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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Anybody.... ?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Happy Mother's Day!

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

... and Alexander Calder to the rescue!

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Could be ... .

Noam Chomsky for president? Of course.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Unless ... .

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

What happens if the scars are deeper than I know?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Log jam ... !

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Sanctuary ...

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Thurgood, Cousin George, and me ...

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Visit to the home of Frederick Douglas - 1817-1895 ...

The short time spent viewing a brief film on the life and times of this former slave and great American historic figure filled in more of the history that I share with other African Americans. Douglas's life span mirrors that of Celestine Breaux, my great-great-grandmother and Mammá's mother. We don't have a birthdate for her, but I know that she lived at least into the early 1900s since I have a dated copy of a deposition she gave when Leontine applied for widow's benefits as a surviving spouse of a Civil War veteran.

I continue to be amazed at the accomplishments of that generation of ancestors who rose from 300 years of enslavement to positions of national leadership within a decade of emancipation. It's astounding! We are a heroic people whose history has been so blurred that we have no way to profit by that fact, nor to build on the unbelievably rich achievements of our collective past.

Maybe it was the experience of the visit to the Lincoln Memorial together with my everyday experience of working with the Rosie the Riveter/Home Front National Historical Park that produced new insights. I'm increasingly aware of patterns in the political life of the nation that span time and are reproduced, intermittently, over time. Maybe one has to attain enough years to begin to see those patterns.

Thought of Frederick Douglas's role in the story of Lincoln. Thought of Henry J. Kaiser and his relationship to a particularly controversial quote uttered by the great emancipator in 1862 -- at the height of the War Between the States. These words were written in a letter to Oliver Wendell Holmes:

"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause."

On the flight home I thought of Henry J. Kaiser, the great industrialist, who might have chosen to paraphrase Lincoln's statement to read:

"My paramount object in this war is to save the nation and the world, and is not either to save or destroy social mores that I may find egregious. If I could save the Nation without forcing black and white Americans to share drinking fountains, public accommodations, housing, childcare, or union memberships, I would do it; and if I could save the nation and win the war by softening some barriers and leaving others in place, I would do that. My job is to build ships faster than the enemy can sink them. That I will do. We'll sort out the rest when the work is done."

And he did; seven hundred and forty-seven ships in four years. Some were completed in four days. These words mimicking Lincoln's statement are a fantasy, of course, but may be descriptive of Mr. Kaiser's intent. The record of Kaiser Permanente in subsequent years since World War II would attest to the honorable intentions of that corporation as surely as Mr. Lincoln's future course revealed his compassion for those living troubled lives as dehumanized "property" of others.

Mr. Lincoln's freeing of the slaves lit the fires under the cauldron of social change in an explosion of revolutionary political activism that preceded the tumultuous and cruel period now known as "The Reconstruction." Mr. Kaiser's domination of industrial innovation during World War II provided the next great phase in social development, if only as an unintended consequense. In the Richmond shipyards during those years -- despite the importing of racial segregation from those southern states from which homefront workers were recruited -- the baseline was laid for monumental new social patterns. Until that time the old racist practices -- long legislated into the laws of the land -- had defeated all efforts at solving the crippling problems of racial segregation. As a direct result of his "lighting of the fires under the cauldron of social change" in his time, he accelerated the nation's confrontation with it's shameful past. That history is recalled as The Civil Rights Revolution of the Sixties.

I was recently a guest at the 60th anniversary celebration of the Kaiser Permanente Corporation in Richmond. I was greatly impressed to hear the president of that organization comment during his brief remarks that Kaiser can boast that their workforce -- both administrative and professional -- is now 52% non-white, a clearly representative example of the nation's ever-changing demographics.

President Abraham Lincoln, Mr. Henry J. Kaiser, and Mr. Frederick Douglas would have been proud of how far we've come, though Dr. Martin Luther King and Ms. Fanny Lou Hamer might admonish us for not having come quite far enough, but I'm certain that we're working on it with diligence.

Our developing park will serve to remind us from whence we've come while giving some measure of just how far we still must travel before we sleep ... .

I'm so proud to be a part of that work.

Leave the world for others to tend while I'm off treading the red carpet and look what happens ... .

Found myself wondering today while watching the huge demonstrations all over the country--why on earth those hordes of people--with a great cause to champion--aren't doing their marching and demonstrating in Mexico city under President Vicente Fox's windows, or in El Salvador, or Guatamala -- whatever their country of origin? Perhaps we could help them to pressure their countries to address their needs for gainful employment at home. Then families would be spared the need to be uprooted and risk life and limb digging tunnels and climbing wired fences, braving arid desert crossings and armed vigilantes -- in order to provide cheap labor for exploitative US corporations.

I cannot imagine that it hasn't occurred to anyone that we may be following the wrong path while trying to save so many deserving people from uncertain futures in a fast-changing world economy. "Twelve to twenty million," and counting. What happens when the number is forty million?

Failing that, do you suppose that when the number reaches critical mass -- they could simply vote the new lands back into Mexico by proclamation? It worked in Hawaii where we eventually had enough haule settlers exported into the islands to vote themselves and everybody else -- including the native islanders -- into the Union to become another state. It worked in Alaska where white settlers eventually outnumbered the Aleuts and the Eskimos and the Indians then voted to become another state of the great Union. Couldn't it work the other way? The Alsace-Lorraine voted itself out of France and into Germany at the beginning World War II, did it not? Could not recent arrivals from Mexico simply vote Southern California, Arizona, Texas, and New Mexico back into Mexico -- when their numbers become impossible to manage and immigration reforms fail? After all, those lands were theirs to begin with, right? Are those states not an extension of the Great Sonoran Desert? Why not? Who's working on this one? Hopefully not any of those mindless dudes responsible for recent critical decisions that now threaten world peace as well as the well-being of the planet!

(What global warming?)

I'm told that, unlike the northern border, Mexico's southern border is practically a fortress; almost impossible to penetrate. President Fox has done a fine job protecting his country from illegal immigration from Central and South American refugees seeking to move through Mexico toward the US border. Interesting.

(From this post it's clear that I'm half-in and half-out of the past and half-in and half-out of any reasonable position on the issue. But I'm getting back into gear again, albeit slow-ly... .)

Crazy times!

Photo: This beautiful slab of Italian alabaster (looks much like coral, doesn't it?) is embedded alongside smooth slabs in one of the exterior walls of the Getty Center in the mountains of Los Angeles. The material is comparatively "young" and "raw" with none of the sleekness a few more eons would give it. The colors are muted earth tones. It is a stunning use of natural materials as art.

Early Midwives ...

Introduction

(text taken from brochure)

Beginning in the late 1600s and continuing today, the African American midwives played an important role not only in the birthing care of millions of mothers and babies, but also as keepers of tradition in the provision of general health care, the communication of vital information, and the maintenance of community.

Despite on-going assaults and condemnations from the medical establishment, African African midwives sustained a long uninterrupted history of crucial care giving. Thousands of African American women show up on early 20th century midwife rolls. As recently as 1950, these midwives cared for as many as 50 percent of all black babies born in some southern states. As midwives, these women were much more than birth attendants; they gave extended care as herbalists, helped with domestic chores, took care of children, and provided sick care. Patients and the general public valued a midwife's counsel and advice and respected her as a wise woman and leader in her community.

Over time, however, cultural shifts, medical innovation, regulations, and deliberate efforts to eliminate midwives from the practice of their unique system of birthing care took its toll. Theirs is a lost tradition. What remains is only a fragment of a traditional midwifery system that once was practiced and controlled by black women.

Early Midwives

Even in the midst of drudgery and oppression, African American midwives occupied unique and important positions. Because plantation owners often assigned black midwives to care for white women as well as black women, some midwives exercised a degree of mobility, freedom, and independence usually prohibited under the harsh laws of chattel slavery. Midwives, often known as "doctor," "doctoress," or "nurse," traveled from plantation to plantation and became important channels for communication about personal family matters and for transmitting information to others who were legally restricted from travel. Some enslaved midwives eventually used payment for the midwifery services to buy their freedom.

Following the Civil War, efforts to organize a system to provide health care for blacks fell short. Harsh segregation laws and practices shut blacks out of mainstream medical and nursing schools for more than a century, leaving black communities medically underserved. Yet, in both rural and more urban settings, "granny" or "lay" midwives provided birthing and nursing care for their communities for many years and were regarded as a health care "safety net" by their fellow citizens. Because they viewed their practices as a spiritual calling, they were flexible about receiving payment and often received no money for their services. What mattered to them was doing God's work.

New Rules

Beginning in the 1920s, states heightened their efforts to train, control, and regulate midwives; the long-term goal was to eliminate them. Across the South, new public health programs permanently altered the responsibilities of the traditional midwife. To carry out the new maternal and child health programs, southern states required that midwives be subservient to the local public health system and trained nurses. As federal dollars increased to assist states in reducing maternal and infant mortality rates, Congress channeled support to improve the quaity of medical education. Yet providing opportunities for black women to become professional midwives did not receive similar public support.

The flurry of new rules in the 1920s required midwives to register annually with local health departments, to be subject to inspection of their homes for cleanliness, and to have their moral character assessed by nurses. Midwives could lose their permits if they failed to report to the public health nurse the names of mothers for upcoming births. To attend the birth, the midwife needed to obtain an "o.k." approval slip from a doctor. The midwife bags once under the midwife's control now had to be inspected and approved. Often well-intentioned rules lacked sensitivity to culture and environment.

To survive the new rules, lay midwives acted with creativity and cunning. Never completely abandoning the core of traditional practices, midwives found ways to honor their long held sensibilities and hold on to community traditions under the guise of cooperation. Others simply quit.

All My Babies

A midwife training film produced for the Medical Audio-Visual Institute of the Association of American Medical Colleges and the Georgia Health Department in 1952 is an unparalleled exception to the trend to downgrade midwives. All My Babies: A Midwife's Own Story transmits skills to lay midwives in a respectful way. Named in 2002 to the National Film Registry List (Library of Congress),the film features Albany, Georgia, Midwife Mary Francis Hill Coley (1900-1966) and has traveled as far as India to train midwives. In the film Coley is more than a standard bearer for public health officials; she personifies the care and sensitivity of so many great-grandmothers, grandmothers, aunts, and cousins--midwives who folk say "got us here." She transmits confidence and steadfastness to the mothers she helps.

Trained through apprenticeship in the mid-1930s, Coley helped thousands of birthing mothers in the counties of Doughterty, Lee, Mitchell and Worth, Georgia. Never driving, Coley often walked miles to a birth. "Miss Mary," as the community knew her, also made daily walks back to a mother's home, sometimes for weeks, to assist mothers wtih a myriad of chores including helping with the children, bathing the mother, and changing linen. Whether paid her standard fee of $5.00 (later $10) or not, Coley gave continuously of her services; she was also a Sunday School teacher and served as the President of the Women's Auxiliary in the Church of the Kingdom of God. Prior to the civil rights movement rocking Albany at the end of the 1950s, Coley was a powerful bridge between the white-controlled public health system and the black community. Even amid deeply entrenched segregation, Coley asserted her humanity.

Survivors

By the 1970s, few African American midwives influenced by the traditional system of care remained in practice. In the 1960s and 1970s, black women in the South began turning to obstetrics (the medical field concerned with childbirth), and perhaps inadvertently contributed to the demise of the black traditional midwife. Midwives old enough to recall grandmothers as slaves were few. Yet, they continued telling their stories to daughters and apprentices and in books, exhibits, and new documentary films.

Fortunately for the traditional midwives who survived, a new generation of midwives launched campaigns to celebrate their accomplishments. Organizations such as the International Center for Traditional Childbearing, the Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA), the American College of Nurse Midwives (ACNM), and various schools of midwifery increasingly recognized the importance of traditional African American midwives as keepers of community and practical lore. The challenge remains to translate historical recognition of past midwives into a widespread renewal of African American midwifery--a renewal that sustains traditions and supports family and community care.


Photo: This is our much-loved greatgrandmother, Mammá, whose story is now more complete. Since the visit to the African American Museum in Anacostia (Washington), and seeing the women within whose tradition she so magnificently served, I feel even more closely-bound to her. Seeing her as a "class of women" of her time serves to fleshen out the images I've held for so long. Seeing myself as following her path in my own time and under vastly different circumstances is helpful to understanding myself and my relationship to all that has gone before me. Everyday now I'm acquiring context for the living of my life. This at a time when one would think there would be little left to learn.

Not so, ... surely.

Then came the visit to the Frederick Douglas House. It's hard to realize that he must have been Mammá's contemporary.

Coming down -- gradually ...

It's been over a week since I've written anything ... but when I found myself unable to sit at my computer without bursting into tears -- I figured it was time to start the decompression process. There were moments after I completed the last entry when the thoughts -- the memories -- the emotions were so overwhelming that my breathing had become truncated and my tongue began to stick to my teeth and the sides of my mouth -- and no amount of liquid could satisfy the thirst. Had it not been for the fact that there were enough reasonable explanations for such a state, I would have become a victim of my own vivid imagination and thoughts of diabetes and/or potential stroke surely would have occurred to me. Realization that -- had it not been for the fact that I'd (wisely) decided to take along a "witness" (Kokee), this was the point where I would have begun to erase the experiences from memory and to reject the wonder of the past several days. By this time I'd have settled into what goes as normalcy for me and climbed back into my pumpkin yet another time. But it was not to be. I've lived every minute of the magic -- and it would not be denied back into the "ordinary."


We woke on Wednesday, the day of the award ceremony, with the promise from Martha of another tour of the nation's treasures. Kokee was anxious to see where African Americans lived in the Anacostia area of the District, as was I. Martha arrived ready for another day of sharing our odyssey and off we went. Today we would visit the Frederick Douglas home and the African American Museum, a National Park Service site that was not on the great mall, but had been placed in the core of Anacostia. I'd heard about this area for years but had no idea what to expect. It is a visibly depressed, antiquated and oddly unpopulated area made up of many multi-storied brick housing structures mixed in with ageless bungalows wearing the usual iron bars on windows found so inescapable in black neighborhoods throughout very low income districts; barren trees nude for the winter season. The absence of people on the streets in midday added to the desolation. That felt strange, but might have been explained by the time of the year and the just above freezing temperatures.

We'd already been deeply impressed by the handsome and well-dressed and very professional young African American men and women who serviced the desks and counters at our exclusive Hyatt Grand Washington hotel, and the welcoming and well-informed young African American national park rangers at Arlington House and elsewhere, but we had not yet experienced the black community, as such.

Nothing had prepared me for what the next few minutes would hold. We walked into the African American Museum to find a remarkable exhibit featuring "Reclaiming Midwives; Pillars of Community Support." And with no warning I found myself standing under a photograph of a black slave midwife -- with an astoundingly familiar text that described -- in a formal way -- precisely the story told me to as a child so many years ago -- by Papa George and later by Aunt Vivian -- the description of the life of Mammá in all of the dramatic details that filled in the spaces that my child's mind had missed and my adult mind may have found too painful to absorb.

I found myself speechless; sobbing uncontrollably -- feeling as if this was the reason for all that had happened to me over these past miraculous days -- the rationale for the honors being bestowed, and the trip to the foot of the Lincoln Memorial. Here before me, indeed, were the women who had lived the lives of the unsung, the neglected, and shamefully exploited "Builders of Communities and Dreams."


I finally understood a system that I'd bought into unknowingly from childhood; a destiny I'd been living out without a script. For the first time in my long life I had a feeling of total fulfillment of my destiny. The tears would not stop. I made no attempt to control them. I'm sure that my sobs were audible. At some point a woman (white) tourist quietly approached to gently press a small packet of tissues into my palm. I accepted it without comment. No words were needed. She seemed to know. In that moment there were no spaces between. She then stepped back into her stranger-ness and I into that weird combination of joy and grief and a kind of communing over time and space with a past I'd really never known but in some strange way found familiar. I seemed to be remembering things I'd never experienced.

Taking photos of this show was prohibited for some reason, so I cannot reproduce those texts here, but I will take some of the pictures from the brochure in the hope that I can communicate some of what I found there. It will not surprise me if that turns out to be impossible to reproduce, but over the next days I may find a way to use words well enough to describe the experience. Whatever it was that so moved me has stood in the way of my writing since March 30th. Today is the first attempt at beginning to sort it all out.

Photo: Brochure from the show, and a key component of the great adventure in the shadow of the Great Emancipator.