Time for crowing ...

I've been wandering around in the past for the last few weeks -- started with Katrina and with my concern about the possible loss of kinfolk and a culture that I should have forgotten long ago but haven't. Those ties of family and culture are obviously unbreakable as long as one's memories withstand the ravages of time.

But that's all in the background of my life. It's the foreground that is so commanding these days. The 60-day emergency hire under which the National Park Service brought me in will expire on September 30. But in the interim, a new park superintendent has been brought in, a new phase of the work of park development has commenced, and the work of liaison between the park and the community has moved into sharper focus. They've found funding to keep me into some indefinite future. It's open-ended, but then so am I, right? I'll be hired as a full-fledged national park staffer when my contract ends. Maybe my classification will be "Living Artifact." Maybe folks will be required to wear those little museum white gloves in order to shake my hand. Don't know. But it feels good.

The prior 7-8 years of my work life involved facets that are at this point of great value to a developing park. Having been a field representative for two members of the State Assembly -- I've become a valuable asset (albeit of some vintage), with experience that is not only relevant but not easy to duplicate in younger careerists.

Age brought with it a new confidence that continues to amaze even me. It's only since I reached 80 that I'm able to say with assurance, "I know!" No longer do I wait around for some Avatar to deliver me or those who trust me for answers that I no longer expect to find, or that don't exist, or are unattainable over the course of any single lifetime. I not only know, but I'm willing to act on the knowing. This doesn't imply, however, that I'm necessarily correct in what I know -- just that I've become quite comfortable with conflicting truths and can live nicely with ambiguity.

The past 4 years have been more exciting than any that came before -- except maybe for the exultation of becoming a parent. Delivering my firstborn, Robert Thomas Reid, still stands out as tops -- absolutely the best. That sense of participating in the creation of life is equalled by no other experience. The thrill of David's birth followed by Dorian's is as keen today as on the days they came into the world.

What's so exciting? Well, this week I worked on several projects that should lead to greater involvement with the host community of Greater Richmond. I have a co-worker whom I adore -- who is enthusastic and appreciative of my efforts -- and who knows all that technical stuff that remains mysterious and thrilling to me -- like Googling into space and back at the flick of the finger. I just leave all that stuff up to the genie.

Yesterday I narrated into a magical little machine -- the size of a matchbox -- a 450-word piece on Black History of World War II that will underlay a slide show of photos of untold stories of the period. Spent the earlier part of the week producing that -- and am satisfied with what developed. It will carry a soundtrack of music appropriate for the time (probably instrumental jazz/blues kind of stuff), and will be used to stir the disclosure of other untold stories by those homefront workers who might be still around.

On October 7th and 8th I'll be representing the park by participating on a panel about Women of World War II in a Women's History Conference at Mills College in Oakland. For November and again in January we're working on two Leadership Guided Tours of the Rosie the Riveter World War II Homefront Historic National Park (henceforth abbreviated to HNP). Will then begin to develop a script for tour guides that can be translated into several of the many languages represented in Greater Richmond -- so that Laotian, Latino, etc., groups can provide their own tours from their own centers.

As an indication of some of the lost conversations and untold stories:

Did you know that there were ships names for 17 African Americans? Three of those were built in the Kaiser Shipyards in Richmond, California; the SS Robert S. Abbott; the SS George Washington Carver, and the SS Harriet Tubman. In addition there were several ships named for historically black colleges; Fisk, Talledega, Xavier, and Lane. But by far the most interesting to me was the launching of the SS Ethiopia and the SS Toussaint L'Overteur -- both in the year 1944. This, at a time when racial segregation was at its height and the Klan still riding high not only in the South, but was now transplanted to the streets of Richmond by those who came west to work in the war plants. How I'd love to gain access to the papers of the deliberations that led to the decision to so honor the "Black Napoleon," the former slave who defeated Napoleon in the Battle for Haiti at the end of the 18th Century.

Richmond is oddly enough, a city with little sense of or appreciation for its history. Easy to understand when one realizes that it was a sleepy little company town (Standard Oil) of around 20,000 until it ballooned overnight in 1942 when 110,000 made their way west to help to build the ships in the 5 Kaiser shipyards that lined the shoreline. Almost everyone was new. Most were from Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas. Those folks (black and white) weren't yet sharing drinking fountains or cemetaries or hospital wards. They wouldn't for another 20 years. They brought "the South" with them.

The archives and the library just outside my cubicle hold theses, photographs, artifacts, slides, posters of the period, oral histories, recently-written books by historians who are only now discovering the period. After all, 60 years isn't a great enough timespan to invite much scholarly investigation as history. Those 60 years, however, represent the Lion's share of my life -- but apparently not the most productive years.

These may be the most productive yet.

Ain't that a hoot?

Photo: A very young Lena Horne singing at the launching of the SS George Washington Carver at Kaiser Shipyard #3 in 1944.

"Busier than a one-armed paper-hanger" is more than just a saying ...

Work continues to be fascinating and engrossing. The idea of being a part of a developing national park is pretty awesome; and that's what's going on right now.

Been thinking about the last post (Sept. 19th) and of the photo that led the story -- thinking that there may be other Creoles reading this who could benefit if I added some names to those faces, just in case you're a researcher.

It's frustrating to have women's names changed by marriage -- and am grateful that younger women of my granddaughter's generation have changed that pattern after far too long. Given the instability of the institution of marriage, it gets awfully complicated to try to trace one's lineage.

In the photo above you'll find many of the daughters and daughters-in-law of the women's in yesterday's post. The shot above was taken in the mid-forties when we were just about the same age as our mothers were at the time of their summer picnic.

front row: Margaret Wright, (can't recall), Elaine Allen Wilson, Juanita Ribbs Reid. Second row, Angelina Lopez, Evalina Donnelly, Annette Starr(?), Gloria Towns Wilson, Ruth Warnie Romine Strange, Blanche Smith (Mrs. Rudy), Moi. Back row: Muriel Reid Kranston, Juanita Smith, (can't recall), Maybelle Reid Allen, Mary Towns Bagby, and Dorothy Watkins.


As you may have discovered already, these are thumbnails and can be blown up by clicking. If there's someone here you're interested in, or, if you recognize someone I've not identified, email me.

Now that I've learned to add photos, I'll return to the archives and add any that seem appropriate to the entries. Will try to identify each as my memory coughs them up!

Having celebrated my 84th birthday on Thursday, and with this deep sense of the need to "download" everything that's pent up in the old brain while I can, I plan to spend more time going through old albums and correspondence so that all that good stuff won't disappear from the earth when I do. Though -- unless I get struck by a comet or some errant hurricane bent up hunting down Creoles ...

There's still work to do.

Thinking today about just what it means to be "poor."

Funny, that might be the least relevant term to use when referring to Creole people or culture. That's simply not an accurate measure of worth for us. I'm certain that -- were I using the values of the European acquisitive and materialistic society that now forms the adopted values of my life -- that word might be fitting. But in the context of New Orleans and all that flowed therefrom, economic worth is fairly irrelevant.

I surely remember being young and crowded into a bedroom that housed all three of us (my sisters and me) in the small 2 bedroom cottage in East Oakland where we grew up. I remember my mother and her bridge clubmembers traveling across town on the bus carrying folding chairs and maybe even a card table to the home of the hostess for the week. I know about Mom getting up early on Thursday mornings to be among the first to "Sally Ann's" (Salvation Army store) for the best pickin's because that was the day that the truck delivered new old stuff to the local store. I know about "red beans and rice on Mondays" and sleeping under blankets monogrammed with SP in the corners (Southern Pacific Railroad). I spent many a day at the free clinic getting shots and some pretty rugged dental care. I remember watching my mother and her friends gathering together to chop, mince, and stir the fixin's for the hoghead cheese with its garlicky aroma and gelatinous texture that we got to taste with salted crackers the next day after it had all been divied up and slipped into cheesecloth packages for sharing. I know how grateful my mother and aunts were when the husbands who traveled the rails as porters came home with brown bags of file (pronounced fee-lay) for gumbo that couldn't be found anywhere in this new West Coast territory we Creoles now called home. I know about collecting bottles to return for a few cents each in order to see the Saturday matinee. I'm aware of all that -- but I scarcely have any memory at all of being "poor."

Makes me wonder what was different about that? Wondering if "poor" is a relative term that has little meaning if everyone in your world is at the same status? How on earth would we have known what "rich" meant, except in a kind of mythic sense of those we saw on the silver screen -- and everybody knew that was make believe, right? After all, I grew up during the depression years.

Maybe poor is a word that is always imposed externally. rarely recognized from inside. But then maybe -- since television was not a part of our world -- we had little need to deal with comparisons. I suppose I must have had some sense of where we were on the economic scale by the time we were adolescents, but I'm not sure it was true even then. By that time we'd created our own criteria and it included the uniqueness that comes with a Creole heritage. We were a proud people with standards that were considerably higher than many that we lived among. We were just one more second generation ethnic group, transplanted complete with the patois (at least among our elders) superstitions, folklore, songs, music, a cuisine, and dimming memories of "home."

I figure that those who now describe those "poor" folk from the Ninth Ward have only a part of the story. So much of the culture has been retained in the DNA of even the "poorest." I felt it watching the "Live From Lincoln Center" presentation for the benefit of New Orleans musicians effected by the floods. When those men marched in with their rhythmic beat -- "humph!," -- the off-count toss of the head in unison -- and the staccato hand clap that I'm certain few white folks that I know could have mastered no matter how hip they believed themselves to be. I felt the presence of my father over my shoulder -- with his hand-painted baby blue leaky cornet and uncle Louis' raggedy bent up drums -- and Dick Dewson's tinny piano -- on any Saturday night of crawfish caught in the creeks in Niles Canyon boiled scarlet and served on spread out newspaper with home brew (if it hadn't exploded in the process of becoming!) at 1322 83rd Avenue in Oakland, California. How they would have resonated to Wynton Marsalis' music!

We'd all have become second liners with kazoos, pots and pans with wooden spoons, combs and tissue paper!

Poor?

Hell no! And envied by many for the gifts of jazz and good times that Creole's have brought to the world.

Rich beyond measure.

Photo #1: Mother's Creole social club on a picnic at Leona Heights near East Oakland. (front row) Alberta Cashin (wife of George), can't recall second face but the third is Ethel Aubert (married to Gene), Mabel Allen (husband Ellis), Marie Gaudet Allen (wife of Herman), Ruth Smith, unknown, little girls Arlene Cashin and Josephine Aubert with my younger sister, baby Lottie Charbonnet (now Fields) with back to camera in the far right corner. Back row -- the first 3 women on the left I can't identify but Lucille Towns (wife of Roy) and Marjorie Ledford (wife of Claude) with my uncle Lloyd Allen horning in on the party at the far right.

Photo #2: Papa George's Model T adorned by his family. Lower row my sister, Marjorie (Charbonnet-Brooms), me (Betty), Aunt Audrey Kingsbury Allen (wife of Fred), Second row, youngest sister, Lottie (Charbonnet Balugo Fields) in the arms of Teen-dah (friend of my grandmother's) with Papa's sister, Isabel Allen LeBeouf Warnie. Seated on the running-board is my mother, Lottie (Allen Charbonnet), who looks traumatized - having just arrived in California from the hurricane-flooded New Orleans with Sarah LeBeouf (wife of Melville) and Papa's third wife, Louise Breaux Allen. Uncle Herman Allen (husband of Marie Gaudet Allen) towering over all.

So many fronts ... so little time ... how does one cope?

Having come from such a long lineage, and having only accounted for one branch of this huge family -- what on earth comes next?

I can imagine how hard it must be for all those who have been displaced by Katrina to figure out next moves. Looked around my apartment after slipping out of my shoes before stepping onto the white carpeting I spent the weekend cleaning. Felt the dry sobs that rise in my throat so often these days. Such a contrast with those who are returning home to filthy water rising to the ceiling. Looked around and wondered what I would save -- if the water were rising fast? What would I do if all I had left at the end of the day were the clothes on my back and the ring on my finger? Suppose there was nothing left to prove my existence at all? And, most important, how could I reach those kinfolk who live far beyond the waters -- about whom I know little, but who might be in a position to help ... .

I'm in that position. I wait for I know not whom -- a phone call from some relative who doesn't know of my concerns, or of my willingness to share my life. I haunt the lists online not knowing whether the names I see are those for whom I'm looking. The women have changed names through marriage, maybe more than once. Do I adhere to the known family names (Allen, Breaux, Charbonnet) and forget about all else? Been doing that, but coming up empty, except for rumors.

I'm hating the fact that we're so scattered, so out of touch. Would love to be able to knit us all back into some kind of whole -- and if possible -- I'd never allow that kind of separation to ever happen again. I worry so about the children ... .

Find myself worrying even about those from whom I've been alienated for a variety of reasons over many years ... Wondering what could have been important enough to make for such deep cleavages in our lives ... and how can the healing begin?

..and will there be enough time?


Photo: Grandfather Louis Charbonnet's business card that I've treasured for all these years. Also have notebooks in which he computed his worker's pay and estimates of construction. His leatherbound engineering books sit on my bookshelf in the hallway. How comforting to know that they're dry and not lost to the waters of Katrina ... .

Countin' noses ...

My father had three sisters and seven brothers. Over the years, many had relocated out of New Orleans into other parts of the country. Several families settled in Southern California, others came to the Bay Area. Through cousins I've now located all of the William Charbonnet family (or at least have received word that they're safe and evacuated out of Louisiana). Some have joined with sons and daughters in Maryland, Atlanta, Texas, etc., and two live nearby in Oakland. I suspect that many will return home over time. But for the moment, there's nothing to return to.

I've learned that a number of kinfolk are in Baton Rouge. The Louis Charbonnet III family has settled there after losing the Charbonnet-Labat Funeral Home that was last seen in a NY Times photo under six feet of water! All families have lost everything. Families like ours has created and carried so much of the culture through a long Louisiana history, since before the Louisiana Purchase in 1805. I cannot imagine what will happen when that historic city has been gentrified out of existence by white folks who have no idea of what's being lost.

Do you suppose that anyone is aware that Senator Mary Landrieu and Lt. General Russell Honore are both Creoles -- just like me? She is the daughter of former New Orleans mayor, Moon Landrieu. Or that the bombastic "John Wayne" character who is credited with having provided whatever real leadership that emerged in that fiasco that ruined Michael Brown of FEMA, comes from a large Creole farming family in Northern Louisiana. At another time both would be identified as "black," but now that we've entered this weird hard-to-nail-down racial identity window -- the "one drop rule" has been scrapped. We're left in a kind of racial limbo -- at least some of us have been. Others (like me) insist upon our black identity and challenge anyone to argue otherwise. We all carry the genes of some tribe or other in West Africa.

New Orleans was the city where -- for generations -- those relationships have been worked through fairly successfully. Creole/Cajun culture clung faithfully to its differences and proudly held its uniqueness over at least 300 years. I have no idea whether that figure of "70% African American" that's given out so often these days on the newscasts counts all the rich racial mixtures (Caribbean, African, Haitian, French (Cajun-Creole), Spanish (Islenos), Choctaw, etc, that have created this new race of charming, seductive, artistic, talented, clever, colorful people who remain New Orleanians no matter how far from home we travel over time. It still feels like home to me and I've been in California since 1927!

I cannot imagine that one day (if those who've been displaced aren't allowed back to reclaim their culture) we'll see the emergence of some generic southern equivalent of plastic and neon Las Vegas. How sad that would be! And the unknowing developers will have no idea of what has been lost -- not one whit.

We who are only peripherally involved may have a role to play. In any way that we can, we must work to see that New Orleans is not erased from the cultural mix that makes up this nation. That cannot be duplicated. Louisiana was a cosmopolitan territory under the French, the Spanish, etc., long before the 13 colonies declared separation from England and created the nation that we are now, and that may be in great jeopardy in our time.


Photo: Charbonnet sisters, daughters of William and Estelle Holland Charbonnet - taken in 1978 in New Orleans.

No one in the world can ever convince me that what we've seen in the federal response to the Gulf Coast hurricane had nothing to do with racism.

It was blatant. It was criminal neglect. Katrina exposed what we all knew but what only the honest among us will admit. We're still a deeply divided country -- first by economics and ultimately by race. In the deep south, the two are most clearly connected. For the most part -- the poorest among us are African American. In New Orleans, particularly, a lot of those who were "apparently" white suffered along with their darker-skinned relatives without being recognized as "black" by viewers who watched their misery and tried to share their pain. This is not to say that there weren't poor whites and a few not-so-poor mixed in with the hordes of displaced citizens. Of course there were. All suffered similar fates -- all horrific!

The awful stories that will come from those who lived that horror will work their way through the country over the next months, and they will equal those images and stories that drove the Civil Rights Revolution of the Sixties. And well they should. The pictures of people screaming for help and being ignored equal those of fire hoses and dogs and police out of control at Selma years ago.

After days of worrying and wondering about family members who were caught up in the tragedy I had a moment of triumph last night. Was listening to the African American chief of police in a CNN interview. He was lauding those officers who had held tight and remained on duty despite the awfulness of their personal situations and concern for the fate of their own families. In a moment that flashed by he mentioned the name, " Officer William Charbonnet," who had defended him in a moment of stark danger. This had to be one of my young cousins. I didn't even know we had anyone on the police force, yet here he was -- and one of the heroes, at that. It felt so good to know learn about him in this way. It didn't matter that I wouldn't have recognized him if he'd been shown on camera. No problem. This was a Charbonnet. And I knew where at least one was in that corner of Hell and maybe before the week ends, I'll learn of others.

Oddly enough, my daily work at the National Park Service is going extremely well despite the day-to-day dives into depression. Keeping life in balance may be the greatest challenge. The highs are so high and crashes into the lows each night when I watch the days happenings in the wake of Katrina are so hard to manage. It's dizzying ... .

Despite all I'm feeling hopeful. Others are seeing and feeling and reacting to the same reports and images that I'm seeing and feeling and reacting to. We are not alone. It's possible that the reaction of reawakened news teams and a stiffening of the spines of Democratic leadership in Washington is taking place. Maybe this is where the country turns around and hits an upward spiral. Maybe this is the place where we've hit absolute bottom and can kick-start ourselves up into the next phases of positive change.

Noticed something else: Because of the disgraceful and life-destroying conduct of FEMA and the failure of traditional institutions to function -- ordinary human beings stubbornly moved in and by-passed where they could. We finally got sick of having our human responses acted out through privatized corporate systems and went back to taking care of our brothers and sisters ourselves by any means necessary. Each time I heard one of their heroic stories -- like that 18 year old kid who stole a bus and drove a full load of survivors to Houston -- and got arrested upon his arrival -- I feel pride and victorious for us all. Or the many who headed directly into Hell from wherever they were to ferry people out or bring food and water in -- despite prohibitions that threatened their own freedom and safety. There were probably more heroes than we'll ever know.

Surely a new day of freedom will grow from such deeds.

I cannot believe otherwise and remain sane.

It may be only symbolic, but historic St. Louis Cathedral came through without harm ...

Bourbon Street and the Old French Quarter withstood all that Katrina could hurl. That may mean that the Convent, too, withstood the rising waters. But that may be asking too much. It was miles away from the higher ground of downtown or Canal Street.

I find myself recalling that my parents talked about Uptown (the wealthier district), Downtown (Creole section) and BackaTown, the district of the poorest of the poor. I suspect that it was BackaTown that suffered the greatest losses. Having said that, I can't remember enough about those dinner table conversations to speak with any authority. Touro (not sure of the spelling) is the place of the home that I can vaguely remember as being our last before coming West; a small bungalow on an unpaved street. I know that what passed as sidewalks -- over the length of a city block -- were actually two long wooden planks set side by side and end to end to walk on every summer to avoid the mud from the daily summer rains. Those boards were dragged in by the neighbors and chopped up and burned in wood stoves for heating and cooking in winter, then replaced by the city the following summer. Sounds an awful lot like BackaTown to me, right? But then my proud Creole folks always referred to their neighborhood as Downtown.

I can remember (from my visit to N.O. as a teenager) that cigarettes were sold to anyone (children included) at a penny-a-piece from broken-sealed packages, and that anyone could purchase a drink who could stand at a bar. I remember seeing my Aunt send one of the kids to the store with a pitcher to buy a bright red drink called, "Jumbo" to go with the shrimp jambalaya. Sounds an awful lot like BackaTown to me.

Can remember when the Good Friday hurricane of 1927 struck, and resulted in my parents picking up what little they could salvage and joining my grandfather in Oakland, California. Mother arrived with 3 little girls and little else on a Southern Pacific train with Dad following a couple of months later to join us. We lived with my maternal grandfather, Papa George, Aunt Vivian, Uncle Lloyd, Aunt Louise, and Uncle Frederick, in a tiny 3 bedroom home surrounded by open fields in East Oakland until my father could find work and rent a small cottage nearby.

Small wonder that Katrina has reached her tentacles out to find me even this far away on the Pacific Coast. The tears flow as if it all happened yesterday. My need to fulfill my role as family savior in the way that Papa George did is driving me into a frenzy! I'm really less moved by the plight of my extended family members who are now most likely comfortably listed among the power elite than of those who are far more like me (at the time). My own experience as a "refugee" -- folk from BackaTown whom we've seen desparately cutting their way through rooftops and suffering family separations and dislocations in unknown places -- without Papa Georges and Aunt Vivians to step up to provide aid and sustenance.

Many of my relatives lived closer to the French Quarter on paved streets -- in wooden homes that all appeared flush against the sidewalks with two or three steps to climb to reach gates that led to inner courtyard gardens. The Charbonnet-Labat Funeral Home was located on such a street -- but that area had lately been bi-sected by a major highway that cut into that community -- Claiborne Street, maybe? Most now live Uptown and quite possibly evacuated early in their SUVs along with the rest of the "haves." After all, that's the position we've all been striving to achieve in the world, and few can be faulted for having earned the right to the good life by hard work and due diligence. The Charbonnet would surely have done that.

Our extended family is now scattered all over the South; Texas, Florida, St. Louis, with a number evacuated safely to Baton Rouge. Many of us had already settled over many years in both Northern and Southern California. I've reached no one directly, but have learned from local relatives who have received word from some survivors, that most are accounted for.

I'm left with this emotional connection to those who've been left behind. I'm left with memories of little girl Betty now resurfacing fullblown -- of lying in a small bed on sodden clammy warm blankets -- raised high on orange crates in a small bedroom by frightened young parents -- with water lapping all around. Of shrieking winds and deafening thunder. Of wondering why God was punishing everybody on this Good Friday? Who had sinned so badly? I have these firmly-etched images of my father (the builder) hammering together a flimsy plywood boat with which to ferry people around town to what higher ground there was -- and my sister, Marjorie, being allowed to sit in the back of the uncaulked boat bailing out the water with a pot as it rose around their feet. I was too young to help much, but did get to bail when needed and no one else was around. Even at that age I can remember feeling the importance of being small -- because we took up less space and more people could be saved because we were. I suppose this may have been the first time that I felt the awesome power of one human being to effect lives, even the power of one very little girl.

Went to bed last night in my comfortable apartment -- alone -- with all those square feet lying empty when they might be serving the greatest need of all by being made available to others. Was reluctant to list my empty rooms on Craig's List indiscriminately to strangers when it might be needed for my own displaced kinfolk. That brought on a sense of guilt since it's quite possible that I won't be able to locate anyone ... and... . Perhaps there needs be a limit placed on just how long one should wait before acting on behalf of anyone needing to be housed.

I'm receiving calls from caring friends with offers of blankets, personal items, diapers, money, they'd like to give -- but want to wait until families have been brought into the Bay Area and are within reach. No one wants to burden a broken Red Cross system with gifts that their volunteers can't process and therefore would become lost to those who need the help so desparately.

It's impossible not to wonder whether or not many of those floating bodies are less fortunate members of my own family -- there are so many of us to account for... .

Even more important -- they may be all of us -- surrogates whose only sin was that they were too poor, too young, too old, too sick, or too black and therefore relegated again to "the back of life's bus!"

There but for the grace of God ...

But then I'm an atheist, remember?


(Photo: Dorian Reid's "Lion with Rainbow")

The good writers ...

Despite the horror of it all, some semblance of sanity is beginning to return. Spent the morning reading the Sunday NY Times; Frank Rich, Maureen Dowd, Paul Krugman, and Anne Rice. Last night I read a brilliant piece by Rick Bragg (Miami Herald). In the words of those giants of the written word I found solace. Truth is having its day; if "truth" is defined by those words that confirm something buried deep inside me; clicking into what I already know.

As in the days of Vietnam, the scenes of such human misery and neglect coupled by the lack of connection with our institutions as represented by government sources, is not be believed. The dissonance is so pronounced that one wonders if the entire world isn't seeing what is inexplicable even to the most uncaring among us. There appears to be as many conservative as liberal voices screaming for help for those poor souls suspended in hell! It is difficult to imagine the level of incompetence we're witnessing. That may be the scariest of all.

Maybe it was easier to yield to those conspiracy theories that insisted that brilliantly evil forces had taken over the nation, and that they'd been working toward the complete takeover of our systems of governance over a period of the past forty years. That was hard enough to confront in the dark of night when paranoia runs rampant. But the Ship of State in the hands of morons? That's an incomprehensible nightmare!

Is it possible that the man in our White House is simply so ineffectual, so frightened, so unknowing and ignorant that -- as he sat paralyzed for that long period reading to children on 9/11, he sat frozen in space too stupid or terrified to move? He repeated that performance for 48 hours last week; frozen in space, unable to move, distracted, "too stupid or terrified to move?" Is this possible?

Reports of the whereabouts of the rest of the administration leadership was equally as insane. No one has yet reported on the status of the vice president. Strange? No words of caring or condolence? No sign of taking charge even at a second level position? Sitting in a bunker somewhere deep under NORAD? Do you suppose he was out readying the forces of Halliburton to get into position for the rebuilding of New Orleans, only this time with seafront villas and casinos, hotels and resorts, and NO black folks except for those willing to play "slaves" for visual effect of a "reenactment" of the Old South?

Heard Randy Rhodes (Air America) posit the notion that the difficulties confronted by that beleaguered city were caused by the fact that this is a Red state with Blue leadership. The senator, the governor, the mayor are all Democrats (Blue). In the deep south, Black folks are notoriously committed to the Democratic party, therefore are politically expendable. Could the situation be that cynical?

I do know that here in California the energy crisis that toppled Governor Gray Davis proved to be motivated by the fact that our legislature is predominantly Democrat, our congressional delegation the most liberal in the nation, and that we paid for it by the administration's withholding help until Davis was overturned by a celebrity Republican in a special election. Enron figured heavily in the destruction of our energy system by manipulation of the regs. Remember folks, Ken Lay of Enron is a close friend and ally of the president. Political retaliation is surely likely to be a factor in what happened in the wake of Katrina.

Surely an investigation should expose the fact that political vengeance may have played a part in the refusal of the administration to fund the reconstruction of the deeply flawed levee system in New Orleans. The fact that 30% of the Louisiana National Guard is currently on duty in Iraq. The highwater vehicles (Humvees) that would have been needed to save lives at home were also overseas. The deep cuts in funding for the levee reconstruction (despite years of warnings by the Times Picayune and reinforced by the mayor's pleas) were quite possibly effected by political vengeance as well.

By the weekend, we will have word that literally thousands will have lost their lives. Some will be children. It is highly likely that some will be relatives I've been unable to locate after endless hours of searching online ... .

Now it's back to haunting the Red Cross online "We're safe" listings, Craig's list, CNN pages, and more phone calls to busy signals from broken telecommunications systems in faraway places in a putrid, water-sogged, hot and humid South reeking from the stench of dead and rotting flesh.

Let me know if you're still reading ... my only company this weekend has been the ghosts of my past.

It's lonely ... .


Photo: New Orleans Mardi Gras Ball of 1924 - the debut into society for young Creole women. Cousin Vivian Allen sitting 3rd from far left; Uncle Raleigh Coker 2nd from right standing. He was physician, graduate of the nation's only black medical school, Meharry.

On feelings of utter outrage, sadness, ... hopelessly old and irrelevant ...

Am aware of having dropped some invisible internal control button to "dim" so that the horrendous pain of the loss of an entire culture is now occurring both inside and outside of me... Maybe Creole-Cajun life and history really does die with my generation .

The human loss is beyond comprehension. If I hear one more commentator give the body count as "147" right behind the mentions of "...bodies floating by, being abandoned in attics, left by the sides of roads and in SuperDome restrooms ...etc.," I'll scream! After all those uncounted bodies of the weak of the too young or too old or too black have been floating by now for almost a week! There are reports of rats being seen claiming the remains. The body count in the city of my ancestry and early childhood will surely rise to thousands in days to come. That is, if those who have been lost don't simply join the long list of unreported dead in the war of Iraq -- a fact that never really materializes into actual numbers.

Spent most of the past several days searching the web's survivor lists for cousins I can scarcely remember but feel deeply connected to by our common ancestry. They're so alive for me due to the countless hours spent in reconstructing that history -- from the 1500s to the present. It's gathered into two huge binders and on the walls of vintage photos that line the hallway of my apartment. Perhaps what I've collected over the years will become the family archives and the only record of this family's long tenure in the country and the world. Ours is the story of black America with all of its pain, anguish, and glory. "Up From Slavery" is a book title that I recall from my early years. Can't recall the author at the moment, but what it describes in those few words speaks volumes about where life's journey has taken the Allen/Charbonnet/Breaux clan. Katrina may have erased that record of our existence.

Not only are those ancestors who are so alive for me still, but the structures left by the builders of my family; my grandfather, Louis Charbonnet; my dad, Dorson Louis Charbonnet, and his seven brothers. I'm sure that Corpus Christi Catholic Church, designed and built by my grandfather many years ago -- and that I visited from California as a teen -- to discover it racially segregated with white New Orleanians occupying the middle pews and people who looked like me sitting on both sides. It's surely gone now in the rage of a hurricane called Katrina. And it's segregated history reduces its value to me not one iota. It is the system that was; and that may have exemplified for us a low point in our collective lives that may now be overcome because we've experienced another soul-shaking exposure of our sins. Maybe we can move now toward redemption.

Then there were our family homes on Laperouse, Frenchman, and Touro streets -- and the Convent of the Holy Family Sisters out on Gentilly (shown in photo above). Bill and I visited that Charbonnet-designed and constructed institution the year before he died. I remember now running my hand across the cornerstone bearing my grandfather's name and the dates hoping to remember the physical impression well enough to bring back alive to my blind father upon return to the Bay Area. This was the convent that housed the first African American nuns in the nation -- the Holy Family Sisters, an order dedicated to the care and education of black children at a time when there was little else. Surely it no longer stands since it was built not far from the Lake. It is my guess that those good sisters may well have remained in place as the water rose. They may have perished in service to their people and to "The Lord." The Order was still very much together when we visited -- complete with the little draped window near the heavily secured front doors -- through which frightened young girls could slip blanketed newborns without blame or guilt, to be raised by the nuns or placed out in the parish for adoption.

Most of my family's dead are entombed in above-ground crypts in St. Louis cemetary on the edge of St. Louis Cathedral in the French Quarter. The tears come as I wonder whether their graves -- some that date from the early 1800s -- still exist ...? The French Quarter may have held. I don't really know. Nearby Canal Street and some of that area that I can recognize as the cameras panned -- appears to be intact still.

My cousin, former Louisiana state senator, Louis Charbonnet, III, and his family have been evacuated to Baton Rouge. Other family members have been evacuated to Florida, Texas, and St. Louis, MO. His senatorial district included the French Quarter. His family's mortuary, "Charbonnet-Labat" which featured jazz funerals and red bean feeds in its parking lot on Mardi Gras Day -- surely was destroyed by Katrina. It was an important cultural landmark in the city they so loved.

But what is the most disturbing is that in the course of my work -- where I'm working hard to help to expand the WWII story to include that of African Americans (the story of Rosie the Riveter is a white story) -- I'm experiencing newly-activated anger at racial segregation and economic deprivation. Watching the horrific images being spat out non-stop from our television screens by what appears to be a newly-aware press corps revives mind pictures of slavery, lynchings, Selma, fire hoses, attack dogs, etc. The only comfort I can find is in the growing conviction that the numbers of outraged citizens of all colors, sizes, social and economic levels has grown exponentially and that this may usher in -- finally -- a time of reconciliation.

I find hope in the fact that newsmen and women -- on the spot -- were suddenly seeing new awful truths and awakening to what so many of us who've lived the history have always known; that the nation is deeply-divided and must ultimately come to terms with its shameful history in order to finally move toward love and compassion that crosses barriers of race, gender, and privilege. Perhaps in the days to come, they will be able to reflect this in reports on the most powerful system of communication the world has ever known. Maybe they can hurry the healing before it's too late ... .

Do you suppose there is any possibility that this sick country can take a page from President Nelson Mandela's book -- with the help of our newly-awakened media -- and create a Truth Commission and seek reconciliation?

But then the phenomenon of Katrina heralds a new age -- one in which nature's awesome power will continue to bring the world to its knees because the greed of man blinded him to the warnings of global warming before it was too late ... .

And in that knowing place deep within -- I -- quietly -- no longer envy the young.

...unless we manage to outlive or out-gun those currently in the seats of power in this nation. I no longer rule out the possibility of armed revolution -- something I could never imagine in my worse nightmares. Almost anything is possible in these times of such horrendous loss of our institutional underpinnings.

...and we're the "Leaders of the Free World!"

Photo: Convent of the Sisters of the Holy Family, New Orleans, Louisiana.

All tracks utilized. No runways left!

I don't think that I've ever really had any way to measure my brain capacity until now, that is. Started my new position mid-month and am finding that -- once I found myself back in full time work mode -- there was simply nothing left to draw from. I'm literally consumed by the new work and too busy 'doin' it' to stop long enough to tell about it. Writing was the last thing on my mind as I pulled off my denims and pulled on my pajamas after a quick supper each evening. It feels good.

I also found myself wondering how the new park superintendent would feel about my candor in these writings, and if I'd continue to feel the same freedom that I've enjoyed over time. That's still an unknown. But then that's not been a significant factor before -- and perhaps it won't be now. Besides, I'm enjoying the work far too much to feel any caution about what negatives might be churned up over time.

Maybe the fact that this is a limited contract and not the career move with a future that it would have been at some earlier time makes a difference. We'll see.

Whatever the problem, I left Ms. Hermione Ginglehopper hanging out there along with whoever else is reading, and that's a pity. We'd just re-established a nice relationship again, and exchanged some really meaningful private emails - and that must not be interrupted by anything. After all, this is her record of Grandma's life that's goin' on here, and I suspect that she's been working her way through the archives by now and has caught up to date.

So where are we?

Am excited about my work that involves working closely with a young woman who's moved over from the Crissy Field program at the Presidio. Together we'll create the community outreach plans for the Rosie the Riveter Homefront Historical National Park (that name is a choker!), and -- as suspected -- my earlier work experience prepares the way for this new challenge beautifully.

When I sat down to put together a list of "Important People to Contact and Why," I found that I was able to sit down with the Excel program and pull together a list of 174 such without looking up a single number except from my Palm Pilot. I also found that I knew each one well and that the rationale for including each was clear in my mind. These covered the four small cities that had been my working universe for the past 7 years, and my sense of the territory had dimmed not one iota. I can do this. I see real respect in the young faces around me, and I feel warm and appropriate to the task.

If there is a difference today, it's that I find myself expressing a sense of urgency that has come with age -- as if I must work hard over the next few months to "download" the data collected in my brain over a lifetime -- into this new work before whatever wisdom is there -- dissipates or atrophies into nothingness and is lost for all time. That leaves little time for mistakes or half-truths. I'm less apt to deal in subleties and/or nuance, but to be ever more direct in my dealings with others. That's been a growing concern for me, but seems sharper now than ever before.

I don't believe that I'm particularly confrontational or that this gets expressed negatively. I believe that I'd know if that were true. What it does mean, though, is that I'm in no way reluctant to challenge half-truths or situational ethics. But then at my age there is little to lose and much to gain by being open and real. In this changed world, even those far younger than I tend to be more candid than I recall of my own generation.

Made a fascinating discovery only this past week. It has to do with the power of language. On the web site of the National Park Service a new concept has been introduced that I find extremely exciting. It's something called "Civic Engagement," and has to do with an entirely new attitude; one that undergirds their staff and intern trainings. For instance: Wherever park sites includes places where slaves were kept or worked (old plantations; Williamsburg, Monticello, Mt. Vernon, etc.) the word used for the those who worked the fields is no longer "slaves" but "enslaved people." Such a subtle difference, but words that connote a sea change in attitude. It gives me an entirely new way to think of my ancestors.

I don't think that I've yet begun to incorporate the huge difference that has already begun to make in my sense of self and of those who came before me. Is it because the word slave describes a person and enslaved people describes a condition in which they found themselves? I'm not sure yet, but I'm wanting to locate somewhere in some archives the debates that produced the change. These must have been truly mind-shaping discussions by truly thoughtful people, and I'd love to have been a part of it.

That I'm now working with the Park Service among people with a mind toward not only preservation of but learning from history is a gift of monumental proportions. I'm so looking forward to participating in the shaping of this new park in Richmond, California, where (I truly believe) much of the groundwork was laid for the Civil Rights Revolution of the Sixties and beyond. Being old enough to see the continuum of change is an advantage few enjoy.

Life does keep unfolding ... .


(Photo: A portion of a larger wood sculpture with tempera by Dorian Reid, NIAD artist)

This has been a week for feeling old ...

and there's something quite appropriate about that, isn't there? The reminder from Miss Ginglehopper momentarily pulled me out of the "peer" status that I enjoy so much of the time with those far younger than I, especially in the workplace. It served as reminder that -- if I'm to remain truly centered -- I must not allow myself the illusion that the world I'm moving around in so comfortably much of the time is my own. It belongs to another generation that formed just a few decades behind me, and many decades behind the world of my grandchildren. The power is now in the hands of those in their midyears -- 40 to 65 -- and since that's the world of our president, I'm finding that leadership pretty disconcerting.

I wonder what the world looks like to a generation of twenty-somethings whose advantages have been so sharply curtailed by a nation that is obviously in decline on so many fronts? The choices open to my grandchildren are limited by a nation at war, an incomprehensible national deficit, a time of crumbling institutions, and a dizzying rate of change.

Simultaneously, it is a time of unprecedented technological achievement; the promise of the elimination of fatal diseases through stem cell research and application; and the growing public reaction to the need for reform of our justice system. And -- just possibly -- the world's growing determination to be at peace will overtake the efforts of the warmongers in her time.

Thought a lot about that in those productive moments just before sleep last night.

I'm not all that sure that we've learned a lot over the years. When I was Miss Ginglehopper's age, my world, too, was at war. We saw the dropping of the atom bomb that many saw as ending World War II and thereby saving many lives. I remember the horror that I felt for what our "civilized" nation had inflicted upon the world -- and the fear that consumed my life for many years -- fear of the day when some country would see us as the scourge upon the earth, a role we at that time assigned to Germany and Japan. Would some country one day remember the Enola Gay and the destruction of Hiroshima -- and obliterate us from the planet in retaliation for what we had done? As a person of color, I wondered why the Japanese were bombed and not the Germans? Were they expendable because they were not white, therefore less than fully-human? Was it possible to be black and not wonder? Was it likely that we who lived in a racially-segregated country would ever see it differently? I still don't know the answer to that question.

All of those questions come alive again for me as I watch the horrors of Guantanamo, Abu Graib, and the ruined lives of 2 million American prisoners (mostly of color) rotting away in a metastacized prison system, only 1% of whom are considered violent and/or incorrigible.


I find myself wondering now why (during the Sixties) I'd so gullibly assumed that racial integration would solve all of our problems. It hasn't. The list of African Americans who are now counted among the corporate and governmental elite is significant, yet I can find few among that illustrious bunch with whom I could have a reasonable conversation, or in whose opinions and policies I would find of any comfort or agreement.

And that isn't all that soured on the racial integration front. (And to think how hard I worked and marched and protested and petitioned for that cause over many years.) Something precious was lost in that process -- but I'm not sure how we might have done it all differently.

Is it possible that we placed too much emphasis on blackness and not enough on the black agenda? The list of people of all races and skin colors who worked sacrificially for the black agenda is long and filled with names of the selfless; those clearly recognized as people who were able and willing to bear the pain of our growth at a time when that was the greatest gift they could have given. It was rough at times, for us all, but we've made it. We're making up the constituency of the Progressive movements (Progressive Democratic Caucus, MoveOn.org, People for the American Way, Code Pink, NAACP, ACLU, the Urban League, etc.)

What I hadn't expected for myself is that -- as I moved ever more deeply into the political mainstream, my black identity became more and more important to me. Integration as a way to lose myself in the diversity of a changing country just didn't work. Instead, in later years (after the political and social gains had been at least partially-achieved), the African American story rose in prominence in my own life. My race may have been a problem to others, but it certainly was less and less of a problem to me. As my pride and comfort level rose with maturity, my confidence grew as well. The older I became the more solid my pride in my racial background and a family history that reaches back to a time that precedes the Revolutionary War and the establishment of the nation by at least 100 years.

I'm not sure how old one has to become, or just what experiences one needs to go through to find this place upon which I now stand so arrogantly, but I hope Miss Ginglehopper can find some shortcuts. Maybe the accelerated rate of change will work in her favor and by the time another five years has elapsed, she'll begin to find the ground just a little firmer beneath her feet.

It's at such times as this that I'd love to feel that I might hang around just long enough to see her safely launched.

... then there's always the chance that she's already taken her first steps in that process and that it won't be necessary to worry her home ... .

Photo: My very special granddaughter, Kokee Amanda Reid.

Finally got busted!

I've sometimes wondered how I would feel the day that my grandchildren discovered my writings. Though this has been a journal always intended as a gift to them someday when I am no longer around, there has always been the risk that one of them would happen upon these stories one day. It's happened.

Arrived home from my weekend in Mendocino to find a message among the spam that had collected that started with the words ... "was reading your blog and ..." which meant that someone was writing in response to my blog. The user name was not familiar. The signature jogged my memory and I grinned to myself as I saw but a few loving words,

" ... just ran into your blog, Grandma, and I want you to know how proud I am of you. I love you!

signed,

"Harmony Ginglehopper"

She'd found me. This was my twenty-something granddaughter. I remembered that when she was a very little girl I'd sent her a note (or a birthday card, maybe?) that was addressed to

"Miss Hermione Ginglehopper"

She was such a little girl. How on earth could she have remembered? Yet she had. And here we are a grandmother looking at 84 this year and a mature young woman in her twenties. And even these many years later, this bit of whimsey was still at work making magic. We never know what will be retained, do we? I don't believe that we ever spoke of that card or that silly little name game, but it had been tucked away in that place where children place such things -- to be brought out lo these many decades later to serve as a deep love connection that has defied time.

And these pages will serve to introduce her to a woman she's rarely been allowed to see. And she will now become a part of my story, with little fear that I will invade her privacy. I'm afraid that I know as little about her life as she's been allowed to know about mine. That's the life process, and follows the pattern that kept my mother's life a mystery to me, except for that which bled through the distance between us.

There is so little that I've lived that will hold any relevance to the world that she will grow into. The rate of change has speeded up to the point that "Miss Ginglehopper" will inherit one that I struggle very hard to read. But through it all, there may be a word or phrase here and there that may provide some landmarks that will help her better read her own.

I so love you, Sweetie! Welcome to these pages, and I sincerely hope that you'll find yourself here somewhere. You've surely been one of the souls to whom I've been speaking since these pages were started a few years ago.

Hope that I've made the case for what it means to be me ...

Maybe there will be something here that will help you to better understand just what it means to be you. Buried somewhere inside "Miss Ginglehopper" are the genes, the DNA, of the woman who lives behind my eyes; as I carry the genes, the DNA, of all of the family women who came before us both.

That's an awesome thought, isn't it?

And finally we have an instance where that overused word does not overstate the point.


(Photo: "Miss Ginglehopper" )

Life has closed in tightly but nicely, leaving little room for telling the stories ...

The work goes well, and I'm having that wonderfully rare feeling of fulfilling a role that no one else can; a role that is truly essential to the work underway. I can't recall when this has happened before in my life ... but I'm sure it has because there's a familiar feeling about it. Being in these advanced years gives permission to speak of it unselfconsciously, without false pride but with real appreciation for the enormous privilege I've been granted to continue being of service in the creation of a national park.

I'm building a data base for the planning of the community outreach component of the park. "Rosie" has been several years in the making -- and its come a long way. There are visitors arriving almost everyday from Everywhere, USA, to take the driving tours of the park-in-progress.

The archives are steadily growing and already scholars of the period of WWII are stopping in and requesting time and space to explore the collection of papers, artifacts, oral histories, etc. There's the steady click of computers in our temporary reception center at city hall -- as young interns continue the never-ending task of data entry and followup telephone calls to Rosies throughout the country who've made contributions that require clarifying information.

But there's an important area that will begin to come alive now. It's the place where my recent work experiences come into play. The city of Richmond and the surrounding constituency area of Greater Richmond (at least 4 small cities) need to begin to buy into their roles as host communities. It won't be easy. What has been designated by Congress as an urban national park made up of those structures that best tell the story of the World War homefront war effort, has been regarded for 60 years as blight awaiting demolition and redevelopment by those who've lived and worked in their shadows. It will take many visitors over the next few years -- folks who'll arrive with reverence and enthusiasm and a sense of honor that those of us who've lived that history must "catch." There will at some time be a tipping point where their reverence will become true for us, too. I'm sure of it. And for one who spent the war working in a Jim Crow segregated union hall, that's quite a statement.

History was not necessarily kind to many who were caught in the chaotic period of economic adjustment in the years following the declaration of peace. The temporary war housing was torn down only weeks after the war ended, casting many into homelessness. Jobs disappeared for most, unceremoniously without the necessary time to find work elsewhere. Displacement was a fact of life, and the option to return to the places from which they'd come was an unreal choice. Few were willing to return to the share-cropping fields of the south, or, to the kinds of poverty they'd known in places of even less opportunity. Women, especially, were no longer willing to settle for homemaking, exclusively, and the future for them was in the place where they'd learned new skills and earned their independence. The ground had shifted under us all.

Creating ways to explore that history in these host communities -- but doing so informed by the struggles that followed in national life will be one of the exciting results of having the park created on our shores. This may describe the most interesting work of community outreach; or it can.

Despite the great work of Henry J Kaiser in creating the most powerful defense industry in history (5 shipyards here, alone); the first 24 hour-a-day childcare program in the nation; the first HMOs; and giving birth to mass production on a scale unprecedented. He was on a mission to defend the country against the Axis powers. He was in no way conducting a social experiment. He created a huge "war machine" composed of thousands of willing but unknowing hands of every size, shape, and color -- hands attached to over-aged men, under-aged boys, and eager women from everywhere. He was running an around-the-clock battle to build and supply 747 ships (before war's end) -- some completed and launched in a period of no more than five days.

The human drama being played out in these communities over the next 20 years laid the groundwork for much that followed in the ensuing years. It would erupt into the Civil Rights Movement in the Sixties, and life would never be the same for any of us.

I, for one, went from the position of a lowly young clerk in that Jim Crow union hall on Barrett Avenue in those years -- to being named a "Woman of the Year" before the California State Legislature in the year 1995. That required tumultous political and social change in a part of the country that has never ceased to create many patterns of change for the rest of the country and the world to emulate.

The greatest of the untold stories may have occurred not during "The Good War," but in the years that followed -- as the direct result of our homefront experience in this rapidly-changing world.

That is surely enough upon which to begin to build the community outreach component of the Rosie The Riveter Homefront Historical National Park. Finding ways to re-open those much-needed conversations will be challenging but probably more rewarding than almost anything I can think of these days.

Nostalgia is beginning to crowd out the residual anger that's taken up space in my psyche for so long; space that I need now for other things. Perhaps that will happen for others as well.

I'd never have dreamed ... .

See what I mean?

Right photo: 1995 was a big year. Was honored by being named "Woman of the Year" for the 14th Assembly District by Assemblymember Tom Bates in ceremonies at the capitol in Sacramento.

Left photo: Office of Boilermakers A-36 (that "A" stands for auxiliary) the Jim Crow union out of which all black shipyard workers were assigned. It stood at 1600 Barrett Avenue, Richmond, California. Circa 1943.

Transitions for both Dorian and her elderly cat, Speedy ...

Came home on Friday to a frantic call on my lan phone from Dorrie announcing through tears that Speedy was failing fast and could no longer stand and had stopped eating. It was not unexpected. Speedy had been obviously ailing for months and at the time that Dorian moved into her apartment two weeks ago, we'd acquired an 8 week-old kitten to soften the pain of the anticipated loss.

Drove over to her place to pick her up with the very frail cat lying quietly in the carrier (on a crocheted small coral-colored blanket made for her especially by Dorian). One look was enough to know that the end had come -- and that my dear daughter knew that.

She had been intending to stay with me overnight anyway, but now we would have another mission besides saving quarters by doing her laundry at Mom's. Now we would visit the vet for a final examination and possible euthanasia. And that's how it all worked out.

We drove to Berkeley on Saturday morning after finding no local veterinary clinic open on the weekend. So it was to the Animal Shelter we would go, or the SPCA might be appropriate if we could locate it. Discovered upon arrival at the shelter that they would not put the cat down without having a signed release from a vet. We found one nearby and learned that (as suspected) Speedy was hopelessly ill with liver or kidney failure with no chance of survival. However, it would cost $141 for the vet to euthanize her if they were to also handle the disposal. Having no wish to put my handicapped daughter through an extended experience of loss -- I bought the entire package and blessed my credit card in the process.

Dorian was not rushed, but sensitively allowed to sit and hold her much-loved pet until it seemed natural to leave her. I was grateful for that. She was tearful but resolute that this was the right thing to do.

We got back into the car, headed back toward Interstate 880 and suddenly noticed to the west, a sky filled with brightly-colored kites! It was Kite Festival Day on the Berkeley Marina and -- as if sent from on high -- the perfect event for this moment of deep sorrow.

We joined the heavy traffic headed for the Marina meadow, parked at the boathouse, and joined the throngs of moms and dads, babies and small children, dogs on leashes, all of the usual collection of beautiful Berkeleyans who might be expected to turn out for such an event. It was impossible to stay sad as we walked along the waterfront past the house boats and colorful sailboats moored there, took a moment or two to watch a wedding occurring in plain view on the top deck of a Red & White ferry anchored at the peer. Ahead of us high in the sky hundreds of kites of every size, shape, and color flew against a cloudless sky above the sky-reflected azure of the bay! There were all forms of fish, octopi, butterflies, birds, octagonals, geometrics, and two huge yellow cats! How fitting!

Upon arrival at the end of the long walk, we climbed a gentle mound and sat on the grass with hundreds of others to watch the kites against the sky. There were very serious adult kite fanciers with intricately-designed four-string models attached to a kind of spinner; children who had made their own at one of the tents, kites easily identified by their size (small), identical shapes, all white with pink tails; and some that resembled the huge gas-filled types common to holiday parades. From time to time there would be music on the sound system -- everything from bluegrass to Handel. It was impossible to not catch the high spirits of the day.

Several things stood out for me. The stark contrasts between the gentle character of the activity itself and the quiet in the people involved, and the headlines of "rumors of wars and more wars" I'd left behind on the car radio was startling. The "flying" was all-consuming and the "watching" serenity-producing. What a wondrous thing was this ... .

I felt that my two little granddaughters were probably somewhere in that crowd and hoped to catch sight of them at some point. But, surprisingly, there were so many little Berkeley kids of mixed-race -- little olive-skinned beauties with almond shaped eyes and waste-length dark hair -- that they would have been impossible to find. Berkeley appears to have become the mecca for such families, and for those who've given up all claims to racial superiority long ago. Here was this polyglot of humanity living in harmony together in a world at peace.

The flying kites became symbolic of so much for me -- not the least of which was the quiet comment from my mentally-disabled daughter just before we rose to begin the long walk back to the car, "... Did they do it yet, Mom? Do you think that Speedy's in kitty heaven, Mom?" In the environment of love and peacefulness that we were so much a part of in that moment, it was quite easy for this non-believing mother to say quite sincerely,

"Yes!"

Photo: Dorrie painted this portrait of Speedy the following week -- to serve as the centerpiece for the memorial service she conducted in the courtyard of NIAD. Do notice the lovely white halo over her head; a nice touch. With Dorian, the staff and other NIAD artists paid proper tribute to the dearly departed in the noontime ceremony. I missed it since it all happened in that world in that world that she lives in where mothers can't always follow.

Back to the Nine to Five and loving it ...

So many changes in so little time.

Dorian has moved into a group home not too far away, and is loving the renewal of her sense of independence and freedom from this too conscientious mother. The placement is working out beautifully. She's sharing a two bedroom ground floor apartment in nearby El Cerrito with a young woman who is also developmentally disabled. Upstairs lives another pair in the same fourplex, so they're in a small community that is maintained for a cluster of disabled adults with supervision by Harmony Homes, in a program I've only recently learned about. They live at scattered sites throughout the community but all participate in programs and activities especially designed to meet their needs.

Dorian is continuing her work at NIAD (National Institute for Artists with Disabilities) where she's been so very successful. Her sculptures are being featured at a reception next week at the NIAD Gallery, and she's busily anticipating the local acclaim (mostly her family) that she's begun to enjoy.

On Tuesday I started the new position with the National Park Service. I will be working closely with a lovely young woman from the west side of the Bay (the Golden Gate National Recreational Area) at the Presidio. Together we'll be planning the outreach strategies that will bring together the local communities with the Rosie the Riveter Homefront Historical National Park. She'll be working with me only two days a week, and otherwise I suppose I'll be on my own.

With the recent retirement of the park superintendent and the anticipated arrival (August 24th) of her replacement from Yosemite National Park, the program is experiencing no small amount of chaos. There is a total reorganization going on with the 4 national parks in the East Bay being combined under one superintendent (John Muir, Port Chicago, Rosie the Riveter, and Eugene O'Neill's Tao House in the Diablo Valley). My work will be at the Rosie site, only, I believe, since it is here in Richmond and in the surrounding areas of West County that my prior work experience is of greatest value.

Since my last entry over a week ago, we've completed Dorian's move, visited my dear friend in Mendocino for a long weekend at oceanside in his beautiful home 80 feet from the sea's edge. Did some retroactive sinning, and felt delightfully wicked in the process. Being with him took the sting out of what might have been a very painful separation experience. Instead of weeping, I drove my little red Beamer ("Rosinante") a little above the speed limit right through the Anderson Valley that lay in full summer splendor from the most riotous display of wildflowers that I've seen in years. The heavy rainy season paid off in blooms that lit up the fields in the way that literally demanded that one stop and look! And I did, several times.

To Tom's place from mine is a 4-and-a-half CD trip, and I timed it so that when I hit the stretch through the redwood forest that lies beyond Booneville, Hubert Laws was playing his flute -- with that incomparable rendition of "Amazing Grace" serving as the sound track for those magnificent miles through filtered sunlight -- just before Highway 128 merges into Pacific Coast Highway 1 and the ocean comes into full view for the first time! From there to historic Mendocino Village is a scant ten miles along the cliffs high above the sea, and Tom's is just a few minutes beyond ... .

Returned on Monday to find that Dorian had survived the first weekend on her own handily, and that I'd managed to actually stay "in the present in the place where my body was" with little difficulty. We visited Glass Beach and collected sea-polished bits to bring home. It was the short drive along the Mendocino headlands -- past the sunday morning strolling tourists -- to the great independent bookstore for the Sunday NY Times. Then reading in bed and occasionally looking up at the blue sky through two large skylights directly overhead that fill the bedroom with light, or stars, or a moon, or fog, or wisps of fast-moving clouds that go nicely with cups of hot tea and Frank Rich and Maureen Dowd columns.


But where on earth does one go for Bidet lessons?

I haven't the foggiest ... .

Dinner with the cast of tomorrow ... .

Earlier on Sunday -- while walking along the wharf toward the boarding area of Pier 6 -- past the tantalizing aromas of the Orient, Mexico, Japan, breads of every kind from several specialty bakeries fused with the floral scents of beautiful flowers everywhere -- my cell phone vibrated silently from my pocket. It was Rachel reminding me that tonight I'd promised to come to dinner to meet ... (then the static, the breaking-up)... and combined with the sounds of gulls squawking loudly overhead and the hum of conversations from nearby sidewalk tables -- her voice was lost. Figuring that she might hear me I just assured her that I would surely be there, around six o'clock, as promised. It sounded like something about a movie, maybe? Maybe home movies of one of their trips. But now it was time to board the ferry for the cruise 'round the Bay.

Rachel is a former co-worker, another field rep in the assembly office I'd recently left. Her husband is the Chief of Staff for Rep. Barbara Lee. He was formerly a member of Ted Kennedy's staff. A truly charming couple of youngsters that I am very fond of. About a year ago I was honored to be invited to be one of the readers at their wedding.

Despite some fatigue, I reached home in the early afternoon to find another message from Rachel on my home answering machine -- reminding me about the dinner this evening ... and, yes, I would go. I felt truly complimented by her persistence.

Arrived at their lakeside top floor apartment to find a small assortment of very interesting people, not the least of which were two beautiful young filmmakers from New York. This was the reason for the dinner. One, Shola Lynch, is a documentary filmmaker formerly of the Ken Burns team -- having worked on several of his PBS productions, "Jazz," "Baseball" The "Civil War," I believe, among others. Some time ago she'd gone off on her own to do the POV production of "Unbought, and Unbossed," the story of Shirley Chisholm, the first woman to run for the office of the presidency of the USA. That was in '72. I'd served as a McGovern delegate to the '72 Democratic Convention at Miami Beach. This evening held great promise.

Shola is here on a visit and in the process of pulling together her second individual effort -- the story of Angela Davis. She has the commitment from Prof. Davis (now on the faculty of the University of California at Santa Cruz), and will be raising funds and making the contacts to begin production on this new PBS piece. I believe that it, too, will be a POV presentation.

Around that table in the glow of candle light were Jeffrey and Rachel (staffers for Rep. Barbara Lee and Senator Don Perata), a Latino member of Lee's staff; a female professor of history and black studies at the University of California at Santa Cruz, a young public defender and his very pregnant wife who has left her teaching position at Mills College -- and is also an attorney. Then there was a public school teacher, and our two documentary filmmakers. I felt so privileged to be a witness to the future. These were the best and the brightest, and they sparkled with vitality and charm. It was easy to dismiss the earlier part of the day when I'd experienced the drop back into time that had the feeling of so little social progress and so much frustration; stagnation.

Yet, here it was. The future. In this world of late Sunday evening, among those young professionals were several "out" gays, two inter-racially mixed couples, this elderly activist lady (wise enough but surely of yesterday), and the two brilliant young New Yorkers from the new world of an expanding culture that I'm not sure those aging union Leftists are quite ready for. The world changed when we weren't looking.

I'd truly forgotten that the future can be seen right now. I knew that at one time -- especially during the Nu Upper Room days when I first was introduced to the world of Hip Hop (see earlier archives) -- that all one has to do to see how it all turned out is to step into the world of the young. I'd forgotten that. The old biases and prejudices have disappeared for the most part. In the world in that other dimension, much of the garbage has been dumped and the rules are fresh and new. Nowhere is that more evident than here in the Bay Area -- but you have to know what you're looking for and be open to the surprises that are everywhere.

I suppose it's partly the Blue States phenomenon.

We shared stories and gnoshed on the finest of cheeses and bread sticks -- drank wine from tall stemmed glasses, laughed a lot and -- eventually gathered around the table for a lovely dinner prepared by the man of the house. That, too, was refreshing. It was so unself-conscious and so "today."

Fell into bed at close to midnight last night feeling symtoms of whiplash from reacting to the the events of the day. Oddly enough, all of the irony of the morning's cruise as the only African American on board -- in the all white world of the labor movement had dropped away. In its place was the comforting feeling that in some strange way, we'd already won. The national transformation was well underway despite the most valiant efforts of the conservatives and the reactionaries and the Luddites to stop it. My generation and those immediately following on the time line will die away soon enough -- leaving this brave new world that is already formed and fully operative in its place. And I don't think it's fragile, either, but vibrant and venturesome and creating new edges for us all, if we've the stamina and the passion to take a look.

It was a glorious day -- and I'm precisely where I want to be in time and space and on the planet.

Sleep came quickly.

This morning I contacted the office of a former employer, Berkeley city councilman, Attorney Don Jelinek, who is the authority on George Jackson, the San Quentin prisoner who died in a hail of bullets in a prison yard shootout years ago. I wanted to alert Don to the fact that I'd referred Shola and that he should expect her call. Jackson figured heavily in the love, life, and times of Angela Davis and their story will now be told. Don recently completed his own book which contains much of his story. It may have been published by now. Shola Lynch will need to spend some hours with Don. This is another of those times when all the parts of my long life come together in these marvelous ways -- to connect with the lives of others and help to facilitate a very promising future.

One long day of crossing and conflicting time lines ...
Rose early in anticipation of the bay cruise -- weather mixed -- the July inversion pattern brought the usual finger of fog through the Golden Gate -- but the promise of a burn off was surely indicated. It would be a glorious day on the water.

Met my friends for the BART trip to the embarcation point at the Ferry Building (what a wondrous gathering place that is!). We were greeted by jeweler's kiosks and street musicians -- hawkers and artists all ready for the invasion of Sunday visitors. The sidewalk cafes were filled with young people fashionably careless-carefully dressed in high-priced sneakers, muscle shirts, and tans that suggested faraway places (or simply many Sunday brunches on the wharf). Sunday morning in San Francisco is probably equal to the Trevi Plaza in Italy or the boulevards in Paris. Lots of cyclists everywhere and crowds beginning to gather for the annual Walk for AIDS to Golden Gate Park six miles away.

We joined those gathered at the entrance to the pier where our ferry would launch. I would be placed among the presenters -- historians on the Bay Area union movements, the WPA and PWA contributions to its development, authorities on shipbuilding and ports. And then there was Donna Graves, historian who has contributed so much to the development of the new national park, the Rosie Memorial at the Richmond shoreline, and currently gathering oral histories for preservation. And me -- the "Reluctant Rosie." The two other Rosies cancelled at the last minute.

There would be ongoing lectures as we took close up looks at the new Oakland Bay Bridge presently under construction while those currently working on it told us what that was like; the port of Oakland, the Alameda Naval Air Station, Hunter's Point, Angel Islands, and finally, we rounded the Richmond shoreline and ports, the SS Red Oak Victory, the Ford Assembly Plant under-going restoration, and those parts of the new national park that we could identify from the water.

Learned some interesting facts, like: the Port of Oakland was able to take over port dominance from San Francisco because 1) it was the western terminus of the critical railroads, and, 2) it was able to extend the port properties enormously through the good fortune of being the dumping site for all of the soil excavated for the construction of the BART tunnels years ago. And, that the ships that now bring in cargo in 20' containers from everywhere in the world are built large enough to accommodate 8000 in a single shipment. Due to their size, they can no longer move through the Panama Canal! Kinda like the WalMart of shipping. "Giganticism" has taken over the world. It's everywhere; merging corporations, banking systems, information delivery, Costco, WalMart, and now shipping! Every time I catch the sight of that caseload of Costco's toilet tissue that fills my bedroom closet's top shelf -- I have this moment of the giggles. Some folks put their money in stocks and bonds. Mine is in toilet paper!

All-in-all, it was a good day. I spoke my piece about the ugly racial climate of the period. Was surprised to see that these untold stories were, indeed, new information for many in that audience. For some of the obvious gray-haired and balding old Leftists, there were the nods of recognition. But it was quite clear that no one aboard this 3-tiered ferryboat would have considered themselves in any way tainted by such attitudes of racial superiority. These were the Progressives, after all. These were the veterans of the Boilermakers who'd worked to build the ships of the "Good War," and the Longshoremen who live still in the shadow of Harry Bridges who ruled the S.F. Waterfront during the early years of the struggles. These were the machinists and teamsters. Our captain up at the helm was a woman, after all, a proud person in a "non-traditional" role. Surely these were not the offenders. They listened intently and applauded enthusiastically when I finished my presentation; sassy and arrogant though it may have seemed to some.

...but no one appeared to notice that I was the only African American on board. And sixty years have passed since the period of segregation that I spoke of prevailed.

Despite protests to the contrary, one might have cause to wonder just why that is ... .