The New deYoung Museum is stunning!

We drove to San Francisco yesterday afternoon to get a first glimpse of this spectacular new fine arts museum in Golden Gate Park. The reviews are in and consensus is that this is an architectural triumph and worthy of its place among the world's finest. The crowds are still large, but it's so spacious that it's not a problem.

The main exhibit (until February 15, 2006) is the collection of "Hatshepsut; From Queen to Pharaoh" and is wonderful. The gold objects, travertine (Egyptian alabaster) bowls and cosmetic containers, breast plates, necklaces (one made of 1400 tiny gold beads!), lifesized sandstone figures recovered from tombs where they were stowed centuries ago for the millenium and all magically brought together from many parts of the arts world for us to see.

Now this is context. When one can get this timeless ageless glimpse of humanity across a timeline of literally thousands of years, perspective is unalterably changed. Even the wars of our times are diminished. And it's quite obvious that much of human nature has remained unchanged. We were seeking the path to eternity lo those many eons ago -- and settling on answers strikingly similar to those found today in many parts of the nation and the world. The belief that one could "take it all with them into the next world" dominated how life was lived. It occurred to me that we've codified the practice into statutes that enable us to -- if not take it all along -- at least to pass it along to our heirs. Instead of the alabaster jars, jeweled collars, golden sandles and finger guards and toe covers, we do it with real property and family heirlooms, and best of all -- estates that guarantee status for those we leave behind while we tune our harps and test our wings before the throne of The Almighty.

An awful lot of us still believe firmly in our ability to transcend this life and guarantee ourselves spaces in some faraway Heaven overseen by a God created in our own image and who respects our biases enough to see to it that we're not troubled with having to deal in the hereafter with those unlike ourselves. Or so it would seem from that life-changing visit to Corpus Christi Catholic Church in New Orleans as an impressionable teen. I've never really forgiven the fact that seating was segregated in a church built by my grandfather. This was one of the earliest memories of the feeling of being the only grownup in the room; a feeling I would recognize many years later as I sat in that school auditorium in the front row while the principal and faculty performed a minstrel show in blackface on the stage before me. I was the mother of the only black child in the school -- and he was only eight.

I was particularly interested in the Nubian scribes who were prominent in the Hatshepsut exhibit. There were a number of these learned and highly respected men shown in paintings and at least one huge sandstone sculpture of such a scribe. My friend again tried to explain to me that -- despite the ebony skincolor -- Nubians were not black; an ongoing dispute. I remember having such arguments with Bill years ago when I would insist that those in North Africa -- including the Egyptians were more closely related to me, racially, than they were to the caucasian world. How on earth could they not be? Anwar Sadat might have been my Uncle Henry if I had an Uncle Henry! (White folks foolishness!) This was the continent of Africa, after all. And here it was again, Tom is a gentle man who would rather not enter into such a debate with me -- but who looks resolute and unconvinced -- smiling tolerantly and benevolently but clearly adamant in holding to his own learned opinion. Because it was such a beautiful exhibit in such a beautiful place -- I continued to hold my ground but did so wordlessly. We were at an impasse. We'll hash this one out one day in front of his fireplace with the rain sounding lightly on the copper roof at his home in Mendocino. I've not given up -- only temporarily silenced.

Meanwhile, the fine arts are many faceted and my favorite artist these days is one Dorian Leon Reid of the National Institute for Artists with Disabilities (NIAD). Dorrie will love this Exhibit. We'll visit soon, and I may learn something from the way she incorporates the experience into her own work. She's fixed on cats and there is little more arresting than the Egyptian graceful and mystical depiction of the cat. These are her Speedy on steroids!

But today I'll attend the memorial service for dearly departed lovingly remembered Lucretia Edwards, a woman adored by all who knew her; another reminder of the passage of time and of lives.

Photo: "Apples" by Dorian, painted last year. It hangs on the wall of my kitchen and brightens both the room and my life each time I catch a glimpse of it when I flick the light switch on.

A collective honor... ?

Of course. This amazing honor is being awarded on my watch, but was earned by all of the family women -- my enslaved greatgreatgrandmother Celestine of No Last Name, her enslaved daughter, Leontine Breaux Allen (our beloved Mammá); my own mother, Lottie Allen Charbonnet; Aunt Alice Allen Hymel, St. James Parish educator; the trickster, Aunt Vivian Allen Jernigan, of all of the women of the preceding generations ... good thought. I can say proudly, "look how far we've come!" And just maybe it will provide some guidance for the younger family women I'll leave behind when my time is spent. The years of researching family history and rebuilding the lines of connection bring with them a heightened sense of context. Thought of in that way, any false pride drops away and in its place comes a rare feeling of entitlement. Now I can write that bio. The "favorite photo" I've chosen is one taken when I was in the process of beginning the second half -- somewhat past fifty. That Betty was still in possession of a full head of hair and with eyebrows not yet descending over eyelids! The molting process was still years away.

When making the choice from an array of old photographs, I found myself wondering if this indicated that I saw fifty as the point at which life crested? Nope. It was only a fleeting thought. I'm keenly aware that the trajectory is still being defined, and that I've never felt quite completed -- still in the process of becoming. But my physical self as viewed objectively was probably at its peak at that point in time. This picture was taken on the day that Bill and l were married in the early 70's. I felt loved and whole and real and feisty and the camera caught every bit of it.

And speaking of such, word came this morning from a friend; a member of Richmond's city council and a noted architect who is in New Orleans as a part of a team of experts investigating the mold and structural problems left by Katrina. When Tom announced his assignment, I asked if he'd look into the fate of a couple of the buildings my father and grandfather erected many years ago. This morning it came -- the Phoenix is rising (see photo)! Charbonnet-Labat Funeral Home has survived 4 feet of floodwater and is again operating. One day before too long, those jazz funerals will be wending their way to and from burials at St. Louis Cemetery as they have for the past century.

I've still not made meaningful contact with scattered family members, but at least I know that life is continuing, and that the legacy of Charbonnet is still a strong part of the identity of that city and its culture. Am hopeful that as things begin to slowly return to whatever form normal will take in the coming months and years, there will be a coming together of now dispersed family members.

That reminds me -- I must try again to reach cousin Louis Charbonnet and his family through the Mid-City Carriage Company. Have kept up (online) with continuing coverage on the fate of his heroic workers who saved the horses and mules -- and know that those animals that survived are stabled out of state awaiting restoration of their New Orleans home. The French Quarter will surely see those horsedrawn carriages again along Bourbon Street before too long -- a symbol of life as it once was lived in one of the most interesting and oldest cities in the nation.

I know that because the culture is in my DNA. Time and the distance have done little to diminish it.

Photo: Sent by Tom Butt as evidence of the survival of Charbonnet-Labat Funeral Home.
Photo on the right is explained in body of this entry.

Work grows more intense with each day ...

...but maybe that's not what's happening at all. Maybe it's the sense of urgency about running out of the power to actualize all that's collecting in my mind -- that never-ending "to do" list may collapse into itself at some point like some black hole ...

Something else is beginning to color my days; it's the sense of some new quality of 'listening' to my words by others that wasn't there before -- and that I'm beginning to place demands on myself that words not be squandered into nonsense but that they be worthy of the attention given. Crazy? Does that mean that I'm in danger of becoming stilted? Pompous? Perhaps, but it goes along with the fact that I'm beginning to amass honors of a kind that make me want to peek behind myself to see if some more worthy soul is standing there waiting ... and that I'm blocking the view ... .

Perhaps my world is trying to say to me that it's time to leave the stage and make room for some unannounced successor. On the other hand, the excitement of feeling relevant still, and with the ability to join with others to bring the forces of change together in meetings and receptions and on picket lines and at demonstrations and civic meetings is heady and makes retirement still some faint goal for some distant future.

I'm still feeling effective and stirred by contemporary issues as if time has ceased to exist and that I'm caught in some undetermined age group -- somewhere between 35 and 70, surely not 80 or beyond. All of the Bettys are operative still, each rising to the forefront as the occasion demands. Now and then I catch sight of myself in a mirror or a reflection in a storefront window and my mother looks back. It can be jarring. This is surely the reason that some women opt for cosmetic surgery; to bring the inner and the outer selves into some reasonable alignment. I'm beginning to understand that.

My personal appearance has been relatively youthful for such a long time that the temptation to tamper with it has never been an issue. But now I'm beginning to notice that everything is beginning to fall, that my eyebrows have dropped closer to my eyelids and the feathering over my top lip .... What used to be freckles are now fullblown age spots that defy all attempts at coverage -- (don't believe the hype). And the hair! I will not succumb to wig-wearing -- but the hair-count is miserably scant -- and each time I draw the comb through my brush and toss away those collected in the bristles I know that there will be no replacements. Hair follicles are finite -- one of life's fundamental truths!

I worry now that my wardrobe is no longer reflecting my age. Am I dressing too young? Having no detectable changes in body shape over a lifetime, there has been little reason to buy clothing. I'm now past the age of acquisition so my wardrobe is perhaps 20-30 years old now -- except for the purchase of a new sweater or Levis now and again. Maybe I'll look around for the modern day version of that little black dress that was always the mainstay of my wardrobe with my long-dormant string of pearls ... that should reflect agelessness, right?

If this all reads like trivia, know that it has to do with my inability to put into words here how humble I'm feeling at having been announced as one of the honorees for the year 2006 by the National Women's History Project (NWHP). Having participated in the Mills College Conference on "Women of the West" a month or so ago, I have some sense of just how prestigious an honor this is. When I visited their website a moment ago and read through the list of women previously honored I could scarcely breathe!

The announcement of the year 2006 honorees is scheduled for November so I'm late. I need to return this form as a followup to the letter of acceptance I sent two weeks ago when notification came. Instead I'm sitting here stunned into silence and so awed by the honor that all I can think of are all of the stupid ways that I'm unworthy, like sagging eyebrows and terminal molting!

I came to my computer this morning to begin to put together the bio they've requested and to select a "favorite photograph" to accompany that -- and instead find myself sitting here feeling tearful, filled with humility, and totally unprepared for what this means. I'm so intimated by all of it that I'm having an extremely hard time following through. Does one ever feel worthy of such honors?

Maybe a trip to Nordstrom's for a new hat will take care of the qualms ... .

Or not.

(Stephen Sondheim -- Elaine Stritch, where are you?)

Photo: Another unbelievable day. This one in 1995, being presented with "Woman of the Year" plaque by Ms. Gail Wilson, wife of Governor Pete Wilson, before the California State Legislature. I didn't tell my family but drove the 78 miles to and from the Capitol alone and unheralded by those I love. Spent the day in that strange world being feted with no witnesses to share the experience with. Why? Maybe this year I'll change that. Maybe I've already overcome the reticence by posting it here.

To: Betty Reid Soskin
From: Steve Hurst
Subject: Quote from you for Richmond Chamber of Commerce Magazine/Directory
Date: Sat, 5 Nov 2005 11:17:58 -0800
X-ELNK-AV: 0

Hi Betty

Looking around my cluttered office today, I had one of those "Ah ha!" moments. I found your card.

I am designing and producing the next magazine/directory for the chamber. I suggested that we include quotations from individuals along with their portrait to show the diversity of the community.

I would like for you to tell me in a couple of paragraphs (I know you have volumes to speak) what it is you like about Richmond.

The purpose of the magazine, aside from raising revenue for the chamber, is to cast a positive image of Richmond to the business and residential community, as well as promote the image of the city to businesses and individuals considering a move here.

I'll search through my archives for a nice shot I've taken of you, but I may request taking a few newer shots for the image I want to project.

Thanks

Check out my websites


STEVE HURST
www.stevenart.com – Graphics, Photography, Paintings, Websites
stevehurstclocks.com
_________________________________________________________________________________

Will this do? Gave it lots of thought, and it feels right.


"Having lived a long lifetime in several areas of the East Bay I've experienced the distinctively differing cultures that these adjoining communities represent. After living for extended periods in Oakland, Berkeley, Walnut Creek, El Cerrito, then Berkeley again, I've found Richmond the most challenging, the most interesting, with more opportunities to help to effect change than in any place that I've ever lived. As a political and social activist with a restless need to join with others in giving shape to the future, this matters greatly to me.

Despite the contradictions -- at times Richmond is totally provincial and "set in her ways"; treating newcomers much like Cape Cod treats its summer people -- and at other times she feels so open -- malleable -- yielding to the forces of change in ways that threaten her ability to form and maintain a civic identity. She feels like a city ever in the process of becoming -- never quite there -- so there's still time to help in the shaping. That's a completely different environment than one might find in San Francisco, Berkeley, or Oakland; all cities fully formed. Here, I see opportunity everywhere I look. The hope to join with others in re-creating the world we want to see seems more likely to be realized here than in any other place that I've known."

Betty

Photo: Taken last Friday at the ceremonial relocating of the old World War II Whirley Crane that served in the building of the victory ships at the Kaiser Shipyards. It was an event of historic significance that moved one more piece of history onto the site of the Rosie The Riveter/Home Front National Park. 11/4/2005

Epiphany.....!


Was startled out of sleep this morning. It was another of those moments of knowing; and it was suddenly all-of-a-piece; the last several seemingly unrelated entries plus some bits and pieces lived off-screen and away from this keyboard -- pieces that fell into place in a mosaic of clarity:

• Life in South Berkeley as a full-fledged struggling black merchant,
• The years of being radicalized by the contrasts inposed by my double life as female merchant while simultaneously living as an empowered faculty wife at the university.
• Being privileged by having my life in the cauldron of the innercity balanced by the ability to return every evening to a lovely home at the topmost ridge of Berkeley, above the university and on the edge of the pastoral wilderness of Tilden Park ...
  
• while those I faced from behind the counter remained each night to be impacted by the sounds of gunshots, fear, police sirens, poverty and crime, in daily lives lived against impossible odds.
  
• New talk of a curfew for youth in Richmond, and
• The pending execution of Stanley "Tookie" Williams.

Crazy melange? You're right. I'm not even sure I can get it unsnarled in a few words ... .

Yesterday I was about to drive out to meet Tom in Walnut Creek when I discovered that my wallet was missing. Recalled that it was probably left on my desk at work on Friday and detoured from the Hilltop area through downtown to pick it up. The drive took me down Macdonald Avenue past Fourth Street park with its usual number of mostly scruffy-looking men "chinnin'" as Papa George would say. Grinned to myself in realizing that -- were I driving past Pete's Coffee or Starbucks in a white neighborhood I'd have seen men socializing. Here, I saw men loitering. I drew to the stop sign at the corner of Fourth and Nevin and noted that the men on two of the corners leaning against the store windows were clearly younger and far more animated; playful. But my CNN-conditioned mind easily translated the scene into one of drug-dealing. An easy trap. Was reminded of South Berkeley in the Seventies, and of how differently my mind read such scenes then -- when looking from inside the belly of the beast and not as an outside observer. Here, I was not a member of the community of the Iron Triangle. These were not youngsters whom I knew or cared about except in the abstract. What else was different? The element of fear. I'd grown past that in those life-changing years in South Berkeley. As that thought surfaced my hand automatically reached toward the door lock.

On the drive to Walnut Creek -- out San Pablo Dam Road past the reservoir -- through the brilliant red, gold, deep greens riot of colors of autumn, my mind locked on the contrasts almost as automatically as my fingers had on the lock button only moments before. Wasn't I only minutes away from upscale Orinda where my friend, Felix Polk's, life had been smothered out by Susan (also a child of privilege), and where that wealthy 16-year-old Goth had savagely murdered the attorney's wife in a fit of fury? Why had the fear not followed me here? Was it because here those awful crimes were seen as an anomaly; against logic. Why was that? Was it because as a society we've set up the conditions in both places that predicted outcomes. If so, the solutions to the problems should be as predictable, shouldn't they? Why were they not?

That handsome 16 year-old enjoyed a disproportionate share of resources, an SUV, the best schools, a room of his own, every gadget technology can offer, books, travel, summer camps, parents with the strong educational backgrounds, professional achievement. They had the time, the energy, and the financial resources to satisfy not only their children's needs but wants as well. Where on earth could that reservoir of disembodied rage have found a place from which to grow? How could this be? We have every right to wonder. Even though he was clearly a juvenile, his name was released to the press but there was no mention of his family connections. Protective attorneys? On the very first report of his arrest the newcaster mentioned that "his sister had been tragically killed not too long ago," as if to explain his actions and give him an excuse for unspeakably tragic outburst of rage. Only later was his mother identified and implicated but only because she'd been arrested for aiding and abetting in her effort to protect her child. This is clearly a child of privilege. There were the usual explanations from neighbors and friends of "...this is such a peaceful community. How could this possibly have happened here?" And in a way they're right. It's a complete mystery.

On the other hand, we have an African American youngster from whom health care, parental guidance; recreational resources, school counseling; from streets that crackle with potential violence; with halfway houses and methodone clinics to pass on the way to and from school; with drug dealers to sidle past; and, often without enough food, or money, or attention; and too much responsibility for younger siblings; and often without anyone at home who understands the demands placed on you by teachers who haven't a clue about what your life is like on the outside or how relevant are the teachings you're expected to absorb ... and besides, he or she looks nothing like you and speaks another language. And one day you graduate from highschool against all odds and enter college. How could this be? Conventional wisdom would surely have predicted prison, right? The fact that many of your friends didn't make it to adulthood but as often as not died in a hail of bullets within a few feet on these same streets is a factor in how you see the future. To climb past the low expectations of those who dominate your life colors your own expectations of yourself and cripples ambition and smothers dreams ... .

How much are kids born to their fate? White privilege would surely have cast the lot of our young Goth differently. What was the missing ingredient that produced the monster? What inner strengths brought this innercity youngster past the chaos of life around him or her and into the mainstream?

In a way, Stanley "Tookie" Williams is living out the norm for black males. The supreme court, the attorney general and the governor are expected to fulfill societal expectations by denying clemency. This would be another norm. The expected outcome for troublesome black youth.

His execution will solve nothing because there is no understanding of or solution for the problems that sent him to prison as a young man. How much wiser to hold him in a life sentence without the possibility of parole where we might plumb his mind for answers to the cul de sac we've created for ourselves in our inability to understand or address the problems of youngsters from his world. He has proven his ability to grow beyond the confines of prison into greater understanding of the problems that sent him there. We have not.

Little has changed in South Central, except that Williams has quieted much of the gang violence through his quiet work from Death Row. The work that brought him to the attention of the Nobel Prize committee will surely die by lethal injection with him and we'll be the poorer for it.

The expectations for our children -- depending upon whether they reside in the Iron Triangle, South Central, Orinda or Columbine -- or any of the white communities where school shootings have taken lives -- are profoundly different. We're capable of producing monsters anywhere -- as anomalies. Have we yet learned the lessons of Columbine?

Can we allow ourselves to continue to use our innercities as a catchment areas for the breeding of violence? Must poor youngsters be forced to continue to swim against the tide of fortune when -- by shifting the lens ever so slightly -- we might see new solutions and begin to build hope for a new future? Will we one day learn that cultural and emotional deprivation are the hidden causes of much of the violence in the world of our young of whatever racial background or economic class? Will our children eventually spring out of the adult-imposed pathology, as they did in the Flower Child era of the Haight-Ashbury days -- seize the world and make it their own again?

After having picked at this through for much of this day, I find myself wondering -- not about how many violent gangs have been produced in the Iron Triangle to boost the kill rate for this year -- but at the miracle of the many who have managed to overcome the environment of destruction to which we as a society continue to confine their young lives.

Our children may have to wrest their world from us in order to save it.

At the moment, we're leaving little upon which they can build.

Maybe they've seen the future and are in dispair of what they see ... .

Photo: The work of CAA/ICU student, George Scott Braley © 1998. Co-Directors Mat Schwarzman and Juana Alicia at Urban Arts in Oakland, California.

Stanley "Tookie" Williams ... execution date now set ...

December 13th has been named as the day when Stanley Williams, San Quentin Death Row inmate, is slated to be put to death by the State of California. His plea for clemency was denied by the Supreme Court and he is awaiting word from the governor; his last possible chance for commutation of the death sentence. The crime for which he is being executed is for the killing of four people -- crimes that he strongly denies having committed. What he does not refute is the fact that he was the co-founder of one of South Central L.A's most notorious gangs, the Crips.

There has been ample evidence of a trial that was rigged; a jury that was not of his peers; evidence tampering; inadequate legal representation; jailhouse snitches from those trading his life for lessening of their own prison time, etc. There has even been the recanting of one of those who is now serving time again in a Nevada prison, and wanting Stan's forgiveness for having lied for his own gain. But that's not what disturbs me and is making sleep difficult to fall into ... .

Some years ago while working for the state, I was invited to be a member of the entourage of Ms. Winnie Mandela who flew from South Africa for a five-day visit to San Quentin to see Williams and to bring visibility to his case for clemency. This would be my first visit to the inside of the prison, having been at the outer gates with others at earlier protests of the death penalty from time to time. This time would be different. I had no idea what I'd find, but there were moments prior to that day when doubt that I could do this at all rose to throb in my throat and shallow my breathing. On the day of the visit, I found myself driving across the bridge -- inadvertently past the exit and into San Rafael -- then having to turn around and drive back to the entrance. A sure sign of subconscious resistance.

The visiting party was an interesting one. In the party were two members of the press, John Gioia, a county supervisor; Barbara Cottman Becnel, the extraordinary woman who is William's co-author in a series of children's books and his long time defender (featured in the film "Redemption" starring Jamie Fox); Ms. Mandela, a pastor of note, and Betty, representing a member of the State Assembly.

Having only experienced Death Row through television, I was expecting to be standing behind bulletproof glass with a few of the more notable visitors speaking to the prisoner through a wall telephone. I was not prepared for this large noisy visiting room shared by many denim-clad Death Row prisoners seated around large tables with their families, including a number of children. Stanley Williams spoke with us freely. Everyone looked so ordinary. Stan was a warm and very unlikely murderer, and that was in striking contradiction to the truth as we'd known it.

We'd been screened carefully for contraband before entering. We'd been warned prior to coming not to bring in writing implements, for women not to wear bras that contained underwires, had removed everything for close inspection including shoes in the reception center -- no cameras or tape recorders. Preparation for entering had taken hours since -- oddly enough -- it was Ms. Mandela who couldn't get past the metal detectors despite an embarrassing numbers of tries, and eventually a call to Sacramento to the attorney general's office when she became furious and threatened to leave without completing her mission. The problem took more than an hour to resolve and never revealed the source. I'd arrived earlier than the rest of the party and sailed right through; but I'm sure that it was because the African American guard greeted me upon arrival with, "...well hello Ms. Reid! Get any new releases in this week?" He was a Reid's Records customer, though I hadn't recognized him. In our community this carried more caché than my state creditials.

Stan has since been nominated four times for the Nobel Peace Prize and once for Literature. His work with children through the books he's written to discourage gang violence has been life-changing for kids around the world. His website (that he's never seen) is maintained by Barbara Becnel and has had hundreds of thousands of hits. He has been the leader of a movement to bring peace to innercity streets, a movement that started in South Central but has spread across the nation and the world.

All of this may seem an eleventh hour conversion and a cynical ploy to avoid the death penalty, but not if you've met Stan Williams or read his writings. I have. Barbara and I are friends. I've been with her when she presented him by telephone to groups working for a moratorium on the death penalty -- in hushed rooms where his gentle voice was miked to speak to the issues without guile or with no sign of desperation or a wish to extend his lifetime in a prison cell unnecessarily. One has the feeling in listening to him that his wish is to allow himself to be used in the interest of savings others. His native brilliance is apparent and stunning to witness when he speaks. His use of language is terse -- to the point, and honed from years of having to say it all in small bursts of time on collect calls to Barbara from the prison.

How can this happen? In a similar way to that which transformed the life of President Nelson Mandela. Of William's 26 years on Death Row, 7 were spent in solitary confinement. Seven years without human contact re-creates the mind, I believe. The young man who was sentenced early in life was now someone else; a phenomenon replicable in monastic life where it's entered into voluntarily. I don't believe we have any notion of what it means to have only one's self to interact with for such an extended period. Is it possible that we become the instrument of our own redemption under such conditions? I believe that it was out of that experience that peace was attained and out of which his books began to emerge from bits of paper passed through to Barbara and eventually published for children everywhere to help them to escape the tragedy of his own life gone so terribly wrong.

I recall in those moments in that place that the music, the poetry in me, always rose from my dark places. That a kind of touching bottom brought a reactive lunge upward and a kind of epiphany that burst forth in some creative form that was not otherwise available to me. Could this be universally true?

On December 8th there will be the start of a weeklong vigil at the gates of San Quentin. I'll join with my friend, Unitarian-Universalist minister, Rev. Paul Sawyer of Pasadena , Mike Farrell, Tom Hayden, and others in the Movement for a Moratorium, hopefully. We'll start with a prison-gate-church-service at ten o'clock and will remain a constant presence (in teams) until midnight of the 13th -- unless there is a stay -- and a promise of a re-visiting of the issue of a moratorium on the death penalty. It's time to join with attorneys, pacifists, concerned young people, compassionate policy-makers, the Innocence Project, former gang members, and any one or group that has begun to see the imbalances and injustices of a system that's lost its way.

The irony of living in a time where the indiscriminate slaughter of so many civilian men, women, and children in Iraq -- not to mention our own young men and women in a war so few of us can understand or justify -- is inescapable. That we can compartmentalize in ways that allow for such cruelty thoroughly confuses the concept of "Intelligent Design" and reinforces my belief in a random universe. It seems far more likely that the concentration of corporate power has derailed democracy and ushered in the frightening possibility that Man has created God in his own image, an image tragically wanting and manipulated by the powerful at will.

That "The State" can create and maintain a Guantanamo or Abu Graib, a California Youth Authority where recently 4 kids have died and where the need for reform is denied by those who have to power to change it. Where claim is now made that my country has endorsed torture as a part of its arsenal of war; and that we've formed a network of places, worldwide, where anyone can be held endlessly without charge and tortured at will. That this has become a nation that justifies the right to kill in our names under the guise of capital punishment, or war, or in defense of ..., or eventually -- because our oil is under their country!

Upon leaving the visiting room that day -- Stan reached out for a hug. Without hesitating for an instant, I hugged back. Intuition had taken over. In that moment, he lost the stigma of pariah and I'd allowed him to become a very human being whose fate I cared deeply about.

I need to rent "Redemption" at the video store before December 8th. It's been long time since that experience. I need to renew the truths that prevailed that day at San Quentin -- when all doubt vanished and I knew.

Knowing can be so fragile ... .

Photo: Ms. Winnie Mandela signing autographs at the Laura Hunter Tutoring Center in North Richmond. We'd just returned from visiting with Stanley "Tookie" Williams at San Quentin's Death Row.

Worried about my soul?

X-IronPort-AV: i="3.97,265,1125892800
d=scan's08,217"; a="923897159:sNHT19952876
From: H"Howdy"
To:
Subject: been reading your blog ...
Date: Fri, 28 Oct 2005 20:34:15 -0400
X-
ELNK-AV: )

You have a riveting web log
and undoubtedly must have atypical & quiescent potential
for your intended readership.
May I suggest that you do
everything in your power to
honor your encyclopedic/omniscient
Designer/Architect as well
as your revering audience.
As soon as we acknowledge
this Supreme Designer/Architect,
Who has erected the beauteous
fabric of the universe, our minds
must necessarily be ravished with
wonder at this infinite goodness,
wisdom and power.

Please remember to never
restrict anyone's opportunities
for ascertaining uninterrupted
existence for their quintessence.

Best wishes for continued ascendancy,

Dr. Howdy


To "Howdy"
From: Betty Reid Soskin
Subject: Re: been reading your blog ...

Dear Howdy:

You are obviously unhappy with my humanism and would wish that I were able to acknowledge the God in whom you believe. You describe him/her beautifully and I might do well to pay closer attention to the "honoring of that encylopedic/omniscient Designer/Architect." Yea verily ...!

However, to do so would rob me of the richness of my own search for meaning. It might cause me to accept the notion that truth is little more than curiosity satisfied. Life has not led me there, but instead has presented me with the intelligence, the imagination, the willingness and the courage to go it alone. Such a quest is far too important to leave to others.

I may be wrong. That's the risk of being human, and I'm enough of an agnostic to feel that the God in whom you believe so fervently is capable of loving enough, is understanding enough, and forgiving enough of my inability to act on faith, alone. I suppose -- in a way -- that I've lived my life as though there were a God, and as if I've gained unwittingly by sharing in some unknown state of grace. Life has been good.

I'll stick with Darwin, Einstein, Hawking, Emerson, et al, until I have more years and fewer miracles to try to explain to myself from the standpoint of Intelligent Design. The natural world provides more than enough wonder to satisfy my spiritual needs. I'll leave the supernatural to others to ponder.

Thanks for taking the time to let me know that blogging is reaching someone besides my own family.

Sincerely,

Betty

Photo: The Pacific as seen from a bluff in Mendocino. Wondrous!

Another resurrection day ...

Had forgotten for a moment that death comes in threes -- and Dorothy Pete, Lucretia Edwards, and Mary Otani obviously formed the triad. Can put that kind of introspection aside until the next cycle unfolds. I can stay in that place just so long before natural exuberance takes over and I'm again feeling the zest for living -- pressing against the edges of consciousness -- and back in the swim doing a reasonable breast stroke while pushing the river.

Despite what feels like the starter version of a cold, all sorts of wonderful mind games are going on in my head. Some were stirred by something I wrote a few days ago about those "...visions of a lifetime now being realized, finally," and about how exciting that can be.

Like inner cities across the country -- abandoned and left to rust and ruin as habitat for those who can afford to live nowhere else, Richmond suffers its urban core. In our city that part of the old downtown is situated between 3 railroad tracks, in "The Iron Triangle." The district is infamous in many ways. The crime stats match the level of need and is predictable by the lack of recreational resources for its young and mostly African American kids.

Prominent as a presence and a major negative influence on the lower end of the main street is a Rescue Mission that serves as a place for the depositing of troubled souls who struggle against drug addiction, alcohol abuse, and parollee status. It's safe to say that few other communities would accept such an enterprise, and that the county allows for little opportunity for objections. Add to these the homeless of all races who drift in and out as pressures wax and wane. Poverty and the aura of failure are the common denominators in this environment. In such a social climate, the pall of potential danger hangs over everything. The drug trade is highly visible and ever-present on street corners and in the park where dealers work with impunity and relatively little interference from the police.

I remember in the late Sixties when our little store -- in a similar area in Berkeley -- was being broken into so often that my young husband started spending his nights sleeping in a back office with a loaded rifle beside his cot. He could no longer afford to come home to suburban Walnut Creek at night -- the 28-mile drive made him vulnerable to break-ins and his desperation and paranoia effected our life together and contributed to our eventual divorce.

At one point he drove to the police department to demand better surveillance but was told by the officer on the desk "... it's convenient to have an area like this. When something happens in other parts of Berkeley -- we know where we can most likely pick up the culprit." The city was practicing an informal policy of crime containment -- and our building was right in the middle of their catchment area. Of course. I recall that the county methadone clinic was established within two blocks of our corner -- putting the addicts right in the middle of the "candy store," and no one saw that as inappropriate either for those being served or for the youngsters in the community and their families. At that time there were 11 halfway houses located in the city, 9 had been placed in our very low-income community. The cynicism is inescapable.

Richmond's historic downtown stands less than two miles from the National Park's interim reception center and -- should be set aside for historic preservation and restoration. Market forces and the redevelopment agency may deem otherwise. I don't know. If we follow the lead of many like communities, city government may well opt for one more unimaginative generic shopping district. What a pity that would be! What a missed opportunity. There is little recognition that this part of the city will be living in the midst of a national park soon, and that there are implications for related economic development that can help to redefine a civic identity that has suffered for years from poor image and disastrous crime rates.

One of my dreams is to find a way to help to create in the Iron Triangle an African American Arts & Entertainment District. The city still has a 40% black population mostly concentrated in the Iron Triangle, with the legacy of the Home Front WWII history. We need a memorial to those workers and to the artists who -- through their music -- enriched a time of persistent painful racial struggles for these hastily transplanted hard-working black folks.

That history involves a rich legacy of black music; both blues and jazz. During the war years Tappers Inn, Minnie Lou's, and the Savoy in North Richmond hosted the likes of Jimmy McCracklin, Bobby Blue Gland, Lightnin'' Hopkins, PeeWee Crayton, Wynonie Harris, Joe Liggins, T-Bone Walker, Big Mama Thornton, Johnny Otis and Little Esther, Howlin' Wolf, etc.  Richmond was the West Coast mecca for traditional blues that arrived with the great migration of African Americans who came from Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Oklahoma to work in the Kaiser shipyards -- and had little "home" to return to.  How did I know?  Because we opened Reid Records in South Berkeley on June 1st of 1945 to satisfy that demand for the expressions of black culture that arrived with them.

Many of the bluesmen and women stayed on at war's end to earn their way as chauffers, waiters, porters, red caps, maids, during the day and to make their music at night for little or nothing in the small storefront clubs that sprang up along the coast over the years. Their music, their techniques, their aura, didn't. That traveled overseas over the next 3 decades to find a home in Liverpool, London's East End, Paris, Amsterdam, and Sweden until the music later re-entered our country through the artistry of Eric Clapton, The Beatles, Keith Richards, etc., and swept the world to great acclaim and created great fortunes for those artists. Janet Joplin, Elvis Presley, and later, Bonnie Raitt, adopted the music and relayed it back to audiences who'd refused to accept it from the original black artists, but couldn't resist its power when expressed by whites. Of those musicians, Raitt, Clapton, and Richards have been foremost in crediting those who inspired their music and created their careers. To their credit, all three have tried consistently to honor the debt.

Somewhere in the world there needs to be a marker for the art form. Richmond is the natural center for the establishment of a Blues Hall of Fame. Here's our complement to the new national park; a world destination. It needs to be a place where the entire African Diaspora can be celebrated in a museum, rehearsal and performance spaces, workshops for set-building and costume-making, art galleries, cafes, small shops for souvenirs, clubs and restaurants that feature the great variety of African and African American arts and cuisine from Gullah to Cajun-Creole, Ethiopian, Ghanian, Brazilian, Cuban, South African, Caribbean, etc. Were I a child you'd have to beat me off with a stick!

We need to make it a place where we can celebrate our heritage and where non-blacks can come to learn. We need to have a place to grow new young black artists so that the music will not continue to be delivered by derivatives. We all (not only African Americans) need our children to know of this legacy and to be enriched by it. We need the arts passed on by those black masters still living among us before it's too late, and there are many such scattered around the West Coast and looking for somewhere to land. (Are you listenin' E.B. Wainwright and Johnny Tolbert?)

A friend once described to me a plan whereby artists from all of the disciplines were given partially subsidized live/work spaces in a district like ours -- this, in exchange for the sharing of their gifts with children in the local schools. Since most dancers, painters, sculptors, potters, weavers, musicians, etc., who live by their art have such a difficult time making ends meet, subsidies are essential for survival, but what they have to barter is priceless. When I think of a time when a critical mass of such creative people become a part of this community by living among us and sharing their talent with our young, I'm ecstatic!

The Iron Triangle can be transformed. We can replace degradation with creativity and new life. We can begin to stop watching our backs because our children might also have their eyes on the prize of new possibilities. African/American "Have-Littles" would again have a sense of place and might stop waiting around not-so-passively for gentrification to sweep them off into some other place where no one else wants to be now that they've lost those "jobs that nobody else wants to do." We can claim dignity by restoring the pride that now exists mainly in our places of worship, but that should move out from Sunday to enhance our weekday lives. The best jazz in the world now comes from the choir loft and has for years -- but only the most hip are aware of it.

And best of all, our children can learn to identify the artist within themselves.

Yes!

If Dorian has the capacity -- given her mental deficits -- what about all those youngsters who are fully functioning but deprived of that spark of life and direction and hope?

It could happen ... but I'll need to strike a Faustian bargain with the devil for another 20 years!

Or not ... .

Photo: My younger son, David Allen Reid, current proprietor of Reid's, here seen at age 14 listening raptly to his teacher, Jim Stein, playing the blues in classtime at Pinél, a small private school named for the great French psychologist/educator. Both Dorian and David attended this Summerhill-inspired school in the Alhambra Valley near Martinez, California.

Tossed between too many options ... .

All I need is a good 45 hour day. Fitting my life into the current time frame just isn't working. No matter how I arrange my days, each midnight I fall into bed leaving behind huge pieces of work incomplete or barely begun. Maybe that's true for everyone. I don't really know. It's either that, or it's that I'm spread too thin at a period in life when there's simply not enough of me left to go around.

Work goes well. The sense of urgency grows with each day and is accellerated with each death of one of my contemporaries. Among the most recent losses were Lucretia Edwards, credited with leading the struggle for public access to the Richmond shoreline, and Mary Otani, whose path through life connected with my own in political activism. We were both active among the Unitarian-Universalists and with Consumer Co-op members in Berkeley years ago. Most recently Mary and I were founding members in the very effective collaborative, Vision-2000, which successfully worked toward a living wage for all city contracts and is currently working hard on the issue of just-cause evictions. Both these activists will be sorely missed by the communities so enriched by their dedication to guaranteeing the quality of life for us all.

Mortality is now palpable -- a constant fact of life. But it's not particularly morbid for some reason, just more demanding now than before. I'm less concerned with when or how the end will come, but with an occasional fleeting hope for an easy exit. Maybe this sensitivity to the relentless passage of time will lessen as days go by. But meanwhile, there's work to do and it doesn't appear that my replacement has turned up yet ... at least I haven't yet noticed her lurking anywhere in the background.

Talked briefly with son, Bob, last week and said to him in passing that I was (as usual) doing too much and that I seem to have reached a place in life where so many of my wildest visions are now being realized ... and that I've finally accumulated the skills and the contacts and the experience to make real things I'd only dreamed of over a long lifetime. I'm being entrapped by the seduction of the possible. I said to him, "...there is so much happening that I feel sometime that I'll simply explode into the next dimension at some point -- from the sheer excitement of that realization!"

His answer was, "...but, Mom, what a way to go!"

Yes!

Photo: These three seeds were sent to me years ago by our friend, Lama Wangdor, in a note from Rewalser high in the Himalayas on the occasion of our marriage. They've always held a mystery for me. Have never known what would grow from them. They've served as a metaphor for all of life -- complete in their being. They represent both the beginning and the end of life -- as we all do. As fragile and as delicate as they appear to be, they as we -- are star stuff.

Another homegoing ...

If one lives long enough the number of deaths begin to overtake the number of births -- and funerals begin to overtake wedding events. It's the life cycle, and has been so since the beginning of time. This month brought the final days of Dorothy Marion (Reid) Pete whose 90th birthday we celebrated last year -- followed in only a few days by the arrival of Jessica's firstborn; a little boy. Those are the everyday miracles experienced in all of our lives. The story of Harlem is not:

During the beautiful memorial service for Dorothy, her son, Geoffrey, shared this touching and extraordinary little story of the deep relationship between his mother and her little cocker spaniel, "Harlem."

Dorothy was in her 91st year-- after a long and dedicated life -- and had been failing rapidly over the past several months. She was being lovingly cared for at home by her three sons, Geoffrey, Gregory, and Dennis. Gregory had taken over the role of primary caretaker in her final days.

Harlem had been her constant companion for years. During the memorial service a soft knowing giggle ran through the congregation when Geoffrey reminded us how -- whenever any one of her friends picked her up for an errand or churchgoing -- room in the car had to made for Harlem. He lived in and as Dorothy's shadow.

As she became more frail in her final days, Harlem was leashed so that he wouldn't be in the way of the increasing medical and personal attention that she now needed. Gregory et al were there to give her a soft landing into whatever afterlife her faith provided, and there wouldn't any longer be room for Harlem, obviously.

On the day of her death and cremation, Harlem was finally allowed off leash where he'd been kept near the kitchen -- tied up and isolated. Geoffrey thought it right to allow him to roam free for a bit after such an unaccustomed confinement. After a time Geoffrey looked out and called. No Harlem. A few hours later he'd still not returned. As the night wore on more time passed and still no Harlem. There was cause now for real concern. The little dog was not accustomed to the streets and could be in jeopardy.

In the morning the telephone rang and it was the voice of a kind stranger who had found and identified him by the phone number on the identification tag on his collar. Harlem had been found miles away from home wandering in the vicinity of the Chapel of the Chimes, the crematorium where Dorothy's remains ... .

Some things defy logic, and rightly so and are the stuff of legends.

This one was true -- and the cause for a deep silence that followed the telling of the story against the bank of flowers (mostly red roses) that framed the teller of the story.

Dorothy would have loved it.

Photo: Dorothy as she looked when I first knew her in the late 1930's. She was the sister of my husband, Mel's, father. She was the first African American secretary hired by the YWCA's main branch in downtown Oakland, California. She was also the first African American administrative aide to successive pastors of Lakeshore Avenue Baptist Church. Dorothy's ancestors arrived in California during the Civil War and have contributed significantly to the building of the West. To learn more about them click on California Black Pioneers under my photo on the top left.

Andrés' response to my last entry ... another reality spoken for ...

Received this email from my friend. I've received his permission to share this note with you.
_________________________________________________________

Betty: I have certainly also thought about the issues you raise in your comments and I would have to say I try to not think nationalistically. First of all I am convinced we are one species, the human species. Race is an artificial social construct just like religion and nationalism. I also, as a person of Mexican ancestry, am a product of colonial "racial mixing." The Mexican nationality is wrapped up in an idealization this "mestizaje", or racial mix, that is the contemporary Mexican. At the same time the "Indian" heritage is revered and yet still they remain at the bottom of the social and political ladder.

Every country in Latin America and in North America is still grappling with the continuance and legacy of the injusticies of the colonial systems. Racialization is one of these issues because it becomes a proxy for economic segregation. The varieties of "racial admixtures" will become rare remnants. In the meantime, economic issues will be argued in terms of these artificial constructs whose only reality occurs when people buy into them.

In Brazil, which has more "African Americans" than the US, more Japanese than any country outside of Japan, the largest Arabic population in the Americas and various ethnic European population groups, Afro-Brazilian people identify the opposite of the US. It is not the degree of blackness that defines one, but the degree of whiteness. This is a result of Brazil's own experience with these same forces, which include even a higher degree of "miscegenation" for a longer period of time. A survey was done by a university in Brazil in the 1990's and they asked several thousand Brazilians to define themselves racially. They received over 250 self descriptions.

The book, The Brazil Reader," has that essay. Also, Nicholas Vaca's book "Presumed Alliance" about African American/Latino political conflict in the US lay out important issues to initiate just the dialogue you suggest.

Food for thought ... .

Paz, Andrés
_________________________________________________________________________________

Indeed it is, Andrés. Realized as I wrestled with the issue that I've lived most of my life within a 30 mile radius. With a family that has been on this soil since the late 1700's, I have no real connection with any other land - except theoretically and politically. Were I dropped off somewhere on the West Coast of Africa I'd undoubtedly feel as alien as I sometimes feel here at home, despite a fairly sophisticated grasp of the issues. There's a cost to being "everything." You have flashes of being nothing. Maybe I envy your strong cultural identity at a time when mine is being diminished day by day. It may be as simple as that.

Andrés speaks from a far deeper place in himself that resonates with a homeland and home culture that is at least a psychological "back door" in the event that retreat is ever necessary. Perhaps that explains why I cling to nationalism while he speaks authoritatively from an international perspective. Maybe. Reading his response made me feel embarrassingly provincial, but the feelings of justification for those feelings remain despite all.

Maybe it's irrational. Purely emotional; but just maybe those are feelings shared widely enough with other African Americans that they need to be taken into account. There is an emotional component that may be buried in that place in me that waits for recognition of wrongs done in times past to those who preceded me on the planet and whose genes I'm ferrying through this life, and to wrongs I've had to live through without recourse. A legacy from slavery? Is there some invisible x mark on my forehead or buried in my DNA?

But even more important is the frustration that I feel when confronted with the need to distinguish between the displacement of black service workers and immigrant's rights. The discussion invariably falls into the subject of race rather than hold to the economic considerations. I can readily agree that race is an "artificial social construct." Whether or not we "buy into the concept" is not an option, but a factor of our existence. That simply doesn't get me beyond the fact that the service worker industry has changed complexion now and that race was a critical factor in this dramatic transformation -- to the advantage of immigrant workers and to the detriment of African Americans. What makes it even more insidious is the fact that one reason we can't get a handle on the problem may not be because it's a race thing at all, but is actually based in the superficiality of skin color, alone. And maybe the irrationality is not in me at all, but in the European colonialist psyche.

I'm just glad that my feelings about the racial aspect of it are enough in check that they don't spill over into personal relationships. I know that the fault lies elsewhere and not with other people of color. I simply don't know what to do with them except to express them with candor, with hope for understanding, and enough companions without that mark of unresolved pain to help by bearing some of the pain of my growth.


Left photo: Mother's eldest brother, Herman Allen and wife, Marie Gaudet Allen sitting in the large expanse of meadow where the Mueller's dairy cows were often pastured (Circa 1917). When I was a little girl in the 20's and 30's the iron foundries moved in and replaced these greenlands. I'm glad that I knew them as the staging area for my childhood.

Right Photo: Aunt Marie seen here near Papa George's little bungalow on 75th Avenue in East Oakland -- in the shadow of what is now the Oakland Coliseum. This Creole woman could as easily have been the aunt of Andrés. She surely reinforces his arguments about the nature of the artificial social construct. (Click the little photo open to enlarge.) (Circa 1918)

Million More March ... was about ...

one of the cleverest ploys ever inflicted on a people. And it wasn't at the hands of Minister Louis Farrakahn, but can be traced back to those who came together more than ten years ago to reconfigure the way the census would be designed. Crazy? Maybe not. Inspired, depending upon the goals.

Under the new set of criteria -- black people would no longer be counted under the old "one drop" rule, but starting with the census of 1990, would be able to check multiple boxes for racial identity. I knew at the time that something truly revolutionary had occurred. I wrote about it for my boss. No longer would I need to claim my "Negro" or "African American" designation, but could now legally become other, or any number of exotic racial combinations. This could be a field day for those of us whose race was fast-becoming no more than a political choice due to generations of miscegination. This is surely true for my grandchildren and my nieces and nephews who -- over the past generation of growing up in the relatively enlightened S.F. Bay Area -- brought Asian genes into our already exotic blend of racial and cultural genetic jambalaya.

But there's a darker side to this change in racial identification. Within a few weeks after the census results were analyzed we learned that (Aha!) African Americans would soon no longer be the largest racial minority, but were fast being overtaken by Latinos. Stories about the need to pay attention to the Latino vote grew, and politicians gradually began to cast their eyes toward the barrios instead of the projects in order to increase their political power among the "unwashed". It was during those years that we began to see a lessening of attention paid to illegal immigration and noticeable changes in hiring policies that now saw a major displacement of the country's black service workers.

Black hotel maids, janitors, day laborers, porters, nurses aides, gardeners, etc., all were now replaced by immigrant labor. They were now doing those "jobs nobody else wanted" but that had supported black families for generations and built a bridge into the middle class for many, including mine. Where did the black service workers go? Some improved their lot through education and increased opportunity, but many dropped into the underground economy fueled by the illegal drug trade. Given the new time restrictions on welfare and little education and/or training that might move them out of poverty, the outcomes were highly predictable. People will feed their children in whatever ways necessary. The streets got meaner over time, and the continuing violence that naturally feeds on desparation and hopelessness is now cutting down our young in frightening numbers. There is the growing concern that our young have internalized the race-hatred and have become suicidal -- and that homicide is but one manifestation of that truth.

Blacks had lost political power through the simple act of taking advantage of the opportunity to identify as "other." We lost significant political power by reducing our numbers through the census analysis. The truth is that -- under the old one drop rule -- there are actually more of us now than ever before in history! The Latino population, despite growing numbers, cannot begin to overtake the numbers of us who are mastiso, creole, and every other black blend love can create and has over many generations. We tend to forget that where schools, housing, and workplaces have been resistant to racial integration, we've had integrated bedrooms since before the days of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemmings! And not exclusively through sexual exploitation, but through at least some courageous people crossing those lines of separation for the sake of love.

It's a game of semantics that has proven devastating to our ability to bring together our people toward the unification needed in order to truly overcome. With help of the census designers, we hardly know who our people are! We've been successfully splintered into a thousand racial bits and atomized into a meaningless blob no one needs pay attention to, politically. With each generation that blends into the whole, we lose potential leadership, energy, and the sense of belonging to something beyond ourselves that we must have in order to give substance to the kind of demonstration attempted on the Mall in Washington yesterday. I would predict that by the twentieth anniversary of the Million Man March, we'll have all but disappeared into some multicultural-multiracial gumbo! And it will have all started with a seemingly simple change in statistical language.

This is surely not to say that Latinos have entered this country in great numbers to purposely steal away the work of African Americans. To the contrary. Everyone of us is trying desparately to make life better for our children than it has been for ourselves, especially those from below the border. But it is to say that Latinos are the benificiaries of white racism by default with little reason to be aware of or any incentive to resist the rewards it brings to an equally needful people.

One day as we all progress inexorably toward a more just society, we'll have those critical conversations and black and brown Americans will begin to recognize the ways in which we're competing for space on the bottom rung of the economic ladder and will unite toward change -- together -- change that will begin to move all of our children out of poverty and into economic viability. That is when the demographics of our prisons will no longer reflect the inadequacies of our seriously flawed systems of education and governance. But first we need to begin to control the language that controls us -- by recognizing the manipulation and challenging the distortions when they threaten our mutual well-being.

Since when was "75% minority" not the majority?

Photo: Andrés Soto of the Richmond Progressive Alliance shown here at an event to save Breuner's Marsh, a wetlands adjacent to the East Bay Regional Park's Point Pinole. It is currently under threat by private development that will limit public access and destroy habitat for endangered species.

Such a strange night ...

It's been playing in the background all week -- the drama in a Martinez courtroom being played out in all of its brutality and shame. I've not wanted to write about it, but it begins to look like I need to get it behind me in order to move on.

Turned on NBC tonight and as I clicked the remote past Prime Time I saw her face for just an instant. I clicked back. She'd appeared on MSNBC a few nights before and I'd quickly clicked her away -- not wanting to deal with it. It has been 3 years since I learned of my friend, Felix Polk's murder. The woman on camera was Susan Polk, a woman I never knew. Her sensational murder trial bleeds into my life despite all efforts to silence her.

The late Dr. Felix Polk was a member of my husband's (Project Community) research staff at the university when we first met. He was a fine psychologist with whom I was paired in our work on the campus at Concord High School. We worked together with adolescents for about a year in the early Seventies. He was bright and gentle and always seemed a bit shy.

At that time he was married to Sharon Polk, a brilliant concert pianist who was the more outgoing and witty of the two. They had two great kids, their adolescent son was studying acting with the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco under Director William Ball. Felix was very proud of his family. I found both the Polks interesting to be around, and Felix a great mentor and good (though always reserved and respectful) friend. After some years I learned of their divorce. It was only mildly surprising since divorce was not a rare event in the lives of the those who peopled my life at that time.

I watched the hourlong interview tonight with Susan -- explaining how she'd stabbed her "violent and abusive" husband to death (26 times), and I was horrified. I believed that she must have entered his life long after his marriage to Sharon had ended since those years were now long ago. Not so. I watched her face as she disclosed "the scandalous event in my life." She said that their affair had begun while she was his 15 year-old patient -- in the year 1972!" A year during which Felix "...had hypnotized her so that she has no recollection of what occurred in her therapy sessions". She was 25 when they married. The years of her "seduction" would have been clearly the years when he and I were working together in the schools and when I knew him and his family fairly well. This was surreal ... I could not turn away but sat transfixed before the small screen unable to move.

In watching the program I felt shock each time the camera did flashbacks and -- instead of the greyhaired Felix whom I didn't know -- the 40 year-old darkhaired psychologist Felix whom I did know well would emerge and my own flashbacks would take over.

The camera roamed around their spacious and beautiful Orinda home for the entire hour. They showed 3 young sons born to his second marriage to Susan -- and who were strangers to me. Only one appeared on camera, and in support of his mother. Only Felix's neighbor friend's description of events and of his relationship with Felix and of conversations they'd had in the days leading up to the murder made sense to me. It appeared that this man and I knew the same Felix Polk. That physically and mentally abusive mad man in no way resembled the murdered man described by Susan Polk.

I remembered then a day when I'd written a report on our group session for him. In it I'd described my impressions of each youngster of the dozen or so students in our group -- and given my perception of small changes I'd observed over weeks since the previous evaluation. In a very untypical moment of closeness he stopped by my desk to return the paper with the words. "I want you to know, Betty, that I couldn't have written that." It was the highest compliment and the more meaningful since it came from one who rarely entered into casual talk. It meant much to me since I was the only member of Bill's staff who held no degrees. The others were all either graduate students, Ph.D candidates, or full-fledged psychologists. That was the day that Felix welcomed me into "the Club." I was no longer simply the wife of the principal investigator to be merely tolerated, but a valued member of the research team. I felt validated in the academy by a professional whom I deeply respected.

Susan Polk murdered him "...because he was trying to kill me!"

What was it that I missed.....?

Photo: This framed batik hangs on my bedroom wall. It is by an anonymous African artist.

Such a quiet day ...

Spent this holiday foraging through storage boxes and discovering everything except those things that I know were saved -- but that have disappeared into that place where the "other sock" usually ends up. You know that you have them, but where?

Someplace there is a cassette tape of a concert that I saved for years -- the audio portion of a 30-minute concert I performed for KQED years ago. It was the only record of one of the countless Betty-lives lived over the decades. Without that tape, I'm not even sure that she existed anywhere except in my imagination. Impossible, of course. The lyrics are all here in my files and now in my blog, and the songs are singing themselves softly as I type.

It's a little like the copy of the scenario and the stills from "Farallon Light" safely stored in my files -- I can hold the browning sheets in my hands and remember the filming and the scoring ... but can't locate a copy of the 16 mm film anywhere on the planet. That's not quite true, though, since a friend did locate one at the University of Southern California film department recently. I emailed that source only to learn that their copy is "...too scratchy to be of any use." I'm in a kind of summation period in this life and needing to gather together evidence of my tenure on the planet -- and that film is terribly important to me now. My friend -- who heads the media department at Vista College here suggests that I should request it anyway, and that new techniques may make it possible to restore it. Will do.

But the cassette ... .

If I can't find it ... .


Photo: Photo taken at a concert of the Unitarian-Universalist General Assembly in Cleveland in the late 60's.

Women's History Conference ...

Women's Conference at Mills College in Oakland was great. I really must maintain these connections. For reasons I can't quite explain -- much of my time is spent at home or at work and rarely in the company of other women for the pure enjoyment of the experience. There is so much happening in this world of women -- so many fascinating women from the arts (writers), education, historians, the California president of NOW, political activists, a young African American army officer and poet; so many with so much to give and so willing to give it. Wish I hadn't waited until today to participate in the conference. This was the last day and my role was to serve as one of many panelists. I believe that it went well, but I never am a judge of that.

Lots of photos were taken and will post them when and if someone forwards them as promised. I brought along my digital camera but was too reticent to take it out of the car. Preferred to pretend that this wasn't terribly important in order to control the panic. It was. Would love to have one that was taken with Aileen Hernandez, one of my all-time idols.

My ad lib remarks were well-received. The words felt good leaving my tongue -- as truth always does. Discovered just how long 15 minutes can be -- and have no idea how close to time I was -- but the audience was listening closely and -- I recognized the end when it arrived. That's the most important thing, I suppose, particularly when there are six panelists.

Didn't hang around for the final workshops, closing reception, and evaluations. Felt pretty well used up, emotionally, and a call on my cell phone from Dorian -- wanting to talk about her Special Olympics soccer game earlier in the day gave a natural reason to head for home. Since she's moved into a group home, I find myself not willing to give up those times when she reaches out to share her life and small victories.

Remembered then just why it is that I've spent so little personal time with friends. Raising a handicapped daughter safely into adulthood is/was all-consuming. I was repeating as always - in these moments after my talk -- the pattern that I've held to all these years. Time is my own only so long as Dorian doesn't claim it.

Will spend some of the evening going over the cards that were slipped into my hand as I was leaving -- will check out some web sites -- learn more about the incredible women of history whose names I learned only today.

We've done far more than simply hold up our half of the sky, I think.

Photo: Dorian with Mom, at age 11, taken in 1968.

I'm developing such a backlog of unwritten events and thoughts ... with little time to "download" ...

But I need to spend a part of this weekend thinking about what I'll say next weekend at the Mills College Women's History Conference -- this will be a good place to begin, I think.

On Thursday evening there will be a Holly Near concert and casual gathering where there will be a chance to schmooze, I suppose. Never was very good at that. When people approach me to chit chat -- and ask silly questions for the sake of the ritual -- I tend to give real answers and then feel embarrassed that this was not a part of the game. Hate schmoozin'!

On Friday there will be a ceremony in the morning where Justice Sandra Day O'Connor will be honored followed by a great variety of workshops that will go on throughout that day and the next.

On Saturday I'm scheduled to represent the Rosie the Riveter/Home Front Historical National Park on a panel that will be dealing with monuments and tributes to the nation's women. Not really sure what that means and will take the time here to work through some of that. It may save some embarrassment next Saturday by keeping my remarks relevant.

What I've been thinking about (and what's confusing the issue for me in many ways) is the fact that different people have lived such differing realities. My experience doesn't reflect that of the Rosie's who are the heroines of the Home Front war effort at all. We lived those years in a racially segregated society. Yet, one of the reasons that I'm of any value at all to the NPS is precisely because I represent the untold stories of the period. Those lost or never-held conversations are critical to the establishing of a baseline against which to measure social progress made over the years that followed. Only by looking closely and honestly at those times that radically altered basic social patterns -- can we begin to understand the turbulence of the last 60 years and continue on a corrective course. The federal response to those who suffered such shameful abuse and neglect from Katrina in the heavily black Gulf states suggests that we still have miles to go before we sleep.

To have lived long enough to be acutely aware of the continuum of change and to still be connected enough to express it may justify my participation on that panel. I need to hold to my truth and not get caught up in what is often a glorified version of women's role in the war effort. I must stay with my own reality; and that of women like me.

Recently read a book on African American Women in the West (not exact title but will look it up later) and noticed something that had escaped my notice until recently. It's important, I think:

Though there are 21 pages in a chapter entitled "World War II," not once did the words "Japanese," "Nazis," "The Axis," "Bataan or Midway," receive mention. It suddenly struck me as I completed the chapter that the war had never been a major factor in my life, either. I'd never known why that was, or that anyone else experienced it similarly.

Obviously, for African Americans, the epic was not the War, but escape from a hostile South. The War simply served as background to this greater drama. This chapter in a fine book on the experiences of the African American woman spoke of customs, practices, relationships, philanthropy, work ethics, racial prejudice as transported to the west by white southerners, church and civic involvement, recreation, job opportunities or the lack thereof; everything but "The Great War." Interesting?

That chapter would have been written very differently had the author been a white female participant on the home front war effort. It would have talked about climbing in and out of the noses of warplanes or learning to rivet or weld against the resistance of male workers, etc. It would be a story of great pride in overcoming gender biases and prevailing against the odds. And it is those stories that are being collected and treasured as Rosie's long-neglected history is being honored by the establishment of a national park in her name. The story of Rosie is a white woman's story, and a worthy one at that. But it isn't my story, nor the story of the many women like me who were shamefully wasted human potential in sea of inequity.

The time of retrieving those lost conversations has finally arrived. The National Park Service is not only listening, but is facilitating the untold stories under a new program called "Civic Engagement." There is a growing audience of willing listeners -- those who are eager to hear. The Lion's share of the work may be in getting African Americans to relive the pain of those years by putting it into words -- those who are still alive and willing. Their children and grandchildren continue to suffer from the effects of the hopelessness and sense of rejection that's worked their way into the DNA of a people without any longer remembering the why of it ... .

A tremendous opportunity is before us through the work of the National Park Service. By setting aside and restoring places and structures of our shared history, we can be the catalyst for our own transformation into what our founding documents tried to provide for us -- that framework for freedom for all people. Even in their ambivalence around just who "the people" were, they provided the template for what a democracy can be, if each generation in turn accepts the responsibility for re-creation and dedication to the principles therein.

I suppose these are the underlying reasons that I've lived much of my life as a political being, ever hopeful of positive change.

Wonder, sometimes, how different it might have been had Mr. McGovern won the nomination and the presidency?

Photo: Served as a McGovern delegate with the California delegation (in 1972) led by then Speaker of the House, the Honorable Willie Brown. The irony is that I was chosen by the same congressional district that fiercely challenged my right to live among them some 20 years before.