Lay in bed this morning listening to the hour-long panel discussion we taped last Sunday; "Wrap up for the Election" ... .

What a trip!

My original impressions about the event were right on. The only thing missing was some indication that I was seriously considering bopping the columnist (sitting to my right) over the head with my umbrella! This morning I lay there in my pajamas laughing out loud at the thought of it, and wishing I'd said so on the air. This young man simply couldn't enjoy the moment. He sounded like Eeyore of the Pooh stories. I was even more annoyed listening to the conversation one whole week after the fact.

Except for wishing I'd delivered words profound enough to fit the historic occasion we were gathered to talk about, I felt reasonably comfortable while listening.

I heard what was obvious; that poor Mr. President-elect may have inherited an electorate that has lost sight of the fact that this is a participatory democracy that requires that we the people must remain in the equation. What specific policies he will enact; what programs he will immediately introduce are of less importance to me than what is it that we as a nation will become under his leadership. It is obvious that we may have finally elected someone who is ready and willing to tap into our considerable strengths. As I said at the end of the taping, "...he needs me nipping at his heels. His stated plan is to govern from the bottom up. I take him at his word, and plan to go on being as political as I've always been.

You can hear the panel discussion at www.theglobenewspapers.com. There's a little box on the left side of the screen where it says, "Listen to the Globe". You just click on the black section in the middle of the box. When I figure out how to do so I'll post the discussion in CBreaux Annex.

Meanwhile, I plan to keep my day job.

It was a long night of tossing fitfully -- dreams of the last time Rick and Gordon and I were together ...

on board the SS Red Oak Victory as she was being towed down from the mothball fleet berthed at Benicia ten years ago. She was a gift from the Navy to the museum and would be restored lovingly by veterans of WWII over the next ten years. Gordon had been working as a volunteer for the Richmond Museum of History and had been enthusiastically stamping and folding invitations and otherwise engaged in the planning of this grand adventure. I was working at the time as field representative for Assemblywoman Loni Hancock, and had made it onto the invitation list as such. Rick was there with Gordon. We were so happy that day -- with several hundred other celebrants; with fire boats greeting us with their giant sprays; with WWII planes flying overhead as we sailed triumphantly under the Richmond/San Rafael bridge!

One year later Gordon would be dead of throat cancer and Rick would soon follow him into that watery grave beside the ship -- a victim of alcoholic abuse and the pain of rejection since childhood. They were not only a gay couple, but Gordon was white and from Portland, Maine, and Rick was African American. They were scorned on both scores.

Woke this morning feeling very tired and forlorn (old fashioned word, but fitting), and I'm foolish to think that I can face today unmoved by memories of their loss. A microphone in my hands might be very risky. I'll stand at attention with the others. Will surely hold the flowers for the ceremony -- because my work demands that I fulfill those duties. It will be difficult to remain in the present and not see that very painful past. The triggers are hairlike, and hard to control. I will ask to be relieved of the "saying of a few words" as planned.

I dare not tempt fate ... .

There will be many opportunities to challenge conventional thinking on the matter of same sex marriage. Today is about something quite different. Today we honor the veterans of all wars and there is a responsibility to contribute to this ceremony in the ways that are pre-ordained by custom.

But there will be moments -- some time between one o'clock and four when my stint ends -- when I can stand alone at the railing and remember the little boy I so loved and have now outlived by eight long years.

The holiday season is always the most painful.

Small wonder that the cracks in my psychological armor were pierced on Sunday.

It's Misery Eve... .

Participated as a panelist in a radio wrap-up of the presidential election ... .

That was Sunday afternoon.

I arrived at the offices of The Globe, a local African American Newspaper with a radio division. The moderator is a friend of long-standing and someone I find it difficult to say no to -- ever.

The other two panelists were a columnist for the newspaper and a young fourth grade teacher from the local school district. Both were male.

I was in a foul mood for reasons unclear at the time, and I'm afraid it showed. I felt myself increasingly combative with one of the panelists; at odds with his opinions more often than not. Though it was an internal battle that was being waged with myself and I suspect hardly showed except harmlessly. Not sure about the why of it, but some of the not so subtle irritation had to do with what I heard as his inexplicable conservatism. His cautious attitude was annoying, though this was someone I'd never met before, so such feelings were clearly irrational.

I heard myself say at one point, "...O Lordy, I expect any minute now to hear you say -- with all deliberate speed!" I was clearly the most liberal (does that word still mean what it used to?) among the three of us, and that surprised me. I would have imagined that young people would be far more daring and "progressive." It was not to be. They were as old and as measured and as conservative (if that word still means what I thought it did) as one might imagine about men twice their age. Though the teacher was clearly more of a free thinker than the columnist, who was a Stanford grad and an attorney -- and clearly right of center.

I suppose I wasn't ready yet to get out of my paper hat, and felt that my parade was being rained on. It may have been as simple as that.

I may be in a confetti mood for days!

But then the irritation may have been related to excruciatingly painful events I was subconsciously trying hard to smother ... it's that time of year.

Tomorrow I will be in uniform participating in Veterans Day observances on board the SS Red Oak Victory at Shipyard 3. I'll speak a few words to the visitors in the planned ceremony and will participate in the flower tribute. I will be representing Rosie the Riveter WWII/Home Front National Historical Park, officially. The ceremony will be an emotional one for me; though no one will know.

It was from the deck of the Red Oak Victory that I scattered the ashes of my eldest son, Dale Richard Reid, 8 years ago, in the autumn of the year 2000. I held his remains in my hand -- combined them with beautiful red roses as I let them drop over the rail -- one by one -- into the waters below. It was just 18 months after Rick and I had scattered the remains of his partner, Gordon Higgins in the same manner -- from this ship.

Their's had been an 18 year monogamous relationship that ended with their deaths, just months apart. Two lives destroyed by a thinly-veiled staggered act of suicide brought on by alcoholism and the heartbreak of lifelong social rejection.

On the same day that brought such exaltation with the Obama victory ... Proposition 8 passed in the state of California overturning the right of same sex couples to marry. There is great irony in the fact that the same African American voters who helped to bring the great joy of the election of Barack Obama-- voted simultaneously to take away the precious right of others to wed. How in the world could anyone choose against the right to love? What a tragic juxtaposition of events!

I'm only becoming aware as my fingers tap the keys -- why I was so irritated at the taping. Small wonder, right?

How I wish I could have influenced those who voted away the rights of others ... how I wish they could realize the pain of rejection inflicted upon so many who so recently were given the right to wed ... but then, how on earth could African Americans not know? Is that not the stony road that we've just traveled?

I'll stand at the rail tomorrow and drop red roses into the waters, again. This time for all those who perished in all of the wars of our time and before. I'm certain that this struggle, too, will one day be won -- but please, let no one suggest that it will happen "with all deliberate speed"!


Then -- if I'm lucky -- I'll try to get back into my paper hat for another round of exaltation -- once I get past the tears ... .

Unlikely, perhaps unrecognized -- gentle Revolutionary ... .

He was born in racist Greenville, Mississippi, in 1936. He died far too young. He grew up in Maryland, in the shadow of a Capitol built by slaves. There is no way that Jim Henson could have not been shaped by his times -- the Civil Rights movement was surely playing powerfully in the background of his life. The influences of the vestiges of the Civil War; the trail of violence that marked his birthplace; the history of lynchings, the lives sacrificed for the right to vote ... .

Strangely, it was the memory of this gentle artist with the inner child so strongly influencing his work that has haunted me in the days following the election of our new president.

Henson, alone, may have quietly changed the mindset of an entire generation of children who were enchanted by his multi-colored, multi-everything creatures who slowly chipped away at the way we saw ourselves and one another. He taught compassion to some and self-esteem to others -- and love to all.

Henson and his Children's Television Workshop confronted the stereotypes and created pathways between children of every color and culture. He did it at a time when they were eager to learn and accepting of differences. We all got to learn how "one of these things is not like the other" and how it "isn't easy bein' green" from a thoughtful and wise Kermit the Frog. And our parents were listening in the other room as the tiny ones -- so malleable -- so innocent -- so open-- experienced the evolution of a nation's ethos -- and in time were touched as deeply as were the children.

Does anyone doubt, any longer, the power in early childhood education? Has it dawned on anyone besides me (and Linda Tillery, of course) that those babies of the Fifties, Sixties, Seventies, and beyond are now sitting in the boardrooms of major corporations; are the legislators now entering the state houses across the nation; are running the military and guiding the arts? They're the Sesame Street alumni, and they "got it!"

If only he could have lived to see how his magical creatures helped to change the world!

On Tuesday, those Sesame Street graduates were gathered on the malls, in front of the courthouses, waving American flags in town squares all across the country. They've reclaimed "patriotism" and sentimentality. They came together spontaneously in the thousands, peacefully, in celebration at Grants Park in Chicago; and in the far corners of the world. They were proud of themselves and of their new president-elect, knowing that we'd all crossed a threshold of some sort and that life would not be the same, ever again.

The little Obama girls will see a very different world than the one that Jim Henson was born into, and it's my guess that he intended it to be just that way.

And, I do believe that we have a ways to go still before equality is fully realized for all, but those facing up to that challenge are approaching it from the same side of the social barriers --and we're about as varied as those lovable Muppets are that Jim Henson gave to the world.

There are many heroes who contributed to this movement, and Jim Henson should be up there with the rest of them.

Photo: Bottom photo taken in Brisbane, Australia, when the election outcome was announced to the world.

So many moving images over the past weeks... gave up trying to save them all, but this is the one that left me speechless and awash in tears ... .

It came in an email with this message:

Subject: A picture worth 158 years
Date: November 2, 2008 12:02 PM

The picture above is from the Obama rally in St. Louis. I guess the eye is first drawn to the sheer number of people. Impressive. But that's not the point of this picture to a historian.

If you look in the distance, you can see a white building with a greenish-copper dome. That's the Old St. Louis Courthouse. For years and years, slaves were auctioned on the steps of that courthouse.

The Old Courthouse used to be called the St. Louis State and Federal Courthouse Back in 1850, two escaped slaves named Dred and Harriett Scott had their petition for freedom overturned in a case there. Montgomery Blair took the case to the US Supreme Court on the Scott's behalf and had Chief Justice Roger Taney throw it out because, as he wrote, the Scotts were "beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations, and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect."

I found it rather uplifting that, 158 years later, the man who will most likely be the first black US President was able to stand outside this very same courthouse and gather that crowd. Today, American looked back on one of the darkest moments in its history, and resoundingly told Judge Taney to go to hell!

Photo: Click to enlarge.

It was during these years (prior to 1978, I believe) that I left my position at the university at Berkeley ...

to return to try to save our small family business which was in a shambles. This was also the point where the political Betty was born and began the process of learning to lead through trial and error.

It was such a time as this. We were in the throes of my very first period of active campaigning. The city of Berkeley was in a heated mayoral race between Gus Newport and incumbent and now former mayor, Shirley Dean. That was in 1978. It's interesting that in this year, 2008, Ms. Dean is again challenging the incumbent mayor, Tom Bates. And, no, I have no horse in this race -- these players are only incidental to the story I want to tell.

Though I no longer lived in South Berkeley by that time, having divorced and remarried, this was Reid "turf" where Mel and I had carved out a bright future back in 1945 -- intended to support and hold as legacy for our 4 children. It was all threatened now -- with Mel's health rapidly deteriorating and the business in a state of financial ruin. The streets of our low income community were alive with negative street life. It had changed drastically since we created our little music store there years before. Our block had become ground zero for the drug trade.

It would be up to me now, and I'd spent the previous two decades living in suburbia raising children and accumulating little experience that would be applicable to what would be needed at this point in our lives.

I'd gone to Carol Sibley, a close friend of my husband, Bill's, and a widely respected community leader who'd almost single-handedly brought the school busing solution to Berkeley during the great battles to desegregate -- and who could be enlisted (I hoped) to help me to locate the sources of political power that might help my impoverished and crime-ridden south end of the city. She brought me together at lunch with her dear friend, Shirley Dean, who not only refused to be of any help -- but who stated firmly that she had "no intention of turning her back on the black leader 'down there' who supported her fully." I read this same leader as the major source of the corruption I was having to deal with and told her so. Nothing could dissuade her. She had his word. I was the new kid on the block with no conceivable power with which to barter.

Everywhere I looked there were Shirley Dean signs posted throughout South Berkeley. It felt hopeless. With so little to lose, I went to the Gus Newport headquarters (we'd never met at that time) and picked up as many signs as I could carry. I posted them everywhere possible on my building, and hoped for some sign of hope. We were in a sea of Dean signage. I then took the remaining signs and walked up and down a 3 block area asking for permission from store owners for window space in which to post them. Everyone readily gave permission. But the next day when I drove to work past those same shops -- every sign had been removed and replaced by Dean's posters. It felt hopeless.

A few weeks before election day I purchased large rolls of newsprint, a gaggle of wide-tipped felt pens and duplicated my sample ballot in bright red and blue ink. I filled my 8' plate glass display windows with my huge homemade ballot -- prominently posted my signature at the bottom -- with each candidate as well as each initiative checked. I purposely left a couple of initiatives in doubt (with question marks) to assure anyone interested that I really didn't have all the answers but was going with my best opinions in each case. I did not pretend to be telling anyone how to vote; but was being completely public with my own intentions. It was my hope that other merchants might do the same so that we might -- together -- raise political awareness on the street. On my counter I posted a legal-sized sheet that explained my conclusions for anyone to see and take away. I registered voters and took the time for friendly debates. It was a wonderful experiment in democracy.

If my intention was to end up in the Fortune 500, this surely wouldn't be the means by which it was achieved. Operating a little record shop on Sacramento Street in South Berkeley would surely not get me there. I needed another reason for braving the often frightening environment in which I found myself. I was perfectly willing to settle for social change as a reason to open the door each day. As long as the little shop paid its expenses and a couple of small salaries, I could feel successful. Being what I wanted to see in the world turned out to be the motivation needed to get through some pretty tough times. Setting short-term achievable goals guaranteed enough satisfaction to keep spirits high and the customer base growing. In time I published a newsletter that went out to 20,000 faithful Reid's customers from all corners of the country and abroad. Eventually I gave it up because I could no longer afford the cost of 3rd class postage or the hard job of writing, stamping, bundling, and carting all those bags to the Post Office for delivery.

It was also amazing! In the days that preceded the Newport/Dean campaign, I watched in awe as people drove up in their cars and parked while they marked their sample ballots and moved on. Even the young street guys sat on the curb and made notes. In time candidates for city offices began to stop by to chat and to seek endorsements. It was the most astounding thing I'd ever experienced. Does one become a civic (political) leader by self-declaration? Apparently so. Who on earth would ever have guessed such a thing even possible?

(Do you suppose I'd become a community organizer? The term would have meant nothing to me at the time.)

Over the next few years it was really fun to see the neighbor's begin to stop by prior to my ballot posting to stick their heads in the front door to ask "... how we gonna vote this year, Miss Betty?"

Do you suppose that's the way it happened over the cracker barrels at the Grange long ago?

I've missed that hands-on involvement over the years since turning the business over to David. Operating Reid's Records as "proprietor" was so much more than it seemed. I got to really love
the give and take with customers and the sense of power over my declared "500 Feet." It led to a continuing life of political involvement since that time, and with a quiet sense of how easy it all is, if you factor in the human touch.

Postscript: Gus Newport was elected mayor that year, and four years later we served together as Northern California co-chairs of the first Jesse Jackson campaign for the presidency.

And -- Reid's Records still exists (even as "records" disappeared along the way) after 63 years and counting -- still serving its community with youngest son, David, now at the helm. Ours is probably the oldest continuing small black music store in the country -- now specializing in church supplies as well as the best in black gospel music. We just had a face-lift after far too long (new awnings and paint job). The community has undergone great changes and most of the old-timers have moved on. If you live in the Bay Area do stop in for old times sake, and give David a chance to continue to serve in the old tradition that we all enjoyed for lo those many turbulent years. Had we only have known what lay ahead, and that we may have played a tiny role in the social progress now evident in the nation. I believe that we did just that, though it involved a lot of blind faith in what was then an unknown and murky future.

Photo: The group photo was taken of noted gospel singer, Vanessa Bell Armstrong and her entourage, at the height of her career. Reid's Records became the place where many of the most noted black performers stopped by, including Aretha Franklin, Shirley Caesar, Patti Austin, etc., over the years.

Lower photo: Yes, that's a young Janet Jackson who stopped by to sign albums for our customers.

None will ever know how difficult these past months have been for one so terminally political as I ... .

Though I've not missed total involvement in the electoral process since my first vote at the age of 21, in this most remarkable election in the lives of all those living today - I've been relatively silent. No walking precincts. No endorsements or bumper stickers. No placards on my car's back window nor campaign buttons on my lapels. Checks were submitted online and phone-banking from my cellphone from home. But, yes, I do have at least two tee-shirts and a couple of souvenir buttons brought home from one of the national conventions by friends. But for the most part I've never ever been so uninvolved in presidential campaigns.

There weren't the usual gatherings at campaign offices or attendance at work parties. No. This was a very different experience for me; though the Internet did allow the kind of anonymous participating in online discussions that removed some of the sting of isolation. Not sure I could have managed without some way to vent.

It is probably a wise decision by government to limit the ability of federal and civic employees to lobby in these cases, but it's really frustrating. I've surely felt the need for restraint and have agreed with the principle, in general. It's in the specific that it becomes so hard to hold to such rulings.

Today is Sunday; the last after a two-year battle for so much more than the White House. It may be a battle for the soul of the nation -- a crucible.

Since the National Park Service manages the White House, The Capitol Mall, all monuments and memorials in Washington, D.C., we rangers can volunteer to work the Inaugural proceedings. Can you imagine what a plum this assignment would be if realized?

We're near the end of the process now; the historic election is only days away. And however it goes, I've volunteered to work the Inauguration in January. If chosen, I may be picking up trash behind the parade or working a bottled water station, but I'll be there, hopefully. Though that will depend upon the outcome, of course (so I suppose it's not really "however it goes" at all). And anyone can surely guess from the content of my writings just where my heart lies and just how high my hopes are for the long-delayed fulfillment of the promise of the great American Experiment.

Wish I could sleep from now until the first precincts are counted!

Cognitive dissonance... ?

Wrote earlier about a recent encounter with a professional photographer that left me with questions. He was assigned to produce a series of "people" pictures for an exhibit of some sort and, I -- among others -- drove up to Martinez at the request of our Chief of Interpretation to participate. I might be able to fill in the "elder" quota; a simple assignment easily met.

Was impressed by the huge amount of gear he produced for the work, and wondered what on earth he could catch that others may have missed? Rarely have I seen photos of myself that I've been particularly pleased with. Earlier we'd flipped through some of his portfolio showing his work documenting the De Anza Trail. Great work, and his enthusiasm for it was clearly evident. Maybe this time ... .

I stood in front of the visitor's center at the John Muir Memorial site in a place that he'd determined gave us the desired early afternoon light. He worked with the glazed look of someone totally preoccupied with the task at hand -- I'd quickly become "subject" and he seemed to be looking beyond (inside?) me with "chin higher, lower, look here, follow my finger," etc., but never appeared really satisfied with what was in his viewfinder. I could sense it. Eventually, he didn't really formally end the session so much that he simply moved on without any sign of either completion or satisfaction. I could sense his frustration though neither of us gave words to it.

My suspicions were confirmed when I next saw him a couple of weeks later at the Home Front Festival. He asked if it would be possible for us to meet for another photo shoot soon? He still had that troubled look on his face as he asked the question. I knew that the artist's mind had seen something that the technical mind had failed to produce and that it was still troubling him.

I hadn't yet seen a copy of the original. A few days ago it arrived in an email and there she was; my mother! There is as much cognitive dissonance rolling around inside my psyche as that being experienced by the photographer.

The body that I "look out of" is not the one who looks back at me from my mirror each morning. An indisputable sign of aging is the fact that one no longer needs a mirror to apply the minimal makeup I now use (lip gloss and a bit of blush over cheekbones with lightly-defined brows). I'm not sure that I even see the image before me most of the time. My mind must provide filters that allow me to see a version of myself developed somewhere along the way that no longer fits reality. What is left of the Betty in the recent photo holds the very essence of my parents -- leaving very little room for whatever bits and pieces Betty contributed along the continuum of our collective lives. I think what little is left by now is referred to by others as character.

I can see the "me" of it in personal taste in dress (Indonesian batik), in the lovely antique (250 year-old) amber necklace brought back from Ladahk (on the Tibetan border) many years ago by my late husband, Bill. It adorned the bronze throat of a native woman who was willing to part with it for a price (sadly!). I've always wished I knew its story... I often imagine I can feel its energy. These provide evidence that my life experience thrust the Charbonnet/Breaux lines out beyond our national borders and back into the world from whence they originally came (France, Africa, Spain, etc), at least superficially since I didn't make the trip with him.

Other than the record here in this journal, most of my Betty disappeared gradually along with most of my "pretty" but I'm guessing that -- in some spiritual/electronic/chemical way -- there are enough traces of my individuality contained in what gets communicated in a "live" encounter that the (artist) photographer senses; wants desperately to capture and record -- but which stays tantalizingly beyond reach. Could that be true? Very rarely these days, am I able to find the essential me, either -- though I continue to look behind these words for evidence that I have lived and continue to forge a life for myself.

Perhaps that's why I write.

Maybe I'm still establishing my position in space and the irrevocable right to appear in the faces of my children and theirs far into some distant future, as the features of my ancestors -- my parents -- are etched so deeply into mine.

Could this, then, be immortality?

In looking back it occurs to me that I'd probably have been willing to give up a few good years of character for a few more years of pretty!

Working over the past few days on an article I've been asked to write -- to be submitted to the California Historian for publication in spring ... .

Shouldn't be a problem, right? I'm at the age where I've become living history myself, and -- having outlived all the naysayers in my life there are few left to dispute my claims; an enviable position to be in; or so one would imagine, anyway.

Been trying to recall all those flashing insights that pop into my head when I'm walking a group along the time-line at the truly moving Rosie the Riveter Memorial at Marina Bay Park. It's what we Interpreters do. The relevant facts are right there accessible at the front of the brain, and move out between my lips as if programmed in advance. I'm often surprised and delighted at the kinds of memories that are invoked on those walks through history. I've occasionally been silently pleased at a continuing ability to clearly articulate those times that our generation survived against such great odds. I can still feel the affect of those traumatic years in the process of the telling.

But now it's time to require my fingers to kick in and connect with those memories enough to enable my brain to produce a lengthy piece for publication. That's a horse of a different color; and this ain't Oz!

Why am I able to write so effortlessly when it's a matter of free association -- as with blogging? This is not in the least difficult. I simply imagine the words onto the screen and up they spring as if through some direct line twixt mind and fingertips. This has always been true. My personal files are filled with accounts of events, ceremonies, stories, challenges, written long ago to no one in particular. Long before blogging was the order of the day, keeping a journal of some sort has been an on-going practice. There are fading carbon copies written on onion skin and typed on my faithful and beloved old IBM Selectric with it's back-spacing correction feature and immensely satisfying slapping back of the carriage at the end of each line! It seems only yesterday, and long before my love affair with my MAC.

Was invited this week to attend parts of a 3-day conference celebrating the 40th anniversary of the demonstrations that occurred at San Francisco State University during the Sixties. It was the time characterized by Dr. S.I. Hayakawa pacing like a caged tiger atop one of the buildings along the Quad -- wearing his tassle-topped tam 'o shanter and wielding that infamous bullhorn.

Tonight there is a reception featuring Harry Belafonte and Danny Glover and other dignitaries that will celebrate the winning of the battle to create the first Ethnic Studies Department in the country. What happened at SFSU would usher in a completely new and sustaining edge in the field of education that would be emulated on campuses through the Academy.

When Ray Allen called to tell me about the conference and to extend the invitation to attend, I suddenly recalled that somewhere in my files was a folder containing an eye-witness account of those demonstrations. I was there! I'd written about the experience. Again, I'd recorded history before there was any hint that it would ever be meaningful or worth marking as of any consequence. Prescient? Yes. Always.

Over the past few days I searched and found the folder and spent what seemed endless hours reading through my long-forgotten notes -- the completed series of what I (apparently) hoped might someday be worth publishing. (The fantasies of a young mother plotting escape?)


Back to today: Why -- when writing has been so effortless over a long lifetime -- do I feel so inadequate to the task of doing a formal piece for a journal? And, no, it isn't the first such invitation -- I received an invitation to submit a weekly column for a local newspaper some time ago and couldn't find the will to even answer the request. I simply tucked it away after allowing myself to feel my ego temporarily expand to new levels, and then felt embarrassed over the next months each time I ran into the editor socially who'd extended the offer. Maybe it felt good enough to be asked without having to deliver. After all, my blogging elicits little response from readers so there is little accountability to contend with.

When my paper on Rosie the Riveter World War II/Home Front National Historical Park appears in print sometime in the spring, I will have published. What on earth is so fearful about that?

I truly don't know... .

It is here that I find the balance to a life so often strained by too much, too often, too filled with intensity and purpose... .

Last weekend I drove up the coast -- through Marin County, past Santa Rosa and through Cloverdale - into the long approach to the Anderson Valley with its miles of curving roadways past Boonville and Philo -- through more miles of orchards and vineyards, into the redwood forest -- then -- to the blue Pacific with its unbelievable expanse out to the horizon with its suggestion of eternity!

I do this as often as time allows and at the end of the long 3-hour drive I find him waiting - fulfilling his promise of sunsets and salt air and peace. With the latest copy of the New Yorker and tea and toast with marmalade in bed with the large skylights over the bed changing its program from starlight to wisps of drifting fog to clouds and -- an occasional swooping hawk or a stray gull warning of a storm far out to sea -- for just a fleeting moment... .

There are long talks about cabbages and kings, friendly "fierce" debates over today's developments, speculations about the upcoming presidential election, and the dire financial picture that seems far away and less threatening in that setting.

It takes less and less time now, to become aware of the world dropping away and in its place a serenity to which I'm unaccustomed and which I don't always trust, but that I'm beginning to understand as essential and attainable when I stop long enough to look and listen ... . I remember Sister Corita Kent's admonition in an art piece of the Sixties that said, simply, "don't just do something, stand there!"

Until, I realize that there are those for whom this is normal. Everyday. Proving by the sheer magic of this sublime state of being enjoyed by so few in my experience, that the ocean and the redwoods are as real and as close and as accessible as we allow them to be.

Time at this stage in our lives is all the more precious. I can no longer afford pride nor lack of time or dedication to purpose to steal this birthright that we owe to one another as sentient beings.

This is the place where the magic lives -- and where beauty is tangible -- and where the illusion that time is eternal holds irrevocably true. Where there are no remaining doubts that we're each an element in the universal all. It's where I can go to experience what forever looks like.

Such is the friendship that I've found and cherished over these past years ... .

There have been days when the fear of the fragility of life brings quiet terror, but the feelings are fleeting and are quickly replaced by the joy of the moment. It's in such moments that time becomes painfully relevant and finite. A moment when there is so little future to look forward to.

Now is truly all there is.

But then we've always known that, of course. The acuteness we're experiencing demands that attention be paid to just how it will be lived -- now that we're where we are on the continuum.


So we drove high up into the mountains -- high up into the giant old-growth redwoods -- later returning back down along the magnificent coastline from quaint Westport past the Pacific Winery to Fort Bragg and home again to Mendocino ... and the panic was dissipated.

I called it motion sickness.

He couldn't know that it was the cold cloying fear and profound sadness of inevitable endings ... .

A very special Saturday -- another one-of-a-kind day of surprises ... .

Today started in its usual Saturday way with a leisurely cup of tea after sorting laundry and selecting the first load ... then musing absently about just what I would write today ... choosing to edit instead of create -- separating what was originally one lengthy piece into two quite separate entries (see below) and making myself another post for this date.

By 11:30 it was time to stop procrastinating and get back into uniform to return to the office for a prearranged visit with a group of young people who make up the newly-formed Home Front Youth Corp. I wasn't exactly sure what was expected of me, but their instructors (Rangers Elizabeth, Carla, and Craig) were already there and I was to slip in to do whatever my part required.

When I arrived they were viewing videos of the World War II era -- Rosie was the centerpiece - but our little DVD of "Lost Conversations" was also to be shown (as I now recalled) and I would probably be expected to lead a short discussion afterward. Easy. This was something that has become fairly automatic and requires little preparation.

It went well. I could feel the connection that I've now learned to wait for and not try to force in any way. The young people were receptive and the films shown were interesting.

That lasted all of 45 minutes leaving me with a feeling of being all dressed up with no place to go until I got into my car and remembered that Dorian had mentioned a show at the Richmond Art Center (now under renovation) where she'd heard that there was something I might like to see. She'd grinned mysteriously in the telling -- and I guessed it might be related to the piece that Rodrigo and I had participated in a couple of weeks ago. Maybe they'd produced some stills that I might be able to see. I recalled that this was a part of the community program opening soon. Would that be today? Maybe. I'd stop by and take a look.

Walked in to the Center to find a meeting in progress. It was a meeting of the Richmond Art Center's Board of Directors who were in the process of electing new members and preparing for the opening of a new show when the meeting ended. I was motioned to a seat and slipped in as inconspicuously as I could but felt just a little out of place. There were many in the room whom I knew in one context or another, and it was soon comfortable and I felt a little less like one who'd crashed a party.

As the meeting ended a raffle was held. (Virginia had slipped a raffle ticket into my reluctant palm and urged me to take part.) In the way that happens on very rare occasion to those of us who "never win anything" I found myself the recipient of first prize -- a $100 contribution toward an art class of my choice! Incredible! Been wanting to do this for years, but never felt the time was right and it seemed so totally self-indulgent. But after all, Dorian is a NIAD (National Institute for Artists with Disabilities) artist and this would give us something new in common. What a wonderful gift! This I will do, and soon.

In addition, a noted muralist, John Wehrle, a board member came over to tell me that he had received the commission to create a new giant mural at the primary gateway to the City of Richmond (Macdonald Avenue off I-80). He is using a number of identifiable community people in his mural and would like for me to be one of them. At first it felt a little dishonest since there are so many members of this community who have lived here all their lives and have given so much. Though I've spent most of my entire lifetime in the San Francisco Bay Area, only the last ten or so years have I lived in this city. He waved away my limp protest and I agreed despite those very temporary feelings of guilty pride.

To his comment that he would be giving me a call "one of these days" to make arrangements, I laughed with "...don't wait too long. I no longer buy green bananas!"


Photo: The marvelous fish sculpture that adorns the entrance to the Richmond Art Center is being removed in order to be cleaned and restored to its original splendor before being lowered back into its place high over the entrance to this great art center. There is no comparable arts facility in all of the Bay Area and beyond.

2nd Photo: The very active arts community seen here at the opening of the annual "Art of Living
Black" exhibition that has become one of the great events this city features.

I've not written for days, and it was certainly not for lack of material ... .

To the contrary, It has been more a case of allowing feelings to amass without relief for lack of the time to record them. It's always this way. I remember what I want to say while idling at a stop light crushed in afternoon traffic; while standing in line at the bank; or squeezing avocados at the green grocers ... then the thoughts slip into what should not yet be "the past" and are lost.

Some of those are hard to write about for other reasons. There is the new but (apparently) ongoing (past two weeks) strange brief relationship with a professional photographer. When I've worked through and understand it more fully "where the words go" ... I'll write about it.

There are also some after and still burning effects of the Eugene O'Neill/Paul Robeson festival still suspended in the air and being processed. Interesting. What has followed over the past couple of weeks is reaffirming that growth doesn't stop with age. The experience of "All God's Chillun Got Wings" has provided a way to grow beyond my presumed limits. Silly? Maybe not.

In subsequent conversations at a recent luncheon with two friends who attended the last of the 3 performances I learned that "Chillun" (as do most of O'Neill's works) turns out to be autobiographical as well. Yes. That had completely escaped me - though I pride myself on a good sense of both theater and literature, and some familiarity with the body of the work of this particular playwright since becoming associated with the Eugene O'Neill Memorial Site -- at least peripherally through my own work with the NPS.

I'd missed so much while preoccupied with the racial implications. The Robeson role of Jim Harris had blinded me to the main story that I should have been able to see had that not been so. I missed it.

Learned over lunch (yes -- goat cheese, cherry tomatoes, and arugula, grapes and melon, with fancy crackers) that the lead characters; Jim, the submissive black husband; and Ella; the abusive schizophrenic white wife had been given the names of the author's parents; James and Ella O'Neill. (I'd failed to notice that and it is a key to understanding the play.) Or that Ella's obsessive determination to prevent Jim's ever attaining his goal of becoming an attorney mirrored O'Neill's father's acting ambitions, though he did reach limited success over the course of his career. One can surely guess at Ella's effect upon his ambitions over the course of their troubled lifetime together. The real life Ella was addicted to morphine. I'm familiar enough with the narrative of their lives but had missed the metaphor. Maybe I need to go back and -- using this broader perspective -- read the troublesome play again. This time free of the effects of the emotional effects of the "n" word. Obviously, the layering of realities that characterize O'Neill's work is why we honor him as American's greatest playwright and why the Pulitzer would be awarded to him for a 4th time.

I might have missed all that had it not been for the conversation over lunch with two friends who were not "of color" and who were therefore free to have a broader view of meanings, and to experience the complexities that were lost on me. I find myself wondering how often in life I may have allowed the narrowing of an experience simply because I was unable to get beyond race?

On the evening that my friends saw the play the talk-back between the audience and the cast lasted a long 40 minutes. Everyone came away with good feelings that some kind of threshold has been crossed, and that "Chillun" (with a Q&A) should be performed far and wide. That its presentation was extremely timely, and that the nation is finally ready to move -- together-- into these conversations. I'm so proud of the National Park Service's role in helping to bring this work out of mothballs and back onto the stage -- and of my own role in acting (albeit) briefly as consultant to the project.

Maybe there were lunching ladies throughout the valley last week -- and, just maybe, we were all moving ever closer toward a kind of atonement.

I think that I'll look back on this year's Festival as a pivotal place in my theater learning curve. The ability to see the human story -- somewhere beyond the racial story may be something I can share with my grandchildren in some casual way. But then they're growing up in a very different world than the one that produced my generation and may have been spared the limitations I'm sensing in myself.


Photo: From this year's production held at the Village Theater in Danville, California.

So much, so fast, so all-consuming ... A lovely month of special days ...

This weekend brought with it the 2nd Annual Home Front Festival, an event still in the process of becoming. One day we'll look back to see just where new traditions were born, and find the beginnings of "custom" and "practice." I suppose this is how it happens. Maybe it's no more complicated than the fact that -- for reasons unknown -- I always climb into bed from the left side even though I sleep alone. Reasons are now lost in time and "custom" takes over, even when the experience no longer provides any rhyme or reason.

Faith Petric, our 93 year-old "Rosie" was phenomenal! She is a tiny woman with a twinkle in her blue eyes that hints of the mischief that's barely hidden. She sang labor songs and Woody Guthrie pieces and performed a duet with my son, Bob, called "Why am I painting the living-room?" that was so wonderful that I felt giddy knowing that it was all being videotaped for posterity. Faith received her plaque (beautiful!) graciously and will take off tomorrow for Ireland where she will be visiting her daughter who lives there. I suspect that she'll be singing in some Irish Pub, surely, and not too long after she de-planes!

This is a woman to marvel at; a life to celebrate, surely. She has positively influenced several generations of young people, my son Bob, among them, and has enriched the lives of a steady stream of adoring singers and musicians who've gathered at her home in the Haight-Ashbury on Friday nights for almost fifty years. What a lovely woman is Faith Petric!

Photo top left -- Faith Petric and Bob Reid singing together.
Photo: mid-right - moi with Steve Gilford, our show's co-producer and Kaiser Permanente historian. The other co-producer was Marian Gade of the San Francisco Folk Music Club.
Left photo - Bob Reid, singer song-writer, horse-trainer and eldest son, father of Rosie.

On Thursday -- while standing in awe (as always) in that cathedral-like expanse of the Craneway of the venerable historic Ford Building ...

I envisioned an event that's been forming in the recesses of my mind for a very long time now.

The Craneway is such an awesome space; one that invites imaginings of places I've seen only in art books and dreams but have treasured since childhood; places like Chartres, the Sistine Chapel, or the Louvre. I'm at such a late stage in life now that any thought of actually seeing such wonders has slowly evaporated into a void -- well beyond the realm of possibility. But this Albert Kahn-designed magnificent cavernous daylight-filled 400,000 sq. ft. architectural wonder captures that little girl sense of awe and it's all I can do to slow my breathing and keep my jaw from dropping each time I find myself standing in its towering vastness.

Recently there was an announcement by the developer of the recently-restored Ford Assembly Plant that the legendary choreographer, 90 year-old Merce Cunningham, has come out of retirement long enough to create a site-specific piece created to celebrate the public launching of (newly-re-named) Ford Point. It's being co-sponsored by Cal Performances and (learned from a disappointed dance enthusiast) is completely sold out! (And I neglected to order tickets!) The performance is scheduled for early November.

On impulse I dashed off an email to Eddie Orton, the building's developer and a casual friend, with a suggestion I would never in a million years have made before Octogenarianism became my new religion a few short years ago. "Eddie, Merce Cunningham is an inspired choice -- but I'm anxious for you to see the work of choreographer Joanna Haigood of Zaccho Dance Theater for the next big one. Look her up on their website and tell me what you think."

Each time I squint through eyes cast skyward while standing in the Craneway I imagine Joanna and her daring dance company suspended on a web of cables performing their aerial act -- using the full dimension of the emptiness of that huge structure and giving life to the totality of the air space in the beautiful ways that aerial dance inspires. I'm breathless just thinking about it! (Yes, that's Joanna suspended from the face of the old Ferry Building clock in San Francisco - 1995.)

His email response was almost immediate (surprisingly) inviting me to raise the possibility with the Craneway's manager, James Madsen. I couldn't tell whether there was any real interest or whether this was his "don't call us, we'll call you" response. It turned out to be quite real. Had a brief whispered exchange with James yesterday while in the building with a small group to discuss sound requirements for the upcoming Home Front festival, and learned that he'd gone to Joanna's website as suggested and saw the same potential that I see there. He suggested that we get together to talk about possibilities. At the moment Joanna is on a plane bound for New York for a performance in a dance charrette with "Dancing in the Streets" next weekend, but was reachable by email and responded magically within moments with enthusiasm!

Do extraordinary things happen in this crazy casual way at times? I suppose so. Maybe they happen when we get old enough to speak out for the things that matter to us with less of the hesitancy of youth and a sense that -- if we're going to make a contribution -- even when they're purely whimsical -- we'd better do so right away or it may not happen -- ever. Maybe -- if we don't -- the unique gifts that each of us one-of-a-kind people brought with us into the world at birth may be lost for all time.

Besides, people listen now in ways that suggest maybe we've earned the right to be heard.

I do plan to be around to see Joanna and her company defy gravity as if propelled by silken wings through that magnificent space -- in a show that will rock the dance world and fulfill my every childhood fantasy of soaring above the earth! And to do so as if I'm not too terrified of heights to board the elegant outside elevators that look down on the Atrium at the Embarcadero Hyatt Regency!

Might we call that vicariosity? If this isn't a word ... it should be. It's surely as descriptive as Dorian's disastrophe.

... and I've forgotten to tell you that after one reaches the age of 87 a body is entitled to create one's own vocabulary, too.


Photo: Photo from "Main Frame," a recent piece created by Joanna Haigood. To read her statement, click on this image to enlarge. Use the Zaccho link under my photo on the left to reach the website for more information. By way of explanation; I once served briefly as a member of Zaccho Dance Theater's Advisory Board.

One festival completed and one to go ... The Second Annual Rosie the Riveter Home Front Reunion is but days away ... .

This is a photo taken at last year's event, and those are some of the hundreds of Rosies who came from far and wide to celebrate together. They came with children and grandchildren in a grand reunion weekend.

This year our "poster girl" is 93 year-old still performing folk singer, Faith Petric, who worked in the Hoboken shipyards during WWII. She is a legend in the folk music world; a friend and contemporary of Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Ronnie Gilbert, and the late Malvina Reynolds of "Little Boxes" fame -- a friend Faith and I shared. We currently share kinship with my performing son, Bob Reid, an ardent admirer of this amazing woman.

This year's reunion will be a celebration not only of the Rosies, but will bring together the music-makers of the folk music world as well. Faith is one of the founders of the almost half-century old San Francisco Folk Music Club with members scattered throughout Northern California. Members of the club will spend the day with us and they'll bring their voices and instruments with them to the newly-restored and magnificent Ford Building (now called Ford Point) where we will spend the entire day in song.

I will be properly uniformed and hatted along with my ranger colleagues -- with special duties as one of the co-hosts for the stage show. I'll also do impromptu interviews among the members of the audience with my roving mike. Last year those Rosies almost wrestled it away from me -- they were so eager to tell their stories. This year should be the same, but this time I'll be better prepared for their enthusiasm; hopefully. We'll see.

That's the weekend of October 5th here on the beautiful shoreline of Richmond, California. For more information, check out the Home Front Festival website -- or the Richmond Chamber of Commerce has a link to the information as well as a schedule of the weekend of activities. One day I predict that our Homefront Festival will rival the New Orleans Mardi Gras celebrations, or, the Mummer's Parade in Philadelphia. (Jus' you wite, 'enry 'iggins!)

Congressman George Miller (seen here welcoming the crowd at Kaiser Shipyard III) joined the festivities.

All-in-all this has been an extremely busy several weeks. Squeezed in among all the usual and unusual busyness was another birthday. I'm at that stage in life where birthdays now come every six weeks. Funny how that goes ... .

Mostly, it was just another Monday. I'm increasingly grateful for each one of them.

It took a mere 80 years, but I think we've made it, Mr. O'Neill ... .

Unlike your ugly Broadway premiere in 1924 when bomb threats, angry audiences, and outraged theater critics spat upon your play, Black and White theatergoers sat together in a small village theater in a trendy suburban tree-lined public square and experienced your controversial "All God's Chillun Got Wings" without incident. In fact, we shared the evening without being either defensive or confrontational. And it wasn't because we'd cleaned up your dialogue or ducked the hard questions. It was because in our era we've reached a place where the social order has given way to possibilities unheard of ever before in history in this nation that rose from a shameful history of human slavery to the very serious possibility of an African American ascendancy to the presidency of these United States! And it all has happened within the lifetimes of just 3 women in my family, my ggmother, Leontine Breaux Allen; 1846-1948 and enslaved from birth until she was nineteen; my mother, Lottie Allen Charbonnet, 1894-1995; and me, Betty Charbonnet Reid Soskin, 1921-present.

Last night's modest small town evening of theater was a triumph; so much more than I'd dared hope for. Admittedly, it was a self-selected audience of those who have an interest in both O'Neill and Robeson so may be atypical of the general suburban population. Nonetheless, in some strange way we were all (those of color and not) witnessing events from the same side of the social barrier and that is new. We are, indeed, living in a new day. We've crossed into unexplored territory and from this place a new world is coming into view.

At the end of the one-act play the cast joined us from the stage to talk about what we'd seen. I was still not comfortable with the content. "Chillun" was not redeemed by moving into dramatic form. It was disturbing to me in the reading and seeing it performed did nothing to make it more accessible. All I could think of was the tragedy of Paul Robeson, a proud black man whom I'd had the honor of meeting close up and personal. In fact, I was a part of a small group of young people who picketed the Paramount theater with him at the opening of Walt Disney's Song of the South which he believed to be unforgivably racist; and I agreed, even as a late teen. He was tall and stately and proudly black! He was a close friend of Matt Crawford, an old friend and a political activist I knew through my involvement with the Berkeley Co-op Movement. That weekend a group of us young people had gathered at Matt's to meet Robeson -- prior to our picketing assignment. We sipped pink lemonade and played "Spin the Bottle" and I received an innocent kiss on the cheek from the great man. Visions of that Sunday afternoon came back while watching the pitifully submissive character of Jim Harris on stage last night.

I wondered how Robeson, that powerful man; that proud black Adonis could have ever crushed himself into the role of a meek and submissive character, ever? I'd had a chance some years later to see him act as the iconic Moor, Othello, against Jose Ferrer's Iago at the Curran theater in San Francisco. That's the way I'll always remember him. That role with its ornate costumes and regal settings was in keeping with the Robeson of my memory. I cannot imagine what it cost him to play the role of Jim Harris for 100 performances ... and how such roles helped to fuel his eventual anger against a system which produced such tortured people.

During the Q&A when the play ended, the cast was wonderful in expressing their feelings about the roles they'd just played. The candor they showed freed the audience to be equally open and honest in their responses. The actor who'd played Jim opened by telling us how much he hated Jim in the beginning, but of how much he'd gained in the process of learning to understand and accept this cowering man of little pride. The rest of the cast was equally as candid and I felt a deep and abiding sense of gratitude that the O'Neill Foundation had trusted us all enough to bring all this together and with enough blind faith that we could handle it. I'm ashamed that I lacked that kind of faith. I was prepared, last night, for anything other than what we found -- a readiness to have those long lost conversations ... finally.

The National Park Service, the O'Neill Festival Committee, and director, Eric Hayes, are to be congratulated for taking on this bold experiment in theater and bringing together the human elements that gave it the social and political significance that it deserved.

You may rest easy now, Mr. O'Neill. And you, Mr. Robeson, your uncompromising courage and painful sacrifices may have gone a long way toward producing our new political reality.

Sleep well... .

Tonight's the night ... and I'm so-oo-o on edge ... .

Eugene'O'Neill's "All God's Chillun Got Wings" will be staged at a premiere with reception this evening. I'm sitting here pretending that I'm not concerned. Not true.

It feels as if all that I could have done was achieved, but my fear is that it will be another missed opportunity to engage the Danville community in a meaningful dialogue that may bring the understanding that the great playwright and his star, Paul Robeson, were seeking.

The subtleties are easily missed. I'm not at all sure that I was able to adequately raise the awareness necessary for this to be anything more than either a polite exchange of niceties, or, a surface conversation that won't bring us (me!) past the "n word" utterances. I so want to see myself as sophisticated. Knowing. Erudite. Beyond hurt feelings over mere words. Down deep I'm not at all sure that's true. And if it isn't...what does one do?

Read a brilliant article today written by Tim Wise. It was carried in AlterNet; the subject being White Privilege. It was penetrating in its simplicity, and easy to toss off as something meant for those others. I'm sure that most of tonight's audience would deny the concept as applying to their lives in any way.

I may easily be one of a very few persons of color in tonight's audience.

By the end of the evening -- I will probably be firmly in the camp of "other."

Maybe that's what is so disturbing ... .

Tomorrow I'll let you know how we fared.

Photo: Eugene O'Neill in his study in Tao House where he wrote his most penetrating prize-winning plays. This is now a National Park site and one of the four parks within our management orbit.

It was Friday morning ... last ... when my office phone rang ...

It was program director, Sanjit Sethi, from the Richmond Arts Center asking if I would be willing to participate in a program involving teens; what did I recall about the first time I voted; would I be willing to be interviewed on camera, "... no more than 20-25 minutes." Did a quick mental calculation of just what commitments lay ahead for the rest of the day -- and, "yes" it was, of course.

The interview was scheduled for five o'clock. Never mind that it was the end of the day at the end of a long week and that energy was running on empty ... but I do love youngsters and a refusal just wasn't an option.

Arrived at the Art Center just as the program director was getting out of his car. My young interviewer was nowhere in sight, but arrived soon thereafter. It was Rodrigo -- and such a soft-spoken gentle soul he was. He was wearing an Amnesty International tee shirt and a jaunty leather hat. He appeared a little shy but open and direct with an earnestness that invited respect and suggested the seriousness of the experience. Fatigue magically dropped away and we were soon at work. We sat in straight-backed metal chairs with cameras aimed at each of us -- under intense lighting that served to blur the presence of the others in the room. They soon dissolved into the darkened background and then there was only Rodrigo ... and me.

Rodrigo's first question was "when did you first vote?" and I was surprised that I couldn't recall just which president that was. I stumbled and stuttered for a minute and came up with something. I remember now that my first vote had to be for Franklin Delano Roosevelt, surely. I was 21 and it was mid-WWII. It had to be. But I answered pretty tentatively. Since I have never ever in life missed an election, they've become not much of an event -- just what one does as a citizen. After all these cycles it is a non-event in my life despite the excitement experienced with each election.

In a few minutes the conversation began to flow as if rehearsed. The questions were real because his face told me that my answers were important to him. We talked with two cameras recording our conversation for almost a half-hour. The time flew by. The passion that underlies my civic life kicked in at some point and we connected, my young interviewer and me. I wanted him to know how much the electoral process meant to me and it was clear that he was interested in knowing. Would that it were always so easy to span time and generations. It comes rarely, but I felt it in those moments. I've certainly experienced times when the spark refused to ignite and words held little life. Not this time. This time the words met in mid-air ... .


I learned from the director as we were leaving that this was a community arts project that involves pairing adults and adolescents in these unedited conversations around the issues of the electoral process and that sometime in October -- prior to the November general elections -- under the sponsorship of the Richmond Main Street Initiative those interviews will be blown up and projected against the walls of adjacent buildings in the old downtown in a gigantic multimedia public art display.

I had no idea.

It was an memorable experience for me -- and maybe for Rodrigo as well -- an experience well worth sharing with the community.