. . . AND I SAY, IT'S ALL RIGHT

I am feeling sort of like comedian John Candy, the bumbling houseguest who wears out his welcome. But somehow he redeems himself, making his exit with enough grace and affection to get a thin but real invitation to, “Come back again.” It seems, in the weeks since Thanksgiving that I’ve worn friends and family thin with my enthusiasm for Winter Solstice. I have the self imposed task of promoting Solstice. If I don’t do it, who will? Western (Christian) civilization has systematically supplanted Baby Jesus’s birthday in place the world’s oldest, longest continuously celebrated holiday. Baby J was born in the spring if the biblical account is correct. Shepherds were back out in the fields with their flocks; it was tax time in the Roman Empire, spring time. Christmas is awesome with wonderful stories to suit everyone’s appetite but my mission, if I accept it (Mission Impossible), is to restore a calendar correct Honoring for the first begotten Sun. 

So for those who have forgotten, for sure in the past 6,000 years and certainly long before that, humans have noticed the sun’s orbit sinking lower and lower in the south (Northern Hemisphere) as summer slips into fall and the onset of cold weather foretells the approaching winter. Way down in Africa of course, where it all began, the shadows stretched north. They saw it coming and knew the hardships that came with it. As shadows lengthened, old people in their 30’s and even kids would commiserate; “Oooh man, it’s gonna’ get cold, really, really cold.” Then, when the resident Shadow-Shaman noticed, the shadow cast by the sacred post or rock stopped its longer-ing and began to shorten. The Sun was on the rise again and that was good news. It would take a long, hard winter before it got high overhead again with warm breezes and mild weather but you gotta’ have faith. Every year, same-o same-o; they counted the days and there was a pattern. So they were able to anticipate the awesome day that the Sun started coming back. It did not spare them the hardships of winter but like other mysterious, unexplainable, miraculous things, it also carried the promise of Spring. Devout believers of all religions are still invested in promises of one kind or another. Something really troubling is going to get a lot better if you can stick it out a little longer. 

I will celebrate that shortening of shadows here in a few hours. I usually have company where we sit around a wood fire, commune with dark chocolate and brandy, listen to Sun significant music, stand up and shuffle our feet if it feels just right. I think about my long-distant forbearers, what it must have been like when you were educated if you knew the difference between 20 and 25 and you were really old if you lived long enough to see your grandchildren. But they were every bit as smart as the 21st Century smarty pants. They just had to know for sure about a jillion things that are no longer relevant. When snow is on the ground we don’t have to know where to look for leeks or dandelion root. 

I remember how good it felt to sing with my class mates, “. . . above thy deep and dreamless sleep, the silent stars go by.”  Now I take comfort singing along with George Harrison, his song “Here Comes The Sun”  My solstice song goes, "It seems like years since its been here. Little Darlin’, here comes the sun, here comes the sun and I say, it’s all right." I like the heretic’s life, it is a good fit. Take away believing in the unbelievable and the Obedience clause: doubt doesn't address the hereafter but it's really liberating in the here and now. Not to fault anybody’s religion. If it fits wear it, go in peace, judge not lest you be judged, do no harm and live as best you can. 

Tomorrow the daylight hours will have increased by a few seconds, not that we will notice but it is the implied promise and year after year, it hasn’t failed in all of human history. By tomorrow night I will have shifted completely into Christmas mode. My family will be celebrating Christmas together with sinfully rich food, plenty of outrageous foolishness and my pagan tendencies will either go unnoticed or be forgiven. 

SIT WHEREVER YOU LIKE

Any Tuesday evening around 6:30, you can get a free meal at 9th & Oak Street in Kansas City. Last night it included hot dogs, lasagna, green bean casserole, chicken chili, that baked, sliced potato dish all covered with cheese that my mother used to make, dinner rolls, cookies, brownies, energy bars, bottled water, coffee and hot cider. You don’t need a coupon and there’s no password, you just show up, get in line and take your turn. You say, “Yes, please” and hold out your plate for whatever you want and hold back on what you don’t. In either case you say “Thank you” and move on. Once served you can sit wherever you like. Behind the serving line is an urban green space, a well maintained city park with trees, walkways and benches. There is a low retaining wall along the sidewalk that sits well and curb seating accommodates latecomers. 

Last night there was several inches of snow on the ground; the wind had settled but it was cold. Still, as if by magic, at 6:20 several cars, trucks, vans pulled up, set up tables, quickly organized and put out containers of donated food. I was on the handle end of a ladle, loading 10 oz coffee cups with chicken chili. I wore really good, wool socks and insulated hiking boots, long johns, jeans and several layers up top under a heavy, hooded Carhartt coat. My gloves kept my hands warm but fingers and toes went cold after 15 minutes of standing in one spot. Hungry humans off the street were dressed, catch as catch can, as best they could. When you see beggars carrying backpacks, loaded shopping bags and dragging suitcases to dinner, it’s because it is all of their possessions. 

David was next to me up the serving line pouring coffee and hot cider. A crusty old guy with long white hair and beard, he is a regular, reliable volunteer with “K.C. Heroes”, a volunteer group that figures largely in the Tuesday meals program. Last night, besides his task, he helped me keep cups and containers organized. Cleaning up afterward I checked my smart phone; the temp was 23 degrees. 

If my friend Mark is like Don Quixote then I would be Sancho Panza; he drives, solicits and collects donated food, cooks and organizes along with K.C. Heroes. He convinced me that I should volunteer. David the coffee dude needed a ride last night so we drove him across town to a seedy neighborhood, a borderline barrio with residents and business’s that reflect every ethnicity; let him out in front of an old, 3 story, brick apartment building. 

On our ride home I asked about David and Mark explained, he was homeless as well. He noted the difference between being homeless and unsheltered. The latter being, not only homeless but not having access to any public or private buildings for the purpose of shelter. David lives unsheltered in a tent in the woods near the VA Hospital. There is a camp there; not a safe place but the folks who call that wood lot Home do try to take care of each other. In extreme cold, he has a friend in old NorthEast, just off Independence Boulevard who lets him sleep on the sofa. It violates her lease agreement so they have to sleep dressed, in the living room with the lights on and a card table set up. The landlord does watch who comes and goes and if it looks like unauthorized dwellers are present, he calls the police. When the police announce and enter they find friends playing cards; no vagrants, no problem.

As much as I’d like to think otherwise, I volunteer as much to ease my conscience as to exercise altruism. I truly identify with disenfranchised people. I don’t think anybody deserves anything; we get what we get. Nobody makes bad choices so they can fail. All decisions are inert until they unfold and you find out how well you read the tea leaves. I think about all the people who did the right thing and went to work in the towers on 9/11. We are creatures of habit and what worked once upon a time can be your undoing when the winds change. Ben Carson is the current Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. One would think that a famous surgeon could connect the dots but he confirms my doubts about narrow minded intelligence. At his senate approval hearing he said, “Poverty is a choice.” The people I served chicken chili to last night didn’t choose to be homeless or unsheltered. Privileged bigots profess; “We choose our station in life by the choices we make.” They may not be 100% wrong but they are dreadfully, irresponsibly incomplete. We have to make choices as if we Captain our own boat but in fact we are passengers. We can sit in a deck chair, hug the wall or lean against the rail but we go where the ship goes. I know David ate well last night and I hope his sleep was undisturbed. 

IF MOTHERS . . .

Sometimes I get distracted and wander off the subject, tracking down some piece of trivia that has nothing to do with what I’m doing. Add to that, I am drawn to quotes. If and when someone I respect and admire says something powerful or insightful, I add it to a long list of quotes I keep. As the list grows I tend to reread and review the list, rebooting those ideas. Yesterday I was looking for the source of, “If mothers ruled the world there would be no wars.” The quote pops up in various forms regularly. The best, most likely source is, Anonymous. But many famous people have leaned on it. In 2007, Sally Field won an Emmy for a dramatic role. In her acceptance speech she embellished her remarks paraphrasing “Anonymous”. She said, “If the mothers ruled the world there would be no God Damn wars anyway.” Fox Broadcasting  Company which aired the show, when they saw where she was going they killed the mic and camera so, with the time delay the tv viewing audience missed it. Fox knew her politics and were prepared to cut her off. So much for Sally and Fox, no secret who gets my respect or which one I admire. 

It takes something dramatic in the short term or something consistent and compelling over time to get adults to change their ways. We are creatures of habit and giving up anything that feels both good and right, it doesn’t come without a fight. A big part of that human paradigm would be; “Women are from Venus, men are from Mars.” The gender gap has, I think, always been a stumbling stone. One doesn’t need a story to understand male privilege and how primitive men dominated by physical power. Still, civilization came along and very little changed at the gender gap. Long story short, women still come up short on the equity score card and the rhetoric over the bitchiest bitch or (men) the shittiest ass hole still mucks up the gender bias. Men believe they are superior by historical precedent  and divine declaration while women defend their position by simply doing the math. 

I was a typical male, still believed in common sense and it told me, all those other men can’t be wrong. But I would change. When my daughter was born I began to consider the possibilities and pitfalls she would encounter. It was a sobering experience. When her three older brothers were born I had no such concerns. It took years of noticing holes in the male-myth, like a neural maze where every argument for male superiority petered out in a dead end. My cohorts would lean on double talk and fiction to sustain their egos but I was vulnerable to reason.  I thought of my own growing up, of my parents and their roles. Using a ‘sailing ship’ metaphor; if our family was a schooner then my dad would have been the main sail. He was larger than life, up high in full view, harnessing the wind, driving us forward. My mom on the other hand was nowhere to be seen. She was under the stern, she was the rudder but had full control over where we were headed and she could change course without permission, leaving the sail to flap and hang useless. 

Honey bees have adapted to the gender gap quite successfully. Drones are good for one thing. When they no longer serve a purpose and food gets scarce they are banished from the hive and starve. In the human realm, I tend to be critical of male hegemony. You do the math and numbers are so much more reliable than made up hyperbole. All we are good for is, like drones, sewing our seed. In the long time lapses between servicing queens we have become hopelessly competitive to the point of ultimate competition, waging war. Even then, the gain is measured out in prideful ego and temporary power. With women, if you can’t overpower your gender opposite, being bitchy works. At best, the weaker sex has a way of having their way. But times change and women are competing with men successfully, at least in my culture. They haven’t crossed the bar yet, (another sailing reference) and they don’t have parity just yet but who knows? 

Sally Field was right, she was right on the mark! If you don’t have a uterus and you haven’t nurtured life in the womb, brought it to fruition and launched it on its way, then you can’t appreciate the wonder of it all. Mothers are the glass half full. Men have to settle for half empty. Maybe it’s true, all we men are good for is ego driven pride and sending our progeny off to wage war. Men do a thorough job of over-inflating patriotism and the virtue of waging war. I didn’t want my baby girl to grow up the vassal of some man by way of a Y chromosome. Now I have granddaughters to further my concern. I feel fortunate to be a man who both understands and appreciates his role in the scheme of life. My role may be that of a boorish self-seeker but I can adapt and improvise, the gender gap gives me good cause. Civilization doesn’t have to be right, it just has to work and it's been working more for men than for women. Women are after all from Venus, and men are from Mars. 

I'LL HUFF AND I'LL PUFF

I served in the military for 4 or 7 years depending on how you count reserve status, worked in factories for several years, spent 5 or 6 years at college or university again depending on how you count. Then there was that 30 + year stretch, depending on how you count that I went to school because it was my job. But I have always been a storyteller. If all my mother wanted were facts she asked my brothers, but if she wanted the story, she came to me. 

About the time I retired from teaching I experienced a calling, not unlike righteous minded pilgrims who feel chosen to do the Lord’s work. I have been writing for a long time as well and writing is important, you don’t stop writing because you sense a new or different calling. Nothing takes the place of writing. Writing is a utilitarian endeavor that links language with information, then comes understanding. Story has a life and a purpose of its own. As a writer I am a source. As a Teller, I am an instrument. In the 20 years since, I’ve traveled the world with a bag full of stories. In all that time I’ve never made money, seldom broke even. Like Johnny Appleseed, I was planting story at my own expense. All those years in the classroom, the downside was low pay. But in retirement, the upside is good benefits and time to explore, wherever you want to go. It is not an extravagant life style, if you are frugal and if you live modestly, you can do just that; wherever you want to go. 

Inside the storytelling community the craft unfolds much the same way preachers accommodate religion. In many cases, preachers are the best tellers in the business. Their story can be so digestible, so satisfying, for thousands of years civilization has taken it to heart, both its fiction and its fact. But religion is only a small slice of the story pie. Story is the archive where human history is preserved, with an ever so thin, muddy boundary between myth and truth. When the story is so complicated or so big that the ear and the mind can not process it, there comes a simple story with metaphors and fictional characters to fit the need. Story-Teller-Listener, if they join hands with the teller in the middle, the circuit is closed and a light comes on. A window to possibility opens that otherwise the listener would never discover on their own. 

Beyond the fiction, history more than suggests that evolution has employed a BigBrain imagination and recently (at the time) acquired language to share complex ideas and experiences. Think of it; one person can describe to another, the differences between the footprints of buffalo and zebras, miles away from any foot prints, in the dark. They shared information on where it was safe to cross a stream and which roots were good to eat and which were not. Those stories and every other story have been linked together and they bridge the gap between campfires and solar panels. 

Can you imagine a chimpanzee trying to tell a rain forest version of the “Three Little Pigs”? What would, “I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down.” sound like? We are, as far as we know, the only animals to tell stories. Whales and primates certainly do communicate, very well as their needs be. They can show how to do but they have no language to thread together like beads on a very long string. They can’t use the same words to tell very different stories. The fact that humans have such a rich history is more about language than it is about intelligence. Without story, every generation would have to reinvent the wheel. I am a StoryTeller and I want people to know that story is as much a part of our legacy, maybe more so than any other smart thing we dreamed up. Flush toilets are irreplaceable but without the story, we would still be squatting in the woods. 

POPCORN

I am in that loop between Thanksgiving and Christmas, trying very hard to be merry if not joyful, and I am for the most part. Still, it ain’t easy. I avoid news media with a sense of purpose. I don’t know much of anything that comes from talking heads or headlines that pass for news. If not depressing then certainly disturbing or worrisome; not a dooms day thing but like fatty meat, hard to digest.

When I was teaching school there was a one-word expression that described a particular type of ‘out of control’ classroom. It went like this: one kid (K1) does something disruptive that requires teacher (T) attention. Normal activity stops. With that break in the flow of instruction (T) gives undivided attention to the perpetrator. Whether they think about it or not, other students seize the moment. (K2) on the other side of the room, out of the line of sight, blurts out something intended to draw a response. If (T) doesn’t respond to (K2), everybody starts talking. (K3) who is triangulated away from (K1 & K2) screams, knowing that (T) won’t know for sure who screamed. If (T) doesn’t disengage with (K1) in an attempt to restore order in the room, it goes from a simple ‘Ping’ to zoo-chaos in 15 seconds or less. The word is “Popcorn”. In the lounge or in a meeting it was common to hear an adult confess, “Yeah, they went Popcorn on me this morning.” Everybody had their own way of counteracting Popcorn, some better than others but you had to have a plan. Even if you go nuts, act crazy, you become the center of attention, gain some control, do your job. That was my strategy. 

The news: on the local scene it’s all bad, or nearly all bad. Sometimes a sports star does something for poor or sick kids. Sometimes the police have an uplifting encounter with ordinary people or a new company brings jobs to the city. In national news, very little good news. It feels like the Popcorn effect on a global scale. When one bully-leader burns the house down and has his critics murdered, his neighbor, the bully across the border feels empowered to do something even worse, and so on: Popcorn. 

If the bully-leader is a narcissist demagogue, like the Donald, then his indiscretions go viral. Other wanna-be Donald autocrats model his self obsessed, bad behavior. In congress you get Popcorn, with partisan-tribal obsession between competing political interests. Out of that we now have Fake News and pushback against any and everything that doesn’t satisfy competing partisan whims. In a classroom where I am the biggest kid I wield at least some influence but when I step outside my door I’m just another kernel of unpopped corn. So I’m taking the coward’s way out. I’m not going to pop at all. I don’t need to know all the dirt or listen to any of the propaganda. Good music or educational programs are entertaining and even better, they digest without the gas pains.

My own personal ideology, if taken to its other end will offend or annoy typical citizens. Simply stated, I think we do well enough for high functioning monkeys. At the core of our dilemma, we are conflicted between an instinctive need to throw poop and take what doesn’t belong to us and biological/anthropological limitations that make us interdependent; we need each other. I guess that makes us narcissistic altruists, an oxymoron but what the heck, looking too hard, too long in the mirror isn’t very rewarding, neither is watching the news. 

HOME

Thanksgiving falls in two days and I get to family (the verb) twice this year. I am old enough to remember when the word family applied only to blood relatives and marriage mates. Over a lifetime my sense of family has expanded from the traditional circle to include a “Backdoor” clan, birds of a feather. They enjoy the recognition and benefits without a pedigree. Family is qualified by ‘this, and’ rather than ‘either, or’. I live in the light of family status as a spectrum rather than a data point. Not that I love one more and the other less as love is not a commodity. In my book, if it requires a score card and pay backs it isn’t love, it’s an arrangement. So if you spread love wide and deep there is no need to save some for another day. The source won’t dry up, there is always plenty to give away and; it is well to remember, what goes around comes back around. That’s how family works. 

My Three Rivers, Michigan family is having traditional turkey and dressing on Thursday; I’ll be there. My niche there is pretty well defined. When my Backdoor brother succumbed to cancer in 1996 I acquired a surrogate something -or-other role that has endured. My surrogate little sister and I are going shopping tomorrow on the night before. She is a bit of a scamp which means we will probably stretch a few boundaries. Then I’m sure, we will all be competing for counter space Thursday morning. I make a mean cranberry relish with more pecans and orange zest than the average turkey & dressing freak would attempt. But when you turn me loose in the kitchen this time of year, that’s what you get. 

Come Saturday, back home in Ravenna, Michigan the Watson’s will close ranks for their holiday get-together. Duane is my Backdoor brother there. When I retired in 2001 I had no place to call home and he resolved that dilemma in short order. Duane announced that I would live with them on their 40 acres of woods and blueberries. Lori, Duane’s wife is my Backdoor sister, she collects my mail and keeps track of where I've gone and what I leave behind. Their 3 kids, my former students, they descend on the homestead for holidays with marriage mates and 8 new descendants, all age 6 and under. It is a maelstrom of chaos and affection when they all converge. I am expected to take my turn reading to and playing with the little units. I don’t know how long or how well I could sustain that engagement but certainly, it is always entertaining and comforting to know that my station with the kids is equal to that of the dogs. 

Come Sunday I will point my Ford F-150 south and begin the trek to Missouri. I used to make it in a single day but that was when I drove at night. Now, in the season of short days I find shelter for the night somewhere in between. It allows for some creative routing and that opens up a new window for discovery. Every new stretch of unexplored highway offers a variety of photo opportunities. On the way up, in the back waters of western Illinois I discovered a cleanly harvested, rolling network of corn and bean fields and two old barns that still had some function. Otherwise they would have been demolished and retasked  as productive farmland. The photo op was irresistible. Time lost stopping, sometimes going back for photos is well worth a late arrival. 

Once back in Missouri I have plenty of family, by both blood and the Backdoor to keep me in the loop and on the busy.  I used to push back against where I’m from but lately it has become a pointless hangup. I realize that people are simply conditioned to starting conversations with that inquiry. They don’t attribute much meaning to origins and the implications it begs. Since I got out of the military I have not really wanted to be from anywhere. That fact that I am here or there at the time is enough identity for me. So, for the sake of clarity and compliance I concede that I am from Michigan. Duane told me so last night. He said that I live with my brother and sister, no matter where I go or how long I stay away between the going out and coming home. I find that comforting, a little weight off my conscience that few understand or care about and I won’t miss its passing. 

GREAT POTENTIAL

I know a little bit about a lot and I know a lot about a little, nothing profound but there you are. My voyage of discovery has followed a trajectory that ends with the glass of water, half full or half empty. Which it is depends on a bazillion little data points, too many to put in order and decipher. In my case it’s more about the size of the glass. Mu glass is small and it doesn’t take much to fill it. Even if it were half empty I would drink from it without reservation. 

It's fair to say that my profile is very normal, middle of the curve, predictably average in nearly every aspect of human experience. Given the culture and the way I have assimilated, nothing stands out. The Human condition guarantees, being unique simply means that we are not all exactly alike. At best I am statistically insignificant.

Honestly, the little bit I do know is terribly vulnerable, subject to error. I can be, I am frequently incorrect about beliefs, ideas, information and data. It’s like trusting a good compass. It always points true except for when it doesn’t. The earth’s magnetic field gets distorted (something about the iron in the earth’s core) and the needle wanders. Good maps have (declination tables) providing where to make correction and how much is needed. If only there was a declination chart for emotional imbalance and wannabe common sense. 

When it comes to intelligence I tend to skew away from the norm. Not that I have more or less but that I think it is over rated. It has a lot of potential but I was put in my place when my college mentor cautioned me, “You have great potential but that simply means there is so much you haven’t accomplished.” 

If you’ve ever watched an 8 year-old learning to drive by trial & error, that’s civilization (that’s us) believing that he can control a 2 ton machine at 200 mph going into the 3rd turn at Daytona. The old axiom about not learning from history dooms us to employ the same flawed intelligence that yielded wars and oppression in the past. It is much more alluring to pursue what feeds the ego or makes us feel righteous rather than doing the math and follow the curve. 

Ny humanity feels special even if I’m terribly normal in a relatively safe, prosperous society. Considering over 7 billion souls around the world, I’m not so normal. I would be at least a standard deviation above the norm, maybe two when it comes to life style and material wealth. I am very lucky as I was born into it, can’t take credit for choosing the circumstances. Everybody wants to improve their station in life. Being born out of a slum in Caracas or a river bank in Mumbai, my chances for the good life I live would be miniscule. Those who say it’s about choices and that anything is possible would also tell you that climate control is all about building a better thermometer. Here I am preaching again. At least the sermon was short. No singing, no benediction today, just be glad you woke up this morning and that you won't have to go to bed hungry.