The continuing drama at San Francisco's city hall heightens my anxiety and stirs painful memories of Rick's death. I won't linger on the implications of a parent outliving her young. This has happened to countless others, and brings up the natural feelings of regret and the guilt of survival for each of us, I'm certain.
But maybe this is a chapter on mortality as much as it's a chapter about the loss of my son -- and what sense I've been able to make of it as one without a belief in divine intervention:
It was a day of changes. I'd decided to sell the home in El Cerrito. I'd bought it ten years before in order to accommodate mother's last days. Dad died at 95 in 1987. Mother survived him by six years, to the age of 101. Eventually, she'd passed on and the cost of maintaining "a house that could accommodate the Christmas tree," could no longer be justified. I'm sure that I wasn't alone in this. Many parents continue the myth of being the center of the universe long after it's appropriate to do so.
I'd located a one-bedroom condo in Richmond's Hilltop Village, and was in the process of crating up all the "stuff" that would go to storage when the call came. It was Rick's landlord. "Mrs. Soskin, we haven't seen your son for three weeks, and there is growing concern among his neighbors that ...". My heart stopped for a fraction of a second, and I could hardly catch my breath.
Called my niece, Gail, who lived reasonably close by -- and David (by now hysterical) in Berkeley to relay the news, knowing that I couldn't drive across town to learn the truth. They immediately dropped everything and took over. David still does "'s'ponsible" very well. I sat and waited with a growing feeling of numbness, my body magically preparing to protect itself against what was sure to come.
The phone pierced the silence with a shrill ring and the landlord's voice on the line with, "...I'm so sorry, Mrs. Soskin." I screamed! David hadn't reached me yet. He'd opted to drive to tell me in person rather than to speak those fateful words by phone knowing that I was alone. When he did arrive, we called Bobby, together. David's words now engraved on my brain, "...it's over, Mom. It's over." How difficult, even now, to admit that embedded in the horror and pain of grief lurked the feeling of relief. He was right. It was over.
This wasn't new. There was a familiarity about this strange mixture of feelings. It was a reminder that in 1987 and within three short months, the key men in my life had all passed away. My father first of all, then Mel (my first husband and children's father), then Bill -- the man I'd married at 50 after the first marriage ended. I was at first devastated with grief. I'd been at the foot of my father's bed at the hospital when I heard his last breath being expelled. Bill lay in a coma for months before the end came. Mel died after years of living as an amputee -- living death for a former athlete. I'd experienced his death as merciful. They'd all died in that brief period.
Imagine my surprise to find that, only a few months later, right behind the grief lay the exultation of emancipation. I'd had no sense of my individuality, my womanness. As it is with many women in my age group, I'd been consistently defined by the men I'd loved for an entire lifetime, and without question. I don't think that I'd yet decided whether feminism was a step up or down, and my life as "part of a whole" seemed destined to be.
How many months I lived in that space of silent joyful/sadness I'm not sure. It wasn't something to be talked about. But springing out into the world with new horizons and unfamiliar mountains to climb became all-consuming. Having married at a very young 19, I'd experienced being child, daughter, wife, mother, but had skipped over "woman," without any idea of just what meant, or awareness that I'd not lived out that essential part of myself; nor had I missed her. Tapping into new capacities in myself drowned out the eulogies in a flurry of activities and interests. The need to maximize the second half of life moved to the top of my priorities, and I sensed a new sense of purpose and preciousness of time -- made the more urgent by the loss of those I'd loved and lost.
Rick had been dead on his bathroom floor for three weeks when his body was found. He'd died of cirrhosis from years of alcoholism. He'd died alone. His death followed that of his lover, Gordon, by no more than a year. His death had been one of the longest acts of suicide imaginable; a slow inescapable descent into the hell of self destruction. David was right. Rick's life had never really started. A bright potential had been snuffed out years before for a variety of reasons -- some beyond my understanding. Some not. I'll never know how much I contributed to that despite all the love invested. None of us can ever know that, and it's probably just as well.
But the mystery would deepen in days to come.
Both Bob and David had a sense of having reached Rick a few months before his death, at a time when he was hospitalized in crisis. His blood pressure had risen to dangerous levels and though close to death, he'd survived for the moment. Both younger brothers had spent time visiting with him in the hospital. Bob's approaching wedding (only two weeks later) held excitement for us all. Bob believed that Rick had every intention of participating with us, and that they'd connected meaningfully after a long period of separation. Bob lives on the Monterey Peninsula and has for many years, so their lives rarely crossed at that time. Though we didn't give it words, I suspect that we each knew that he'd not live much longer.
Knowing doesn't soften the shock or finality of death at all. Nor do the lost lives of those who went before. Each loss is all-consuming. Experience does little to prepare one for losing a loved one though, as we age, there is some movement toward the acceptance of one's own ending. A child cannot imagine non-existence. I can. Maturity may be measured by just when we accept the fact that we must die as all beings do, and the emphasis begins to center on just how well we are using and have used the privilege of life. A friend said to me on the occasion of my mother's death, "...remember, Betty, no life is complete without a death." He'll never know how important those words would become in my own struggle with the acceptance of my own mortality. Being all used up before the end, has become a driving force -- an obsession. The growing sense of urgency has added spice to my days and lightness to my step in this most recent decade when life has become more precious than ever before.
Just stopped long enough to scan through the binder that holds the records of Rick's last days and read through the descriptions of the strange events that gave a date certain for his last hours. Will copy them here if only to reinforce the experience and remind myself (and you) of how wondrous is the capacity of the human mind to skip across the limitations of time and space when the need is great enough and openness undisputed.
More later.
Friday, February 20, 2004
Monday, February 16, 2004
The plight of all those hopeful Gays and Lesbians ...
camping out at San Francisco's city hall (thought of them as the heavy rains pelted down during the night) in the hope of getting married today ... . Thought of Rick, and wept in the night.
Rick's homosexuality was obvious from infancy (as I look back). I recall reading an article in Parents Magazine when he was about five. Something about testes that fail to drop by a certain age, or glandular development that might be delayed -- not sure what it was, but whatever caused my questioning, I made an appointment with our pediatrician to talk about what I suspected. She was shocked by my questions and let me know it. "This is simply a gentle child. You Americans are so strange. In Europe we allow our men to be gentle without suspecting homosexuality. In America it is different." She continued, "children don't choose gender until they reach puberty and it is impossible to tell anything until that choice is made."
I continued, "but if a child is continually having his/her gender questioned, isn't that choice somewhat prejudiced?" She didn't answer me. I figured that this information was suspect and that my "gentle child" was gay and that it was okay with me. One can't share life with a youngster for his five earliest years and not be smitten for life. My biggest problem would surely be to protect him from his "testerostonous" father!
I remember (very athletic) Mel -- on the occasion of about the tenth time Kenny Allen (around the corner toughie) sent Rick home bloodied and bent-- decided to teach Rick to defend himself. Perfectly ordinary thing for a Dad to do, right? Wrong. I knew that this was a gentle child who would never make it against the strength of a bully like Kenny! This ritual went on for weeks. Mel would kneel with both hands held out before him for Rick to punch his little fists into. First left, then right, then crossover, then upper-cut ... made me nervous to watch this futile game day after day.
Some time later Rick came home from play -- nose bloodied, chin scratched, tears of humiliation and fear of facing his dad mixing with outrage! I ran to gather him up for comforting before Mel could get to him -- but it was too late. Mel popped out of the kitchen with, "...why didn't you hit him like I taught you?" Poor little Rick, "...but he wouldn't hold his hands up!"
There was no male killer instinct in my child, and there never would be. He loved dolls and math, in that order. Built his first crystal set for radio reception when he was eight. Taught himself algebra with books from the library when he was in 6th grade because he needed it for a science project he was working on. This was a special child. He was bright, a linear thinker, sharp, and far more feminine than masculine in some important ways. And he'd been so since he came into my life at only a few months of age.
When he was in third grade I attended a teacher-parent conference and was told that Rick was a good student but that he was often seen "passing notes with another little sissy boy." At about the same time, my mother-in-law visited the house and noticed Rick washing dishes. Her warning, "...Betty you mustn't let that boy do those kinds of things...". But the pediatrician had told me years before that boys needed to play with dolls and do household chores just as girls did because "...they grow up to be parents just as girls do." An early feminist? At least she was partly right, but just a little twisted in her diagnosis.
The part that stuck was the part about there being a choice at puberty. I tried very hard to keep open and accepting so as not to effect that "choice." (If there was the slightest possibility that she was right.) Never allowed myself to hint that I knew, at least until it was so obvious that Mel and I were unable to discuss his homosexuality at all. We never did, though I heard Mel call him a sissy in anger -- but only once. Their's was a love/hate relationship that tore them both apart for years.
Poor Rick! His alcoholism was his only out from the misery. He was -- first of all -- an adopted child in a family that later produced three more biological children. He was an only child until he was five, then Bobby and in quick succession, David. He suffered the agony of being the only black child in that suburban school where he was scorned. He was Black and Gay. He was a lost soul.
After a tumultous and painful adolescence, at twenty-one he moved into town from Walnut Creek, into his first apartment. He was on his own. The call came, the one I'd expected all our lives. "Mom, can you come to dinner next Wednesday? Dress your prettiest. It's something special." When I arrived that evening, a young woman was waiting in the livingroom with Rick. He introduced us, and announced that he had something terribly important to tell me. It was at that moment that he told me about Ron, a handsome (white) man in his early thirties and owner of a kind of "Sharper Image" store in San Francisco. "He wants me to move in with him as his roommate, Mom." "And will you," asked I? "But you don't understand, Mom." "Yes, I do," says I. The young woman (obviously here for moral support) enters the conversations at this point with, "yes, she does, Rick." "You've always known, haven't you" says Rick? "Yes."
We left to join Ron at a fine restaurant where he announced that he and Rick were planning a trip to Amsterdam soon, and that he'd not wanted to take off without our family knowing about their relationship. Ron's family lived in Connecticutt -- a place they would visit on the return trip from Europe. I felt relieved and grateful that we'd together crossed some threshold that freed us all. We'd all come out, that evening.
But all that's left of that relationship are a few shares of Ford Company stock, given to Rick as a Christmas present years ago. The documents have been in my safe deposit box for all these years, a box I thought I'd closed out long ago when I moved. He had a key and had placed them there in a sober moment, I guess. I knew nothing of them until recently when they appeared in my name in an announcement of unclaimed property from the State of California. Have sent in proof of ownership and one day soon they'll arrive, the last vestige of a lost life... .
camping out at San Francisco's city hall (thought of them as the heavy rains pelted down during the night) in the hope of getting married today ... . Thought of Rick, and wept in the night.
Rick's homosexuality was obvious from infancy (as I look back). I recall reading an article in Parents Magazine when he was about five. Something about testes that fail to drop by a certain age, or glandular development that might be delayed -- not sure what it was, but whatever caused my questioning, I made an appointment with our pediatrician to talk about what I suspected. She was shocked by my questions and let me know it. "This is simply a gentle child. You Americans are so strange. In Europe we allow our men to be gentle without suspecting homosexuality. In America it is different." She continued, "children don't choose gender until they reach puberty and it is impossible to tell anything until that choice is made."
I continued, "but if a child is continually having his/her gender questioned, isn't that choice somewhat prejudiced?" She didn't answer me. I figured that this information was suspect and that my "gentle child" was gay and that it was okay with me. One can't share life with a youngster for his five earliest years and not be smitten for life. My biggest problem would surely be to protect him from his "testerostonous" father!
I remember (very athletic) Mel -- on the occasion of about the tenth time Kenny Allen (around the corner toughie) sent Rick home bloodied and bent-- decided to teach Rick to defend himself. Perfectly ordinary thing for a Dad to do, right? Wrong. I knew that this was a gentle child who would never make it against the strength of a bully like Kenny! This ritual went on for weeks. Mel would kneel with both hands held out before him for Rick to punch his little fists into. First left, then right, then crossover, then upper-cut ... made me nervous to watch this futile game day after day.
Some time later Rick came home from play -- nose bloodied, chin scratched, tears of humiliation and fear of facing his dad mixing with outrage! I ran to gather him up for comforting before Mel could get to him -- but it was too late. Mel popped out of the kitchen with, "...why didn't you hit him like I taught you?" Poor little Rick, "...but he wouldn't hold his hands up!"
There was no male killer instinct in my child, and there never would be. He loved dolls and math, in that order. Built his first crystal set for radio reception when he was eight. Taught himself algebra with books from the library when he was in 6th grade because he needed it for a science project he was working on. This was a special child. He was bright, a linear thinker, sharp, and far more feminine than masculine in some important ways. And he'd been so since he came into my life at only a few months of age.
When he was in third grade I attended a teacher-parent conference and was told that Rick was a good student but that he was often seen "passing notes with another little sissy boy." At about the same time, my mother-in-law visited the house and noticed Rick washing dishes. Her warning, "...Betty you mustn't let that boy do those kinds of things...". But the pediatrician had told me years before that boys needed to play with dolls and do household chores just as girls did because "...they grow up to be parents just as girls do." An early feminist? At least she was partly right, but just a little twisted in her diagnosis.
The part that stuck was the part about there being a choice at puberty. I tried very hard to keep open and accepting so as not to effect that "choice." (If there was the slightest possibility that she was right.) Never allowed myself to hint that I knew, at least until it was so obvious that Mel and I were unable to discuss his homosexuality at all. We never did, though I heard Mel call him a sissy in anger -- but only once. Their's was a love/hate relationship that tore them both apart for years.
Poor Rick! His alcoholism was his only out from the misery. He was -- first of all -- an adopted child in a family that later produced three more biological children. He was an only child until he was five, then Bobby and in quick succession, David. He suffered the agony of being the only black child in that suburban school where he was scorned. He was Black and Gay. He was a lost soul.
After a tumultous and painful adolescence, at twenty-one he moved into town from Walnut Creek, into his first apartment. He was on his own. The call came, the one I'd expected all our lives. "Mom, can you come to dinner next Wednesday? Dress your prettiest. It's something special." When I arrived that evening, a young woman was waiting in the livingroom with Rick. He introduced us, and announced that he had something terribly important to tell me. It was at that moment that he told me about Ron, a handsome (white) man in his early thirties and owner of a kind of "Sharper Image" store in San Francisco. "He wants me to move in with him as his roommate, Mom." "And will you," asked I? "But you don't understand, Mom." "Yes, I do," says I. The young woman (obviously here for moral support) enters the conversations at this point with, "yes, she does, Rick." "You've always known, haven't you" says Rick? "Yes."
We left to join Ron at a fine restaurant where he announced that he and Rick were planning a trip to Amsterdam soon, and that he'd not wanted to take off without our family knowing about their relationship. Ron's family lived in Connecticutt -- a place they would visit on the return trip from Europe. I felt relieved and grateful that we'd together crossed some threshold that freed us all. We'd all come out, that evening.
But all that's left of that relationship are a few shares of Ford Company stock, given to Rick as a Christmas present years ago. The documents have been in my safe deposit box for all these years, a box I thought I'd closed out long ago when I moved. He had a key and had placed them there in a sober moment, I guess. I knew nothing of them until recently when they appeared in my name in an announcement of unclaimed property from the State of California. Have sent in proof of ownership and one day soon they'll arrive, the last vestige of a lost life... .
Saturday, February 14, 2004
Leisure doesn't play well today ...
It's Saturday and I'm finding that a Saturday that isn't preceded by a busy week holds little meaning.
Read The Nation cover to cover, and gave due diligence to the pundits on the Left and decided that I need to locate a new base for political activities and soon. Came to the conclusion that -- for good reason -- the Democrats have clearly come together in the hope of unseating the Bush presidency by supporting the "electable" John Kerry. S'okay. I can live with that, though I find myself hoping that Dennis Kucinich and Howard Dean will remain in the race through to the end in order to provide a ballast on the Left that may keep Kerry from doing the "Centrist" thing by moving to the perceived middle after the primaries are over. Clinton with the help of Dick Morris moved to the right of Nixon when running for his second term, and the temptation will be great for Kerry to do likewise. His positions were far more conservative at the beginning of the primaries than in the more recent past. It wasn't until he adopted Dean's far more feisty anti-Iraq Bush policies that Kerry's fortunes began to change. Becoming more critical of Bush's stance on both economic issues and foreign policy turned the tide for him. Were Kucinich and Dean to remove themselves from the race prematurely, I fear a pulling back on his part. By liberalizing his views, he's given a political home to a brand new constituency -- one that will quickly disintegrate if there are signs of that kind of "Clintonism." That would mean a far closer and more perilous fight for the presidency against a powerfully-financed George Bush.
Am finding MoveOn and People for the American Way essential to my ability to track events. I've come to trust a host of sources; George Soros, the Guardian, The Nation, Le Monde, Al Jazeera, and (yes) the Berkeley Daily Planet for local stuff, adds a sense of being part of something larger than myself these days. This is new, and largely made possible by the Internet. Having access to CSpan and the cable coverage of city, county, and state governance is making a difference in campaigns and the way we've come to use political power. Never have ordinary citizens had the tools to move governments in quite this way. We've magnified power of the electorate a thousandfold through technology. Hope enough of us are aware of that and are using it wisely. Eli Parisher and MoveOn have surely changed access and provided the means by which we can bring accountability into the equation, raise funds, and have our voices heard in an effective way.
And -- today is Valentine's Day. Noticed on the last pages of The Nation a column of personal ads. I'm aware that many folks my age read the obituaries with the same interest. Sometimes read the personals for entertainment value, and for what little vicarious thrill there is in seeing bold and sophisticated men and women with enough daring to say precisely what they want for the entire world to see. Smart! Not sure that I could ever do that, but I did see one ad by "a professional man (mid-eighties, it said) who lives on the east coast and is seeking companionship," sounded mildly interesting. "Has home in New York and summer place ...". Now if that had been "lives on the west coast with a summer home on Tiburon or Belvedere," who knows. Maybe would have answered it. Felt daring just thinking about it. Nah, he'd probably be a Republican anyway.
It did stir memories of living in relationship and brought up some nostalgia for times past. Guess I've kept myself too busy to have regrets about living singly, but -- maybe it's just the effects of February 14th. Remembered with a grin of the Valentine's Day that I baked a heart-shaped meatloaf for Bill. He told that story for years, and embellished it with descriptions of sprigs of parsley placed strategically to suggest God knows what! He always made me sound clever and Noel Coward witty in the telling. It's also true that it takes an awful lot of "busy" to re-direct all that sexual energy elsewhere -- and an equal amount of self-delusion to convince oneself that none of that matters. It does.
I'm thinking that I may need to re-think the entire notion of romantic love, and embrace a broader definition of just what that is, and just how that might be achieved. I may have more time on this planet than previously thought, and updating my conception of just how that time might be spent may need consideration (grinning wickedly!).
Now, back to those tango lessons ... .
It's Saturday and I'm finding that a Saturday that isn't preceded by a busy week holds little meaning.
Read The Nation cover to cover, and gave due diligence to the pundits on the Left and decided that I need to locate a new base for political activities and soon. Came to the conclusion that -- for good reason -- the Democrats have clearly come together in the hope of unseating the Bush presidency by supporting the "electable" John Kerry. S'okay. I can live with that, though I find myself hoping that Dennis Kucinich and Howard Dean will remain in the race through to the end in order to provide a ballast on the Left that may keep Kerry from doing the "Centrist" thing by moving to the perceived middle after the primaries are over. Clinton with the help of Dick Morris moved to the right of Nixon when running for his second term, and the temptation will be great for Kerry to do likewise. His positions were far more conservative at the beginning of the primaries than in the more recent past. It wasn't until he adopted Dean's far more feisty anti-Iraq Bush policies that Kerry's fortunes began to change. Becoming more critical of Bush's stance on both economic issues and foreign policy turned the tide for him. Were Kucinich and Dean to remove themselves from the race prematurely, I fear a pulling back on his part. By liberalizing his views, he's given a political home to a brand new constituency -- one that will quickly disintegrate if there are signs of that kind of "Clintonism." That would mean a far closer and more perilous fight for the presidency against a powerfully-financed George Bush.
Am finding MoveOn and People for the American Way essential to my ability to track events. I've come to trust a host of sources; George Soros, the Guardian, The Nation, Le Monde, Al Jazeera, and (yes) the Berkeley Daily Planet for local stuff, adds a sense of being part of something larger than myself these days. This is new, and largely made possible by the Internet. Having access to CSpan and the cable coverage of city, county, and state governance is making a difference in campaigns and the way we've come to use political power. Never have ordinary citizens had the tools to move governments in quite this way. We've magnified power of the electorate a thousandfold through technology. Hope enough of us are aware of that and are using it wisely. Eli Parisher and MoveOn have surely changed access and provided the means by which we can bring accountability into the equation, raise funds, and have our voices heard in an effective way.
And -- today is Valentine's Day. Noticed on the last pages of The Nation a column of personal ads. I'm aware that many folks my age read the obituaries with the same interest. Sometimes read the personals for entertainment value, and for what little vicarious thrill there is in seeing bold and sophisticated men and women with enough daring to say precisely what they want for the entire world to see. Smart! Not sure that I could ever do that, but I did see one ad by "a professional man (mid-eighties, it said) who lives on the east coast and is seeking companionship," sounded mildly interesting. "Has home in New York and summer place ...". Now if that had been "lives on the west coast with a summer home on Tiburon or Belvedere," who knows. Maybe would have answered it. Felt daring just thinking about it. Nah, he'd probably be a Republican anyway.
It did stir memories of living in relationship and brought up some nostalgia for times past. Guess I've kept myself too busy to have regrets about living singly, but -- maybe it's just the effects of February 14th. Remembered with a grin of the Valentine's Day that I baked a heart-shaped meatloaf for Bill. He told that story for years, and embellished it with descriptions of sprigs of parsley placed strategically to suggest God knows what! He always made me sound clever and Noel Coward witty in the telling. It's also true that it takes an awful lot of "busy" to re-direct all that sexual energy elsewhere -- and an equal amount of self-delusion to convince oneself that none of that matters. It does.
I'm thinking that I may need to re-think the entire notion of romantic love, and embrace a broader definition of just what that is, and just how that might be achieved. I may have more time on this planet than previously thought, and updating my conception of just how that time might be spent may need consideration (grinning wickedly!).
Now, back to those tango lessons ... .
Friday, February 13, 2004
Though little has changed and the future is still "dimly lit," yet ... .
I woke to a more hopeful day today.
Dinner with Marilyn Langlois and her Jasper was productive and found some new friends who may prove to be very helpful in getting the school open and running again this fall. I'm always buoyed by contact with other productive people, and the Goode's (husband from the legal staff of now-deposed Governor Gray Davis, and wife, Erica, a physician) proved to be wonderfully warm and innovative and shows all the signs of becoming good friends in the future. Became reacquainted with Maury, about my age and a recent widower. Met him a week ago and enjoyed good conversations with him and with Marilyn. There's a brightness of eye and animation in body that announces the presence of the Goodes in a room -- I've sensed it before in others who've come into my life in the past. Chemistry? I liked them and Maury, and of course, the Langlois. Jennifer Ross, grants writer and dear friend, and Melita Sims, principal and adminstrator of the school, completed the group. We agreed to come together for a celebration exactly one year from last night -- assuming that we will have by then breathed new life into the Barbara Alexander Academy.
With my stockinged feet resting on the warm body of the family Newfoundland (whose favorite place during meals is under the dining-room table), we shared a wonderful feast and a wealth of goodwill. Good wine, good food, good company, and a great project to worry into being, plus a spectacular view of the night sky over the San Francisco Bay from Point Richmond. Can life be better? Hardly.
Home about ten thirty to the sound of a telephone and the plaintive voice of Dorian who was not scheduled to be picked up until this morning ... .
Still feeling well-fed in both soul and body, it didn't feel like too much of an imposition to climb back into my car and drive to Oakland to gather her up. She was grateful to see me (Kyle was rarely mentioned) and chatted happily all the way home. (Okay, so some of it was complaints about him, but with something added -- a growing recognition of his considerable flaws, with a matching impatience with his inability to change.) But, either I was in too good a mood to have my paper hat displaced, or, she is actually feeling it better to be with me tonight in a place of safety than at home, alone. Either way, we arrived back at my apartment pleased with ourselves despite the late hour. We even did some giggling before falling asleep, always a good sign.
This morning she rose with the expectation of going to NIAD. After a fleeting complaint about feeling a cold coming on, there was no resistance and a sense of anticipation for what she would create today. We're making progress.
Having the time to re-think just how she and I will move into the future is a luxury that I didn't anticipate. There are some programs I'd like to look into and will do so over what might be a short window of opportunity -- until Kyle figures out how to seduce her back into his control. How weird that I find myself in a competition for her affection. How healthy can that be? Feel uncomfortable even typing the words ...
I must be careful to make some corrections in the balances in my own life -- now that my work life has been interrupted. Will have to make a real effort to resist the temptation to bury myself in satisfying her needs and neglecting my own. That would be so easy. So justifiable since she is so impaired. My sons and my grandchildren need me as well, and maybe most of all -- I need myself. The choices don't seem to get any easier as experience mounts. If that were not true, this last stretch would be a breeze, wouldn't it?
Bill used to rise every morning at five o'clock to meditate. For the entire ten years that we were married, this was his practice. "Need this for focus," he'd say. It's a thought...may be a way to get in touch with that being who lives behind my eyes and directs my every move.
If ever there was a time ... .
I woke to a more hopeful day today.
Dinner with Marilyn Langlois and her Jasper was productive and found some new friends who may prove to be very helpful in getting the school open and running again this fall. I'm always buoyed by contact with other productive people, and the Goode's (husband from the legal staff of now-deposed Governor Gray Davis, and wife, Erica, a physician) proved to be wonderfully warm and innovative and shows all the signs of becoming good friends in the future. Became reacquainted with Maury, about my age and a recent widower. Met him a week ago and enjoyed good conversations with him and with Marilyn. There's a brightness of eye and animation in body that announces the presence of the Goodes in a room -- I've sensed it before in others who've come into my life in the past. Chemistry? I liked them and Maury, and of course, the Langlois. Jennifer Ross, grants writer and dear friend, and Melita Sims, principal and adminstrator of the school, completed the group. We agreed to come together for a celebration exactly one year from last night -- assuming that we will have by then breathed new life into the Barbara Alexander Academy.
With my stockinged feet resting on the warm body of the family Newfoundland (whose favorite place during meals is under the dining-room table), we shared a wonderful feast and a wealth of goodwill. Good wine, good food, good company, and a great project to worry into being, plus a spectacular view of the night sky over the San Francisco Bay from Point Richmond. Can life be better? Hardly.
Home about ten thirty to the sound of a telephone and the plaintive voice of Dorian who was not scheduled to be picked up until this morning ... .
Still feeling well-fed in both soul and body, it didn't feel like too much of an imposition to climb back into my car and drive to Oakland to gather her up. She was grateful to see me (Kyle was rarely mentioned) and chatted happily all the way home. (Okay, so some of it was complaints about him, but with something added -- a growing recognition of his considerable flaws, with a matching impatience with his inability to change.) But, either I was in too good a mood to have my paper hat displaced, or, she is actually feeling it better to be with me tonight in a place of safety than at home, alone. Either way, we arrived back at my apartment pleased with ourselves despite the late hour. We even did some giggling before falling asleep, always a good sign.
This morning she rose with the expectation of going to NIAD. After a fleeting complaint about feeling a cold coming on, there was no resistance and a sense of anticipation for what she would create today. We're making progress.
Having the time to re-think just how she and I will move into the future is a luxury that I didn't anticipate. There are some programs I'd like to look into and will do so over what might be a short window of opportunity -- until Kyle figures out how to seduce her back into his control. How weird that I find myself in a competition for her affection. How healthy can that be? Feel uncomfortable even typing the words ...
I must be careful to make some corrections in the balances in my own life -- now that my work life has been interrupted. Will have to make a real effort to resist the temptation to bury myself in satisfying her needs and neglecting my own. That would be so easy. So justifiable since she is so impaired. My sons and my grandchildren need me as well, and maybe most of all -- I need myself. The choices don't seem to get any easier as experience mounts. If that were not true, this last stretch would be a breeze, wouldn't it?
Bill used to rise every morning at five o'clock to meditate. For the entire ten years that we were married, this was his practice. "Need this for focus," he'd say. It's a thought...may be a way to get in touch with that being who lives behind my eyes and directs my every move.
If ever there was a time ... .
Thursday, February 12, 2004
Night before last brought a late call from Dorian in distress ...
Drove in at almost midnight to pick her up (complete with her family of two precious cats in carriers) and tucked her into the futon beside my bed -- for the night. These calls usually involve her sometimes live-in, alcoholic, and paranoid-schizophrenic lover who is either moving in or moving out -- depending upon whatever is shifting his body at the moment.
This "living in the community" feature of dealing with the mentally handicapped has a definite down side. When she was much younger, the State was, too. The Lanterman act made it possible to move many patients out of institutions into communities because -- through several Regional Centers scattered throughout California -- services were provided to enable each to live up to his or her potential (whatever that might be) within the general population. A valiant goal. Through a series of successive budget shortfalls and an ever-increasing population, those services have been drastically cut and we now have barely-functioning mentally deficient souls struggling out there with less and less to support them. It's really tragic. Many living under bridges and on warm grates throughout the country are those without family members to fill in the gaps for them. They fall through the cracks and often die from neglect, heartbreak and total confusion. As parents and siblings die off, they're left without advocates.
Dorian's young man is one such. He was born to parents who abandoned him, and was later adopted by another pair who did likewise after much abuse. He is clever, ego-maniacal, and domineering. I have to continually remind myself that he is impaired and not simply pathologically narcissistic. Staff cutbacks have provided a situation that supports his alcoholism and aggravates an already compromised life. And, my daughter adores him. He controls her every move and overrides my influence with her. That's new for me. She and I have always had a fine relationship that evolved intentionally and over many years from "mom" to "best friend." That's all but shattered, except that I can still count upon her honesty when things get really rough. Otherwise, she is so protective of him that I fear that she is being silently abused and shields him from criticism when she can.
I'd picked up the "Sea Biscuit" and "Whale Rider" DVDs on Tuesday, and we climbed into bed and watched them late into the night (both terrific!). Dropped her off at NIAD for her art class yesterday. She was obviously depressed and non-productive. She'd worked on a block print but had trashed it as not worthy of her effort. She a fine judge of when she's done well or failed at whatever she's working on.
Yesterday I drove her back to her apartment in Oakland in the early evening -- her therapist was coming at seven -- so she stayed there overnight. She called early this morning to check on just how her cats had fared without her. Kyle was apparently still gone.
Today I have lunch with a former co-worker (friend), a meeting with the National Park Service folks at 4:30 and dinner tonight at Marilyn's about the Barbara Alexander School. Dorian has Amy (her teacher) this afternoon from 2 until 4:30 so will be occupied fairly well. Tomorrow morning I will pick her up for another day at NIAD. Saturday morning there is basketball practice for Special Olympics -- I'll drive her in to Oakland for that. Then we'll spend the weekend together, hopefully.
That is, if Kyle allows it.
...and I find myself wondering just how long I'll be able to fill in the gaps in funding for her by partially supporting two households? Were I to die tomorrow, despite all, would my Dorian drift out into the social abyss and end up under a bridge somewhere?
Collapsing our lives into a single living space will undo all the years of training her to live without me. It's been such a long and painful process, but may have been an exercise in futility after all. I still hope to not infantalize her this late in life, but must try to continue to confirm her independence in every way possible. That involves taking some worrisome risks.
It seems less likely now than a month ago, but -- given a bit more effort -- maybe I can salvage something beyond my principles. That resignation may be have more costly than I'd realized. It troubles me to think that I may have compromised Dorian's future as well as my own, and she has a lot more future than I have, at least potentially. And therein lies the undercurrent that rules our lives ... the theme that dominates everything.
What will happen to Dorrie?
Drove in at almost midnight to pick her up (complete with her family of two precious cats in carriers) and tucked her into the futon beside my bed -- for the night. These calls usually involve her sometimes live-in, alcoholic, and paranoid-schizophrenic lover who is either moving in or moving out -- depending upon whatever is shifting his body at the moment.
This "living in the community" feature of dealing with the mentally handicapped has a definite down side. When she was much younger, the State was, too. The Lanterman act made it possible to move many patients out of institutions into communities because -- through several Regional Centers scattered throughout California -- services were provided to enable each to live up to his or her potential (whatever that might be) within the general population. A valiant goal. Through a series of successive budget shortfalls and an ever-increasing population, those services have been drastically cut and we now have barely-functioning mentally deficient souls struggling out there with less and less to support them. It's really tragic. Many living under bridges and on warm grates throughout the country are those without family members to fill in the gaps for them. They fall through the cracks and often die from neglect, heartbreak and total confusion. As parents and siblings die off, they're left without advocates.
Dorian's young man is one such. He was born to parents who abandoned him, and was later adopted by another pair who did likewise after much abuse. He is clever, ego-maniacal, and domineering. I have to continually remind myself that he is impaired and not simply pathologically narcissistic. Staff cutbacks have provided a situation that supports his alcoholism and aggravates an already compromised life. And, my daughter adores him. He controls her every move and overrides my influence with her. That's new for me. She and I have always had a fine relationship that evolved intentionally and over many years from "mom" to "best friend." That's all but shattered, except that I can still count upon her honesty when things get really rough. Otherwise, she is so protective of him that I fear that she is being silently abused and shields him from criticism when she can.
I'd picked up the "Sea Biscuit" and "Whale Rider" DVDs on Tuesday, and we climbed into bed and watched them late into the night (both terrific!). Dropped her off at NIAD for her art class yesterday. She was obviously depressed and non-productive. She'd worked on a block print but had trashed it as not worthy of her effort. She a fine judge of when she's done well or failed at whatever she's working on.
Yesterday I drove her back to her apartment in Oakland in the early evening -- her therapist was coming at seven -- so she stayed there overnight. She called early this morning to check on just how her cats had fared without her. Kyle was apparently still gone.
Today I have lunch with a former co-worker (friend), a meeting with the National Park Service folks at 4:30 and dinner tonight at Marilyn's about the Barbara Alexander School. Dorian has Amy (her teacher) this afternoon from 2 until 4:30 so will be occupied fairly well. Tomorrow morning I will pick her up for another day at NIAD. Saturday morning there is basketball practice for Special Olympics -- I'll drive her in to Oakland for that. Then we'll spend the weekend together, hopefully.
That is, if Kyle allows it.
...and I find myself wondering just how long I'll be able to fill in the gaps in funding for her by partially supporting two households? Were I to die tomorrow, despite all, would my Dorian drift out into the social abyss and end up under a bridge somewhere?
Collapsing our lives into a single living space will undo all the years of training her to live without me. It's been such a long and painful process, but may have been an exercise in futility after all. I still hope to not infantalize her this late in life, but must try to continue to confirm her independence in every way possible. That involves taking some worrisome risks.
It seems less likely now than a month ago, but -- given a bit more effort -- maybe I can salvage something beyond my principles. That resignation may be have more costly than I'd realized. It troubles me to think that I may have compromised Dorian's future as well as my own, and she has a lot more future than I have, at least potentially. And therein lies the undercurrent that rules our lives ... the theme that dominates everything.
What will happen to Dorrie?
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
One might think that being unemployed would allow for more free time than before ...
Not working out that way. Looking for another position before I default on my mortgage or lose my insurance coverage keeps me not only busy but with a sense of urgency that surpasses even that which comes with the natural course of aging. This is something else. It probably equals the disquiet that everyone feels -- regardless of age -- when living from paycheck to paycheck. Any interruption in that process brings a sense of sheer terror. I'm beginning to experience shallow breathing -- now clearly noticeable because of the absence of the normal sense of power enjoyed for so many years. Always believed that I was facing the world with honesty and directness, and ever conscious of my ability to handle almost anything, given the time and the energy. Have rarely felt helpless and have climbed a respectable number of mountains in my day and made a hell of a lot of lemonade!
Let's get to the good stuff:
Kevin Cooper's execution has been set aside, and the anti-death penalty movement can stop and catch its breath. Turned out to be a celebration instead of a wake at the prison gates last night. Wonderful! The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals turns out to be the factor that turned the march toward death into a dance of victory. That panel is still deliberating the fate of Stanley "Tookie" Williams, but did the unprecedented thing of recommending that the governor give full consideration to clemency when handing down their last response to his case. That decision is still pending.
The film, "Redemption" is continuing to cause a great stir in festival circles with invitations to several more. Sundance gave it buzz that has excited the public far beyond the anti-death penalty movement. C.H. Pounder plays Winnie Mandela in the movie. Mandela called Barbara as she was leaving LA/Ex for home. A friend of Winnie's was in the audience and called South Africa to rave about the film. What resulted was an invitation to Barbara to bring it to South Africa for a showing before the Parliament. Channel FX is thrilled and is already working on it.
Spent Sunday lazing under the tallest eucalyptus forest imaginable (a monarch butterfly migration site), within reasonable rock-tossing distance to the ocean. This is the A-Frame home of an artist friend on whose board I'm serving. I so love interacting with these creative minds. There was a stage-lighting specialist, a grants-writer-capacity-building woman of the arts, a dancer-aerialist and one of her dancers, the beautiful black-eyed 4-year old son of Joanna, and a choreographer called "Baby Jose." Jose (the stage-lighting specialist) is from Argentina whose ultimate life plan is to purchase an old castle in central Mexico for a Bed and Breakfast. His specialty is cooking. He created a fine dinner for us all while we huddled before the fireplace and sipped tea that Joanna had brought back from South Africa ... they talked of Paris, the time they'd spent together in Peru ... Jose's upcoming trip to Brazil (we're all invited to go along, of course), and his most recent trip to Italy.
Jennifer and I spent last Sunday at a dance concert at the Yerba Buena Center where we'd accidentally run into Jose (who stage-manages the Center) and out of that came the invitation to Joanna's on Sunday. It was instantly clear that life grows out of life, and that I must continue to move about in the world in whatever way life presents itself. To not do so is to begin the slow and inevitable surrender to death. This may be one of the unstated but driving life forces ... maybe. Also, in a flash this very obvious truth rose out of nothing into full bloom while looking at the moon out of the car window as the others chatted comfortably about things I knew little or nothing about. It felt warm and right, and like one of those obvious truths that was more like a memory than an epiphany. There's a kind of elegance about that ... like something that rose at some elemental level from the experience of 6 year-old Betty long before she had the language to describe it ...
For the thousandth time in my life, on Sunday someone asked if I'd been a dancer at some earlier time in life. I said (again) "no." But silently -- with no future plans at the moment -- I decided then and there that it's not one minute too late. Will save some time in my new (non)schedule to enter a dance class. My body is lithe and moves well. The fact that I've led a relatively active life suggests that my bones can still take some stress without disintegrating. I've no sign of bone loss, yet, and my energy level is still high. But bonuses will surely begin to ebb if I find myself wasting away in front of the TV. Since I'm still a member of the board of the East Bay Center for Performing Arts -- and, since there are no age barriers -- why not? Maybe no one has yet tested the upper edges of the age levels for dance.
Phone just rang: It was a dear friend from Dion's staff inquiring about how I'm feeling, whether I've found work, (checking on signs of depression in my voice, I'm sure). Fortunately, since she didn't reach me when I was writing those first two paragraphs, she caught me contemplating dance lessons. The mind is oddly mercurial, isn't it? Another important truth? Maybe depression comes in short bursts, and can be dispensed with in quixotic ways. Think I'll set aside my job search for today and create for myself a new reality -- one that includes dancing. (Felt such a deep response on Sunday -- to the sound of a concertina in the background of conversation -- of something on CD -- a tango! Wouldn't that be a hoot!) Think I'll come out from behind this screen and pick up a leotard and maybe some maracas -- in case I can find flamenco dancing somewhere. That, too, stirs something deep inside... .
I'm beginning to know that -- whenever it comes -- death will be a rude interruption in a lifelong search for experiences. If only birth came with a built-in rehearsal feature and a place to Slo-Mo the best parts! Other than that small flaw, life's a bargain at any price, even when times are uncertain and the future only dimly lit... .
Not working out that way. Looking for another position before I default on my mortgage or lose my insurance coverage keeps me not only busy but with a sense of urgency that surpasses even that which comes with the natural course of aging. This is something else. It probably equals the disquiet that everyone feels -- regardless of age -- when living from paycheck to paycheck. Any interruption in that process brings a sense of sheer terror. I'm beginning to experience shallow breathing -- now clearly noticeable because of the absence of the normal sense of power enjoyed for so many years. Always believed that I was facing the world with honesty and directness, and ever conscious of my ability to handle almost anything, given the time and the energy. Have rarely felt helpless and have climbed a respectable number of mountains in my day and made a hell of a lot of lemonade!
Let's get to the good stuff:
Kevin Cooper's execution has been set aside, and the anti-death penalty movement can stop and catch its breath. Turned out to be a celebration instead of a wake at the prison gates last night. Wonderful! The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals turns out to be the factor that turned the march toward death into a dance of victory. That panel is still deliberating the fate of Stanley "Tookie" Williams, but did the unprecedented thing of recommending that the governor give full consideration to clemency when handing down their last response to his case. That decision is still pending.
The film, "Redemption" is continuing to cause a great stir in festival circles with invitations to several more. Sundance gave it buzz that has excited the public far beyond the anti-death penalty movement. C.H. Pounder plays Winnie Mandela in the movie. Mandela called Barbara as she was leaving LA/Ex for home. A friend of Winnie's was in the audience and called South Africa to rave about the film. What resulted was an invitation to Barbara to bring it to South Africa for a showing before the Parliament. Channel FX is thrilled and is already working on it.
Spent Sunday lazing under the tallest eucalyptus forest imaginable (a monarch butterfly migration site), within reasonable rock-tossing distance to the ocean. This is the A-Frame home of an artist friend on whose board I'm serving. I so love interacting with these creative minds. There was a stage-lighting specialist, a grants-writer-capacity-building woman of the arts, a dancer-aerialist and one of her dancers, the beautiful black-eyed 4-year old son of Joanna, and a choreographer called "Baby Jose." Jose (the stage-lighting specialist) is from Argentina whose ultimate life plan is to purchase an old castle in central Mexico for a Bed and Breakfast. His specialty is cooking. He created a fine dinner for us all while we huddled before the fireplace and sipped tea that Joanna had brought back from South Africa ... they talked of Paris, the time they'd spent together in Peru ... Jose's upcoming trip to Brazil (we're all invited to go along, of course), and his most recent trip to Italy.
Jennifer and I spent last Sunday at a dance concert at the Yerba Buena Center where we'd accidentally run into Jose (who stage-manages the Center) and out of that came the invitation to Joanna's on Sunday. It was instantly clear that life grows out of life, and that I must continue to move about in the world in whatever way life presents itself. To not do so is to begin the slow and inevitable surrender to death. This may be one of the unstated but driving life forces ... maybe. Also, in a flash this very obvious truth rose out of nothing into full bloom while looking at the moon out of the car window as the others chatted comfortably about things I knew little or nothing about. It felt warm and right, and like one of those obvious truths that was more like a memory than an epiphany. There's a kind of elegance about that ... like something that rose at some elemental level from the experience of 6 year-old Betty long before she had the language to describe it ...
For the thousandth time in my life, on Sunday someone asked if I'd been a dancer at some earlier time in life. I said (again) "no." But silently -- with no future plans at the moment -- I decided then and there that it's not one minute too late. Will save some time in my new (non)schedule to enter a dance class. My body is lithe and moves well. The fact that I've led a relatively active life suggests that my bones can still take some stress without disintegrating. I've no sign of bone loss, yet, and my energy level is still high. But bonuses will surely begin to ebb if I find myself wasting away in front of the TV. Since I'm still a member of the board of the East Bay Center for Performing Arts -- and, since there are no age barriers -- why not? Maybe no one has yet tested the upper edges of the age levels for dance.
Phone just rang: It was a dear friend from Dion's staff inquiring about how I'm feeling, whether I've found work, (checking on signs of depression in my voice, I'm sure). Fortunately, since she didn't reach me when I was writing those first two paragraphs, she caught me contemplating dance lessons. The mind is oddly mercurial, isn't it? Another important truth? Maybe depression comes in short bursts, and can be dispensed with in quixotic ways. Think I'll set aside my job search for today and create for myself a new reality -- one that includes dancing. (Felt such a deep response on Sunday -- to the sound of a concertina in the background of conversation -- of something on CD -- a tango! Wouldn't that be a hoot!) Think I'll come out from behind this screen and pick up a leotard and maybe some maracas -- in case I can find flamenco dancing somewhere. That, too, stirs something deep inside... .
I'm beginning to know that -- whenever it comes -- death will be a rude interruption in a lifelong search for experiences. If only birth came with a built-in rehearsal feature and a place to Slo-Mo the best parts! Other than that small flaw, life's a bargain at any price, even when times are uncertain and the future only dimly lit... .
Friday, February 06, 2004
Dropped Dorian off at NIAD ... .
(National Institute for Artists with Disabilities) this morning and drove away with the first signs of depression. Couldn't decide what to do with myself with no destination in mind. Haven't been this open for many years, which is a way of saying that I had nowhere to go. Have never been the StarBucks type. With home the likely place to head for at the moment, I find myself sitting here at my computer with nothing of note to report.
The phone rang, "...this is Marilyn. Wanted to report that Maury (the man who met with us on Tuesday) has agreed to contribute to the Barbara Alexander Academy and has suggested that he will seek matching funds from Chevron/Texaco as well." "I'm having a dinner on Thursday next for other contributors and wondering if you would join us?" Agreed. The work on this remarkable charter school must continue. I, of course, accepted, and wondered if I should tell Marilyn how important this call was to me? She pulled me back into an unknown future by setting a date for me to pin myself to.
It's always been true that I need options. I can be comfortably alone only if I have a choice about it. At those times when I'm at loose ends with nothing to do -- slipping from chair to chair and watching "television" instead of specific programs -- I experience loneliness. But, if the phone rings and someone at the other end of the line asks, "...want to go to a movie?" Then, and only then, I can say "no, I plan to spend the evening doing laundry (or a report, or writing, or doodlin')," and at that moment I've chosen to spend the evening at home, alone. It's having someone present an option that makes the difference. Funny. It's always been so. Marilyn had innocently presented the option that transformed time into a living space.
So now that I've chosen, I'm writing here and planning to spend the afternoon making calls and updating my calendar to include new items more closely related to my new open schedule. Lunch with Mindell, another with Michelle, and still another with Isiah are new items. Talk with my broker about my portfolio and the need to begin to transfer dividends into my checking account instead of redepositing. Practical things now must move to the top of my "to do" list. Must contact someone to finish hauling possessions out of the storage place so that another monthly bill can be eliminated. So I'll be a little crowded -- maybe a yard sale?
Has anyone else on earth accumulated as much paper as I? Time to plug in the paper shredder and rid myself of records that go back beyond 7 seven years (isn't that the legal time allowance?). That should take up several days of browsing and tossing, a task I've delayed far too long.
Who knows what gems may turn up among the debris? Or, just how much garbage I've been hoarding for lo these many years ... .
Maybe I've found another compelling activity, at least until another Marilyn calls ... .
(National Institute for Artists with Disabilities) this morning and drove away with the first signs of depression. Couldn't decide what to do with myself with no destination in mind. Haven't been this open for many years, which is a way of saying that I had nowhere to go. Have never been the StarBucks type. With home the likely place to head for at the moment, I find myself sitting here at my computer with nothing of note to report.
The phone rang, "...this is Marilyn. Wanted to report that Maury (the man who met with us on Tuesday) has agreed to contribute to the Barbara Alexander Academy and has suggested that he will seek matching funds from Chevron/Texaco as well." "I'm having a dinner on Thursday next for other contributors and wondering if you would join us?" Agreed. The work on this remarkable charter school must continue. I, of course, accepted, and wondered if I should tell Marilyn how important this call was to me? She pulled me back into an unknown future by setting a date for me to pin myself to.
It's always been true that I need options. I can be comfortably alone only if I have a choice about it. At those times when I'm at loose ends with nothing to do -- slipping from chair to chair and watching "television" instead of specific programs -- I experience loneliness. But, if the phone rings and someone at the other end of the line asks, "...want to go to a movie?" Then, and only then, I can say "no, I plan to spend the evening doing laundry (or a report, or writing, or doodlin')," and at that moment I've chosen to spend the evening at home, alone. It's having someone present an option that makes the difference. Funny. It's always been so. Marilyn had innocently presented the option that transformed time into a living space.
So now that I've chosen, I'm writing here and planning to spend the afternoon making calls and updating my calendar to include new items more closely related to my new open schedule. Lunch with Mindell, another with Michelle, and still another with Isiah are new items. Talk with my broker about my portfolio and the need to begin to transfer dividends into my checking account instead of redepositing. Practical things now must move to the top of my "to do" list. Must contact someone to finish hauling possessions out of the storage place so that another monthly bill can be eliminated. So I'll be a little crowded -- maybe a yard sale?
Has anyone else on earth accumulated as much paper as I? Time to plug in the paper shredder and rid myself of records that go back beyond 7 seven years (isn't that the legal time allowance?). That should take up several days of browsing and tossing, a task I've delayed far too long.
Who knows what gems may turn up among the debris? Or, just how much garbage I've been hoarding for lo these many years ... .
Maybe I've found another compelling activity, at least until another Marilyn calls ... .
Wednesday, February 04, 2004
Spent a frustrating day ...
Changes are hard enough to deal with when they're the result of one's own doing, but when they're brought on by forces beyond one's control ... well, that's a horse of another color.
On Monday State Senator Perata's office called to say that "the senator's not ready for prime time." With the Kevin Cooper execution scheduled for next week and with protestors already sitting-in at San Quentin, and with full-page ads being placed in the national press by the anti-death penalty forces, I suspect that the issue is just too controversial to take on at the moment. It means that the 60 Minutes interview team has come to town to do the initial background interviews in preparation for the Stan Williams segment, but that there will be no announcement of a bill on the moratorium. Since we've passed the deadline for bill submission for this year's session, it wouldn't have been introduced until after September, anyway. Timing didn't work out. Therefore, Ed Bradley is not scheduled to arrive until around the 23rd of February.
Today Barbara left for the Pan African Film Festival in Culver City and a series of meetings arranged by Tom Hayden to follow on Friday and Saturday. Declined the invitation to go along (despite the fact that Blockbuster is picking up the tab) in the interest of updating my resume and getting the word out -- in the event that someone has an available position. Crazy? Maybe, but I really can't afford to be idle for long or I'll have to start drawing on dividends and reducing my investments prematurely. There isn't too much in reserve and Dorian's expenses grow with each month (this week brought the announcement of another rent increase). A couple of days at the Beverly Wilshire wasn't all that easy to walk away from, though. That was probably my last chance to do "luxury beyond reason!"
There will be a screening of "Redemption" in Sacramento for members of the legislature sometime before the television airing in mid-March. Will be helping to set that up over the next week or two.
Next week will be emotionally draining. Plan to attend the vigil for Kevin Cooper at San Quentin. Will join with others -- probably not on the night of the execution though, but on the night before. It's just too painful to be present at the gates that night. If I can find it somewhere on my hard disk, I wrote a description of that experience. It's hard to explain just why I feel drawn to such actions, but I am. To have a life taken in my name (and yours) should not be taken casually. To place oneself at the scene sharpens the awareness of just how inhumane an act is capital punishment. for the USA to be so far behind the rest of the world in outlawing this murdurous practice defies logic. But then death of young people through war is still beyond my understanding, too.
With the 9th Circuit Court still deliberating his case, Stanley Williams is at least a year away from his execution date (with luck), but having met him and seen his transformation -- having worked so closely with Barbara on his behalf over the past 4 years -- I cannot imagine what it will feel like to experience the effects of his execution on us all, when and if that day comes.
There have surely been unbelievably horrific acts committed by twisted individuals who must be shut away from society for the balance of their lives. "Life without the possibility of parole" is justifiable. That I do believe. But to kill in order to discourage killing makes no sense. The State (being me and thee) has not the right to take life. If one is capable of dropping the pellet, or, personally performing the act of giving a lethal injection, then I suppose the aversion that I feel is my problem, alone. But, there is no virtue in committing such acts in the aggregate if we would be unwilling or incapable of doing it as a lone individual. That's the acid test for me.
Since my work to date has allowed much variety and constant change, there is a risk that I will be drawn into specific areas of concern and lose the ability to balance the highs and lows and levels of intensity in my days. Must be careful. There has to be time to watch the kites, children at play, moving water and changing skies, art and artists, hear music and work with those young people who are on their way into public service. Without those balances, my life may start to be lived defensively and without intentionality. I've seldom had that problem, but then there has always been a central focus. That's what I must find now. If not through another position, then through a carefully-planned program of volunteering. I'll need to be ever alert to opening doors.
Tomorrow will meet with the people at the Chamber of Commerce about the Arts & Entertainment District, and then follow up on resumes sent out by email. These were sent by invitation, so I'm hopeful.
Entering a precarious period, but with lots of hope and some excitement.
Photo: Me, grandson Rhico, Ms. Winnie Mandela, and granddaughter, Kokee Amanda Reid.
Right photo: Ms. Mandela and I visited the Laura Hunter Learning Center in North Richmond on the day that we visited Death Row inmate, Stanley "Tookie" Williams. She'd flown from South Africa to lend support to the anti-death penalty movement and, specifically, to help to plead the case of this five times this Nobel Peace Prize nominee. He was also nominated for the prize in literature. This month (10/2005) his last appeal was turned down by the Supreme Court. His execution will now be scheduled unless the governor acts in his behalf.
Tuesday, February 03, 2004
Met with Barbara Becnel and Assemblyman Tom Hayden yesterday, I like him, and, of course, Barbara and I have forged a lasting friendship over the past years ... .
Working with him will be wonderful. He's dedicated to the idea of a moratorium on the death penalty and is committed to changing the criminal justice system in any way he can. Is anyone aware that the cost of educating a child in this state is about $6000/year while the cost of maintaining one prisoner is $27,000/year? That has to stop anyone with common sense in their tracks, right? How have we come to this?
Watched the PBS documentary on the state of the schools (hope you can catch it) called "First to Worst." Shocking story of the continuing effects of Prop. 13 on the education of our young. Helms Middle School is in my district. It's a school that I'm familiar with and what is seen on the small screen is both accurate and disgraceful. The Orinda high school shown is also in the 14th Assembly District, with its unbelievably rich educational culture and hardworking parents who have the financial ability to make up for the deficits that rob innercity kids of so much. Had to keep reminding myself that I'm no longer working for the District ... .
But this morning I'm off to a meeting of the Ma'at Youth Academy, as a board member -- an assignment I'll continue to serve -- I'm still in touch with a group that brings environmental education into the schools. This afternoon I'll meet with someone who may be interested in contributing to the revival of the Barbara Alexander Academy.
Haven't yet sent out those resumes, but have been asked by several interested people to submit ASAP so there may be interest in a continuance of my "career," despite the break in employment. Lots of possibilities ... but now I must leave for Ma'at board meeting.
It's raining and gray and the house is still. I'm so rarely here at this hour. It's strange... .
Working with him will be wonderful. He's dedicated to the idea of a moratorium on the death penalty and is committed to changing the criminal justice system in any way he can. Is anyone aware that the cost of educating a child in this state is about $6000/year while the cost of maintaining one prisoner is $27,000/year? That has to stop anyone with common sense in their tracks, right? How have we come to this?
Watched the PBS documentary on the state of the schools (hope you can catch it) called "First to Worst." Shocking story of the continuing effects of Prop. 13 on the education of our young. Helms Middle School is in my district. It's a school that I'm familiar with and what is seen on the small screen is both accurate and disgraceful. The Orinda high school shown is also in the 14th Assembly District, with its unbelievably rich educational culture and hardworking parents who have the financial ability to make up for the deficits that rob innercity kids of so much. Had to keep reminding myself that I'm no longer working for the District ... .
But this morning I'm off to a meeting of the Ma'at Youth Academy, as a board member -- an assignment I'll continue to serve -- I'm still in touch with a group that brings environmental education into the schools. This afternoon I'll meet with someone who may be interested in contributing to the revival of the Barbara Alexander Academy.Haven't yet sent out those resumes, but have been asked by several interested people to submit ASAP so there may be interest in a continuance of my "career," despite the break in employment. Lots of possibilities ... but now I must leave for Ma'at board meeting.
It's raining and gray and the house is still. I'm so rarely here at this hour. It's strange... .
Saturday, January 31, 2004
Feeling a little insecure this day,
it's been a long time since I've had to wonder just what I might be doing come Monday ...
When I allow myself to think about the audacity of a woman my age thinking that she can resign any position on a question of principle? How crazy is that? What in the world would give me the idea that I can walk away from any great job and pick up another at the drop of a resume? But, in thinking back over the past weeks, I can't imagine any other course of action. I could not have stayed, but walking away with only 3 months to go for my retirement benefits to kick in is probably not the brightest thing I've ever done. The state system requires five years of service, and I've worked under the PERS retirement system for 4 years and 9 months. One day less and you're on your own.
There is an alternative. Since both the city and county use the PERS system, if I can find some limited project (3 month stint), I can continue to accumulate credits for time served. Have put out word along the network and will hope that something will turn up. Otherwise, I will be one very expensive volunteer! Can't imagine not being involved in something. Will continue to do consultancies when possible, and to work on special projects with Barbara Becnel, but the steady income that I've grown used to, and that supports both my life and Dorian's has come to an end. Severe cutbacks in the state budget have eliminated her psychotherapist, her rent has seen another increase, and her meds that cost $10 in November rose to $300 after January 1st when she went for a refill. One might certainly question my timing, right?
Meanwhile, this afternoon I helped to celebrate the birthday of an old friend, and tomorrow is a concert of Dimensions Dance Theater with Omar Sosa, pianist, at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco. Am dreaming of tickets to see the long-awaited Lion King that opened this week and will be in S.F. until September.
Will meet on Monday with Barbara Becnel and Tom Hayden, then will complete engagements with those still in my datebook and that I can take into my personal life (some interesting projects), and plan to spend the next week lunching with friends and seeking more permanent work arrangements. Wednesday brings the 60 Minutes interviews and Ed Bradley. Have contacted my state senator to announce the introduction of his bill on the moratorium. Will have his answer on Monday. Probably should set aside the next week for worrying about approaching income tax preparation and then property tax filings, then, and only then, aarrggghhhh!!!!! Screaming time! But not until at least 60 days have elapsed.
My chances for employment at Hooters are pretty low, and I'm not sure I'll qualify for flight classes due to excessively sweaty palms -- but there must be something. There's a community college just down the hill from my condo. Maybe they can use a busybody type for something. Maybe I'll take those art classes I've been wishing to take -- "one day when there is time."
Don't think it's crackup time yet, but today my usually mind-bending drive on the freeway yielded little other than questions. Usually my best thinking is done while stuck in traffic. I keep a little tape recorder in the dash compartment, and have often been known to work out some pretty hefty questions while stuck between two SUVs and an oil rig on I-80. Today I couldn't focus, so noticed all of the negatives -- deisel smoke, sirens, garbage on the road, sinister-looking skid marks, angry drivers. Funny, that stretch along the bay usually brings up marine views, sailboats, windsurfers, an occasional kite, weird license plates, interesting sky patterns as the fog moves in stealthily from the sea... .
Was reminded again of just how true it is that we create our own reality... .
it's been a long time since I've had to wonder just what I might be doing come Monday ...
When I allow myself to think about the audacity of a woman my age thinking that she can resign any position on a question of principle? How crazy is that? What in the world would give me the idea that I can walk away from any great job and pick up another at the drop of a resume? But, in thinking back over the past weeks, I can't imagine any other course of action. I could not have stayed, but walking away with only 3 months to go for my retirement benefits to kick in is probably not the brightest thing I've ever done. The state system requires five years of service, and I've worked under the PERS retirement system for 4 years and 9 months. One day less and you're on your own.
There is an alternative. Since both the city and county use the PERS system, if I can find some limited project (3 month stint), I can continue to accumulate credits for time served. Have put out word along the network and will hope that something will turn up. Otherwise, I will be one very expensive volunteer! Can't imagine not being involved in something. Will continue to do consultancies when possible, and to work on special projects with Barbara Becnel, but the steady income that I've grown used to, and that supports both my life and Dorian's has come to an end. Severe cutbacks in the state budget have eliminated her psychotherapist, her rent has seen another increase, and her meds that cost $10 in November rose to $300 after January 1st when she went for a refill. One might certainly question my timing, right?
Meanwhile, this afternoon I helped to celebrate the birthday of an old friend, and tomorrow is a concert of Dimensions Dance Theater with Omar Sosa, pianist, at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco. Am dreaming of tickets to see the long-awaited Lion King that opened this week and will be in S.F. until September.
Will meet on Monday with Barbara Becnel and Tom Hayden, then will complete engagements with those still in my datebook and that I can take into my personal life (some interesting projects), and plan to spend the next week lunching with friends and seeking more permanent work arrangements. Wednesday brings the 60 Minutes interviews and Ed Bradley. Have contacted my state senator to announce the introduction of his bill on the moratorium. Will have his answer on Monday. Probably should set aside the next week for worrying about approaching income tax preparation and then property tax filings, then, and only then, aarrggghhhh!!!!! Screaming time! But not until at least 60 days have elapsed.
My chances for employment at Hooters are pretty low, and I'm not sure I'll qualify for flight classes due to excessively sweaty palms -- but there must be something. There's a community college just down the hill from my condo. Maybe they can use a busybody type for something. Maybe I'll take those art classes I've been wishing to take -- "one day when there is time."
Don't think it's crackup time yet, but today my usually mind-bending drive on the freeway yielded little other than questions. Usually my best thinking is done while stuck in traffic. I keep a little tape recorder in the dash compartment, and have often been known to work out some pretty hefty questions while stuck between two SUVs and an oil rig on I-80. Today I couldn't focus, so noticed all of the negatives -- deisel smoke, sirens, garbage on the road, sinister-looking skid marks, angry drivers. Funny, that stretch along the bay usually brings up marine views, sailboats, windsurfers, an occasional kite, weird license plates, interesting sky patterns as the fog moves in stealthily from the sea... .
Was reminded again of just how true it is that we create our own reality... .
Thursday, January 29, 2004
Lots of changes...Resigned from my position and have spent most of this week closing out an important chapter in my life. It was somewhat sudden and involved a matter of principle, and one that I don't feel free to discuss publicly. However, I've been moving in the direction of a career change for some months. It was simply a matter of time.
Have discovered over time that an important stage in the aging process involves a growing sense of urgency. I'm far less patient in these years, and -- having a compressed period in which to accomplish so much -- drives me mercilessly at times. Unfortunately, most of the rest of the world is in a "hurry up and wait" place, with the luxury of time working in their favor.
Today the staff took me out to lunch at my favorite restaurant on the marina, and I felt the sadness of separation deeply. They've become so dear to me, and I was so touched by their caring. We've been together barely two years, but parting was still difficult.
Almost before I managed to move my personal files and pictures back home, the new pages of the next chapter began to unfold:
Very close to my heart has been the work of the anti-death penalty movement. Will be meeting with my friend, Barbara Cottman Becnel, and Tom Hayden (former legislator but now teaching at Occidental College in Southern California) on Monday. Barbara is the woman who managed to get Stan Williams, inmate on San Quentin's Death Row, nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize two years in succession. He's been nominated again this year for both the Nobel Peace Prize and the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is the subject of "Redemption," a film made for television but shown twice at Sundance Film Festival last week. It will be shown nationwide in April on FX Channel. Jamie Foxx plays Stan and Lynne Whitfield, Barbara. On Wednesday and Thursday of next week it opens the Pan African American Film Festival in Hollywood.
With the next execution scheduled for midnight, February 10th, the debate is heating up again in California with a member of the legislature considering putting forth a bill that will seek a moratorium until the system can be studied more closely. Death Row inmate Kevin Cooper may not be saved, but there is a new governor in place who will have to decide on the clemency issue, and he may be more receptive than was Governor Gray Davis who was so heavily-funded by the Prison Guards Unions. The next two weeks will give us a chance to see if there's been any change in the attitude of the citizens in this state. They voted 90% to support capital punishment some years ago, but with so many innocent prisoners caught up in a flawed system, sentiments are changing markedly across the country. We have no measure yet of the effects of the debate on the citizens of this state. Our executions are not as frequent as those of Texas, for instance, so the debate carries no urgency.
All that is to say that Sixty Minutes is sending Ed Bradley to the Bay Area to work on a segment on Death Row inmate Stanley "Tookie" Williams (the subject of "Redemption"). It will be aired in March. I have the responsibility of meeting with both Bradley and the legislator who is preparing a moratorium bill, in the hope that he can be persuaded to make his announcement on Sixty Minutes -- thereby getting national coverage. That'll be on Wednesday afternoon. But tomorrow (my last day at the office) will be the first day of my new assignment.
Not sure where all this will lead, but I'm feeling right about having freed myself from this last chapter in the Saga of Betty, and can't wait to see where life will take me next. It feels good. There's a quiet excitement about this unanticipated change.
Attended a retirement dinner for our city manager last night, and in looking around the room at that familiar crowd of actively involved people, it felt like home. There are two candidates for city councils that I'm working closely with -- that will continue. There is the Arts Commission that I can now work more closely with (been missing a lot of meetings due to the demands of my job). There is the Chamber of Commerce that is showing great interested in my vision of a now-abandoned downtown redevelopment into an Arts & Entertainment District. Will be meeting with the Chamber staff to explore that one day very soon.
I'm guessing that I'll become more of a player in the city than in the state, and that feels right. It's so much easier to effect change in the smaller arena. This is always where I've done my best work, I think.
This is a city in chaos, with a budget crisis of enormous proportions, and with most of the management team gone and replaced by interim staff. With firehouse closures, and public safety threatened in a time of a national emergency. This is also the time of great opportunity. It's a time when there is the greatest chance for making a difference. It's at precisely such times that the adrenaline flows wildly, and I see possibilities everywhere I look. To be free to explore those opportunities is the best of all worlds. It was truly time to move on. It feels right. But I'll sorely miss those wonderful young women with whom I've spent these last several years working to save the world. There are some exceptional young people working in public service. I wonder if we really appreciate just how many there are out there, doing their best to serve us all?
Now I'll look for the batteries to fit into my beautiful crystal mantel clock -- a most thoughtful gift from young women who have enriched my life and kept me whole for even more years. The inscription embedded in a small silver plaque (taken from an original painting that hung on my office wall) reads, "Against the ruin of the world there is only one defense; the creative act." The painting was given to me many years ago by an artist friend, Clarice Bois. It's meant a lot to me. It hung near my work space at home, always. I brought it along to my office when I went to work for Loni. I'd thought that painting only spoke to me, but obviously Clarice had made her impact on each of them as well. She died several years ago, but this tribute to her work touched me deeply.
...I will wear the exquisite handpainted "wearable art" scarf of muted purples, greens, lilacs, and pale yellows, when I want to feel particularly pampered and regal.
The future is in good hands.
Truly ... .
Photo: Painting by Clarice Bois - 1968.
Saturday, January 24, 2004
...and whom shall we say represents "normal" in this cautionary tale?
After having spent the years from six to twelve at a fine Summerhillian private school in the Alhambra Valley, it was time for Dorian to move on. She'd spent the years relatively happily, but she was the only mentally-handicapped child in this small progressive school, and as the children she'd entered with grew older and intellectually more capable and less tolerant of her deficits she tended to seek friendships with younger and younger children. I was convinced that she was becoming grotesque to the littler ones and now needed a different educational environment in which to continue to grow at her own far slower rate. I'd learned about a fine school in Marin County that might better serve her changing needs. I think that experience colored my feelings about mainstreaming such children. Dorian needed a place where it was she who was at the higher end of achievement scales. Something I've never regretted.
The Cedars was a boarding school, heavily endowed, obviously well-run, and recognized and supported by Lanterman funding (State of California). It was a reasonable 35 or so miles from Walnut Creek, in Ross, and therefore practical for us, though extremely difficult to think about since it was to be our first separation. Our family was defensively close and I wasn't sure how to prepare the boys for this next step in Dorian's move toward whatever independence she could achieve before I die and leave her in the world without our support.
I'd noticed from the first newsletter that no surnames were used when reporting on activities of the residents. This should have been a tip-off that -- despite outward appearances -- this was a people bank in which to deposit embarrassing relatives. This was my first brush with the mentally-handicapped community since Dorrie had never been exposed to that world, nor had we.
Also noticed that -- on my every-other-Sunday visits -- I rarely ran into other parents. I did become acquainted with several of the young staffers and volunteers who were students at Marin Junior College. They quickly became accustomed to my more frequent visits and could be counted on to see that my girl was content and cared for.
When Dorian was about fourteen, she struck up a friendship with 17 year-old blond Larry, a very sweet and well-mannered youngster who appeared far younger than his years. On our visits she and I would take walking tours along the marina, visit downtown San Rafael or Sausalito, attend any public event we might happen to run across in the Sunday papers, sometime go to church together, etc. After her innocent friendship with Larry began, I would include him in our visits, with consent of the staff.
One day Joylene (young staffer) called me at home to say that Larry's parents were coming from Portland, Oregon, the next weekend on their annual visit. They would like permission to take Dorian to dinner with them at that time. They'd obviously heard from Larry about his new friend and (I'm guessing) were grateful that he'd matured to the level where he could have such a friendship with its signal of approaching manhood.
After talking with a very excited Dorrie, I agreed to bring a new dress for the occasion the very next day, and would postpone our next visit until a later time so that she could tell me all about her "date."
The day came. The phone rang late in the afternoon. It was Joylene with a hysterical Dorrie! It seems that the staff had neglected to tell Larry's parents that his new friend was not white, and that -- though his father had arrived with a bouquet of roses for Dorrie -- his wife refused to get out of the car. She was outraged and wouldn't budge! Dorian was left waiting in her new dress and first heels -- with a bouquet of roses -- and Larry was sent off with his parents without her... .
As was almost always the case in the lives of our children, the institution did not protect her. This was the pattern that mystified and enraged me over the years. Where it was surely not possible for the institution to either foresee or prevent such racist atrocities by individuals that so damaged others, the "institution" does have a responsibility to protect and defend those individuals who are the victims of such misdeeds. There was a responsibility to the institution to not acquiesce to the tantrum of Larry's mother, but instead of confronting her, they were embarrassed that it hadn't occurred to anyone to warn her in advance, therefore an acceptance of the rightness of her position.
It gets worse.
I'd tried to comfort my distraught daughter by phone, but she was not to be consoled. Some hours later, when Larry had been returned to the Cedars by his parents, he avoided contact with her. He'd explained to other residents to the best of his mentally-retarded ability that his father told him that something was terribly wrong with Dorrie's mother's skin ... which poor little Larry obviously read as something physical, physiological, and probably contagious! Upon hearing this from others -- Dorrie became frantic -- thinking that something awful had happened to her mother since we'd last been together! She could not be consoled until -- after another call from Joylene -- I drove the long drive to the Cedars so that Dorian could actually see me and be comforted that I was just fine and that my skin had not turned green or purple or scaly!
That may represent the absolute lowest point in the saga of the struggle with racism.
I have no idea what I'd say to that mother were I to meet her today. There are no words. That may make a nice epitaph for my tombstone ...
There are no words ... .
After having spent the years from six to twelve at a fine Summerhillian private school in the Alhambra Valley, it was time for Dorian to move on. She'd spent the years relatively happily, but she was the only mentally-handicapped child in this small progressive school, and as the children she'd entered with grew older and intellectually more capable and less tolerant of her deficits she tended to seek friendships with younger and younger children. I was convinced that she was becoming grotesque to the littler ones and now needed a different educational environment in which to continue to grow at her own far slower rate. I'd learned about a fine school in Marin County that might better serve her changing needs. I think that experience colored my feelings about mainstreaming such children. Dorian needed a place where it was she who was at the higher end of achievement scales. Something I've never regretted.
The Cedars was a boarding school, heavily endowed, obviously well-run, and recognized and supported by Lanterman funding (State of California). It was a reasonable 35 or so miles from Walnut Creek, in Ross, and therefore practical for us, though extremely difficult to think about since it was to be our first separation. Our family was defensively close and I wasn't sure how to prepare the boys for this next step in Dorian's move toward whatever independence she could achieve before I die and leave her in the world without our support.
I'd noticed from the first newsletter that no surnames were used when reporting on activities of the residents. This should have been a tip-off that -- despite outward appearances -- this was a people bank in which to deposit embarrassing relatives. This was my first brush with the mentally-handicapped community since Dorrie had never been exposed to that world, nor had we.
Also noticed that -- on my every-other-Sunday visits -- I rarely ran into other parents. I did become acquainted with several of the young staffers and volunteers who were students at Marin Junior College. They quickly became accustomed to my more frequent visits and could be counted on to see that my girl was content and cared for.
When Dorian was about fourteen, she struck up a friendship with 17 year-old blond Larry, a very sweet and well-mannered youngster who appeared far younger than his years. On our visits she and I would take walking tours along the marina, visit downtown San Rafael or Sausalito, attend any public event we might happen to run across in the Sunday papers, sometime go to church together, etc. After her innocent friendship with Larry began, I would include him in our visits, with consent of the staff.
One day Joylene (young staffer) called me at home to say that Larry's parents were coming from Portland, Oregon, the next weekend on their annual visit. They would like permission to take Dorian to dinner with them at that time. They'd obviously heard from Larry about his new friend and (I'm guessing) were grateful that he'd matured to the level where he could have such a friendship with its signal of approaching manhood.
After talking with a very excited Dorrie, I agreed to bring a new dress for the occasion the very next day, and would postpone our next visit until a later time so that she could tell me all about her "date."
The day came. The phone rang late in the afternoon. It was Joylene with a hysterical Dorrie! It seems that the staff had neglected to tell Larry's parents that his new friend was not white, and that -- though his father had arrived with a bouquet of roses for Dorrie -- his wife refused to get out of the car. She was outraged and wouldn't budge! Dorian was left waiting in her new dress and first heels -- with a bouquet of roses -- and Larry was sent off with his parents without her... .
As was almost always the case in the lives of our children, the institution did not protect her. This was the pattern that mystified and enraged me over the years. Where it was surely not possible for the institution to either foresee or prevent such racist atrocities by individuals that so damaged others, the "institution" does have a responsibility to protect and defend those individuals who are the victims of such misdeeds. There was a responsibility to the institution to not acquiesce to the tantrum of Larry's mother, but instead of confronting her, they were embarrassed that it hadn't occurred to anyone to warn her in advance, therefore an acceptance of the rightness of her position.
It gets worse.
I'd tried to comfort my distraught daughter by phone, but she was not to be consoled. Some hours later, when Larry had been returned to the Cedars by his parents, he avoided contact with her. He'd explained to other residents to the best of his mentally-retarded ability that his father told him that something was terribly wrong with Dorrie's mother's skin ... which poor little Larry obviously read as something physical, physiological, and probably contagious! Upon hearing this from others -- Dorrie became frantic -- thinking that something awful had happened to her mother since we'd last been together! She could not be consoled until -- after another call from Joylene -- I drove the long drive to the Cedars so that Dorian could actually see me and be comforted that I was just fine and that my skin had not turned green or purple or scaly!
That may represent the absolute lowest point in the saga of the struggle with racism.
I have no idea what I'd say to that mother were I to meet her today. There are no words. That may make a nice epitaph for my tombstone ...
There are no words ... .
The demons will out!
Since the big event on Monday I've had scarcely a moment to get out of my paper hat and quiet down enough for the significance of what has happened to surface. Held it all together until last night. This was the long-anticipated opening night of the Henry J. Kaiser exhibit attended by Kaiser family members, museum patrons, foundations, individual funders, city and state officials (Loni, of course), historians, and me. It may seem strange, but I'd completely forgotten about it until around three in the afternoon when I was reminded by another staffmember that it was on my calendar. I was to staff Loni for the evening. And I'd not yet told Loni that my image and audio strip were a part of the exhibition. No accounting for such a slip, except that it was an extraordinary week in my extraordinary life.
Getting to sleep each night this week has been more and more difficult. Seeing old friends on Monday had served to churn up memories -- both joyous and painful -- with each crowding out the present and replacing it with "mini-documentaries" that played out in the dark against my closed eyelids, often only to be washed away by cleansing tears. Would that this had happened long ago. My pride had robbed me of the chance to rid myself of the pain, even during several years of psychotherapy. Admitting that such things were happening to us somehow made them the more deadly. I'd not even shared such things with my family or childhood friends who lived within driving distance of no more than 30 minutes -- across the hills. Not even my hard-working young husband knew what some of the days were like in our new life among hostile strangers. The catharsis of Monday cannot be overstated.
The image of my poor dear Rick looms large in these playlets. His early onset alcoholism was marked by the fact that -- when under the influence -- anger would rise in him that was terrifying! He was a slightly-built teenager, but could hardly be contained at such times by his father who outweighed him by 50 pounds.
Let me describe just one incident in his troubled life:
For Christmas one year, Mel's gift to me was a beautiful beige Mercury stationwagon with the simulated wood side panels and a ski-rack on top. It was -- until the year before when he'd give me a magnificent Martin concert guitar -- the most extravagant gift of my life.
On an afternoon, two days after Christmas, I gave 17 year-old Rick the keys so that he could drive to his friend's home about 3 miles from ours -- such a thrill! His drinking was still well hidden, and only occasional until much later. He was a good driver and an otherwise responsible youngster. We had a loving relationship, and this was -- after all -- the new "family" car. He'd been driving my old one for some time.
When he reached Kevin's, and before he could get properly parked, a man rushed out of the house next door with a hammer held high and hurled it at Rick! It crashed against the side panel beneath the window on the driver's side (missed Rick), and made a huge dent in the paneling. All the while the brute was yelling "Nigger get the hell out of here!" Rick was terrified both of this wild man and -- of course -- at how he could face his parents.
A few hours later my phone rang and Florence Pierson's voice on the other end said, "...Betty, Rick is here with us. He's afraid to come home." She then explained to me what had happened and put him on the line. He had no words, only sobbing. There was nothing he could say. There was no way for me to explain or for him to understand. It was all totally irrational. It was another of those times when reaching down inside my mother-self to be helpful yielded nothing. My mouth was as dry as cotton. I simply told him to come home and that I loved him, and that we would talk to Dad together.
Then there was the impossible question of explaining to the insurance company ... and then just quietly paying the deductible and moving on. I believe now that the "moving on" may have done more to harm my children than anything else might have done. Life forced us to learn to cope and to become complicit in our own psychological devastation because there simply were no rational responses to the irrational. My children probably learned from me to stifle their responses in quite the same way, so that over time, I ceased to learn of such things -- except when they were too agregious to contain, or those rare times when such incidents were funny enough to afford a good laugh. We learned to share the ironic more easily as they grew older and wiser.
Then there's the inexplicable story of Dorian and her first date ...
Since the big event on Monday I've had scarcely a moment to get out of my paper hat and quiet down enough for the significance of what has happened to surface. Held it all together until last night. This was the long-anticipated opening night of the Henry J. Kaiser exhibit attended by Kaiser family members, museum patrons, foundations, individual funders, city and state officials (Loni, of course), historians, and me. It may seem strange, but I'd completely forgotten about it until around three in the afternoon when I was reminded by another staffmember that it was on my calendar. I was to staff Loni for the evening. And I'd not yet told Loni that my image and audio strip were a part of the exhibition. No accounting for such a slip, except that it was an extraordinary week in my extraordinary life.
Getting to sleep each night this week has been more and more difficult. Seeing old friends on Monday had served to churn up memories -- both joyous and painful -- with each crowding out the present and replacing it with "mini-documentaries" that played out in the dark against my closed eyelids, often only to be washed away by cleansing tears. Would that this had happened long ago. My pride had robbed me of the chance to rid myself of the pain, even during several years of psychotherapy. Admitting that such things were happening to us somehow made them the more deadly. I'd not even shared such things with my family or childhood friends who lived within driving distance of no more than 30 minutes -- across the hills. Not even my hard-working young husband knew what some of the days were like in our new life among hostile strangers. The catharsis of Monday cannot be overstated.
The image of my poor dear Rick looms large in these playlets. His early onset alcoholism was marked by the fact that -- when under the influence -- anger would rise in him that was terrifying! He was a slightly-built teenager, but could hardly be contained at such times by his father who outweighed him by 50 pounds.
Let me describe just one incident in his troubled life:
For Christmas one year, Mel's gift to me was a beautiful beige Mercury stationwagon with the simulated wood side panels and a ski-rack on top. It was -- until the year before when he'd give me a magnificent Martin concert guitar -- the most extravagant gift of my life.
On an afternoon, two days after Christmas, I gave 17 year-old Rick the keys so that he could drive to his friend's home about 3 miles from ours -- such a thrill! His drinking was still well hidden, and only occasional until much later. He was a good driver and an otherwise responsible youngster. We had a loving relationship, and this was -- after all -- the new "family" car. He'd been driving my old one for some time.
When he reached Kevin's, and before he could get properly parked, a man rushed out of the house next door with a hammer held high and hurled it at Rick! It crashed against the side panel beneath the window on the driver's side (missed Rick), and made a huge dent in the paneling. All the while the brute was yelling "Nigger get the hell out of here!" Rick was terrified both of this wild man and -- of course -- at how he could face his parents.
A few hours later my phone rang and Florence Pierson's voice on the other end said, "...Betty, Rick is here with us. He's afraid to come home." She then explained to me what had happened and put him on the line. He had no words, only sobbing. There was nothing he could say. There was no way for me to explain or for him to understand. It was all totally irrational. It was another of those times when reaching down inside my mother-self to be helpful yielded nothing. My mouth was as dry as cotton. I simply told him to come home and that I loved him, and that we would talk to Dad together.
Then there was the impossible question of explaining to the insurance company ... and then just quietly paying the deductible and moving on. I believe now that the "moving on" may have done more to harm my children than anything else might have done. Life forced us to learn to cope and to become complicit in our own psychological devastation because there simply were no rational responses to the irrational. My children probably learned from me to stifle their responses in quite the same way, so that over time, I ceased to learn of such things -- except when they were too agregious to contain, or those rare times when such incidents were funny enough to afford a good laugh. We learned to share the ironic more easily as they grew older and wiser.
Then there's the inexplicable story of Dorian and her first date ...
Thursday, January 22, 2004
Somewhere in an earlier post ...
I'm sure that I've entered the lyrics to this song. However, since the MLK Day speech I have received a number of requests for the words. I used this as a closing:
To Each of Me ...
To each of me
to love within the reach of me
and if this love could teach to me
why each of me, in turn,
should torture so the soul of me
and tear apart the whole of me
within life's play, each role of me
must speak to me, must learn
that blackness and the white of me
are just the day and night of me
are not the wrong or right of me,
can't you see ... there's got to be
some answer to this planet's pain
my microcosmic world -- insane!
if only I could make you see
it's here to see
just look at me!
there is within me all of you
from distant lands the whole of you
the dreams, the heart, the soul of you
if only you would see
that black and white are part of it
my brown is at the heart of it
and blending was the start of it
and someday it shall be
that blackness and the white of us
will be the day and night of us
and not the wrong or right of us
the weak or might of us
then we'll be free!
Betty Reid Soskin
copyright 1969
never published
It's been an eventful week. Not sure that I'll be able to respond to those who've sent words of caring and best wishes, but surely sometime this weekend I'll be out of my paper hat enough to write sensibly about all that's happened.
Probably the most important is that today there was a message from the reporter who covered the Martin Luther King celebration informing me that she is planning a series on racism and diversity for her paper in the near future and would like to use parts of the original interview. That such a conversation has begun in the Diablo Valley is far more than I'd have imagined. I couldn't be more pleased.
But I've just returned from the kickoff party for a young man I've been working with as a mentor. He is a candidate for the Richmond city council in November, and is someone I'm so very proud of.
So much is happening. If I only had another couple of decades to complete the work ... .
Tuesday, January 20, 2004
Shouldn't really take this on tonight,
but if I don't -- much will be lost in the accumulation of busyness that's already pushing the events of yesterday to the back of my mind ...
Spent much of Saturday writing my speech for MLK's celebration. Pulled together a number of pieces from my blog with the intention of doing a cut and paste. Really thought I'd done enough musing and writing to be able to connect it all with a bit of re-writing.
Had to interrupt the process to attend David Pierson's memorial service -- and what a beautiful ceremony it was! This remarkable family had come together from Spain, Switzerland, and several other points around the country to honor their father and comfort their mother. I would have expected no less from these loving people. This death -- as others before it over the past two or three years -- are slowly closing a chapter on my own life that tells me that -- for all the evil things that happened to us in the Diablo Valley, love triumphed over all. I could not have found dearer friends.
After ten years of suffering the gradual deterioration from Alzheimers, David's daughter, Joan, read in her statement that -- as his ability to speak began to diminish from the ravages of the disease, he gradually lost all of his words except terms of endearment. "I love you" were the last words to disappear. He died peacefully in his sleep.
Fresh from the experience, and by the time I drove back across the hills to Richmond, I'd lost the rage that was re-surfacing to drive my speech, and a new direction hadn't surfaced yet. Went to bed not knowing where to take this.
On Sunday, I drove in to pick Dorian up for our weekly trip to the supermarket, and returned home to prepare to drive to Oakland for the annual MLK Concert at the Calvin Simmons Auditorium. Gospel choirs, jazz choirs, a children's choir, with brief film clips of Dr. King at pivotal moments in his career. All in a packed house filled with the greatest diversity imaginable. The city of Oakland has it all. How sad that one only hears of the murder rate. Inspiring!
When I reached home at the end of the evening, I walked into my den and trashed everything I'd written, walked down the hallway and looked around at my gallery of historic family portraits and made a decision. I would go with the Love Legacy of Martin Luther King. I would gather up the portrait of great-grandmother Leontine Breaux Allen, the two large binders that held my family history, a photograph taken at Dorian's christening with Mel and the children and me taken at one of the temporary little cottages that our UU church had used on its way to full churchhood, two documents (the marriage license of great-great-grandmother Celestine (slave) and her slaveowner husband dated July 1865, only days after the Emancipation Proclamation was declared and greatgrandmother Leontine's christening certificate). Fairly sure that there would be no more than a couple dozen of the stalwarts there to hear my little presentation, I would just share my history and ad lib my speech.
Just before going to bed I went to the kitchen to drink a glass of milk and listen to any messages that may have collected on my answering machine. There was one of particular interest. It was the voice of Theresa Harrington, the Times reporter who had done the interview. She sounded really distressed. She was giving a long apology for the article that was appearing in the paper on morning edition. "I want you to know that I turned in an article that my editor altered drastically. He removed all of the positive things you said, and printed only the negative, and cut the article severely. I also write for another journal and would like to have your permission to submit the article to that editor if I could." I had no idea what that meant, but decided to not read whatever it was before speaking.
On Monday morning I showered and dressed casually, drove out with plenty of time and my box of papers and photos to share. Arrived at the Civic Center and entered a large room without noticing that there was a Channel 5 truck in the lot. Had no idea what the agenda was, or with whom I was sharing the program.
Was delighted to find a friend from my everyday world sitting in the front row. I hadn't known that he would come. He'd read the article. Then others began to arrived and as the room filled -- several people came up to say that they'd read the article and wasn't I courageous??? There were many friends arriving -- from my old life of 30 years ago -- come to lend support and to share the celebration of Dr. King's day together. As the room filled, it was clear that this was a big thing! It was important. My vision of sharing my pictures and family history documents -- and "winging it" -- was hardly appropriate to the occasion. But it was too late to do anything else. I'd trashed my speech.
The mayor spoke. The head of the InterFaith Council spoke. An African American gospel choir shook the roof with singing! The Native Americans did a ceremony of peace. The Buddhists in traditional dress performed a blessing. I was only one part of something very important to this community.
I'd invited my son and his children to attend. It was the first time in all the years that David had returned. Bob wasn't able to make it, but had sent his blessing.
As the keynoter, my "speech" followed the other elements, and there was time to grow tense -- but, surprisingly -- I didn't tighten up. Felt welcomed and "at home."
On cue, and without panic -- I stood up at my introduction and began to speak. I finished at some point (felt about like the allotted 15 minutes) when it seemed natural to end, and there was a spontaneous heartfelt standing ovation that shook the rafters! No notes, no preparation. Just memories and the introduction of my David and his brood.
I eventually saw the article. David picked up a paper for me near the restaurant where we lunched. The piece pretty well blasted the town as having not changed a whit despite years of national change. In 1952 when we moved in as one of the first non-whites to dare to do so, we were pioneers. While trying to write my speech I'd learned that the census figures give the African American population in that city as 1.0% -- in a city that has grown to be at least ten times what it was when we knew it. The reporter was quite right. The article had been sensationalized, but there was not one word in it that I hadn't said, or that was untrue. I could see that she'd done a good job, despite the editing. I stand by my words.
It was also true that as people began to arrive, they were smiling and congratulatory about what they obvious saw as my courageous ability to "tell it like it is!" David (who had read it before driving out from Berkeley) may have had it right. He met me grinning with, "...me and the kids figured we better get out here and watch Grandma's back! As we all sat at lunch together, 17 year-old grandson Rhico said, "grandma, I watched the mayor while you were speaking. I'll bet he was hoping you wouldn't come back here again." But it was all said in fun, and I could sense the pride in them all as we at our pancakes and glowed in the "coming home" that the day had provided.
There were so many hugs from so many old friends, that served to remind me that what we'd all lived together had been so much more important than the dreadful things that our little family had endured over those years. I fell asleep last night remembering that they'd been there with us through it all, and that Dr. King's work had given us all permission to cross the great divide of racial disharmony. I hadn't been alone, after all.
I'll try to tell you what I said. I'm not sure that I can since it was stream-of-consciousness. However, I know where it led -- and I know that it turned out to be an important statement that I wish someone had taped. Isn't that always the way?
Maybe tomorrow... .
Photo: Greatgrandmother, Leontine Breaux Allen, the year before her death. She was enslaved until 1865, the year of emancipation. She was 19 when freedom came with the Emancipation Proclamation. She died at the age of 102 having lived from 1846 to 1948. I was 27 when she died. Slavery for me is not an abstraction.
Thursday, January 15, 2004
Time moves so swiftly ...
I've been joking about the fact that -- on the downhill side of the years past fifty -- Christmas comes every six weeks. Time does speed up as the years pile on. Feel breathless at times from the effects of the rate of change. The collapsing of time this weekend is having a strong effect on me, trying to remain contemporary while being asked to dip into years past, causes some shift in the fault lines of age -- and I'm feeling just a bit off balance... .
Tomorrow morning at ten o'clock the West County Times reporter will come to do a profile for release in Monday's edition. The photographer will come at around one to do his thing.
At 4:30 I'll attend a meeting with a group created by the Redevelopment Agency's Rosie project to go over ideas for signage for the areas leading to the new national park. At six we'll leave for San Jose and the Democratic Convention. The important evening event is the convening of the Black Caucus at seven-thirty. This will give me some idea of what issues will be involved in the creation of the platform. These discussions are rich and often contentious and never dull.
Have already decided to skip Saturday's agenda in favor of attending David Pierson's memorial service. That will plant me firmly in the past -- but it will help me to get into the space from whence the speech must come. However, the leap-frogging between such emotional levels is dizzying. I'm hopeful that this will enhance and not hurt my ability to deliver my thoughts at the Monday event. It is a tremendous opportunity to share that trajectory I've lived through, beginning with that naive young frightened mother, and ending with the return to Walnut Creek as a person of note. And I say that with more of a sense of wonder than of false pride. There's just not room in my life for that.
It took many good and not so good people all leaning together into the winds of constructive change to make that possible. Dr. King was surely one, but then so were a lot of ordinary black men, women, children, who were willing to lay their lives on the line for the right to vote and for the right to have the kinds of educations that would lift them out of poverty (didn't do so well with that one, did we?). African Americans throughout the country, and a lot of good "people-of-no-color" came together to bring about the change that I'm now enjoying. A lot of those folks are still living in the suburbs all over the nation, and some that I know are still working hard to break down the barriers that divide us. Meanwhile, I chose in the late Seventies to return to the inner city to do my work -- and all else has blossomed from that decision. I've never regretted it for a minute.
I'd give anything to be able to sit down with Dr. King, Justice Thurgood Marshall, and Fanny Lou Hamer, and yes, Malcolm X, to give a report and get their feedback. It is so humbling to recall the sacrifices those heroes made during those torturous years. I so regret not being able to let them know that little people like me listened and learned, and that forty years later -- we're still fighting the good fight -- with a bit more sophistication garnered from years of working behind those doors they opened for us to move through.
But their work and ours is far from finished. I'm sure that we all know that. Assessing that unfinished agenda and finding ways to address it will surely take up the balance of my life, and perhaps those of my children -- and maybe yours... .
But first there's a war to stop, an environment to save, and a country in political chaos to somehow re-orient. And maybe the problem is that we haven't the time or the capacity to achieve all that if we don't take them on simultaneously. I fear the fall into Fascism and Corporatism and away from the path toward world peace and racial harmony for which Dr. King gave his life. I'm far less hopeful that we will back away from the edge in time for me to witness this transformation, personally. Except that -- just maybe -- this awesome rate of change will work in our favor. Do you suppose?
(Maybe I just wrote the closing remarks for Monday's speech...)
I've been joking about the fact that -- on the downhill side of the years past fifty -- Christmas comes every six weeks. Time does speed up as the years pile on. Feel breathless at times from the effects of the rate of change. The collapsing of time this weekend is having a strong effect on me, trying to remain contemporary while being asked to dip into years past, causes some shift in the fault lines of age -- and I'm feeling just a bit off balance... .
Tomorrow morning at ten o'clock the West County Times reporter will come to do a profile for release in Monday's edition. The photographer will come at around one to do his thing.
At 4:30 I'll attend a meeting with a group created by the Redevelopment Agency's Rosie project to go over ideas for signage for the areas leading to the new national park. At six we'll leave for San Jose and the Democratic Convention. The important evening event is the convening of the Black Caucus at seven-thirty. This will give me some idea of what issues will be involved in the creation of the platform. These discussions are rich and often contentious and never dull.
Have already decided to skip Saturday's agenda in favor of attending David Pierson's memorial service. That will plant me firmly in the past -- but it will help me to get into the space from whence the speech must come. However, the leap-frogging between such emotional levels is dizzying. I'm hopeful that this will enhance and not hurt my ability to deliver my thoughts at the Monday event. It is a tremendous opportunity to share that trajectory I've lived through, beginning with that naive young frightened mother, and ending with the return to Walnut Creek as a person of note. And I say that with more of a sense of wonder than of false pride. There's just not room in my life for that.
It took many good and not so good people all leaning together into the winds of constructive change to make that possible. Dr. King was surely one, but then so were a lot of ordinary black men, women, children, who were willing to lay their lives on the line for the right to vote and for the right to have the kinds of educations that would lift them out of poverty (didn't do so well with that one, did we?). African Americans throughout the country, and a lot of good "people-of-no-color" came together to bring about the change that I'm now enjoying. A lot of those folks are still living in the suburbs all over the nation, and some that I know are still working hard to break down the barriers that divide us. Meanwhile, I chose in the late Seventies to return to the inner city to do my work -- and all else has blossomed from that decision. I've never regretted it for a minute.
I'd give anything to be able to sit down with Dr. King, Justice Thurgood Marshall, and Fanny Lou Hamer, and yes, Malcolm X, to give a report and get their feedback. It is so humbling to recall the sacrifices those heroes made during those torturous years. I so regret not being able to let them know that little people like me listened and learned, and that forty years later -- we're still fighting the good fight -- with a bit more sophistication garnered from years of working behind those doors they opened for us to move through.
But their work and ours is far from finished. I'm sure that we all know that. Assessing that unfinished agenda and finding ways to address it will surely take up the balance of my life, and perhaps those of my children -- and maybe yours... .
But first there's a war to stop, an environment to save, and a country in political chaos to somehow re-orient. And maybe the problem is that we haven't the time or the capacity to achieve all that if we don't take them on simultaneously. I fear the fall into Fascism and Corporatism and away from the path toward world peace and racial harmony for which Dr. King gave his life. I'm far less hopeful that we will back away from the edge in time for me to witness this transformation, personally. Except that -- just maybe -- this awesome rate of change will work in our favor. Do you suppose?
(Maybe I just wrote the closing remarks for Monday's speech...)
Wednesday, January 14, 2004
Started out on Monday with a call from someone from the National Park Service asking if I'd be willing to participate in a press conference on Thursday (tomorrow) when Ms. Lynne Cheney would be presenting a check to the National Park Service for one of its programs. This, as a "Rosie", of course. Nope. Besides having a full schedule, there was this thing about having a photo op with Republican Ms. Cheney that would not be politically correct for me (being the field rep for a Democratic legislator) -- not too cool, I think. Didn't bother to ask our staff. But I know that I'm so firmly identified with my role as a representative that this would be seen in a political light. It becomes less and less possible to have a "personal" life.
I believe this was also her book tour for a newly-published young people's book about Rosie the Riveter.
Spent the day today sitting in at the California Arts Council's meeting in San Francisco and being awed by the huge circular arrangement of the judicial chambers where the meeting was held. The room reeked of power! The great seal of the judiciary on the back wall spoke volumes. It's impossible to not be impressed. It was an all-day session (10:00 'til 3:00) that featured speakers from the NEA from Washington as well as local and regional arts advocates and organizations. Just sitting in that room gave me a feeling of the weight of the office of the vice-presidency, and I found myself wondering why I'd said "no" so easily? I'd actually forgotten about the invitation until a moment in the presentations when the feeling of awe for the office, itself, washed over me.
Attended another meeting later today at 4:30, this time a collaborative of nonprofits, unionists, political activists, several church groups, etc., and was just as awed by this exercise in the democratic process -- one that's being so foolishly trampled on by those who are presently in national leadership. This group was hard at work on getting an ordinance passed for Just Cause Evictions, getting a parcel tax measure on the next ballot with which to finance the schools ... I was reminded why I'd refused. The distance between is just too great. We are really living in a haves and have nots period, aren't we?
Learned some shocking facts at the Arts Council meeting:
In the current state budget, we have designated 3 cents per person for the arts. In the nation that figure is $110/per person. Canada budgets $238/per person. California ranks 48th in the country in moneys allotted for the arts. Small wonder that we're losing the movie industry to Canada. This, the most populus State, is losing on the quality of life issues.
We have the greatest number of citizens imprisoned, and our most recent moves to eliminate affirmative action will guarantee that -- though we are the most racially diverse state in the union, we're making sure that leadership will remain white by limiting who can and cannot enter the university system. The controls lie in the fact that by raising the cost of tuition beyond the reach of all others, power remains with the white population.
Our school systems have all but eliminated vocational education and are dealing only with the college bound. All others are tracked out of the system in middle school. We are now seeing a 48% drop-out rate of Black and Brown students by tenth grade. It's appalling!
To demand standardized testing results without standardized resources is criminal! There is a case wending its way through our courts that will bring that issue into prominence at some point soon; hopefully.
Maybe my Martin Luther King birthday speech is beginning to write itself. At least the thoughts are beginning to form, and I'll spend all day Sunday moving it onto paper.
On Friday I'll be interviewed and photographed for the local papers. Friday evening we'll leave for the Democratic convention in San Jose (Black Caucus session is Friday night). Will skip the Saturday sessions to attend the memorial service from an old Walnut Creek friend who finally succumbed to Alzheimers. David Pierson was an artist whose oil paintings hang in my dining room and on my bedroom wall. He and his family figured strongly in my often misspent suburban days in the Fifties and Sixties. We struggled together with along with enlightened others through the Black Revolution -- across racial lines -- and, I believe, that ultimately we made a difference. I will miss him. But those stories are still ahead waiting to be told. I'm beginning to feel that there is need for that. Blogging is becoming important to me, finally. We each experience a life that is like no other. Mine has been extraordinary.
Would have been nice to have a photo in my album -- taken with the wife of the vice-president of the United States. If I live long enough, maybe I'll find one I'm more comfortable with... .
Saturday, January 10, 2004
Saturday's come again, ...
and time to let my mind wander back in time ... .
Thinking about one of those periods in time when there was just enough absurdity to keep life in perspective when all else was precarious and beyond personal control. It was a time when Bobby and David were still very young and when the neighborhood children had broken through the social barricades and were spending much of their time playing in our driveway. Their curiosity won out over whatever prohibitions had been placed on them by adults, and the sounds of play had echoed out of our yard all summer long.
I believe that David was not yet in kindergarten when Georgia Wiseman came to work for us. Despite her very Jewish name, Georgia was a tall energetic African American woman who served as both cleaning woman and great friend to this rather lonely young mother living in hostile country. Georgia came on Tuesdays and Thursday every week and handled the bunch of us like the "professional" that she was. She was with us not only through those critical years, but -- after my first marriage failed -- years later, she came back to work for us for several years in the Berkeley home shared with my second husband. My kids were all grown up by then, but Bill and I were both employed by the university. Ours was an enduring friendship.
I can feel my throat tighten when I remember the day that we learned that Dr. King had been killed. It happened on a day when Georgia was not due to work. I was devastated! I was alone in the house. There was a knock on the door around ten o'clock and there she was. "Thought I could catch up on some ironing," said she walking past me with tears flowing. She'd driven over 20 miles from East Oakland because she felt needed. This was Georgia Wiseman. She knew that I would be sad but also frightened.
But that was also a time when a beautiful black Belgian Shepherd moved into our lives. He turned up one morning with a stone in his mouth. He greeted me when I opened the front door, front legs down, hips high and tail wagging. The signal was clear. I picked it up and threw it as far as I could. He dashed off and located it easily and brought it back for a re-toss; an endless game that went on for weeks. When I could toss no more, he'd lie down on the deck and wait for the boys to leave home to board the school bus down the road. He walked them to the bus -- and greeted them each to day to be escorted home. He'd adopted us. Had no idea where his owner was since there he was until late in the evening when Mel drove down the driveway to be escorted up the stairs into the house. I was careful not to feed him for fear that his (unknown) owner would think that I was trying to steal this lovely creature. It went on for weeks. He would arrive early each morning as if to his "job," staying until Mel checked in each night.
After some weeks, the mystery was solved. One of the neighbor children was overheard calling the dog by his name, "Nig!" It was Georgia. Of course, it was impossible for the owner to call him home. How on earth could he/she stand at the edge of our property calling out " Here Nigger!" It was preposterous. It was also very funny! It was also a problem.
Coincidentally, at the time there was a construction job underway in front of our house -- pipe-laying of some sort, in deep trenches -- with workmen from the utility company (both Black and White) spending much of the day digging and pounding with their machines. Here they were working in front of a fine home obviously owned by an African American family who owned a big black dog named "Nig." They could hear the childrens' voices calling out his name as they played. How could this be?
Georgia could hardly stand it. She finally insisted that we have the children use some other name. Only problem with that was that I couldn't find any sensible way to explain to my little ones the reason for doing so. Nig was simply the name of a creature they'd grown to love and at the time the word had no other meaning. Would he even respond to any other? My kids weren't familiar with it, and the other children were probably equally as innocent. These were really pretty young children. Georgia's embarrassment at being the housekeeper for such a family in plain view of the African American workmen was unbearable. She ceased to see the humor in the situation after a very short time.
After some weeks, I finally caught a glimpse a young woman across the road in front of a tiny rented cabin. Nig was standing beside her. Walked over and introduced myself. She moved quickly up her stairs as I arrived and was now standing behind a closed screen door. She was not unfriendly, but not very responsive, either. I told her that I was concerned that her dog was not being fed, that I'd not known where he'd come from or how to report our "find." Told her how much we loved him but wanted her to know that we were not trying to steal him. Made no mention of his name.
She told me that she'd recently moved from a ranch where there had been children for Nig to tend, and that, since moving here, she had accepted a job that kept her away from home much of the time. He was lonely for a family to tend. She was sorry if he'd been a burden to us ... but that she was planning to move soon.
We lost Nig. We never did manage to work out a solution, but we had one happy housekeeper when Nig moved away. Then we went back to laughing at the absurdity of it all!
It was then that we found a reliable breeder and bought Helsa, a German Shepherd pup, who quickly healed the pain of losing our cherished friend, something I'm not sure would have happened without the experience.
What's in a word? I'm not sure, but I suspect that some of the toxins may have been removed for my little ones -- if they can remember... .
Photo: Bob with Dorian under the big oak at our home in Walnut Creek.
and time to let my mind wander back in time ... .
Thinking about one of those periods in time when there was just enough absurdity to keep life in perspective when all else was precarious and beyond personal control. It was a time when Bobby and David were still very young and when the neighborhood children had broken through the social barricades and were spending much of their time playing in our driveway. Their curiosity won out over whatever prohibitions had been placed on them by adults, and the sounds of play had echoed out of our yard all summer long.I believe that David was not yet in kindergarten when Georgia Wiseman came to work for us. Despite her very Jewish name, Georgia was a tall energetic African American woman who served as both cleaning woman and great friend to this rather lonely young mother living in hostile country. Georgia came on Tuesdays and Thursday every week and handled the bunch of us like the "professional" that she was. She was with us not only through those critical years, but -- after my first marriage failed -- years later, she came back to work for us for several years in the Berkeley home shared with my second husband. My kids were all grown up by then, but Bill and I were both employed by the university. Ours was an enduring friendship.
I can feel my throat tighten when I remember the day that we learned that Dr. King had been killed. It happened on a day when Georgia was not due to work. I was devastated! I was alone in the house. There was a knock on the door around ten o'clock and there she was. "Thought I could catch up on some ironing," said she walking past me with tears flowing. She'd driven over 20 miles from East Oakland because she felt needed. This was Georgia Wiseman. She knew that I would be sad but also frightened.
But that was also a time when a beautiful black Belgian Shepherd moved into our lives. He turned up one morning with a stone in his mouth. He greeted me when I opened the front door, front legs down, hips high and tail wagging. The signal was clear. I picked it up and threw it as far as I could. He dashed off and located it easily and brought it back for a re-toss; an endless game that went on for weeks. When I could toss no more, he'd lie down on the deck and wait for the boys to leave home to board the school bus down the road. He walked them to the bus -- and greeted them each to day to be escorted home. He'd adopted us. Had no idea where his owner was since there he was until late in the evening when Mel drove down the driveway to be escorted up the stairs into the house. I was careful not to feed him for fear that his (unknown) owner would think that I was trying to steal this lovely creature. It went on for weeks. He would arrive early each morning as if to his "job," staying until Mel checked in each night.After some weeks, the mystery was solved. One of the neighbor children was overheard calling the dog by his name, "Nig!" It was Georgia. Of course, it was impossible for the owner to call him home. How on earth could he/she stand at the edge of our property calling out " Here Nigger!" It was preposterous. It was also very funny! It was also a problem.
Coincidentally, at the time there was a construction job underway in front of our house -- pipe-laying of some sort, in deep trenches -- with workmen from the utility company (both Black and White) spending much of the day digging and pounding with their machines. Here they were working in front of a fine home obviously owned by an African American family who owned a big black dog named "Nig." They could hear the childrens' voices calling out his name as they played. How could this be?
Georgia could hardly stand it. She finally insisted that we have the children use some other name. Only problem with that was that I couldn't find any sensible way to explain to my little ones the reason for doing so. Nig was simply the name of a creature they'd grown to love and at the time the word had no other meaning. Would he even respond to any other? My kids weren't familiar with it, and the other children were probably equally as innocent. These were really pretty young children. Georgia's embarrassment at being the housekeeper for such a family in plain view of the African American workmen was unbearable. She ceased to see the humor in the situation after a very short time.
After some weeks, I finally caught a glimpse a young woman across the road in front of a tiny rented cabin. Nig was standing beside her. Walked over and introduced myself. She moved quickly up her stairs as I arrived and was now standing behind a closed screen door. She was not unfriendly, but not very responsive, either. I told her that I was concerned that her dog was not being fed, that I'd not known where he'd come from or how to report our "find." Told her how much we loved him but wanted her to know that we were not trying to steal him. Made no mention of his name.
She told me that she'd recently moved from a ranch where there had been children for Nig to tend, and that, since moving here, she had accepted a job that kept her away from home much of the time. He was lonely for a family to tend. She was sorry if he'd been a burden to us ... but that she was planning to move soon.
We lost Nig. We never did manage to work out a solution, but we had one happy housekeeper when Nig moved away. Then we went back to laughing at the absurdity of it all!
It was then that we found a reliable breeder and bought Helsa, a German Shepherd pup, who quickly healed the pain of losing our cherished friend, something I'm not sure would have happened without the experience.
What's in a word? I'm not sure, but I suspect that some of the toxins may have been removed for my little ones -- if they can remember... .
Photo: Bob with Dorian under the big oak at our home in Walnut Creek.
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