simply...

a message of love from a brooklyn girl

2011-07-26T08:00:00.000-04:00

August 2011

Ten years ago we were on an amazing path toward love. The truth was in the music -- Sade had just come to town. And then, as a creative movement, we got derailed. Everything we were about...everything we were on track to be...became dictated by messages of insanity. You thought I was going to say 'war'?
If only it were that simple.

The truth? In the lists.

Best sellers.

The most accurate logs of what we are in the process of becoming

...to express. In art.

Not what we are looking for but what we have found.

(writers, find your rhythm...)

Sade was dancing
in August
at The Garden.

If you were there you know.
You remember.

You could feel the energy in the room, New York, when she sang the words,
"My love is taller, taller than the Empire State...."
We were ready to turn it up in the world with music and art and hope and dreams...

and we were on the verge of a cultural phenomenon called 'renaissance'.

...

We're back on track. I believe. A little older. A little wiser.
But certainly no worse for wear.
Let's pick up where we left off in August. Ten years ago.

The truth is in the lists.
The music.
The technology.
Universal language.

What we are able to do when we become the power of One. Connected.

Heads know how we do. For real.

Anywhere you go, spread it like you be from brooklyn.

One Planet. One people.

Simply...

2009-09-11T08:28:00.004-04:00

...we are what we learn with love.

2008-12-26T09:09:00.003-05:00

"When you see the earth from the moon, you don't see any divisions there of nations or states. This might be a symbol for the new mythology to come. That is the country that we are going to be celebrating. And those are the people that we are one with." -- philosopher

2008-12-26T09:05:00.003-05:00

Our true reality is in our identity and unity with all life...the concept of love your neighbor is to put you in tune with this fact.
-- same philosopher

...because

2008-10-03T11:31:00.002-04:00

ahimsa means
seeing creation
and the beginning of time
and finding new religion
in love's honor.

2008-09-12T08:54:00.001-04:00

art is
limited to
no thing...

Because...

2008-08-04T16:59:00.002-04:00

No child

Anywhere

Should have to hear the phrase,

"Wait 'til you have parents..."

forward

2008-08-04T16:55:00.003-04:00

when friends say,

"wait 'til you have children,"

may it always be synonymous with

"Share Our Joy."

because...

2008-08-04T16:53:00.003-04:00

...the oldest grandparent
will always
first
be someone's child

2008-07-16T07:02:00.002-04:00

sphere n - 1 a (1) : the apparent surface of the heavens of which half forms the dome of the visible sky. (2) any of the concentric and eccentric revolving spherical transparent shells in which according to ancient astronomy stars, sun, planets, and moon are set.

Out of the mouths of babes...

2008-06-19T00:51:00.002-04:00

Imagination! Who can sing thy force?
Or describe the swiftness of thy course?
-Phyllis Wheatley

2008-06-19T00:48:00.003-04:00

"Children learn more from what you are than what you teach." - William Edward Burghardt Dubois

2008-06-19T00:42:00.002-04:00

"Where there is no vision, the people perish; where there is no framework of moral reasoning, the people close ranks in a war of all against all." - Cornell West, The Perils of Racial Reasoning

because...

2008-06-19T00:29:00.007-04:00

some religions seek the path to spirituality through withdrawal from the physical world. a monastic life is held in high regard. some view the human as essentially an animal that is incapable of elevating itself beyond the struggle for survival, hence they encourage a life of hedonism and materialism. some see the human being as an essentially spiritual being, clothed in a physical body -- the physical isn't evil, just not the complete view of reality. which ones maintain that it is, in fact, possible to elevate the physical world? possibly the ones that recognize that the essential human need is not food, drink or comfort, but meaning. when meaning is injected to even the simplest of events, actions, and interactions, what might be the possibility for the physical world be, going forward?

gracenote for the future

2008-06-07T04:33:00.002-04:00

may the past
become
a reflection of
every person
living
because
they know
they are loved

Songs of Freedom...

2008-06-07T04:31:00.001-04:00

"...won't you help to sing?" Robert Nesta Marley

Ahimsa

2008-06-07T03:43:00.006-04:00

The Gospel According to Shug

HELPED are those who are enemies of their own racism: they shall live in harmony with the citizens of this world, and not with those of the world of their ancestors, which has passed away, and which they shall never see again.

HELPED are those born from love: conceived in their father's tenderness and their mother's orgasm, for they shall be those -- numbers of whom will be called "illegitimate" -- whose spirits shall know no boundaries, even between heaven and earth, and whose eyes shall reveal the spark of the love that was their own creation. They shall know joy equal to their suffering and they will lead multitudes into dancing and Peace.

HELPED are those too busy living to respond when they are wrongfully attacked: on their walks they shall find mysteries so intriguing as to distract them from every blow.

HELPED are those who find something in Creation to admire each and every hour. Their days will overflow with beauty and the darkest dungeon will offer gifts.

HELPED are those who receive only to give; always in their house will be the circular energy of generosity; and in their hearts a beginning of a new age on Earth: when no keys will be needed to unlock the heart and no locks will be needed on the doors.

HELPED are those who love the stranger; in this they reflect the heart of the Creator and that of the Mother.

HELPED are those who are content to be themselves; they will never lack mystery in their lives and the joys of self-discovery will be constant.

HELPED are those who love the entire cosmos rather than their own tiny country, city, or farm, for them will be shown the unbroken web of life and the meaning of infinity.

HELPED are those who live in quietness, knowing neither brand name nor fad; they shall live every day as if in eternity, and each moment shall be as full as it is long.

HELPED are those who love others unsplit off from their faults; to them will be given the clarity of vision.

HELPED are those who create anything at all, for they shall relive the thrill of their own conception, and realize a partnership in the creation of the Universe that keeps them responsible and cheerful.

HELPED are those who love the Earth, their mother, and who willingly suffer that she may not die; in their grief over her pain they will weep rivers of blood, and in their joy in her lively response to love, they will converse with trees.

HELPED are those whose every act is a prayer for harmony in the Universe, for they are the restorers of balance to our planet. To them will be given the insight that every good act done anywhere in the cosmos welcomes the life of an animal or a child.

HELPED are those who risk themselves for others' sakes; to them will be given increasing opportunities for ever greater risks. Theirs will be a vision of the world in which no one's gift is despised or lost.

HELPED are those who strive to give up their anger; their reward will be that in any confrontation their first thoughts will never be of violence or of war.

HELPED are those whose every act is a prayer for peace; on them depends the future of the world.

HELPED are those who forgive; their reward shall be forgetfulness of every evil done to them. It will be in their power, therefore, to envision the new Earth.

HELPED are those who are shown the existence of the Creator's magic in the Universe; they shall experience delight and astonishment without ceasing.

HELPED are those who laugh with a pure heart; theirs will be the company of the jolly righteous.

HELPED are those who love all the colors of animals and plants; none of their children, nor any of their ancestors, nor any parts of themselves, shall be hidden from them.

HELPED are those who love the lesbian, the gay, and the straight, as they love the sun, the moon, and the stars. None of their children, nor any of their ancestors, nor any parts of themselves, shall be hidden from them.

HELPED are those who love the broken and the whole; none of their children, nor any of their ancestors, nor any parts of themselves shall be despised.

HELPED are those who do not join mobs; theirs shall be the understanding that to attack in anger is to murder in confusion.

HELPED are those who find the courage to do at least one small thing each day to help the existence of another -- plant, animal, river, or human being. They shall be joined by a multitude of the timid.

HELPED are those who lose their fear of death; theirs is the power to envision the future in a blade of grass.

HELPED are those who love and actively support the diversity of life; they shall be secure in their differentness.

HELPED are those who know.

Source: Alice Walker, writer

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi Speaks

2008-06-07T03:33:00.003-04:00

a. An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind

b. Even as wisdom often comes from the mouths of babes, so does it often come from the mouths of old people. 1921

c. A religion that takes no account of practical affairs and does not help to solve them is no religion. 1925

d. It has always been a mystery to me how men can feel themselves honoured by the humiliation of their fellow beings. 1927

e. The spirit of democracy is not a mechanical thing to be adjusted by abolition of forms. It requires change of heart. 1927

f. Gentleness, self sacrifice and generosity are the exclusive possession of no one race or religion. 1930

g. Everyone who wills can hear the inner voice. 1933

for the love of daughters

2008-06-07T02:54:00.004-04:00

They dreamed dreams that no one knew -- not even themselves, in any coherent fashion -- and saw visions no one could understand....They waited for a day when the unknown thing that was in them would be made known: but guessed, somehow in their darkness, that on the day of their revelation they would be long dead. They were Creators, who lived lives of spiritual waste, because they were so rich on spirituality -- which is the basis of Art -- that the strain of enduring their unused and unwanted talent drove them insane. Throwing away this spirituality was their pathetic attempt to lighten the soul to a weight their work-worn, sexually abused bodies could bear.

What did it mean for a black woman to be an artist in our grandmother's time? In our great-grandmother's day...when her one joy was the thought of modeling heroic figures of rebellion in stone or clay?

How was the creativity of the black woman kept alive, year after year and century after century, when for most of the years black people have been in America, it was a punishable crime for a black person to read or write? And the freedom to paint, to sculpt, to expand the mind with action did not exist. Consider, if you can bear to imagine it, what might have been the result if singing, too, had been forbidden by law. Listen to the voices of Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Nina Simone, Roberta Flack, and Aretha Franklin, among others, and imagine those voices muzzled for life. Then you may begin to comprehend the lives of our "crazy," "Sainted" mothers and grandmothers. The agony of the lives of women who might have been Poets, Novelists, Essayists, and Short-Story Writers (over a period of centuries), who died with their real gifts stifled within them.

To be an artist and a black woman, even today, lowers our status in many respects rather than raises it: and yet, artists we will be.

Therefore we must fearlessly pull out of ourselves and look at and identify with our lives the living creativity some of our great-grandmothers were not allowed to know. I stress "some" of them because it is well known that the majority of our great-grandmothers knew, even without "knowing" it, the reality of their spirituality, even if they didn't recognize it beyond what happened in the singing at church -- and they never had any intention of giving it up.

But when, you will ask, did my overworked mother have time to know or care about feeding the creative spirit? The answer is so simple that many of us have spent years discovering it. We have constantly looked high, when we should have looked high -- and low. As Virginia Wolf wrote in A Room of One's Own:

yet genius of a sort must have existed among women
as it must have among the working class. [Change
this to "slaves" and "the wives and daughters of
sharecroppers."] Now and again Emily Bronte or
Robert Burns [change this to a "Zora Hurston or a
Richard Wright] blazes out and proves its presence.
But certainly it never got itself on paper. When
however, one reads of a witch being ducked, of a
woman possessed by devils [or "Sainthood"], of a
wise woman selling herbs [our root workers], or
even a very remarkable man who had a mother, then
I think we are on the track of a lost novelist, a suppressed
poet, of some mute and inglorious Jane Austen...Indeed,
I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote
so many poems without singing them, was often
a woman...

And so our mothers and grandmothers have, more often than not anonymously, handed on the creative spark....I notice that it is only when my mother is working in her flowers that she is radiant, almost to the point of being invisible -- except as Creator: hand and eye. She is involved in work her soul must have. Ordering the Universe in the image of her personal conception of Beauty. For her, so hindered and intruded upon in so many ways, being an artist has still been a daily part of her life. This ability to hold on, even in very simple ways, is work black women have done for a very long time.

Guided by my heritage of a love of beauty and a respect for strength -- in search of my mother's garden, I found my own.

Source: Essay: "In Search of Our Mother's Gardens" by Alice Walker

...necessary means - transposed

2008-06-07T02:42:00.003-04:00

Focus on 'a' war splits hairs over an indefinite article while non-combatants, everywhere, are caught in 'the' crossfire.
End war.

"I'm for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it is for or against. I'm a human being first and foremost, and as such I'm for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole." - El-Hajj Malik El-Shabbazz

the future

2008-06-07T02:32:00.003-04:00

a little prayer
in the river xong
answered

Notes on Book Culture

2008-06-01T05:35:00.022-04:00

To publish simply means to make something public. Literally, to make generally known, to make a general announcement or to disseminate to the public. Publicizing means that you're bringing something to the attention of the public. Essentially, in the purest sense of the word...advertising. Publicity, then, is the quality or state of being public.

As a reader, when you read a text, what are you actually doing? You are recognizing the writer's gift to you by taking the time to read their work. Because time, more than anything else, is priceless. As a reader, when you purchase a book, what are you actually doing? You are supporting not just the work, not just the artist, but the very idea of art. That is, if you believe a book, in the purest sense, is an art form.

How much should one pay for a book? It all depends on who you ask, but never ask the artist. The majority of people do something else when the objective is solely money and the artist will, no matter what, simply do what they do. When you buy a book you are supporting an idea that, for better or worse, started out as a twinkle in the writer's eye.

So often people take for granted the things that need to be in place before they can purchase a book for themselves to read. First, there has to be literacy in at least one written language. Comprehension. Understanding. It isn't enough to simply "know how to read" because so many eloquent people can barely read more than their name. Next, there has to be a shared or mutual desire between the reader and the artist. The artist expressed the extent of their desire by having produced the work and, by far, the only sentence harder to write than the first will always be the last. Do you share the desire in the writer's first sentence to want to continue with them to the second? What about the third? What about the fourth? If you want to continue to the very end of the story, then you've shared in the artist's desire without, yourself, having written but having done, yourself, a certain amount of work. Because the written word, when the craft has been studied, is like that. Which means that what you also need is a particular kind of focus. Some books are thick and some books are thin. But size in relation to books can be deceptive. There is a huge difference between a thousand pages of words strung together in confusion and ten pages of solid content. A mathematician will tell you that. Each book, after all, is somehow a formula for something.

Instead of asking how much one should pay for a book, do we ever ask what we are doing when we read one? That might be useful. We are, in fact, spending time. And time, once again, is priceless. A mother will tell you that. A father will tell you that. And so will a son. And so will a daughter. Time is the most precious thing we have and so, when we read we are making a special investment. The hope, especially when we have finished a book, is that we have gotten an excellent return. Are we better for having read the writer's work? Are we worse? Are we no worse for wear? Have we learned anything? Are we more confused? Are we motivated to do something? Anything? It is humbling to finish what you think is a very good book and feel a bit of sadness afterward because the book had, through its writer's gift, become more like your friend. But you can, if you wish, open it and read it again. Maybe not right away, because there are other books, too, but sometime later. Because it is always nice to visit old friends after having learned a bit from new ones. Not all books inspire that.

Napoleon said, "History is a set of lies agreed upon," and you kind of have to think, "What a cynical little man!" Because it isn't simply what you read but, also, what you, yourself, bring to the proverbial table. Or, put another way, a book can very well be like a fire. When looking deeply into a well-built one you can, in fact, see a reflection of your soul. Words, when the art is studied, can do that. But, no matter how great the book, not always. G. C. Lichtenberg said, "A book is like a mirror. If an ass peers into it, you can't expect an apostle to peer out." He also said, "Some people read because they are too lazy to think," which makes sense if, after reading, you do nothing. Imagine, then, if after reading -- if after learning to read -- you write. A book? A letter? A poem? A recipe? A song?

Re-examine all you have been told and dismiss what insults your soul, and never ever imagine a world without books. Because a world without books - the ones you hold in your hand - is also a world without art. It is a world without hope. It is a world without dreams. It is a world without possibility. Just as not all books are fact, not all books are fiction. Language - written, spoken and unspoken, too - is the first tool of all our trades. And books are amazing in both art and technology. You may be able to find what you want on the Internet but, if you really want to take a piece information with you wherever you go, you still have to press 'print', fold it up, and put it in your pocket. "Man loves company, even if that of a small burning candle," said G. C. Lichtenberg. To write? Perhaps. To read? To think? Perchance, to dream?

Again, how much to pay for a book? Maybe we should ask the writers. Ask them a couple of questions, that is. "How much time did you invest in the story?" "How much time did you take with each sentence?" "What is the objective of your book?" "What is the main idea?" "If it is, in fact, a labor of love, is that what shines through?" "If you had it to do all over again, would you write that very same story?" "When did you first think it was important to read?" 'When did you think it was important to write?" "Who taught you?"

Did you ever think of asking all that before you walked into a bookstore? Why or, if not, why not? A bookstore is like an art gallery for books. A library is more like a museum. When you buy books your are supporting the artist and all the people you don't even realize you see every day who also believe in the culture of reading. When you make a donation to your local library you are supporting art and you are also helping to preserve the future.

When you give a child a book you are assuming that they read, or hoping that maybe someday they will. Where would you be when you hand that child a book? In what country? On what continent? In what context? Depending upon where you are, and depending on whose child, are you putting the cart before the horse? What on earth are we doing?

Why read? Because, to whom much is given, much is required. That, as an answer, should also give readers some insight into exactly why artists - all artists - in their own way, write.

looking forward, we hope

2008-06-01T05:30:00.003-04:00

say,
"i see
i believe
i dream
a different world,"
to a four-year-old.
ask,
what about you?
then,
the same thing
to a fourteen-year-old
and then
to someone
over forty

declare, declaration, declarant

2008-06-01T04:33:00.012-04:00

A good way to understand how the World Bank works is anecdotally. There is an excellent documentary called Life and Debt that helps the layman understand what it does by using one country as a prism, though the textbook definition is also helpful:

World Bank - an international organization that provides loans to governments and private firms for development projects, such as irrigation, education, and housing. It also grants loans to support government policies that it believes will strengthen a country's economy, such as lower import tariffs and more efficient judicial systems. The bank's official name is The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

Almost all countries are members of the World Bank. The bank is an agency of the United Nations.

The World Bank has faced criticism, especially in the United States. Critics note that the bank has had little success in persuading some developing countries to adopt the policies the bank believes would improve their economies. Critics also argue that the bank should not fund investment projects that can be financed by private loans.

The United Nations is an organization of nations that works for world peace and security and the betterment of humanity. Almost all of the world's independent countries belong to the United Nations.

The United Nations has two main goals: peace and human dignity. A preamble of about two hundred words precedes the charter and expresses the guiding spirit of the organization. Jans Christian Smuts of South Africa is credited with drafting the full preamble.

'We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and nations large and small, and establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom, and for these ends to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbors, and to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples have resolved to combine our efforts to accomplish these aims.'

Ultimately, the goal is for all people of all nations to have their fundamental human rights recognized so that we may all live together in peace. Human rights are those rights that each person is entitled to simply because he or she is a human being. The concept of human rights is based on the idea that each person has worth and dignity, and thus deserves certain basic freedoms. When these freedoms are recognized, each individual can enjoy safety, security, and the ability to make many decisions about his or her life.

The laws and court system of most nations are designed to protect human rights. But national systems are not always effective and many fail to acknowledge certain human rights.

Human rights can be classified in three main types: (1) rights of personal integrity (2) civil liberties, and (3) social and economic rights. Rights of personal integrity involve rights to personal safety and freedom. These include freedom from slavery, torture, and unreasonable imprisonment. Civil liberties are the rights of each person to express beliefs through words and actions. These rights include freedoms of speech, association, thought, conscience, and religion. Social and economic rights involve basic human needs and rights of development. These include the right to food, shelter, medical care, and education. Efforts to establish basic human rights began thousands of years ago. One important early document in these efforts was Magna Carta of 1215 which granted rights to individuals and ensured that England's king would be subject to the law. Magna Carta became a model for later documents, such as the United States Constitution's Bill of Rights, adopted in 1791. The Bill of Rights suggested the idea of universal rights, but in practice, it was not truly universal. For example, the bill excluded slaves, and thus it failed to address human rights as we now understand them.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a document adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 10, 1948. It was designed to protect people throughout the world from abuses of power. The declaration was drafted by a multinational committee that included Eleanor Roosevelt of the United States, Renee-Samuel Cassin of France, and Charles Malik of Lebanon. Eleanor Roosevelt stressed that in approving the Universal Declaration of Human Rights it was important to keep clearly in mind the basic character of the document. It is a declaration of the basic principles of human rights and freedoms serving as a common standard of achievement for all people of all nations. It is comparable to the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, adopted by France in 1789, the Bill of Rights adopted by the United States in 1791, and the future declarations of other nations.

Canada's Constitution includes a bill of rights called the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Charter guarantees freedom of speech, religion, assembly, and other basic rights. It also guarantees democratic government and bans discrimination based on race, ethnic or national background, color, religion, age, sex, or mental or physical disability.

To the Daughters of the Masai and the Dinka - In Blood and, Also Spirit

2008-06-01T04:01:00.008-04:00

1. In cultures where men shave their heads before going to war, what do they think they know? In cultures where men do not shave their heads before going to war, what do they think they know?

2. Why do we cut our hair? Some of us do it as an act of defiance. Some of us do it out of respect. Some of us do it because we think we are beautiful, and some of us do it because we think we are not. Some of us do it to show our strength, and some of us do it because of weakness. Some of us do it as an act of vanity -- there is something wondrous about a perfectly shaped head. Some of us do it because we have got something to prove. And some of us do it because we do not. Some of us do it because of madness. Some of us do it because we have reached a higher ground. And some of us just don't care.

-flip the coin-

Why do we let our hair grow? Some of us do it as an act of defiance. Some of us do it out of respect. Some of us do it because we think we are beautiful, and some of us do it because we think we are not. Some of us do it to show our strength, and some of us do it because of weakness. Some of us do it as an act of vanity -- there is something wondrous about a perfectly shaped head. Some of us do it because we have got something to prove. And some of us do it because we do not. Some of us do it because of madness. Some of us do it because we have reached a higher ground. And, some of us just don't care.

3. Some of us have been asked to grow our hair for a job, and some of us have been asked to cut it.

4. If you have done either, does that make you heads or tales? Does having done both make you the coin? If the one who owns all the gold makes the rules, then to whom do we all belong?

5. Vanity, thy name is woman, to be sure. And you Narcissus?

There are other things to think about.

If a woman's hair is her crowning glory, then why is it always used as a weapon against her, regardless of how she wears it? Why, in too many parts of the world, is she dragged out by it into day or nighttime madness to be, at the very least, raped? Why can she be killed in too many parts of the world for not covering it? And why, in some parts of the world, can she be vilified for not showing it? Why, in some parts of the world, can a woman be judged, harshly or at all, if she makes a personal decision not to grow it? Why, in some parts of the world, does the length and the color of a woman's hair determine for others whether or not she is a whore?

Disproportionately, around the globe, women, children, the young and the old are dying as a result of the violences of poverty. If, at some point, we stop splitting hairs over the trumped up politics of what we have been naturally given to cover our heads with when it is too cold or when it is too hot, what other issues might we actively address?

Eventually, hopefully, growing old with grace.

The Boa Who Ate the Elephant

2008-06-01T03:43:00.003-04:00

To imagine is like flying a kite. The mind, loosely tethered, is free to be blown about. Usually the direction it takes just happens but sometimes by tweaking the string it can arrive at an unlikely destination. Take Einstein who, struck with the thought of riding on a shaft of light in outer space while looking at himself in the mirror, interpreted the imagery to come up with the principles of his Theory of Relativity.

Imagination, an unimaginative person once wrote, is what happens when a drunk loses his watch and has to get drunk again to find it. Although fantasy and make-believe flourish in childhood they rapidly atrophy as one is moulded to fit the adult's grey consensus of reality. A child, out on a walk with its mother, suddenly points and cries out, 'Look, a purple cow!' The mother, perhaps rather tired and domestically harassed, snaps, 'Don't be silly.' And then delivers the crunch line: 'There's no such thing as purple cows.'

So the child, a vagabond in the backwoods of rationality, is brought up to see the world in the prosaic terms of grown-ups and eventually forgets it ever saw a purple cow. Now purple cows walk around unseen by anyone.

-- Frank Gelette Burgess, The Burgess Nonsense Book

brotherly love

2008-06-01T03:40:00.001-04:00

on a planet
where people have been walking
since antiquity
why is there xenophobia?

Today, Word Play, Icebergs and Mountains

2008-05-25T08:55:00.011-04:00

"No matter what they take from me...."

dignity n 1: the quality or state of being worthy, honored, or esteemed.

Words are not just things to be memorized to get through a section on the (L.)S.A.T.. They are the tools for all trades. Anyone can have an opinion, but how many people can define it? What about a thought? What about an idea? What about a dream?

thought n 1a : the action or process of thinking: COGITATION b. serious consideration : regard 2a : reasoning power b : the power to imagine

idea n 1a : a transcendent entity that is a real pattern of which existing things are imperfect representations b: a standard of perfection : ideal c. a plan for action : DESIGN 2 archaic : a visible representation of a conception : a replica of a pattern

dream n 3 something notable for its beauty, excellence, or enjoyable quality 4a : a strongly desired goal or purpose b : something that satisfies a wish : ideal

When someone says, "I've got a thought!" how often does that live up to the definition? What about an idea? What about a dream?

###

Often, the presumption anytime someone hears the word 'writer' is that fiction must be in the works. Which is why there are still so many starving poets and so many musicians who rarely get heard. It is also why best seller lists look the way they do for better and, often, for much worse.

novel n 1 : new and not resembling something formerly known or used 2 : original or striking esp. in conception or style

While some of the finest works in recorded history have been fiction, there are so many other kinds of books, and it's not even touching the tip if the iceberg when it comes to content.

At first it may seem glib to say, "I read something fascinating on the back of my box of cereal." But, when you look beyond your stomach and mass market brands, a whole new world can open up to you. Toys, video games and snack recipes are on some cereal boxes. And, on others, there are whole discourses on what to do for peace. That people took the time to think about an idea and/or dream and then make something that tastes better that fruit loops suggest a staff of writers who think. From the ground up.

Scoff at the notion at first, if you must. But then look at how Kellogg's was founded. Some real thought went into that.

scoff n 1a: an expression of scorn, derision or contempt

The use of the cereal box, by the way, is used to drive home a point. It is so easy to take for granted the ability to read. So much so that people no longer think of ways they, themselves, can write a different=better world.

Journalists have a hard time as writers because their job is to do more than report the news.

2 report 1a: to give an account of : relate b: to describe as being in a specified state 2a: to serve as a carrier of a message b to relate the words or sense of something said

journalism n 1a: the collection and editing of news for presentation through the media

journalist n 1b: a writer who aims at a mass audience
reporter n one that reports as a: one who makes authorized statements of law decisions or legislative proceedings

What is most stunning about the idea of writing is the definition of a writer.

writer n one that writes : as a: AUTHOR b: one who writes stock options

Think of your favorite writer and then wonder what they would think of that.

wonder 1a cause of astonishment or admiration : marvel b: MIRACLE 2 the quality of exciting amazed admiration

The use of language can be enchanted with just a little effort.
enchant 2 to attract and move deeply : rouse to ecstatic admiration

And if, as a writer, you understand that, something special happens. You look at the tools you have been given to work with and, suddenly, everything is different.

everything 1a: all that exists b: all that relates to the subject 2: all that is important

Words -- language -- is everything and a writer gets to choose. There is nothing easy about that. The people who seem to understand this the most are the people who are also poets.

To write is to dare to dream and then go one step further. With language. There are words written for others to read and ones written to be spoken. An increasing frustration with television is to see it and hear it and think, "I would never want to read that." In an age when language(s) is key, shouldn't the opposite be the case? Or, at least, when we pick up a book, a newspaper or a magazine, do we say, "This is so good I can see it,"?

If you want to get an idea of how hard your favorite author has worked for you, here's an exercise. Open a book to any page, choose a paragraph, and also pick up a dictionary. Write down the definition of every single word in the paragraph. Why? Because every single word has meaning. How much more room do the words with their definitions take up, instead of just the words in their sentences? Do the original sentences pass the test? Were you able to complete the exercise before your hand needed a rest? If not, why not? Because no part of writing -- no part of writing -- is as easy as it looks.

###

earthberg n mountain

Turning Stones in Charlotte's World

2008-05-25T08:28:00.006-04:00

0. Everyone has a name, unless some extraordinary circumstance has isolated a person from all human contact

a. Pearl is one of the most valuable gems

b. Michael is one of the four archangels in both Jewish and Christian scripture

c. Gabriel was one of the archangels and a messenger of God

d. water is the most common substance on earth

e. air is a mixture of gases that surrounds the earth

f. universal language - language is the means of communication between peoples

g. universe consists of all matter and all light and other forms of radiation and energy

h. light is so common that we often take it for granted

i. freedom is the ability to make choices and carry them out

j. love-in-the-mist is the name for an attractive flowering plant

k. book consists of written or printed sheets of paper or some other material fastened together along one edge so it can be opened at any point

l. A beautiful book is a work of art. During the 1890s, the Kelmscott Press in England produced many books that have been praised for their fine binding, paper and typography. The press created an edition of the works of Geoffrey Chaucer that ranks among the masterpieces of bookmaking.

m. scroll is a roll of paper, parchment, or other material, especially with writing or pictures on it.

n. sand is a loose accumulation of tiny pieces of rocks or minerals that are larger than silt or clay but smaller than pebbles

o. ocean is the great body of water that covers more than seventy percent of the earth's surface

p. star is a huge shining ball in space that produces a tremendous amount of light and other forms of energy

q. candle is an object made of wax or a similar material that is burned to give light

r. ink is a colored liquid, powder, or paste used for writing, drawing or painting

s. alphabet is the series of letters used in writing a language

t. pencil is the most widely used writing and drawing instrument in the world

u. pen is an instrument used for writing or drawing with ink

v. trumpet is a popular brass instrument in orchestras, bands, and jazz groups

w. violin is a stringed instrument that is played with a bow

x. piano is a keyboard musical instrument in which sounds are made by strings struck by small padded hammers

y. song is a musical composition for one or more voices

z. key is a musical term used to tell the tonal system in which a musical composition is written

During a Festival

2008-05-25T08:18:00.003-04:00

We met a woman in Merida, Mexico who was named after the sun. She told us she had long since given up the search for the perfect tamale and, while she was fluent in French and Spanish, was happy to be speaking in English for a change. She said, "Madness is beauty in a well organized garden," and "Of course there is a master plan. We only need to look as far as the tips of our fingers to be certain." She finished her food and reminisced for a while about how where we were sitting used to be. The she got up, thanked us for our time, and, before she walked away, gave us directions to her friend's bookstore.

When Democracy Weeps

2008-05-25T07:40:00.005-04:00

We had been watching Al Jazeera for about sixty or seventy seconds before both of us realized, as a result of the news crawl at the bottom, that they were speaking about Benazir Bhutto in the past tense. We had only recently learned about who she was when she returned to her country a few months before. When we saw footage of her then, as she was making her return, viscerally we thought, "They are going to kill her," neither knowing who 'they' would be nor presuming to guess. All anyone can be certain of now, is that she died.

Al Jazeera's coverage was exhaustive. In addition to reporting the news of the events that led up to whatever exactly happened to former Prime Minister Bhutto, there was also reportage about her life. When she was in college she was dynamic and, over time, that became sheer eloquence. From the footage and the coverage you could see, and say, "This is quite a woman."

Democracy is not the same as freedom although the two go hand in hand. It would have been interesting to see democracy at work if the people had an opportunity not simply to take to the streets to hear speeches and watch funeral processions but, also, to choose at the ballot box.

What is most eye opening about watching Al Jazeera is the degree to which the news is unbiased in the way they report the facts. Any viewer is afforded the opportunity to draw their own conclusions. Which begs the question, "Why can't I get this network in the United States if that's what I want to pay for on cable?" Which begs the question, "Why is there a CNN International and a CNN North America?" Which begs the question, "Why isn't BBC World live for more than a half hour at a time in my country?"

The coverage of news events on these networks of what's happening in the United States and beyond isn't slanted. It is the same, only different. Different perspectives, mostly. And, since when has that become a bad thing?

When you look around a bit and you find out, from other perspectives, what is happening in and around our world, you might wonder to yourself, "How long has the firewall around my country actually been up?"

"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing freedoms of speech." - Benjamin Franklin

Touch

2008-05-25T07:24:00.004-04:00

"In this world artists are joyous. Unpredictability is the life of their paintings, their music, their novels. They delight in events not forecasted, happenings without explanation, retrospective.

Most people have learned how to live in the moment. The argument goes that if the past has uncertain effect on the future, present actions present actions need not be weighed for their consequence. Rather, each act is an island in time, to be judged on its own. Families comfort a dying uncle not because of a likely inheritance, but because he is loved at that moment. Employees are hired not because of their resumes, but because of their good sense in interviews. Clerks trampled by their bosses fight back at each insult, with no fear for their future. It is a world of impulse. It is a world of sincerity. It is a world in which every word spoken speaks just to that moment, every glance given has only one meaning, each touch has no past or no future, each kiss is a kiss of immediacy." -- from Einstien's Dreams by Alan Lightman

Embrace

2008-05-25T07:22:00.002-04:00

among many other things
freedom is water
freedom is air
freedom is feeling
your self present
in them

After the Great Compromise

2008-05-19T05:23:00.004-04:00

The United States Constitution was ratified in 1788. It is the oldest written constitution still in force. Benjamin Franklin, a key participant in the Great Compromise, died in 1790. The Bill of Rights was ratified in 1791.

The second amendment states: A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of all people to keep an bear arms shall not be infringed.

Had he been around, might Benjamin Franklin have offered some insight into the ambiguity of the amendment as it relates to 'regulated militia' as opposed to 'all people'? Possibly, if as an inventor, he could have known that after 'all people' gained the right to bear arms, Richard Gatling would be most recognized, not for his improvement to agricultural methods, for which he dedicated a great deal of his life, but to patents that would revolutionize the gun.

In the Street

2008-05-19T04:34:00.003-04:00

My elementary school's yard was where I first learned the game of handball with the kids from the housing development across the street. As far as memory serves, the seventies and the eighties were not exactly like the sixties in our neighborhood, but there was a vibration that was exceptionally cool. It is hard to tell just from looking exactly how long the precinct has been there, but it is an old and attractive building.

As a child, from time to time during the warmer months, we kids would go into the precinct to ask for a drink of water. The desk sergeant on duty was usually very nice and would just smile and gesture for us to go inside. The fountain water was cold and so we never really thought about getting soda, either from the store or precinct vending machine.

There is one day in particular that I will never forget because it gave me the purest sense of the future. Not necessarily what it would actually become, but what it could be again if folks believe other ways are possible.

It was late one afternoon, more close to evening, and people were just coming in from work. It was hot, but not miserable, and the air was clear, filled with the muted sounds of summer. Buses in the distance, sneakers running on pavement, with boom boxes adding to the soundtrack.

All of a sudden there was a break in the calm and a crowd across the street quickly started forming. From where I stood I could see two people had started fighting. One was yelling, obviously angry about something, while the other, slightly older, stood ground. They were two grown men, not teenagers, and, from the looks of things, it was kind of intense. Some of the kids on the court ran up to the gate and others, myself included, went outside. I wasn't exactly sure what to expect.

The younger man swung a few times and the older one did too, and then he took a few steps back. Then he swung and yelled something - it was a strange argument, but with fists. A couple of officers peered out of the window but no one came out to intervene. That turned out to be the best call because, after backing up while swinging, the older man tripped. And, without being touched, he hit the ground. The younger man stood over him screaming something about, "You better not ever..." And then someone pulled his arm and said, "All right! Enough!" The two of them walked away and the man on the ground kind of just sat there for a while seeming less hurt than disgusted.

The whole thing lasted a New York minute at best and then, just like the third guy said, it was finished. In my innocence I asked an older person next to me how they knew it was over. The answer, back then, was still more the rule, "As soon as someone touches the ground it is over."

No UFC submission hold.
No knockouts and counting to ten.
It was simple.

The thing of it is, while it seemed both men were angry, and their dispute had obviously come to blows, neither looked like they really wanted to fight. Were they just posturing for honor?

The reason why I never forgot that particular day was because the police let the people squash things. Clearly they knew the community.

There is a whole lot of talk about how "guns don't kill people, people kill people," but doesn't it seem now that people kill people, mostly, with guns?

Little Windup Doll

2008-05-19T04:03:00.003-04:00

What can be most upsetting in every single country is that women and little girls seem to be experiencing a completely different, and much more aggressive level of poverty than their male counterparts. They work so hard for so much less.

Down the street, around the corner from a small guesthouse in San Cristobal de las Casas, there was a little girl beside her mother, sitting in a cardboard box. She spent her quiet time singing to herself while the woman who appeared to be her mother roasted pieces of corn on a makeshift stove. Whenever someone walked by who did not appear to be local, the little girl would climb out of her box, follow behind them with her little hand outstretched and say, "Dame cinco pesos, dame cinco pesos," over and over again. "Dame cinco pesos, dame cinco pesos," in a way that was like soft music.

Even though she was a bit soiled and her hair was matted, the child was adorable. And really kind of difficult to not see. She followed behind passers-by, almost chanting more than singing after a while, until she either got 'cinco pesos' or until she was ignored all the way to the corner. Then she would spin on her heel, walk back to her box, climb back inside, and start singing another little song to herself again.

The woman's face whom she was with was weathered, and her hands looked cold even though she was tending to a small fire. The little girl, with her songs, did not seem to have a care in the world whenever she was inside her box. The woman, however, seemed to be thinking about a lot. And, when she looked up, in her face was a visible repine. She would only look up, though, from her small stove if someone wanted to buy. And that meant almost never because there was a larger, much more elaborate stall just a little ways up the street.

compromittere

2008-05-19T01:14:00.012-04:00

If the members of the National Rifle Association want to lobby for the right-to-carry in our national parks, it really should not be looked at as a problem. They have excellent talking points for a letter writing campaign that address the right, under the law, to feel good about bearing arms on Department of Interior land, especially with their families in tow:

- Rules on carrying and transporting firearms should be consistent - across the board - with the laws of the state that includes the national park or wildlife refuge.

- Law abiding citizens should not be prohibited from protecting themselves and their families while enjoying America's national parks and wildlife refuges.

- The new rules should provide uniformity across all federal lands, eliminating a patchwork of laws that create confusion for gun owners

- Current regulations fail to account for the significant change in state laws since 1984. Forty-eight states now have laws that permit laws that permit carrying and forty have strong Right-to-Carry laws. Federal regulations should recognize the change in state law and follow their lead.

- The new regulations should restore the right of law-abiding gun owners who wish to transport and carry firearms for all purposes on most Department of Interior lands, just as they do now on a Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands.
---

These salient points demonstrate that, as a group, the National Rifle Association simply want to protect the right to exercise our freedoms as we see fit, within the parameters of the law. The understanding is that we will use sound judgment, because to whom much is given, much is required. Surely it is not the intention of the members of the National Rifle Association, out to enjoy certain freedoms privately, and without scrutiny or abuse from the over emotional, to go out and wage war with deer, bear, badgers and squirrels. The issue seems less about hunting and more about how best to set a precedent somehow, some way, for better gun control reform.

The definition of 'firearm' as expressed in the Gun Control Act of 1968 is almost impossible to de-cipher. And clearly that is the point. The problem with the debate about gun control is that people hear the word 'control' and that is when they react. So why not 'gun regulation reform'? The reality is that the second amendment is, and has been for some time now, law and the cat has been let out of the bag. The Gun Control Act of 1968 is an act, or an attempt at reform that can be improved upon. The summary, which the National Rifle Association respects, is basic.

Summary
The basic objectives of Title I of the Gun Control Act of 1968 were to ban mail-order sales of firearms and ammunition, confine the purchase of firearms to the buyers state of residence, and prohibit certain classes of persons from purchasing, receiving or transporting firearms or ammunition in interstate commerces. Specifically, Title I prohibits dealers from selling any firearm or ammunition to any person who is:

a. convicted of or under indictment for a felony
b. a fugitive
c. adjudicated as a mental defective or who has been committed to any mental institution.
d. addicted or unlawful use of marihuana or a stimulant, depressant, or narcotic drug.
e. less than eighteen years of age for the purchase of a firearm that is other than a shotgun or a rifle.
f. less than twenty-one years of age for the purchase of a firearm that is other than a shotgun or rifle.
g. a non-resident of the state in which the licensee's place of business is located.
h. an alien illegally or unlawfully in the United States
i. dishonorably discharged from the armed forces.
j. subject to a court order that restrains such person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner
k. convicted in any court of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence

Such persons correspondingly are prohibited from purchasing or otherwise acquiring any firearm or ammunition which has been shipped in interstate commerce, and also are prohibited from shipping or transporting any firearm or ammunition in interstate commerce.

With certain exceptions -- primarily the purchase of rifles and shotguns -- all over-the-counter purchases of firearms by persons other than dealers must be made within a buyers state of residence. A private individual is prohibited from selling a firearm to any buyer whom he has reason to believe resides in another state.

Title I also requires all persons engaged in the business of dealing in firearms to be federally licensed. Dealers must require from all firearms purchasers proof of identity and residence, and buyers must sign under penalty of statement certifying eligibility to purchase.

It shall be unlawful for any licensed importer, licensed manufacturer, or licensed dealer to sell, deliver, or transfer a firearm unless the Federal Firearms Licenses contacts the National Instant Criminal Background Check system via chief law enforcement officer and receives notice from the chief law enforcement officer that the officer has no information indicating that receipt or possession of the firearm by the transferee would violate federal, state or local law.

Dealers are required to keep records of all firearms and are forbidden from selling handguns to persons under twenty-one years of age, or rifles and shotguns to persons under the age of eighteen. Additionally, dealers are prohibited from making any sale of firearms or ammunition which would place the buyer in violation of state or local law.

Finally, Title I forbids the importation of some military surplus firearms, and permits importation of only firearms shown to be 'particularly suitable for, or readily adaptable for sporting purposes.'
---

While it is a bit unclear exactly why, in this particular age, anyone would want an automatic or semi-automatic gun, if they can pass through every single hoop necessary to both purchase and carry one legally onto a Department of Interior nature and wildlife reservation, so be it. That puts a whole bunch of people with guns in the position of choosing for themselves whether or not they trust any or all of the other people in the designated area who also have the same rights as they do under the law. May today's nature preserves always be yesterday's battle fields. It is doubtful that dear, bear, moose or eagle will take up arms to defend their territory.

People, certain classes of them, who cannot own arms in the United States, is narrowly defined. Who can sell the firearms, and under what circumstances, is a bit broader. What is unclear is why dealers are allowed so many loopholes with regard to the sale of firearms. What is egregiously unclear is the degree to which the definition of a firearm is so elaborate. Given that the Sweden-based Stockholm International Peace Research Institute ranked the United States first among arms exporters, the letter of our law as it relates to 'firearms' should be investigated.

The motivation behind the Gun Control Act of 1968 was not international arms trade. Or was it? Congress declared that guns were a nationwide problem. So it is unclear why it was suddenly deemed a greater good to make it a worldwide problem except that, on the part of politicians, there was no regard for human life in the equation.

The answer to the question of what makes a gun a gun matters less that the answer to the question, "What makes a gun a weapon?" The people of Zimbabwe, and especially Mr. Robert Gabriel Mugabe, can probably answer with no problem. And while the people of the United States have specific questions to ask in terms of arms deals, the people of China have their own set of problems to deal with although no one will forget Tianamen Square.

###

On the other side of the gun control issue, necessarily, is the question about the 'right to life' because too many people carry a bible in one hand, a gun in the other, and try to dictate a women's right to choose. This is easily what is known as an oxymoron, but it would be too easy - and irresponsible - to refer to a penis as a gun. People are not born with semi-automatic weapons in their hands. Roe v Wade, as it stands now, is law. But, in the twenty-first century, people have to be realistic -- an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Turning the issue of what a woman does with her body into a religious one actively negates the separation between church and state. Any woman faced with that particular choice does not skip to the abortion clinic. Rethinking and understanding the science behind the notion of 'planned' parenthood would make things crystal clear.

If, for any reason, a person owns a gun, it is hard to take them seriously on the issue unless they do not, with it, own bullets. As it stands the right to choose has been more a game of semantics. An abortion is a medical procedure performed by a doctor, thus making it private. Are the people who want the second amendment to stand, willing to forgo their right to privacy? Will they agree to have published all of the information collected by the Federal Firearms Licenses and the National Instant Criminal Background Check system and have it cross referenced with all of the people who fit the criteria to have abortions? If the answer to that question is a unanimous, "Yes," then that answer, by definition, is unconstitutional.

In an age of Viagra and Cialis, owning a gun is about the right to choose whether or not to take a life, whether or not it is human. To make things clearer, maybe Roe v. Wade should be amended. If it were called the Women's Right to Privacy Act the discussion between a woman and her doctor remains a discussion between that woman and that doctor when discussing all options about her right not to conceive.

MTV Generation

2008-05-19T01:09:00.004-04:00

if stage diving were a requirement
at the end of every term in office
what might YouTube look like?

proverbs

2008-05-19T01:08:00.001-04:00

There is no bad patience - Tanzania

Elderliness is not a disease but a richness - Kenya

2008-05-15T03:15:00.003-04:00

While Benjamin Franklin was in London arguing the American cause his seatmate one night at a banquet was an English countess. The lady, who had weathered a difficult marriage, flirted with Franklin as she chided him for his seditious views.

"Dr. Franklin," she asked, "Why are you such a rebel?"
Franklin retorted, "Ma'am, it is tyranny that causes rebellion, and wives like you should be the first to recognize the chains of tyranny."

Source: The Wit and Wisdom of Benjamin Franklin by James C. Humes

For the Record...

2008-05-15T02:51:00.003-04:00

The twenty-fourth Amendment was adopted in 1964. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 forbade employers and unions to discriminate on the basis of color, national origin, race, religion or sex. The act also prohibited hotels and restaurants from such discrimination in serving customers.

In 1972, Congress passed the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution. The amendment would have guaranteed equality of rights under the law to all persons regardless of sex. However, it never took effect because it failed to win ratification from the states.

Source: Worldbook Multimedia Encyclopedia

###

As of 1924, dating back to at least 1892, these were the ethnicities listed/recognized by the Federal Government, as having entered America by ship via Ellis Island, according to The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc.:

Abyssinian, Afghan, African, African (black), Albanian, Algerian, Alsatian, American, Arabian, Argentinian, Armenian, Asian, Australian, Austrian, Basque, Bavarian, Belgian, Bengalese, Bermudian, Bessarabian, Black, Bohemian, Bolivian, Bosnian, Brazilian, British, Bulgarian, Burmese, Cambodian, Canadian, Carinthian, Caucasian, Central American, Ceylonese, Chilean, Chinese, Colombian, Congolese, Costa Rican, Croatian, Cuban, Cypriot, Czechoslovakian, Dalmatian, Danish, Dominican, Dutch, East Indian, Ecuadoran, Egyptian, El Salvadoran, English, Estonian, European, Falklander, Filipino, Finnish, Flemish, French, French-Canadian, Galician, Georgian, German, Gibraltarian, Goanese, Greek, Guatemalan, Guyanese, Gypsy, Haitian, Hawaiian, Hebrew (Jewish), Herzegovinian, Hindu, Honduran, Hungarian (Magyar), Icelander, Indian, Iraqi, Irish, Islam, Istrian, Italian, Italian (North), Italian (South), Jamaican, Japanese, Korean, Kurdish, Kustenlander, Latin, Latin American, Latvian, Lebanese, Liberian, Libyan, Liechtensteiner, Lithuanian, Livonian, Luxembourger, Macedonian, Magyar (Hungarian), Malaccan, Malayan, Maltese, Manxman, Mauritanian, Mexican, Monegasque, Mongolian, Montenegrin, Moravian, Moroccan, Mulatto, Native American, New Zealander, Newfoundlander, Nicaraguan, North American, Norwegian, Pacific Islander, Palestinian, Panamanian, Paraguayan, Parsi, Persian, Peruvian, Polish, Pomeranian, Porto Rican, Portuguese, Prussian, Roumanian, Russian, Ruthenian (Russniak), San Marinese, Scandinavian (Norwegians or Danes or Swedes), Scottish, Senegalese, Servian, Siamese, Sierra Leonean, Singaporean, Slav, Slovak, Slovenian, Somalilander, South Africa, South American, Spanish, Spanish-American, Surinamese, Swedish, Swiss, Syrian, Tangerine, Tunisian, Turkish, Ukrainian, Unknown, Uruguayan, Venezuelan, Walloon, Welsh, West Indian, White, Yugoslav, Zoroastrian

"Those who have no voice nor vote in the electing of representatives do not enjoy liberty but are absolutely enslaved to those who have votes." - Benjamin Franklin

To Whom Are We All Related?

2008-05-15T02:11:00.003-04:00

Ellis Island - A Bit of History

From 1892 to 1954, over twelve million immigrants entered the United States through the portal of Ellis Island, a small island in New York harbor. Before being designated as the sight of the first Federal immigration station by President Benjamin Harrison in 1890, Ellis Island had a varied history. The local "indian" tribes had called it 'Kioshk' or Gull Island.

From 1794 to 1890 (pre-immigration station period), Ellis Island played a mostly uneventful but still important military role in United States history. When the British occupied New York City during the duration of the Revolutionary War, its large and powerful naval fleet was able to sail unimpeded directly into New York harbor. Therefore it was deemed critical by the United States Government that a series of coastal fortifications be constructed just before the war of 1812. After much haggling over the ownership of the island, the Federal government purchased Ellis Island from New York State in 1808. Ellis Island was approved as a site for fortifications and on it was constructed a parapet for three tiers of circular guns, making the island part of the new harbor defense system....The fort at Ellis Island was named Fort Gibson in honor of a brave officer killed during the war of 1812.

Prior to 1890, the individual states (rather than the Federal government) regulated immigration into the United States. Castle Garden in the Battery (originally known as Castle Clinton) served as the New York State immigration station from 1855 to 1890 and approximately eight million immigrants, mostly from Northern and Western Europe, passed through its doors. These early immigrants came from nations such as England, Ireland, Germany and the Scandinavian countries and constituted the first large wave of immigrants that settled and populated the United States.

During the evening of June 14, 1897, a fire on Ellis Island burned the immigration station completely to the ground. Although no lives were lost, many years of Federal and State immigration records were lost dating back to 1855 burned along with the pine buildings that were built to protect them. The United States Treasury quickly ordered the immigration facility be replaced under one very important condition - all future structures built on Ellis Island had to be fireproof.

First and second class passengers who arrived in New York harbor were not required to undergo the inspection process at Ellis Island. Instead, these passengers underwent a cursory inspection aboard ship, the theory being that if a person could afford to purchase a first or second class ticket, they were less likely to become a public charge in America due to medical or legal reasons.

The scenario was different for "steerage" or third class passengers. These immigrants traveled in crowded and often unsanitary conditions near the bottom of the steamships with few amenities, often spending up to two weeks seasick in their bunks during rough Atlantic Ocean crossings.

While most immigrants entered the United States through New York harbor (the most popular destination of steamship companies), others sailed into many ports such as Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, San Francisco, Miami, and New Orleans.

The great steamship companies like White Star, Red Star, Cunard, and Hamburg-America played a significant role in the history of Ellis Island and immigration in general.

Source: The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc.

untitled

2008-05-15T02:08:00.004-04:00

while too many cooks
spoil the pot
a couple can be
quite nice

Swing, Harriet Swing

2008-05-13T04:17:00.003-04:00

when miles davis played his axe
his back was mostly to the crowd
louis armstrong faced the world with his
and, for good measure, he also sang out loud
dizzy gillespie had an axe
that pointed up to the sky
and if an angel falls off their cloud now and then
bouncing to the beat of his eternal bop
may very well have been the reason why

say the names harriet a. jacobs, harriet e. wilson, harriet stanton blanche and then
wait one beat

and then you'll see
why yet another harriet doesn't have to be

named to convey the obvious

that a woman's axe
can be her pencil
and
also
her pen

lest We forget...

2008-05-13T04:15:00.001-04:00

what color collar runs the factory?

The Lands of Cotton

2008-05-13T03:59:00.003-04:00

Southern plantations generated three-fourths of the world's cotton supply. In particular, after the invention of the cotton gin, the production of cotton surpassed that of tobacco in the South and became the dominant cash crop. Beginning early in the eighteenth century, a series of inventions resulted in the mechanized spinning and weaving of cloth in the world's first factories in the north of England. The ability of these factories to produce unprecedented amounts of cotton cloth revolutionized the world economy.

The invention of the cotton gin came at just the right time. British textile manufacturers were eager to buy all the cotton that the South could produce. The figures for cotton production support this conclusion: from 720,000 bales in 1830, to 2.85 million bales in 1850, to nearly 5 million bales in 1860. By the time of the Civil War, cotton accounted for nearly sixty percent of American exports, representing a total value of nearly $300 million a year.

Southern plantations generated three fourths of the world's cotton supply. A series of inventions resulted in the mechanized spinning and weaving of cloth in the world's first factories in the north of England. The abilities of these factories to produce unprecedented amounts of cotton cloth revolutionized the world economy.

When war broke out the Confederate Congress decided to refuse to allow the export of cotton to Europe thinking Europe would intervene. European states did not. And, following Abraham Lincoln's decision to impose a blockade, the South was unable to move its millions of bales of cotton. The production of cotton increased in other parts of the world, such as India and Egypt to meet the demand.

Source: Wikipedia

Civil Disobedience in the Op-Ed & Letters to the Editor

2008-05-13T03:37:00.003-04:00

if We didn't forget
that today's paper
really Is yesterday's news
the content would be
much better

What's in a Name?

2008-05-13T03:01:00.007-04:00

The Game in a New Millennium

"You go to war with the enemy you have." Donald Rumsfeld

if kings go to war with the enemy they have, then the enemy of my enemy is my friend. all castles eventually crumble while priests become fat off the blood of prophets. All Sons and Daughters who die in vain wearing the colors of war could become living heroes in a new age if they don the color of the sky.

if each life is played like the ultimate game, then the objective of This game will be liberty. because no one ever pays attention, or even questions why there are so many pawns on a chessboard. and, since only two pieces are gender specific, if capturing a king inspires legacies of war, the possibilities are infinite when the queen is free.

###

CHESS ORIGINS
A version of chess was invented in the fifth century in India, then spread to Persia and the Muslim world. The Indian and Persian games had recognizable figures as pieces - a king, a vizier (or chief minister), elephants - but the Muslim world forbade graven images of any living thing, so the pieces became abstract shapes. When the game reached Europe in the early middle ages through Muslim ruled southern Spain, human figures reappeared, including the king.

Around the year 990, in a poem titled "Verses on Chess" by a monk in the Swiss monastery of Einsiedeln, came the earliest known reference to a chess queen. She was a mild consort, empowered only to move to a diagonal adjacent square...the earliest explicit representation of the queen as the powerful piece she is today appears in Luis Ramiriz de Lucena's "Discourse on Love and the Art of Chess" published in Spain in 1496 or 97. Since older forms still existed, the newer game was called "lady chess" or "queen's chess." By whatever name it became the accepted form throughout Europe despite some opposition from traditionalists. Why, in a world ruled by men, would a game with an all powerful queen be accepted?

First, there is a veneration of the Virgin Mary as a figure of power in medieval Europe. In the New Testament, the mother of Jesus is the meek and submissive "handmaid of the Lord." But by the Middle Ages, she had been endowed with real glory and power.

A more relevant factor may have been the rise to power of real-life queens, principally Isabella I of Castile (1451-1504), who married Ferdinand, Prince of Aragon, and ruled Spain jointly with him. Easily Lucena and others who wrote about "queens chess" were carrying favor with Isabella, perhaps unconsciously.

It was no surprise, if true, that the powerful chess queen arose in Southern Europe. In Southern Europe, aristocratic women had more freedom and power than women in Northern Europe. In the South, a woman could inherit land and titles, could become the countess and run the county. In the North it was more likely that the court would find someone for the women to marry, someone to be in charge.

The king is the most important piece on the board but the queen is the most powerful.

Any woman wishing to follow the chess queen's lead, especially in the public realm, needs to be tactically superior to the men around her, relentless in battle, even cruel when necessary. Whether or not she is called upon to protect her husband...she will have to learn to negotiate treacherous terrain, not unlike the chessboard, if she wants to move forward both at home and in the workplace. She, and those committed to her well-being, could do worse than take up the chess queen as their personal emblem and silently utter those ritual words, "Long Live the Queen!"

Marilyn Yalom,
author of Birth of a Chess Queen

"whenever you're near I hear..."

2008-05-13T02:55:00.003-04:00

a favorite word is 'epiphany'
because it brings to mind 'symphony'
which is, ultimately, 'music'
another favorite is labyrinth
because it is reminiscent of both sides of the human brain - inside and out
in imagination
if 'these' words were objects
may they be sculpture
made of sand
still warm to the touch

The Julian Calendar

2008-05-13T02:38:00.005-04:00

We spent December 25, 2007 in Ghana a few miles from two castles where darkness fell. We were recovering from having witnessed, first hand, how songs in the key of life sometimes get inspired. It was relatively quiet except for the Christmas tape blasting from "can't see in the morning, 'til cant see at night." But the loop only lasted one day and one can hardly ever tire of The Little Drummer Boy, though the duet between David Bowie and Bing Crosby is a personal favorite.

Forty-eight hours later only gave the illusion of peace and quiet with the television off, though it could have easily been an international day of mourning.

And so we waited until it was time to move on, not fully aware of how we had been touched by absolutely everything, including and especially the differences between family and kinship, riches and wealth, and tourism and travel, to count days backward.

Thirteen days later we landed in Addis Ababa on Christmas Day. Walking around in quiet, talking about last year's celebration of a new millennium, as well as all the places We are from with a young man proudest of being both a student and a brother to an older sister, humbled us. And it made us proud. Our time there was short, though, because we were only there in transit while flying further east. To India.

Egyptian Symbols

2008-05-13T02:12:00.005-04:00

a. All-Seeing Eye (in pyramid) - An ancient Egyptian symbol indicating that the dead god is entombed in the underworld but is still watchful during his period of incarceration before his rebirth. The open eye is his soul that is still alive, so he knows what is happening in the world...It appears on the back of the one-dollar bill as well as the Great Seal of the United States.

b. Ankh - This symbol may have originally been taken from an ankle strap. As a hieroglyph it means "life" and as a symbol it is a sign of the vital elements of air and water.... The ankh shows the imperishable, vital force of life. Sometimes ankhs are shown representing a stream of water flowing over the pharaoh's feet during ritual purification.

c. Book, writing, abstract thought - The hieroglyph for book, writing, or abstract thought is represented by the symbol of a scroll. Books as we know them today did not exist in ancient Egyptian times -- instead, papyrus reeds were formed into a kind of paper, and then rolled up and secured with a cord....Abstract thought and writing were new concepts in ancient times, and due to the conceptual similarities between them, they used the same symbol.

Source: SYMBOLS by Sandra Forty, a fantastic reference for symbols from all over the world.

The Game of Daughters

2008-05-13T02:07:00.008-04:00

In my family, my grandmother was the queen of checkers. She taught my mother who, in turn, taught me. Our favorite version is "Giveaway" because it is the most fun. The objective? To give all of your pieces away before your opponent does, which is a lot harder than it looks. The lesson? In the title of the game.

Persuant to the Ancestral Voice

2008-05-13T02:05:00.001-04:00

some of
the finest paper
is made
with...

The Fire...

2008-05-09T03:54:00.003-04:00

"...a fire can be any shape it wants to be. It's free. So it can look like anything at all depending on what's inside the person looking at it. If you get this deep, quiet kind of feeling when you look at a fire, that's because it is showing you the deep, quiet kind of feeling you have inside yourself. You know what I mean?" - Mr. Miyaka

"Landscape with Flatiron"
After the Quake
by Haruki Murakami

(when you transfer at hoyt-schermerhorn)

2008-05-09T03:46:00.005-04:00

HURRY, GET ON BOARD…
Spending a few months in Harlem made me feel like I have been a cocky musician who needed to lay down my axe for a while to properly understand how to play a jazz standard. Hearing something over and over in the background is not the same as feeling it and I spent so long not feeling Harlem just because it wasn’t Brooklyn. And that meant, for the longest time, I was just completely out of touch. A few years ago I had a conversation with a man who adores Harlem so much that when he talked about how much love he found there his voice trembled and, as he spoke, he almost wept. He’d had a bit of a hard time growing up reminisced about how his friend’s grandmother would always make sure that he didn’t go hungry or without a roof over his head whenever things got crazy at home. I told him that could have happened anywhere, including and, especially, Brooklyn. And then I broke off into an impassioned speech about all the things I thought were wrong with Harlem while failing to mention that I probably could count on both my hands the number of times I’d visited, each time with scorn for what I thought I knew. Harlem, as I’d learned it, was about the rise of heroin and crime, as though folks in Brooklyn don’t have a history with drugs and killing off their own. To his credit, the gentleman let me have my say before letting me know that he could tell I hadn’t really spent any time where he was from and that he felt a little sorry for me as a result. If I could find him now, though, I would offer him my deepest apologies for being so one dimensional in my thought process. Harlem could have chewed me up and spit me out while I stayed there – you should have heard some of the things I said – but, instead, she embraced me and I will forever be grateful. My warmest memories of Harlem have nothing to do with landmarks or historical stomping ground and everything to do with feeling like home.

YOU MUST TAKE THE 'A' TRAIN
I stayed up late two Harlem nights in July talking to two different people I adore and to whom I am related in spirit. I cannot think of one time without thinking about the other. Each time we were in front of computers looking at YouTube.com. The first time, with my friend Lesley, was really the first time for me. Earlier in the evening we were upstairs surrounded by people who were all just happy to be around each other celebrating warmth, good feelings, and being alive together and it felt like a family reunion. By the end of the night the discussion dwindled to Lesley and I and, organically, class was in session. Instead of looking at videos of people singing songs with their belly buttons we searched for, and found in all her splendor, Nina Simone. And then Malcolm X. And then Toni Morrison in conversation with Cornell West. I had never visited the website before and never would have never understood how to navigate it properly if my friend had not come all the way from Copenhagen to get a taste of home. In the larger scheme of things that could have been New York City. Specifically, and technically, that could have been Brooklyn. But the love we all were looking for started in the house we were in. A completely different world opened up while we sat at the feet of giants.

The second evening, with Marie, was mystical. I asked her what she knew about YouTube.com and, of course, she knew a hell of a lot more than I did. I told her what Lesley and I had done and then I showed her. We went to the site first to see Nina. And then Marie eased into talking about the first time she saw her in person, which is not the same as seeing her in concert, and she talked about that, too. What almost seemed three-dimensional suddenly came completely alive. And then we moved on to Malcolm X. When Lesley and I were watching him we were in awe. And when Marie and I were watching him there was the exact same feeling. The Man did not have one verbal tick. What must it have been like to be alive, watching him in that moment? Marie told me. And let me tell you, it is one thing to imagine it when you are somewhere else. But it is quite another thing to be listening to and learning about him, from someone who knows, so close to where he made so many folks feel like human beings again. After Malcolm we went to Billie Holiday. I thought about the fact that my mother had seen her and that I should ask what seeing her was like. And then Marie said we should look up Carmen McCrae. I had only heard Carmen McCrae in passing and had no idea how to spell her name. When we watched her, though…damn, why had I not known? Next we went to Sarah Vaughn and Waymond Reed. They were playing in Prague in 1978. The life of the story there lies in the lyrics Sarah Vaughn sang, the melody Waymond Reed played, and everything Marie shared that you kinda can’t get – that you won’t get – unless you’re sitting in front of a computer with Marie in the middle of the night watching Sarah Vaughn and Waymond Reed make music together.

IF YOU WANT TO GET TO HARLEM
When my mother first came to New York, as a little girl she lived in Harlem in the monolith on the southeast corner of 145th street and St Nicholas Avenue. I never imagined it when she told me stories about the restaurant that used to be in its lobby and how she would go there after school for ice cream or a soda. Despite its size it was invisible to me the first few weeks I would walk diagonally across the street from it to catch the train because I had been socialized, as a New Yorker, not to really spend too much time looking up. “Ahundredfortyfithstreet” was just a Harlemite run-on word to me until I told her where I was staying in proximity to her old address. My mother asked me to take a picture and bring it for her so she could see if the building still looked the same. I snapped a few shots and then went to Brooklyn. I was talking to her about something totally different and then I remembered my camera, pulled it out, and showed her the building on the little digital screen. She adjusted her glasses and then did a double take. My mother recognized her building immediately and became a little girl all over again in a way that she never transformed into whenever she talked about ahundredandfortyfithstreet in the past. My mother absolutely lit up, and then she started telling me bits and pieces about things that happened up and down the street of her childhood. Not like she was remembering them but like she was living them again. I had not seen this side of her in such a long time. I could hear the love in her voice for the place she called home, and the experiences which made her feel that way were grand. So much so that I wished I was a little girl back when she was, running around in pigtails and getting into mischief. I wished her home was mine. I was wishing for her Harlem.

C’MON AND TAKE THE ‘A’ TRAIN
Not long after, I was walking down Convent Avenue on a Sunday afternoon. I started to call it a lazy Sunday afternoon but that’s not right because folks in Harlem, despite what you may have heard, are always out in full force. When I turned the corner at ahundreadandfortyfifthstreet I heard music. It was coming from behind the church on the corner, in the building next door. Someone had put speakers out and decided to blast Billie Holiday. I wondered what the sermon was about that day. My mother told me once about the church my grandmother used to go when she’d first arrived in New York and I’d wondered if this is was it. I later found out that it wasn’t but how could I be disappointed having heard?

HURRY, HURRY BOY IT’S COMING
Another time, I walked into BAMAs up on Amsterdam and one-five-seven. The place was packed and there seemed to me to be no order. But I was hungry and decided to wait. At first it seemed like there were a bunch of disconnected folks getting antsy by the small order window. The longer I waited, though, the more I felt as though everyone knew each other but me. Guys who seemed hard to the tenth power eased out of the way for the older folks who came in. Kids who were waiting with do-rags and low-slung jeans were not posturing like they had something to prove. And when the lady behind the counter spoke to them she got answers that ended with smiles and “Yes, Ma’am.” An older gentleman seemed like he was going to put up a fuss about his order but was only kidding. He really just wanted to make sure that lady on the other side of the counter had an opportunity to talk to his wife. The longer I waited the more it seemed like everyone was tired, hungry, and good friends. And with my hard face and Brooklyn hoodie I felt like a bit of an outsider. When I placed my order, though, the lady behind the counter remembered me from the last time I came in, when it was empty, and she gave a smile of recognition as she juggled a whole bunch of other things while taking my jumbled order. When my food came and I asked for something else she scolded me for not including it before while folks looked at me like a newbie. There was an order to what seemed at first like chaos to me. I was the one who messed it up because there was also, apparently, a rhythm to the way folks ordered and picked up their food. A rhythm that involved walking and talking and living around the way for a minute, understanding how to get fed from BAMAs. People love each other in there.

CAN’T YOU HEAR THOSE ENGINES THRUMMING?
I could fake the funk and act like I knew this song had lyrics before I stayed in Harlem. But I didn’t. And I’m almost out of my thirties now. Pretty embarrassing. Because, growing up the way I did, I should have known. And I never would have thought to look had I not been up there for a while. When you hear the Duke and Ella swing, though, it changes you. Partially because the rhythm is different. And, partially because you realize that the song isn’t about the train, it is about the destination. When I heard the song as a kid, solipsistically, I always imagined the train coming into Brooklyn, never giving any thought to where it was coming from. I never thought about all the houses it ran underneath before it reached 59th street. And then I took the M3 bus downtown. From uptown. And I looked around everywhere I could as the bus inched its way. I didn’t try to imagine what anything was like back in the day. What I saw were people completely in tune with where they were and happy to be home. I didn’t need to be on a bus to see that, but being on the bus was important because of how long you can see that feeling last for. And it is everyone, black, Latino, Asian and European. There’s a sense that folks have a community up in Harlem and, if you are a part of it, there’s a certain kind of love that is extended to you. Folks say hello to each other. They smile.

ALL ABOARD. GET ON THE ‘A’TRAIN
Do I romanticize Harlem now? A bit. Because it wrapped itself around me when I laid down my axe, removed the chip from my shoulder and opened myself up. And once you open yourself up it is so easy to become romantic in the purest sense of the word.

(q & a)

2008-05-09T03:42:00.003-04:00

q: what do liberty and justice have in common?
a: they're daughters.

...This Time

2008-05-09T03:32:00.003-04:00

"But it doesn't just happen with any fire. For something like this to happen the fire itself has to be free. It won't happen with a gas stove or a cigarette lighter. For the fire to be free you've got to make it in the right kind of place. Which isn't easy. Not just anybody can do it." - Mr. Miyaka

"Landscape With Flatiron"
After the Quake
by Haruki Murakami

In A Digital Age

2008-05-04T23:33:00.009-04:00

in a digital age

the medium

is only the messenger

###

at what point in history
will children and the elderly
become national treasures?

###

"However many holy words you read, however many you speak, what good will they do you if you do not act upon them?"

"In a controversy, the instant we feel anger we have already ceased striving for the truth, and have begun striving for ourselves."

"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets harmed."

"In the sky there is no distinction between east and west; people create distinctions out of their own minds and believe them to be true."

"The way is not the sky. The way is the heart."

"It is better to conquer yourself than win a thousand battles. Then victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons or by heaven or hell."

"Your work is to discover your work and then, with all your heart, give yourself to it."

All seven quotes - Siddartha Gautama

On Civil Disobedience in a New Millenium

2008-05-04T23:20:00.006-04:00

why take to streets in anger

to be a potential target

when you can pick up a pen

and speak your mind

thus setting so much more aflame?

the last poets?

prophets

for a new age

A. civil disobedience - n (1866) refusal to obey governmental demands or commands esp. as a non-violent and usu. collective means of forcing concessions from the government

B. civil rights - n pl. (1721) - the non-political rights of a citizen; esp. the rights of personal liberty guaranteed to [all] U.S. citizens by the 13th and 14th amendments to the Constitution and by acts of Congress.

C. civil liberty - n (1644): freedom from arbitrary governmental interference (as with the right of freedom of speech) specif. by denial of governmental power and in the U.S. esp. as guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

Pursuant to the Master's Tools

2008-05-04T23:04:00.007-04:00

"The invention of tools does not begin with the discovery that we can use bones, stones, or sticks to kill one another." Riane Eisler

"It is highly probable that the most unique and important human tools -- our highly complex language -- originated out of mother child bonds." Riane Eisler

"That we find basic human inventions - from farming to writing - credited to female deities, suggests that women probably played a key in their development." Riane Eisler

English is a lingua franca. A lingua franca is (1) a common language consisting of Italian mixed with French, Spanish, Greek and Arabic that was formerly spoken in Mediterranean ports (2) Any of various languages used as common or commercial tongues among people of diverse speech (3) Something of a common language

Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 10th edition

If Not for Saint Domingue...

2008-05-04T22:36:00.007-04:00

The Citadel Henri is more than just a world landmark. It is the largest fortress in the Western Hemisphere and, when it was finished, 365 cannons and 10,000 rounds had been assembled and deployed to allow a permanent garrison of several thousand men to resist attack almost indefinitely. It is build directly on the rock, with no separate foundation. Its hewn stones are held together by a mortar of limestone, molasses and bull's blood. It took up to three months to move a single cannon the few kilometers from the coast to the fortress.

Henri Christophe was born into slavery in St. Christopher (St. Kitts) and he learned to speak French, English and Creole. He and at least hundreds of other Haitians fought on the side of Americans during the Revolutionary War in America. He later became a general in the French Army. Christophe fought in the Haitian Revolution, which led to the creation of an independent Haiti in 1804, and he later declared himself the first black king in the Western Hemisphere.

The Citadel was built at the beginning of the 19th century and Henri Christophe meant for it to be a bastion against slavery. After a twelve year revolt against the English, Spanish and French, the self-proclaimed king built it to protect the interior of Haiti in case the French tried to retake the former colony. Henri's main desire was not only to survive at any cost, but to also never, ever, return to slavery. The United Nations includes the Citadel in its list of cultural treasures, along with the Acropolis and the pyramids of Egypt. Its symbolic significance has yet to be realized in the international community...

References: Worldbook Multimedia Encyclopedia, 2001, Worldbook Inc. la rampa

Symbols of United States Government - Civics

2008-05-04T21:38:00.016-04:00

Symbols of United States Government

1. The Statue of Liberty - is located in New York harbor. The Statue was actually a gift from the people of France. The French citizens donated money to build the Statue, and people in the United States raised funds to construct the foundation and pedestal/base. The French sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi designed the Statue. In 1856, he joined the French painter Jean Leon Gerome on a trip to Egypt where his work was greatly influenced by the colossal monuments. The Statue represents a woman escaping the chains of tyranny. She holds a torch which represents liberty. The Statue was presented on July 4, 1884 and was dedicated on October 28, 1886. The Statue's full name is LIBERTY ENLIGHTENING THE WORLD.

2. The Liberty Bell - has become a symbol of freedom in the United States. It rang when the Continental Congress signed the Declaration of Independence. The Bell was cast in London, England in 1752. It is made mostly of copper and tin. After it arrived in the United States the Bell cracked. Another Bell was made from the same metal and it cracked, too! The last time the Bell was rung was on June 6, 1944 when allied forces landed in France. Philadelphia officials struck the Bell and sound equipment broadcast the tone to all parts of the nation.

3. The United States two-dollar bill ($2) is a current denomination of U.S. currency. Former U.S. President Thomas Jefferson is featured on the obverse of the note. The painting The Declaration of Independence by John Trumbull is featured on the reverse. The design on the obverse (excluding the elements of a Federal Reserve Note) is the oldest design of current U.S. currency, having been adopted in 1929; the reverse is the second oldest design, having been adopted in 1976.

In spite of its relatively low value among the denominations of U.S. currency, the two-dollar bill is one of the most rarely seen in circulation and actual use. They are almost never given as change for commercial transactions, and thus consumers rarely have them on hand. Production of the note is quite low; approximately 1% of all notes currently produced are $2 bills. This comparative scarcity in circulation has led to an overall lack of public knowledge of the $2 bill and has also inspired urban legends and folk beliefs concerning it.

Throughout the $2 bill's pre-1928 life as a large-sized note, it was issued as a United States Note, Silver Certificate, and Treasury or "Coin" Note. When U.S. currency was changed to its current size, the $2 bill was issued only as a United States Note. After United States Notes were discontinued, the $2 bill later began to be issued as a Federal Reserve Note.

###
Government by the People

When the American colonies were first settled, merchants and large land owners held most of the political power. But little by little, other colonists began to use the political process to express their views on important issues. Such issues included the ownership of land, representation in government, taxation, and the role of church in society. The colonists learned to back candidates for public office who would represent their views and challenge the power of the ruling class.

The ruling merchants and landowners presented only half-hearted resistance to this widening of political power. They needed the aid of the lower classes to back their opposition to British policy. Furthermore, the very argument for self-government that the colonial leaders used against the British justified those seeking to share political power within the colonies. By 1774, America no longer was a society in which the few ruled with the passive consent of the many.

Through the years, colonists developed a feeling of unity. Their opposition to the British led them to rely on one another more and more. Groups called committees of correspondence were set up throughout the colonies to provide organized opposition to the United Kingdom.

The colonial Americans also shared an optimistic view of their future. They were impressed by the "rapid growth" of their colonies and they loved to calculate how much more their population and wealth would yet increase. Unity and progress led to an increasing sense of nationalism among the people. By 1774, the colonists no longer thought of themselves as transplanted Europeans, but rather as Americans.

As a result of the treaty of Paris 1783, the new nation controlled all of North America from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River between Canada and Florida. Canada, to the North, remained British territory. The United Kingdom returned Florida to Spain and Spain continued to control the area west of the Mississippi River. The original thirteen colonies made up the first thirteen states of the United States. Eventually, the "American" land west of the Appalachian Mountains was divided into territories.

At the end of the Revolutionary War, the new nation was still a loose confederation of states. But in 1787, American leaders got together and wrote the Constitution of the United States. The Constitution became the country's basic law and welded it together into a solid political unit.

###

CHECKS AND BALANCES

There are built in "checks and balances" to prevent tyrannous concentration of power in any one branch of government and to protect the rights and liberties of citizens. For example, the President can veto bills approved by Congress and the President nominates individuals to serve in the Federal judiciary; the Supreme Court can declare a law enacted by Congress or an action by the President unconstitutional; and Congress can impeach the President and Federal court justices and judges.

Judicial Branch
The judicial branch of government is established in Article III of the Constitution with the creation of the Supreme Court. This court is the highest court in the country and is empowered with the judicial powers of the government. There are lower federal courts but they were not created by the Constitution. A courts authority to decide constitutionality is called judicial review.

The Supreme Court, part of the judicial branch, was established in the Constitution as the highest court in the nation. The Supreme Court's most important responsibility is to decide cases that raise questions of constitutional interpretation. The Court decides if a law or government action violates the Constitution. This is known as judicial review. It enables the Court to overrule both federal and state laws when they conflict with its interpretation of the Constitution. Since the Supreme Court stands as the ultimate authority in Constitutional interpretation, its decisions can be changed only by a Constitutional Amendment.

Judicial review puts the Supreme Court in an important role in the American political system. It is the referee in disputes among various branches of the federal, as well as state, governments and is the ULTIMATE authority for the most important issues in the country. For example, in 1954, the Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education banned racial segregation in public schools. The ruling started a long process of desegregating schools and other institutions.

Executive Branch
President: Leader of the Country and Commander in Chief of the military

Vice President: President of the Senate and becomes President if the President is unable to serve

Departments: Department heads advise the President on policy issues and help execute those policies

Executive Agencies: Make regulations to help implement laws

Independent Agencies: Help Carry out policy or provide special services

"WE the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." Our Preamble

Life is not fiction, but what fiction is made of. Who is watching...Big Brother? Are WE?

References: World Book MultiMedia; Wikipedia; Ben's Guide to U.S. Government For Kids! - A Service of the Superintendent of Documents U.S. Government Printing Offices

Public Institutions - These are the People in Your Neighborhood

2008-05-04T21:17:00.012-04:00

FIRE STATION - Fire Fighters put out fires. They also respond to other emergencies such as accidents.

HOSPITAL - When you are sick or hurt, the doctor is there to help. Doctors examine you to find out what's wrong and make you feel better. You don't just go to the doctor when you're sick. You can also go for check-ups so that you don't get sick.

POST OFFICE - Letter carriers deliver the mail. When you have mail to send, the letter carrier will pick it up and send it. Even when the weather is bad, the letter carrier still brings your mail.

LIBRARY - Libraries are FULL of information. Some of the information is in books and magazines and some of the information is on computers. If you have a question, a librarian can help you find the answer.

SCHOOL - Teachers help you learn about many subjects.

Ref: Ben's Guide to the U.S. Government for Kids (Kindergarten) - A service of the Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office

Ella Speaks - the 24th Amendment

2008-05-04T20:53:00.005-04:00

Amendment 24: Proposed August 27, 1962 and ratified on January 23, 1964

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for Presidential or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for senator or representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any *poll tax or other tax.

*The term poll tax does not mean a tax on voting. It comes form the old English word 'poll' meaning head. The United States has never levied a national poll tax but some states once used poll taxes to keep poor people and blacks from voting.

On January 24, 1965 who was in America? Were there Dutch? Were there Portuguese? Were there Italians? Were there Spanish? Were there French? Were there Germans? Were there Polish? Were there Haitians? Were there Jamaicans? Were there Koreans? Were there Chinese? Were there Japanese? Were there Russians? Were there Cubans? Were there Canadians? Were there Puerto Ricans? Were there Mexicans? Were there Brazilians? Were there Ghanaians? Were there Liberians? Were there Indians? Were there Native Americans?

"Remember, we are not fighting for the freedom of the Negro alone, but for the freedom of the human spirit, a larger freedom that encompasses all mankind." Ella Baker

word.

2008-05-04T20:35:00.003-04:00

For change...

de zuiverste vorm van weerstand is topkwaliteit

a mais pura forma de resistencia e excelencia

la forma piu pura di resistenza e l'eccellenza

la forma mas pura de resistencia es la excelencia

la forme la plus pure de la resistance est l'excellence

the purest form of resistance is excellence

"Better than a thousand hollow words is one word that brings peace." - Buddha

Our Global Village - A Question for the People

2008-05-04T16:36:00.002-04:00

if it takes a village to raise one child
the why are We All at war?

Proverbs:
1. If the rhythm of the drumbeat changes, the dance step must adapt - Burkino Faso
2. Walking in two is medicine - Mozambique
3. It is better to walk than curse the road - Senegal
4. You mother is still your mother, though her legs be small - Malawi
5. There is no bad patience - Tanzania
6. If relatives help each other, what evil can hurt them? - Ethiopia
7. As long as fire stays in one's breast it does not cool down - Ethiopia
8. He who finds fault must fix - Confucious

First appeared on April 25, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com

2008-05-04T16:33:00.000-04:00

Those who know

are humbled

by what it takes

to Properly "transform anger into action."

"The master's tools cannot destroy the master's house," but they certainly can help to build something new for Everyone.

First appeared on April 17, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com

2008-05-04T16:31:00.000-04:00

An open question to all the elected lawyers of the United States

If We don't want "the war" to go on for the next hundred years,
and We don't want to pay for another wall after having broken down so many,
and We don't want to pay for another congressional salary increase
before We have better health care,
don't We have grounds for a class action lawsuit for the misappropriation of Public funding?

Maybe someone on the Supreme Court can help US Answer that.

Hell Hath No Fury and Neither Should We

2008-05-04T16:13:00.005-04:00

"Non-violence and cowardice are contradictory terms. Non-violence is the greatest virtue, cowardice the greatest vice. Non-violence springs from love, cowardice from hate. Non-violence always suffers, cowardice would always inflict suffering. Perfect non-violence is the highest bravery. Non-violent conduct is never demoralizing, cowardice always is." Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, 1929

There are many ways to listen. And when you hear something again for the first time with new eyes, it is a humbling moment when you understand exactly how an artist is hoping to touch your soul. It is one thing to hear the lyrics, "I see them gathered, I see them on the shore/I turn to look once more, and he who knows me not, takes me to the belly of darkness..." first from underneath a hair drier in a beauty salon. It is another to listen to them in the quiet company of a friend as she watches those words begin to resonate for you. And it is quite another thing, still, to listen to them for the first time again after first having reached that shore and then returning. What do you do when you realize the complexity with which the ancestral Voice speaks to Us? "Teach my beloved children who have been enslaved to reach for the light continually...Teach my beloved children I have been a slave, but reached for the light continually...wisdom is the brave warrior who'll carry us into the sun." May ALL prayer reach us first through song.

In the New World, first, there were the people of Haiti. They set the stage for Us all. If not for them, where would We be? And, also, the Maroons....

Through birth, and by Divine Providence, my partner and I are natural citizens of the United States. She was born, and we were both raised, in Planet Brooklyn. I opened my eyes to the world in Harlem before being whisked away for a short time to learn how to walk, talk, think and be me by the Pacific instead of the Atlantic Ocean. It took some time and a few Amendments but, by definition, we are both free. It would makes sense, then, as natives from the very first capitol of the land that has been a beacon of hope for so many in the modern world that we would make our journey home Together.

Freedom simply cannot be found alone. History will have it that, after a harrowing journey, we returned home together. And then we went Home. Together. The beginning of Togetherness, more than anything else, is love. Our blood has known capture but has also rejected enslavement because of it.

Liberty as a birthright? Whew. To whom much is given, much is required. And it gets so much deeper.

Context: Our point of entry is Africa although the perspective is Universal.

Since elementary school, while learning about slavery, the focus was always on the cotton field. They taught us songs as part of our heritage: Gonna jump down, turn around, pick a bale of cotton/Jump down, turn around, pick a bale of hay..." There'd be no mention of slave ships for a long time. Or of Industry. Just cotton. And then, from cotton to Crispus to Martin Luther King, Jr. and then freedom. No mention was made of the Caribbean, South America, Europe, Asia - no mention was made of the world in relation to Slavery.

We did learn, tangentially, and with zero context, about how the nose of the Sphinx was shot off. The Greek Sphinx, though, has the head of a woman. "What has one voice and becomes four-footed, two footed, and three footed?" In mythology, when Oedipus solved the riddle the Sphinx became furious, jumping off a rock to her death. But the Sphinx has wings. In that myth, then, why didn't she use them? Thank God for the Phoenix.... The Trans-Atlantic European Arabic slave trade was huge, to be sure, but it didn't start in a cotton field. And it wasn't the beginning of human bondage. Nor was the emancipation of the enslaved in the United States via the constitution the end of it.

The phrase "chattel slavery" is such a benign description when you think about it because it does not bring to mind a particular kind of intercontinental lifestyle that took place over a series of lifetimes. It also does not bring to mind the reality of the process of enslavement. Alex Hailey gives an excellent account when he talks in written, and, especially, spoken word, about the meaning of a coffle. People, as far as the eye can see, shackled Together in lines by the neck and chained by their hands and feet. Human beings lined up for miles - miles - in the hot sun waiting to be packaged, like sardines, on little ships that were miniscule by today's standards and especially reprehensible in their design for maximum cargo storage. As the adjoined people got closer to the shore they got to see first hand what they had to have been feeling through the vibration of the links. How could a different kind of madness not strike?

Humans are not c_attle when it comes to the slaughterhouse.

Some people managed to break loose as they were being lead to dinghys that were waiting to take them to the ships. They would grab and tear at anything they could to remain free. Unfortunately, once you reach the shore, after leaving the hold of a castle dungeon, "anything" means nothing but sand. They dug in with their hands, their feet, their mouths - with all they had - to avoid the inevitability of the ship's hold. Can you imagine a mouth full of sand and madness? What came next was the long journey into darkness. This was the beginning of what We know as hell - the African's tale of woe in the Americas.

Pounds. One shackle. Pounds. Now multiply that times four because humans have hands and feet with which to resist. Plus one more for enjoinment by the neck. And then multiply that by millions over the course of a few hundred years. Anyone profiting off the sale of iron was making a killing. And now, think about a woman. In the hold of one of those ships. Day after day. Week after week. Month after month. Held down amidst the sloshing of fecal matter, urine, vomit, bile...menstrual blood. It is a lot to think about. And so, what if she were pregnant?

There were also the tiniest of shackles at the ready.

Captured people would be brought up on deck from time to time to be washed down with the brine of the ocean. Incidents of people, including pregnant women, able to break loose and jump down into the shark infested waters were recorded to account for the loss of cargo. When you are on the open water, with land nowhere in sight, there can be no question of intent when a human who finds a way to escape shackles jumps down into the ocean. It is more likely that a boy sharing a little boat with a tiger could survive adrift for months than for any human being to be able to swim to shore. There's a particular kind of finality to the blindness of a leap and you understand that, in a unique sort of way, if you ever have the opportunity to skydive. Once you jump, what's done is done and the laws of gravity take hold. But skydiving is not skydiving without a parachute, and diving is only diving when you plan to return to shore. Better to be swallowed by the depths than bear your child into the beginning of a nightmare if you, yourself, have been stricken by a fear and madness so powerful that you cannot even begin to wrap your mind around the concept of what horrors await you when you make it to the other side.

To stave off madness - to survive - it must have been better to simply look up. Our sun is the closest star with which to make a wish. At night there is no difference between the open water of the ocean and the open land of the desert. Everything in the distance is darkness while the sky is riddled with stars to grant infinity perspective. We look up toward infinity. To dream. And we look inward toward infinity. For hope. In either direction there is light. We are all related to those who did not jump. We are related to everyone who chose, instead, to defy the laws of gravity by taking the leap of faith. That kind of leap is blind, to be sure, but no less so than Love. Or Justice.

When gravity takes hold while you are "jumping down" you get caught up trying to imagine the unspeakable, immeasurable, and the incalculable atrocities. You begin to tremble. Your jaw clenches. Your fingers curl toward your palms. And tears well up in your eyes. When gravity takes hold while you are "jumping up" you try to imagine what it would have been like had they never come, and the unspeakable, the immeasurable, the incalculable atrocity never happened...and you become lightheaded with the understanding, in real time, of what has happened to all of the ancestors of those who were left behind. You resent the presence of the can(n)ons because all you should ever need, when someone yells "Fire!" is a match. To light a candle. Or to cook with. Or to stay warm. And that is all.

We discussed many things, including Slavery and the women on the slave ships, while standing at the top of a watchtower overlooking the shores from which our ancestors were taken, with people to whom we could have easily been related. It certainly felt like a family reunion. We were humbled by all of the ways in which we discovered We are all related. And we were humbled, too, by the fact that no matter how much we had learned about what happened, no matter how much we collectively knew, We could not imagine what happened. "Imagination is of three kinds: joined with belief of that which is to come; joined with memory of that which is past; and of things present, or as if they were present." --Bacon (Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary). And so we also discussed the future.

When you decide as a human being to defy the laws of gravity something special happens. You don't think about jumping. And you don't think about floating, either. Defying the laws of gravity means, as a human being, in no uncertain terms that somehow, some way, you have to become like a bird in the sky. Or a Sphinx. Or a Phoenix. There is no need for a parachute. We are humbled by time, patience, language, translation, the ability to read and write, and the meaning of "...with Liberty and Justice for All" when We re-imagine the phrase, "One if by land, two if by sea," while We also think, not of cotton, but of the iron(y) of the relationship between the Declaration of Independence and the sail of a slave ship. And, whether We like it or not, whether We can come to terms with it or not, We are all joined by Love.

The waters may be troubled and the skies gray, but the Universe, with all its stars, is infinite in both directions. It is hard to realize when you have been socialized to either hang your head in shame, or look to the right or left and decide based on a fools notion that you are somehow better instead of basically the same - just different - that all you have to do is look up to be grounded. We learn daytime requires focus, and the nighttime is left for dreaming. In the end, it is a good thing that someone decided to document that the earth is round so we could have a reference point to start remembering that both focus and dreams can happen at the same time. For that though, you also have to remember that the earth's roundness isn't just a circle. It is also a sphere.

We see the world differently, having gone and come back and, "It's not where you're from, its where you're at," says Erik B. and Rakim. Eric Clapton and Babyface say, "If I could change the world, I would be the sunlight in your universe..." which can easily be Our sun just as much the infinity we see in the night sky. It is not hard to remember what it feels like as a child to make a wish on a star and, as an adult, to realize that it is never to late to believe in and act on dreams. For any real change, both outside and within, it is a whole lot easier to do without anger. It is also the best way to begin to move forward in everything, including, but not limited to, time. Since that is easier said than done, don't say it. Do it. Right now. In this moment. Dream a better world. James Weldon Johnson says, "Lift Every Voice and Sing" and the beautiful thing about poetry - about song - is that it really is for everyone. The first verse is the one most commonly heard. So read, in it's entirety, the whole. Especially after having come this far...

Lift ev'ry voice and sing,
'Til earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
Let Our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught US,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought US;
Facing the rising sun of Our new day begun,
Let US march on 'til victory is won.
Stony the road We trod,
Bitter the chast'ning rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not Our weary feet
Come to the place for which Our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,
Out from the gloomy past,
'Til now We stand at last
Where the white gleam of Our bright star is cast.
God of Our weary years,
God of Our silent tears,
Thou who has brought US thus far on the way;
Thou who has by Thy might
Led US into the light,
Keep US forever in the path, We pray.
Lest Our feet stray from the places, Our God, where We met Thee,
Lest, Our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, We forget Thee;
Shadowed beneath Thy hand,
May We forever stand,
True to Our God,
True to Our native land.
Lift Every voice and sing
Till Earth and heaven ring
Let US march on till victory, is won
Victory is won!

First appeared on April 16, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com

2008-05-01T11:38:00.001-04:00

The Phoenix always lives...

Written in Fire the Day Of...A True Story

2008-05-01T11:33:00.002-04:00

It rained all day yesterday. And also a lot last night. This morning, as the rains went further out to sea, there was a rainbow in the sky. A quarter arch, and crystal clear. The sea was a dark slate, grayish blue - more like the threatening color of the skies the day before. But it was also still, like a layer of glass had been placed over it. The longer I was still, the larger the rainbow became. And the more I relaxed my gaze and widened it to the open water the more I could see. There were dolphin far off in the distance jumping out of the water. The colors of the visible spectrum were fully in view. Red. Orange. Yellow. Green. Blue. Indigo. Violet.

Indigo can be seen with the naked eye. What an indescribably beautiful color she is to her sister blue!

While sitting just a little longer something more appeared - a second rainbow forming directly over the first! It was not as intense. It was a more like a whisper and the subtlety of it made me think of the word "humility."

A fisherman's boat drifted into view. It was sort if just bobbing up and down like a little toy and, from the stillness of the water around it I could see that the engine was off. It passed, from my vantage point, directly under the end of the first rainbow and, for a time, appeared to be illuminated by it. Slowly, it continued to drift. And, slowly, each of the rainbows followed the morning storm out to sea.

First appeared on April 4, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com

A Call to Art, Not Arms

2008-05-01T11:28:00.006-04:00

"Re-examine all you have been told. Dismiss what insults your soul"
When you realize the depth and the complexity of The Lie we have been told, do not suffer fools gladly. Do not suffer them at all. Turn your back completely and get on with your work because there is much to be done.What if all the artists - the painters, the songwriters, the poets, the gardeners, the musicians, the cooks, the seamstresses, the novelists - what if all the writers of this world said, "ENOUGH!"? What might the end of this millennium look like if we collectively decide to write the world anew?
We've all seen what happens when the myths we hold up as pillars are a call to arms. A call to artists though? To create work that will stand the test of time? What might Harlem look like? Coimbra or Badajoz? What might Alexandria look like? Xian or Lahore? Sendai? Uppsala? Ivalo? Nairobi? Sao Paulo? What about New Orleans?
Only a fool in a new millennium thinks that war can be a legacy. Any mother worth her salt will tell you that.
"For some people the word 'revolution' has a negative ring. Yet the neutral meaning of the word is simply 'a great change.' The positive potential is that a revolution brings about a dramatic and sudden change for the better. It breaks up the old order that has become rigid, stale and isn't working. Instead, it brings renewal, creativity and expansion. It sets people free from the bondage of their limitations and gives them a new space of freedom and growth. It breaks down the prison walls and sets people free to roam new territory. Revolutions are not always physical. Many revolutions have been mental; they have been revolutions in consciousness." - Kim Michaels - The Secret Coming of Christ
It is no secret. The revolution has already begun. Create your art as though you want it to last forever so that it may at least be around for a few lifetimes. That the pen is mightier than the sword is neither cliche nor competition. It is Love's Divine!
First appeared on April 4, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com

An Open Letter to Senator Barack Obama

2008-05-01T11:06:00.005-04:00

April 3, 2008

Dear Senator Obama,

I would like to introduce myself to you, first, as a New Yorker. On September 11, 2001 I had to walk home from Times Square to Brooklyn because, although it was a beautiful day to start, some bad things happened that set a great deal of sadness, followed by a great deal of ugliness into motion. I do not really understand why it all happened and I don't imagine I ever will because there comes a point when one has to stop searching for the answers to questions rooted in hate. What I remember most about that walk was that I took most of it with a friend. The next day, after a failed attempt to go to work because the trains were not running, I found myself administering self-therapy on the handball court.

I'm kind of tired of talking about that day, even though I have only discussed it rarely. I realized my level of exhaustion when, late last summer, I bought both a 2008 date book and wallet calendar and saw that the eleventh of September had been "officially" named Patriot Day. I don't know that a hate crime of international proportions that caused myriads of people to overcome pain and fear while trying to find out if their loved ones are all right, or any international response that causes myriads of people elsewhere to do the same thing constitutes patriotism.

I'd like to draw your attention to another day instead, a couple of years later. I do not remember the exact date and, whenever I talk about it, I make no attempt to find out. The date does not matter to me because I remember it more as a small window in time that, as a whole, was lot more representative of any notion of patriotism than that day in September.

Late one afternoon I was having lunch with a friend (another one) and, just after we asked for the check, the lights in our restaurant went out. We joked about our bad luck -- why couldn't the power have gone out before it came? We paid and walked outside. We noticed that some street lights were out in the area and shopkeepers were coming outside to look around. It appeared that the neighborhood was experiencing a power outage. Very quickly, though, we found out it was not just the neighborhood and it was not just the city. While old power grids failed, new cell phone networks were operational, and folks everywhere were able to call and let folks know everywhere else that everything, for the most part, was okay.

My friend had to make it from the West Village to Jersey and I, once again, had to make it to Brooklyn. She heard that buses were being set up for shuttling folks going in her direction and she needed to hurry in order to get a space on one. In deference to the people working in lower Manhattan I decided to wait awhile before heading home. Instead, for a little bit of self-therapy, I went to the handball courts around the corner from where we ate so that I could play until it felt okay to start walking. The thing about administering self-therapy through handball in New York is that, thankfully, you will always find a group of folks, for any number of different reasons, doing the same thing.

Before it got too late a bunch of us talked about where we needed to go and a small group of us who were headed in the same direction to the same neighborhood started walking. It was really quiet at first. And then we got to China Town. The fruit and vegetable stands were selling out of everything in a frenzy. A bell went off in my head and I bought some oranges and a couple of bottles of green tea. It was hot. As we reached the entrance to the walkway of the Manhattan Bridge there was suddenly a great deal of tension in the air. Not because it was reminiscent of anything but because there were thousands of people converging on that one bridge. You could hear the footsteps and feel the vibration. It is an eerie feeling when the walkway of a structure that size begins to sway beneath you as you walk forward. The movement of the group was steady, and so the sway became a rhythm. Tension, checked, is calm.

Eventually we reached the halfway point of the bridge. Collectively, all of the people who crossed that point together started feeling good about being "almost there" and so conversations started sprouting up through the silence. Folks started randomly introducing themselves to one another, asking where folks where they were on their way to and where others were originally from. You would be amazed at how many true-grit, down and dirty New Yorkers are from absolutely everywhere else. And you would be just as amazed at how easily people who were born and raised there are ready to embrace them. There was only a slight bit of agitation at one point when a man pushing his bicycle started messing up the flow. First there was grumbling, and then the collective and explicit conveyance in concise Brooklynese that if he wanted to keep his bike from taking a swim in the river that he needed to remember the pedestrians at all times and that he, himself, was one at the moment. There was laughter, and understanding. And the flow in our group returned. By the time we were all walking off of the bridge together it felt like a party. People were hugging each other and exchanging phone numbers, and wishing each other safe travels -- into the rest of Brooklyn and beyond.

The small group that I was walking with cut through Fort Greene park and saw a bunch of people setting up to hang out. They decided to stay for awhile but I kept going. Dusk had turned to twilight and soon it would be nightfall. I quickened my pace and eventually began a light jog. I could not wrap my mind around a pitch black North East grid much less a pitch black New York, and I wanted to get home to my family. There was a possibility that my mother would be home alone although one of my cousins and her two small sons lived in the same building. They resided on the twentieth floor. The closer I got to home the more I started having horrible visions of what a blackout could mean for people who live in high rises. And by the time I reached my building I was running full on and drenched in sweat.

The first thing I noticed as I reached the end of the footpath leading to the front entrance was the large number of folding chairs from our building's community room set up with many of the older people in the building sitting in them. They all seemed relaxed, laughing and chatting with each other as they gave nods of acknowledgement when they saw me. Folks in high rises are their own neighborhood too, and they had watched me grow up there and my mother grow older. I am sure it was clear to them the concern I had for their well being. They understood why I just ran past without officially saying hello.

When I got inside my building the gentlemen on the maintenance staff were all in the lobby with flashlights and candles and they were in the process of organizing among the four or five of them the best way to illuminate three sets of stairs that went up twenty-three flights. I blew past them at first and went right to the nearest stair entrance because I only had to run up three flights. When I swung open the door, though, I got hit by a wall of darkness so thick that despite standing on solid ground I felt as though I were about to fall over into outer space. I had to remind myself to breathe and backed out. One of the men on the crew said, "Dark, huh?" We both laughed and he escorted me to my floor and shone the light until I walked the half-block length of hallway to our apartment and keyed in.

My mother was fine. She had candles going, a couple of those wind-up flashlights, and a wind-up radio. One of my other cousins was also there and he greeted me with his typical deadpan, "Hey." He told me that everything was okay and when I saw that for myself I got out my heavy duty flashlight and walked around the building a bit. An entire system had been efficiently organized whereby young folks were helping everyone get up to their respective floors by casting light with candles, holding hands, and offering words of support. There was not simply precision at work but, also, pure demonstrations of compassion, patience, warmth, love and respect among neighbors. There were also feats of amazing strength. Kids ran up and down the stairs over and over again. A gentleman whom I was certain was in his fifties slowly and steadily made it to the twentieth floor in the almost airless staircase and stifling heat before his wife mentioned that he was, in fact, over thirty years older that I thought! You would never have guessed from the way that he walked her to the subway station every morning before her commute and gave her a kiss before going for his jog. Another woman, who was absolutely terrified of the darkness, came all the way from across town where she lived to check on an elderly friend whom she could not get in touch with. This lady mustered the courage to make it up to her friend's apartment, which was above the fifteenth floor, make sure her friend was safe, and then troop all the way back down to the lobby and across town to where her family lived. As time passed more and more random acts of kindness were displayed. Humanity by candlelight is a humbling thing.

My cousin and her two small sons on who lived on the twentieth floor were not there when I knocked. I found them, though, in the apartment of another cousin on the second floor, sitting on the terrace talking quietly with her sister as the two boys slept. By this time night had completely fallen and I began to feel a deep restlessness. I went to check on my mother again and then, armed only with my flashlight, walked out into the streets of my neighborhood.

The neat thing about Brooklyn is that while there are a lot of buildings there still aren't that many high rises. There are enough, to be sure, but they have not yet become a fecundity. And so you get a different feel for what New York is when you move around in it. As I was walking something peculiar was going on. Folks were sitting under little buffet tents set up in their brownstone front yard areas. Grills had been set up and food was cooking. People were sitting in lawn and beach chairs and, in some spots, music was playing. Old school music. Old, old school music. Laughter was echoing all around and the. "Mm-hmm's" and "Uh-huh's" told me there was a lot of reminiscing going on.

At first I was walking as though I were on some kind of mission, going to the houses of friends nearby to see if they were all right. Everywhere I went people were at ease and so, after a while, I was just walking around. Eventually I doubled back and started walking in the direction of home. And, for the first time, I looked up at the night sky. The biggest, brightest, fullest moon I have ever seen, before or since, hung low in the night sky. I turned off my flashlight. I did not realize it when I was walking down the street before, because my mind was not operating that way at first, that everywhere -- absolutely everywhere -- everything was illuminated in glow of natural light. The feeling I was overcome with was the direct and polar opposite of what I'd felt when I hit the wall of darkness in the staircase hours before. I want to wax poetic and describe for you in elaborately woven phrases exactly what a neighborhood dipped in silver liquid looks like but words, no matter how hard I try, fail me.

I had a few moments of absolute quiet all to myself before being hit with another kind of energy. The kids were out. Brooklyn is Brooklyn. And, on a hot summer night, that means wherever there are clusters of kids left to their own devices fun is being had by all. At first, when I would pass a clutch of them, though, I would tense up just a little. Conditioning, unfortunately, by having been a little over a decade removed from my teens. I was drawn in, though, with the energy of each passing group.

First off, most of them did not seem to care about or notice me, one way or the other. They were thrilled to be running around in the moonlight. And when any few individuals did take notice of me they were only interested in making their group bigger. When I got a, "Wanna run with us, Shorty?" I laughed, said "No, but be careful!" and continued on my way. I eventually got home, checked on my mother and then went to sleep.

The next morning I woke up around seven-thirty. I got dressed, got a bucket off our terrace, and went outside to stand in line at the fire hydrant behind some of my neighbors. When there is no electricity, water does not flow in a high rise. I brought the full bucket upstairs and took my bicycle back down. I wanted to ride around to get a better sense of what was going on. Separate and apart from the radio broadcasts.

People were out at a local vegetable stand buying everything. There were large groups of people in front of supermarkets that had their gates pulled and their doors locked while security people stood in front taking down orders, handing the slips of paper to employees inside who would fill them. Rationing. The reality of a power failure of that magnitude was setting in and there was a bit of mounting frustration. After a while, inevitably, I needed some self-therapy. I made my way over to the handball court. And, of course, I was not alone.

It was nice to hear people share their stories from the night before. Some folks spoke about how far they'd walked. Others about how long they'd been stuck underground in the subway system and what it was like to walk through the tunnels. We talked about how energetic the city felt. And we played.

I do not remember how long the power was out. It felt more like time had just stood still. And that was nice. People all over seemed like they got to know each other again without the added and unnecessary context of doom and destruction. People fed each other. Heartily. The grills were not just going all night but, also, well into the next day. Unfortunately, what could not be cooked and eaten had to be thrown away and, let me tell you, that does not bode well for a high rise with a trash chute and a small compactor. The stench from the rotting food that had piled up a few stories high lasted a long time while our maintenance staff worked their best and their hardest without complaint.

Rumors of ATM's beginning to work in our downtown area began to spread but people had next on the court. And then, as abruptly as they had shut off, the traffic lights came back on. There was a collective cheer. And we continued to play. Time passed, blame was eventually placed, and the news reporting similar stories of people all over being nothing short of outstanding to each other were the standard rather than the exception. With people helping people across all kinds of cultural and socioeconomic lines; with the young helping the old; the healthy helping the sick; and everyone of their own accord simply taking care, as a New Yorker and as an American I cannot think of anything more universally patriotic.

Now, Senator Obama, you may very well be wondering why I am sharing this particular story with you directly. The fact of the matter is that I have thought very long and very hard about it and there is something about your message, as a fellow human being, that feels most inspiring to me. I initially sat down to write to you a much different letter. I was going to start off by telling you how I came up through the public school system and how, at a young age, I was wounded by the fact that a teacher of mine told a fellow classmate that her life then, and ten years into the future "if she lived that long," wasn't worth twenty-five cents. In addition to that child he was trying to actively break, there were thirty-three other pairs of eyes staring on in horror. When I went home that June afternoon I did not tell anyone and I do not think any of my other classmates did either. This man, our teacher, said so much more that day. But I realized as I tried to begin a letter to you that way --thirty-something years later-- that he is not worth it. It is my sincerest hope that anyone who has had a teacher of any kind try to measure them with worthlessness that they rebound by slaying the dragon of imposed low self-esteem.

I thought about telling you of all the egregious ways I have witnessed public institutions fail people. And then I thought, no matter how passionately I feel about these things, none of it is new. And that is the crux of the problem, isn't it? I decided that my objective should not be to appeal to the higher sensibility of a politician because that has never worked. The objective of a politician isn't to keep promises but to keep up politics as usual. But, now more than ever, it does not feel as though any of the problems that we face as a nation have anything to do with politics.

Eight months before Hurricane Katrina's aftermath I fell in love. Hard. And I had the opportunity to go to the opposite side of the world for a brief period of time solely in the name of it. My time there lasted way too soon but the love grew by epic proportions. Being back in America, specifically in New York, after such a brief period of time, was when the real culture shock began. What I had come home to was not what I had left at all. I found myself teetering on the edge of insanity because of the shocking realization that so much of what we have been told about the rest of the world, and ourselves, just isn't true. As a country, we used to pay more attention. Different groups of people have been trying to tell us that for the longest time but we somehow just got caught up in unusually usual politics.

We left America again three months after the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and traveled quite a bit looking, not just at America, but at the whole world and, especially, ourselves through a much different lens.

It is easy to get caught up in all the natural beauty that is planet earth and the temptation to fall off the face of it altogether is grand. But, just as easily, it is possible to get caught up in the absolutely indescribable despair that has been trying to take over our imagination. If you are not careful, and if you are not focused, you can get lost forever. The only thing that can bring about change, the kind of change that is necessary for a global community to thrive, is an open heart and an open mind.

Senator Obama, the question that started crystallizing in my mind, more than any other after seeing parts of South East Asia, Southern Asia, a little bit of Mexico, and not as much of Africa as we would have liked, while meeting people from all over Europe and other parts of the Americas is, what does it mean to be an American? No matter how they're dressed, no matter what they look like, you kind of think you'll know one when you see one. And then you realize as an American, especially if you are from an urban center like New York, that everyone, no matter how they are dressed, no matter what they look like, kind of looks like one. An American. This sounds kind of cliche if you leave New York and look around, globally. Or you can go to the Department of Motor Vehicles and see exactly how many languages the written exam is offered. You also realize, and are humbled by, our mosaic when you see the pictures of lost loved ones after too many fateful days and aftermaths in recent American memory.

The question of what it means to be an American is so fully charged, but in looking for an answer I cannot help but go back to the day when the lights went out. It is a story that I do not feel I have an opportunity to tell as much as I would like because, abroad, we get way too many questions about things our elected officials should have already had the answers for. Everyone looks American to me because I understand the beauty and the history of immigration and liberation in our country. But I also understand that if you have never been to the United States and you only have access to a few media outlets you don't have to feel that way. And you shouldn't be required to by anyone, especially Americans. Because, ultimately, human beings are human beings and all of our basic needs are exactly the same. And so are a lot of our basic hopes and dreams.

My friend, my partner -my love- and I, have been around the globe together. Twice. We have yet to see anything to convince us that an act of hate, at home or abroad, should ever be commemorated using the word "patriotism" or any variant thereof. What individual group benefits? Why would they want to? Senator Obama, if we politicize a date in September then we cannot do it without politicizing the date of the blackout, but kindness should not have to compete with hate. And if we commemorate the blackout then we have to politicize all kinds of other things including the barrel of a gun. And all of that eventually becomes politics as usual. All talk and no action once the polls close, but a few extra words of copy in our date books.

Senator Obama, your message of change, after all We have been through, intrigues me. It inspires me. And it gives me hope. Not because you are charming, or because you have got nice ears, but because for the first time it actually sounds like there is a person who understands in a very basic sort of way that if there is not change for the better now -- right now-- that politics as usual will cause changes far worse than we could ever imagine. Our America is way too special for that. It's people, from every nation on the planet, are deserving of so much more.

I feel as though I officially inherited my little piece of the American dream when I turned thirty-five because I could officially run for President if I wanted. In theory. It is so much easier, however, to write about expressions of humanity, joy and love, wherever they may be found. I continue to be humbled by our Constitution as I get older and understand the limitless possibilities it holds with regard to freedom. Especially the First Amendment, hence this open letter to you.

I cannot imagine a job that will be harder in the next four years than that of President of the United States. Given all that has happened in the last twenty years as well as what we were able to glean from looking at the world with complete independence, all that really matters in this coming Presidential race is that the person best qualified for the position wins. Party affiliation frankly, has become a moot point. For the next four years the person best qualified would seem to me to be someone who has had the presence of mind to go abroad and see what is happening in the world before taking the office. They would also have to be someone who demonstrates that they have the presence of mind to assemble their own advisory staff -- a staff that will do more than read newspaper headlines and tell them only what they want to hear. That person should have a crystal clear understanding of the overwhelmingly complex domestic issues that we have and how similar they are to the domestic issues of our neighbors in the global community.

In these next four years, especially, it would seem most appropriate, given the nature of all senseless acts of violence, that the next President of the United States be someone who has neither raised up arms with the intention of taking another human life - for any reason - nor demonstrated or implied complicity in doing so with a single vote. Given how our nation's long and beautiful history with immigration has helped it grow we mustn't be worried about a race war in the twenty-first century locally but with the constant race to war globally. Our President must, through both words and deeds, be a non-combatant. There is no other way that our troops, their loved ones, or the world community can take us at our word when we say that we believe there should be an end to fighting everywhere.

Senator Obama, these are the things that your message of change have inspired me to think about and share openly with you. And I cannot thank you enough for that. I honestly believe in my heart that all these qualities in our next President will inspire change, not just in people from the United States, but in US All.

With all best wishes,
Deborah Cowell
An earlier version first appeared on April 3, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com.

2008-05-01T11:00:00.001-04:00

Lions are nice but
We
Who know
Walk among tigers.
Not sure what that means? Ask the Buddhist monks of Thailand.

First appeared on April 3, 2008 at www.debbiecowell.blogspot.com