riots, all kinds of fun accompanied the tour of Dylan and the group now known as The Band. Music from Big Pink, The Basement Tapes, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down, The Weight, Cripple Creek, Rag Mama Rag; how did the Canadian Robbie Robertson write such music for that fabulous, soulful Arkansas voice? Levon drummed, he sang, he played the mandolin, and helped carve out the sound that influenced everybody who came after them. When Dylan went back out in 1974 to do his first shows since 1966, and the motorcycle wreck, he had to have The Band around him. 'Nuf said!
It was all supposed to end with Scorsese's movie, The Last Waltz. The Band's farewell concert is a great movie, although Levon wasn't that wild about it. Helm gathered the boys, minus Robertson, for several more albums and tours, moving even further to the center of the stage. That was a good thing!
In the late 90's, Levon was diagnosed with throat cancer. Wasn't supposed to ever speak again, let alone sing. But somewhere along the line, things started to come together again. And when they did, Levon recorded. He issued Dirt Farmer in 2007 and won the Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Album. 2010 brought Electric Dirt, and another Grammy, this time for Best Americana Album. His last recording, Ramble at the Ryman, took 2011's Grammy in the same category. Pretty good encore, eh?
Levon and his Ramblers played Memphis' Orpheum Theatre on November 10, 2010. It was one of the most joyous concert experiences I've ever known.
A few weeks ago, Levon's family posted a message on his Facebook page that he was in the last stages of his fight against a recurrence of his cancer. He died at home on April 19, five weeks short of his 72nd birthday. Levon lived long and well, and died the same way. I was hoping for a whole lot more music from Levon Helm, but his last teaching was in wrapping things up and celebrating a good life.
"Someday, everything is gonna be smooth like a rhapsody
When I paint my masterpiece."
Dylan wrote it. Levon sang and lived it. We're richer for it.
James Dean seemed rock and roll. He wasn't a musician, but he was young, loud, angry and lonely. That's as rock and roll as it gets. Dean bought it in a fast car, going too fast around a curve. Life in the fast lane, indeed!
Buddy Holly and Richie Valens died in an airplane crash way too young. They were in Iowa in the winter, trying to get to the next gig. Hey, the show must go on, right?
The drug deaths that rock appropriated from jazz came later. Hendrix, Joplin, Morrison, Epstein, Jones, Moon, Bonham...live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse? Motto of the late 60's and 70's! But it didn't stop there. Fat Elvis lived every excess known to humanity. And died from them, too.
John Lennon's murder brought musicians' deaths into uncharted territory. Who'd have ever thought that a rocker would become the target of (depending on how you see John and his killer) a mentally ill obsessive, or an assassin. We learned about John's killing on Monday Night Football, from the ubiquitous Howard Cosell. It became an Event. We wrestle with it still.
The rappers took over the death biz. East Coast v. West Coast, the would-be gangsters shot off their mouths on their albums, and shot up the competition in the streets. Tupac, Biggie and about 197 of their colleagues whose names I don't know or care to know are dead for...what, the bling? Did any of them see 30? Nice work, morons!
There have been others and other circumstances, Cobain and Hutchence and on and on.
But a new day has dawned. We have reached the time when those who've made it through everything else are getting old, or sick, or old and sick. Cash, Dickinson, Zevon, gone from the issues that plague normal people. Just this last year, Sumlin, Willie Big Eyes Smith and Pinetop Perkins are gone at advanced ages. For crying out loud, even The Monkees' Davy Jones just died of a heart attack.
Now, Levon Helm is gone. Levon was homefolks, from just across the river in Arkansas. He grew up on the music we all did in this part of the country, and somehow took all that and fell in with a bunch of Canadians. They played as the Hawks. Backing Ronnie Hawkins. Hawkins and the Hawks. Get it? They were smart and funny but mainly tremendous musicians. So good that Bob Dylan asked them to back him. They were on the scene as Dylan blew music up in 1965 and 1966, being accused of everything in plugging in and, allegedly turning his back on the folkies. Death threats, riots, all kinds of fun accompanied the tour of Dylan and the group now known as The Band. Music from Big Pink, The Basement Tapes, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down, The Weight, Cripple Creek, Rag Mama Rag; how did the Canadian Robbie Robertson write such music for that fabulous, soulful Arkansas voice? Levon drummed, he sang, he played the mandolin, and helped carve out the sound that influenced everybody who came after them. When Dylan went back out in 1974 to do his first shows since 1966, and the motorcycle wreck, he had to have The Band around him. 'Nuf said!
It was all supposed to end with Scorsese's movie, The Last Waltz. The Band's farewell concert is a great movie, although Levon wasn't that wild about it. Helm gathered the boys, minus Robertson, for several more albums and tours, moving even further to the center of the stage. That was a good thing!
In the late 90's, Levon was diagnosed with throat cancer. Wasn't supposed to ever speak again, let alone sing. But somewhere along the line, things started to come together again. And when they did, Levon recorded. He issued Dirt Farmer in 2007 and won the Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Album. 2010 brought Electric Dirt, and another Grammy, this time for Best Americana Album. His last recording, Ramble at the Ryman, took 2011's Grammy in the same category. Pretty good encore, eh?
Levon and his Ramblers played Memphis' Orpheum Theatre on November 10, 2010. It was one of the most joyous concert experiences I've ever known.
A few weeks ago, Levon's family posted a message on his Facebook page that he was in the last stages of his fight against a recurrence of his cancer. He died at home on April 19, five weeks short of his 72nd birthday. Levon lived long and well, and died the same way. I was hoping for a whole lot more music from Levon Helm, but his last teaching was in wrapping things up and celebrating a good life.
"Someday, everything is gonna be smooth like a rhapsody
When I paint my masterpiece."
Dylan wrote it. Levon sang and lived it. We're richer for it.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
10 Months
Hi. I'm Joe. I'm a recovering christian. And today, April 19, 2012, I have been clean for ten months.
I walked out of the church on Fathers' Day last June and have stayed out and away ever since. A couple of times early on, it was difficult, because I had developed habits over 30 years that, while destructive and painful, were very, very familiar. Those comfort zones are hard to step out of, even when they are killing us, and they surely were killing me, one miserable day at a time.
Ten months later, my blood pressure is corrected. I haven't had but one migraine headache in all this time, where the routine had become 3 to 5 per week. An awful lot of the frustration and anger that had become my constant companions are just distant memories now. I feel better than I'd felt in, perhaps, 25 years.
I have a new job. I work for people of integrity and honor, which I hadn't believed in at least a decade, previously. The schools bring their own challenges, but there is never a day when I feel that I am mission-less, making no difference in a deadend, dying institution. The stress level in my life is now miniscule.
The hebrew bible tells the story of Joseph. You know, the guy with the technicolor dreamcoat. No, not Donny Osmond, but the character he portrayed. Joseph had a bunch of the sorriest brothers the world has ever had to offer. They wanted to kill him, but were a few cojones short. So they sold him into slavery. Years later, we're told, the tables turned and the rich and powerful Joseph found those bastards in the palm of his hands. He screwed with them a little, but in the end, let them off the hook. He showed he was better than they were. Not that it was all that difficult to be better than them!
It's probably a good thing that Bishop Dick and the Dickettes don't find themselves in the palm of my hand. Allstate, I ain't! But I get Joseph's story in ways that I never did before. The cowardly predators that sought my life didn't get the job done, either, and, indeed, that which doesn't kill us makes us stronger.
I am the strongest I have ever been in my adult life. I have found truths that would have been terrifying earlier, and embraced them fully. I know the difference in reality and bullshit, and where each resides. This improvement could never have happened while in the grasp of the church. I am fortunate. I got out just in time.
Free at last, free at last, I am truly glad to be clean, sober and free!
Ten months and counting!
I walked out of the church on Fathers' Day last June and have stayed out and away ever since. A couple of times early on, it was difficult, because I had developed habits over 30 years that, while destructive and painful, were very, very familiar. Those comfort zones are hard to step out of, even when they are killing us, and they surely were killing me, one miserable day at a time.
Ten months later, my blood pressure is corrected. I haven't had but one migraine headache in all this time, where the routine had become 3 to 5 per week. An awful lot of the frustration and anger that had become my constant companions are just distant memories now. I feel better than I'd felt in, perhaps, 25 years.
I have a new job. I work for people of integrity and honor, which I hadn't believed in at least a decade, previously. The schools bring their own challenges, but there is never a day when I feel that I am mission-less, making no difference in a deadend, dying institution. The stress level in my life is now miniscule.
The hebrew bible tells the story of Joseph. You know, the guy with the technicolor dreamcoat. No, not Donny Osmond, but the character he portrayed. Joseph had a bunch of the sorriest brothers the world has ever had to offer. They wanted to kill him, but were a few cojones short. So they sold him into slavery. Years later, we're told, the tables turned and the rich and powerful Joseph found those bastards in the palm of his hands. He screwed with them a little, but in the end, let them off the hook. He showed he was better than they were. Not that it was all that difficult to be better than them!
It's probably a good thing that Bishop Dick and the Dickettes don't find themselves in the palm of my hand. Allstate, I ain't! But I get Joseph's story in ways that I never did before. The cowardly predators that sought my life didn't get the job done, either, and, indeed, that which doesn't kill us makes us stronger.
I am the strongest I have ever been in my adult life. I have found truths that would have been terrifying earlier, and embraced them fully. I know the difference in reality and bullshit, and where each resides. This improvement could never have happened while in the grasp of the church. I am fortunate. I got out just in time.
Free at last, free at last, I am truly glad to be clean, sober and free!
Ten months and counting!
Sunday, April 15, 2012
100 Years and a Godawful Movie Later, The Story Still Lives
OK, let's get it out of the way: with Cameron's Titanic being released with the excuse of being redone in 3D (for what, the sketching scene?) to glom a bit more money off the long-dead, the box office total has now exceeded $2 billion. I'll say that again. Titanic, the wretched movie, has sold more than $2 BILLION in tickets. Combine that with all the news coverage accompanying the 100th anniversary of the sinking, and the announcement that the last of the ship's dinner menus held by the salvage company sold at auction for $125,000, and the message seems to be that we still love us some Titanic.
Well, why not? The story-the real story, not the one that made James Cameron "King of the World"-has it all.
It starts with bigness. Human beings are fascinated with little else like we are "Big" and Titanic is all about big. From the very name to all the publicity back in the day involving now-ridiculous words like "Unsinkable," "Fastest," "Most Elegant" and so forth. The message was clear: the thing is too damned good-and big-to fail. Who doesn't dream somewhere along the line of gliding down the grand staircase, elegantly dressed, to dine with the finest society had to offer?
Then, if there's anything better than big, it's big getting knocked off its high horse. And they screwed the pooch about as big as is humanly possible. Cheap rivets, goofy design, arrogance regarding speed and ice warnings, and lack of training on the latest communications equipment? Well, you cut the corners, you find the bottom of the ocean! Dumbasses!
Victorian society holds our attention. Many of the men-and a significant percentage of them rich and/or famous choosing death instead of dropping a "Do you know who I am?" to force their way into a lifeboat? Hmmm. Somehow I just can't see Trump changing into tie and tails to enjoy one last cigar stoically. No, The Donald would be screaming at some immigrant with her children that she would never match his value to the economy, while he shoved the littlest ones into the sea. The musicians played. The crew largely maintained their positions and helped all the passengers they could.
The other side of the coin was the villain: Bruce Ismay owned the thing, and he lived to tell the tale. One of his biographies explains his fate: The Most Hated Man on Earth. Seems to rank up there with the Italian captain who tripped and fell into a lifeboat, damn the luck, when his cruise ship went belly up a few months ago. The stories that emerged from the investigations were numerous: Ismay ordered Captain Smith full speed ahead in spite of ice warnings, he ordered full steam ahead after striking the iceberg which speeded the sinking, etc.
Prefer poignancy? How about Mr. And Mrs. Strauss, part owners of Macy's, dying together, as she wouldn't leave her husband. Or, of course, the steerage passengers. I'm fortunate that my poor Irish forebears came to escape the Famine, some 60 years before. We are told that more first-class men survived than steerage children. That's the other side of that Victorian morality garbage.
Perhaps, instead of suffering again through the no-talent Vegas headliner barfing up one more rendition of the worst song ever written by someone not named "Gaga," we should honor the Titanic dead with a little meditation on hubris, frailty and how we're just never quite as smart as we think we are.
Well, why not? The story-the real story, not the one that made James Cameron "King of the World"-has it all.
It starts with bigness. Human beings are fascinated with little else like we are "Big" and Titanic is all about big. From the very name to all the publicity back in the day involving now-ridiculous words like "Unsinkable," "Fastest," "Most Elegant" and so forth. The message was clear: the thing is too damned good-and big-to fail. Who doesn't dream somewhere along the line of gliding down the grand staircase, elegantly dressed, to dine with the finest society had to offer?
Then, if there's anything better than big, it's big getting knocked off its high horse. And they screwed the pooch about as big as is humanly possible. Cheap rivets, goofy design, arrogance regarding speed and ice warnings, and lack of training on the latest communications equipment? Well, you cut the corners, you find the bottom of the ocean! Dumbasses!
Victorian society holds our attention. Many of the men-and a significant percentage of them rich and/or famous choosing death instead of dropping a "Do you know who I am?" to force their way into a lifeboat? Hmmm. Somehow I just can't see Trump changing into tie and tails to enjoy one last cigar stoically. No, The Donald would be screaming at some immigrant with her children that she would never match his value to the economy, while he shoved the littlest ones into the sea. The musicians played. The crew largely maintained their positions and helped all the passengers they could.
The other side of the coin was the villain: Bruce Ismay owned the thing, and he lived to tell the tale. One of his biographies explains his fate: The Most Hated Man on Earth. Seems to rank up there with the Italian captain who tripped and fell into a lifeboat, damn the luck, when his cruise ship went belly up a few months ago. The stories that emerged from the investigations were numerous: Ismay ordered Captain Smith full speed ahead in spite of ice warnings, he ordered full steam ahead after striking the iceberg which speeded the sinking, etc.
Prefer poignancy? How about Mr. And Mrs. Strauss, part owners of Macy's, dying together, as she wouldn't leave her husband. Or, of course, the steerage passengers. I'm fortunate that my poor Irish forebears came to escape the Famine, some 60 years before. We are told that more first-class men survived than steerage children. That's the other side of that Victorian morality garbage.
Perhaps, instead of suffering again through the no-talent Vegas headliner barfing up one more rendition of the worst song ever written by someone not named "Gaga," we should honor the Titanic dead with a little meditation on hubris, frailty and how we're just never quite as smart as we think we are.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
You Don't Sound Like You're From Around Here, Boy!
Ozzie Guillen is in trouble. Again. The first-year manager of the renamed Miami Marlins gave an interview. After all the tumult during Ozzie's tenure with the Chicago White Sox, maybe, we think, he should have learned not to give interviews. But Ozzie likes to talk, and he's a man who says what he thinks, with very little internal editing getting in the way.
Time magazine asked the Venezuelan native about Fidel Castro. Among other things, Ozzie said that Castro deserves respect "because that (expletive) has been in power so long." There are things you can't say in this world. Bobby Petrino would tell you that if you are the football coach at the University of Arkansas and you have a motorcycle wreck, you can't say you were by yourself if your 25 year old mistress was with you, or you'll be the ex-football coach at Arkansas. If Ozzie managed in Seattle, or had come from New Hampshire, he wouldn't have been asked about Cuba. But he works in Miami, and came from Venezuela, and now he is suspended for five games, while Miami's mayor seems to have nothing more significant to attend to than to call for Guillen's firing.
It doesn't seem to matter that many Venezuelans, chief among them, President Hugo Chavez, have a very different relationship with Castro and Cuba than the Little Havanans do. Chavez has gotten treatment for his recurring cancer in Castro's medical community, and sold his oil there. Venezuelans don't teach their children that all evil in the hemisphere emanates from Havana. So, like places in the world where children are taught that the US, or Israel, or both, are responsible for all the world's ills, and people are then willing to train as suicide bombers, we are left dealing with ways of looking at the world that don't make any sense to us. And in our day and time, what is different is wrong, and what's wrong needs to be wiped out.
Ozzie didn't blow anything up, except perhaps his career. But we see again that whether it's Moslem v. Christian, Jew v. Moslem, Cuban ex-pat v. Castro, or anyone who doesn't think like I do v. me, human beings don't deal very well with others' world-views when they are different.
Even when you're talking about a major league manager's perceptions of international relations!
It ultimately doesn't matter who manages the Marlins for the rest of the season. But until we can all reclaim a little empathy, just occasionally see the world through someone else's eyes, and build the bridges that necessarily follow, we will all keep looking for heads to be served up on plates. And we're running out of plates.
Time magazine asked the Venezuelan native about Fidel Castro. Among other things, Ozzie said that Castro deserves respect "because that (expletive) has been in power so long." There are things you can't say in this world. Bobby Petrino would tell you that if you are the football coach at the University of Arkansas and you have a motorcycle wreck, you can't say you were by yourself if your 25 year old mistress was with you, or you'll be the ex-football coach at Arkansas. If Ozzie managed in Seattle, or had come from New Hampshire, he wouldn't have been asked about Cuba. But he works in Miami, and came from Venezuela, and now he is suspended for five games, while Miami's mayor seems to have nothing more significant to attend to than to call for Guillen's firing.
It doesn't seem to matter that many Venezuelans, chief among them, President Hugo Chavez, have a very different relationship with Castro and Cuba than the Little Havanans do. Chavez has gotten treatment for his recurring cancer in Castro's medical community, and sold his oil there. Venezuelans don't teach their children that all evil in the hemisphere emanates from Havana. So, like places in the world where children are taught that the US, or Israel, or both, are responsible for all the world's ills, and people are then willing to train as suicide bombers, we are left dealing with ways of looking at the world that don't make any sense to us. And in our day and time, what is different is wrong, and what's wrong needs to be wiped out.
Ozzie didn't blow anything up, except perhaps his career. But we see again that whether it's Moslem v. Christian, Jew v. Moslem, Cuban ex-pat v. Castro, or anyone who doesn't think like I do v. me, human beings don't deal very well with others' world-views when they are different.
Even when you're talking about a major league manager's perceptions of international relations!
It ultimately doesn't matter who manages the Marlins for the rest of the season. But until we can all reclaim a little empathy, just occasionally see the world through someone else's eyes, and build the bridges that necessarily follow, we will all keep looking for heads to be served up on plates. And we're running out of plates.
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
What Do You Say?
"You know this book, Mr. Piercey?" His thumb was across the title and the author's last name, but I could read the "Harper" and know the purple paperback cover. "Yes. It's To Kill a Mockingbird." "You know what it's about?" His questions were uncomfortable.
He's young. He's smart. He's an athlete. He's a good kid. He is in my room because he got a new phone for his fifteenth birthday, and he brought it to school to show his friend. A teacher saw it. A rule was broken.
This fell as the Trayvon Martin story broke.
"Yes, I know the story." "Why did Mr. Finch help Tom, Mr. Piercey?" I felt the weight of that question for a few moments. I want to believe that the world Tom Robinson knew is gone. I want to believe that one person helping another, regardless of race, isn't really a big deal any more. But I don't live in my student's world.
"Some people believe that you do the right thing." That's what I believe. "No matter what other people may do to you?" That's his experience. We talked for a few more minutes about the old south. He was as interested in Atticus' having to live amongst his neighbors as he was what happened to Tom Robinson. I realized later that he knew what was going to happen to Tom Robinson before he ever got to the end of the book. The news to him was that white lawyer taking the chance.
"Why'd he shoot that boy, Mr. Piercey?" There are no boys shot in Mockingbird. We had jumped forward almost 80 years. I saw that his eyes were way too wet for a fifteen year old boy at school. I started to say, "I don't know" but I couldn't. Because I do know. And because he is a very bright young man, my student did too. I decided in that instant that he wanted to know if I would tell him the truth. I did.
"There is evil in this world, and one of the places it shows itself is in the hatred that some people carry for people of other races than their own." He nodded and folded his hands over his face, looking down at his desk. I have no doubt that when he sees Trayvon's picture on the tv screen, he sees his own face.
"Why'd he shoot that boy?" he asked again, very softly. I try to imagine his confusion. I try to imagine his intellectual struggle. I try to imagine his fear.
But I'm white, and he's black, and we live in America.
So imagine is all I can do.
He's young. He's smart. He's an athlete. He's a good kid. He is in my room because he got a new phone for his fifteenth birthday, and he brought it to school to show his friend. A teacher saw it. A rule was broken.
This fell as the Trayvon Martin story broke.
"Yes, I know the story." "Why did Mr. Finch help Tom, Mr. Piercey?" I felt the weight of that question for a few moments. I want to believe that the world Tom Robinson knew is gone. I want to believe that one person helping another, regardless of race, isn't really a big deal any more. But I don't live in my student's world.
"Some people believe that you do the right thing." That's what I believe. "No matter what other people may do to you?" That's his experience. We talked for a few more minutes about the old south. He was as interested in Atticus' having to live amongst his neighbors as he was what happened to Tom Robinson. I realized later that he knew what was going to happen to Tom Robinson before he ever got to the end of the book. The news to him was that white lawyer taking the chance.
"Why'd he shoot that boy, Mr. Piercey?" There are no boys shot in Mockingbird. We had jumped forward almost 80 years. I saw that his eyes were way too wet for a fifteen year old boy at school. I started to say, "I don't know" but I couldn't. Because I do know. And because he is a very bright young man, my student did too. I decided in that instant that he wanted to know if I would tell him the truth. I did.
"There is evil in this world, and one of the places it shows itself is in the hatred that some people carry for people of other races than their own." He nodded and folded his hands over his face, looking down at his desk. I have no doubt that when he sees Trayvon's picture on the tv screen, he sees his own face.
"Why'd he shoot that boy?" he asked again, very softly. I try to imagine his confusion. I try to imagine his intellectual struggle. I try to imagine his fear.
But I'm white, and he's black, and we live in America.
So imagine is all I can do.
Monday, March 26, 2012
Furman Bisher
There's something about the South and sports. The greatest radio men of the first generation, Red Barber and Mel Allen, were sons of Mississippi and Alabama, respectively. Red's family moved to the newly infamous Sanford, FL, when he was ten. Mel went to Alabama, while Barber became a Gator. Barber and Allen were competitors, working for the Dodgers and Yankees, before eventually becoming partners in the Yankees' booth. Ernie Harwell of Georgia followed along shortly, joining Barber with the Dodgers. Ernie had been the voice of the Atlanta Crackers minor league team, and when the Dodgers sought his contract, the price was catcher Cliff Dapper. Harwell was the only broadcaster ever traded for a player. Ernie's career with the Tigers, beginning in 1960, took him to the Hall of Fame, but it was his departure from the Dodgers for the Giants in 1950 that left open a seat for another redhead, a youngster named Vin Scully.
These southerners and their many brethren had a gift for storytelling, the language, vivid and beautiful, alive in their minds and voices. When things were going well in Flatbush, then the Dodgers were "tearing up the peapatch," or "sitting in the catbird seat." When a performance was too good for words, in the Bronx Allen would ask "How 'bout that?" while Barber was declarative: "Oh, Doctor!" Harwell would build on both. He would recite from the Song of Solomon to announce the arrival of Spring, proclaim "Two for the price of one" for a double play, and criticize a batter taking a called third strike: "He stood there like the house by the side of the road!"
Maybe those broadcasters were really writers at heart. But they were fortunate that they chose the microphone. The typewriter was taken. The South had its sportswriter. His name was Furman Bisher.
Bisher came from North Carolina, but he conquered the world from Atlanta. Early on, in Charlotte, Bisher got the only interview Shoeless Joe Jackson ever gave after his banishment from baseball. He trusted Bisher, as did the drivers who banded together in what would become NASCAR; he wrote their story, too. Beginning in 1950, Bisher became the biggest proponent of sports that Atlanta has ever known. How'd he do? Hank Aaron trusted him to write The Hammer's first autobiography. Bisher also wrote a book for kids, Strange but True Baseball Stories. That book was the first one I ever bought with my own money. Its influence on my love of reading and my love of baseball cannot be overstated. I trusted Furman Bisher, too.
Bisher wrote The Masters every year in the Journal, the Constitution, and then the Journal-Constitution, and in a half-dozen books. He wrote NASCAR. He wrote University of Georgia sports, providing the silky counter-point to Larry Munson's sandpaper voice. Furman Bisher wrote Southern sports. He wrote Southern Sports for 59 years in Atlanta. He couldn't quit when he retired from the AJC in 2009. He started a periodic column in the Gwinnett Daily Post.
Furman Bisher died a week ago. He was 93. He personified that special tie that we Southerners have to sports. He taught six generations of us what mattered about sports, and why. He told the truth, and he told it in our language.
Thank you, Sir!
These southerners and their many brethren had a gift for storytelling, the language, vivid and beautiful, alive in their minds and voices. When things were going well in Flatbush, then the Dodgers were "tearing up the peapatch," or "sitting in the catbird seat." When a performance was too good for words, in the Bronx Allen would ask "How 'bout that?" while Barber was declarative: "Oh, Doctor!" Harwell would build on both. He would recite from the Song of Solomon to announce the arrival of Spring, proclaim "Two for the price of one" for a double play, and criticize a batter taking a called third strike: "He stood there like the house by the side of the road!"
Maybe those broadcasters were really writers at heart. But they were fortunate that they chose the microphone. The typewriter was taken. The South had its sportswriter. His name was Furman Bisher.
Bisher came from North Carolina, but he conquered the world from Atlanta. Early on, in Charlotte, Bisher got the only interview Shoeless Joe Jackson ever gave after his banishment from baseball. He trusted Bisher, as did the drivers who banded together in what would become NASCAR; he wrote their story, too. Beginning in 1950, Bisher became the biggest proponent of sports that Atlanta has ever known. How'd he do? Hank Aaron trusted him to write The Hammer's first autobiography. Bisher also wrote a book for kids, Strange but True Baseball Stories. That book was the first one I ever bought with my own money. Its influence on my love of reading and my love of baseball cannot be overstated. I trusted Furman Bisher, too.
Bisher wrote The Masters every year in the Journal, the Constitution, and then the Journal-Constitution, and in a half-dozen books. He wrote NASCAR. He wrote University of Georgia sports, providing the silky counter-point to Larry Munson's sandpaper voice. Furman Bisher wrote Southern sports. He wrote Southern Sports for 59 years in Atlanta. He couldn't quit when he retired from the AJC in 2009. He started a periodic column in the Gwinnett Daily Post.
Furman Bisher died a week ago. He was 93. He personified that special tie that we Southerners have to sports. He taught six generations of us what mattered about sports, and why. He told the truth, and he told it in our language.
Thank you, Sir!
Sunday, March 11, 2012
Spring Break
This Spring brought a huge change for me. I spent the last umpteen years carrying the company water: You suck, God is terribly disappointed in you, and you better get your act together or else! All of which is, of course, bullshit.
This year the focus is entirely different.
It is Spring Break.
Spring Break was never a big deal to me as a student. I never went to South Padre, Ft. Lauderdale or any of the other fabulous places to pass a week drunk and assuming Rush Limbaugh is right about women. For one thing, I'm Irish. Irish and sunshine do not mix. You've never seen sunburned unless you've seen Irish sunburned! And I've long believed that if you choose to drink to excess, it's better to do it at home. Saves the other drivers and the ol' Permanent Record. Being the father of daughters makes me happy that earlier behavior toward women was no worse than it was.
Now, suddenly, Spring Break matters! As a Junior High School staff member, Spring Break matters a lot. We've had a good first half of the semester. Now it's time for the home stretch. We've got a lot to do. State achievement tests, fourth nine weeks' tests and finals all loom on the horizon, and there's work to be done to be ready for all that. So stopping for a few days is a good thing.
We're breaking the rhythm at home. We went downtown to ride the Trolley last night. Tuesday will be the Zoo, complete with Dinosaur Exhibit, and, hopefully, feeding the giraffes. There will be a trip to The Pink Palace before the week's out, and that's the Dancing Baby stuff. Grandmommie and I intend to slip out for a couple of lunches, a bookstore day, and one day to just disappear. Again, good to throw the change up occasionally. Oh, a baseball image? That reminds me: the MLB Network is carrying about a billion Spring Training games this week. We'll be checking out a few of those, too. Especially any that originate in Fort Myers.
Back to work a week from tomorrow.
Until then, Time Out!
This year the focus is entirely different.
It is Spring Break.
Spring Break was never a big deal to me as a student. I never went to South Padre, Ft. Lauderdale or any of the other fabulous places to pass a week drunk and assuming Rush Limbaugh is right about women. For one thing, I'm Irish. Irish and sunshine do not mix. You've never seen sunburned unless you've seen Irish sunburned! And I've long believed that if you choose to drink to excess, it's better to do it at home. Saves the other drivers and the ol' Permanent Record. Being the father of daughters makes me happy that earlier behavior toward women was no worse than it was.
Now, suddenly, Spring Break matters! As a Junior High School staff member, Spring Break matters a lot. We've had a good first half of the semester. Now it's time for the home stretch. We've got a lot to do. State achievement tests, fourth nine weeks' tests and finals all loom on the horizon, and there's work to be done to be ready for all that. So stopping for a few days is a good thing.
We're breaking the rhythm at home. We went downtown to ride the Trolley last night. Tuesday will be the Zoo, complete with Dinosaur Exhibit, and, hopefully, feeding the giraffes. There will be a trip to The Pink Palace before the week's out, and that's the Dancing Baby stuff. Grandmommie and I intend to slip out for a couple of lunches, a bookstore day, and one day to just disappear. Again, good to throw the change up occasionally. Oh, a baseball image? That reminds me: the MLB Network is carrying about a billion Spring Training games this week. We'll be checking out a few of those, too. Especially any that originate in Fort Myers.
Back to work a week from tomorrow.
Until then, Time Out!
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Hello? Is there anybody in there? Just knock if you can...
It has been a while.
I haven't really known how to follow the previous post. It seems to me an egregious disrespect to Troy Davis to come back with something of my normal sort-pretty much 3/4 dopey.
Well, time has passed, and life is no less absurd today.
So here goes.
What shall we play with? There are so many options...
*How 'bout that GOP? The Good...ok, nobody there; The Dumb...god help Rick Perry;
and The Evil...one word: NEWT! I would say that I've missed Mr. Regular
Guy/Washington Outsider/Family Values/Tiffany's Account/Former Speaker-Freaking
3rd in line for the Presidency/Got the Trophy Wife on the 3rd try, but I'd be
lying! Then, of course, the Cast of Thousands who haven't a prayer...well I
guess that's all they've got, if only anyone were listening!
*Tebow? Leave the boy alone. But we'll shortly be raising hell about the report
today: 43% of the morons-oh, I mean people-in this country think god is helping
Tebow win. 'Course, that might be the more reasonable explanation, 'cause it
sure ain't happening on Timmy's ability!
*The Church? What's the point? Nobody can make more fun of them than they make of
themselves on a daily basis.
*Maybe I should just mention that Dancing Baby's turned 3, and is still the
absolute joy of life as we know it.
*And only 35 days until Pitchers and Catchers Report!
We're back, baby, and I made a resolution to write on the blog every week!
Which means you'll probably hear from me in August.
We'll see...
I haven't really known how to follow the previous post. It seems to me an egregious disrespect to Troy Davis to come back with something of my normal sort-pretty much 3/4 dopey.
Well, time has passed, and life is no less absurd today.
So here goes.
What shall we play with? There are so many options...
*How 'bout that GOP? The Good...ok, nobody there; The Dumb...god help Rick Perry;
and The Evil...one word: NEWT! I would say that I've missed Mr. Regular
Guy/Washington Outsider/Family Values/Tiffany's Account/Former Speaker-Freaking
3rd in line for the Presidency/Got the Trophy Wife on the 3rd try, but I'd be
lying! Then, of course, the Cast of Thousands who haven't a prayer...well I
guess that's all they've got, if only anyone were listening!
*Tebow? Leave the boy alone. But we'll shortly be raising hell about the report
today: 43% of the morons-oh, I mean people-in this country think god is helping
Tebow win. 'Course, that might be the more reasonable explanation, 'cause it
sure ain't happening on Timmy's ability!
*The Church? What's the point? Nobody can make more fun of them than they make of
themselves on a daily basis.
*Maybe I should just mention that Dancing Baby's turned 3, and is still the
absolute joy of life as we know it.
*And only 35 days until Pitchers and Catchers Report!
We're back, baby, and I made a resolution to write on the blog every week!
Which means you'll probably hear from me in August.
We'll see...
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