Month: June 2020

7 was the count.  She didn’t know it was 7, she only knew that after those rapid pulls at the air with her wings she was soring into the sky.  She knew that the ground below included ribbons of black that affected the way the winds moved over her wings.  She saw one of those ribbons and curved her wings to send herself floating over the nearest edge.  The tiny feathers on her face and neck, normally held down by the force of air as she flies, stood up just a tiny amount in response to a change in air pressure.  She knows nothing of air pressure, only that such a feeling signals the moment when she must open her wings wide.  As her wings fill with air she bounds up, up, up at an astonishing rate.  She knows nothing of up or down, she knows only the exuberance which accompanies the change in altitude as she soars effortlessly into the ether.

There exists within our social and political structures a cadre of being which serves itself more than the community it is engaged to serve. The feeding of its own pleasures and power is the primary concern of this cadre and its influence and impact seems to be growing by the day.

There is a book, written in the late 1950’s, which exposed one American version of this cadre to a populous eager to know the truth. “The Ugly American” catapulted to the top of the best seller list and, for a moment, sent a shock wave through the cadre. Had the impact been longer lasting we might never have pursued that misadventure in Southeast Asia which saw my brother, brother-in-law and thousands of other men and women, foisted into bloodying the jungles only to be vilified and told to be ashamed of what they had done.

The cadre survived even that, survived and thrived. And today it grows at every level. In our schools, in our cities, states and in every aspect of the federal government.

Acknowledgment of the existence of this cadre is important now that we consider how to rebuild our communities. One brief example:
Do our school systems really need to be so top loaded with administrators and bureaucrats? Do our children benefit when teachers are underpaid and undersupplied while, at the same time, new buildings and levels of overlords are erected around them? We already know what doesn’t work, systems bloated by edifices and overlords, how about trying something new – cultivating the joy of learning.

Best of all, opposing the cadre is done outside of the partisan malaise that so clouds discourse in our country. The cadre cares not for party or politics, Machiavellian to the core, it cares only for its own flourishing.

“Would you have time to cut the west field?” she said, “the grass is getting really high.”

The tools that give a tractor purpose are heavy, made of steel and chain. Some do work powered by the same diesel energy release that powers the machine. Some accomplish their task through their sheer weight as the machine pulls it on its way. A tool of the later sort was attached as I strolled behind the barn.

Changing the tools on a tractor is a fickle affair. Sometimes one slips off, you back the tractor up to the other and slip it on. Sometimes there are bruises, sometime there is blood, of the skinned knuckle variety. Often there are words, not pleasant words, but the tractor and the back of the barn keep your secret tantrums to themselves.

This time there were bruises and words. Off with the box blade, bruises, words. On with the brush hog, more bruises, more words. On to the tractor and off to the field.

Tallgrass and wildflowers. So many wildflowers of every color and hue. Bees and butterflies busy about their labor. The brush hog had just begun to ply its trade when I saw her waving from the drive. Remove the power from the brush hog, lift the tool and drive over to hear what she is saying.

“The wildflowers are so beautiful, maybe we should give them a week or so, what do you think?”

More bruises but no words, just the remembrance of the look in her eyes as she watched the butterflies.

End of Wusolation

The days of Wusolation have ended, by our accounting.  We’ve been to City Club to work out, we’ve started having family and friends to the house and church is restarting, sort of, this Sunday.  Not sure what to call the next phase of our interrupted global experience.   Let me know if you have any ideas.

Humiliation is so prevalent and brings such great harm.  Whatever your perceived inferiority there is always someone eager to heap humiliation upon you.

Humbleness is so rare and brings such great goodness.  Whatever your perceived inferiority there is, occasionally, someone who with humility lifts your spirit and makes you see that the world is better in Technicolor.

The morning mist rolls quietly in
Dribbles a little dew
For a moment changes the view
Vanishes, as if had never been

You wake up a little confused, strange light, strange sounds, strange smells.  You start to focus on the iron bracket over your head holding a wooden beam that must be at least 300 years old.  You blink and start to remember the long flight, the chaotic lack of order at immigration, your struggling with French, and the driver’s struggling with English as you convince him you really do want to go to the little hotel on the left bank.

Rising and gazing out the window you see the university students walking along the street, almost no cars but a few bicycles including one ridden by a man with a long baguette stick up high over his head.  You clean up in the little bathroom, clearly never anticipated by the original architects, and head downstairs.  “Bonjour” you say in bad French to the young lady at the front desk.  “Good Morning” she says in bad English, but the smiles that pass between you are universal and adds a touch of brightness to the day of each.

You have no idea what time it is, this is Paris, you don’t care, you just start to walk.  Notre-Dame? The Louvre? No, you decide, Musee d’Orsay.  You stroll along the Rive Gauche intentionally turning up and down streets just absorbing the laisser faire.

Years later, in times of turmoil and stress, you are grateful.  So much great art so accessibly displayed.  Tea in front of the giant clock.  The moment when you walked into a room full of Monet’s garden period work and it literally took your breath away.  The stroll back along Boulevard Saint-Germain.

All planted within you a healing balm.

Where you are and how you got there is defined by history

Who you are and what you’ve become is defined by your learning along the way

“Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne’er within him burn’d,
As home his footsteps he hath turn’d,
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no Minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonour’d, and unsung.”
Sir Walter Scott

Over the past week, we have seen peaceful demonstrations that have shined a light on the police state that habitually and systematically deprives elements of our society their rights.  There has been very close to universal support shown for addressing the flawed ideals and structures that created and sustain that police state.  The echoes of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King can be heard in the effectiveness of those who peacefully followed his dream.

We have also seen thuggery and violence that have mostly harmed those same elements of our society oppressed by the police state. 

Care must be taken not to allow the darkness of the latter to defray from acting in response to the light of the former.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that”
Dr. Martin Luther King