Been musing a lot about bi-racialism since the Channel 5 panel discussion was aired recently ... .

Find myself wondering why that discussion continues to have resonance into the 21st century when humankind has been creating mixed race people since before recorded history?

We continue to talk about us as though we're some dire condition that will befall the human race in some future millenium when we've been here evolving all the time! Certainly since tribes invaded other tribes has this been true. Any place on the planet where armies have occupied lands and dominated populations, mixed-race children have been the outcome. Since long before the Trojans Wars to the present this has been true. The Eurasian and Amerasian children born of WWII and Vietnam can be seen everywhere throughout Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia. In this country the slave trade produced millions of us; some from obvious sexual exploitation but a great many from courageous and often defiant young people willing to cross unimportant lines of separation for the sake of love and being together despite societal taboos.

The wonder for me is just why we continue to be seen as an aberration rather than the natural outcome of mobility and social progress? Though tanning salons are still the ultimate in luxury and bronze skin tones most desired by many Europeans, those of us without tan lines are suspect. When cosmetic surgeons are artificially thickening lips to emulate black features there is cause for wonder. At a time when there are actually lip puffer-uppers on the market for those unable to afford silicone treatments. This proved silliest when one day recently I purchased what I thought was lip gloss and got one of the lip enhancers instead. I stayed in the house most of that day -- laughing at myself -- while waiting for the swelling to go down and the slight tingling to dissipate.

Yes. There are some conversations that need to happen in order to free ourselves of some of the hypocrisy that marks our lives and may be preventing the normalizing of relations between the races.


My awareness was sharpened this week when I underwent some comprehensive blood work in connection with my annual physical. When the results came back there was one that gave the results with a racial designation (something called glomerular filtration rate, African American). At this point in my racial complexity how in the world does my physical body make that political distinction? How does one read that test result? Now that's the kind of conversation that we need to be having with our physicians, right? For the sake of my beautiful polyracial grandchildren, I'm planning to do that soon. My politics do not follow me into the examination room, nor will theirs.


Photo: Two of my grandchildren, Tamaya and Alyana, who exemplify our world as it has always been; made up of beautiful mixed children born of love and grace.

For those of us who insist upon living life in a constant state of surprise despite the warnings ... .

Today I took the time to watch all 6 segments of a rather amazing panel discussion in which I participated just after returning from the Inauguration in January. The invitation from Channel 5's "Six O'clock News" Anchor, Dana King, had come just before Martha and I flew to Washington. I'd long since forgotten that it had ever happened since during subsequent weeks my life has been filled with far more than I could process comfortably.

I'd received an email last week (5/19th) announcing that the news would be carrying the promo the very next evening and the excitement began to build -- though not enough to encourage me to alert my grandkids to watch. Who knows what embarrassing thing Grandma would do this time? So I wanted to preview the piece before subjecting myself to that kind of scrutiny.

Not to worry. I did watch the really well-produced promo and felt really proud of this small group who'd met in the Green Room only 15 minutes before air time. But it wasn't until this morning that I took the time to watch all 6 segments on the CBS5.com website. Amazing! What an honor to have been a part of this truly candid and deeply-penetrating honest discussion on a subject of such sensitivity. Take a look. I believe you can reach it online at CBS5.com then add "Multiracial in America: Changes in the Obama Age" to the search bar. If I could figure out a way to add the link here I would, but by the time I do the thrill of sharing will have disappeared and it will seem to serve only vanity to post it.

Watching it this morning in its entirety took the sting out of yesterday's BBC experience and restored my sense of self, and the feeling that it's perfectly okay to live my life in a constant state of surprise!

Betty, Phyllis, the BBC -- and my other woes ... .

My career as an internationalist crashed and burned on Saturday at Shipyard 3. This day would qualify (in Dorian's word) as a complete disastrophe! I had been dreading this event for some unknown reason and had cautioned the producer, Ms. Caroline Miller, that I didn't much see myself as appropriate for their documentary. She'd insisted and -- despite earlier misgivings, I gave in after an exchange of emails.

On Friday I'd asked for a meeting with Martha in a plea for some guidance; saying that I was feeling some need of support -- that this might need someone along to meet with the film crew. Knowing their documentary was about the Lend/Lease program (about which I knew little), I felt unqualified to add much, and said so. I was unaware that there would be 2 other women and that I would be asked to be a "Rosie."

My instructions were to meet their film crew at the old SS Red Oak Victory at five o'clock on Saturday evening. No other details. At about four o'clock I got into uniform and left 30 minutes later for the short 6 mile drive to the Port of Richmond. It was cold and dreary with the fog belt hanging over Berkeley sending stiff icy winds into Richmond and cutting through the harbor. I'd dressed in my Washington, D.C.-inspired long johns and heavy winter uniform but the bitterness cut through despite all.

Upon reaching the old Warehouse and within sight of the cameras and crew I spotted two women whom I've met on many occasions over the past years. They were the Rosies whose stories have been oft told in the inscriptions carved into the Rosie memorial and elsewhere in the literature. I believe their names are Phyllis and Agnes. Because of the cold (I thought), I chose to not leave my car to join them but instead turned off the motor at a spot overlooking the water; set the brake; and rummaged around the back seat for the crossword puzzle book I always have on hand to use at times when I'm waiting for Dorian while she's engaged in some activity or other. I was feeling depressed but without a visible reason ... .

I finally began to feel rude so put away my pen and puzzle book and left the warmth of my car to walk the 50 or so feet to join the others. This, in response to a tap on my car window from Caroline Miller letting me know that shooting was about to begin.

Three large empty wire spools had been gathered together by the film crew upon which we were to be seated with the old ship providing background. The 3 of us were to do a group interview, being questioned -- each in turn -- by a member of the team. The air was chilling! The wind was bruising. I was increasingly uncomfortable but it would be only during the first round of questioning that I would begin to understand what was happening to me. The constant interruptions by aircraft flying overhead distorting sound added to the dissonance I was feeling.

Phyllis had been asked a series of very specific questions about her experience as a young welder on the ships during the war; about her life just before being hired; about the kind of resistance she'd encountered as a women in her non-traditional role; etc. She was great with an active memory of events and feelings at the time. Agnes -- who was next -- also came through with authority and an ability to eloquently reconstruct the times and conditions under which she'd worked. She demonstrated pieces of her equipment, welding helmet, and leathers, and seemed to relish in the chance to relive the experience of her WWII exploits.

Then it was my turn. I was asked to give an overview of the City; the big picture of the times, and to describe the shipyard and harbor which lay before us. I felt the tears begin to well up behind my eyelids and fought to control them. I felt totally out of place in the role, despite the fact that I'm dealing with that history throughout my work day. I've reacquainted myself with the period through extensive reading and doing interpretive tours at the Memorial and elsewhere. That being so -- what on earth could be going on?

Then it struck me and I stopped. I said, "this doesn't make sense to me. I never saw this shipyard or even a ship in 1942 or beyond. In fact, I had never seen this shipyard until I came to work for the National Park Service. I worked across town in a Jim Crow union hall because the unions were segregated and black and white workers were processed differently at a different location -- at 16th and Barrett Avenue. My experience is not reflected in this place. I was not then and am not now a Rosie."

It was then that the cameras stopped for a brief time while Ms. Miller came over to reassure me that they were aware of this and that they were anxious that their European audiences learn something of the African American story of the time and that it was this story that I was to share with them. She whispered to me softly that England had a shared history of the colonials they'd brought in to work in their war industries then abandoned once the war ended and that "... the effects of those years are still with us." I could see the rationale for why I was here on camera, but something was happening to me emotionally that stood in the way of my being able to deliver that story. I should have been interviewed alone and not in the role of "Rosie the Riveter, the Woman of Color" version.

The cameras started again and I tried, this time trying to tell that story of inequality and shame -- but the damage had been done. The other two Rosies sitting in that little circle had become the white kids who wouldn't let me in their tree house! I'd lost focus and felt alien in that setting. My story was lost and I couldn't regain it. I mentioned about how unfair things had been and of how blacks and white were paid differently and that black men and women were held to lower level jobs and had been served by powerless unions. But I was trying to do this sitting in the cold in this alien setting in the shadow of the old victory ship and the warehouse that had played no part in my personal history. I was out of context and it was devastating!

To make matters worse. Phyllis asked if she could speak with me directly. She turned to me and said "my first supervisor was a black man" and besides that, we all worked together and were paid the same wages." I was being challenged. I was being called a liar, publicly. I looked at her and tried to figure out how to respond without going into an argument that would shame us both before the cameras. I chose to remain silent.

What I did not say was that she had only moments before told how she had been one of the first women to be hired (in 1941 under the Lend/Lease program) and that the boss had attempted to provide escorts for the few women in that first crew because they had no idea how the men would react to their presence. Think of the times: Black men were still being lynched for appearing to even leer at a white woman. Black men were assigned to lesser positions until 1945 after many labor protests and demonstrations against the Boilermakers Unions. How on earth would one ever imagine that those white workers would have allowed a young white female welder to be supervised by a black man? It's possible, of course, since I wasn't there to be able to challenge it -- but was it likely? I really don't know. But this was not the time to work that through. I swallowed hard and waited for the filming to end.

I do know, however, of the wage differences since I was a worker in the union where such information was available and protested regularly once black workers began to organize against the inequalities that they faced. Those figures have been upheld by subsequent studies that fill the volumes of accumulating information on those times in black literature today.

So, why, then was this happening now? Why was this woman in the year 2009 putting forth such an argument? I'd faced this before from those who would insist upon the unlikely story that we were all united -- embracing the concept of Democracy -- and in harmony at a time of great struggle and persistent discrimination. This revisionism is something I've sought to challenge and has formed the basis of my work with the park service. Re-visiting those times in the effort to measure more accurately the distance we've come over the decades is a prerequisite to understanding the kinds of social change we in America have endured and overcome; a true narrative far more powerful than the myth.

I kept my silence for the sake of the moment, and avoided eye contact with Phyllis for the rest of the filming, but largely because I was having such a difficult time holding back the tears and crushing down those refreshed feelings of alienation that this setting evoked.

Also, only 100 feet away stood the deck of the SS Red Oak Victory from which I'd scattered my son, Rick's, ashes combined with a dozen singly-tossed red roses ten years ago. I'd almost forgotten that until I'd climbed back into my car as soon as the cameras were shut down and driven quickly away without looking back. I'm sure that that memory was playing there in my subconscious for those few painful hours, unrecognized but powerful still. I let the tears be for Rick in a desperate move for sanity and in recognition of this Memorial Day weekend.

... and today, Sunday, May 24th, in the year 1942, Melvin Reid (1918-1987) and I were married at St. Bernard's Catholic church; an act of faith of two confused young Americans at a time when the world around us was devolving into chaos.

Leadership Group was a really good experience ... I'm growing as a speaker, I believe ...

They meet on Thursdays for an all-morning session for mutual support in the office of a progressive local real estate developer in the old historic district of Richmond. This is happening In the troubled low income, high crime, and long abandoned central district known as the Iron Triangle. They come together weekly to try to find their way back from various hard paths and -- in some cases -- paths into the main stream that some had never managed to find a place in ever.

Macdonald Avenue, the once abandoned old main artery that runs through the historic district is currently under major renewal and is fast emerging with some of its old glory; new streetscape with tree planting, street design which includes the undergrounding of utilities; the complete overhaul of parking and traffic-calming strategies; ornamental street lighting; new businesses and freshened facades on old ones. There are waiting-to-be-installed wayside markers created to tell the story of and make the connections with the WWII home front days, tying the historic district to the shoreline park sites.

Rhonda Harris, local contractor (in white sweater in the photo above), is "reconstructing" the lives of the people of the community in that it is she who has created this forward-looking "redevelopment project" of the human potential alive in the Iron Triangle. She is making a bold attempt at retraining those willing to give themselves a second chance at integrating into a social system they formerly opted out of for reasons often beyond their control.

As I slipped in as quietly as I could about fifteen minutes earlier than my scheduled talk. I could see that the room was filled to overflowing so stood with my back against the door to listen long enough to find the context into which I needed to fold.

It was clear in only a few moments that many here were returnees from incarceration and that the very able instructor (motivator) was introducing them to basic civics; that their assignments (probably on-going) were to attend city council meetings and to find their way into civic political life as one way of getting their needs met through participating. He talked about requirements for job entry and employer expectations. This was basic and oft-repeated but absolutely necessary job-training information that most of us take for granted. The quality of the listening here suggested just how intent this (mostly male) audience was for re-entry into a social system they may have never have made it into -- ever.

After about 15 minutes I was introduced. I dropped my heavy bag on a nearby table, handed my camera to someone to document this day for me, and stood before this expectant group not knowing what in the world I could say to them. Closed my eyes for a second or two and it came. I opened with a sentence or two about the importance of "place." Of how often place determines how lives will be lived, and asked how much they knew about this place called Richmond? That led into the history of their grandparent's heroic achievements during WWII -- the building of those 747 ships in 3 years and 8 months by a never-built-a-ship-before cement contractor named Henry J. Kaiser and his crew of new-to-the-workforce women, former sharecroppers of every color, shape, and gender, that saved the world from domination by Nazi Imperialism. I slowly built the case and watched their surprise and pride grow as they listened intently. Few had ever heard these stories, or of their relationship to them.

The talk was no more than about 20 minutes in all, but what a wonderful morning it was! I may have started a small flame, and I'm hoping that (as promised) I'll be invited back to continue to build on what has been started here. There is every possibility that this park will provide enough inspiration and pride that men and women of honest and good intent such as those I met today will rediscover their legacy. They are the descendants of those hardy souls who crossed the country by whatever means necessary to become the mighty shipbuilders of the home front. How wonderful it would be if -- through this park -- we are able to help them to recapture that past and build a deep reverence for place. And wouldn't that be miracle, indeed?

This must be my week for doctors ... of one kind or another... .

Attended a small gathering (I believe the capacity of the room at Starr King School for the Ministry is 50 -- including the standees in the hallway) this evening to hear Reverend Jeremiah Wright, Pastor Emeritus of Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ. Upon learning that he would be in the Bay Area to receive an honorary doctorate at the seminary's commencement this year I wangled an invitation. As a former member of the Board of Trustees, it was relatively easy, though I was certain these invitations were prized by everyone within the Graduate Theological Union.

I had no idea what to expect, but what a brilliant theologian is this man! What appeared over-the-top in most of the (heavily-edited for the sensational) news coverage during the presidential campaign -- in the intimacy of that small space -- he was kind and warm and wonderfully humorous! What a wit!

He is theatrical to a degree but in good taste and with kindness. He talked for well over an hour and took questions, including some relating to the break with his famous former church member. His answers were honest and direct and (still) righteously angry. The residual pain is evident and he makes little attempt at hiding it. There was an instant where I was sharing both the pain of his loss and -- simultaneously -- the pride that lay just beneath it. Both were present in the glint of anger in his eyes as he spoke about the events that preceded the now famous break.

It was easily understood why one would have been captured by this charismatic preacher; that his congregation would be 6000 productive contributing Christians -- and that one might even ascend to become leader of the free world one day.

It's quite possible that my ability to hear him sympathetically had to do with the fact that I'd spent the day in my cubicle reading In Motion, a marvelous new book published by the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. It is about the sequential black migrations over the centuries -- starting with the slave trade into the present.

In preparation for a leadership class of Richmond community members for whom I'm speaking on Thursday morning, I'd been doing a lot of reading. A few days ago I read about Pullman porters whom the author claimed to be the men who created the black middle class in the 1920's and 30's. Fascinating reading. In the process, I learned that George Pullman, owner and CEO of the Pullman Sleeping Car Company hired only dark-skinned African Americans -- all of whom were called "George." (There's another book title that I'm anxious to read called, "10,000 black men named George."*) Pullman's reasons were that the men were a part of the property of the railroad, like sheets and towels and bottles of hair tonic and whisk brooms. They were not to be seen as persons at all, but as black robots provided to serve white travelers -- to see to their every whim while aboard the luxury railroad cars. Subservience was a prized attribute in that cruelly dehumanizing system.

These were the men of my father's generation; my uncles and cousins. These were the men who were silently complicit in their degradation for the salary of $60/month for a 48- to 60-hr workweek, and a chance to eavesdrop on conversations between successful white traveling men who shared stock tips and business strategies while their shoes were being shined by "George," and which allowed George to earn enough salary and tips to insure that their children would enter the universities, medical schools, and seminaries. It would be their children who would breathe life into the growing Civil Rights struggles over the ensuing decades.

I guess I was just about ready for Rev. Jeremiah Wright tonight.

I will attend the commencement ceremony on Thursday evening in Walnut Creek at Mt. Diablo Unitarian Universalist church on Eckley Lane. I need to do that if only to experience this dynamic presence in the setting that carries so much of my coming-of-age history.

It's experiences such as this that keep me grounded, I believe. But they can be an emotional roller coaster at times.

Maybe this is another of those recently discovered dimensions. Maybe this will be one of those times when I'm unable emotionally to process all that will be incoming -- and dimensions may be the place where I hold them in suspension until -- in some quiet time of reflection I can figure it all out.


*10,000 Black Men" is also available in a film starring Andre Braugher.

Online Testing be damned!

Because his name has become so prominent, Dr. Oz of Oprah fame influenced my decision to log on to take his "Real Age" test. Might be fun, I thought. Let's see how I can challenge the experts who think they can measure such a thing. I'm doing this, of course, secure in the knowledge that I'm going to beat the system, right? How could I not? I'm an 87 year-old woman, fully employed, actively engaged in life, able to still wear clothes I wore in high school, for heavinsake!

Took the 4 minutes required and answered each question honestly and completely and guess what?

I discovered that my "real age" is 92 years and 7 months!

How could this be? I should admit going in of course, that vanity was the great motivator here. It continued to gnaw at me for hours after as I tried to rationalize how such a thing could be.

It must surely have been the exercise questions. My physical exercise comes mainly from jumping in and out of my little red car every day. No Pilates, no yoga, no "walking up several flights of stairs instead of taking the escalator;" no workout at the local gym or even walking or running or using the treadmill. Just the normal activity related to my work. So I answered all of those questions with a "no." That must have shot my score to hell!

Tennyrate, I'm still miffed enough to warn you other vain feminists not to pay any attention to such surveys.

Maybe we should challenge Dr. Oz's medical punditry credentials, at least?

On the other hand, maybe 92 years and 7 months is not as bad or as "old" as our fears might suggest. After all, my mother, Lottie Allen Charbonnet, was still spryly hopping on the bus in 3 inch heels and window-shopping for hours at the downtown department stores every Saturday at the age of 95. (She lived to be 101.) Yes, that would be Mom dancing the hula with the chorus line on the stage at a luau at a fancy hotel in Honolulu the year of her 95th birthday!

Do you suppose there might be something critical missing from these surveys?

What might that be ... ?

Is there anywhere else on the planet where one could live with such a diversity of experience?

Today I visited Berkeley's annual Himalayan Fair in Live Oak Park. Noticeable ( don't recall this from past years) was the great number of Tibetan and other Asian vendors showing their wares. They may have outnumbered the usual complement of Birkenstocked western converts -- among whom would surely have been my husband, Bill Soskin, were he still among the living. You can still recognize them by their studied serenity.

Thought of him today with every whiff of incense blowing by on the fragrant heavy summer air or the call-to-meditation rings from a tremendous array of antique copper prayer bowls being tested by potential buyers for resonance and quality of sound ... .

The perfect venue for wearing my crazy-wonderful Dorian-designed Happy Pants, right?

Remembered how much I loved living in that city all those years ago -- and of the many friends with whom I've (sadly) lost contact over recent years ...

But then ... .

One day -- in the mid-nineties -- my live-in niece, Gail returned home from work to find the McNeill-Leherer production team filming in our El Cerrito kitchen ...

She quietly lay down her gear and began to make coffee for the crew -- as if this was the most normal thing in the world and of no particular consequence. We often laughed at the obvious fact that for reasons unknown, the world tended to bisect through my kitchen!

I had only recently moved from Berkeley and hadn't lived in the community very long. After the multiple trucks and cameras left the two of us doubled over with laughter at the thought that my new neighbors were probably expecting to pick up the West County Times the next morning to read about the old lady drug bust on Cabrillo Street the day before!

The occasion was that I'd been discovered online (probably recommended by SeniorNet) as one of the growing number of seniors who'd become computer savvy and were using the new technologies in our daily lives. Somewhere here in my cluttered files is a copy of that unbelievable tape which features that video essay that had been aired nationwide.

It was a few years later when the (Gail-predicted) call came from the Oprah show. Someone at the end of the Chicago line was calling because my blog had been picked up by someone and I was being asked to be a guest on the show to talk about how the Internet had changed my life. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of a single reason why that would be true. Having said as much the caller immediately lost interest and the brief interview ended. So much for a free trip to Chicago and Oprah fame.

Last week I had the same kind of repressed giggle attack upon picking up my phone at work to hear a woman's voice with a delightful British accent announce that she was calling from the BBC in London and that they have a 5-hour documentary currently in production. "We're planning to come to Richmond "rawtha soon" to film an essential "pawt" of the story." As you may or may not know, Henry Kaiser was building ships for the United Kingdom under Lend Lease prior to December 7th, 1941, and our entry into the war. "We're planning to arrive in Richmond May 18th to do some filming there at the park and would appreciate it if you could be available for an on-camera interview at five o'clock on Saturday, the 23rd."

"Life gets curiouser and curiouser," says Alice!

The old dear slipping a cog? Nope. Not at all, thank you ... .

Reading back through the last few days of posts it occurred to me that anyone reading them might erroneously conclude that the old lady has lost it. Reads absolutely manic, doesn't it?

In the event that the mood swings might suggest otherwise, let me assure you that they are more an indication of the hugeness of the world I move around in, and the enormity of what is out there to be sensed and felt and tasted and perceived -- and that give me a way to measure my own capacity to be open enough to let it all in without self-destructing. Writing is the way I sort through it all, and the means by which I'm able to make sense of the wild places these brain cells take me to if I don't allow the censors in to shut down those nerve endings and slow the synapses.

Wondered as I was dropping off into that quiet edge of consciousness just before deep sleep last night -- if what I'm experiencing as I age up into my "wisdom" (presumably) -- if I'm not tapping into that wildly open-to-learning-everything space that we experience in the ages from birth through 3 or 4 years-old? That period before we reach the place in childhood where compulsion to conform begins to erode curiosity. I'm certain that all of the people that I ever was are alive in me still and that I draw upon earlier parts of myself as the noise and the busyness of the world allows. There's something that feels quite primitive going on these days; something I can't name. But it's all good. No pathology here.

Of this I am certain.

... and this afternoon I'm going to attend a Mother's Day Gospel Concert at Star Bethel Baptist Church in Oakland. Weird for a non-believer? Not at all. There's a quality of profound faith in the black church that I can witness no other place on earth, except for a moment or two last winter while standing transfixed at the south rim of the Grand Canyon. Black gospel music is glorious! Count it another dimension of existence. It needs no rationale. Nothing to prove. Check intellect at the door and join the shoutin'! The hats, alone, provide enough drama and color to satisfy most saints, surely! Next Sunday I'll visit with Mozart and Brahms and Haydn at a chamber music concert at Davies Hall in S.F., but today it's the celebration of Hallelujah! There's no earthly dimension that could simultaneously accommodate such diverse cultures -- but they co-exist within me -- and quite comfortably, thank you -- as do all of the apparent contradictions I wrote about the failures of public education and the exaltation of living those few hours with the fourth graders at Joaquin Miller School on Friday.

I see few inconsistencies, only Dimensions!

Differing realities? Dimensions? What gives?

I suspect that it is the gift of being able to remain in the now that controls the phenomenon, but whatever it is; I'm experiencing a new awareness that excites me down to the molecule level. It rivals time travel in ways that are undeniable:


It is possible to attend a meeting of seniors almost anywhere in the liberal Greater Bay Area and find myself amid hard-working, thoughtful, caring white-haired liberal/radical/progressives who are striving for equality at all levels. They can be found standing on street corners with picket signs damning war and demanding peace in our time. Stalwart members of the NAACP and the Civil Liberties Union are valiantly supporting their causes come rain or shine on any given day. They have surely been found at the gates of San Quentin protesting the inhumane death penalty. Life would hardly be worth living did I lose sight of their presence in my life. I've surely spent enough time during my long lifetime sharing and/or acting on those concerns. But they're but one reality in a life filled with complexity. Among primary concerns has always been racial equality -- something to be achieved at all costs.

Yesterday I spent a part of my day with the combined fourth grade classes at Joaquin Miller Elementary School in the East Oakland hills. It was African American Day, and the children had recently completed a unit on "the wartime migration of African Americans in the 40's"; intended to fulfill the requirements of the California History standard. I'd been invited by a member of the faculty (referred by the Oakland Museum) in my park ranger role to help to add life to their studies. The visit was to include lunch (typical African American menu of macaroni and cheese, potato salad, chicken wings, yams, mustard greens, corn bread and red soda water). In celebration of the day the children were costumed in the working garb of the period with little girls wearing colorful bandanas, the signature of the Rosies of WWII. It was pure delight to find a photo of myself (a laminated copy of the front page story in the Oakland Tribune) in their exhibit right along with the icons of the Civil Rights struggles.

I sat with the children during lunch and watched and listened quietly -- trying to figure out just what I could possibly say to them that might bridge the vastness of the space between their youth (9 & 10 year-olds?) and my 87 years. How on earth could that be possible? And if I couldn't build that bridge what purpose could my visit contribute to their learning?

Then through half-closed eyes (while sipping red soda from a paper cup) I suddenly saw the rainbow before me. This was surely one of the most racially diverse audiences I'd ever experienced. And it was all completely natural. The teaching staff as well as the children represented the full spectrum of the demographics of this remarkable American city.

Suddenly I realized that there was a congruence, a continuum of experience that meshed those white-haired activists working so hard to make right the world and these beautiful children with whom I was honored to share the day. It was this. They represent separate dimensions. Neither is aware of the existence of the other. Those sincere elders are still working hard toward goals that have already been achieved! The children in the All-Purpose room at this elementary school were the end result of that heartbreaking effort of the past decades of struggle. The questions and the answers were at hand in the here and now. And I was the bridge! Because I'm able to remain in the now, I'm experiencing both realities simultaneously!

Were one to question these children about their feelings about the election of the first black president, they would probably have no idea why we were even asking such a silly question! For them, the conversation is hardly worth engaging in. Were people ever so silly as to believe that they could own other people or lynch men because they refused to step off the sidewalks when confronted by another man or woman on the same path -- or that we would refuse to allow some people to ride in the front of the bus or that we would confine some to only the lowliest of labor because of a difference in skin color -- or, be so uncool as to refuse to share drinking fountains or attend the same schools because of race?

How to let them know what they'd taught me yesterday ... I tried in a small way by starting off saying, "... I'm not sure how to make the bridge that I'll need to tell you about my life -- I'm 87 years old. My great-grandmother was born into slavery in 1846 and my mother in 1894 and I was a little girl before there were ball point pens, bridges across the bay, push button telephones, or television or Harry Potter or cell phones -- etc. What is it that you'd like to know about me?" And from there the questions flowed.

It worried me that I may have been talking over their heads, but even if they were having to reach a bit, I felt connected to them, and even if I couldn't tell them that I'd discovered the differing realities, dimensions, and connections between the work of those dedicated elders and the perception ... that I had -- in a crazy few seconds -- slipped into a dimension where the questions and the answers had blended into a unified whole -- in a single moment of time -- in an instant that defied the limits of time and space ... .

As I was leaving after some picture-taking (which I'm hoping will be forwarded soon), it was clear that the teachers had heard me. It's possible that ... if my words were obscure -- maybe they'll evoke different questions from the children in days to come, and that new learning may occur because new thoughts have been introduced. I don't really know. I never know, really, except that I can sense viscerally when that human connection has been made.

But I drove away - back into the afternoon traffic on the Warren Freeway -- grinning to myself and feeling well-fed and affirmed in the knowledge that the world is in good hands and that those lovely children now growing into the process of democracy are being well-prepared by a diverse team of adult graduates of Sesame Street. That it took us all to reach this place, and that those caring elders may or may not ever know that they(we) were more successful than we could ever have dreamed. (I hope you're catching all this, Jim Henson, wherever you are!)

None of this will make sense tomorrow -- but this day, Saturday, May 9th, in the year 2009, I learned that I'm able to navigate differing realities and dimensions almost at will -- and as it is destined to be -- those distances between here and there and then and now will continue to narrow as the years taper into oblivion.

Thinking about Justice Thurgood Marshall and the Brown vs. Board of Education ruling -- 1954 ... .

I've been including in my talks lately, the fact that one of the gifts of aging is that one knows how all the stories turned out. True. An octogenarian view of history makes possible this period of summation, only now that the patterns are visible. Every now and then there are flashes of insight and the implications are inescapable. Each time I find myself watching news coverage about the plight of public education, the tiny pieces of incremental change add up to a reality that is disturbing. We've experienced a downward spiral and lost control of the way we're schooling our young. And, how else does a democracy survive except with an educated electorate? After 55 years of living with the results of that much-heralded decision, has the system of public education been successfully dismantled?

I'm not at all sure that those who championed the cause for equality won that one. In fact, it seems more and more evident that we may have lost that battle resoundingly. Recent studies show that segregation is more evident than ever and that we're a long way from achieving the goals of the mandate of 1954.

Just after the order to desegregate came down from the Supreme Court (by the way, a racist decision since it was the first time in history that a ruling was not immediately adopted but included the words, "with all deliberate speed") the disintegration of public education began. This meant that we allowed enough foot-dragging for the forces of resistance to organize and defeat the intent of the ruling. Black children who were attending all-black schools lost their teachers for the most part since our educators could not follow the kids into the newly integrated schools due to what was considered inadequate training. Our children were suddenly tossed into a world where everyone with authority was white, while black teachers who had been held in high esteem in their own communities were unceremoniously purged from the system.

Most white children throughout the southern states were moved into tax supported private "academies" created to keep them out of what was believed to be "harm's way." As the result of sometimes violently protested busing programs, schools everywhere were gradually re-segregated since demographics now followed housing patterns and racism determined where families of color could live. The great suburbanization of the Fifties withdrew much-needed tax dollars from urban school systems throughout the next two decades, a financial loss to inner city schools that has never been regained.

Over time, we've forgotten the genesis of "academies," and they've moved out of the south and been transformed into "charter schools" a change that has -- over time -- re-directed funding away from public education and into often untested and highly-specialized voucher-supported or privatized corporately-run institutions. And though often credited with introducing important innovations, accountability is often overlooked. We appear to have completely forgotten their genesis or why they exist at all. I felt a ripple of concern upon hearing our president speak out strongly in support of charter schools, and found myself wondering if his relative youth had shielded him from making the connections with the past?

Meanwhile, graduate schools are by now so costly that only the relatively wealthy can afford to attend. With teaching so poorly paid in comparison to other careers, repayment of student loans has become impractical for most students, black or white. In time it's my fear that -- whether or not we ever achieve racial equality -- it will be those who can afford the education who will continue to lead in all fields; a further extension of white privilege.

Why am I mulling this over at all? I discovered in a conversation a few nights ago that my son, David, is working frantically to find some way to finance his two young daughter's (11 and 13) tuition in Catholic school. Would you believe that for a semester it will cost $23,000 for each? This is not some exclusive educational institution for special kids; it's just your ordinary neighborhood parochial school for ordinary Catholic children. And beyond that first semester -- what then? In the urban public school that they currently attend, participation in the vollyball program had to be skipped since it would have required a payment over $700 for each for the season. Could the fact that the junior proms and senior balls -- that used to take place in specially decorated school gyms and that now involve limos and grand hotels and week-long spring breaks in Cancun or the Caribbean -- suggest a profitable arrangement by school districts with travel agencies and the hotel and visitor's bureaus in major cities? Should we be thinking "kickbacks" or is this grandma's paranoia?

Am I the only one who remembers my own introduction to the arts and music and literature and science came from public schools that were funded by us all? The PTA may have funded band uniforms with car washes and bake sales (and I'm not even sure about that), and the local grocery stores and gas stations collected coins in a jar on the counter for field trips, but it was all there. It seemed effortless. I can't recall my own parents ever being concerned with anything beyond making sure that I fulfilled my obligation to attend classes on time and neatly dressed for the day.

What have we done?

... and, how can we begin to find our way back?

The first of the big Richmond annual festivals ... Cinco de Mayo!

Not even the slow steady light rain could dampen the spirits of those who gathered along 23rd Street to watch us pass by today. I was Unit #43 driving alone in today's parade, inching along in our NPS sedan with the signature arrowheads emblazoned on both sides; dressed in full regalia; sandwiched between a small contingent of U.S. Naval folks and a large flat-bed truck carrying several miles worth of "Cielito Lindo" blaring loudly enough for the late sleepers in the lower hills to hear!

I could remember waking in the night wondering if the headlines this afternoon would read, "Lil ole lady mows down drum and bugle corps in today's festival parade!" But, gratefully, it was not to be. Though it was my first ever participation in a genuine parade, it was all carried off professionally with the proper attention to regal smiles and graceful hand-waving (it's all in the elegance of proper wrist rotation!). Only once did I feel skittish and that was at a point in the proceedings when the mounted caballeros rode past going in the opposite direction -- with horses that didn't seem all too sure they wanted to go that way ... . I held my ground, stared them down, and they -- with some resistance -- clipped-clopped on without incident.

The trick was to leave at least 40 feet between my car and the marching unit ahead; never move out of first gear; and to be sure to maintain eye contact with those who waved back. Nuthin' to it! The best moment came when I was able to catch the eye of a child (perhaps 8-9) standing at an upstairs window of an apartment all alone and looking forlorn (ill, maybe?). I waved and his face lit up brightly as he waved back. Our eyes had met briefly, but it was a few seconds of full recognition. How nice! Made my day, and perhaps his as well.

Now that I've mastered the finer points of parading despite precipitation and inexperience, I'll start preparing for the Juneteenth Festival Parade next month.

Happy Cinco de Mayo, y'all!

Guided a bus tour for Drinking Liberally (a local chapter of a national political group) which regularly meets to debate current events ... .

...and it was while standing is the gaping expanse of the cathedral-like Craneway of the iconic Ford Building that I felt the impact of revelation:

If the visionaries of my generation could enable us to abruptly disassemble the auto industry under the eminent threat of war -- and tool up to transform itself from auto manufacturing to tank assembling, and shipbuilding, and then create an aircraft industry from scratch in the matter of months -- what's so difficult about creating a green economy based on alternative energy sources now?

All it took in 1941 was a nation willing and prepared by courageous leadership to sacrifice for the good of the all. We did without, gave up everyday items, dealt with rationing of the essentials, grew our own food, even walked when petroleum was needed for the war effort.

Found myself wondering as I fell asleep last night if President Obama isn't looking at more than the Franklin Delano Roosevelt regulatory policies for guidance, but as much at the leadership style that inspired those kinds of sacrifices in we the people who bought in despite a discriminatory social system that could easily have cost us the national will to prevail in a disastrous war that saved us from totalitarian world domination. Perhaps political partisanship will be the hurdle to be overcome in our time ... but we may have the kind of leadership that can overcome that, I believe. This may be what's behind the president's insistence upon erasing those lines that divide us; red from blue, liberal from conservative, Democrat from Republican. American lives as well as the lives of the entire planet may well depend upon his ability to accomplish that.

I realized again while guiding yesterday's tour that this park is vitally important to helping this generation to shape its response to precipitous climate change. The models for the mobilization lie in the WWII Home Front story. They exist to tell the world that that kind of monumental change is not only possible but that we've already done it. That the models are here to see and that therein lies the hope for the future that we're so desperately seeking in order to meet the new and daunting challenges to life as we know it here on the planet we call home.

Could hardly sleep last night as my mind raced back over the day in the search for the tomorrow that is always tucked into the kaleidoscopic re-run that prepares me to face each succeeding day.

Last Wednesday was another remarkable day in a remarkable year of growth and change ... for both me and the park.

Attended a special day at Fort Mason where the members of the media, PBS staff, and some members of park staffs from those parks surrounding the bay gathered to meet Ken Burns. I've rarely seen so many rangers in one place at the same time. We'd been invited to preview parts of the latest PBS documentary created to tell the story of the NPS. It's called, "The National Park System, America's Best Idea." It was an all day event that included a preview not only a part of the 12-hour piece to be shown in late September, but we also heard speeches by Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan plus others who figured prominently in a number of parks and programs that are featured in the work.

Burns is indisputably the documentarian of our times, and to have been included in that audience was a great honor, but as with his latest epic "The War," I came away with a sense of frustration.

The work has taken ten years to complete and starts with the early development by men (and they were all male) like John Muir, Theodore Roosevelt, Mather, Albright, etc., and those magnificent pristine wild places that were saved for posterity. Yellowstone, being the first followed by Yosemite and other places of natural wonder would later include the historic sites -- the battlefields, monuments, and memorials that tell the story of the nation.

At one point it was realized that the visitation "by the people" who were the owners of the national park system tended to be restricted only to those who could afford the trips and that there was limited access for those who could not. In more recent times the NPS has concentrated on bringing the parks to the people by legislation created to include the protection and preservation of urban historic sites that now enshrine the heroic stories of the Underground Railroad, the Civil Rights Movement, the Native American stories, the Women's Movement, etc., all critically important to the telling of the more complete story of America.

As with "The War" in which the Burns documentary told the western story through Sacramento. It almost completely ignored the Greater Bay Area where the shipbuilding industry pretty much turned the fate of the war in the Pacific by building supply ships faster than the enemy could sink them. Instead he chose to use the (albeit compelling) story of a Japanese family's internment instead. An important story, but the stories that I and millions like me lived as home front workers were missing from the narrative. When taking 12 hours to tell the story, one might suppose that both could be accommodated.

In this week's Burns experience, I felt the disappointment at having the documentary end with the creation of Denali National Wilderness Park in Alaska in the year 1980; more than 20 years ago. That meant that we had not yet reached the point of the beginnings of the urban parks movement and the new more inclusive aspects of park development; so much of which were the "swords into plowshares" parks which included the entire Presidio, Fort Mason, the Marin Headlands, Fort Kronkite, and surely not the entire home front story now being told through the addition of our Rosie the Riveter WWII/Home Front NHP.

Of course he had to stop somewhere, I suppose, but it certainly begs another series that is inclusive of the new directions. Besides, it might have been more enjoyable had he thought to bring Wendy and the Lost Boys along, too.

More later.

Uncompromised truth has its day ...

Insight!

Leaning against the wall yesterday at the premiere of the "Untold Stories" (trying to be as inconspicuous as possible) it dawned; the effect this newly-created national park is having on this city. The insistence upon total honesty as we re-visit the era of what is remembered as "The Good War" has proven to be unquestionably wise. The epiphany came at a moment when our mayor rose to honor the young high school students, Crystal Johnson, 18, Sara Moran, 16, Maria Esparza, 17, and Veronica Godinez 18, in the ceremony following the viewing of their production. I suddenly could see that everything was dependent upon through which lens that history was being viewed. Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, as one voice of many sincerely dedicated peace activists, is seeing it through the lens of the brutal and senseless carnage of war; though one facet of the greater story.

It would be understandable for Kaiser Permanente Corporate leaders of today to view that same history primarily through the remarkable industrial achievements of Henry J Kaiser's total re-structuring of the shipbuilding industry; a history that has had profound implications throughout the years since ... years of unprecedented progress in so many fields -- preventive health care, early childhood education and development, union/management relations, mass production and prefabrication systems.

The Ken Burns documentaries and The Saving of Private Ryan are important if the lens used was one exploring the body count stories; those of human degradation created by armed conflict; our known human capacity for violence and brutality; military sacrifice and heroism. All are critically important to the telling of the story of WWII, but those are not Richmond's story. Those were not the stories that the teens had given up a year's worth of Saturdays to tell.

Rosie the Riveter WWII/Home Front National Historical Park is providing the narrative of the "Great Mobilization"; the coming together of people from Everywhere, USA, in response to a world threatening international crisis. Those years saw the creation of the cauldron into which the nation's conflicting social mores and patterns were cast resulting in two decades of life-changing chaos out of which the causes of civil and human rights were painfully carved bringing us more in line with the promises of our founding documents and loudly-professed but sorrowfully unfulfilled national ideals.

Since 1776 we've been a revolutionary country painfully at odds with a set of core principles and values for which we've been willing for generations to fight and die but by which we've miserably failed to live. We've deceived the world by holding out a tempting imaginary chalice of peace and freedom while holding to contradictions and an arrogance that denied their ever entering into our reality. The WWII home front mobilization and subsequent struggles for redefinition forced us to move through to a more honest alignment with those core beliefs. But -- as a nation of diverse ordinary people in transition -- it all happened with mind-numbing speed -- far too rapidly for us to process.

It is that story that Richmond tells. By initial attempts such as this important work by these young women, we're building a bridge back to that period for us all to re-visit. They're helping us to build a baseline against which to measure the dramatic social changes that have brought us to a new and more enlightened national ethos. Those years (1941-1964 and beyond) forced us to re-examine the relationships between human and civil rights and even the possibility of a world at peace. Without the insistent stress upon the everyday lives of ordinary people living in extraordinary times -- without the urgent demands of the war years to find ways to live and work together despite a non-supportive and unforgiving social system -- and without their persistent and sometimes combative resistance to continuing to any longer endure the contradictions, the nation might never have reached this place of transformation.

"Untold Stories" revealed the raw material from which the new understandings have been carved. Out of such sorrowful history world peace may yet be born. I believe that the City of Richmond provided the background against which the country first began to confront its contradictions and correct its course -- entering a period of 20 years of social upheaval --echoes of which still resonate from our nation's lecterns, pulpits, and town squares. We're still a work in progress, but yesterday's gathering at the Museum suggests that here in this place -- after 6 decades of accelerated change -- this relatively young community of strangers is still asking the right questions, and through the National Park Service, the nation is listening.

Meanwhile, those awful wounds born of hatred and racial injustice are best cauterized by Truth.

Perhaps Rosie was more than a mere riveter, but the ultimate symbol for change of a kind that we're only now beginning to fully understand and appreciate; understanding provided by yet another set of lenses -- those of 4 young students exploring their history and (hopefully) being awed by both what we've endured and how far we've come.


Bottom photo: Director Lois Boyle, SS Red Oak Victory; Luciano del Rio, Richmond Youth Media Project; Crystal Johnson, me, Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner of the 14th Assembly district; Sara Moran, Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin; Veronica Godinez. The fourth member of the group (not shown), student Maria Esparza has joined the Air Force as a direct result of her experience in the program (as she reported on camera).

Note: You can be there by clicking on the thumbnail for enlargement.

Student Conservation Association (SCA) doings ... .

This afternoon -- 5:00 'til 7:00 -- I will get to experience myself as one of the subjects in a 15-minute documentary created by a group of high school girls in a multimedia workshop. The project was conducted under the imaginative leadership of Carla Koop, a member of our ranger staff at Rosie the Riveter WWII/Home Front NHP.

After the release of a timely story in the Contra Costa Times, we've received enough calls from members of the community and beyond to cause no little concern about whether the Richmond Museum of History with a 40-person room-capacity for seated guests will be able to accommodate the crowd!

We've learned that among the guests will be Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner. She will present commendations to the kids (how exciting it that?), and from the telephone calls I've received at home, we may have to run the film at least twice.

There's a part of me that is always scanning the horizon for my replacement; until something like this happens. Then I wonder just how anxious I am to leave the stage ... .

Watching young minds grow and having some sense of contributing to that process is heady stuff. These feelings of pride and humility must be what teachers experience in their later years. Maybe I, too, am a teacher or sorts.

From my young friends from the California College of the Arts ...

Dear Betty,

I hope all is well, and thank you for meeting with us at the Rosie the Riveter Memorial Park two weeks ago. It was an honor to be amongst your presence.

Our lunch with you marked our final meeting with community leaders of Richmond, and thus we have reached a conclusion of what our final project will be.

As we mentioned to you before, we have decided to create a book of illustrations, bio's, quotes, and info on the wonderful people we've met in Richmond. We are honored to ask your permission to include you in our book.

We have a number of interview questions we would like to ask you if you are interested in participating. I will include them in this text. If you choose to participate, feel free to answer the questions by email, or we can contact you by phone. Just let us know what you are comfortable with and what is most convenient for you.

We hope for this book to be resourceful and informative to the community of Richmond and beyond.

With warm regards,

Madeleine Tonzi
Kathrine Canton
Aria Caton
Camille Hoffman
Sasha Gainor
Katy Chmura

Here are the questions for you to consider if you choose to participate:

What is your role within Richmond?

Besides being a resident, of course. I moved to the city from nearby Berkeley (in Alameda County) while serving as a field representative for two members of the California state assembly; Dion Aroner, and later for her successor, Loni Hancock. I was responsible for all of West Contra Costa County and after a year or so decided that I needed to live in the community in order to best serve both it and those I represented. That evolved into my current position as a NPS park ranger where I've become more and more deeply involved in helping the city to discover and honor its colorful history.

How does your background and practice contribute to the health of Richmond?

I suppose the fact that I am a member of the African American community and therefore one of the many cultural groups who reside here, and partly because I am by nature a very open person of an age where I'm given permission to express that candor, I seem to have the capacity to release the same in those around me. That means that I've found a way to maximize that openness within the context of the work that I'm doing. That's an amazingly empowering way in which to move through life. I'm not at all sure that all of those elements could have come together before my present age (87). I seem to have outlived the need for artifice. I'm no longer becoming, but in a constant state of "being." Perhaps this translates into my community life.

What do you want to share with others about Richmond's history?

It's probably the fact that Richmond played such a pivotal role during those years (1941-1945) when the great mobilization occurred. Total strangers were brought together in this place from many parts of the nation to build the supply ships that would change the course of WWII. In the process the city found itself unwittingly participating in the greatest social upheaval of a kind that re-shaped the country for all time. Extraordinary ordinary people came together under an inherited system of racial segregation yet found the ways to transcend -- to struggle through the next 20 year of confrontations -- both militant and peaceful -- to create new social patterns that eventually changed the course of history. The Greater Bay Area was the nerve center for the war in the Pacific. Richmond was the nerve center of that nerve center with its 4 shipyards. By virtue of the social forces unleashed here for the first time, Richmond later became the cradle of social change. One day the descendants of those humble home front workers will realize that legacy and the city will rise to its rightful place as the "place where it all happened."

If you could send a message to your community, what would it be?

That the time spent in fighting crime and violence would be better spent in replacing it with more positive elements. We choose our reality; I truly believe that. What we choose has the capacity to become a self-fulfilling prophecy. We must free ourselves of externally-imposed images and re-direct our energies into creating and being what we want to see.

Where do you think the heart of Richmond is? and why?

I'm not sure that I've been here long enough to answer this question. Or, maybe a more honest answer is that I'm not sure that anyone knows that yet. My sense of the city is that it is a community in search of an identity. Having started out as a company town; been taken over by the great mobilization and the war; having only now become engaged in any kind of collective introspection; its heart may still be undiscovered. That there is one I do not question. Maybe -- if I live long enough -- that question will be answered.

What growth do you hope to see in Richmond's future?

I'm not sure that I'm as interested in growth as I am in consolidation. I'd love to stop the calendar and the clock long enough by some magic to figure out where we'd like to go. This new national park and my own work on its behalf -- I'm more and more convinced -- will help to shape whatever future is out there to be explored and actualized by helping to forge a shared history of a fascinating community.

Betty