Been thinking about audacity -- and "speaking only in declarative sentences ...

and realizing that there is some need to re-state context here. There may be readers who haven't the foggiest notion that the voice being expressed here is that of a descendant of a slave great-grandmother -- the loving grandmother who raised my mother and whom I knew into my own adulthood. She, Leontine Breaux Allen, was born in 1846 and died in 1948 -- in her 102nd year. At the time of her death I was 27 years-old and the mother of 3 of what would become my family of 4 children. My mother, Lottie Allen Charbonnet, lived from 1894 until 1995, after celebrating her 101st birthday. I will celebrate my own active still productive 84 years on the planet in September of this year. We've, collectively, seen an awful lot of life. For me slavery, Jim Crow, blatant racism, are not abstractions -- but major influences in the life filled with the effects of this country's greatest unfulfilled promises. These pages may be a statement of what the costs to the spirit may have been, but I cannot be the judge of that. You must be.

But -- I do get to speak in declarative sentences!

I make no pretense at objectivity nor do I make any attempt at bending truth to serve some prescribed goals. There's no one left to impress. I've outlived all of the naysayers in my life and can speak freely without fear of retribution or loss of status in the family or in the greater society.

The experiences here have been highly colored by the events lived as a black woman in a world twisted by racism and political expediency. Having survived all of that through the powers of disassociation, I suppose, in these later years I find myself still sitting on a reservoir of justifiable anger, but with the ability to stand outside myself and witness my own process. That's come with age and no small amount of quiet self-confidence, fiercely fought for and eventually won. That's taken a long lifetime, some pain and, at times, tragic heartbreak. But as the song says, "I'm still here!"

Hopefully, there are lessons here to my progeny to add to those of our ancestors who've trodden these boards before I entered stage left in 1921. Having lived at a time bracketed by slavery, Jim Crow, the Great Depression, World War II, the smug Fifties and the turbulent Sixties of the Civil Rights revolution -- the assassinations of two Kennedys and one King, on into the Human Potential Movement of the 70-80s and beyond into the crossing into another century and the Information Age -- I get to leave my own roadmap through that wilderness into the now. I lived all of those periods as an open vessel; deeply and with passion.

No life has been identical to mine.

No other lives have been identical to anyone else's.

We're one-of-a-kind people, each with a story worth telling.

These writings are simply a record of time as I lived it, or, at least as read by the events that drew me in and shaped the world in which I move.

So saying ... she wrote on ... .


Photo: My mother, Lottie Allen Charbonnet, at the age of 95 dancing at a luau on a holiday in Hawaii. A few weeks after my father, Dorson Louis Charbonnet, died -- we sent her off-shore for the first time in her life to see the world. She'd spent many years caretaking and it was time. A niece, Victoria Balugo Jones, accompanied her on the great adventure. This was a far cry from Welcome Post Office, St. James Parish, Louisiana! She lived another 6 years. This is surely a fine example of the irrepressible Creole spirit.

Mysterious workings of the mind ...

I'm utterly fascinated by what happens when the mind is free and unencumbered by the need to be objective or even fair. That last post reached far back into the subconscious to dredge up thoughts long-thought dead or at least consigned to the memory box marked "insignificant."

Not needing as much sleep as when I was younger, I've gotten into the habit of setting my little bedside radio to Air America and dropping off at some point without turning it off. I'm sure that my mind continues to pick up words and phrases long after real consciousness has settled on "dim." It was probably for this reason that I wasn't aware until last night that yesterday was the anniversary of the Ohio National Guard's attack on the student demonstrators at Kent State that resulted in death for several. I must surely have heard some reference to that during the night before. This would surely account for the mindset when I wrote the last entry.

The reason being that -- on the summer following that awful event in Ohio -- I (and co-incidentally, my son, Bob) spent a week at mountain campgrounds in Colorado Springs with the Intercontinental Conference of several hundred Liberal Religious Youth; a group largely sprinkled with members of the SDS. A number of those college students had been involved in the demonstrations at Kent State. Bob and I met without being aware that I'd been invited as one of five workshop leaders from the artist community. He'd arrived from the Monterey Peninsula where he'd been visiting with our mutual friend, poet, Ric Masten and his family. Ric had also been invited to lead a workshop. It was a week I'll never forget. I felt privileged then. I feel privileged still to have been included in the history being made by the youth of the time. Though I must admit to some feeling of awkwardness around my having spilled over from my own generation into that of my teenaged son. I can recall the embarrassment that I felt when we discovered one another in the crowd on that first evening. We've never really discussed it. We shared the same convictions about the anti-war movement, and had certainly collided at other times while acting upon them. Perhaps this was no different, but I wonder now in looking back.

The meeting was held at Colorado Springs because it was the site of a major speech by President Richard Nixon, and the students were planning disruptive demonstrations and acts of civil disobedience at the Air Force Academy where that speech would be delivered. We were in the thick of the Vietnam War, and protests were mounting. These student activists were battle weary from having also been in the bloody street struggles against the Chicago police -- struggles that resulted in the arrest of the Chicago 8 and the wildly theatrical trials that followed. This was the Chicago National Democratic Convention during the summer before the spring of the Kent State's tragedy.

Those stirring 'roun the campfire conversations were heavily sprinkled with references to the Illuminati, the Skull & Bones Society, the annual arcane Bohemian Grove celebrations, the Tri-lateral Commission, etc., and had not yet reached the time when the Evangelical Southern Baptist takeover of the Republican party or the domestic terrorism from the Far Right -- before the smoldering hate-inspired militia movement had come into being. This was long before Iran-Contra, the Salvadoran-Guatamalan or Nicaraguan takeovers, the assassination of Allende in Chile, or the invasion of Panama to seize Manuel Noriega, and Watergate. This was long before Timothy McVey and the bombing of the federal building in Tulsa. It was before disaffected militarily-trained young white Nazis had surfaced in numbers large enough to cause concern. And this was long before September 11th, and the changing face of terrorism to that of the middle easterner.

Yesterday's post was heavily laced with Vietnam era paranoia, admittedly. But it may be speaking to a time when the seeds were being planted for all that has followed. Perhaps it was this that my active mind was trying to weave together into some kind of logical pattern ... I don't know. I'm aware of the continuum, the clear progression from then to now.

What is clear is that nothing is wasted. Experiences long dormant continue to claim their portion of the cortex and can wreak havoc if not recognized for what they are. Sometimes they're cautionary and, at some subconscious level, move us back from the edges where danger lurks. Sometimes they distort meanings and create disembodied fear that can't be identified or related to anything or anyone with reasonable accuracy, but account for edginess and sadness that defies understanding. Strange ... .

This morning I heard a long discussion on Democracy Now about the takeover of the Republican party by the Christian Evangelical Movement. The voices were those of two members of the protestant clergy; religious conservatives who share the concerns of the rest of us about the power being wielded by the forces now controlling the legislative process. I began to realize how intertwined were my thoughts yesterday with those being expressed this morning. There is a relationship that I haven't quite figured out yet, but I will. It's all of a piece.

The return to power of the cast of characters who brought us the Central and South American undeclared wars and the Iran-Contra scandals is frightening. The coming together of the names that figured so heavily in times past with the awful events of the present is sobering. To see Watergate figures now popping up as pundits (Liddy, North, etc) is more than disconcerting; it's ludicrous! To have Wolfowitz, Negreponte, Ashcroft, Rumsfeld, now buffered by the likes of Zel Miller, Frist and DeLay et al has got to be upsetting to those of us who've lived through the previous crimes and realize that there isn't the time for us to do it all over again. To watch the effects of their work upon a nation's electorate who has either forgotten or has never known this history that we're now re-living is the most troubling of all.

The new coalitions formed for the purpose of deconstructing this government's processes and procedures -- including the Constitution and Bill of Rights -- threatens our continuing existence as a nation. They have the power to destroy the underpinnings of democracy, itself, robbing the world of one of the most successful models for governance in modern history. We now sit at the pinnacle of that power -- and its misuse is catastrophic under present leadership.

I'll probably spend lots of drive time trying to figure out the code; the mind-messages that may make sense of what's spewing from my fingertips ... matching some of what is stored in muscle memory to those wisps of thoughts that defy logic and solutions -- but that stubbornly refuse to die.

...and though I'm tempted to delete yesterday's writings, I choose rather to let it stand and try to understand it against the background of what the next few weeks will bring. I'm beginning to look for the prophetic in the mundane ... an intriguing pastime that waxes and wanes as my personal life becomes more or less complex. This involuntary re-playing of old tapes that have been archived somewhere in memory will continue to spillover into the now, I suspect. The fight to not get blindsided by them may become more and more critical as the years pile on and fears of approaching dementia begin to stir. I find myself wondering about the inevitability of that -- as do most who've lived into these advanced years.

So far that fear amounts to little more than, "...now where in hell did I leave my keys?"

As I said, it appears that little is ever wasted.

There it was, hiding behind that Paul Miller entry ...

The thing that's been troubling me for a very long time. It has to do with education in the abstract; what's happened to it, and of what that foretells about the future. Maybe what we have here is one of those assessments only available to those of us who've lived long enough to begin to connect the dots. Wonder if anyone will listen...? Those younger are busy creating those dots, which is as it should be, maybe.

If we really do understand that the nation's takeover began many years ago in a successful campaign that only now is unfolding in such broad strokes that few can deny its existence. If we now understand that it was a bold 30-year conspiracy with many players and hidden networks that became cross-generational and international. To this Fox Network-defiled mind, I've begun to see the Bohemian Grove gathering, the Tri-Lateral Commission, the Illuminati, and the Skull and Bones as one huge centuries-spanning conspiracy with a single common denominator -- white European descendant males! How's that for paranoia? Suddenly everything I've ever heard about such conspiratorial enterprises has melded into one giant mosiac with no international boundaries and a single goal; world domination by any means necessary.

The problem foreseen by the white elite in this country -- the singlemost powerful on the planet -- was that it was fast becoming one in which the European ruling class would be soon replaced by a society in which majority status would be lost to the "unwashed." It was only a matter of time. At least three irreversible factors were operating. Each spelled the eventual elimination of white dominance. One was the burgeoning immigration of Third World peoples flooding our shores and crossing our borders; another was dreaded mescegination, and the third was the birth of equal opportunity for non-whites in education and in the promise of access to the workplace. All threatened the continuance of white dominance. The militias and super-Christian preservationists were ham-fisted in their response to what they saw as a "white holocaust," while those in positions of unprecedented wealth and political power were clever and brilliantly manipulative with the ability to set in motion long range remedies to the threatened loss of control of the nation and, ultimately, the world. Control of the earth's resources was unquestionably the key; and for the moment, petroleum is king.

In this country, I was first aware of the assault upon public instruction under the administration of Ronald Reagan who gave the first signs by the attempt to abolish the Office of Education. Someone foresaw empowerment of the underclass as threatening to the existing political power structure. We, the people, should have seen it coming. But we felt protected by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, didn't we, without fear that these institutional powers could ever be eroded from within. How foolishly trusting. How naive, as time would soon prove.

The Right To Life movement never targeted black or brown abortion clinics as far as I know, in fact, many black women on welfare were undergoing mandatory tubal ligations at a time when Planned Parenthood was in constant threat of outright assassinations and bombings. Those most active among the Right to Lifers were and are white males, if you'll notice. White women are being forced to carry to term those precious little lives that will be sorely needed in the struggle to continue world dominance while black and brown babies are facing lifetimes of poverty and starvation from societal negligence. White women are being seen as little more than incubators for the next generation of rulers. It's a frightening step back into history to a time when women were little more than powerless possessions in a male-dominated world of empire builders. To their credit, many women are working hard to save themselves from such a fate. The current attempts at seating anti-abortion federal judges signals a reversal of Roe v. Wade and a return to women as chattel -- or to an American version of a pschological wearing of the burkah.

It matters little how multiracial or multicultural this nation becomes, the white "majority" will continue to see power to rule as its rightful legacy, and all others as less than equal by right of inheritance from the founding slave-owner fathers. They've created God in their own image and claim rights to all that flows from their creation. It's a complete bastardization of Christianity. And -- it's a cynical misuse of teachings that should have continued to nurture peace and love in the world for at least another half-century.

Thirty years out we're seeing massive disenfranchisement of non-white voters, funneling of young non-whites into the armed forces by virtue of lack of opportunity in the country's economic system; one in 3 black or brown men living behind bars in the greatest incarceration rates in the nation's history; the closing of the doors to higher education by pricing it beyond the reach of all but the offspring of the elite, and, by deconstruction of the system of public education that insures that only the elite will be capable of ruling. Many Black and Brown youngsters are winnowed out of the system through tracking by the time they reach upper middle school. In the state of California 49% of Black and Brown students drop out by the tenth grade. Despite desparate attempts at salvation by many highly motivated teachers and administrators, they're already lost to the deadly competitive underground economy fueled by drugs, untargeted rage, resulting in senseless death on the streets. They're as often as not slain by little more than ignorance and/or lack of opportunity for anything resembling the good life.

I strongly believe that the deconstruction of the nation's public schools in favor of privatization has guaranteed that white dominance will be assured throughout most of the next 50 years, at least, unless those proverbial dots begin to come together in ways that the mainstream can see their meanings and begin to stop the cabal in its tracks. The privatization of prisons has turned them into schools for crime and people banks in which to deposit all those we've failed to educate or socialize into the mainstream.

The battle over illegal immigration at our southern borders while no attention is paid to the northern borders is clear evidence that there's a major skin color problem here. Why are not the Minute Men militias gathering along the Canadian border?

I have a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that suggests that -- down deep -- I'm already convinced that it's too late to stop the juggernaut. There are so many fronts to be fought on simultaneously that the chance of winning back the country seems slight, indeed. Do we hit the streets to stop the war? Which war? Is there a chance in hell that joining the next march to Sacramento to challenge a corrupt governor's school budget cuts will make a difference? What about dealing with the micro? Is the macro simply too huge to take on without first creating enough man- and womanpower to assure success? And what will be the cost of waiting for some right time?

I don't have nearly enough understanding of the worldwide implications of what I seem to be culling from the almost hourly barrage of incoming news reports, but it's more and more difficult to find a local response to events that are so far beyond me. The temptation is to allow my mind to go numb and busy myself with what I can manage -- like can I really afford to continue to run my car on gasoline that's now hit $2.67/gallon? Or, why on earth did that wild-eyed young woman flee from her impending wedding? And, will West Wing and Judging Amy continue into the fall season and what on earth will happen to poor weird embattled Michael Jackson? And, will that obviously mentally-challenged young female soldier at Abu Graib really be forced to take the fall for higher ups who surely are culpable for the inhuman torture of prisoners? ...and why are there not women in the streets in protest?

Is the answer continuing to work through MoveOn and People for the American Way and reading TruthOut and Alternet, continuing to support the Southern Poverty Law Center and the ACLU? Watching for signs of other like-minded folks to link to in order to continue to mount the challenge that may turn things back on course? Do I keep drawing spiritual sustenance from those whom I continue to admire as the selfless heroes who still have the power to stop us in our tracks by their courage and derring-do? There are those stalwarts like Medea Benjamin of Code Pink, and Pacifica's Amy Goodman, attorney and political activist Van Jones; cartoonist, Aaron Magruder; Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky who is using the arts to create revolution; columnists, NY Times' Frank Rich and the Berkeley Daily Planet's Jesse Douglas Allen-Taylor whose incisive writings stir action in others? They've all learned to magnify their voices through their ability to inspire others.

Sounds pretty depressing, right? I know. It all feels so hopeless -- and my inability to watch the smirky arrogant faces of Carl Rove, George W. Bush, Rumsfeld, et al, is beginning to rob me of any sense of control. How on earth can I find any pathways toward action if I can't even bring myself to see or listen to the voices that are ruling the day? They've seized the media and rule the legislative process by blurring the lines between all avenues to power.

Perhaps the answer is to take another drive out into the wildflowers bursting into bloom along the creekbeds and leave world-saving to those better equipped to deal with it... .

Maybe I just need a shot of whatever-it-is-that-deadens pain... .

Maybe I've earned that right.

Perhaps that's the privilege of age, and has always been. Recognition that the work will never be done before it's time to leave is -- maybe -- what creates the grand design of civilization by leaving tracks to follow and then making a timely stage exit into the unknown. None of us gets to ring down the final curtain or declare the game over ...

unless ...

we've been convinced of the certainty of and the need to work diligently to fulfill a biblical prophecy known as -- "The Rapture" --, or,

can control the dropping of the next nuclear bomb.


And when did I earn the right to speak only in declarative sentences? When I crossed the Rubicon of Old Ladydom and ...

if I can't do it now -- then when?

DJ Spooky AKA Paul Miller, an encore ...

Miller was the subject of an NPR interview with Michael Krasner this morning. Happened to catch it just as it was beginning and was again struck by the sheer brilliance of this young intellectual. Arrived at my destination before the program ended and sat in my car to hear it out. Discovered that he's on the faculty of the European University in Switzerland; that he has just released a new compact disc; and that he is appearing at Stanford this week, and elsewhere in San Francisco. His writings are profound and his influences about as eclectic as any I've ever known. He quotes from Robert Frost, Marcel Duchamp, Marshall McLuhan, Fifty Cent and Coltrane and the Beatles without pausing for breath. His is an amazing grasp of modern culture, and his use of metaphor is astounding.

It's been a while since I've visited his web site but I plan to do so just as soon as I figure out whether or not I'm up to understanding his use of language and the complexity of his ideas. It's not unlike those evenings of listening to Bill's friends from the university spouting emerging theories of physics or the esoterica of Tibetan Buddhist practices. I hear Miller with the same excitement that I felt then, the excitement that comes with discovery. It's not that he uses jargon or idiomatic speech. It's that there's a weakening grasp on my own language in a rapidly-changing world. His is the language of twenty years from now. Mine is from yesterday. I didn't imagine that I would ever need another.

I've not seen him picked by Charlie Rose yet up for an evening around that table, but expect to soon. This is the undisputed voice of the future.

Mark these words.

Great tour ... next stop the Galapagos Islands ...

Beautiful day on San Francisco Bay. The Delphinus (the Dolphin) was a sleek small boat that plies the waters on guided tours of the Pacific from Alaska to the Galapagos, year round. And what wouldn't I give for that trip to the magical land of the great stone heads, monstrous sea turtles, and wildlife found nowhere else on earth? Ronn Patterson, our skipper and owner of the charter service turned out to be a fascinating man who is an expert on whales. Look him up on the net. His resume is amazing. Sitting right behind him watching him expertly cut through the waters of what turned out to be a very shallow bay (12 feet for the most part with some places no more than five) was great. The channel deepeners are at work constantly keeping the lanes open for sailing. Listening in on his conversations with other guests made me want to sign up for the next trip. Maybe I could get used to the retirement thing, if I could spend the time traveling with these folks. Maybe that's for the second half of Octogenaria.

Among the guests was Steve Gilford, historian, author, filmmaker, with a long list of fine publications about Kaiser Permanente and the work of Henry J. We'd met before when I was working with the National Park Service last winter on that brief consultancy. It was Steve who did the research that turned up the fact that Kaiser had built and launched 17 ships, nationwide, that were named for African Americans of note. Three of those were built here in Richmond, the S.S. Robert S. Abbott, publisher of the Chicago Defender; the S.S. John Hope, a nationally-known educator; and the S.S. George Washington Carver.

In a free moment last November -- while eating a bagel I happened upon a log of the Kaiser launchings in the archives. In so doing, I discovered that there were actually several more that had escaped Gilford's scrutiny. There were three named for historically black colleges -- Fisk, Talledega, and Xavier. In addition I made the most exciting discovery -- that here in Richmond, at a time when racial segregation was for me a tragic and dismal fact of life, there was a ship named for the legendary black hero, Toussaint L'Overture -- the brilliant military strategist who, at the end of the 18th century led his people in a struggle that wrested Haiti from the control of the French in a bloody revolution. He was known as the black Napoleon. Oh to have been in the room when that decision was made! And where are the archives that would hold the documentation for that decision? What an intriguing story to explore, right?

I sent Gilford the new information so that he might add it to his research. I wondered how he'd missed it, and were there others that I'd missed? Then it dawned. Just as I had no knowledge of at least half of those named on his list because they were obviously named by whites and little known among western blacks, he would not have known some of those so honored because he was not black. For him those three colleges could easily escape notice, and unless one had some familiarity with Haitian history -- L'Ouverture also might easily be overlooked.

We'd not seen one another since that exchange of emails, so the chance to chat was a wonderful gift. We had a long talk over a picnic lunch at the end of the bay tour, and I learned a lot about Henry J. Kaiser that I'd not known previously.

Someone earlier in the day had asked whether I thought that Henry J was a racist? My answer was "no." He was an industrialist charged with the building of a great fleet of ships in order to fight a cruel war that threatened us all. He was not charged with conducting a social experiment. Much of what he created in the process brought enormous social change and altered lifelong attitudes -- and probably contributed to the Civil Rights struggles of the Sixties, but that was incidental to ship-building. He needed hands -- any kinds of hands -- and there wasn't the time or the energy to change public policy or to legislate morality during the course of the war. He took many thousands of poor people from the southern states who hadn't yet shared drinking fountains, restrooms, lunch counters, or cemetary space -- brought them to Richmond by any means possible, and molded them into a virtual army of homefront workers who met the goals of turning out a completed sea-ready ship every 4-5 days, over 700 in all. Had we not been totally consumed by working around the clock in a kind of perpetual motion machine to supply the needs of the South Pacific, we might have killed each other!

I was working in that Jim Crow union hall filing cards at a time that has since been romanticized as the time when those on the home front set aside their racism for the good of the nation. Not so. There were lessons to be learned then as there are now, and only by being honest about where we've been and what we've lived can we begin to realize the promises of this nation or make democracy worthy of exportation to others. The fact that African Americans were working, fighting, and dying in defense of rights we would not realize for another 20 years must never be forgotten. That fact lifts the level of our patriotism ever higher, and places even greater demands for some expression of appreciation for debts unpaid for far too long. It was not only the Civil War that needs that conversation about reparations. There is the granting of psychological "reparations" from WWII that may hold the key to the nation's eventual gaining of racial peace and harmony. I can judge this by the close-to-the-surface anger that still rises when I remember. Most of those memories are dying now, with those who lived them. Perhaps this new park will become the repository for the entire untold story -- the story that will keep us aware of the great human drama that was lived out here and that provided the impetus for the great social movements that played out in Selma, Montgomery, at the Lincoln Memorial when Dr. King stirred the nation's conscience, and that changed history.

Maybe that fact, alone, is justification for finally accepting the designation of being a "Rosie." I'm one of the carriers of that history, and this alone may be the real reason why spending this last part of my work life with the Park Service is important. Maybe such conversations in a natural setting without microphones or portfolios are far more important than might appear on the surface.

While representing the state I'd participated in several of the planning sessions with historians, architechs, engineers, designers, and park staff from other parts of the country. This was during the earliest stages of envisioning the completed Rosie the Riveter national park and moving it toward its eventual formation. My voice (small though it may be) has already helped to shape some of the attitudinal stuff -- break the stereotypes, and less in formal pronouncements or diatribes over race relations than casually over bagels and apple danishes shared during breaks.

Maybe this is one of the ways that the world gets changed, ultimately ... in tiny increments in many places by ordinary people like me -- being what we want to see in the world.

Maybe it's a bit more than simply having known Mable Kuss.

... and I'm sure it is on my more confident days.

Finally, a reprieve from idleness:

Okay, I know what the book says. Little ole ladies are essentially fit for little more than bridge, church socials, and the occasional book club outing. Grandmothering is supposed to be all consuming, and (for those of us still in control of our wits) social activism should be carefully assigned by the deacon and should involve little more than cookie baking with the girl scouts and/or collecting recipes for the church fundraiser. Not so. There are still a few of us stubborn old women who insist upon staying in there until a suitable replacement turns up and takes over. Some of us may be carrying around talents and abilities not so easily replicated, and in such cases, opting out simply isn't an option. Yes, I'm one of those. I knew Mable Kuss!

A couple of weeks ago there was a call from Elizabeth, Park Ranger at the Rosie the Riveter Historic National Park. She was calling to invite me to attend a social event being planned for tomorrow that would involve the volunteers from four newly-combined national parks in the area; John Muir in Martinez, Port Chicago in Concord, Eugene O'Neill's Tao House in Alamo, and Rosie the Riveter Historical National Park in Richmond.

In an interesting move after the recent retirement of the former park superintendent, the National Park Service chose to bring together under a single adminstrative staff, all four parks largely for economic reasons, I'm sure. Three of those posts most certainly require extensive educational backgrounds in curating, interpretation, and fiscal policy. The fourth will be a people position, one requiring knowledge of and experience in the social/cultural life of the area. It is called community outreach, I believe. Guess who?


On Sunday, we'd attended a concert hosted by the city of Richmond and featuring the East Bay Symphony orchestra under the baton of Maestro Michael Morgan. During the reception that followed (it was the opening event for the city's centennial year celebration), we chatted for a few minutes with the new acting park superintendent. It brought to mind the fact that -- already in motion -- were our plans to visit Tao House on Tuesday. (Do you see how my life serendipitously has these periods when I'm acting on information not yet received?)

By coincidence, Tom and I drove out to Alamo on Tuesday to visit Tao House -- for no particular reason. About a week before I'd suggested that we might enjoy this as our next field trip (we've been doing a lot of touring of interesting local historical sites of late). I'd been busily chatting as we drove.

When our family lived in the rural Diablo Valley during the period before it became heavily populated suburbs, Tao House was that lovely isolated stand-alone estate that we could see from the Danville Highway. We knew that the celebrated but reclusive author, Eugene O'Neill lived there but no one ever saw him. The O'Neill family name appeared nowhere -- but the house sat highly visible about midway up the slope on the edge of the heavily wooded Las Trampas area in the foothills. We'd heard that Erskine Caldwell (Tobacco Road and God's Little Acre) lived in Orinda (never quite sure this was true). He never turned up in our circles, either.

What we did know was that on Wayne Avenue -- in the flatlands below Tao House -- lived my husband's parents. There were fewer than a dozen sprawling one-story ranch homes, each surrounded by open lands, orchards, or truck gardens. Tom and Reba Reid kept a couple of horses and the extended family held the annual Fourth of July picnic on their grounds. We could look up and see high in the distance, Tao House.

Then there was Mabel Kuss. She was from a pioneer family whose home was halfway up the foothills and may have been the only one within walking distance of Tao House. She was also a member of the Unitarian-Universalist fellowship that we were deeply involved in. I'm certain that Mabel would have known the O'Neills and/or their daughters. Mabel was elderly (perhaps the age that I am now) at the time that I was a young wife and mother. She was a lovely woman with a serenity that I can recall still when I close my eyes.

On Tuesday when scanning the road maps in preparation for our trip to Tao House, there it was. The street leading up to that monument bears the name, Kuss Lane. I've lived long enough now so that those I knew intimately have been memorialized in the signage. No honor could be more fitting in this case. Mabel was much-loved.

Driving along in what was now completely unfamiliar territory, it was almost impossible to tell when one small town started or ended. The orchards had been replaced long ago by lovely homes and tasteful retail businesses blended carefully into the landscape. I almost drove past Wayne Avenue (The Reids had lost their home tragically in a fire years ago) and wouldn't have recognized anything, anyway. We turned up Del Amigo on our way to Tao House only to be stopped by a mechanized gate partway up the hill before we reached Mabel's old home. We could go no further as residents of the area pressed their remotes and moved past us to the access road into the main streets as we clung to the side of the road so that they might pass. Tao House now sits in a gated community. One can only visit by appointment and such visits are limited to 3-4 per day and can only be arranged for by being picked up in Danville by a park van for the trip to the site. It seemed curious that a publicly-owned national historic park monument would have such restrictions, but in some ways it seems a continuation of the legacy of reclusiveness that had shielded O'Neill's life and home from prying eyes and ears. In a small way it fit nicely the sense of mystery that was a part of Tao House.

Which brings us to yesterday when I drove out to the Rosie office on the Richmond marina after a reminder call from Elizabeth -- to pick up a detailed map telling us where we're to meet for tomorrow's bay cruise from the Berkeley Marina. In a brief chat I was able to ask her my questions about Tao House (she'd visited earlier in the day) and in the process learned that (according to Elizabeth) there were job openings under the reorganization and that my name had come up during the discussions but that staff was under the impression that I'd accepted another position and was not available. "Howard is in his office now. Do come in and see him, Betty." Which led to the conversation with the new park superintendent that ended with him saying, "...I'll send you the information packet right away, Betty."

During the conversation, it was clear that three of the new positions will require extensive education and training within the national park system, as well as experience. The fourth is something quite different. The community relations job would draw upon my experience as a field representative for the state of California over the past years; a time when I worked in almost all of the geographic areas in which these four parks are situated. In addition, I now have the experience of the two-month contract fulfilled with the park system last winter, serving in the same capacity, and for which I received the best evaluation of my entire career.

But beyond all that, I'm the only person who remembers Mable Kuss! Or, who knew Tao House when the author lived there. Or, who wrote an article on a memory of the tragic explosion of the munitions at Port Chicago for the Berkeley Daily Planet last fall. But now I need to bone up on John Muir whom I didn't know, but I can fake it. (Okay, so I'm just not quite that old!)

Tomorrow we'll take the Bay cruise with the 4-park volunteer group, and I'll get a chance to visit with the national park service staff again.

The Delphinus is described as a large, two decked, white vessel (32 guests expected), and is ordinarily chartered by small groups for trips up to Alaska. We'll tour the entire Rosie the Riveter park with a view from the water for the first time (for me), visit the Rosie Museum Collection, stop and board the Red Oak Victory (ship being lovingly restored by some who served aboard her in WWII), then back to the Berkeley Marina for a 1 o'clock lunch.

And, maybe, just maybe -- when the decisions are made and the new hiring begins (within the next few weeks, I presume) -- I'll be back in the thick of life using up and transforming old time into new.

That's as it should be, I think.

I'm beginning to believe that I've stumbled onto the formula for living that works for me. With no sense of being driven or denial of aging or awareness of diminishing power -- I quite naturally continue to bend into the winds of change, intuitively, with neither compass nor map in a kind of effortless dance -- and at times get out of sequence with events because it's all so organic.

Wouldn't it be great if I could use this whatever-it-is to read the stock market or to predict whether the country will survive the present administration through the next election cycle?

Arrrrggghhh!!!

Today the grim truth dawned. As certain as the fact that the planet is now firmly on the path of global warming -- I will outlive my hair! Since there is every indication that I (barring being hit by that proverbial truck) will live at least another ten or so years, that will be about 7 years longer than my hair will be with me. By the time I reach the next milestone on this road of life, I should resemble a 5'3" caramel-colored Michael Jordan; a whole lot shorter but just a tad prettier than he. Why did I not know that the hair supply is finite; that there are just so many strands to a customer?

What with the boomers coming up so fast around us now, shouldn't I be putting some money into wigmaking enterprises? Could make a killing, maybe, but I may not have the smarts to count my winnings by that time ... .

Felt an attack of terminal female vanity rising as I realized that having my crowning glory back sits right up there with my wish for world peace!

...at least that's the way it looks this morning.

But this afternoon I'll join others in a demonstration at the Federal Building in downtown Oakland; in protest of the attempt to eliminate the filibuster and to seat those appalling federal judges in the continuing drive of the Right to take over the country and the world. While there I just might look around and see how many of my contemporaries are hair-challenged and just how they're handling it.

Maybe great hats are the answer. In the immortal words of Stephen Sondheim, "...does anyone still wear a hat?"


Photo: It's occurred to me that -- it matters not at what point in which decade I've been photographed, my hair was simply caught back in a clip at the nape -- with little attempt at being fashionable. There must be a message someplace, but I'm not sure what it is. This was taken in 1974, or thereabouts.

There's an old blues song by Bobby Blue Bland ...

named, "Age ain't nuthin' but a numba." I think's that's about right. I've never been able to guess anyone's age. My mother lived to be a still flirtatious 101 and enjoyed almost every minute of it, partly because of her personality and her lifelong naivete. She was still quite lovely to look at 95, small-boned and slightly built with a feminine soft roundness; always nicely dressed with hat and gloves as she went tripping downtown on the bus every Saturday afternoon to window shop and browse the sales (especially lingerie) -- and in 3 inch heels, to boot. Having that as a model of aging while mothering a mentally-retarded daughter who is a perennial teenager really bolluxes up the works. I lose all sense of what is or is not age-appropriate. I suppose it's all in the genes and/or one's consciousness. Have never obsessed over fleeting youth; having never really felt old. Really didn't begin to notice wrinkles and age spots until the past year or so. I hate my thinning hair, but love the dusting of white just now beginning to appear around the edges of my face.

Except for the fact that my wardrobe grows less and less age appropriate, it still works. I've always loved to wear "art" and "ethnic" and such pieces rarely grow out of fashion. Almost everything in my closets has been hanging for 25-30 years. There is little change in my height and weight since high school, still 5'3" and 127 pounds dripping wet, so it's been easy to simply grow past the age of acquisition and to continue to savor beautiful purchases all with connecting memories. I have dresses from Morocco and Egypt -- batiks from Thailand, silk brocades from Japan -- mostly gifts from Bill from long ago brought back from his travels to faraway places. There are lovely garments sent from Rewalser in the Himalayas by my friend, Lama Wangdor -- a cave dweller refugee from Llasa, and all garments once belonging to his mother. He brought them out when he fled the Chinese Invasion long ago. Brought them out with precious dzi stones sewn into their seams for safe passage through the mails. My jewelry is almost all antique with stories attached that stir dreams still vibrant; a beautiful chunky widow's bracelet of silver and ivory, and pendants of coral and turquoise purchased right from the neck of a Tibetan woman Bill met in a marketplace high up in Lahdak on the edge of Tibet in 1985 or thereabouts. There is the magnificent sherpa's choker -- silver overlaying some kind of black wood, so old and well-loved that the silver is worn thin or through in some places -- enough to cause me to wonder upon whose throat it had once rested and how long ago... and had it seen Everest...?

My kids grew into being my contemporaries at around the age of thirty, I think. From then on it was a case of sharing the search for the promises of maturity; my having never identified quite what that was.

Because of a deceptively youthful appearance, the men I tended to attract over the years were almost always far younger then I. But age usually reared it's ugly head right in the middle of such potential romances upon the realization that experience counts for an awful lot, and that young men lacked the essential life experience that adds to the wholeness of a person. Now, a "younger man" for me must be over 70 in order to meet the criteria for a meaningful relationship. The man that I married (the second time) was 7 years older and more than capable of keeping me envious and ever reaching for understanding of all that he knew ... .

I suppose what makes this post relevant would be the fact that it took at least 70 years to even begin to fully understand what it was that I needed for a sense of completion, and of how much of that was physical, emotional, or even available from outside of myself.

I'll bet Susan Sontag would understand what I'm talking about. Always wanted to share a cup of tea with that lady, but now it's too late ... .

Indeed, "age ain't nuthin' but a numba," and that numba becomes less and less relevant as the years pile on.

Photo: Beautiful very old ivory widow's bracelet Bill brought back to me from one of his Himilayan trips. The necklace is made of dzi stones from Tibet -- gifts from Lama Wangdor of Rewalser, India.

Okay, so I waited so long that I got busted!

Dorian's case manager called this morning to learn just why that call had never been made. She was doing followup as all good case managers should -- but suddenly I was in tears! All of the resistance that got bottled up behind my eyes now spilled in a non-stop rush of self-pity. How could we be asked to do this again, after all these years? Hadn't I lived out this separation many years ago, and why on earth should those aches be still so fresh and renewable as if I'd sent her away for the first time only yesterday?

It was obvious that this professional understood. I owned up to having "lost" that critical phone number and that I'd done nothing about investigating the new home, and she went on as though I'd said nothing -- as if this was not a new situation at all for her -- and that we would surely grow beyond the setback. It felt better. After some questions from me and answers from her to re-acquaint me with this housing opportunity, I was back in the saddle and ready to take some notes and make the calls.

What I learned this morning may have been what touched off my attack of resistance in the first place. The group home being recommended was situated in an area of the city that I know well from my work as a state representative. It has a somewhat dark reputation for safety and was isolated. The home was one for seniors so would be less than ideal for Dorian and her level of abilities and interests. She's interested in competitive athletics and visual arts and is used to more freedoms than I'm guessing she would have in a privately-operated group home. Maybe that's what sent me into limbo ... .This time I heard the words fully and my resistant had now found a home. My reactions had been instinctive, but now I realized that they have some foundation in reality.

If we're going to think of her next home as one where she would be living with elders rather than people more in keeping with her mental age (something I guess I've tried to give her), then some re-thinking needed to occur. She's far more like an late adolescent than an elder. There has obviously been significant growth over time. At one time she was far more like a child. Haven't given that much thought until now. I have no idea how she would be affected by being suddenly tossed into the life of a senior without having had the time to grow herself through mid-life. Maybe the system is not designed in ways that can allow for an orderly progression through time for the retarded. Maybe the system has to skip necessarily over this in its need to provide the best for the many and whatever it can for the few. Something to ponder ... .

That being so, I will now make the trip to visit the recommended group home (about which I am surely unenthusiastic) for the sake of simply being able to say that I'd done so. Then -- I'll give myself some time to think hard about how to weave us through the problem presented by that last paragraph -- there's something important here for which there has been little or no preparation. But my intuition has rarely led me astray, and the burial of that phone number had some hidden meaning that will surely be revealed over the next hours, days, or weeks.

I've about decided that a group home with seniors may not be appropriate, but an apartment in a complex for seniors may be quite adequate. There's one nearby; HUD-developed and quite nice. Eligibility requires that one be 55, I believe, still a ways off for Dorrie, but there are some tenants who have younger family members living with them. The head-of-household must be at least 55, I believe. She would be less than a block away -- still within walking distance of the mall that she loves, still eligible for transportation to and from NIAD, and with no need to give up possession of her much-loved and well-cared-for (2) cats.

There is a lovely little lake just at the bottom of the hill with occasional ducks to watch. It is a favorite dumping ground for feral cats who are fed daily by benevolent cat lovers who live in that complex.

I think that I've been rescued for the moment. At least I now understand better why I was so torn, and just why I couldn't make that call.

So saying, I'm off now to visit the not-quite-right group home, and then to learn what I can about that senior housing complex just across the way from here. I'm not sure that I can get them to make the exception to the age requirement, but her case manager may be able to handle that.

There is always some logical reason why, isn't there?

Betty the Seer

Wonder if sitting at home doing nothing will ever be an option?

Tomorrow Dorian and I will drive in to Oakland High School where she will do her Special Olympics track and field practice followed by swim training. She lives for Saturdays these days. I feel so grateful for the inspired work of the Kennedy family in creating this marvelous program for the developmentally and physically disabled. She's earned a trunkload of medals for every possible event over many years -- going from one sport to another over the course of a year. In the appropriate seasons she enjoys bowling, track and field, basketball, softball, soccer, swimming -- and in winter, cross-country skiing. We've done some things right; and Special Olympics is one of them.

Later in the day I'll meet Tom for the trip by BART to the SFMOMA and a four o'clock lecture by artist, Kathan Brown. Looked her up on the web in preparation for hearing her talk and again felt grateful for this remarkable resource. It means that I will bring so much more to the lecture, and that I will take away even more. What a world! ...maybe a trip to the observatory soon will fill in some of the empty spaces in my understanding of the universe ... do you suppose?

Meanwhile, there's this desktop (not my computer, but the one it sits on) to sort through. I've still not moved on locating that little scrap of paper upon which the name of Dorian's possible next home is written. I've continued to pile clutter on top of all that lies below -- and though I'm very much aware of what I'm doing, I can't make myself complete the process and make that call ... and if I can't find the phone number ... .

Guess I'll just do string theories and blue herons and Papa George kinds of thinking until it magically works its way to the top of the heap.

Had no idea it would be so hard to do what I know must be done.

No amount of well-intentioned but empty resolve will deliver us to that place where we must go.

For the sake of her emotional and physical survival in my eventual absence from her life -- she must be released to her own fate.

Life is precarious at best, and precious -- and terminal.

Some lives are more fragile than others ...

... and do I really trust the world with hers?

Apparently not.

It's a curious day ...

one that matched my mood; bright sunlight one minute and then clouded over the next by slowly-merging wisps of cumulus clouds on their way to prepare for the next showers... April lives up to her promise.

Yesterday brought another day of real pleasure in the company of an interesting and engaging man whose company I've come to treasure. We drove to San Francisco early in the day -- out to Golden Gate Park -- for a visit to Spring! It was all that I'd hoped. It's been many years since I've taken the time to see spring. The visit to the Conservatory where the tropical plants are grown was simply amazing. The giant ferns and fronds of proportions that defied logic reached to a lofty 30 ft in some instances. We didn't last too long in the heat and humidity, though both are essential to the maintainance of some of the most lush and dramatic blooms on earth. There were orchids of every kind and size, hibiscus and bouganvillea and passion flowers and cyclamen, some with pistles and stamen so erotically exotic that it made me want to look away! The brilliance of the colors rivaled the best that man can offer despite an artificially-produced pallette of limitless range. We're pikers when compared to what nature can and does produce.

Saw my very first great blue heron standing regally at the edge of the lake in Strybling Botanical Gardens. It was so still that for an instant it escaped notice. I could have so easily missed this miracle. Then with the slightest of movements this magnificent irridescent blue and lavendar and soft mauve creature lifted one reed-thin limb after the other in a grand stride and disappeared into the giant-leafed Australian plants that grew at the rim ... I felt the loss as one who lives under the flyover of such birds -- but for so long has ignored their existence. How many other miracles have I missed while preoccupied with world-tending and child-rearing and seeing only those things that occur within fifty feet of my consciousness?

The power of the wild blue heron served to reawaken images of the wetlands of my childhood where there were egrets and mallards; springtime rituals involving the gathering of caterpillers from the branches of wild anise to capture in jelly jars -- to take home and watch excitedly as they slowly evolved into beautiful monarch butterflies! Memories of gathering polliwogs in those same marshes where now stands the Oakland Coliseum and its expansive parking lots. Watching over a period of many days the budding of legs and the shrinking of the tail as those tiny green frogs emerged magically from the sleek slimy little black tadpole bodies. I thought of the egrets who lived among the tall cattails of the marsh and so silently strutted nearby as though we children were not there at all -- lifting long spindly legs out of the mud then down again in a stately march as we watched in hushed silence ... so many visions still locked in my child's mind. I could almost feel the earthworms that Papa George encouraged me to learn to love (after some initial repugnance) slide through my fingers and back into the ground as we troweled the warm soil in preparation for spring planting.

I doubt if Papa George knew much about ecology. I'd not even heard the word then. He was, after all, the son of a slavewoman who'd spent much of his life helping to work the family garden in St. James Parish. I don't believe he ever attended school. He' spent nights as a waiter at the downtown Oakland Athletic Club on Clay Street, and his days smoking his pipe and tending his garden.

There was surely a kind of native wisdom that allowed native peoples the world over to develop a sense of a natural order that told them to plant at certain phases of the moon and that provided a non-verbal non-literate "book" of natural law that made the beans and the squash and the melons and potatos prosper and the tables bend from the harvest and the canning kettles overflow with the winter's store. I'd forgotten all that in this world of plastic-wrapped on-demand pre-cooked dinners. I'd forgotten my little girl horror as Papa George twisted the Sunday dinner live chicken by its head until it died in a burst of flying feathers and then chopped off its head with an ax -- then handed it through the kitchen door to my mother to scald in the huge pot of boiling water. Then came the plucking of feathers and the unforgettable stench!

That beautiful blue heron brought back visions of my crushed panama-hatted bib-overalled Papa standing among those bean-poles and spreading zucchini plants. She erased -- for the moment, at least -- all of the development that has replaced the scenes of my childhood. She closed the gap between my very young and very old Bettys for just long enough to prove that change is not necessarily progress, and that having lived long enough to watch some reversal of the "let's-cement-over-the-planet" philosophy and the re-birth of the connection with the earth is a blessing. After all, I've now lived long enough to witness an earnest effort to rid the world of the culverts and to day-light the creeks and rills of my childhood. I've lived long enough to see birth of a new appreciation of the role played by wetlands in the maintenance of flood control and protection of habitat.

How wonderful that I got to be a player in the process during those years of working with the environmentalists of this area from my position as a state assembly field representative. But until writing this piece, I didn't realize how much those restorations have meant to me. Maybe one of the functions of these flashbacks is that the perspective of aging gives one a way to put the words and concepts learned in later life together with the experiences and emotions of those first ten years. Maybe those connections don't get made if we don't live long enough to make them. Perhaps this is what gives meaning to higher education -- it gives younger folks the tools for making the linkages that those of us without formal educations can only evolve into over many years.

Thank you wild blue heron!

...but I have no idea of why I felt so tired at the end of the day and ended up in bed so very early last night. Could it be that since I've stopped working actively, I'm spending more time in the past than in the present? Is that fatiguing? Is this what getting old feels like? It's been a long time coming -- but maybe it's here. And what on earth do I do with that? Do I simply fold into it gracefully or do I give up on the memoirs and get back to work? After all, when sixteen -- I had no idea that I would be around for my eighteenth birthday, did I? There were never any guarantees, and there still aren't. I suppose one goes on planning and living and projecting into the future until one's time is all spent and that thing that believers call eternity takes over. I think that I'm more certain than ever, though, that the thought of becoming a part of whatever creates the life of a blue heron by helping to replenish the earth is about as fine an ending as one might wish. My kind of immortality ... .

But then what do I know?

Pope Dreams ...

Just watched the CNN coverage of the naming of Pope Benedict XVI. Not sure what I was expecting, but instead of my usual feeling of quiet regret at having opted out of the believer's club, the absurdity -- the surrealism of it all overcame the regret and cynicism raised its flag of victory, yet another time.

The paradox of sitting in my apartment with a remote control in hand viewing live coverage of the faraway Vatican Palace -- an ocean and a continent away in southern Europe(!!!) was the epitome of scientific achievement, right? How then did the voices of a youngish Norbertine priest combined with CNN's Wolfe Blitzer's in any way fit into this reality? Blitzer was asking (quite seriously) just how the new Pope would rule the world of Catholicism in this new era following the reign of one who'd left such huge shoes to fill? The priest's answer: "The hordes of pilgrims who've gathered here over the past few days have been heard to shout, "sainthood now!," indicating how deeply and universally his predecessor was revered." Then he added with great solemnity, "The Chief Exorcisor here in Rome is already in touch with the fallen pope and knows that he -- together with Jesus -- will be providing strong support to the Pope Benedict XVI in the days to come."

Suddenly the whole scene took on (for me) all of the aspects of theater and magic and the mysteries of the occult. Shades of Harry Potter! All of it; from watching the faithful so mesmerized by endless hours of watching that chimney for the tell-tale sign of white smoke, to the celebratory announcement that came after a relatively short period of negotiation and consensus.

The elaborate vestments (and one can hardly consider them other than costumes) scarlet splashed everywhere -- the lavishly beautiful interior images of the Papal Palace and the Sistine Chapel in a world reeling from "wars and rumors of wars," continuing genocide, devastating bombings; out of control AIDS epidemics ravaging already long suffering and exploited Third World populations; unprecedented natural disasters involving tragic loss of life and property; no longer deniable effects of global warming; economies on the edge of collapse; and corporatism that threatens the sovereignty of all nations on the planet. What can account for the world's ability to compartmentalize all of that so effectively -- and to pinpoint all of our attention on 171 elegantly red-robed and blessed-beanied Catholic Cardinals in the process of naming a new Pope? He is, after all, only one leader of a single denomination in a world with multiple belief systems with multiple dieties and/or avatars charged with the responsibility of saving souls (or not) or guiding their flocks through the endless privileges and pitfalls of reincarnation.

If ever there was proof of the dominance of European religious systems (both Catholic and Protestant), this past month of observances has provided it. That organized religions should be playing such a prominent role in our daily lives should come as no surprise given the decline in the educational system in this country. By default we're falling into the same kinds of religious fundamentalism that so marks current Mideastern internal political unrest. Given another generation or two, one might well expect that those small nations will discover the freedoms inherent when church and state are held separate. Allowing them to --- without interference -- evolve toward the obvious may be the secret to achieving world peace.

There are among our elected officials a number who might be quite comfortable in the roles of the Mullahs and Imams of the Mideast. There seems little difference between those scenes of all males sitting in worship on their prayer rugs in temples of Iraq and Iran and Afghanistan -- and the images of those Cardinals marching off into their Holy Conclave with nary a woman in sight. It's all a matter of degree. One might suspect that -- given their wont -- if the church had not been challenged over the decades here in this country and in much of the developed world, women would still not have the vote, been allowed to own property, or, even themselves! Even the control of our own bodies has again fallen into question of late, and may well be soon lost to those proclaiming a reverence for life (only not ours).

Find myself wishing that I had enough time left to spend a few years living in either the Far or the Middle East, just to learn something about life under other systems. I'd love to know how the women in those countries have survived with their religious beliefs intact. If they have, that is. I've never really known whether my atheism is a simple rejection of the religion of my own experience, and, whether under some other system I might have been a believer, too. Don't know. But I suspect not. I've never had much difficulty separating reality from belief. That may be where the rubber meets the road for this pilgrim. I've always felt that what I believe is far too important to be left in the hands of others. But I know deep down that reality is something best arrived at in concert with others, and can rarely be accomplished alone. But even as I type the words, the statement falls apart. Isn't it probable that reality is really no more than agreed-upon "truth," and ever open to interpretation? Could that "truth" be little more than curiosity satisfied?

So much to learn and to know ... and to never really be quite certain of...

But then I've never been too comfortable with certainty, anyway.

Brahms, Beethoven, Dvorak, 'n Dizzy ...

Beautiful concert at First Church in San Francisco on Friday evening. Fine seafood dinner at Tadich on Sacramento at Battery in the Financial District -- then the drive straight up hill, past the Pacific Union Club, Grace Cathedral, scraping the clouds high on Nob Hill to Van Ness and the music of the masters. I do enjoy it tremendously but continue to feel less "at home" than as a curious visitor to the world of European chamber music. Will always be simply a refugee from the world of jazz -- off on a junket. I'm surely not alone with such feelings since these are clearly a different form of music lover, with very few who cross over from the black world to white. There are rarely more than one or two others who look like me in such gatherings. Nice visit, though. I feel myself relaxing into the music more and more -- and wishing that I might be able to take on the cello one of these days, even while knowing that it's far too late ... .

Yesterday was a quiet day sitting in my car in front of the highschool where Dorian was involved in her every-Saturday-morning Special Olympics practice. We've move past baskbetball (except for the upcoming state games) and into track and field and swimming. That means lots of time sitting in my car reading and working crossword puzzles while she romps and runs and swims the morning away.

We watched Bob's appearance with Xia's friends at KUSP in Santa Cruz. A friend captured it in some way with the computer and forwarded the links to us. Dorrie and I then (magically!) watched and heard Bob singing his original songs with this little band of kids -- and loved every minute of it. His work is so fine, and I'm so proud of his continuing contribution to children's music. The wonder of these Internet archives where one can enjoy programs-on-demand hours after they've actually been aired ... such a world!

Today is mine. Am attending my first ever Citroen Rally over in Marin County with Tom. We'll spend the late morning and afternoon chasing down items (signs?) in a kind of treasure hunt (or that's what it sounds like) with him at the wheel and I keeping an eye out for the whatever-it-is that will bring rewards. The day is beautiful; San Rafael is always a joy to visit; and he's bringing along a picnic to share when the rally ends. Nice Sunday.


What I'm not doing: Should have attended the State Democratic Convention at Los Angeles this weekend, but have just about completely unplugged from all such activity of late. It all feels beyond me now, and in the hands of the young and the energetic. I'm hoping that Phil Angelides will get the nomination of the party and will be confirmed for the candidacy for governor to succeed Arnold. He's someone I've watched for years and who will serve the party and the nation well as he ascends the leadership ladder. He's a visionary with the ability to implement his goals. We'll see how far talent and integrity will take him in a world where neither seems any longer treasured. He's been on this escalator to power for some time now, and his time may have come.

Am praying that there is enough energy to stop the special election called for by the governor, so that $70 million dollars of state moneys won't be needlessly squandered. I take that quite personally since my Dorian has had her life interrupted (along with countless others of the handicapped) through the budget cutbacks that have already befallen her world and mine. At least she had a home to be returned to. What about those who have ended up on the streets of our California cities?


But today I will skip voluntary public service in favor of the Citroen Rally with Tom. Maybe this is the way that elders have traditionally passed the torch. We just set down the reins, cut the horse loose, and play in the fields of life until it all ends quietly ... maybe. Maybe not. We'll see.

String theory,indeed!

That last entry is a clear example of the lengths to which the mind will go to escape the problems in the foreground. Waaaaaay out in space this time! Denial goes by many names and in this case I was able to shoot myself into another universe with all of the theoretical wonder physics can offer. Anything to avoid having to search for that elusive scrap of paper upon which the name and phone number of Dorian's possible new placement is written. Wild!

Okay, so now that it's almost two o'clock in the afternoon on the day after my great space travel adventure, I'll close down MAC and work on the desk clutter ... .

But before I do that (see, I'm still stalling), I need to acknowledge that there was word from a mutual friend that my Bob is appearing in a show on KUSP in Santa Cruz this Saturday. Not sure of the call letters, but believe it may be the PBS affiliate there. Check out the link over on the lefthand side of this blog. His web site may have the details, though I'm not sure how much time he puts into keeping it updated these days.

Also, under California's Black Pioneers (also linked over there) there are some truly fascinating additions to the web site. Learned from Cousin Doug in a conversation the other day that one of our ancestors was a bootmaker in San Francisco during the Gold Rush days. So much history -- so little time left in which to make more (for some of us).

Will meet with the board of the Ma'at Academy tonight (environmentalists) and will fill y'all in on that next week sometime. Good folks on a mission.

And in the meantime, I'll try to forget that I truly must take seriously the need to release Dorian to her own future -- and that I must not wait until there's another crisis and we're torn apart even more painfully than before. It was like trying to separate the skin from a green peach ... .

That must not be allowed to happen... .

String theory?

I'm fascinated by physics, a carryover from my days as a faculty wife and all 'roun cocktail party intellectual in the 70s and 80s. The space probes draw me in and chew me up with every new landing attempt. I'm known to lose days on end while watching as if in a trance -- images on the small screen of pretty ordinary rocks and rills that I could probably see if I just hiked a few miles up into the nearby hills. You can imagine the joy when on a recent Citroen Club outing with Tom I found myself sitting in the Space Science Center at the Ames Laboratories in Mountain View. The films and exhibits brought the Mars probes into consciousness as nothing else could have. The chance to hear lectures from those who were a part of the great adventure was truly mind-boggling.

Last night I watched a PBS-NOVA special on the String Theory. It didn't take very long to find myself hanging on by my fingernails to keep up. I have tried in the past to barely fathom Stephen Hawking's mechanical voice that tended to add to the futuristic edge of his words. I have a fragmented understanding of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, but somewhere along the way Quantum Theory entered from stage left and there was a "Big Bang" of my right cortex! Now we're dealing with Ed Witten and his "M Theory" involving "gravitons." According to the narrator, no one knows what the "M" stands for, but Witten teasingly implies that it may mean "murky." And I was just beginning to deal with quarks and opened-ended and/or enclosed strings, and none too successfully at that.

Einstein's work upon which so much of the understanding of the universe depends was incomplete. Those who arrived at the Big Bang theory of beginnings were having to yield to the Quantum theorists -- the two theories were in conflict and could not be reconciled. There are many who've now come to believe that Witten is Einstein's successor and that requires a re-evaluation of all that has gone before.

It is in these instances that I so regret growing old. Most of the time my age is simply a fact of being and evidence of movement toward non-existence ... but there are times when I begin to see how bitterly I resent having been born just a few years too soon ...

Having acquired some reasonable understanding of 5 then 10 dimensions, the scientific world is now faced with at least 21 -- and according to some, the number is infinite and probably involves multiple parallel universes; universes that are in the continual process of banging into one another and being absorbed ... the "Big Bang" gone wild!

The images, matrixes, diagrams and analogies incorporated into the NOVA show were so fabulous that even this struggling aging brain was able to hang in and pull it together -- if precariously.

There is no longer a single exciting String Theory, but at least five! That being so, the world of physics is back to square one. Except for Whitten (Witten?) who has put forth the hypothesis that the five are simply complex aspects of the original one. And now we're off to the races again. The prize of discovery will surely be revealed within the next dozen or so years. Scientists are out after the Holy Grail of physics with competing laboratories working at breakneck speed both here and in Switzerland.

It was the kind of presentation that begs to be bought on video or DVD and added to the collection of fascinating studies I will watch again some day but rarely do. The world keeps revealing itself in hints that offer promise of answers to mysteries now just barely beyond our reach.

God stuff?

(...and capitalizing the god word in this case feels right. It all depends upon how one interprets it, I suspect.)

Do you suppose ... ?

that a lot of the angst that I'm feeling (and interpreting as the natural depression that heralds gittin' ole) is really masking a new bout of separation anxiety involving Dorian? We worked for her entire lifetime to prepare her for my death and her survival without me. We had it nailed for some years there, but then the social system began to fray at the edges from state budget cutbacks and to finally collapse totally. Bringing her home to live with me for the first time since she was in her pre-teens less than a year ago was a defeat for us both. Over the past months I've evolved from "super-friend" back into "mom" with a vengeance. Try as I might, the inevitable has happened and I find myself fixing her breakfast, even brushing her hair and packing her lunches for her days at NIAD. I worry and fret when she hasn't returned from the mall when expected, and have become dependent upon our constant cell phone connections even when off on a tryst with Tom. It's crazy! And there isn't the time to do it all again.

On the Monday before I left to visit to Mendocino, I'd called her case manager to say that I was ready to begin to look at living alternatives for her; that we were beginning to seriously regress; and that someone needs to help me to move us toward a new separation. When I returned (and after a thought-filled 3-hour drive, alone) I found myself pushing all such thoughts to the back of my mind and ignoring the need to act on it. The pressure had been eased by my 2-day respite and I felt rested.

Her case manager had agreed that we needed to begin to look at next moves. It seems that Dorian had given her therapist a call sometime the week before when we were battling over her spending habits and her inability to resist the cellphone hawkers. She wants her independence back. We both need our lives back to live out each in our own way. I cannot protect her by robbing her of the chance to continue to grow and learn. She will live beyond me. With or without the ideal social support system I tried so hard to tap her into, it is her destiny to live through the risks that her disabilities manifest, and no amount of motherly protection can change any of that.

This truly capable professional had given me the telephone number of a possible group home that is near enough to NIAD so that her art programs can go on uninterrupted. That was over a week ago, the day before I left for a 2-day visit to Mendocino. I promised to give the referral a call just as soon as I returned (on Thursday). I have since lost the phone number and am reluctant to ask for it again. It's buried here on my desk someplace. It was written on the back of a scrap of paper that I no longer will recognize... All very predictable.

Mentally, I'm thrown back to the time when I first experienced the pain of sending her off to The Cedars, a residential program in beautiful Marin County -- and it's all refreshed and achingly familiar. It's as though all those feelings were carefully stored in some remote part of my mind and are back to taunt me enough to crowd out everything else. We lived through it again when -- at 13 I hired someone to fly with her down to St. Vincent's Academy in Santa Barbara because I couldn't bear to do it. I knew that the rules of that wonderful school dictated that I could not contact her for the first 6 weeks, and my awareness of the pain that would surely cause was almost unbearable. I've never recovered from the guilt I felt for the trickery involved. But we both survived and she thrived in that setting with those loving nuns.

Dorian has by now pretty much forgotten about having made the call to her therapist in anger and I've had a few days of respite with Tom. The sense of urgency has passed. There is little incentive to make that call now, but I surely recognize the need to find that vital scrap of paper and proceed with plans to give her back what little autonomy that I can by letting her move away and back into her own life.

I'd never have guessed that it might be even more difficult this time. Having now lived with her underfoot for almost a year, I've become aware of just how vulnerable she is, and of how serious are her mental deficits. The risk factors are huge. The guilelessness and natural generosity of the retarded make her a prime target for those who would do her harm. And -- my trust in the ability of "The World" to protect her has diminished over the years, and I have little left to comfort me now. When we were both much younger; when I felt my own inadequacies so much less and trusted "The World's" systems so much more, it was far easier. I've lost my innocence. She's doomed to exist in her's.

Maybe, having written out the words, I can go about the business of retrieving that important link to our much-needed freedom and make those calls. It will be only the prelude since the goal is to begin to investigate possibilities now and -- hopefully -- to have her resettled in early summer.

Wish us luck,

Oh how I hate to get up in the mawnin'!

Just wasn't designed for leisure. I need work to do; meaningful work. The full effects of this retirement that I've drifted into without purpose is weighing heavily on my psyche. There are added distortions caused by the shift from standard to daylight savings time to contend with. It all feels surreal...I'm becoming more and more sensitive to the speeding up of time; and of how finite. During early April it's hard to remember that time has never been a certainty, only a temporary gift to be used well and treasured as precious.

It's gradually dawning that my work life is over now, and that I'm needing to structure my days differently, or structure them at all. I've lost the rudder on this glider so haphazardly built over the past half-century, or, gotten myself hung up in the web of indecision from which there may be no escape. Morning dawns then night falls with little to distinguish them one from the other. I seem to be moving between Jon Stewart shows and trips to Albertsons for groceries. That's simply not enough upon which to hang a life! I need to keep reminding myself that I could be spending my time moving between the doctor's office and the pharmacy; and of what a blessing it is that I'm not.

Oh there's this new man in my life; and that lends some spark to the days -- but at our advanced ages the relationship is non-directional. Not even sure what that means, except that the word seems fitting for where we are in time and space. He's warm and interesting and undemanding and we're settling into a warm and comfortable relationship of sharing time and creating new memories at a time when one might have expected yesterdays to have replaced all of the tomorrows. Not so, apparently. And there are very different expectations evolving. Instead of checking out my Palm Pilot for the next scheduled meeting of the civic whatever or the committee to overturn the most recent attempt by the governor to ... I find the little beeping signal means that I've punched in "4/12/05 -- the wild rhododendrons will be in full bloom in the pigmy woods at Little River." Maybe that's good; a sign that my priorities are changing dramatically, and my values along with them. However, I'm not at all sure that the rapid turnaround won't cause whiplash or that it will come in time for me to redirect myself before the abyss!


Watched a part of the Bolton confirmation hearing on CSPAN before dropping off to sleep last night, and found that some of the fear for the nation's survival has been replaced by boredom and dangerously-lowered expectations of national leadership. I simply cannot imagine the amount of slippage that has occurred in governance, and of how effectively mediocrity has replaced excellence over a lifetime. Or is it only the past 30 years -- those years when cleverness (a la Carl Rove et al) resoundingly trounced statemanship, and the country and the marketplace were taken over by Corporatism? Fascism? Could it also be that as an octogenarian I bring more accuracy and wisdom to my assessments of that leadership? Maybe we could do worse than to find ourselves being led by Hal the Computer, after all, since at least it might prove to be more even-handed in doling out power and privilege, and less subject to the arrogance and greed of human power out of control.

Maybe, along with the growing ennui, I'm beginning to sense inevitability in our decaying social and political systems. And even while writing those words I find myself wondering if I'm not expressing an attitude common to elders as we look back upon where we've traveled over time; while more and more aware that we've probably given all that we can and that our presence on the earth may have made little real difference in the end.

If this is the direction that my mind will gradually settle into, maybe the entrophy of the aging process is finally boring its way into my being. If so, the glimpses of the future are not what I'd hoped for. Will there simply be less and less to celebrate and more to mourn as the days pile on?

Oh god, I hope not... .

(Wonder if I'll live long enough to be willing to type god with an uppercase "G"?)

Hypocrisy reigns, worldwide ...

Tried terribly hard to share the pain of loss of the His Eminence, The Pope -- but failed miserably. Did fairly well the first day, but by the time his remains had been paraded by on the small screen for the umpteenth time, it was over for me. Poor man (and man he was) tried his best to fulfill the office of Pope-dom; I truly believe that. Only problem is that I simply cannot find it within myself to embrace orthodoxy of any kind. The Catholic faith of my childhood was simply outgrown along with Santa Claus, fairies and elves, trolls, The Wizard of Oz, Captain Ahab, Ruth Fielding, and even Prince Rainier of Monte Carlo! That poor prince's demise was almost completely buried under by the Pope-a-rama as were the nuptials of that other notable prince, Charles, and his Camilla. Is there no justice?

There's a peculiar innocence about all that which causes me to wish silently that I'd remained a believer at times. I take no pride in being outside the circle most of the time. I waver between feeling the loss of my own innocence as tragic and torn by the fear that I'm missing out on something essential to the human condition and that I will die without having come to terms with my inability to solve the mystery. At other times I feel perfectly content to be uninvolved in the drama of liturgical processes and arcane belief systems. Life is magical enough without divine intervention; at least for me it is.

It's enough to know that one day I will no longer exist -- at least not in human form. That I will return to "The All," or whatever it is that brought me here. I firmly believe it's all molecular and explainable if we resist the temptation to coat it all in superhuman terms and make ourselves content with the probability that -- like all of nature -- we too will go back to being star stuff -- "as it was in the beginning ever shall be world without end, amen ...". The fact that "I am!" is enough. Anything more is imagined, at least so it seems to me.

Watching the excesses this week -- happening in a world in chaos -- frightened me when I let it occupy my thoughts for too long. HIV-AIDS rampant in Africa, and another outbreak of Hemmoraghic Fevers, another earthquake in Indonesia in those already nature-ravaged islands, children killed by mines in Iraq -- and still more cut down by gun violence here at home; continuing wars in lands whose names I can't pronounce with any confidence -- what God gave permission for such pain and suffering?

And the well-to-do, the royals, the statesmen and women, potentates and presidents -- all in their best mourning clothes gathered together, two million strong, to pay homage to the memory of the emissary of the one on high whom they believe holds the keys to our fate, (God, Jesus, Allah, Buddha, Yahweh, etc.), each true believer willing to defend to the death the supremacy of his/her "One God" over all others, but who stand this day in the shadow of the Papal Palace, carefully positioned for political advantage according to protocols strained by the sheer magnitude of the crowds. I found myself frightened into turning off the whole pageant in disbelief of what was being reflected back to us from the Vatican. "A culture of life," indeed!


Then I learned that Jon Stewart's Daily Show won its second Peabody Award yesterday. Maybe we'll make it after all.