IT JUST WORKS

Finding Your Roots, is a television program hosted by Prof. Henry Louis Gates. His guests are usually famous or celebrity and he helps them track down their ancestry through genealogical research and DNA matching. I watched the other night as retired Yankee shortstop Derek Jeter discovered his great-great grandfather was a southern slave owner his GG grandmother was a teenage slave. The origin of his family name, on the African American side came from a rich white man. Master Jeter knew the baby was his and after the Civil War, he favored him with privileges and benefits that were unavailable to other former slaves. The patient, relentless research and running down loose ends was better than a movie mystery. 

Gates’ next guest was Rebecca Lobo, former All American basketball player and WNBA star who is now a sportscaster. Her roots went to Spain but she had no idea of any details. Gates found a photo of her great-great grand parents, taken in Morocco in the late 1800’s. They had to flee Spain after a failed revolt, then had to flee Morocco. They booked passage on a ship for Argentina but they arrived late and missed it. Another ship was leaving the next day and they were able to get on board. Not until days later, they discovered the ship was not bound for Argentina but for New York. As Gates and Lobo shared the information there came a point where her body language and expression registered a revelation. If her great-great grandparents had arrived on time, she, Rebecca Lobo would have never been born. Their descendants would have been Argentines, not Americans. Her father would have never found her mother as he would not have been born either. 

If you apply that principle back in time, generation after generation, the fact that our parents found each other at all is mind boggling; their parents before them and theirs before them. That given, you and I, all of us had to be conceived at one particular point in time. On my mother’s side, the egg cell I came from was only available during that particular menstrual cycler. Any other month, a different egg and it wouldn’t be me; the offspring would have been somebody else. The genetic makeup of a particular egg cell comes from the same source as every other egg cell from that woman but none of them will share the same fingerprint. Gene combinations occur in random fashion; remember Mendel’s Punnet Square from biology class? If you have four beans in your pocket, each a different color and you pull out two beans, how many different color combinations are possible - (6). In an egg and a sperm there are thousands of different gene possibilities; that’s why we’re all so different. Every month it’s a similar set but never the same. If that’s not enough, consider the sperm source. Think of it as a horse race with millions of horses, over a course that takes hours to complete. The first sperm to penetrate the egg triggers a reaction that rejects all other sperm. Only one sperm expresses its gene combinations with the egg and they both follow the same random method of selection. It gets even more twisted. Not all sperm have an equal, even chance of being the chosen one. They are produced by the millions in a constant flow, with a shelf life. At any given time, minute to minute, there are only a few thousand sperm that actually have a chance and they are moving along like millions of children playing musical chairs with only one chair. When the music stops, only a few are standing next of the empty chair and they are the few who actually compete for the prize. Maturity and place in line are critical. All the others run out of energy and drop out of the race or arrive too soon or too late. The fact that it takes two DNA packages to make a human is complicated by two different windows of opportunity; one that spans a few hours every 28 days while the other opens and closes, minute to minute, non stop, all the time. All this high drama and they just thought they were having fun. 

So not only couldn’t you have been born to anybody else, but you had to be conceived within a narrow window, of minutes or maybe an hour for you to be you, the you-you see in the mirror and not a different child by the same parents. Gibran said that children are simply life’s longing for itself. Nature does’t have a plan, it just works. That’s what Rebecca Lobo realized with Louis Gates. I know the feeling, had that Ah-Ha experience in grad school and I’ve never gotten over it. The odds against me being born were astronomical but that was before my ancestors found each other, before my parents found each other, before the right egg and sperm cells found each other and against the odds, I was born. Try to imagine all the children who were never conceived. I think about that kind of stuff. 

DEADMAN'S CURVE

Bicycles and swimming; where would I be, what would have become of me without bicycles and swimming? I got to go on swimming forays with the Cub Scouts before I was old enough to join. Then there was the farm pond over the hill, the one we weren’t supposed to swim in. I learned to swim: ‘Monkey-See Monkey-do’. The same year, between 1st and 2nd grade, I got a bicycle. My brother Dave had a bike with skinny tires, not good for riding double. My dad got a good deal on a second-hand, balloon tire bike. It was too big for me but I would grow. In the meantime, I could ride on the bar and Dave could pedal us the two miles to and from school. I bragged on my new bike but nobody believed me. It was too big and my brother did all the riding. I made up a story, that I could ride it, just could’t get up on it to get started. My classmates wanted to see this so they steadied it for me to climb up on the seat. My legs were too short for a full circle on the pedals but I grabbed the handle bars and nodded my intent, down the school driveway. They gave me a shove and I was launched. I could neither pedal nor brake but I steered it straight down the drive, into the wire fence of the house across the street. I remember untangling myself from under the bike as my friends came running down the hill. I was embarrassed. Everybody knew; my big talk was all talk, I couldn’t ride the bike. Then I saw blood. A bare wire in the fence had gouged me under the jaw. By the time a teacher arrived I was a bloody mess. They bandaged me up, called the Superintendent of Schools who drove down from Hickman Mills and took me home. The next day I showed off my stitches; I still have the scar. 

I grew to fit my bike, riding it everywhere. The summer between 7th and 8th grade, a friend and I were headed to Fairyland Park to go swimming. Fairyland was an amusement park with a midway, rides and a great swimming pool, a five mile ride into Kansas City. Our route took us west across 87th street, a stretch marked by a hilly section and a steep, downhill, S-Curve famously known as Deadman’s Curve. We both knew we would race down the Deadman, nobody wants to be last to the bottom of the hill. Halfway down we were going faster than we could pedal. On the bottom half of the ’S’, water had carved out a narrow rut in the gravel between the pavement and the guard rail. With gravity accelerating and centrifugal force pulling us out toward the shoulder, the front wheel began to wobble. I tried the brakes but when the front tire dropped off the concrete into the rut, I bailed out. No broken bones but I lost a lot of skin. My legs and back were raw. The bike had some broken spokes but was still ridable and we rode on. 

When we got to the pool I showered, patted dry and got in the water. Abrasions look awful but mine didn't really bleed. The chlorine was probably good for it; it was 1952 after all and nobody seemed to notice. In the movie, “Sand Lot”, the boys take a break from their baseball game to go swimming and ogle the girls. They show off, do cannonballs, splash the girls who were sunning themselves for the benefit of high school boys. The pool scene always makes me think of Fairyland Park, teenage girls, cannonballs and an ill fated race down Deadman’s curve. 

Bicycles and swimming; they do go together. I still swim and ride. Swimming pools haven’t changed much but I have. Can’t remember my last cannonball and I keep it between the lane markers; they have another pool for playing in the water. Bicycles are a lot better now, more expensive but then you can scroll through the gears until you get the right one and speed wobbles are a thing of the past. How does that saying go; You separate men from boys by the price of their toys? I haven’t crashed in over a decade, think I’m onto something. Maybe discretion really is the greater part of valor. 

PERILOUS TIMES

Perilous times: we live in perilous times. Growing old, if you’ve been paying attention, nobody has to tell you the world is a dangerous place. Young people can figure it out easy enough but they tend to be preoccupied, trying to spend their youth without losing it. Nobody wants to be old but you certainly don’t want to die young either. So, I have arrived, happy to have made it, thankful for good health, good friends, some cool toys and a livable income. Obviously I must have done something right and I’ve avoided some perilous pit falls. Perilous times: every day, every moment is full of peril. You can go there by choice or fall prey to it simply by; the wrong time, the wrong place. 

Looking back on a life filled with calculated risk and unwitting gambles, I cannot discount the role of random, good fortune. I am simply lucky to be so old, with such a good life. When I was a kid the dangers were different but they were there. No seat belts, no air bags and we drove crazy; nothing could stop us. Still, some of us died in car crashes; bad luck or bad choice, who knows? We had our perverts and kids were abused but again, wrong place, wrong time. Most of us slid through without a scratch. I grew up during the heyday of White/Male/Christian privilege. I didn’t chose those demographics; I was born to it. Right place, right time. Born white, male and christian in Mogadishu or Riyadh today would offer none of the privilege I enjoyed. 

I think ‘Perilous Times’ is a catch phrase for people who feel a need to validate feelings about past or present. On the one end, the ‘Good Old Days’ is simply a nostalgic reflection on the blind exuberance of youth. It has noting to do with other times. On the other end, if you look for gloom and doom that’s what you will find. Now-times are dangerous. Times, disease and technology change but danger doesn’t. Danger exists in time and space, on when and where you are. It still takes both good judgement and a lot of luck to prevail. Study after study, year after year; schools are deemed the safest place a child can be. Yet there is wide spread fear of mass killings in schools. If you think these are the worst of times then it’s about you, not the times. 

There is a story about a man walking on a beach after a storm. Hundreds of star fish have washed up on the berm, too high for the tide to take them back out. Their fate is to die there. Then he sees a boy walking toward him, picking up star fish and throwing them back out into the surf. He tells the boy there are plenty of star fish in the sea and the ones that die will be eaten by crabs and birds. They are part of the food web and their fate just doesn’t matter. The boy keeps picking up star fish, throwing them back into the sea and says, “It matters to that one . . . and that one . . .” The story can be about the man and the boy or it can be about star fish. I think it’s about star fish. They live in perilous times but this time is a right time, and this beach is a right place. 

NOTHING WRONG

Mary Frances Harmon was a year behind me in school but we were in the same Sunday School class. Her parents were sponsors for our church youth group. Kids know without being told, where they rank in the peer pecking order. Mary Frances was near the top and I was somewhere down the line. She used two names where the rest of us only needed one, her hand was the first to go up and her parents knew she would deliver exactly what they wanted to hear. Mr Harmon was tall and manly but Mrs Harmon did all the talking. She was short and thin with wire rim glasses, hair pulled back and a smile that was less than convincing. 

One evening we had to go outside for an activity. On either side of the double doors that opened to the sidewalk were two Redbud trees that arched over the doorway. I was first out the door and it was both easy and natural to swing up into the branches. My feet would be dangling from the over-hang when the rest of the class came out. But Mrs Harmon stopped them inside to organize and she missed me. “Where is LeRoy?” Nobody knew. When they came out, they couldn’t miss my feet. Ten year-olds will giggle at anything and that was all I wanted, approval, a simple affirmation. “What is wrong with you?” Her voice went up an octave with an angry edge, equal to her displeasure with me. She was serious. I was on the ugly end of her evil eye after that and she never let me forget, said she was going to tell my mother but she never did. Mr. Harmon couldn’t have cared less.

It was normal for men to light up their cigarettes as soon as church let out. On Sunday afternoon the sidewalk outside the chapel doors would be strewn with crushed cigarette butts. But women who smoked waited until they were in their cars. My mother didn’t smoke but said it was proper to wait. Mrs Harmon smoked outside before they reached their car but I didn’t care. I didn’t have any reason to not like her but neither was there anything to like. Why so angry - What is wrong with you! It wasn’t a question.  

My son and his family were over for a Sunday cookout recently. I told his girls that nobody had ever climbed my Sycamore tree. It was big enough, someone needed to do that. They have a Maple in their back yard that answers their climbing needs so I didn’t have to say more. They came back again just the other day. The younger one asked, “Does the Sycamore need more climbing?” I raised eyebrows and gave her a nod. By the time I caught up, she was laddering up through the middle branches. It occurred to me, in my wisdom, ‘There is nothing wrong with her.’ Her dad asked if it brought back any memories and I mumbled something. It made me think of Mrs. Harmon: what a narrow life she must have lived. It made me think of him, hanging by his knees, 20 feet up another Sycamore, another life-time. Next thing I know he was up there with his girls, limb to limb, peeling bark and testing hand holds. No, nothing wrong here. 

IGNOBLE

Humanity is predisposed to dismiss its deficiencies and to exaggerate its virtues to the end, human life is not only superior but also sacred. Most religion would have it that way and the psyche goes there without any inducement. At the other end of the spectrum, misanthropy is a view that the human condition is both corrupted and unworthy. Plato attributed it to thwarted expectations or being extremely naive. In either case, it would seem that the vast majority lean hard to the superior/sacred version. Naturally, I tend to swim against the current. It is fair to say that when it comes to humanity, my expectations have been seriously let down and naiveté comes easily. I make this disclaimer in self defense, taking no comfort thus, it just is what it is. 

We have a multi-billionaire, real estate tycoon running for President. Yesterday it was revealed that he paid no (none) income tax for 18 years, legally. By manipulating loopholes and privileges afforded the immensely rich, he didn’t have to pay. If it was within the law, (experts say it was) then what’s the hang-up? It will be - it is natural for working, tax paying citizens who shop for the best deal on a television set or a car, because money is hard to come by, to recognize the inequity there and find fault with those who exploit it. In his defense, rich and powerful supporters laud him for his astute business savvy. “He has a fiduciary responsibility to pay the least tax that he is required to pay;” is their response. They praise his “Smart” behavior, dismissing a moral obligation to the principle and the spirit of citizenship. In other words, your obligation to maximize your own wealth is greater than any obligation to insure the national infrastructure or the system that provides such opportunity. Beating the system would then be a nobel act. The logic unfolds; those who can’t beat the system should idolize and sponsor those who can. 

I want to know how you justify that shuffle-dance between God & Country patriotism that touts the Bible, flaunts the flag and principles of fairness, asking “What would Jesus do?”  with what we actually do. Our culture is a broad fabric with many threads but all together, it sends a public message, “We are a righteous people who seek and defend justice.” But the unspoken principle usurps the message. It says, “God helps those who help themselves so don’t let concern for others dampen your avarice.” 

The duplicity of this self ascribed righteousness is appalling. It’s bad enough that we have a wretch like D-Trump in position to become our President. But the real insult is the broad support he receives from ordinary people. Yesterday, I listened to a discussion between news media experts. A conservative news paper editor was asked why he had so greatly underestimated DT’s appeal at the beginning of his campaign. He attributed it to two, unexpected causes. First was the reemergence of a deeply held, deeply felt racism, across the culture. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts, explaining the striking down of sections of the Voting Rights Act alluded to how we have changed as a nation; that we no longer need to protect voting rights of minorities. After all, we have an African American President. I would suggest that the racist pushback against minorities in this election cycle is evidence to the contrary. 

The second cause, according to the news editor, was “Poor Education.” DT appeals to the ‘Poorly Educated’ in his speeches to the poor and the working class. But the editor explained it where DT doesn’t. It’s not about what was or wasn’t learned in school. It cuts right on up through college graduates. He cited an inability to discern between fact and fiction, a cultural phenomenon, A short but good discussion followed that touched on the internet, a “Reality TV” mentality and ‘Talk Show” propaganda. People have neither the ability to confirm their sources nor the desire to do so. As a people, we believe the voice that tells us what we want to believe. ’Google’ has become the new, graduate school. Together, DT has assembled a consortium of privileged malcontents, racist bigots and predatory business interests that has a good chance of winning the Presidency. 

So I have trouble with a self righteous, noble, human model. Epicurus, (300 BC) reduced human nature to seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, both physical and emotional. It is a function of the primitive brain and when it conflicts with what we believe to be Righteous and Just, the Righteous and the Just take a back seat. We have weighed thousands of philosophers since 300 BC but Epicurus’ observation still holds water. I’m sorry we’re not better than we are but then maybe I should see the glass as half full. 

OMG

It’s a gray day in Grand Haven, MI, spitting, wishing it could rain. I’m in my office this morning, looking out my corner window at people walking briskly with steaming coffee and wind breakers, up and down Washington Street. ’Coffee Grounds’ is my part-time, some-time, spiritual retreat. Coffee is the best. Toast your own bagel and chase it with a big, chocolate chunk cookie. I’ve got my smart phone charging and life is pretty good. I went to the beach yesterday, thinking the wind might be blowing up some whitecaps but it was placid and overcast. Still, you take photographs. It’s like signing in at the desk; you were there and who knows, maybe you get lucky. 

I looked out the channel to the lighthouse and something didn’t jell. Not much going on but something was amiss even at that. Shades of gray and OMG: the catwalk was gone. For ever; as long as I’ve been coming to Grand Haven the red lighthouse and black, elevated catwalk have been the town’s fingerprint. As you walked out the pier, almost a quarter mile, it was under and around the heavy, black iron work that bridged up the old walkway, from shore to the lighthouse itself. In the old days when the light keeper had to negotiate heavy weather, to and from shore, the catwalk was the only way. With a life line attached, one could work from hand hold to hand hold, 15 ft. above the pier and the waves crashing over it. Of course it’s all automated now. GPS and radar have rendered the light unnecessary, except for its scenic value. But you love it, absolutely love it when you trip the shutter in the same split second the light glows red and a big wave explodes up and over the breakwater. 
The catwalk isn’t there; just gone. Its old pier mountings are still jutting up a foot or so in two straight lines, running out to the lonely looking, little red lighthouse. I don’t know why they did it. I’m sure it was a good reason. That piece of work would have been very expensive and something surely must be safer or improved but I’ve that yet to find out. As I stood at the breech, the route out to the end looked more precarious, more dangerous without the catwalk. If you were crazy enough to be on the pier during heavy weather, you could get behind and hold onto the iron work. Now it looks more like I remember, kids walking the railroad track; nothing to lean on, nothing to hold onto. Falling off the track might skin you up but falling in that water, any weather, would put even a strong swimmer at risk. People drown in this water every year and now the catwalk is gone. But things change, even the things you love and you can go along or you can live in the past. Someday soon this will be the new normal. 

FOLLY

In 1994 I was an Environmental Issues Resource Teacher at Nowlin Middle School, in Independence, Missouri. My area of expertise was plant science (‘Botany’ sounds so tedious,) with a classroom converted into a lab and a newly constructed greenhouse. My best friend there was Rick Clear, another resource teacher, the I.T. guy for our school. Rick had been a world class, middle distance runner in the early 1980’s, narrowly missed qualifying for the ’84 Olympics. He was a Major in the Army Reserve, Commanding Officer of a unit in Cape Girardeau. MO. We were forever playing practical jokes on each other. 

That spring, I was enrolled in an environmental workshop at the Marriott in Jefferson City, MO. It ran Thursday-noon through Saturday-noon. The day before, we realized we would be in the same hotel only I would be checking out as he was checking in. He and his wife Patsy would be at a high-brow, full dress, Army Reserve banquet there. I told him, maybe I could slip in and we could share an extra desert. Rick gave me a condescending grin and assured me, there was no way in hell that I’d be in that room at dinner time. I didn’t think much about it until Saturday morning as we were wrapping up our workshop. Then I remembered his comment in our office.

We checked out before noon and the banquet wasn’t until 5:00 but they were setting up the grand ballroom as I took my suitcase to the car. Then, sometimes, things just take on a life of their own and you get carried away. I found the banquet manager and told him my story; I wanted to upstage my friend’s smug arrogance. “Can I put on a server’s shirt and tie, and serve him his meal? Can we maybe, put scraps under the lid instead of his prime rib?” The man’s sly grin was his answer. I had some time to kill but that would be easy. 

But by the time they began seating the officers and their ladies, an intricate plan had been devised equal to a plot twist in a Tom Clancy novel. I was in my borrowed white shirt, black bow tie and black apron. Seating had been prearranged by the military, according to rank. Rick and Patsy would be at a table to the right and back from the head table. Meals were stacked on carts in the tunnel, labeled by table number. I waited in the wings until our table was next. The other servers were all in on it, like spies on a secret mission. When everyone at Rick’s table had been served, I came up from behind. He never saw it coming. I reached over his shoulder, sat the plate down in front of him. He was talking across the table; never looked up. I lifted the metal cover and said, “Enjoy your meal Sir.” He looked at his plate, barren except for two, dried up, turkey-drumstick-bones. Then he looked up at me. It was like a boxing combination, left hook and right cross, enough to knock you out. He looked at his plate and back at me, like a bobblehead doll. I said, “No way in hell I could be in this room!” I turned and walked, never looked back. “Frank, Frank; hey. . . Wait . . . What are you doing here. . . He’s not a waiter, I work with him. . . Hey, what’s going on?” and I was in the kitchen. I thanked the banquet manager, changed clothes and was out the door. Rick got his prime rib but it came at a price. 

Monday morning, all he could do was purse his lips and shake his head. He didn’t get in any trouble, the people at his table loved it while nobody else seemed to notice. He swore he would get even but he never did. Six years later he had made Lieutenant Colonel, had left the school district for a job in the private sector. I left a couple of years before that and was teaching in Allendale, Michigan. In his last year at Nowlin Middle he misappropriated some money and had been found out. They were going to press charges. A mutual friend called me. In the wee morning hours, Rick had driven to a parking lot at a near by lake, duct-taped a hose from his exhaust, through the window and he took his own life. 

He used to tell me, all I needed was to start coming to his church. But I think that was part of his undoing, a self righteous Faith and the devil made me do it. The shame of being found out was too much for his Baptist dichotomy. I miss my friend and I would forgive him for his folly but I never put much stock in his advice.