Spending time at Don Quixote's windmill

A windmill looks like a clock, when standing still. And where Don Quixote had vision and put his sword to work, my pen has stayed silent here. Now I must account for that face of time, those years gone by...

...Never mind, the past is the past. About a half century ago, I imagined that by age 72, I'd be typing a manuscript for the Great American Novel of the 21st Century. A novel isn't going to happen, but I do have a screenplay that is being adapted to the small screen, and in a series format. At least it's underway.

The wind has picked up speed since November 8, 2016, and those blades are chopping away both historical and future dreams. Whack! Another whack! Missed...but I and my fantastic cohorts will continue doing battle. Since the great battle is about truth and interpretation in uncertain times, we shall record the present as honestly as we can, allowing pauses for occasional mystical whacking. The soul requires the challenge.

No Treatment Couches in Jail Cells

Wyoming, like other states, is having a crisis that legislators wish to sweep under the rug…again.  Our jails and prisons are becoming the recovery and support facilities for the mentally ill and non-violent drug offenders.  That is wrong because of so many reasons, and the costs the state is already paying because of no rational action to create support systems in communities is obvious now. What really makes this writer sad is that they shouldn’t have to told…they already know; but denial persists.

Cutting costs by cutting services through attrition and tabling physical plant investments makes each community subject to economically disabling circumstances.  When mayors and council members, county officials and citizens face more homeless persons on their streets, shouldn’t they ask why this is happening?  One of the answers they will hear is that once an inmate is released, that person may no longer have a job, a home, or any means in which to support themselves, and in many cases, their family suffers as if the members had committed offenses. Spouses and children do not deserve the consequences that have lifetime effects. Employment becomes near impossible when an application reveals the arrest and adjudication outcome (or lack of finality). Housing is more difficult to obtain, and both friends and family are more hesitant or unable to assist.

There are four corners of identifying the resolution to this growing problem of not treating mental illness and addiction: 

1)     Offering a spiritual connection.  Not religion nor dogma; just identifying and connecting on a personal spiritual journey to a higher power.

2)     Offering physical security for the time needed to create their own, in a community of mindfulness.

3)     Offering training of both job skills and other learning skills that help secure the future material needs.

4)     Offering both professional and lay support to assist in gaining enough confidence in order to become a giver of life to others.

There is no cheap alternative to real healing.  Jails and prison are not alternatives society can afford, nor really want, when one considers the extreme costs of disenfranchising individuals and families.  People who find themselves in jail could be considered “lost souls” in that the basis for their incarceration rules their thinking, their lives and the consequences placed on others, as well.  All yearn for a sense of community, warts and all.  Facebook and the likes are not replacements for community; they are tools. Healthy humans desire to give as much as they are given; sometimes more.  In economic terms, the concept of “giving back” is very profitable to communities.

The Progressive Ideological Roundabout

Can’t see your choices for commitment clearly?  That’s like doing a runaround in a roundabout.  We progressives are in a roundabout, sometimes changing lanes, and always following many paths with our senses to hopefully an action that declares our commitment, until the next exit looks more urgent to follow. But what keeps us from turning to a declared action and getting off the roundabout are our choices which, when illuminated, are not to achieve a positive action, but more of a defense against the obstructionists.

Global Warming/Climate Change.  Now that’s at the top of the list, right?  What’s the point of ending poverty, racial disparities, mass incarcerations, lack of health provisions…unless we save the planet first?  But, there’s the meanwhile, and thus the more we learn about the human condition and how many suffer today, there’s this nagging conscience whose voice says that today’s problems must be addressed now as well.  And we try.  We respond with emails (sometimes letters and phone calls), and sometimes go to town meetings to try to pin down a politician. And we give…endlessly.

I don’t think the conservatives deliberately set out to create mayhem with our choices to support, but I do think that their obstructionism over the last two decades have made them think they are a success unto themselves.  That radical conservatives seem not to have an open agenda, but a covert plan based upon what they deem success in thwarting social change, we progressives have allowed our boots to descend into the mud of slow-motion idealism.

Truly curious and educated progressives see things holistically, yet our choices of actions are placed in silos, as if one grant, one legislative action will conquer a problem.  Interconnectedness is denied its role in fulfilling the promise of even a part of the good intentions of funders and legislators, thus shortly we all recognize the futility of throwing targeted money at a whole problem.

We should be celebrating the 50^th anniversary of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty successes.  We should be celebrating the expansion of Sargent Shriver’s signature Head Start program.  His Peace Corp should be heralded as the best effort toward world peace ever instituted, but alas, inadequate funding obstructed these programs to flourish, and instead, obstructionism as a belief system emerged as an attempt to destroy them.  This year is proof of an unconscionable ideology that celebrates destruction of progressives’ humanitarian roots.

Maybe us progressives on that roundabout don’t recognize the unconsciousness of our choices of exits.  If we continue veering left, we continue going in circles…it’s that right turn that’s offered that turns us off.

Gertrude, the 1927 Flood and her Passing May 7

1927 and the Great Mississippi River flood. And 2011, another Great Mississippi flood year and Gertrude's passing. She sighed her last breath on May 7th while her grandson held her hand quietly and in sync with what he knew was happening.

I posted Gertrude's picture in an earlier post, taken in 1927, a student at the University of Arkansas. She became a teacher, a mother, a World Book Encyclopedia sales person, a librarian, a grandmother and great grandmother. In 1927 at home in southern Arkansas on a lake created by the Mississippi River's course change eons before, the flood waters creeped at them from behind and then spilled over into the lake as if searching for a way home. Gertrude told stories of that flood from memories as vivid as what the next decade would bring...the Great Depression. She lived through all the wars of the 20th Century, was there when Charles Lindbergh landed in a field in Lake Village. She witnessed changes in technology and even mastered her first VCR, taping shows from PBS. She shared her life in ways which graced many.

Gertrude died at home in Denver, CO under the care of my son, Luke, and daily care from The Denver Hospice. We are grateful beyond words for their care.

Rest in Peace, Gertrude Tompkins Carlton Lueg, May 6, 1910 - May 7, 2011.

A little story of metal and memories

As I mentioned last week, Gertrude is nearly 101. During a recent visit I picked out a piece of jewelry that's fascinated me since childhood and put it in her hand. It's a dark, shiny orb attached to a chain. "That was Puddin's." Immediately, my mind shot back to 1929 when Puddin died. Gertrude continued, "she used to wear it. It's called monel".

The clarity of Gertrude's comments after all these years of silence about that necklace put a hush to my mind's wanderings. I commented that I'd never heard of monel. Gertrude then offered the necklace to me to wear. I told her I would get the clasp replaced and would love to own it.

While sitting with her as she grew quiet over her own memories of 1929, I used my cell to look up Monel and then eagerly read to her what I found. As an industrial metal, I found it interesting that Puddin had a piece of jewelry made of this fascinating alloy.

In the following 82 years since Puddin's death, I doubt that Gertrude has had many occasions to talk about Monel. But last week, the word came out as if it had been a constant part of her life. As she has aged, she has shared many stories of her youth and early married years. I've learned things about my father who died in 1965, things that make me happy.

The decade in which Puddin' died was also the times of the Great Mississippi River flood. They lived in southern Arkansas across the river from Greenville, MS. All areas were inundated for weeks. From books I've learned how masses of people suffered. From Gertrude I learned the personal stories. I wish all of our elderly were cared for as Gertrude has been so their stories could be heard as well. Oral histories come from them. What are we missing?