Angela who... ?

In a moment of boredom this morning I turned on television and clicked the remote into CSPAN (untypical for this hour of the day, especially on a Saturday) to see Dr. Angela Davis of the University of California at Santa Cruz at the mike speaking before the Twelfth Annual Conference on Black Student Government at the University of Iowa. Having nothing better to do at the moment except for matching socks -- and I could do that while watching -- and besides they seem to match better when they're still warm from the clothes dryer, I'd just sit, match and watch.

This is someone I've always been quietly fascinated by, but also somewhat intimidated by as well. She is a brilliant revolutionary thinker far out of my league, I thought. I couldn't ever imagine being in conversation with this remarkable woman though we'd surely traveled on the same path for brief moments in time. But there it ends.

My activism was never deep enough to have taken me to jail for my principles. Nor was it strong enough to have demanded the kinds of risky stands that she'd taken for an entire lifetime. In all honesty, I've rarely felt capable of -- or brave enough to go the distance -- not in the face of the loss of the esteem of friend or fear of foe. I think that she's always made me feel a bit less than... .

Today there would be just Betty and Angela and there was nothing to defend or deny -- from my seat on the sofa I could just lie back and wiggle my bare Saturday morning toes on the hassock and take the time to figure it all out -- try to locate the root of my fascination and admiration -- and (yes) awe of this remarkably brave woman.

Early in her talk she made the vital connection and those "doors of perception" opened wide for me. In her very clear and understated way I heard her say, "... history is not a synonym for the past. History is alive and in this moment. It is dynamic. We are history. We carry the promise of history and it is we who must bear the pain of the past." All else was heard against those words. I sat at rapt sock-dropping attention for the next hour -- as much a part of her audience as were the young students in that auditorium.

It was soon apparent that the basis for my sense of inadequacy in the presence of her brilliance lay in the fact that I'd lived my entire life within about 30 miles in one of the most liberal areas in the world, and despite its shortcomings in real terms. She started life in the racist south born of activist parents; with a mother who'd been as dynamic as she. Her mother fought the fight to defend the Scottsboro boys, been active in the NAACP at a time in history when doing so was the equivalent to being a Communist during the Fifties. Angela was clearly an Internationalist. She surely didn't share my ambivalence about the illegal alien issue. For her there were no national boundaries. I've never grown beyond a kind of informed provincialism due to a lack of exposure to the wider world.

My sincere abhorence of capital punishment grew in isolation from that single exposure to Stanley Tookie Williams and Barbara Cottman Becnel, his activist friend of many years -- and the visit to Death Row a few years ago. Out of that instance, I was able to grasp the need for abolition of the death penalty for all our sakes, but it was from that very small window of experience. This was the microcosm that encapsulates my life, limits my vision, and keeps me properly humble.

Angela has enough education plus experience and the advantages of world travel to have come to the same place at a far more sophisticated level; from the macrocosm.

Says she, "Capital punishment is rooted in racism, and it cannot be abolished until we recognize that fact and move through. During the time of the Civil War there was only one crime for which a white man could be executed; murder. On the other hand, there were 77 crimes for which blacks could be put to death. We cannot get rid of it until we recognize that history and purge ourselves of this shameful legacy through contrition."

Of course. These are facts that I'd never known and, this day I found myself wondering anew at the huge gaps in my (our) education. That I am almost completely intuitive with a deep sense of the awesome cruelty and unfairness of the act -- and that I'd found myself some years ago arriving at the same position -- was the cause of wonder. I could not claim to have arrived at my position intellectually. It was/is therefore harder for me to defend. Angela's gift of clarification was one I'll not soon forget. I'll now dig deeper and not expect those I love to follow my lead blindly just because I have the courage to stand my ground at those San Quentin gates in the shadow of the gas chamber. I will learn more for the sake of furthering this cause.

It was also clear from her remarks that societal violence -- as expressed in so many ways both individually and collectively -- is all of a piece. The ultimate expression of that cancer is surely illustrated not only by capital punishment but by Abu Graib; Guantanamo; the irony of our marines taking "ethics of war lessons" on the battlefield and within earshot of an undeclared and cruel war as a result of murdering 22 innocents in Iraq; the McCarthy-izing of communications by sweeping wiretaps; hidden torture prisons in Europe and the Mideast; over two million of our citizens imprisoned; disenfranchisement via felony convictions; etc.

She ended her remarks with an interesting answer to a question from one of the students in the audience about just what can be done to bring constructive change : " ... it is the job now of youth to be figuring out the answer to that question. It's your responsibility. We've done our work and our role now is to to support yours."

Made me wish I had about 20 more active years. I'm just beginning to get the hang is of this incredible journey called life, I think, and time will surely run out before I get The World into any kind of order ... .

Attended the annual Point Richmond Summer Music Festival last night -- balmy, warm, great music -- and new questions to ponder ... .

My work with the National Park Service is casting me back in time in interesting ways. Many hours of my day are spent in mulling over World War II history in the attempt to discover ways to address those years in relation to the present. The ability to bring these eras together in some semblance of order may be what determines our success or failure in breathing life into this park. I didn't grow up here but nearby in Oakland, and must therefore borrow heavily from the memories of others in order to try to understand all that has happened.

In yesterday's early evening I sat for hours in one of those molded white plastic chairs among many other molded white plastic chairs holding big and little bottoms of the population of this fascinating city. This particular corner of it is the place where the history of Chevron Petroleum Corporation (nee Standard Oil) and the Santa Fe railroad are almost palpable. In this picturesque little town square in the shadow of the old Hotel Mac, lives a number of descendants of those whose roots were firmly embedded in those two pioneering companies. This city was established in the year 1905, and probably from the very spot that tonight hosted the annual music festival. It's now inhabited by numbers of descendants of those pioneer settlers; a fair-sized arts community; and a disproportionate number of those who currently run the city -- either formally or informally by "consent of the governed" (sometimes reluctantly granted).

After decades of languishing as a purely industrial community with minimal ties to the Greater Bay Area, Richmond had its rebirth in 1941 when the needs of the war machine and Henry J Kaiser's response to it boomed it into history in unprecedented ways. With that dramatic chapter came racial segregation -- sudden and almost complete.

What struck me last night was the fact that something unrecorded; unheralded, perhaps even unnoticed has occurred over the past sixty years that has changed forever the way Richmond sees itself. Almost more than any other place I've ever known, there was more unselfconscious race and gender mixing in the street dancing to the sound of reggae and zydeco last night -- from those from the age of four to perhaps 80. One might not find this innocent coming together in quite this way anywhere else on the planet. There was no feeling of "working at it." Equality is/was something taken for granted. Assumed. No longer labored. There surely must be vestiges of it remaining, but to hold such biases openly is no longer tolerated. Few would dare any outward expression of racism.

Found myself wondering as I watched the screen that pops up behind my eyes in those early moments before dropping off to sleep, whether the Bay Area in general and Richmond in particular has simply become a magnet for the enlightened over those years? Could this be what's happened? Maybe we've simply reached critical mass and the voices of the opposition can no longer be heard clearly. Though there are continuing signs of those who simply got trapped here and never were able to move on.

What I do suspect is that this small city with the unenviable reputation of being "the most dangerous city in the state of California" may be seen from the outside as less than desirable for the very reasons that are proof of our having become the most successfully racially integrated city in the Bay Area and the State. I used to be struck by the fact that the same racial demographic to be found at the Office of Human Resources; Kaiser Permanente's waiting room; the Social Security Agency, and the lines at the Department of Motor Vehicles, is the same demographic one will find at the Richmond Country Club during any of the numerous golf tournaments and fancy banquets that occur there from time to time.

We've done something right. Discovering just what that is may hold the secret to rebuilding hope and trust in a generation of youngsters who seem to have been left behind in a growing environment of violence. Maybe that's the mission of the park -- to help to retrace the steps that brought us to where we are and to try to reclaim with youngsters and for the young some of the spirit that got left behind during our struggles to survive and overcome. But then that's the mission of us all; those of us who lived long enough to have learned the lessons of our times, across all the lines of separation.

It was all there in the evening sounds last night -- in the Point Richmond Annual Music Festival. It was there in the easy laughter and in the swaying bodies of all sizes, shapes, and colors, to a beautiful Cajun waltz that I'm sure that I only imagined remembering ... and never knew.

Much like world peace ... .

Interesting day, today. Was the luncheon speaker for the monthly meeting of the retirees of Local #790 of SEIU - AFL-CIO.

I am really beginning to enjoy these events -- and am more comfortable these days and less threatened by the limelight. In fact, I jokingly mentioned to Martha (park superintendent) when I got back that I might just take this show on the road and become one of them motivational speakers! Though there's little hope of that, given the enjoyment I'm getting every day just doing the work of the very creative process of park-building. These little special events come as quite incidental -- a phone call from someone with an invitation -- and a little mark on my calendar -- and ... .

Little preparation is required since I'm really only dealing with known history (known by me) and that's so subjective that there's really little reason to do much in advance except relax into it and enjoy.

Today I was struck by how interesting it is that history of 60 years ago has moved into the foreground all around the Bay Area. Among those who attended today was a union official (African American) who is working toward the restoration of the old 16th Street Southern Pacific railway station near Oakland's waterfront. His group is at the early beginnings of the project and their excitement is building. I could see the delight in his face and those of others when I began to cover the historical parts of my little talk -- and I could see that we were connecting.

There were people in that audience who were longtime East Bay residents -- some of whom had arrived during World War II as homefront workers. There were some who had been customers at our little store in South Berkeley and remembered me standing behind the counter learning the business while battling the streets. There was the feeling of homecoming today, and it felt right and good.

I'd brought a small supply of business cards, just in case anyone ... and regretted not having brought more. They were so quickly seized that I had to promise to send a supply for distribution as soon as I returned to my office. And I did just that. Mailed off a copy of "Lost Conversations and Untold Stories" DVD, a few brochures about the park site, with a handful of business cards to be distributed later.

I sensed the hunger for grounding, roots from the past, in that room today. I vowed to add to any future presentation the suggestion that we remove those real boundaries between these nine Bay Area counties that ring the bay and return to those days when the African American community was regional. With that greater pool from which to draw leadership in the old days, we were all enriched. Our community reached from Monterey in the south to Sacramento and Marysville in the north. Our social and cultural events drew from San Jose and San Mateo, San Francisco and Oakland and Richmond. We lost something when those articifial boundaries were imposed for reasons I've never quite understood.

Maybe we can begin to look at that as we rebuild our history and share our stories again. Maybe today was an important beginning of a broadened view of our park building. Maybe black history cannot be told without reuniting all of its elements.

Maybe I'd like to drive into Oakland soon and visit the old 16th Street Southern Pacific railroad station and re-imagine Uncle Herman Allen, Uncle Frederick Allen, Uncle Lloyd Allen (three sons of Papa George), and their other friends and co-workers as they worked that luggage as men of service; proud Red Caps! I remember from childhood how much taller those uncles stood when in uniform ... there's still something about a uniform, isn't there? Any uniform.

So many stories ... and so little time.

New thoughts on (as Steven Colbert might say) "Youthiness!"

Ever since our series of meetings last week referred to in the last post, I've been thinking about this next phase in the development of the historic downtown and its relationship to the Park. It's clearly etched in my mind, but the execution of the concept is still illusive, but I'm onto something critical, I think:

While listening quietly to the presentation of the "Memories of Macdonald" concept to the Arts Commission on Thursday evening -- it came to me. At one point I blurted it out in short bursts, and though the group surely were caught by my words -- they left me unsatisfied, incomplete, but I knew where I wanted to be going ... .

It has to do with the fact that I see the primary issue as change -- and as the common denominator between youth of our time and those of today. I recalled that on December 7th, at the beginning of World War II, I was barely out of my teens. That my generation of homefront workers and fighting forces were also barely out of their teens. That the important thing this park can do is to connect today's youth with those of yesterday. We need to relate from that perspective -- not as children and elders but as the youth of widely separated generations.

The important thing to focus on, in this case, is how our youth reacted to the traumatic changes we were forced to live through -- given the perilous state of the world and that of our own nation at that time. Perhaps today's kids -- while learning about that remarkable period in our country's life -- can try to identify the traumatic changes that their world is undergoing and then to try to identify the ways in which it is or is not coping with those changes.

After all, they're having to face unprecedented changes in the decreasing quality of education; 108 different languages in their schools; greater density in city life; uncontrolled possession of handguns with increasing street crime; the proliferation of illegal drugs in their neighborhoods; breakdowns in family structure with either non-working or both parents employed; gang warfare; fewer schools and more prisons; diminishing access to higher education; impending global disasters due to climate change; a national debt that will threaten their ability to ever rise to our former economic greatness; all making for a world that is frightening to those youngsters who are living in a world we elders never knew.

But the seeds of their world were sown to a large extent by how we responded to our times, the laws we passed that assured more equality to more of us; the fears we expressed as we contracted and distorted other freedoms after the assassinations of our national and spiritual leaders; the limitations we've allowed as we drew back from the international community after 9/11; our disgraceful declining involvement in the electoral process; -- and most of all -- the leaders we've chosen over time; all leading to the wars of their generation.

Heavy thoughts ... .

At the same time they enjoy greater mobility and far more independence that might also be seen as abandonment by the parental generation. We have no idea how much the creation of gangs is merely a way of coping with the disconnection from the parental generation for any number of reasons. Perhaps those gangs represent surrogate family groupings created to compensate for the losses they've experienced in this new kind of societal isolation.

A part of our planning involves the creation of Walking Tours using audiotapes and I-PODs that will take people through the historic districts. Having kids describe their world in the troubled Iron Triangle to those interested enough to do the walks could be an exciting way to share their more current history as juxtaposed with the history of our times. We will develop groups of youth guides out of existing programs for young people -- in much the way that our community "docents" are beginning to come into being as a feature of our bus tours they, too, will emerge over time.

When viewed through the lens of the element of change, we might find ourselves able to detoxify the generational differences in much the same way that our bus tours are allowing the sharing factually of a period of painful segregation across those sensitive lines of separation. Perhaps we can reduce the distance between Richmond's youth of yesterday and today, and erase those lines of separation to the extent possible.

Under the auspices of the Park, Joanna Haigood (Zaccho Dance Theatre) will be serving as an artist in residence at the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts later this year or in the early spring. Her project will evolve as a dance swap -- a series that will have the generations trading the dances of their period. They'll learn to Lindy and the Jitterbug, to do the Chicken, the Mashed Potatoes, and we'll get to learn the Electric Slide and Hip Hop and whatever else comes next! It will all be videotaped by EBCPA students and projected in huge images on the side of the old Storage Structure in Shipyard #3 or on the hull of the SS Red Oak Victory at the grand opening of the park sometime late next year.

As I said before, we've got ourselves a National Park to build, and it's going famously!

Should you have any ideas, please pass them along. Anybody can play in our park. After all, it's national.

Photo: Not particularly relevant except that it gives me a chance to show 8 year-old granddaughter, Tamaya Reid, in a performance of her West African dance class in a recent East Bay Center for the Performing Arts afternoon event. That's Tamaya -- third dancer from the left -- right in the middle. She's a bit "youth-ier" than the teens I'm referring to in the above piece.

Shall I tell you about our exciting park tours? My weekend in Mendocino? "Too muchness" is becoming a problem ... .

Those tours are most successful. Choreographing the 4-hour sessions of community people from a list of volunteers has been a real joy. In the first place, these are people who are being asked quite subtly to participate in the beginnings of the building of a national park. We don't use those words, but in effect, that's precisely what we're doing.

We gather at city hall in one of the conference rooms, share coffee and fruit and watch our little "Lost conversations and untold stories ..." DVD and give them a chance to explore our collection of World War II artifacts collected from Rosies across the country through a grant from the Ford Motor Company. We board the little 28-passenger rented bus at around nine o'clock for a visit to the woman-designed Rosie Memorial on the site of what once was Kaiser Permanente Shipyard #2 and that is now the site of a development of upscale condos and a beautiful park. We spend the next 4 hours taking our "tourists" over areas they've been traversing for their entire lifetimes; past structures they stopped "seeing" long ago; past ground long-familiar and that has played background to the totality of their life experiences over the past 60-odd years. Watching the reawakening as our guests excitedly pop up from their seats to interrupt Naomi (our NPS guide and my co-worker) to add to the bare bones of her story. She's designed her presentation to provide context -- to purposely evoke this response. The history is so close to the surface and proves to be so irrepressible -- immediate -- alive!

The cast of characters of this -- our fourth tour over the past few months -- consisted in part of a Latino member of the county grand jury, a man raised in war housing of WWII; a member of the city's redevelopment agency staff and a newcomer to Richmond; the City Clerk; a contentious and courageous community activist (African American) for whom a new health clinic is about to be named; the owner of an historic deteriorating building -- the International Hotel -- that once housed the black Pullman porters while they waited out the servicing of the Pullman railroad cars at the nearby plant (still standing but converted to new uses) before returning to the upperclass travelers for whom they were designed.

That little building that consists of 20 sleeping rooms and a large reception hall has served as her home for all the years while she's fought for historic landmarking and the funding to restore it. It figures hugely in black history since African American workers could not stay in the (white) Pullman hotel at that time. This place was known across the country and would surely figure in the story of the fight for racial justice waged by C.L. Dellums in the 50's; a story that begs the attention of future black historians. Today was the day that we added Ethel Dotson's International Hotel to the tour and raised it to the level of "landmarking," officially, in the minds of our "tourists."

Antonio Medrano, upon our stop at the Mexican Baptist Church on the far western edge of the city, took over to tell us about the early days of Richmond's spanish-speaking community; that this area was once agricultural, where they tilled the soil and raised their food -- along the rail lines of the Santa Fe.

There is an openness in these recollections. Racial differences are briefly touched on, not so much as complaints, but rather as a clear recognition of the reality of those times -- the painful years that preceded the Civil Rights struggles of the Sixties. When seen against the progress that has followed in its wake, that history seems to have been at least partially detoxified -- ready now for sharing across the lines of separation.

We also had on board Steve Gilford, a Kaiser Permanente historian, whose work in researching of African American participation in the shipyards served as the basis for some of my own. When the tour reached Kaiser Shipyard #3, the site of the SS Red Oak Victory and the Whirley Crane that helped to build her, Steve took over and provided the more technical information that would have been otherwise missing. It was at this point in the tour that I started to see the need to involve more young people in these adventures. How wonderful it would have been had they been a part of the group. I thought of Glen Price, member of the West Contra Costa School District board who'd had to cancel at the last minute but who has signed on for the July tour.

Also on board was a reporter for the Berkeley Daily Planet, Jesse Douglas Allen-Taylor, who wrote a great story for last week's Friday edition -- a piece that has been widely circulated and appreciated by members of the National Park Service staff and management. It can be read at the paper's website.

Just before leaving for a restful weekend on the north coast I briefly visited another growing edge of our work, this time at the request of a team that's engaged in the planning of a streetscape project that will bring the park to the heart of the city, Macdonald Avenue, the main artery now undergoing revitalization. With that team we're participating in the planning of a series of programs called "Memories of Macdonald" that will engage the community in the gathering of more oral histories, digital video and digital-audio projects in which the kids of the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts will be involved this summer. Our meeting was with the artistic director and staff of the EBCPA with whom the park and the redevelopment agency are partnering. We later met with the city's Arts Commission to introduce them to the concept of civic engagement and of their part in it.

We're busily building a national park, guys, and it's an amazing process.

Photo: Taken under the old wooden bridge just south of the picturesque tiny town of Mendocino. Great place for picking up drift wood and lovely pastel-colored sea glass.

My upside down world ... also known as "Betty and the Bigots" ... .

I'm having such a difficult time these days; losing the ability to separate myself from the conversatives on the issue of illegal immigration. It's really terribly uncomfortable, sitting here watching CSPAN coverage of the senate debates on the immigration bill. I simply cannot imagine how on earth I manage to find myself nodding in silent agreement with the obviously racist tirades on the need to seal the southern borders against the invasion of illegals; poor people simply seeking better lives for themselves and for their families.

It's far easier to hear my own arguments reflected in the comments of CNN's Lou Dobbs because he, at least, applies some reason to the debate -- and his arguments sound a lot like my "wrong conversation" thesis. But there's a thin line there somewhere, one that I seem to have crossed -- where it all falls apart and I'm increasingly disturbed by how really close I'm coming to thoughts I once detested when applied to me and to those I love. Why is this different? Why does my American self bristle at the sight of Mexican flags being proudly paraded through our streets? Why am I so angry with President Fox when he seals his own southern border then comes to my state to ask more freedoms and acceptance for his citizens whose rights he should be championing at home? What's wrong with all this? Is what is not being said the culprit in all this? And ...why do I feel so guilty when people I trust and respect are over there on the other side asking for my understanding (Senator Barrack Obama, Attorney Van Jones, Rep. Maxine Waters, etc.)? What am I missing?

At the end of the day I still find myself resentful of having the debate framed by bigots who are usurping the language and tactics of the Civil Rights Movement. It's like Ward Connerly's anti-Affirmative Action arguments that are shaped in the same way -- using Dr. King's model as his own and therefore feeding the fires of discrimination unwittingly and creating supportive arguments for the opposition to all that I believe in. It's all so convoluted ... confused -- and why do I feel so defensive?

Why does only Lou Dobbs suggest that industrial, corporate, and agricultural interests be held to paying a livable wage so that those "jobs no American wants to do" would be filled by our own citizens who cannot live or support families on what illegals are paid? Why can't we talk about the millions of displaced service workers (black) abandoned to poverty and the streets because there is no way to support families and move into the mainstream when not even those "jobs no American wants to do" are available to them at a wage that will pay the bills and educate the young?

The unspoken beneficiaries of the current lack of a coherent policy are illegal laborers who are able to send back to Mexico billions of dollars to aid that economy, and corporate farms, hotels, hospitals, and large contractors whose profit margin is bloated by exploitative cost estimates that distort our own economy and overload our social systems.

Many newly-arrived illegals from below the border unwittingly benefit from white racism and have little reason to not take advantage of this fatal flaw in this nation's never-quite-attained self-portrait of the ideal democracy.

Are my feelings of today colored by those years when I worked in support of Cesar Chavez and the cause of the United Farmworkers? Those marches are still vivid in my mind. I remember how hard he worked against the guest worker "Bracero" program designed and executed by the owners of large farms in the Salinas Valley and was a thinly-veiled strategy to import scab labor designed to kill the farmworker's crusade to gain a living wage and humane working conditions. What's different now? Why am I still stuck there -- with the vision of feisty delegate, Dolores Huerta, at the '72 Democratic Convention where we combined the lettuce boycott with the business of the convention and won both? There was little indication of black/brown tensions at that time. I recall sitting two rows behind her waving my "boycott lettuce!" sign while the Alabama delegates in their straw hats and red/white/and blue outfits sat happily and defiantly chewing on lettuce leaves just one aisle over. Those were the bigots! We were all progressives seeking economic justice for all. What has changed?

And why does it feel as if the entire country has shifted far to the right, leaving me out here on the far left, alone, without having been aware of the changes that led to where I now find myself? I distinctly remember always thinking of myself as a political moderate. What happened to that? And, as a Liberal, why do I feel abandoned?

Is it true, then, that if the political extremes get too far out on their own paths -- that these eventually collapse into one indistinguishable whole, unrecognizable by either side?

Wish I could hear from you ... there are so rarely any comments from those who are reading here ... even when my words are truly controversial. Am I the only one with such questions? Am I the only one who hasn't gotten all this figured out yet? I'm both confused and deeply troubled ... .

Anybody.... ?

Photo: Traditional Mexican dance performed by students of the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts -- where children come to learn through their own cultures and through those of others. The West African dance and Mexican dance classes are among the most popular. Most of these children are from very low income families and attend through a generous largely grant-funded scholarship program. The EBCPA is in its 39th year of operation in the heart of Richmond's historic downtown. I'm working to build strong ties between that institution and the park for which I'm responsible for community outreach.

Spring's officially arrived ... and nothing announces it more clearly than the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts ...

Yesterday we experienced another of those signs of a climate change. While other areas of the world are seeing typhoons and torrential rains -- here in the Bay Area we're experiencing a rare rainy season that has reached all the way into late May. Until recent years these were the deliciously hot days that promised summers that wouldn't truly arrive until around the last week of August. Sandwiched in between June and all of July are those cold and damp fogbound days that include a usually miserable Fourth of July.

I can remember my dad's younger brother, Louis Charbonnet, on a visit from New Orleans and an avid baseball fan, being taken to a game in San Francisco where people were sipping hot soup! He could hardly conceal his good-natured contempt for such a practice. Baseball season was the time of beer and soft drinks (preferably red). He could not stop laughing at the silliness of it all!

Having lived my entire life on the west side of the hills in the Oakland-Berkeley area of the East Bay, I had no idea as a youngster that one could simply drive through the Caldecott Tunnel, drive inland about 5 miles and there it would be -- summer! The temperature might never reach 45 degrees on one side of those hills that served to block the fog drawn in by the valley heat -- while only ten miles away in the valley people were sweltering around their swimming pools in 90-100 degrees under blue skies.

Yesterday Alyana and Tamaya were dancing and grandma was duty bound to be in the audience. I have an almost perfect record of attendance over the years. This week was a bonanza, Alyana (fourth grader) and her afterschool dance program made for a very special Wednesday afternoon. I watched her dance with a chair most imaginatively. Yesterday she performed with her West African dance group in a piece I've now seen so many times that I could probably do it myself, but it might take a martini or two. The two little ones are now 8 and 10 and are in their fifth year of dance lessons. Tamaya started when she was not quite three.

Lest you're fooled into thinking that this busy soul's entire life is made up of world-saving, be advised that I also do a fairly good job of grandmothering, too.

This was a very full week. The fourth in a series of Leadership Tours (on Friday) was resoundingly successful. It lived up to expectations and it appears that we will continue them into the foreseeable future. I was expecting to end the series in July, but they are building in importance and interest and the wait list is already approaching its limit of 28 "tourists" with the next outing still weeks away.

But that's for tomorrow's entry ...

Left photo: The instructor with his class of 3-6 year-olds in Saturday's beginning ballet performance. There's nothing lovelier, except maybe the standing ovations received from proud young parents. Interesting to note that this audience -- largely African American, Latino, and young -- responded to this formal European dance form much as we do in the call-and-response tradition of the black church; "... you go baby!" and, "you got it," and shouted proudly mid-performance, "...that's mah baby!" This was probably not what Degas would have seen fit to paint, but was more in the spirit of, "...it ain't all Hip Hop, we can do this stuff, too." (Click to enlarge to full size.)

Right photo: Alyana dancing with her class at Berkeley Arts Magnet school's afterschool program.

Maybe a new cure has been found for vertigo ... the works of Alexander Calder.

Have been fully stabilized now for several days. Actually almost from the time that I stood before the great scuptures at the SFMOMA. There were a few traces of disorientation during the long walk from the museum to the financial district -- but for the most part the world settled down into some reasonable semblance of order on Friday and has remained so until now. The tendency to hold eyes to the front and pause before glancing left or right has disappeared and I'm again leaping over tall buildings in a single bound. I've tossed the Meclezine and its full steam ahead.

Another of our community-outreach "tours" is scheduled for the upcoming Friday and all seats are now taken. Word of the success of these bus tours has spread wildly, and the "civic" is now fully "engaged." Not sure what I've written about this phase of our work, but a word or two about now might be worthwhile:

As is true of other cities across the country, Richmond's downtown core was abandoned about 30 years ago as shopping centers were developed on the outer fringes of the most densely populated areas. As the merchant class moved out into the suburbs taking resources with them for the most part, the innercities began to disintegrate and implode as centers of poverty and crime took over. Banks and supermarkets followed those more affluent rooftops and city services declined miserably.

Only in recent times has the Smart Growth concept begun to take hold -- boosted by rising gas prices and (in California) inadequate public transportation systems. Construction of fewer affordable housing over recent year within the city proper -- is now being remedied by the introduction of transit village development; new more densely designed mini-communities within the whole. The redevelopment agency is beginning to have a positive impact on the blighted areas of the historic downtown. Our bus tours may serve to help distinguish blight from historic landmarks by raising the awareness of the city's celebrated wartime history. It appears that we're beginning to succeed in that effort.

As luck (and an act of Congress would dictate), early in the year 2000 Richmond was named as the one place in the nation where there were more World War II structures still standing than in any other state. Albeit they still stood as the result of benign neglect and not from any sense of reverence for its past, but nonetheless there is still much through which to tell that important story of an era. There are many still living who have active memories of those years, and -- if we can save them from the wrecking ball -- sites to be saved for posterity.

It's a complex story; one filled with both triumphant and painful memories. The story is largely of emancipated women (white) whose lives were forever changed by the opportunity presented by their times. These were the Rosies for whom every barrier was lifted to make possible their stepping into the labor force by the conscription of all able-bodied males to active duty in the war. Here were (still standing) the very first 24-hour-a-day childcare center in the nation; the Maritime Child Development Center we recently visited. The beautiful Albert Kahn Ford Assembly plant that switched from the autos to tanks in the early days of the global conflict -- and that has been beautifully restored to its original architectural splendor and will now be used for new peaceful purposes. It will house the new Rosie the Riveter/Home Front reception center along with other commercial enterprises.

Scattered throughout one of the most economically-deprived and neglected parts of the city -- the abandoned historic downtown -- are at least two wartime housing developments (once racially segregated), the Winters Building that once served as an air raid shelter and now houses the East Bay Center for the Performing Arts; the old Kaiser Field Hospital; the International Hotel, a decaying 20-room building that once was the stopping place for black porters who worked for the Pullman Company whose west coast servicing yards were in Richmond; the Oishi-Sakai greenhouses, Japanese flower growers whose owners were sent to internment camps far inland; Kaiser Permanente Shipyard #3, the current home of the last ship built by Kaiser, the SS Red Oak Victory, now under-going restoration by some of those who sailed on her in both WWII and the Korean wars; the Whirley Crane which built her; the old massive storage "bunker," machine shop, and paint shops, and the graving basins in which the 747 Kaiser-built ships were built and launched over a four-year wartime period. So much more than I can cover here (check out the Rosie the Riveter website for more).

The story is that those sites are scattered throughout the Iron Triangle, the long-neglected inner core of the city. Taking the community aboard small buses for a long morning starting with coffee, a short DVD, "Lost conversations ..." (seen in CBreaux Annex), has been our way of reacquainting the city with its own forgotten history. We load the bus with civic leaders combined with a few elders who lived those times and -- with a park narrator at the helm -- we help them to share their stories as we drive around to the various sites. To watch the reawakening of that history through their eyes is a revelation. The elders come alive and the "come-latelys" sharpen their ears. The civic leaders get to witness the community's response to that history. Suddenly the "we" extends from those of us whose business it is to breathe new life into those times, officially, to those who begin to make real connections with their own history. They begin to look at what up to now has been junk structures waiting to be replaced by new condos -- as critical to that history and historic preservation begins to take on new meaning. Just as suddenly, the awareness that their community is literally living in the middle of a brand new national park begins to dawn, and the fact that the National Park Service is here to help them to tell their story. Can you even imagine how exciting this process can be?

We have the opportunity to redefine the city's public image through its identification as a national resource and tourist mecca. This abandoned inner core can now be re-shaped with new opportunities for economic expansion. Most important to me is the possibility that we can include along with the truly important Rosie story, that of the very different African American homefront worker story; the Japanese internment story; the Latino story; that of the Italian and German immigrants who were each effected but who more quickly "overcame." We have an amazing role to play in bringing those stories with their amazing complexity into the national dialogue for a second look.

We have the rare chance to re-examine those factors that led to the rapid social changes that marked the next two decades in the history of the country. This park is that important, but only if we walk through the conflicts that created the times and avoid the temptation to paper over the lessons we should have but have not yet fully learned.

Those now in their later years have the rare opportunity to participate in that process. We're making every effort to include in each 28-passenger bus tour (we're now had 4 with a 5th coming up in July) a few of those who lived and worked in those tumultous war years. You have no idea how wonderful it is to see those workforce veteran voices held in such respect as their stories begin to be expressed as we ride along through the past ... their past ... with newfound reverence.

Photo: This thumbnail shows only those sites that lie along the shoreline. The structures that are less than one mile away are those that were the staging ground and the living spaces of the homefront workers. It is that part of the story that our tours highlight -- and quite successfully.

Mother's Day ... and, another of Dorian's delightful expressions of art. (Take note Marc Chagall.) ...

Saturday brought a trip to San Francisco's Crissy Center for the 5th annual Community Heroes award ceremony. The day was a rare one -- spring at her best -- and even at one o'clock in the afternoon, hometown folks, visiting suburbanites, and a healthy sprinkling of tourists were already gathering on the green for the Kaboom! activities that would end with one of the largest free barbecues and firework displays of the year.

I'd been asked to accept one of the 3 awards for Sharon Fuller of the Ma'at Environmental Youth Academy. Sharon could not be present and, as a member of her board, the role of recipient fell to me by default. It simply meant saying a few words about the honoree and having another opportunity to meet with the Golden Gate National Recreation Area national park staff and to revisit some of the young people who work with other younger people in some very exciting environmental programs.

The Crissy Center model is one we'd love to emulate in the emerging Rosie the Riveter/Homefront NHP on the Richmond shoreline. I've been fortunate in that my co-worker in developing the community outreach part of the program is one of the three Crissy Center staffmembers, Naomi Torres, who is with us on loan, parttime. It is from this experienced career park ranger, that I've learned much about the concept of civic engagement. Though I suspect that this is something I've known in theory a number of times over a long lifetime; something that keeps getting dusted off and renamed each decade. The important things are like that. They get rediscovered and refurbished and redefined into new realities -- if they're really worthy. Civic engagement may be one of those. There are times these days when I no longer know whether I'm learning or simply remembering old concepts.

On Sunday, David, Dorrie and I drove to a nearby Pacific Asian buffet restaurant where we joined many families (mostly Asian) celebrating parents lining up for booster seats for little wiggly ones -- it was one of those restaurants. Not a bit like the all-grownup sophisticated crowd at Tadich's in San Francisco's financial district on Thursday evening. Few smartly-dressed Porsche-driving brokers and admen and women here. A gaggle of strollers parked haphardly in the lobby. Shorts and tee-shirts on most; with a few "holiness" types decked out in church-going outfits topped by those elaborate signature hats African American sistahs wear on such occasions. The noises were different; the steady hum of conversations in strange languages nicely laced with the universal language-free sounds of children's laughter nicely blending with the clattering of pots and pans and cutlery.

Happy Mother's Day!

Photo: Dorrie's gift was this drawing of her two cats, Gracie and Marilyn, designated granddaughters for the day. The happiness in her choice of color may give some indication of the lack of fear at the fairly recent move into her own apartment across town. At least that is my hope. I see no indication of worry or instability in this drawing. I'm always searching for signs ... .

... and Alexander Calder to the rescue!

It's been a week of happenings all leading to today. Despite queaziness brought on by not being sure where my feet were going to deliver the rest of me, I did manage to assign power to the top half of my body and -- eventually -- overcame what turned out to be disconcerting spasms of vertigo that strike with little warning -- depending upon too-quickly executed turns of the head, loud sounds, and fast movement picked up at the outer edges of my field of vision. However, in the process did a few stupid things that proved that it takes a little more than common sense to keep all the body parts neatly aligned and moving smoothly.

Feeling temporarily improved, on Wednesday I joined David and the kids for a trip across the bay to the Orpheum where we shared a rousing performance of Cathy Rigby in Peter Pan. What a show! Not sure what I expected, but surely not the great music and dance and delightful stage settings that we watched from the second row of the dress circle along with a soldout house where the median age must have been somewhere around 11, give or take a few toddlers and at least one octogenarian. What a time!

Together we groaned and booed at each entrance of the "Bli-my Sli-my Cap-tain Hook" with his cartoonlike pirate crew. The hardest part was not singing along with every song. The only explanation for the entire house not bursting into song at the drop of the maestro's baton and a few familiar notes was surely the median age of the audience and the lack of any memory of the original. I'm sure that every grownup in the theater knew every word of the score. "I gotta crow" made every muscle in my throat ache from the not-singing.

On Thursday I skipped a work-related scheduled tour of the bay aboard the Delphinus to visit the mothballed fleet at Suisun Bay near Vallejo. It was an annual volunteer's day event, sponsored by the park. Figured (wisely) that this would take more than sea-legs and given the current state of my inner-ear problems, this was not the smartest thing to undertake. The combination of a trip over water sounded less attractive than an invitation to see the Calder Exhibition at the SFMOMA -- slated to close in a few days. Now that was a wise decision.

However, this was the first time I'd found myself fearful of looking up at the massive skyscrapers in the financial district (for fear of toppling over). For the first time I found myself acutely aware of the movement of traffic all around us. Even the movement of the escalator that fed us from underground of BART up to Market Street had been disorienting. Strange.

But that was of little concern compared to the stupidity of visiting the wing where the surrealists were being featured. Magritte does not play well when one's ears are ringing and the tones are about a half-note off -- one from the other -- making for a dissonance that is threatening to sanity,

But ... Alexander Calder's sculptures were magnificent! I'd only been aware of his mobiles and a few of his wire pieces, but here was an entire wing of his large sculptures in both wire and the most exquisitely-balanced and engineered pieces imaginable. I could have spent the entire afternoon in those rooms. Maybe -- in a way -- his works served to provide the one thing I most needed on this Thursday afternoon, on a day in May in 2006; balance. I felt "steadied" by it. In a strange way I felt whole, anchored. If I could just store up enough of this to carry me on the walk through the heavy five o'clock homebound traffic of the financial district to Tadich's where we would have an early dinner ... .

Alexander Calder had provided some temporary but much-needed relief but, unfortunately, this would not last more than a few hours.

Friday brought some stability and bright colors no longer shocked my peripheral perception, the ringing in my ears slipped into a single note, and the dissonance was lost in the busyness of another day at the office... .

Now if only the world would react similarly ... and the country would strike some kind of balance instead of careening off into more chaos each day. Could it be that my body is simply mirroring this new and frightening reality?

Could be ... .

Noam Chomsky for president? Of course.

I suppose that there is more than one way to scrap the franchise or commit political suicide. Barbara Cottman Becnel for governor can only be followed by Chomsky for president. It's logical; a stroke of sanity in a sea of total madness. Unless the field improves and the Dems win back the house and/or the senate from those now in power -- that's precisely what I will do, come the next presidential race in two years. I'll vote on all of the initiatives and all of the lesser offices and commit the top of the ticket to my quest for sanity!

On the other hand, maybe we could make Chomsky secretary of state or a member of the Supremes ... now wouldn't that be something? And while we're at it, we could bring back Lani Guinnere as a replacement for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when and if she decides to retire. She could neutralize Justice Clarence Thomas, hopefully. Someone needs to. Has that misplaced Justice ever submitted a written opinion?

Effects of vertigo? Perhaps. Spent long hours battling sleep last night -- mentally rearranging the government in the vain hope that there is still time -- and that this is at least one way to avoid nuclear destruction and save the world for my grandkids and yours.

Today we'll visit the de Young in beautiful Golden Gate Park -- try to find a new perspective among the azaleas and rhododendrons (maybe we'll see one of those magnificent blue herons in one of the many ponds). It's possible that, at least for a few hours, this feeling of absolute terror will subside.

Photo: My beautiful Dorian Leon Reid at 5 months. I hadn't yet realized the extent of her congenital brain damage, or, that she would never reach maturity. In a way, I suppose that my entire life has been spent subconsciously trying to leave a safe place for her in an unsympathetic world. The fear that I have failed in that mission grows as time winds down while she grows older and her future becomes more precarious. Emotions -- not being governed by intellect -- keep me ever engaged in the hopeless yet absolutely necessary work of fulfilling that dream.

Hopeless? Maybe ... but that's no reason to bail.

I've voted without any reason to hope so many times over a lifetime that I no longer make any connection between those causes I choose to support and anticipated outcomes. One look at the total meltdown we're seeing in Washington, D.C., would suggest that there are an awful lot of us in the same position -- and that opting out simply isn't a choice. We simply have to be guided by conscience and principle and hope for the best. I must believe that justice, morality and reason will someday overtake greed, arrogance, and evil. Some things we do simply because we can't not.

Spoke briefly with some political colleagues this afternoon about Barbara's candidacy. She and I spoke briefly early in the day -- and I realized that the media is ignoring her presence in the race, totally. My friends looked at me with thinly-veiled good-natured pity and true generosity -- and I looked back with the same expression that I wear when I'm petitioning for my causes -- or staring down a prison guard at the gates of San Quentin. It's all an exercise in futility, and we all know it, but once committed ... .

During our brief conversation over some of the best scrambled eggs in town (soft and creamy with a dollop of sour cream, a raisin scone with raspberry jam at Bettie's Grill on Fourth Street) -- I felt the hopelessness grow. They were right, of course.

Barbara's daring challenge to the three major candidates for the governorship may be tilting at windmills, but it's all we've got. All three; Westley, Schwarzenegger, and Angelides are sworn to uphold the death penalty. They will not break ranks on this one. But they're not the problem. In the state of California the polling tells us that 70% of the people support capital punishment, and the chance for any candidate to be elected is dependent upon their doing the same. Our only chance is to change the hearts and minds of the electorate. Our only chance.

That would mean doing extensive education on the issue and expensive polling widely and often then having the ability to publicize poll results. It will be necessary to prove to the viable candidates that there is a constituency for a new position that supports a moratorium, at least. At the moment, there is not the funding, nor the time, nor the people power to make that happen.

Unless ... .

...but I don't dare let myself become overwhelmed by an attack of common sense!

Photo: Co-demonstrators at the gates of San Quentin on one of the many times we gathered in the vain attempt to stop the execution of a prisoner. The plea for a moratorium until we can determine whether or not we may be putting the innocent to death continues to be ignored.

Vertigo, or where oh where did I leave my sense of balance?

It appeared for a few days there that I'd spend the rest of my life with my head pointed in but one direction with no checking out those things beyond what front-face presents. What a miserable ailment this is! Had it once before -- no idea what caused it then nor what took it away. One day (about ten years ago), I woke listing dangerously and unable to stabilize. My body tended to follow my head -- and my head was on some kind of path unrelated to the rest of me. One quick turn of my head and the world would spin crazily! Miserable!

Having been blessed with the best of health for the greater part of life leaves me with no way to defend against such a random attack. What's left of my brain immediately begins to conjure up visions of strokes and heart attacks and any other wandering ailment I see advertised on the tube. Felt as if I'd gotten myself one of each of those side effects that get tagged on to the end of those pharmaceutical commercials. So much for that.

But vertigo may be stress related -- not bad stress, just stress. Since returning home I've been back in the thick of work -- the best kind, actually. Case in point:

Two weeks ago we drove to Sacramento to watch the panel hearings for grant applications. This was for Proposition 40 bond moneys for historic preservation. We'd (the park and the Rosie Trust) submitted a large grant that would enable us to restore one of the Kaiser historic sites -- the Maritime Child Development Center; the first 24 hour-a-day childcare center in the nation. The old building stands abandoned and has for most of the last 60 years. It was hurriedly constructed early in World War II without a foundation. The place is riddled with mold; has rippling floors and smells of putrid dry rot. However, in that building (and another such childcare center some blocks away) is a treasure trove of child-sized furniture, toys, tricycles, red wagons, wood construction blocks, cribs and desks, home made children's kitchen furnishings, all stacked as if the children walked away yesterday.

Once restored, it will become one of the scattered sites of the Rosie the Riveter/Home Front Historical Park, with at least one specimin classroom open to the public. The rest of the large building will be rented out to nonprofits -- one of which is an environmental program for teens. It's an exciting step toward the actualization of another piece of the park we're building.

Word came within 24 hours of our visit to the capitol that we'd been selected. That means 2 million dollars (to be matched) is now available to the city and the park with which to begin that work.

Funny, two years ago it would have concerned me that the child development center was created to make it possible for white women to be hired into the homefront workforce. Black children were not accepted, but were cared for the way they would have been in the south from whence they'd come. These were largely sharecroppers who'd come to the west coast to work in the shipyards -- and who would have had no expectation for childcare, so it mattered not. They came with a strong tradition of collective parenting, and it served them well in Richmond. It had to. Or maybe this was also the home of the nation's first latch-key children.

The park development's darker side surfaces and subsides in what is becoming a familiar pattern. That we're in the process of enshrining a period of racial segregation is important but only inasmuch as we do that without seizing every opportunity to reexamine those times and work our way carefully through the conflicts that rise to the surface as we work.

I felt the same thrill that my colleagues felt when that grant announcement was made. I was ecstatic and felt just as triumphant -- but perhaps for different reasons. Maybe what is different is the fact that I've begun to lose any sense of a separation from the rest of staff -- either in our intent or in how we go about the work of re-building this important chapter in the nation's history, together.

There's an openness and a willingness to honestly face the real possibility of providing answers to questions nobody's asking. At least that's true of those with whom I'm working at the National Park Service. We may be ahead of the community in that respect so that next weeks and months may have some unknown waters to navigate. I'm determined that important history is not papered over rather than confronted. It will be in those friendly (and maybe not so friendly) encounters that the learning and the atonement will occur. We must not miss this opportunity to lay those ghosts.

What happens if the scars are deeper than I know?

Barbara Becnel; first woman governor of the nation's largest state -- California?

maybe, and -- in the best of all worlds -- hope reigns! There appears to be a growing leadership vacuum, and surely this is a woman worthy of serious consideration -- one who will force the much-needed debate on our system of justice and capital punishment over the next few weeks leading to the June primary. Can't recall ever being stopped by the quoted odds of chances of victory -- and this isn't the time to start.

Last night I ventured in to Berkeley to hear my friend give a presentation at the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian-Universalists. In the audience were a number of familiar faces -- those with whom I'd stood on vigil at the gates of San Quentin in the eerie days and hours before an execution -- over many years.

I recalled that UUs were almost always strongly represented in most of the causes I've supported over time, and that is true across the nation. Have always suspected that I could go to any part of the country, visit the local UU church or fellowship and start a conversation with anyone -- starting in the middle of the fourth paragraph and leaving out all the indefinite articles! Have wondered from time to time whether there is something we've learned through UUism or whether the power lies in the kinds of individuals who are attracted to the denomination? The percentage of UUs working hard in support of equal rights, human rights, fair wages, single-sex marriage, reforms in campaign financing, world peace, etc., far outstrips almost any other denomination. When combined with the Ethical Culturists, the American Friends Service Committee, the Humanists, ACLU, and the United Methodists -- there are probably enough of us to shape almost any progressive political endeavor, and often do, by sheer strength of our convictions and the determination to act on them.

Sitting in that modest sanctuary with the others last night -- listening to Barbara make her presentation that included a description of the last day and hours spent in the death chamber as a witness to Stanley Tookie Williams' execution -- gave some sense of what I've missed by going it alone over recent years. Seeing Ann Fagin Ginger, a noted authority on the United Nations, international law, and longtime head of the Berkeley Peace Commission -- stirred those embers of days of Berkeley activism -- and reminded me to make those re-connections soon. Amplifying my voice by working more closely with others is surely something to reactivate. Living in Richmond has served to dull some political nerve endings that may have some life left in them.

Barbara has asked that I do some writing for her campaign. We'll meet again later this week to talk about that. If we're going to get the debate on the moratorium up and running through her campaign -- the time is now. There is less than a month-and-a-half left in which to move the issue into front and center of the debates. She has never even paused in her efforts to stop state sanctioned killing. It is I who slackened of late. It is I who needs now to get out of my paper hat and back to work.

All three candidates (the governor, Steve Westley, and Phil Angelides) are committed to continuing the death penalty in this state. None will even allow for reconsideration of a moratorium though there are several bills waiting to be heard in the legislature. In the event that Barbara picks up a significant number of votes in the June primary -- she will have placed the issue squarely into the debates. In the event of a close election, if a significant number of voters who are calling for a moritorium or for abolition were to vote for her -- this would represent a solid block of potential votes any contender will need in order to insure victory in November. Her candidacy may not seek the governorship as much as it is a plea for the hearts of those who aspire to lead us.

I've been hoping that Angelides would relent and tap into the growing restlessness in this state and nation around the question of the death penalty. Maybe, together, we can help him to shift to a new position. We need to convince him that there is a large and growing constituency for abolition. I know that his position is bolstered by the other two candidates, and a reluctance to break ranks in the middle of a campaign. He told me at the meeting in Mendocino that he stands alone in his family. His wife and daughters are staunchly opposed to capital punishment. Interesting?

Judge Foley has postponed from May to August the decision to rule on the unusual cruelty aspect of death by lethal injection; so that judgement will fall within the timespan of a lively and contentious political campaign for the office of governor. That should justify an open discussion before the statewide electorate. Barbara will be the instrument for that discussion and I will support her in that effort.

The media is ignoring her presence in the race. She's a courageous woman whose persistence, passion, and sheer power of intellect will serve the cause well. She will travel to Soweto after the primary to scatter Stan's ashes there as promised. Meanwhile, his cause and that of others, as well as our collective consciences will be well served by her run in the primary.

This morning (quite early) we talked briefly by phone. She was on the freeway on her way to appear on a panel on street violence at Oakland's city hall. She will attend the Democratic Convention where she will bring her cause to the table. I no longer hold delegate status in the 14th Assembly district so can't be of much help there -- but next week we'll confer and maybe, together with enlightened friends (you?), -- we can make a statement that will be heard 'roun' the world.

Wish us well. Do take the time to respond to this entry ... would appreciate hearing from you in these troubled times.

Photo: For additional information go to www.VoteBarbaraBecnel-Gov.com or send an email to Barbara@VoteBarbaraBecnel-Gov.com. We'll need volunteers throughout the state. Join us in this important struggle to bring to a halt this barbaric practice of killing in our names. It's quite possible that these are the first steps in bringing a reconsideration of preemptive war and the possibility of peace in our day, or that of our children.

Log jam ... !

Am experiencing an unfamiliar problem and it's affecting my ability to write. Too much input, too little time. No way to assimilate those thoughts that are obviously screaming more loudly as the result of the past week's experiences. Sleep doesn't come easily -- though my need for sleep is actually less these days. Have no idea whether I'm less tired or simply afraid to waste time being unconscious and unaware when the value of time has increased so noticeably in these later years. The sense of urgency that comes as a natural consequence of aging, waxes and wanes, but is more acute as the days shorten.

I'm also struggling with the feeling of being out of step on some important issues, and with the sense that I, alone, know. That is so dangerous to my sense of propriety that -- rather than that awareness coming with a proud sense of possessing some superior knowledge and therefore privilege -- I'm left feeling conflicted; feeling a disconnect with others whom I respect -- and ... old. That, because I know this cannot be true. Despite all, the feeling persists and a sense of increasing isolation comes with it.

Case in point: The immigrant question may be the most troubling. I know that I'm not a racist but that's what nearly all racists convince themselves of. None but the most evil would own such biases, surely not willingly. But I truly believe that we're in the wrong conversation. We've allowed questionable political forces to frame the debate and they've done it to their advantage.

I felt it so strongly the other evening while watching the president repeating ad nauseum, "...they do the work no American wants to do!" I thought of the countless times I've heard that phrase over the past months and years. The real truth is that no one should be asked to " ...do the work no American wants to do" surely not at slave wages. The question is less about immigration than it's about the need to pay a living wage to all workers. That's the conversation we need to be having. How long since we've seen a rise in the minimum wage?

The fact that illegal immigrants are being shamelessly exploited by corporate interests by forcing wages down for everyone is rarely discussed. Those workers are only trying to better their own lives but in the process are benefitting by white racism, innocently. The debate should not be brown against black but both against corporate exploitation!

The displacement of service workers is no longer a part of the conversation, and should be. No more pump jockeys at gas stations; no newspaper delivery boys; no elevator attendants and fewer non-skilled jobs across the board. Called Earthlink Help Desk a week ago and the techie I spoke with was in India! We've out-sourced many jobs to other countries and in-sourced more and more to those who can get past the barriers at the borders in a quest for economic salvation. And all to the advantage of corporate interests and at the cost to non-skilled and low-skilled poor whites and people of color who are being robbed by a broken system of public education and little or no health care.

Homelessness is growing exponentially. People where I live are doubling and tripling up in modest structures designed for a single family. Many are invisible because they're living in outbuildings and garages. They have no legal addresses (therefore are disenfranchised) because their makeshift "homes" are most often illegal and in violation of city codes. They are in no position to complain about roof leaks or faulty plumbing, or lack of heat, and ... .

Learned this morning that 70% of young black males are now high school dropouts. That 70% are either incarcerated or on parole by the time they're thirty. That means that we've substituted prisons for institutions for learning in the lives of the young, black, brown, and under-educated. In California 50% of students of color (both boys and girls) are "... pushed out of the public school system by the ninth grade." It's disgraceful! Small wonder that I can't sleep.

How many of these (do you suppose) would have been the gas station attendants, the janitors, nurses aides, phone operators, artists and musicians, bank tellers, elevator operators, bus boys,gardeners, red caps and barbers and cosmeticians, of another day? What ever happened to vocational training and the jobs that went with them in the crafts and service industries? And -- if we were providing preparations for such jobs would our schools be educating kids for a world that no longer exists? Isn't that another of the conversations we ought to be having?

Is the only answer warehousing our young in prisons where they're asked to provide slave labor to corporations who pay them little or nothing for their labor making furniture or assembling widgets -- (the new form of "rehabilitiative" prison practices). It's ironic that some of that work provides training of a sort, but upon release former inmates are confronted with prohibitions in those same industries that -- bans that prevent employment due to having been convicted of a felony and having served prison time; the classic "catch 22."

We're in the wrong conversation ... but how on earth do we change our course when the media and the forces that control it holds us to this mantra that eats away at our sanity and leaves us with the choice of either joining their conversation or run the risk of being branded racist -- UnAmerican -- and even more tragic than that; old!

No one can possibly survive in this country on what "guest workers" must settle for in order for the machine of American industry to continue to serve our collective needs. The costs to the rest of us are a persistently rising poverty level for the least able among us, a large section of the population subsisting on the ill-gotten gains from the underground economy fueled by the drug trade, and a bloated upper class now obscenely wealthy and powerful.

We must bear the costs of healthcare for those who cannot possibly take care of themselves as they continue to crowd the emergency rooms across the country or have no healthcare at all or suffer in silence until easily-preventable diseases bring death. And, at a time when so many of the middleclass can no longer afford health care services even for their own families. There is constant threat of deportation and the disintegration of families as children born in this country (Americans by birth) face the possibility of losing parents through discovery of their status as illegals. Who would wish that on anyone? Who but the wealthiest and least caring would see such lives as livable, or, that anyone should deserve such a fate? What kind of arrogance requires that anyone be relegated to lives of such desperation? And -- all for the purpose of allowing us to continue to live beyond our means in a collapsing world economy?

Yes. We're being seduced into the wrong conversations, as we are about the need to drill in Anwar while failing to mention the need to conserve (junk the SUVs!) or R&D of alternative energies; and about that issue that's allowing for the surveilance of US citizens in the name of National Security ... all wrong conversations.

I'm thinking that -- come November -- if we play our cards right, maybe we'll get to frame the debate again. Do you suppose?

(Think I'll click into MoveOn.com and pledge my $15/month as requested in today's plea for support.)

Photo: Taken in front of the slave quarters at Arlington House, the ancestral home of General Robert E. Lee. Our National Park Service guide was a well-informed young woman whose very existence in this position would argue against the enslavement of any American over another. This setting was strangely sanitized and bereft of any signs of the lives lived within those brick walls. Found myself over these past days wondering if we're now seeing slavery reconfigured (as is torture) but still destructive of families -- parent's ever-constant threat of separation from children -- forced to live substandard lives of desparation -- for beyond the ability to overcome, ever. The new face of slavery in our time?

Sanctuary ...

Woke on Thursday morning with just a touch of vertigo -- shortness of breath -- and with a feeling of unease that persisted well into the day. My work was being effected by the pressure of suddenly becoming "visible" in new ways and at odd times.

Yesterday I'd fulfilled an obligation to a family member to be her guest at an event in Berkeley -- as one of three women being presented to an audience of about 100. I love Berkeley, and despite the fact that celebrity fatigue was becoming a problem, it felt right to allow others the chance to draw from this font of whatever-the hell-this-is -- as well. It seemed as if I owed something to those in whose estimation I'd justifiably acquired this new status -- and maybe it was pay off time.

It was a lovely party at the North Berkeley Senior Center -- a favorite gathering place -- but was stretched out over more hours than my stamina could handle. Arrived at the appointed hour of 1:15 with an ending time of 4:30. The time would be shared by a "Reading and Book Signing by the author, Jerri Lange;" "An Accomplished Jazz Pianist, Marysa Kenyatta;", and "Our National Guest of Honor, Betty Reid Soskin." Those words were followed by the increasingly mystifying "Cultural Anthropologist and Writer," that continue to give me a feeling of over-the-topness. After all, this blog is my only writing (except for work-related pieces), and I'm not too sure what a cultural anthropologist is.

Turned out to be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back, and I vowed on the drive home that day to flee the field and head for sanctuary. I would pack my overnighter and head for Mendocino early tomorrow. After all, Dorian is now fairly well-adjusted to living on her own again and David can be depended upon to monitor that part of my life. Mendocino is where I would be able to slow the world enough to climb off for at least a weekend and get myself back into my box without all the strings hanging outside blowing in the winds of confusion!

It was a strange drive. Unlike other times when I see the changes in weather patterns, wildflowers along the roadside, new growth of bright greens -- the various shades of new and old foliage, and the dramatic changing effects upon the landscape that form this beautiful drive north -- this time I'd find myself using the tripmeter to furiously push forward into the miles. I was measuring the 3-and-a-half hour drive into how many cd's it would take to get me there -- and as fast as I'd pass signage that indicated how far to the next town -- I'd set the tripmeter back to zero and chew up the miles as fast as my little red Beamer could do so. Caught myself careening around at 80 mph at times and had to consciously lighten my foot on the gas pedal each time the speedometer would climb as if on its own.

This trip that I usually enjoy so much had been reduced to little more than directional signs -- San Rafael, Novato, Petaluma, Santa Rosa, Windsor, Geyserville, Cloverdale, Philo, Booneville, Navarro -- and with a sudden exhale Route 128 gave way to the merge with Coast Highway #1 and it felt as if -- just as I did that final ascent to the top of the grade -- at the entrance to that scenic wonder where the Navarro River meets the ocean -- it was as if I'd experienced some kind of "pushing of an invisible re-set button, and perspective re-asserted itself with a vengeance! Everything began to fall into place again -- the seascape in its vastness exposed the fact that I'd been living in the foreground of my life over the past weeks and that this had narrowed my sense of both my self and the world.

Tonight I would see stars again in that immense universe; stars that are normally lost to me under too-bright urban skies. Today there would be the ocean crashing against the western wall of the continent -- my north Pacific Coastline! Mendocino is where I still experience all that, and where fear and trembling is diminished to its rightful place in the panoply of important and unimportant factors in my life. For the next 48 hours there would be no search helicopters circling menacingly overhead nor police sirens blaring nor gunshots in the night -- in a cacaphony of the sounds of city life that I've incorporated so totally that I'm only aware of them now in the stillness of this environment -- in this absence of 21st century street sounds that masquerades as peace.

... As does war in our time ... .

Photo: The view from his livingroom -- an 80-degree sweeping panorama of vast ocean interrupted by nothing unless one's eyes can reach to the shoreline of Japan ... .

Life is moving so fast that I'm breathless just trying to absorb it all without imploding ... .

Events of today quickly subsume events of yesterday -- not to mention the day-before-yesterday.

Since arriving home from the east coast there have been parties and continuing honors that are beginning to make me feel like an over-ripe rock star!

On Saturday after our Thursday (3/23) flight home I was driven to downtown Oakland to -- what was supposed to be an errand to IKEA but -- in fact was a surprise party planned and executed by son, David. It had obviously been weeks in the making. I was still so caught up in all that had happened -- it wasn't until we drove into the downtown area, into the 400 block of 14th Street near Broadway, that it dawned on me that we were heading for Geoffrey's. This is a family-owned gathering place where more and more ceremonial events are being hosted. Geoffrey's is a very special place, but in most recent times it has served as the site of memorial services for those we'd loved and lost. Maybe now we could exorcise the place with a celebration of the living. Me!

David had been busy while Kokee and I explored Washington -- grandchildren, cousins, and friends (I've now outlived all of the aunts and uncles) had gathered together for an afternoon of performances and presentations. There were brief speeches by both sons, Bob and David; a touching tribute by Dorrie who had been dressed for the party in beautiful African garb complete with fancy head wrap; a traditional African dance performed by a dear young friend; a violin solo by beautiful cousin, Joan Lewis, -- jazz player who's traveled internationally performing with noted musicians; a song by Bob (despite a bad cold); and touching tributes by old friends. There was Kokee's halting and close-to-tears words of confirmation that our shared adventure had reinforced our love. This was followed by a feast provided by cousin Geoffrey Pete served on brightly-colored placemats David had ordered from the National Women's History Project catalogue that displayed photos of the ten named honorees. He'd purchased a 15-minute DVD produced by the NWHP in honor of celebrated women over the past century. We'd viewed it as a part of the program at the Autrey ceremonies. It was his way of giving context to what had happened to me -- and it moved me to tears. Whatever the world has bestowed -- this recognition in the eyes of my sons and my family was the most touching and reaffirming of all that had happened over the past weeks.

Being the source of such pride was a rare privilege, indeed, and brought with it new meaning to all that had happened. I'd only that week experienced the feeling of having had a role in bringing all of the ancestors into my century and soon I would have a role in passing the baton to those who will follow. This strong sense of being a part of a continuum of change might well become the compelling new force in what is left of life to be lived. The newfound feelings of worthiness were reinforced in that room as I experienced the pride that I felt in myself mirrored in the eyes of those I love. That kind of congruence is rare. I suspect that this is a one time thrill. But maybe once is enough if properly savored and not allowed to be distorted into arrogance or over-confidence. This could be where the wheels come off the wagon if I begin to lose my sense of balance and begin to glide without effort instead of continuing to reach and stretch into the unknown future ... .

I must not allow this to become my obituary. There is need to continue to project myself into time as before. There are still symbolic white towels to drape over those imaginary gateposts of the world -- and future "Dr. Hymel's" to be searched out and supported in their work of saving humanity -- and the children I'll leave behind.

Photo: Martha Lee and granddaughter, Kokee, sharing the sweeping panorama of countless grave markers and the J. F. Kennedy family graves at Arlington Cemetery. The view from this spot takes in the Jefferson Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Washington in the distance. Wish it could show the feelings that such a view of the nation's symbolic past are evoked at such a moment. Only a respectful silence can tell that story ... .

Thurgood, Cousin George, and me ...

On our last evening in Washington -- after having visited Arlington Cemetery and Arlington House (home of Gen. Robert E. Lee); the Lee slave quarters (sterile and bereft of signs of the lives endured there); the Kennedy graves with the eternal flame ablaze but oddly lifeless; Anacostia's African American Museum and the Frederick Douglas home; we headed for one of the grandest buildings I'd seen in all of Washington. It was the Justice Thurgood Marshall Building that stands adjacent to Union Station.

This is the building that holds the offices of the Judiciary. From the street it appears not dissimilar to the buildings around it -- institutional white with regularly-shaped windows that pretty much match others nearby. However, once you step into the front of the structure (facing Union Station) this beautiful architectural gem is almost all-glass with an upward-sweeping ground floor atrium that features an indoor bamboo garden with trees reaching at least to the height of the second floor where all of the offices are visible through floor-to-ceiling glass walls -- from entry-level. In this huge reception area there is only the security desk; the garden area with its stone path winding gracefully through the giant bamboo -- and a magnificent iconic bronze bust of Justice Marshall.

Prior to our visit, I knew nothing about this beautiful edifice, and wondered whether my ignorance is widely-shared among people of color?

I thought then about an old copy of Ebony magazine back home in my files; a picture of mother's (and my) cousin George Allen, former president of Southern University, in full academic regalia standing next to his close friend and colleague, none other than Thurgood Marshall. That picture must have been taken during Justice Marshall's time on the Supreme Court bench. It was taken at commencement exercises. This was George Allen, son of Uncle Sam and Aunt Marie Allen -- nephew and namesake of my grandfather, Papa George.

I remembered then that I'd forgotten to take this George along to the Lincoln memorial the night before; but more than made up for it by visiting with Thurgood here at his building -- bringing along best regards from the family ... . (smile).

The surreal has by now become the norm in this wild and wonderful adventure ... .

( NPS's Martha Lee; we could never have done it without your guidance and companionship. Thank you!)