Bill Ayers and Robert Kennedy’s Son

Sep 242010
 

This time the Bill Ayers story is real. This time there really is a story.

Last time, the story was that the retiring University of Illinois professor and former Weather Underground fugitive plotted with the then Senator Obama to capture the presidency. There was no real story.

This time, there are facts. Professor Ayers asked for emeritus status from the university. The university turned him down. The reasoning, quoted in total below from the Chicago Sun Times, was given by University Board President Chris Kennedy. Son of Robert Kennedy.

This time, there were some actual facts. Mr. Ayers did author a book which he dedicated to Sirhan Sirhan and a list of political prisoners held by the United States.

Sirhan Sirhan who, with a handgun in the kitchen of a Los Angeles hotel, both changed the course of American history and took 4 year old Chris Kennedy’s Dad, Robert Kennedy.

So this time there were facts. A very hard decision. And list of “What if’s” that could go on as long as the coldest dark night of the American collective soul.
Beginning of course with “What if Bobby Kennedy had lived?”

That Professor Ayers was a world class teacher is acknowledged by pretty much anyone who came within 5 feet of him. And on the list of bad things that can happen to a person, being denied emeritus status might clock in pretty close to last. Somewhere above a hang nail.

But there is something larger here. There is Chris Kennedy’s decision. His reasoning, weighing each piece of a much, much larger picture. Being the sum total of who he is, what shaped him, defined him as a person.

And as I read the power and the eloquence in his words I am struck first with the sadness for all that might have been.

But then I think about what he both said and did here, and there is a new thought. Somehow there is hope.

Somehow there is hope.

Because as I read again what he wrote I can’t help but believe how proud his Dad would have been of his son.

Chris Kennedy’s Statement:
There are times like today when we must make difficult decisions and perhaps those that are controversial or simply create a spectacle.
In my decision-making capacities as a trustee, I am not given the luxury of taking a poll on every issue and simply voting with the majority.

Instead, like those leaders of our republic who serve our community in a representative democracy, I must ultimately vote my conscience.
Today we take up the topic of emeritus status.
There are provisions for emeritus status in the university-organizing documents.
The emeritus status is an honorific status.
It is a title that is one of prestige.
It is not earned by right, but it is given as a privilege by the board of trustees.

I need to point out that this is a purely optional act.
While the process of conferring emeritus status may end with the board of trustees, it is important to note that it must begin with the individual faculty member who must request this honorific status for themselves.

Apparently, Mr. Ayers, who has been a teacher at the University of Illinois at Chicago, has asked for this privilege and honor to be bestowed on him.

Our discussion of this topic therefore does not represent an intervention into the scholarship of the university, nor is it a threat to academic freedom.

It is, rather, simply a response to his request.
In my role, I am simply responding to something which has been presented to me.
I am guided by my conscience and one which has been formed by a series of experiences, many of which have been shared with the people of our country and mark each of us in a profound way.

My own history is not a secret.
My life experiences inform my decision-making as a trustee of the university.

In this case of emeritus status, I hope that I will act in a predictable fashion and that the people of Illinois and the faculty and staff of this great institution will understand my motives and my reasoning.
I intend to vote against conferring the honorific title of our university to a man whose body of work includes a book dedicated in part to the man who murdered my father, Robert F. Kennedy.

There is nothing more antithetical to the hopes for a university that is lively and yet civil, or to the hopes of our founding fathers for their great experiment of a self-governing people, than to permanently seal off debate with one’s opponents by killing them.

There can be no place in a democracy to celebrate political assassinations or to honor those who do so.
We are citizen trustees whose judgments should be predictable to the community that we serve, and I would ask anyone who challenges my judgment, “How could I do anything else?”

WELCOME As a Work Search Tool

Sep 212010
 

Excerpt from:
FINDING WORK WHEN THERE ARE NO JOBS
Part Seven: Pictures of People Finding Work
Copyright 2010. Roger Wright

NOEL’S STORY

Noel did not need the job. No matter what it paid or didn’t pay. He didn’t even need to work. Much less two jobs. Not at age 84.

He had always worked. Since leaving the Royal Air Force as a young man, he had built a successful practice as an architect. And he was still an architect. Still working. That never went away. Perhaps “semi-retired” but certainly not retired. He lived in a small green mountain village in Wales.

In his younger years, there were at least 5 local pubs in the area. Perhaps more. But now, with the changes in the business and the global recession, there was only one. Noel would stop in 2 or 3 times a week. Always on the same days

And Noel always liked to support the locals of course. Especially in hard times. He would take his seat at the bar, near the front door. He knew everyone. He knew the owner well. A hard man. Roughened and cynical by all his years behind the bar. He knew how close the owner was to shutting down. And that didn’t make him any more friendly with the customers either. But there was one thing Noel did not know.

Noel did not know that every time he was in the pub, business went up. Sometimes as high as 10%. But it always went up.

The owner had a feeling that Noel brought in business. Didn’t really know why. But he knew what his books were telling him. On the nights Noel was in the pub, business went up. So he decided he’d pay more attention to the twinkly eyed older gentleman. Find out his secret.

It didn’t take long. As he watched Noel hold forth from his seat at the bar, he realized that first and foremost, Noel almost never forgot a name. And when he did forget, he asked, and then used the person’s name. He ended up addressing everyone by name. It seemed like such a small thing. There had to be more.

As he kept his eye on Noel he realized that he was doing something else. Again, it was so small, one could miss it if one were not careful. Noel was welcoming everyone to walked in the place. Everyone! Even when the owner might have waved or said hello to a patron, Noel would burst out with “In case no one has told you yet, let me be the first to welcome you!”

Could that be it? Calling a person by name and then authentically welcoming them? That was all it took?

After a week of this, the owner was looking at his books one night and he realized it was true. Noel was increasing business in the pub! Astounding.

From that day on, Noel never paid for another drink. Something that of course bothered him at first. “What’s the occasion?” he’d ask. At first the owner would just smile and say “We’re glad you’re here, Noel.” But after one or two quizzical looks, the owner broke down and spilled the secret. “Noel, when you are here, I do better business.”

“Ah,” said Noel. “I am all for better business! I suppose we could do this. Just as long as the work never became a job!”

“Of course, of course,” said the owner. “All you have to do is be you.”

“Well, that happens to be my specialty!” smiled Noel as he raised his glass.

And as he did, some old friends came in the door, “Ah, Marnie and Keith! Welcome! Cold outside eh? Come in!”

Jack Goeken: An Inventor Early in the Morning

Sep 182010
 

The name might not ring a bell. But his ideas touched most all of us.

Jack Goeken, inventor, who died at 80 this week in Joliet IL after a battle with cancer, had the idea, “What if anybody could talk to anybody else on the phone no matter where they were?”

Today, in 2010, that idea might sit along side ideas like, “What if everybody could sit in a car? Use indoor plumbing? Watch television? Go on-line? Grab a cold drink from the refrigerator?”

But none of those ideas would have shape, color, texture weight or smell without an inventor. Somewhere there was an inventor. There were artists, like the brilliant Ray Bradbury, who fueled our collective onward march of creation by envisioning sparkling diamond jewels of wonder like intergalactic space travel. And then there were inventors. People who took an idea and made something important happen.

Jack Goeken was an inventor. I never had the honor of meeting him, but I worked for a company he started, MCI Telecommunications. And even long after he left the company in 1974, the energy of the inventor, fueled and made huge by William McGowan, could still be felt in the day to day business of growing the idea of how anybody could talk to anybody else on a phone no matter where they were.

Oh, that and also not pay AT&T, the nations only phone company until MCI, for the privilege of doing so.

Jack Goeken learned microwave electronics in the US Army. He started an aircraft radio repair business. And then he had this idea.

What if we used microwaves for two-way communications for truckers on a 236-mile stretch of the old Route 66 that ran from Chicago to St. Louis? He and a couple of friends scrapped together $600. They called their company “Microwave Communications Services.” Later that name was shortened to MCI. The company became, at that time, the fastest growing company in the history of American business. Sometimes, when I worked for the company during the time now called its “Classic” period, someone would ask, “What does MCI stand for?” And we’d answer with the proud and crazy wings of youth, “Money Coming In.”

But in being the guy who was there first at MCI, Jack Goeken was just getting started.

Reflecting back on his remarkable legacy from afar, I wonder if he had a connection to the early mornings? Perhaps not literally. But I wonder if early in the morning brought him ideas. Early in the morning, that time when the streets, and the airwaves are most empty, the promise and the coming of a new day, a new chance, a new way to start a question no one had ever asked before with “What if. . .”

Perhaps early in the morning is when his ideas percolated up to the surface. Ideas like, “What if there was a way for florists, those stewards of fragile beauty, to process orders that could span the world?” And then Jack Goeken went and started the FTD Mercury Network that did just that.

Then some other early morning, he thought, “What if people could talk to each other from airplanes?” And started Airfone. Then a few years later started Airfone’s rival, In Flight Phone Corp, adding digital technology, e-mail, stock quotes and games.

Jack Goeken was once quoted as saying, “Everybody comes in and says you can’t do something, so I do it just to prove it.”

Jack Goeken. Inventor.

“Everybody comes in and says you can’t do something, so I do it just to prove it.”

There’s a thought to greet the sunrise and the early morning.

What if more people thought like that?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE8NSvD7LSE

Picasso, Janis Joplin and Kafka in the Job Interview

Sep 152010
 

From “Finding Work When There Are No Jobs.”
Copyright 2010 Roger Wright

Excerpted from Part Seven: Pictures of People Finding Work

In the tightly knit world of the autobody business in Los Angeles, they called Ron “Professor Painter.” Everybody knew him. Respected his skill in the paint booth. Gave him grief about always lecturing somebody on something. Telling stories. Bringing up some obscure fact. When the TV show Cheers was at its height, Ron was often compared to the know it all mailman Cliff Claiban.

Truth told, Ron was just curious. About pretty much everything. His amazing skill as a paint man in the shops had allowed him to make a comfortable living his whole life. He was born to do flawless work. And he did it in LA where the standards were very, very high. But the other advantage of his trade was it allowed long hours of pure thinking time. In the paint boot, Ron’s skill took over while his head circled the universe of all the literature he had read late at night when no one was around, all the music, all the art. Ron had finished high school. And then he’s really started learning.

And then he started learning. Learning was like a giant bag of crispy potato chips to Ron, when he started munching, he just couldn’t stop. And the result of this massive input of fact, fiction and imagination were stories. Some he kept to himself. When he could get someone to listen, he shared them.

But the other thing he did with them is that he used them to help work out whatever problem, whatever challenge he was having. Sometimes he found that if he could just make up a story about a problem, the story itself would bring the solution.

And the fact that body shops were shutting their doors faster than a tricked out 1962 cherry red Corvette Stingray on a desert road when no one was watching was a problem. Even a top tier paint man like Ron couldn’t find work. He’d spend his days going from shop to shop. Ron was a paint man, he was thorough. So he’d hit every shop. And no one said yes.

The Professor was starting to believe that it was true. That there were no jobs.

So he turned to story. And he thought, as he drove on to the next shop, what if 3 of history’s great artists went looking for a corporate job?
Ron had spent some time working for a corporation when he was younger. So he knew a bit about how they worked. In fact he had first discovered that making up stories was a terrific alternative to banging your head against a power point presentation when he worked for a corporation. So Ron had his three artists looking for jobs in corporations.

And as the story unfolded in his head, Ron wondered, “If I can figure out who, among these three, gets work first—maybe I can figure out how I could find work?”

So on that Tuesday morning, driving from one shop to the next, Ron began to say his story out loud,

PICASSO, JANIS JOPLIN AND KAFKA IN THE JOB INTERVIEW

An aging Picasso opens the door that says Human Resources; and peeks into the office. From behind the desk, a young woman of perhaps 23 stands up and motions for him to sit.
“Thanks for coming in Mr. Picasso. My name is Kristie. Any trouble finding the place?”

Picasso shrugs.

“Alrighty then. I’m going to be asking you a few questions about your background and experience. Then it will be your turn to ask me questions on this new role we’ve just put in place here at United Informers Equity. Then we can talk about next steps. “Okey doke?”

Picasso shrugs.

“So, I understand you are some sort of an artist? Do I have that right?”
Picasso reaches for a piece of paper on her desk. Turns it over and quickly sketches a dove. Pushes it over the desk to Kristie. He has yet to say a word.

“I see.” Kristie stands up and says. “Well, as you can imagine, we have lots and lots of people applying for this job. So we’ll be in touch. I don’t think we need to take any more of your time. Can you find your way out? OK then. Have a great day.”

Picasso shrugs and leaves the room.

One door down, in the next Human Resources Office; Janis Joplin knocks and a young man named Timmy, who is also Kristie’s special friend at work, says; “Why yes Ms. Joplin. Thanks for coming in. Any trouble finding the place?

Janis Joplin coughs. Clears her throat and says, “Got any coffee? Rough night last night.”

Timmy frowns, cocks his head and says, “I am so sorry. Fresh out. But if I may? I understand you are some sort of singer? Is that right? Do you have a resume?”

Janis Joplin shakes her head no. then says, “All I brought is this.” She reaches over, runs her hand along the top of Timmy’s monitor, and a video of her singing “Try, Just a Little Bit Harder” begins to play.

“Well,” says Timmy when the video ends. “That certainly was something. We will certainly let you know if anything comes up. These are hard times you know Ms. Joplin. So we’ll let you know.”

And as Janis Joplin leaves the sterile little office here’s what happens.
The lights blaze on bright in every single Human Resources department.
In every country in the world. No matter what time it is.
No matter what year it is. No matter what century.
And a stoop shouldered brooding young man with a very, very old soul named Franz Kafka coughs as he sits down for the first time inside a giant stone building in a Prague of a much earlier time.

Outside the sign on the building reads “The Worker’s Accident Insurance Institute for the Kingdom of Bohemia.”

“Ah Herr Kafka,” says Human Resources Director Getz. So glad you could come in. It says here you are a writer?”

And Kafka replies

“As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself in his bed transformed into a giant insect.”

Director Getz slaps his palm on the polished oak top of his desk and says,
“Splendid Herr Kafka! You know that just this morning; we had a man go missing. A writer. Who knew we’d need another one! Herr Kafka? You’re hired!”
——————
Ron laughed to himself, remembering how he always loved that line. Aways loved that line about the guy turning into a bug. Then he started thinking, “How come Kafka found work? Why didn’t Janis Joplin or Picasso?

And that was when it hit him It was so simple, that the Professor never saw it. Not till he started playing, making up stories.

Kafka was replacing a missing person.

Ron was going from shop to shop because he knew people. But mostly because he was methodical. Liked to do things in an organized, logical, thorough manner. He was talking about his experience. Even before he found out of the shop had any missing persons.

Ron skipped the next shop. Pulled over into the parking lot of a Carl’s Jr. hamburger joint. And started punching numbers on his cell phone. In an hour, he had contacted 10 shops. Something that would have taken him a day if he had gone to all 10 in person. One of the shops, a nice operation run by an old friend named Lori who used to train shop owners in East L.A. back when they both had corporate jobs, was in panic mode.

Lori’s painter had just stormed out. She had 5 vehicles to get out right now.

Ron told her not to panic. 15 minutes later he was at her shop. And instead of trolling for jobs, Ron had work.

Kristin’s Chorus

Sep 102010
 

Excerpted from “Finding Work When There Are No Jobs”
AFTERWORD: Quick Portraits of People Who Found Work By Thinking Differently

Kristin was a teacher. She had always been a teacher. It’s all she knew how to do.

She had begun teaching in high school. Then special education for emotionally disturbed kids. From there, came the learning that what she was really good at was being a coach.

And as she got better, she realized that coaching adults was where she excelled.

She went into corporate training, talent management, all sorts of different titles that all came down to the same thing, helping someone else get better at what they do. That was it.

To her, it was like a chorus. Or better yet, a duet. Singing together just sounded better. And when she was teaching teachers, managers, or writing the training, or delivering the work, planning or training sessions herself, and she was at her best, it became like a chorus.

She loved every minute of it.

Up until the time when there were no jobs. Teachers were being laid off in every city. And if you worked with adults? In business? To help them reach their goals? That was like being a blacksmith.

So Kristin got in the job search line. And it made her very tired, very fast. She knew the goal was to sell herself. She’d done sales training that had generated millions and millions and millions of dollars for the folks she supported. She’s even sold her training. But selling herself was different.

It was as if she was trying to sing every part in the chorus herself. It just wasn’t working.

So she started thinking. She had spent her life helping others be better singers. Why stop now? So Kristin decided that she’d be quiet.

Perhaps he wisest move by anyone in a helping profession.

She decided she’d be quiet and let the other members of the chorus sing her praises.

Kristin wrote this letter. And in the letter—SHE was quiet. She used other people’s words. She made her own chorus. She used variations of the letter for 50 organizations where there might be work. No jobs. Work.

And in 2 months she had three offers for work.

The letter was successful.

Now Kristin gets to sing in a chorus where everyone is on key. And they are all singing the very same song.
———————————————

Dear Ms. White;

Speaking directly to your three criteria for the Program Manager role; I thought I’d share the words of others on what kind of a fit I’d be:

Collaboration: Beth Ohura.
Chicago Public Schools Director of Professional Development.

I’ve known Kristin Smith for a number of years, Kristin has a success record for building leadership capacity for the full spectrum of educators all over the world, but Chicago is her home. In my role as Chicago Public Schools Director of Principal Professional Development, and later as a CPS principal, Kristin has demonstrated in our interactions a commitment to the children of Chicago above and beyond. Having been in both the private and public sectors, she brings a unique set of talents. As a staff developer, Kristin puts others first. He is enthusiastic and articulate, and sensitive to the people with whom he is working. She has an amazing ability to strategize so his methods match the learning needs and styles of the people in front of her. This is particularly important for reaching CPS teachers, as the various school cultures tend to be so idiosyncratic and unpredictable at times. She will know where to facilitate, where do provoke thinking, and where to push, always with an eye to getting others to develop their own voice and sense of efficacy. I think this makes her a great match for your programs, because what Kristin relishes more than anything else is making other people successful. I strongly urge you to consider her for a position.

Curriculum Development and Delivery: Robert Alexander. Vice President. Southern Data.

Kristin invigorated our leadership development program at Southern Data. She is a thought leader who knows how to implement. She developed programs that were known for pertinent content that challenged status quo thinking. These programs allowed senior leaders to evaluate current leadership skills and to embrace new skills. Her in depth knowledge of this practice area gave her a tremendous amount of credibility with the leaders at Southern Data. I would recommend Kristin to any organization looking to increase their leadership skills.

Delivering the training: Melissa Waller, Vice President. Telecom Inc.

I was privileged enough to have Kristin as an instructor/trainer for a year long leadership candidate program I was involved in at Telecom. Upon initially meeting Kristin, I was immediately drawn to her charisma and approachability.

She is one of the best motivators I have ever been around; she is a very positive and creative thinker who has a very real talent to put context around anything that comes up in discussions. Her knowledge and ability to ‘link the world together’ are a very rare combination. She always promoted an atmosphere of true and honest knowledge sharing among the group involved and never made you feel like any comment was unwelcome.

She genuinely cares about others and I loved to witness her in action. I was in ‘awe’ of her everyday. I’ve never met anyone who is more inspiring and who promotes the growth and development of others like Kristin does. She is one of those people that you just enjoy and you find yourself wanting to be like her – Anyone that meets Kristin will be blessed in many ways. Her spirit, knowledge, enthusiasm and professionalism will benefit any person or any organization he is ever involved with.”
—————-
As you review the mountain of resumes composed of folks talking about themselves; my hope is that you’ll remember this note—composed of other people—not me—talking about what I could bring to your company.

And it would be a true joy if this prompted a conversation with you.

Take Care,

Kristin Sang
312-555-1212

Mayor and Maggie Daley at Home

Sep 082010
 

“Daley the son?” Lester snorted, “They’ll write books about him, Roger. Books.”

Not even Lester knew that the announcement of Mayor Daley’s retirement would come today. And Lester knew just about everything. The press release said “Major Cabinet Announcement.” When the Mayor spoke today, there were eight reporters in the room. Afterwards, the eyes of his security detail were wide with shock and none of them were answering the constant rings of their cell phones. This was a family decision. And only family knew.

So on this bright blue breezy afternoon in early September, a day when it seemed that the swirling winds of coming autumn simply wouldn’t stop, I skipped the afternoon coffee.and walked a couple extra blocks to Langes on Southport. Last of the old man bars in the neighborhood.

Wouldn’t hurt to get an early start, a few beers and shots with Lester. The Mayor was retiring. That was worth a drink. One way or another, that was worth a drink. Because this was big news

In Chicago, you don’t need a last name for him. He’s the Mayor. He’s been the Mayor for 21 years. No one had been Mayor for longer. Except of course his father. But not by much.

Pushing in the dirty glass door, Lester in his spot in the corner of the bar, hunched over staring into his Pabst Blue Ribbon, faded plaid hat and ancient eyes. I nodded to the bartender, held up 2 fingers, and there were two frosty PBR’s and shots of Jim Beam on the bar before I could even sit down.

“Think power Roger, before you do anything else, think power.’ Lester never bothered with hello. It was all one continuing conversation.

“But is this a good thing?”

“Pfftttt.” Lester spat on the floor. “Good thing! Which part of the airplane you looking at boy?”

“Huh?”

“I said, which part of the airplane you looking at!” He knocked back his Jim Beam and signaled for another. He knew I was buying. “You looking at the wings, the tail, the color of the seats, the size of the pilot’s chair? You ask if this is a good thing, that depends on which part of the airplane you looking at.”

“Not sure I’m following you Lester. Airplanes? You talking about the time the mayor sent the bulldozers into Meigs Field in the middle of the night? Tore up the runways and put in a park?”

“Ah, I ain’t taught you nothing, have I? No, I’m not talking about that. OK, how about this. When was the last time you saw a flower, Roger?”

“”Well, just over on Ashland I guess. On my way here. All the flowers spilling out from the planters in the middle of the boulevards . . . .it really is beautiful.”

“Who you think made sure all those flowers were planted? All those trees? Who do you think did that Roger?”

“Well yeah I know. I know the Mayor was into that stuff. But we got big problems here. We got crime. We got no jobs. Schools, taxes. A corruption tax of $300 million dollars a year! Lotta people think the Mayor is a crook! What’s up with the flower Lester!”

“Lotta people think the President is a Muslim too. Course we got all that. We got the made up problems and we got the real problems. We got an Olympic bid that didn’t work. We got a Children’s Museum that he wanted to build underground. We got it all here!”

“So why should I pay attention to the flowers?”

“You ain’t looking at the whole airplane Roger. You’re thinking like some kind of Senator or something.”

“You mean I should think positive?”

“Hell no! That’d be your worst mistake. Even worse than not seeing the flower. Of course it’s a friggin mess. Of COURSE it is. But did you listen to what he said?”

“He said it was time.”

“Then that’s your answer Roger. That’s your answer. It’s time. And when he said it was the right time for his family, did you see her smile?”

“Maggie? His wife?”

“Of course Maggie! Who do you think, the Queen of England!”

“But what does that mean, It’s time?”

“Here’s what it means Roger. It means that none of us know how much time we have. So when you start thinking about that, when you start thinking hard, when you see the whole airplane and you remember the single flower, then it’s time.”

“”I don’t know. A lot of people don’t like him!”

“So what?”

“And replacements?”

Lester interrupted. “He was a giant Roger. And all the boys lining up at the trough because they think this is easy? They think this is some sort of free ride? Start thinking about who among all of them loves this place like he does. Start thinking about who is tough enough to not be liked. It is a pretty small list.”

“So Lester? One more question. When you get right down to it, do you think he did it for her?”

“Maggie? Or Chicago?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Well then, I’ll tell you the answer Roger.

The answer is yes. He did it for her.”

—————————————————–

“it isn’t hard to love a town for it’s greater and lesser towers, it’s pleasant parks or it’s flashing ballet. Or for it’s broad and bending boulevards, where the continuous headlights follow, one dark driver after the next, one swift car after another, all night, all night and all night. But you never truly love it till you can love its alleys too. Where the bright morning faces of old familiar friends now wear the anxious midnight eyes of strangers a long way from home. A midnight bounded by the bright carnival of the boulevards and the dark girders of the El.

Where once the marshland came to flower.

Where once the deer came down to water.”

Nelson Algren

“Chicago. City on the Make”

She Would Look Different Each Time

Aug 292010
 

The Lord’s mercies never come to an end, they are new every morning.
Lamentations 3:22-23

The endless wet heat that August of 1930, as if the prehistoric swampy soul of Chicago could at any moment burst up through the ground itself and the floods would take it all. A world now gone underneath a gray sickly sea.

But the waters held back. So she stepped inside the church, slid into a pew unseen and started listening. She had been to this church before. She would be here again. And if you were to see her, she would look different each time.

She would look different each time.

At the end of the service, the pastor told the congregation that if they were with him, they could come next door and say goodbye. And he then he turned his back to the church and walked out the door. The people of the church finished the hymn without the pastor, walked together out another door, down some stairs and began to talk. She followed.

Then a leader got up and began to speak. And as she listened she smiled, thinking of her father. The leader told the story. All of it. Left nothing out. A story like many stories she had heard through the eons.

The leader spoke without blame. Repeating, “I am speaking without blame” again and again like a steady ancient drum. She heard the echoes of all the wandering souls who work very, very hard. Who do the best work they can do. She heard a whole group of leaders doing every single thing they could do.

There are no stones unturned here.

She thought again of her father. How he had smiled and then had put the first scientist on earth. The scientist knew how to look at the problem from every angle. To ask others to look too. To step back and look again. To seek mediation and good counsel. Then to take a breath. Say a prayer and have faith. In this group of leaders, she saw the loving balance of what happens when science meets faith.

She saw, as she had so many times before in conversations just like this one, how her father lets us create our own fate in so very many ways. Not all ways. But so very many.

She saw how real leaders, like these people, make the decision that we put them there to make. Even when the decision isn’t easy.
Even if we all don’t like it. They make the decision. That’s what leaders do.

Then she saw how the leaders let everyone who was hurt be hurt. She saw who chose to leave the room before the conversation ended.

Finally, this time, on this visit, she spoke. On that hot August day in 1930, she made herself visible and said, “This is my first time in your church.” Looking as she looked today, it really was her first time. She continued, ” And I have to say, if this is how you handle problems, I am very impressed.”

The people of the church welcomed her. They all said,

“We’re glad you’re here.”

They didn’t just say it. Or reference it. They meant it.

Then an older voice chimed in, echoing tender mercies of the morning from across the world, a strong woman’s voice ringing of green new misty mountain Welsh villages. And this voice from church history said, “This is a broken leg. We set it. It heals. We move on.”

So the meeting ended. Someone turned to the stranger who even now looked different from when she first came in, and said “We hope you’ll be back.”

She smiled and said, “I will.”

And then the church began to sing.
—————————————–
Link to Jeff Tweedy and Mavis Staples “Wrote a Song For Everyone”
http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1418433766?bctid=593531762001

Jimmy Webb’s Soldiers Writing Home

Aug 222010
 

Grandfather Youseef. No one knows him by any other name. He pulls his hands out of the hot soapy dishwater in the back of the Pakistani restaurant on Devon Avenue in Chicago on a hot and tired August night. He looks down from the map of Pakistan flashed by CNN on the crackling television bolted high on the wall of the kitchen. On that map runs the path of the flood. He hears, “a land mass the size of Italy now under water.” He envisions the towering noble shade tree that stood at the path leading into his village. It’s top branches now peeking out helplessly from the swirling raging waters. As he pictures the tree drowning, he dreams up the smell of bread baking in her kitchen. And he knows that she’s gone too.

So he dries his hands on his pants. Looks over at the swinging door to the dining room as the younger man, the owner he sometimes calls Nephew, plods through carrying a gray plastic bin of dirty dishes, and motions with his chin up to the television set, now flashing images of Chinese airplanes unloading food crates and American helicopters threading their way into tiny landing patches filled with people who now have nothing, surrounded by the rushing waters.

The owner stops for a moment, shrugs his shoulders. Grandfather Youseef stares hard at him and the owner answers back by shaking his head yes.

As the owner places the grey dish bin between the sink and the dishwashing machine and plunges his own hands into the soapy water, Grandfather Youseef shuffles head down, to the grocery cart that holds his life and pulls it out behind him through the back door of the restaurant into the wet, warm alley and then out to Western Avenue where he turns north and shuffles towards the nearest spot of open land.

At the Honda Dealership he crosses at the light, walking into Warren Park against the throngs of sweaty, shouting children and weary warm streams of adults crawling through the heat back home. As Warren Park empties and drains its human sea, Grandfather Youseef walks to the middle of an open field of grass. Then, as streetlights become the only lights he stops and pulls a scrunched up lightweight tarp from his grocery cart. He grabs a handful of what looks to be sticks, and with a sudden burst of swift and sure movement, he fashions up a tent.

His first smile of the evening at how quick he made that tent appear. If she were here right now. If they were 21 again. If she would have watched him strong and sure make that tent rise fast as if they were in their prime right now, oh how she would have laughed the music of rainbows, then told him. “That was nice, but next time watch me make the tent rise faster. Stand aside and watch a woman work!”

All three walls of the blue tent standing, he crawls inside to a deeper darkness. Like he is crawling into time. Holding close the three battered books from the bottom of the cart. His Koran, Tao Te Ching and Christian Bible. He hugs them all to his chest in the darkness of the tent.

The thought that comes then is a Christian verse from the book of Isaiah; there is no need to open the book as knows the verse by heart.

“I, the Lord, am the vineyard’s keeper; every moment I water it.
I guard it night and day so that no one can harm it.”

He speaks out loud to the empty tent walls, “ Isaiah 27. Verse 3.”

As he speaks to the walls he pictures her again. Not at 21, but at 16. Hiding behind a tree watching while he and his friend tossed a red rubber ball back and forth, scuffling up the dust of the village road. Peeking out with a quiet smile every time it was his turn to throw. Picturing the red ball against the blue sky of home. All of it now under water.

Then from the death of the water, his mind moves north from Pakistan.

A thousand miles north. Into the winds of blazing fire sweeping across Russia. Miles and miles and miles of fire making forests burn and blanketing Moscow with smoke.

Once, at 21, they had plans to leave their village and perhaps try Moscow. But now their village was under water and the forests around Moscow were burning. Moscow now just another place that they would never see.

From those massive raging fires just about to hit the remnants of Chernobyl and trigger the release of all those buried gases, he pictured another fire, this one tiny.

On a beach, way back then just after the long journey to America. She was here. Just a quick visit to America. A quick visit he hoped would last forever. For awhile she was here. And there was this one night with another fire.

This fire of gentle, glowing embers on the sand, looking out into the gulf stream waves from the summer beaches just outside of Gulfport Mississippi. Way back then there were fires that could simply warm. Joyful rain that could simply soothe. Once she was here. In America. With him.

When she was here, no one was alone.

On that beach the Gulf winds rocked a wave whispering a rhythm that just they knew.

Now those very same waves and winds brought in swirling plumes of oil. Slithering under the waves and not going anywhere, ready to kill.

In fear this time, he said the verse from Isaiah out loud.

“I, the Lord, am the vineyard’s keeper; every moment I water it.
I guard it night and day so that no one can harm it.”

A rumble of a Chicago police car in the distance. The spotlight on the tent. The rookie on the passenger side opens the door, but the old cop driving shakes his head no and says, “That’s the Grandfather. Let him be. We got to find the kid.”

Grandfather Youseef thinks through the verse a third time,

I, the Lord, am the vineyard’s keeper; every moment I water it. I guard
it night and day so that no one can harm it.”

And then he smiles in understanding. Because he finally sees the War. He finally makes the connection.

The oil, the fires and the floods. All of them connected. It is all one war. This rage against the planet. The larger home we all share. He shakes his head in disbelief at the phrase “Act of God” Because the oil and the floods and the fires, these are NOT acts of God.

From the settled evening stillness of Warren Park, his muffled old man shout from the inside of his tent, “It is all one war. We are choking the life from the planet. That is the war!”

As he shouts he doesn’t even know the half of it. He does not know that a thousand miles north at the top of the world, a chunk of ice the size of Rhode Island has just that moment broken loose completely and began to float south.

For a moment he is sorry for those who really don’t know how to tell the difference between themselves and God. He wonders what it will take for them to see their personal connection to the war against the land.

And immediately he knows. It will take a story. Because the story is what lasts. A story is the only thing more powerful then the forces that join to rage against the planet.

He looks around at the closed in walls of his tent and the walls tell him which story.

The walls answer. The walls speak the only story that’s about all of us sons and daughters of Abraham and all the other prophets of the East.

So just like Father Abraham, in the very same story told in the Koran, the Bible and of course the Torah, Grandfather Youseef raises the walls of his tent. He leaves the walls open on this tiny little patch of deserted city. He stands beneath his tent, now open to all the summer winds. He does the hardest thing there is to do, he does what’s been lost to all the sons and daughters of Abraham.

He opens his tent to the stranger. He simply opens his doors.

Without one shred of a clue who will arrive. He gets ready to welcome a stranger.

He gets ready to welcome “the Other,” the one who is different from him.

He says to himself:

Because in this war, if I could just do what Father Abraham did. The most powerful story I know. Maybe she would hear. And if she would hear, then maybe a stranger could hear too. Showing her will help me show the world.

In opening my door to a stranger, I am connecting to all.

If she heard me write this. Like I too was a soldier writing home. Then maybe I too would have left something behind.

If I could just do that, maybe it would be like any soldier writing home from the wars, home to where she stood hiding behind that big tree on the path that led into the village. Just a soldier, being every soldier, writing home from the one giant and most wicked war, the war against the planet.

Writing home to say to her.

“It wasn’t God that did this to the earth. It wasn’t God, it was us.

.

If the story is what lasts, then the soldier writing home will make the story stronger.

If every soldier writes home then everyone will hear. It’s all one big war against the planet.

Grandfather Youseef looked out into the darkness, searching for the stranger, but all he saw was a tiny little black-eyed boy of seven drinking a bubble tea.

“Why are you here?” he asked the boy. “Is it not too late for you?”

The boy shrugged his shoulders, “I don’t know. I can’t find my Daddy.”

“Where do you live?”

“Granville and Western. Do you know where that is Grandfather?”

“Yes my son. Come, I will walk you home.” Grandfather Youseef then took down his tent. He had been in America for most of a life time now. But he had also never left that dusty village road and that tree she was hiding right behind.

Thinking back, he had always been a soldier writing home. And he wondered how many of his letters she had heard. How many dispatches from the front lines of the war.

He wondered if she’d hear this story. The one where he raised the walls of his tent and welcomed the little black-eyed boy.

Perhaps some day he would put his soldiers letters home from the war to music.

Just like Jimmy Webb did here. A song that must be listened to with brand new ears to know it was a letter from a soldier home. A letter just like his.

You could listen to a song a million times and never hear it. Then you hear the composer sing it. Punctuated by a story of what the song is really about. And it’s a whole new song.

And this song by Jimmy Webb?

Best letter home Grandfather Youseef had ever heard.

He remembered the line, “She was 21, when I left Galveston.” And as he remembered that line he knew that none of the geography mattered. A letter home from the war could be from anywhere.

It was all the same war.

And she is always standing, looking out to sea.

So as the war went on, the old man told himself that he would just keep writing letters home. Trying to be like Jimmy Webb. Because that’s all he knew how to do. The old man whistled a few bars of the Jimmy Webb song.

Then he looked down at the lost boy who had appeared at the door of his tent and offered him bubble tea, reached for his hand, and said,

“Let’s go young one, I’ll help you find your father.”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfYJKpLX1xw&fs=1&hl=en_US]

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