Remembering Leslie Scalapino

There are some wonderful -- explicative (by which I mean articulate) and moving -- remembrances of Leslie Scalapino being published.

Lyn Hejinian, Leslie Scalapino Remembered:

With the death of Leslie Scalapino on May 28, 2010, the world loses a writer whose visionary thinking provided her with a range of intensely experienced themes and images. It also informed the syntax of her language, which one might readily term experimental but which, more to the point, was a manifestation of the incessant vigilance she imposed on her mind and its articulations. The effort that her writing entailed was motivated by her conviction that action (e.g. writing, but also teaching, editing, publishing, insisting) and being (the present of anything or everything) are inseparable. One is one with the present. Everything is creative....

Leslie's generosity to poets (as a teacher, as an editor, as a publisher, and as an audience member at readings) was an expression not only of interest but of her ferocious persistence on behalf of something larger than art, though art was central to it. Leslie—in every facet of her complex and committed life—was engaged in a struggle for truth. It wasn't a transcendent truth but the truth of justice—particular and specific to the instant. She was an unprecedentedly original writer, because she was so very much an original thinker. She was also a fiercely compassionate writer. Suffering and injustices (of circumstance, of other people's thoughts as well as actions) were persistent themes in her writings, which sought (and spotted) alternative terrains for being, however fleetingly they could be glimpsed or said to exist.

R.D. Pohl, at ArtsBeat, Scalapino's writing punched a hole in reality, includes this about her latest published work:

Her most recent volume Floats Horse-Floats or Horse-Flows was published in March by Buffalo-based Starcherone Books. Based on the notion of "alexia" or "word-blindness (but not arising from a nervous disorder)," Scalapino generated a narrative in which "unknown words create a future."

How to describe the book? It's set in a kind of inchoate or apocalyptic continuous present in which strip miners, wounded soldiers, and dislocated polar bears wander across a deforested, animal and human corpse strewn landscape, orphaned girls are trafficked on the streets of Calcutta, insurgents sweep across the desert in Toyota pick-ups, a female detective named Grace Abe tracks a band of animal poachers across the hinterlands of Tibet, while elsewhere Venus and Serena Williams face off in a tennis match the main focus of which is Venus' "deconstructed forehand," an American president and his henchmen act to advance the interests of corporation named Haliburton, and poet named Creeley appears Virgil-like to a female narrator named One in her dreams.

It's a beautiful, horrible, synaesthetic vortex seemingly spun out of an intentionally disassociative lexicon the paradoxical end result of which is the tenuous possibility of freedom and social action. New York City based writer Douglas Manson, who read the book last year while living in Buffalo and working as an editor for Starcherone Books, recently wrote the following about it:

"I read the manuscript last year, and finally understood what she was trying to do--that the mind comes to recognize itself in the act of reading, with emphasis on "act". I've never read a book as difficult as that one, but also never read a book that made the activity of reading such a conscious, palpable one. She understood the way language structures thought so thoroughly that she could write both its trauma and apotheosis. It's not a book one likes or dislikes, but will show you, through your senses, exactly what the mind is doing when it reads."

Leslie Scalapino reads from Floats Horse-Floats or Horse-Flows, recorded and produced by Konrad Steiner. Feb. 14, 2010
(distributed by PennSound / BlipTV




New York Memorial for Leslie Scalapino
Monday, June 21, 2010 8:00 pm
Poetry Project St. Marks Church

Petah Coyne, Simone Fattal, Joan Retallack, Mei-mei Berssenbrugge, Charles Bernstein, Susan Bee, Ann Lauterbach, Susan Howe, Paolo Javier, Molissa Foley, Fiona Templeton, Laura Elrick, Rodrigo Toscano, Steve Clay, Rachel Levitsky, James Sherry, Pierre Joris, Judith Goldman, E. Tracy Grinnell, Tom White & others

There will be a wine and cheese reception to follow.

The Memorial follows two performances of Scalapino’s Noh play Flow–Winged Crocodile at Poets House
Saturday, June 19, at 7:00pm & Sunday, June 20, at 2:00pm
Directed by Fiona Templeton, with Katie Brown, Stephanie Silver and Julie Troost. Dance by Molissa Fenley. Music by Joan Jeanrenaud. Projected drawings by Eve Biddle. Cosponsored by Belladonna and The Poetry Project.
$10, $7 for students and seniors, free to Poetry Project and Poets House Members

Buddhist funeral ceremony
officiated by Abbot Norman Fischer
Thursday July 1, 2010
San Francisco Zen Center Green Gulch Farm
1601 Shoreline Highway Muir Beach, CA 94965-9759
for directions and parking: www.sfzc.org/ggf/
2pm in the Green Dragon Temple; 4-5:30 reception in the Wheelwright Center

In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to: The San Francisco Zen Center, 300 Page St., San Francisco, CA 94102 Poets in Need, PO Box 5411, Berkeley, CA 94705 Reed College for the Leslie Scalapino Scholarship, 3203 Southeast Woodstock Blvd., Portland, OR 97202-8199 The AYCO Charitable Foundation, PO Box 15203, Albany, NY 12212-5203 for the Leslie Scalapino-O Books Fund to support innovative works of poetry, prose and art

San Francisco Memorial: Readings with poets, artists & friends
Friday November 19, 2010 (date to be confirmed)
Maude Fife Room, 315 Wheeler Hall
University of California, Berkeley
Time & further details TBA

Education Matters: The 2010 UC-B Summer Reading List

Incoming undergraduates have now received the annual Summer Reading List put together by University of California at Berkeley faculty and staff. This year's theme is Education Matters:

In this uneasy period for public education, rife with budget cuts, fee increases, and struggling schools, both in California and across the country, it seemed to us a good time to examine stories about and issues in education. After all, we here at Berkeley have chosen to work in higher education, and those of you about to join us have decided to pursue your bachelor’s degrees, so while all of us will spend much of our time concerning ourselves with what we’re doing and how we’re going to do it, it also seems worth thinking about why we’re doing it. The following series of recommended books — memoirs, biographies, arguments, poetry, fiction, and one blog —form a compelling collection that can help us get at this question. We suspect that more than one of them will appeal to you...

Jennifer Dorner
Head, Instructional Services
Doe/Moffitt Libraries

Michael Larkin
Lecturer, College Writing Programs

Each recommended reading is paired with a comment by the nominating faculty or staff, and is followed by a short blurb about that teacher. For access to the UC Berkeley Library Web Catalog, go here.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Alex Haley
New York: Ballantine Books, 1965
A complete education on three fronts: the streets, the slammer, and politics. This book really opened my eyes to hidden facts about the U.S. and how we treat people of color. But beyond that I learned about how a man can evolve from ignorance to sophistication without ever stepping inside a classroom. Thanks to Haley’s book I took it upon myself to master the dictionary as much as possible, starting with “that little Aardvark” as Malcolm so eloquently put it. Highly recommended for incoming or outgoing students.

Alvaro Lopez-Piedra
Library Assistant, Monographic Receiving Unit
Spanish/Italian/Portuguese Collections
Alvaro Lopez-Piedra works in the Technical Services Unit at Moffitt Library. His responsibilities include processing Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Catalan book shipments, communicating with vendors and book selectors, and occasionally helping in the mail room. In his spare time his face is buried in a book or in his music collection.


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Educating Esmé: Diary of a Teacher’s First Year
Esmé Raji Codell
Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2001
This is an inspiring book following Codell’s first year of teaching as a 24-year-old in a new public school in Chicago. She includes funny and heart-rending stories of her struggles to teach troubled students with sometimes wacky approaches, while simultaneously contending with an undermining school principal, gang members, and abusive parents as well. All of it is told in her distinctive voice. Hard to put down. Hard to forget.

Martha Olney
Adjunct Professor
Department of Economics
A recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award, Martha Olney has taught Economics at Cal since 1992.


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Three Cups of Tea
Greg Mortensen
New York: Viking, 2006
This is a fascinating account of a Berkeley RN/mountain climber in the Himalayas who became close to the villagers who saved his life, and decided to build a school for their children. The project faced many obstacles, but he and they prevailed, and he went on to build many schools in rural Pakistan. The Taliban and conservative forces tried to limit the schools to boys only, but the author and his Pakistani allies insisted that girls be allowed to attend on an equal basis with boys. These schools help Pakistanis see another side of Americans, and win hearts and minds away from terrorism.

Nancy K. D. Lemon
Lecturer
UC Berkeley School of Law
Nancy K.D. Lemon teaches courses in Domestic Violence Law, both at Boalt Law School and in the Legal Studies Program (for undergraduates). Her graduate students come from public policy, sociology, social welfare, and ethnic studies, as well as law.


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No Right to Remain Silent: The Tragedy at Virginia Tech
Lucinda Roy
New York: Harmony Books, 2009
As Chair of the English Department, Roy provided Seung-Hui Cho with a tutorial in poetry after he was removed from a class for his threatening behavior. Cho later killed 32 people and wounded many others in an on-campus attack, and then killed himself. This book provides a close look at Cho from Roy’s perspective, but more important, she examines how Virginia Tech handled—and in some instances mishandled—information about Cho’s disabilities, its release of information to the public, and its response to the killings. Roy looks closely at issues of free speech, administrative red tape, and the relationship between “town and gown.” Many of the security measures now in place at UCB and other universities resulted from this tragic event in 2007. Not intended to scare, this book is a close examination of university culture.

Jane Hammons
Lecturer
College Writing Programs
Jane Hammons is a recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award and teaches upper and lower division courses in writing for CWP. Her writing can be found in The San Francisco Chronicle Magazine, Columbia Journalism Review and literary magazines such as Alaska Quarterly Review, Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, and Southwestern American Literature.


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Winning the Dust Bowl
Carter Revard
Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2001
EVERYONE should read this memoir. Coming from the American heartland, Revard tells a classic story of his success rising from humble beginnings as a mixed-race kid growing up during trying economic times. He recounts his story with a mix of pictures and stories of his family, as well as with exemplary poems and prose. Yet it goes beyond that—it’s a subtle text on how to write poetry; it’s also the story of how we become who we are, what shapes us and speaks to us as human beings, and what we all share. This is a true gem of a book. If you read it, you will never forget it.

John D. Berry
Librarian
Comparative Ethnic Studies and Native American Studies Collections specialist
Ethnic Studies Library
John Berry is of Choctaw/Cherokee/Scots-Irish/German heritage, an Oklahoma native, and a traditional stomp dancer. He is listed on the Native American Authors pages of the Internet Public Library, and has published poems both in print and on the web.


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Our Schools Suck: Students Talk Back to a Segregated Nation on the Failures of Urban Education
Gaston Alonso, Noel Anderson, Celina Su, Jeanne Theoharis
New York: New York University Press, 2009
The authors of this book examine the reality in which many students find themselves: confined to over-crowded, under-funded, segregated public schools. With fine-grained analysis and unflinching honesty, the authors challenge the prevailing idea that students and their “bad values” are to blame for the state of public education and, instead, hold responsible those who sustain structural inequalities and who perpetuate assumptions that criminalize and stereotype urban youth. Seamlessly woven throughout the text are the voices of students who “talk back” to those in power, critique their learning environments, and demonstrate their power as critical social actors. A terrific, compelling read.

Luisa Giulianetti
Assistant Director
Student Learning Center
Luisa Giulianetti loves working with students as they develop as writers. She is interested in composition studies and 20th century American literature, especially African American literature. She has taught seminars for writing tutors and composition courses, most recently in African American Studies.


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Why School? Reclaiming Education for All of Us
Mike Rose
New York: New Press, 2009
This short, compelling text takes the readers inside schools to see how the current, narrow focus on standardized assessment has “shrunk” the definition of education. (See also Rose's entry “Why I Wrote ‘Why School?’” posted on the author’s blog.) Rose brings us inside classrooms to offer illustrations of a broader definition that includes “curiosity, reflectiveness, imagination, or a willingness to take a chance, to blunder.” In a highly competitive environment like UC Berkeley, it is easy to let numbers drive teaching and learning and admissions. Rose’s little book asks us to reconsider the meaning of education in a democratic society: it’s about developing skills and being prepared for work, yes, but it’s about much more than that. And he asks us to put the question of “Why School?” at the center of the public debate.

Margi Wald
Lecturer
College Writing Programs
Margi Wald teaches courses in the College Writing Programs and is Director of the Summer English Language Institute. In addition to her ten years at UC Berkeley, she has taught in ESL and writing programs in Texas, Tennessee, Illinois, and abroad. Her research focuses on instruction in grammar and vocabulary and on academic literacy development among immigrant ESL students.


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Mike Rose’s Blog
Mike Rose, Professor of Social Research Methodology at UCLA, has written about education for years. As a nice complement to and extension of his recent book (see above), his relatively new blog offers timely entries with postings related to topics such as “the purpose of schooling in a democracy,” “education policy,” “race to the top,” “University of California Budget Cuts,” and “Obama and Education.”

Melinda Erickson
Lecturer
College Writing Programs
Melinda Erickson teaches undergraduate writing courses and graduate pedagogy seminars at Berkeley and works with teachers of English internationally.


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Five Stages of Greek Religion
Gilbert Murray
Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955
As an undergrad at UC San Diego, I was introduced to this book during discussions with members of the Philosophy Department there. The book is based on a series of lectures Murray gave at Columbia University in 1912 in which he traces the development of Greek religion through its early worship of Olympian gods, to Homeric epics, to the development of different schools of philosophy that pre-dated Christianity. Passages from this wonderful book have accompanied me through all the twists and turns of a lifelong devotion to learning and education.

Paul Hamburg
Librarian for the Judaica Collection
As librarian for the Judaica Collection, Paul Hamburg has developed a keen facility with Hebrew and Yiddish language databases, which he shares with interested faculty and students. His research interests include the History of the Hebrew Book and the Music composed in the Terezin Concentration Camp in Czechoslovakia during the Holocaust.


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The Education of Henry Adams
Henry Adams
New York: Oxford University Press, 2008

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin
Philadelphia: PENN/University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005

Coming of Age in Mississippi
Anne Moody
New York: Dell, 1976

Down These Mean Streets
Piri Thomas
New York: Vintage Books, 1997

A Midwife’s Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, based on her diary, 1785-1813
Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
New York: Vintage Books, 1991

Up From Slavery
Booker T. Washington
New York: Modern Library, 1999

Bread Givers
Anzia Yezierska
New York: Persea Books, 2003


When many people think of education they think of schools. I do as well. But I also think of learning, and I know that learning in its most profound forms often takes place far beyond schoolhouse walls: within families, homes, communities, and nature; at work and play; and in struggle. I recommend students read several of the books listed above and consider what learning is, where it takes place and under what conditions. I hope they will come away from their readings, as I have, with more expansive understandings of education, learning, and life.

Ingrid Seyer-Ochi
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Education
A former public high school teacher, Ingrid Seyer-Ochi is an anthropologist and historian of education whose research and teaching interests focus on urban education, the history of education, and diversity and inequality in schooling. Her most recent project is an ethnographic study of learning opportunities in three of Oakland’s most diverse and integrated neighborhoods. Her book, Smart on the Under: Excavating Opportunity in Urban America, is forthcoming.

the oasis

Dobby is clearly a gift, on loan to us.

He is the runt of Marmy Fluffy Butt's litter and from the beginning proved to be one of those special animals that comes along once in the lifetime of a blue moon.

Sam-I-Am continues to decline, steadily but slowly. I am moved by his decision to stay close to me, even though, clearly, there will be times I am going to wish he would glom onto someone else.

(More specifically... I hope he will decide to get off of my legs. Soon.)

But for now, it is a distinct honor. Much of my time is spent trying to get him to eat and drink.

I got up at 4 am and snagged an apple, kind of upset at how Sammy looked -- his eyes were very dull and he was exceedingly sluggish. The toxins normally cleared from his system by the kidneys and his liver are clearly taking over...

It suddenly seemed crucial that he drink some water -- just as, a few hours earlier, I staked the fate of the world on whether or not he would swallow my offering of a fragrant spoon of Super Supper. The Earth remains on its axis precisely because Sam-I-Am settled for a mouthful of plain yogurt.

Enter Dobby.

He surveys the situation, notes my near hysteria and Sammy's clear reluctance to imbibe...

And then begins a game of "Monkey see, Monkey do" that leaves me laughing, and Sammy, at least temporarily, hydrated.

Side by side at the bowls, they alternate between tapping their paws on the liquid surface and daintily lapping up the water.

I eat an apple.

Dobby pauses to give me a conspiratorial grin, then turns to lick Sammy gently on the head.

Maybe we can all grab a few more minutes of sleep.

Warscapes

It's been kind of a surreal day, and that's saying a lot.

Ferrying Sam-I-Am back and forth to the vet these past few days has been emotionally draining, as well as annoying, I'm sure, for Fred.

He refuses to put Sammy in a pet carrier, and holds him in his lap -- in the car, in the waiting room. (My suggestions that other pet owners might not be so thrilled with his choice evokes only the blankest of looks.)

While they were waiting for the vet today, Fred kept dozing off... and just when he'd reach the point of a real snooze, Sammy would promptly chirp at him.

"He would give me a look that said, 'Hey, can't you stay awake with me here? C'mon, my
human!'"

Sammy's chirps are legendary -- when he really needs you, he pulls it out of his bag o'tricks. Two tones, loud, and always accompanied by guilt-inducing looks.

Big eyes, the whole spiel. He's a wise guy.

[Sometimes he throws an elbow, if the chirp-und-glare routine falls flat.]

We left him at the vet, as we were having no luck getting him to eat. I was fast becoming his least favorite entity by coming at him with a syringe filled with water every half hour. Even so, he had not been able to swallow more than a few millilitres.

An x-ray showed that his liver was inexplicably small, while his spleen was inexplicably large.
His gastrointestinal tract, thanks to our insane twice daily doses of anti-furball elixir, was completely and totally empty -- no food, no masses, no kinks. An ultrasound showed some kidney damage (that's the extent of the explanation we received on the phone), and lab tests pointed to a possible kidney infection, as well. No imaging study, though, points to any obvious cancers, which is what we feared when the vet announced his excess spleen (you and I know he is channeling Baudelaire...).

All in all, not Sammy's day.

So it was very kind of the vet to call us late tonight with the news that the grey ghost was eating non-stop. The theory is that he felt renewed after getting lots of subq fluids. The vet estimates he'll be there a few days more, at least.

Considering we feared losing him this morning, we receive this news with great happiness this evening.

Unless I'm in an alternate universe?

I just glanced at the New York Times' headlines:

U.S. Identifies Vast Riches of Minerals in Afghanistan

The United States has discovered nearly $1 trillion in untapped mineral deposits in Afghanistan, far beyond any previously known reserves and enough to fundamentally alter the Afghan economy and perhaps the Afghan war itself, according to senior American government officials.

Anyone else get hit with the prescient heebie-jeebie shivers?

Sadly, A Repost: I. Need. A. Laxative.

I wish I had something more fascinating with which to entertain the remains of ERP's visitors, stopping by to gape at a Challenging Patient, but life is what it is, and today, that means a repost about constipation and sappy commentary about a cat-friend. I must say I was surprised when, checking back on his comment thread, I discovered myself to be a drug-seeker and a kook. Y'all be sure to shut the drawbridge -- and try not to fall in the moat on your way out.


I don't imagine there are many people out there who will be able to understand my frustration. That's why I like to call it My Frustration.

When I ask other people to help me, I relinquish most of my control over the way in which I want to be helped. In addition to lowering my exhaustive and incomparable standards, I give up control in ways never considered before the onset of Life as a Gimp.

Privacy. I have none! Influence? Fading, a mere effervescence.

I need a laxative. I mean, I have a laxative, but it isn't working. The situation is kind of dire. My mobility has been non-existent these past few weeks, and my narcotic doses are destined to be the stuff of legends. The only things I have going for me in the Poo Department are my Stellar Eating Habits (just ignore all the Diet Cola and popcorn). I mean, if an apple a day keeps the doctor away, then I cover the bases by eating two.

Still, hoping against hope that I can ask for what I want, get what I want, and all that, in a timely fashion, I presented myself to Fred, with a smile on my face and a song in my heart.

"Sweetie, I hate to interrupt you, but I need you to do something for me."

Fred heaved a sigh full of put-upon soul. I'm not exactly sure what he was doing, just that it had something to do with capacitors, as he had before him the famous Leyden Jar. One of them. It's a small obsession. (Some people make origami peace doves.)

When I want to get The Fredster a little something... special? I order one of those mysterious little plain brown paper package numbers -- you know, the ones full of "600 Capacitors: 20 each of 30 values."

Ceramic capacitors. Axial-Leaded Solid Tantalum Capacitors. Silver Micas. Yer Aluminum Electrolytic. Boy toys.

He was wearing his headlamp thingy, redundant multimeters spread round him in a semicircle, a god in his created world.

"Yeah? What do you need?" He asked, pleasantly.

"I need a laxative. I want to try that Miralax stuff that Dr. Go-To-Guy from MDVIP recommended a few weeks back. I don't care what it costs."

"But, Retired Educator, my love, you have a laxative. I just got you a bottle of 100 Senna Laxative, Sennosides 8.6 milligram tablets, comparable to Senokot, the Natural Vegetable Laxative, when was it... yeah, yeah... it was 12 days ago. The price? Hmm. An amazing $5.50! That was a great buy."

"Fred? Please, I really need your help. It will take you, what? 15 minutes, max?"


"That stuff can take a while to work, you know. Maybe you just need to give it a little more time? Have you had any bran cereal?"

"Darling," said I, enunciating with care, "I have had 24 Senokot over the last 3 days, tripled the amount of stool softener I take, and had 4 enemas. I have had bran cereal and prunes, apple after everlovin' apple, plus at least 96 ounces of water every day."

"Wow, that's impressive!"

"Thank you. Will you go to the store, please? Soon? I'm pretty miserable."

"Sure, no problem. I just need to finish this up, take a quick shower, then I'll get right on it. I should be back by one... We can watch that bad vampire movie, if you want. Have a cozy, lazy day?" Yes, Fred is manly enough that he can pull off "cozy." About once a week, he even comes out in support of "whimsy."

"Okay, thanks, Fred." I turned the wheelchair and started to speed back to the cozy confines of our bed, which is the only place my bloated, whimsical self wanted to be.

"Hey! Have you tried hot water? Some people drink hot water... With lemon."

The preceding conversation, so faithfully transcribed, took place around noon.

As mentioned a few posts ago, Fred was diagnosed with ADHD in 2001.

I just thought I would throw that into the present narrative for your consideration. Also, because it is now after 4 pm. I watched the movie: it was, indeed, about vampires, and was pretty bad -- the kind of bad movie that it is fun to watch with someone else. There is now a fresh bad movie on, but it is not nearly as good as the first one.

Fred seems to have knocked out a few more Jars of Leyden. He also appears to be entering with great glee into one of the Twitter fads: HengeClub. Yes, little groupings of capacitors on circuit boards, an Ode to Power, I suppose. HengeClub naturally appeals to him, as Fred is a druid, a neo-druid. In the same vein, he also makes Alternative Crèches -- the Nativity Under Water, Winnie the Pooh does Baby Jesus, and so on.

Yes, a neo-druid of the Reformed Druids of North America, or RDNA, with ADHD -- and unfortunately very fazed by the vastness of nature.

For what it is worth, DiscoJimbo has submitted our favorite Henge, called StonedHenge:

I was on the cusp of that sarcasm born of misanthropy when Fred stuck his head in to say: "I'm so sorry. I got distracted. I'm going now -- be right back."

And just like that, he was gone.

Guilt and gratitude, together, are quite potent. I am familiar with "I'll be right back," when used in conjunction with the grocery store in question, and expected his return in roughly 45 minutes, longer if he stopped to check new used book arrivals at the neighboring thrift shop.

Time enough to whip up a "vegetable plate" dinner, our bi-weekly tribute to diner food and something that my colon also appreciates. Scoping out the offerings of the veggie drawer, it looked to be a meal born of carrots, cabbage, and brocolli. I tossed the rotten cuke, and put on some brown rice, wasabi peanuts,and onions.

Enough roughage to blow out Fort Knox.

So I end up with a lovely carrot and lentil soup, nicely warmed with fresh ginger, and finished with just a scosh of coconut milk, served with a raw brocolli and cabbage slaw, and the rice. I don't much like brown rice but in hopes of restoring the gut? I am ready to do anything. More importantly, The Fredster loves it.

Round things out with some nice flatbread and hummus, and poof! A lovely meal. And as if on cue, I hear the drawbridge descending, and the dulcet tones of Ruby, the Honda CR-V, happy to be home.

Surely, given this meal and the soon to be had Miralax, surely, surely, my agony will end soon.

His arms full of groceries, an unexpected boon, Fred comes storming into the Medieval Kitchen common area -- that we have basically turned into a Breakfast Nook, with the help of judicious wallpaper, featuring mad trellises, peppered with lemons, of all things.

Fred frequently returns in a huff from shopping, as he seems to be an Idiot Magnet, encountering people whom he subsequently names numbered "twats," as in "Twat Number One," "Twat Number Two," and so on. (Gender, oddly enough, is irrelevant.)

I have protested the use of the word, but frankly? It doesn't bother me all that much. I guess I apologize to you, on his behalf, should it offend... but honestly, I don't think he even reflects on its meaning.

I ask, "What happened?" and turn to stir the soup, my heart sinking, my gut déçu.

"Well, I talked to that Twat of a Pharmacist over there, asking him what would be the best laxative for someone like you...

"For someone like me? How exactly does that work again? I keep forgetting..."

"You know what I mean -- you're in a chair, you take narcotics, there's a compelling history of small bowel obstructions..."

"What about the Miralax, did you get the Miralax?"

"Well, no. That Twat of a Pharmacist gave me this stuff, which he swears will work and be easier on you. It costs about a third as much -- plus you get a heck of a lot more. 50 for $3.39! I can always go back and get the MiraLax later, okay? It's ten bucks for just ten doses."

It chaps my ass. If I could just go to the store myself, by myself, on behalf of myself. I feel about three years old, I feel frustrated, manipulated. But more than anything, I feel constipated, and in a serious way that looks never, ever to be relieved.

With amazing calm, resigned now to a fate of death by constipation, I ask my sweet Fred what purgative the pharmacist has sent, my voice suddenly gone all sing-songy.

I don't even inquire anymore why purchasing the items I request is always such a freaking impossibility.

Fun times at Marlinspike Hall, deep, deep in the Tête de Hergé!

I think I'll put out some candles, use the tureen Aunt Nancy gave me, and some of the Haddock Family's finest china.

After we eat, there will be time enough to put up the bottles of white balsamic vinegar ("On sale! I got all they had!") -- the sesame oil, the teff flour, carefully measured.

Sammy, in Dobby's Embrace

Sam-I-Am, longtime feline friend, is very sick.

Life in The Manor is muted: The articulate, momentarily, lost...

And so, to stand in the gap, your prayers and thoughts are beseeched, and appreciated.

Sammy, in Dobby's embrace

Update, 15 June 2010: Sam-I-Am remains in the animal hospital, but may be released tomorrow. The good news is that he seems better, generally, and is eating. The bad news is that his kidney failure is pretty profound, and that he [likely] has lymphoma. We will be doing home infusions to keep his system as clean of toxins as possible, and him as comfortable as can be. We were told he was not a good candidate for chemotherapy. The vets have gone to great pains to stifle all irresponsible hope on our part, so we plan on showing Sammy a good time and lots of love until his quality of life dictates that we make the hard decision.

Update, 24 June 2010: Sammy came home a week ago, and it really is touch and go. Yesterday, for example, I got him to eat about half a normal amount of food. Today, he declined to eat or drink, until about 10 pm, and then only licked a bit of food off of my fingers. Sometimes all he will eat are "dental treats" -- by Greenie. His throat apparently hurts, as he clearly wants water and food but usually ends up staring at it (and then glaring at me, as if I engineered this situation). Dobby remains on his wings, getting in the way of everything and generally being a great comfort. Marmy Fluffy Butt and Uncle Kitty Big Balls are, above all, perplexed -- but also enjoy glaring at moi, as they are not being entertained in the manner to which they are accustomed. Well, harrumph! I don't know how long Sam-I-Am can live like this. He's being a very brave boy. We will continue to try and meet all his needs, and then some...

The Fate of Oiled Birds

A brown pelican coated in heavy oil tries to take flight June 4, on East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana. AFP

Over at The Big Picture, a Boston Globe production, AP Photographer Charlie Riedel posted 8 striking images of seabirds caught in the oil slick off of Louisiana's East Grand Terre Island.

I entertain visions of towering, animated Dawn dish detergent bottles frolicking up and down choreographed lines of khaki-panted, super-dedicated volunteers -- from all walks of life! representing every state in the union! -- scrubbing and rinsing, wiping and dipping the oiled plumage of all the seabirds damaged by the BP spill in the gulf.

Oh, and singing. There is also singing. You know, to go with the frolicking.

I first grew suspicious of my imagination when a wildlife organization down in Sarasota [Save our yadda-yadda, 501(c)] announced that there was no further need for volunteers to help rescue oiled wildlife. They followed this non-appeal with a failure to ask for funds. [Remember, BP is to foot the entire "clean-up" bill, so your donations now to wildlife charities will fund other disasters later!]

Earlier on in the crisis, there were requests for sheets, heating pads, paper towels, and pet kennels. And Dawn, of course. In this video, International Bird Rescue Research Center Director Jay Holcomb reflects on how a dish washing detergent became the number one tool for cleaning oil from wildlife. (Video is from April 2010)



In the 1950's and 60's, "different substances were applied to the feathers of oiled birds, some of which were: mascara remover, butter, lard, powdered chalk, waterless hand cleaner, acetone, detergent and various oils," notes Holcomb. It boggles the mind, but in the 70's, there was a spell where applying corn meal on top of warmed mineral oil (underneath all of which was the poor bird) seemed an excellent idea.

It turns out that there actually is a bird-washing machine, but that the machine is considered not quite as efficacious as a human armed with you-know-what. This YouTube video from December 2009 features a bird-washing machine that employs "a new detergent" that purportedly strips out the hydrocarbons but not the natural oils needed by the feathers. IBRRC Director Holcomb is adamantly opposed to the use of these machines. He relates their disastrous use in France, following the Erika spill:

Each time, the birds' wings were injured and the birds died. Our biggest concern is that it does not take into consideration the individual needs of each bird. Animals cannot be cleaned like apples. They come in different shapes and sizes, even within species, and therefore require individual care and cleaning.

[The financial relationship between the IBRRC and Procter & Gamble seems to be limited to one of mutual fund- and awareness- raising, but I honestly haven't checked into it. Somehow I doubt the existence of a subterranean ploy by P&G to corner the bird-washing market...]



With this oil spill, my imagination has finally failed me.

We have surely failed the most innocent victims of our environmental crimes.

And now we must ask ourselves whether the photogenic hand-washing of oiled wild life is just a means to feel better, to assuage our guilt.

An article published today in Der Spiegel online clearly voices what has been murmured for decades by the scientific community -- that euthanasia makes more sense than the elaborate but largely futile efforts at bird-washing:

A German biologist says that efforts to clean oil-drenched birds in the Gulf of Mexico are in vain. For the birds' sake, it would be faster and less painful if animal-rescue workers put them under, she says. Studies and other experts back her up.

"Kill, don't clean," is the recommendation of a German animal biologist, who this week said that massive efforts to clean oil-soaked birds in Gulf of Mexico won't do much to stop a near certain and painful death for the creatures.

Despite the short-term success in cleaning the birds and releasing them back into the wild, few, if any, have a chance of surviving, says Silvia Gaus, a biologist at the Wattenmeer National Park along the North Sea in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein.

"According to serious studies, the middle-term survival rate of oil-soaked birds is under 1 percent," Gaus says. "We, therefore, oppose cleaning birds."

I may be getting old and cold.
Or maybe I am tired of being fooled, and of being a fool in the world.

We owe our best to the species that we harm and destroy, so a serious conversation about what constitutes our best is long overdo. Unfortunately, when a hard conversation needs to take place in this Land of Large, we disguise our avoidance as grand benevolence. Because we are able to both wash the oiled wildlife and fund habitat rehabilitation, we allow our fuzzy focus to continue uncontested.

(Fodder for future pieces, let me send up this trial balloon: I venture that this tendency we might prefer to call generosity is also what fuels opinions that name us naive, that peg us, kindly, as in denial; Less kindly, I've heard Americans called dangerous, and our various stupidities, choices.)

This article by John Flesher and Noaki Schwartz with AP fleshes the issue out nicely, and includes a response from the animal-rescue community: Rescuing oiled birds: Poignant, but is it futile?

Unnaturally Red Serranos

Well, I am either insane or so mentally healthy I ought to bottle myself.

How would you react to hearing your doctor suggest the removal of both of your shoulders, as well as your left arm? Further, how do you think you'd feel when, hardly skipping a beat, this talented physician proposed amputating a leg, "sooner rather than later"?

Granted, he's pulled the "off with her leg" stunt before.

My reaction was a wide, scary grin and the sing-song pronouncement that "I'm not ready for that, okay? Let's talk about that next time, okay? Okay?" -- after which I did the only logical thing and went shopping.

Nothing crazy -- more's the pity -- just groceries. But our cart contained some telling elements by the time we hit the checkout line:

Habaneros and Scotch bonnet peppers;
Pickled jalapeños, fresh jalapeños, and the lovely smoke-dried chipotles;
Big, beautiful, fragrant, deep black-green poblanos;
Unnaturally red serranos.

For Fred's Peace

It's as if we are living in shifts here at Marlinspike Hall, deep, deep in the Tête de Hergé (très décédé, d'ailleurs).

I slept from 2 to 5 am. Fred went to bed around 7 am. While I am fairly predictable in my hours, he seems to be changing his daily. I don't know how to help.

However, through the years -- through the twenty years as of June 1, 2010! -- I have learned how not to hurt or hinder him in this tough business of adequate sleep, rest.

It's in large part due to ADHD, he thinks, and he would be the one to know.

I have been schooled in Fredness. His particular version of Sleep Hygiene is rigid because completely sequential-- if interrupted, he must start the process all over again, from the top, at the beginning, dès le début... adding at least an hour to the complicated regime of calming his harried and brilliant mind enough to sleep.

No lamps should be lit. Instead, we each use a reading light, either banded on the head or attached to a book.

Fresh water sits by a precise stack of current reading material.

Teeth are flossed and brushed -- then he spends about 43 seconds gargling.

Before climbing into bed, he tours The Manor in a kind of proprietary shorthand, making sure that the drawbridge is up, the wattle is daubed, and The Moat's electric eels are fully charged, but not indiscriminately shocking.

(Not true eels, these creatures are actually knife fish, native to South America -- and to our Moat. Called apex predators by learned ichthyologists, we have found them nonetheless susceptible to Gounod's Faust, in particular The Jewel Song -- this 1903 recording of Suzanne Adams' version of the toe-tapper comes courtesy of Michigan State University's Vincent Voice Library. Anyway, it is due to this constitutional weakness that we had to curtail outdoor performances by the lusty-voiced bonne et belle Bianca Castafiore. The last time she entertained moat-side, we lost a half-dozen of The Manor Guard Fish -- and Captain Haddock was heard to exclaim, "Powerful stuff... She reminds me of a hurricane that hit my ship once.")

Until we excavated the Underground Passage from Renascences, the twelth-century tavern historically bartended by the Panofsky clan (and voted Best Artisanal Ale by Tête de Hergé patrons), Fred used to wait up for all Manor stragglers. If Bianca, one of the Domestic Staff, Marmy, Uncle Kitty Big Balls, Sam-I-Am, or -- God forbid -- Dobby, our little idiot, were out making a late night of it, Fred strummed now a guitar, now just his naked fingers in a show of anxious patience. The usual culprit? That would be Cabana Boy, who rarely wanders home before Last Call. Therein lies the explanation, I suppose, for the difficult and extensive Contract Negotiations between Management [Fred] and Cabana Boy [the metrosexual face of Labor]. Last year, we had to have federal mediators come in.

(The Manor runs on 100% Union Labor.)

Since getting an equity loan on Captain Haddock's ancestral home, this beloved Marlinspike Hall, we've added the Underground Passage and nerves are much less frayed; People come and go in their own time, unsupervised and on the Honor System; Fred can hop into bed at night confident that all our Mavens and Denizens are safe and sound. Well, safe, at least.

Back from making his nightly rounds, Fred rearranges the Pile of Cats artfully arrayed across his side of our mammoth bed, takes a few sips of water, expels several deep, heartrending sighs, and snuggles into his pile of pillows, book in hand.

He's almost there...

This is the moment propitious to pillow talk and we murmur at one another for five to nine minutes, comforting, laughing, looking forward.

After that, no talking! Not even to say "Good night, sleep well, my love..." or "I think fire has broken out in La Recepción again... and I fear for our massive collection of Bone China Coffee Cups, Mugs, and Saucers!"

That's the ideal version of bedtime (also the family friendly edition!).

Lately, though, we've had to recognize that I cannot sleep much and that Fred struggles with snarky demons late at night. I am blessed with techniques and means to ease my pain, even though I also won't pass up the opportunity to complain about it, at least not here.

The mind can leave us exposed and vulnerable when the rest of the world signs off and finds its rest. Fred managed to survive a childhood spent in pure Hell -- beat mercilessly, neglected, horribly abused. Somehow, he survived with his native goodness and sweetness intact, still willing to take the risk of... other people.

But in those quiet moments, those limnal moments, he is afraid, he is small, he is alone -- and his memories assume a stature greater than they merit. Along with the daily struggle to focus and organize from within his ADHD, he fights the terror of post traumatic stress. He knows his mother and father are dead; He knows that no one will ever again bash his head with pots, pans, shoes -- until he falls, senseless; He knows that he will never be denied entry to his own home, or forced to make his bed in an alley with the winos; He knows he matters, knows he is dear.

But in the initial moments of surrender to sleep, this sweet man lies open to attack... open to the cruelty of memory.

So yes, we pass as ships in the night when the terrors loom too large.

I lay in bed, alone, and pray for guidance, and pray for creativity.

And pray for Fred's peace, for Fred's safety here, at least, in Marlinspike Hall, deep, deep in the Tête de Hergé (très décédé, d'ailleurs).

Finally, A Theme Song!

"Oh My God, He's Going to Kill Me"

From a desire to "show her mannerisms and allow people to hear her voice," Grays Harbor investigators have released a video of Lindsey Baum playing with a friend. The video was made in November, 2008, and the identity of the young boy is being protected.

Lindsey, now 11, has been missing since June 26, 2009, when she apparently was abducted during a short walk home from visiting a friend in her hometown of McCleary, Washington.

I am sure that other videos of Lindsey exist, so... please tell me that my discomfort at this particular choice is nothing but a personal problem. It sends chills down my spine to hear this child scream "Oh my God, he's going to kill me" over and over -- that she is playing with a friend, that her protests are mock, none of that matters.

The scene is simply chilling and I wonder at the real impetus behind its release.




Browse previous posts on this blog discussing Lindsey and her disappearance, here.

Websites set up by family and friends can be found here and here.

A $25,000 reward has been set up for information leading to Lindsey's recovery.

If you see her or have information regarding her whereabouts, call:

-- 911
-- Grays Harbor County Information tip line 866 915-8299
-- McCleary Police (360) 495-3107

or EMAIL: soadmin@co.grays-harbor.wa.us

Skyhook

John Robert Wooden
October 14, 1910 – June 4, 2010

Coach Wooden on the eve of defeating Kentucky in 1975 to win his record 10th NCAA championship in 12 years. He had announced his retirement after the semi-final victory over Louisville:



The next day:



Kareem with Coach, then:




Kareem Abdul Jabbar, on the occasion of Wooden's 99th birthday:

As a pupil of Coach John Wooden I am thrilled to be able to celebrate his 99th Birthday. It was so long ago, 1965, that I met him that it seems that he has been part of my life forever. Forty-four years is a good deal of time any way you cut it. In those years what I have learned from him has helped make my life significant and meaningful. If I just consider the success I enjoyed as a basketball player at UCLA I could stop there. But there is so much more. Coach Wooden wanted his players to learn life skills in addition to hoop skills and he used basketball to teach them. His major concern was that we got to graduate from UCLA and have the knowledge, skills and discipline to be good husbands, parents and citizens. I feel that any success I have enjoyed as a parent was informed by what I learned as a student of Coach Wooden’s. His ability to challenge us without crushing our precious adolescent dreams was masterful and I really benefited from those lessons. He let us try it our way and then he showed us the correct way. The results are there for all to see. All of the success on the basketball courts was secondary to these goals. The best time I shared with Coach were those moments on road trips when we would have quiet time to talk about whatever was on our minds. Coach would share some of his favorite poems with me and I would talk to him about some of my favorite books. As a former English teacher he was very aware of many of my favorite authors. His taste in poetry included; Shakespeare, Robert Frost, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and, much to my surprise, Langston Hughes! I’m a big fan of crime stories and enjoyed talking with Coach about Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, John Le Caree and Arthur Conan Doyle. The most important results of our conversations were that he let me know that I should realize my potential as a student and athlete. He felt that approach would be the best for me in the long run. Of course, he was right on the money with that guidance and I have never felt uncomfortable being a scholar in addition to being an athlete. The graduation rate of athletes who played for Coach Wooden is over 65%. You will not find a more successful accomplishment for any NCAA coach who has ran a program as long as Coach Wooden did. It is his most cherished achievement and he feels that his “boys” are the jewels in his crown. I am very proud to be one of his ‘boys’ and I want to wish him and his family thanks and congratulations for what they have accomplished and what they have meant to my life. Happy Birthday Coach. May Allah bless you and yours.

Living All the Ages of Man (btwn 3:48 AM and 5:26 PM)

It's 3:48 in the wee morning.

I am tired of getting up every 40 minutes, so let's pretend rested vigor and proceed with the day. Imagine an exclamation mark, if it helps.

Has anyone ever suggested that you fake it until you make it? Should that helpful advice figure among the chesnuts your friends serve up, I share your pain. It's not like someone telling you that a pinch of sugar will make your marinara sauce *pop* or even that those oversized scrub pants make your butt look... not huge, exactly... more like -- misshapen. No, it is clearly a critique of your very essence, and understand this, if nothing else: you have been found ANNOYING.

It has been a long while since I've been permitted to voice complaints around The Manor. A year and a half or so ago, Fred begged for me to suffer in silence. We were spending most of our time in hospitals and doctors' offices, infusion centers and labs. I was out of my mind with pain and infection.

Nothing has changed, except that, now uninsured, my doctors are struggling to keep me going until the advent of the Great Interim High Risk Pool, which will then enable them to toss me back into the operating room to relieve me of my shoulders and any other infected bones/hardware.

I cannot recall whether I was brave enough to set that down in this blog. Did I? I cannot remember. Anyway, that is apparently the final judgment -- since we cannot even identify, much less eradicate, this bleeping infection, the orthopedic surgeon and my internist, both, are lobbying for making me even more of a Depressed Freak.

My internist also won't let up on his contention that my right leg needs to be chopped off.

Ouch.

Ouch, I say!

These thoughts make me cry and sear my brain cells. I smell burning brain. Okay, maybe it is just the fever.

I honor Fred, and understand his need not to have to face what I must face. He will deal with things as if they are surprises sprung upon him by a maverick world. The man has more capacity for denial than anyone I've ever met. It still puzzles him to find me hunched over this laptop, sweat dripping from my matted hair (*ew*!), eyes glazed, so rosy-rosy cheeked. At his incredulous glance, I whisper: "I'm okay. It's just the fever." At my whisper, he reflexively asks: "Why do you have a fever?"

And I imagine tossing him to the Imaginary Monsters in the Real Moat.

[Apologies to Marianne Moore.*** If you love her poem (one version of which is at this post's end), her imaginary gardens with real toads, you should familiarize yourself with the publication history of it -- it's fascinating. And wonderfully instructive.]

So I confess that it is not others who shame me into faking it until I make it, but rather that it is a form of self-flagellation. Why else would I have spent an hour and a half rubbing lemon oil onto a variety of wooden tables while the rest of my country homesteaders snored in peaceful oblivion?

Four end tables, a console table, a coffee table, and a... plain old table. Our Little Idiot, Dobby the Runt, kept me company. He is the SmellMeister and insists on sniffing whatever I am involved in. I fill my HillaryClintonForPresident water bottle and he must sniff the liquid, then taste it from my finger. I do believe that one day he will save me from poison, this furry and personable little tastetesting pink nose of a cat. He smells the clothes both going into the washer and emerging from the dryer. Always well-behaved, he sniffs most everything we cook or bake, and to see him caught in a spasm of rapid eye-blinking is a fair warning that someone ought to have left out that last tablespoon of cayenne pepper.

Even whole suites of rooms away from her, Dobby goes into nose and eye spasm whenever La Bonne et Belle Bianca pops the top of a Diet Coke. There must be microscopic bubbles that travel directly to His Pinkness, as his reaction to the carbonization process borders on the pathological. Whenever flu strikes, we have to shield him from the nefarious effects of Alka-Seltzer Plus.

Anyway, if you've not been advised to stiffen your upper lip and make like tragedy is not your constant companion: Lucky you!

My penance-based life, au contraire, is founded on the mortification of this pesky flesh. I'm paid up through Early Eternity just by the simple virtues of CRPS! Actually, misguided ascetic notions of self-worth are commonly exemplified by flagellantism. I'm not kidding -- keep the thought in mind and go out among The Brethren and The Sistren. You'll see. (The World has become not much more than a Gathering of Frustrated Self-Anointed Life Coaches who, upon realizing that others are not lined up, breath bated, to hear their wisdom, opt to march in the streets, whipping themselves. Remember Perugia -- not for Amanda Knox and murder, but for its cutting-edge medieval flagellants!)

To the right is a bronze, circa 1480,
from the Galleria Nazionale dell'Umbria, Perugia.

Another way of foisting pop behaviorism on folks is to sing out, with a smile in your voice: BEHAVE your way to success! It's a favorite among the dOCTOr Phil crowd, but probably not his most quoted, as it sometimes has only a fist-in-the-eye as a reply. My Self-Annointed and Appointed Life Coaches, all of whom have excessive time on their hands, and none of whom are sitting next to me at 4:14* in the wee of the morning, live to employ this dictum (from a distance, though).

[*There has been a brief blogging interruption as I kissed His Fredness off to bed, murmurmurmurmurmuring him into the gentle arms of his fatigue.]

Fred, my friends, is pooped. He spent much of the day pretending to be a farmer, picking vegetables and busting up clods of unrepentant clay with the steel-reinforced kevlar toe-guard and toe-cap of his cemented-construction Doctor Martens 7A43TEAK Industrial TrailBlaz safety boots.

Except for those darned boots, he passed the Look-At-Me-I'm-A-Farmer test. Hogwashers and all.

You'd probably be shocked to learn that, in addition to hanging out with the Local Fringe Element -- in our case, a bevy of Existential Feminist Lesbians (I don't care what the ladies screech, you cannot infer one term from the mere presence of another) -- Fred is a Founding Member of the Red and Anarchist Skinheads [RASH]. Another proud New York Native "fighting to win back the subculture from neo-Nazi groups."

It's the quiet druid you have to watch out for. Smile.

Fred said he did some well-timed spitting out at The Farm, and would have gladly climbed a rope suspended from the gymnasium rafters if there had been one. The urge for exertion of masculinity was nearly overwhelming but he stopped short of a chew and a spit.

Thank God. {rolling of the eyes}

So my Macho Darling and the Existential Feminist Lesbians hauled home to The Manor three kinds of beans and some lovely English cucumbers. Turn by unsuspecting turn, three EFLs and Fred sheepishly whispered in my ear that, despite an entire day exposed to manure and burlap, they were unable to identify the bean varieties. He alone, though, thinks the English cucumbers are zucchini.

What?

Oh. Nothing exotic. Yellow wax, French green, and snap pea.

I knew, somehow, when I typed "chew and spit," that it would end up biting me on the ass. A person shouldn't have to look up every dang thing just to avoid some sick unpleasantry.

Chew and spit, in my agrarian world, refers to the gross practice of chewing tobacco and the ensuing spitting out of its nasty juices in a well-controlled stream. Sometimes called chaw rosin, I became familiar with the stuff during a stint at the Gothic Wonderland, a place that owes its existence almost entirely to Mother Tobacco. Don't listen to the revisionist histories which have the Duke Endowment funded by the family's textile and energy ventures... It's all about tobacco.

[My favorite phrase in the Duke.edu bio of James Buchanan Duke describes the Dukes as "[a]rdent Republicans and sympathetic to the downtrodden"!]

I loved the colors and smells of the nasty leaf -- I even visited the fierce and weird auctions that used to be common in local curing barns, trying to decipher the alien poetry spewing from deep within the auctioneer's throat, interspersed with dashes of Christian scripture, and, some say, visitations by the Holy Ghost, as speaking in tongues was not all that uncommon.



Needless to say, I actually do have some understanding and compassion for those raised in the tobacco culture, those who did the actual culturing of the stuff. The reference to chaw rosin, to chew and spit, was a fond and innocent one. [For the record, I stopped smoking around 1994, in fits and starts. Fred? He decided to show me up by quitting... overnight. Smoking is now prohibited in The Manor, though some inviting peppered floral scents waft around on the odd summer evening.]

So would someone please tell me when, exactly, spit and chew became the buzz words for an eating disorder? Like bulimia and anorexia, it is a singular disorder, usually an obsessive compulsion. And lest you be so innocent as to think that C & S might still be a reference to some wholesale grocers or a green engineering design firm, think again. It's much more likely to refer to buccal violence against chocolate-dipped macadamia nuts with a side of whipped cream.

I am further informed that this technique is attributed to Elton John, that its unexpected down side [s:h:o:c:k] includes tooth decay, lots of time demands, and the tendency to shoplift, as it is an expensive eating disorder to maintain.

I dunno. This fake it 'til you make it, behave your way to success movement may be the key to our mutual survival. I will deny the existence of pain, sleeplessness, and disability, and others can deny the existence of calories or God.

What totally sucks? The denial game usually works.

Give it a try -- C'mon! Unless your Gender Rules prohibit, plaster a rigor-inspired grin on your face, smear some raspberry-flavored gloss on those dry lips! Carefully layer concealer under the eye and apply a bit of eyeliner to the lash line. Don't forget mascara, wear something bright to match the vibrant scleral petichiae, and punctuate all utterances with a delighted giggle. (Or, if you are writing, with LOL.)

This is all getting really old -- this emotional gumbo, this lack of sleep, the failure of my environment to pity me. Complaints about my inefficacy are pouring in, despite the make-up, the perky colors, oiled tables, and promises of three bean salads, galore.

Body dysmorphics have taken over my language, and feminist lesbians have stolen away Fred's libido.

Dobby is sniffing my fear with suspicious beady eyes.

I putz away the day, come back to this very blog post, begun after 40 minutes of sleep, 13 hours and 38 minutes ago, in hopes of returning, finally, to bed. A storm rages outside, and three of the four felines are in my clothes closet. Fred slept a proper night's sleep and is now considering a nap. (Farming is hard work.)

The Manor's various Denizens (and Mavens... Never forget the Mavens) are resolute in their message of disdain for my psychic pain. Uncle Kitty Big Balls, the sole cat to brave the storm outside the comfort of my organic cottons and angora leg warmers, announces, in no uncertain terms: *Ack*:*Ack*. I think this means, in MarmySpeak, "Take your pain medication, with a side of muscle relaxant, grab a bowl of lowfat plain yogurt, carefully doctored with aspartame and vanilla extract, put your ass on the mattress, your feet on some pillows, and reread The Once and Future King."

The three frightened cats' tails are all twitching in unison, as they mewl at moi in between syncopated ronronnement.

Yes, something makes me look up mewl. I can't be happy with what I already know, cannot even behave my way to success in the World of Words.

You probably were already familiar with MEWL and PUKE.

My online dictionary cheerfully chatters about it being a well-known "phrase," modified from mewling and puking -- which did finally start the ringing of all sorts of bells inside my poor head.

I know, you are way ahead of me, but cut me some slack, would you? I just got up, sort of, haven't had coffee yet, and eveyone here is mad at me. Mewl! Puke!

Yes, Shakespeare rang those bells, and when Shakespeare sets a bell to clanging, there's no unringing it.

It's the cheery Jaques from As You Like It who intones the well known monologue on the Ages of Man:

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms;
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lin'd,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well sav'd, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

— Jaques (Act II, Scene VII, lines 139-166)

Shakespeare, I see, has brought me to my untimely [melancolic] end...

Unless I choose to check out what promises to be a new toe-tapping favorite, "Sal, let me chaw your rosin some." It's the child of Gid Tanner's Skillet Lickers, and dates from roughly 1930. Tanner's country songs were called "rural drama stories," and I can't think of a more fitting genre to investigate as I go about putting my internal house in order. There's one in particular I want to find -- something about a "corn licker still."

[Spoken: Ah Riley, Lets go down to see old Sal.
See if she wants to give us a cud of
that rosin to chew on this morning.
(Riley:) All right, let's go down to that sweet gum tree and find out.
All right. We'll go down and play her a little tune called
Sal Let Me Chaw Your Rosin Some. Let's go boys.]

(Fiddle)

Jump up Jinny, jump up Joe,
You never get to heaven till you jump Jim Crow.

(Fiddle)

Cabbage in the garden, Peas in the gum,
Sal let me chaw your rosin some.

(Fiddle)

Hogs in the garden sifting sand,
Sal is in love with the hog-eyed man.

(Fiddle)

Along comes Jinny and along comes Joe,
Along comes Jinny with her apron on.

(Fiddle)

Cabbage in the garden, peas in the gum,
Sal let me chaw your rosin some.
(Fiddle)

Hogs in the garden sifting sand,
Sal is in love with the hog-eyed man.

(Fiddle)

Jump up Jinny and jump up Joe,
You never get to heaven (un)less you jump Jim Crow.

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****
Well, it's been fun, but I've reached my end and will at least go assume the recommended positions for sleep. I've heard good things about them! Enjoy Marianne Moore's poem, and -- if you don't already know -- try to figure what parts she ended up resigning to footnote status, and which she kept as the primary poem. She was a card, was Marianne.

***Poetry

I, too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all
this fiddle.
Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one
discovers in
it after all, a place for the genuine.
Hands that can grasp, eyes
that can dilate, hair that can rise
if it must, these things are important not because a

high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but because
they are
useful. When they become so derivative as to become
unintelligible,
the same thing may be said for all of us, that we
do not admire what
we cannot understand: the bat
holding on upside down or in quest of something to

eat, elephants pushing, a wild horse taking a roll, a tireless wolf
under
a tree, the immovable critic twitching his skin like a horse that
feels a
flea, the base-
ball fan, the statistician--
nor is it valid
to discriminate against 'business documents and

school-books'; all these phenomena are important. One must
make a distinction
however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the
result is not poetry,
nor till the poets among us can be
'literalists of
the imagination'--above
insolence and triviality and can present

for inspection, 'imaginary gardens with real toads in them', shall
we have
it. In the meantime, if you demand on the one hand,
the raw material of poetry in
all its rawness and
that which is on the other hand
genuine, you are interested in poetry.

--Marianne Moore

Very Disturbing Content: Animal Cruelty at Conklin Dairy Farms in Plain City, Ohio (followed by Rx Antidote)

WARNING: This video shows terrible treatment of cows and calves -- it is hard to watch.



Using hidden cameras, the group Mercy for Animals (MFA) filmed this footage at the Conklin Dairy Farms in Plain City, Ohio, over a period of four weeks in April and May 2010. Should the video be pulled from YouTube, it is available on the group's website.

Conklin Dairy workers were documented inflicting the following examples of extreme cruelty and abuse to the cow and calves under their care:

Violently punching young calves in the face, body slamming them to the ground, and pulling and throwing them by their ears

Routinely using pitchforks to stab cows in the face, legs and stomach

Kicking "downed" cows (those too injured to stand) in the face and neck – abuse carried out and encouraged by the farm's owner

Maliciously beating restrained cows in the face with crowbars – some attacks involving over 40 blows to the head

Twisting cows' tails until the bones snapped

Punching cows' udders

Bragging about stabbing, dragging, shooting, breaking bones, and beating cows and calves to death

Mercy For Animals submitted their findings to the Marysville, Ohio City Prosecutor's Office in hopes that criminal charges will be filed against these employees involved in "the ongoing pattern of abuse."

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Here's a recent summary of events from L.A. Unleashed: All things animal in Southern California and beyond:

Ohio dairy farmworker charged with animal cruelty after advocacy group releases undercover video
May 27, 2010 1:01 pm
-- Lindsay Barnett, blogger

Following Illinois-based animal advocacy group Mercy for Animals' release of undercover video it says documents numerous instances of animal abuse at an Ohio dairy farm, a farm worker has been charged with 12 counts of animal cruelty.

Billy Joe Gregg Jr., 25, was fired from his job at Conklin Dairy Farms Inc. on Wednesday and arrested later the same day. He was arraigned Thursday and remains jailed following his court appearance. A judge set his bond at $100,000. He is due back in court in June, at which time he will enter a plea.

An investigation into the alleged cruelty at the Plain City farm, including viewing of about 20 hours of footage provided by Mercy for Animals, is ongoing and may result in additional charges, the local sheriff's department told the Associated Press on Wednesday.

The Mercy for Animals video (which is available for viewing on the group's website, but is not for the faint of heart) depicts a calf being thrown to the ground before a worker stomps on its head and adult cows being beaten with crowbars, poked sharply with pitchforks and punched in the udders, among other things. The group says the video was shot between April 28 and May 23.

Each animal cruelty charge against Gregg could carry a penalty of 90 days in jail and a $750 fine. Chief Deputy Tom Morgan told the Associated Press that the video seems to show three to four workers participating in acts of alleged animal cruelty and "we have to identify who all is involved."

In a statement released Wednesday, the Conklin dairy company insisted that it did not condone cruelty to its cows, adding that it has "launched [an] internal investigation into this matter and will be conducting interviews with everyone on our farm who works with our animals."

In a further statement Thursday, it again condemned the acts caught on Mercy for Animals' video, but added that the footage is missing context that would demonstrate that its facility is operated in a responsible way, according to the Associated Press.

One of the men shown in the video appears to be farm owner Gary Conklin himself, the Columbus Dispatch reported. The Dispatch also noted that the farm had been inspected three times in the last year. Though the inspections were intended simply to gauge the facility's cleanliness, Ohio Department of Agriculture spokesperson Cindy Kalis said that telltale signs of animal abuse would have been noted during the inspections. None were found, she said.

The farm's statements condemning animal cruelty rang hollow for at least one animal advocate, Farm Sanctuary co-founder and president Gene Baur, who released his own statement Wednesday. In it, he commented that the Conklin company "asserts that its farm operates according to high standards, but the video shows that they operate by a different set of standards than most Americans. The cruelty and violent behavior that is now common on farms where animals are seen as commodities is outside the boundaries of acceptable conduct in our society."

Mercy for Animals released a similarly grisly video depicting unwanted live chicks being thrown into a grinder at an Iowa chicken facility last year. At that time, the group's executive director, Nathan Runkle, argued that laws mandating the humane treatment of farm animals should be addressed on a federal level rather than being regulated by individual states, which it largely is at present.

With the release of the recent dairy farm video footage, Runkle reiterated his support for tougher regulations relating to farm animal treatment, saying in a statement that "stronger and stricter state and federal laws to prevent and discourage farmers from abusing and beating animals" are required.

Even before news broke of the cruelty investigation at the Conklin facility, farm-animal welfare was something of a hot topic in Ohio, where a coalition called Ohioans for Humane Farms is pushing for humane reforms and increased oversight of the state's livestock board. It hopes to place a measure that would address farm animal treatment on the state's ballot in November.

In his statement Wednesday, Farm Sanctuary's Baur called the proposed ballot measure "a positive step in the right direction for Ohioans who feel justifiably outraged by the abuse at Conklin Dairy Farms."

Susan Crowell of Farm and Dairy: The Auction Guide and Rural Marketplace, provides something of an industry response to the Conklin animal abuse video, questioning MFA's intent and methodology. I've certainly no problem with that, as most of us know this video documents an intolerable aberration that is as shocking to insiders as to an urban soul like myself. However, she couldn't resist an emotional appeal there at the very end of her article, where she plaintively wails:

Where is our outrage when abusers target our children?

And... that's where she loses me. I suffer from a severe allergy to underhanded illogical appeals and had to self-medicate with chocolate.

Until then, her points are, for the most part, necessary, if not particularly well-taken (she echoes her industry's jaundiced view of vegans and their seductive ways). I don't think impugning MFA's mission of promoting extreme vegetarianism is a meritorious way to rebut the abuse in the videos, however they were obtained, but casting critical doubt is rarely a bad thing:

“Animal agriculture is incapable of self-regulation,” condemns Mercy For Animals on its blog. MFA was the group behind the undercover footage and its packaging and release on the Web.

But readers need to be aware of the group’s ulterior motive, and that is promoting a vegan diet (vegans try to eliminate the use of animals for food, clothing or any other purposes). Nothing excuses the actions of the dairy farm employee, but you need to know where this group is coming from.

“Compassionate consumers can end their direct financial support of farmed animal abuse by rejecting dairy, and other animal products, and adopting a vegan diet.”

Personally, I have lots of questions before I feel I can comment legitimately on the issue. Not the issue of animal cruelty or mistreatment of farm animals — that I can easily comment upon because it has no place on any farm, and all farmers must care for their livestock in the most humane way possible. But the issue of how this video came to be produced and released is rather murky.

Who was the undercover “investigator” from Mercy For Animals? When was he hired, if he was posing as an employee? Did he know Gregg before he arrived on the farm? When was Gregg hired? What is the farm’s process for checking references? Who were these guys’ references?

How many employees does the farm have working with the cattle? Who supervises and trains employees? Did other employees know this was going on?

Did the Conklin family know this was going on? When did the Conklins find out about the undercover video, and when did they see it? Where were they when this action was taking place?

Did Gregg know he was being filmed (he clearly speaks to the camera angle in several segments)? Did the individual filming also participate in mistreatment to gain Gregg’s trust? How did MFA target Gregg and/or Conklin Dairy Farm?

Why did it take four weeks for MFA to prepare the video — and let the alleged abuse continue, if they proclaim to care so much for animals? Why not work with law officials or the local human society to create the case?

Did MFA “misuse” the animals itself to promote its vegan agenda? Did the individual filming egg or urge Gregg on, to instigate the abuse?

Have investigators checked computers, e-mails, cell phone records to piece together a timeline, or an understanding of who knew who, and who knew what when?

Was Gregg paid by MFA? Is he a supporter?

Why was the video released at the same time Humane Society of the United States’ CEO Wayne Pacelle was making a visit to Ohio to drum up support for the Ohioans for Humane Farms’ ballot initiative? Was HSUS involved with MFA in the making/releasing of this video?

My questions do not give Gregg a green light to do what he did. We have a rule of law in this country, and he has been charged. It’s time for the police and legal system to work — and get answers and facts.

It’s also time for the rest of agriculture to stop being the silent minority, and to speak out on its own behalf, about how you treat your livestock, which is NOT what is portrayed in the video. There’s no question about that.

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**RX ANTIDOTE TO THE HORROR ABOVE IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE LUCKY DUCK RESCUE AND SANCTUARY. FOR EFFECTIVE, SEMI-PERMANENT RELIEF, WATCH "Harry the Duck and His Kittens" video (below) q 4 minutes, with a warm, soothing beverage, until sour stomach, aching head, and psychic fatigue are relieved. Faith in humanity will not be restored, but faith in the ineffable has been recognized as a suitable generic substitution.

"We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical, concept of animals....

We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far beIow ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err...

In a world older and more complete than ours, they move finished and complete, gifts with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethern, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of earth."

- Henry Beston

leslie scalapino :: 1944-2010

Leslie Scalapino

Tom White has issued the following statement:

Scalapino makes everything take place in real time, in the light and air and night where all of us live, everything happening at once.
— Philip Whalen

Leslie Scalapino passed away on May 28, 2010 in Berkeley, California. She was born in Santa Barbara in 1944 and raised in Berkeley, California. After Berkeley High School, she attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon and received her B.A. in Literature in 1966. She received her M.A. in English from the University of California at Berkeley in 1969, after which she began to focus on writing poetry. Leslie Scalapino lived with Tom White, her husband and friend of 35 years, in Oakland, California.

In childhood, she traveled with her father Robert Scalapino, founder of UC Berkeley’s Institute for Asian Studies, her mother Dee Scalapino, known for her love of music, and her two sisters, Diane and Lynne, throughout Asia, Africa and Europe. She and Tom continued these travels including trips to Tibet, Bhutan, Japan, India, Yemen, Mongolia, Libya and elsewhere. Her writing was intensely influenced by these travels. She published her first book O and Other Poems in 1976, and since then has published thirty books of poetry, prose, inter-genre fiction, plays, essays, and collaborations. Scalapino’s most recent publications include a collaboration with artist Kiki Smith, The Animal is in the World like Water in Water (Granary Books), and Floats Horse-Floats or Horse-Flows (Starcherone Books), and her selected poems It’s go in horizontal / Selected Poems 1974-2006 (UC Press) was published in 2008. In 1988, her long poem way received the Poetry Center Award, the Lawrence Lipton Prize, and the American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. Her plays have been performed in San Francisco at New Langton Arts, The Lab, Venue 9, and Forum; in New York by The Eye and Ear Theater and at Barnard College; and in Los Angeles at Beyond Baroque.

In 1986, Scalapino founded O Books as a publishing outlet for young and emerging poets, as well as prominent, innovative writers, and the list of nearly 100 titles includes authors such as Ted Berrigan, Robert Grenier, Fanny Howe, Tom Raworth, Norma Cole, Will Alexander, Alice Notley, Norman Fischer, Laura Moriarty, Michael McClure, Judith Goldman and many others. Scalapino is also the editor of four editions of O anthologies, as well as the periodicals Enough (with Rick London) and War and Peace (with Judith Goldman).

Scalapino taught writing at various institutions, including 16 years in the MFA program at Bard College, Mills College, the San Francisco Art Institute, California College of the Arts in San Francisco, San Francisco State University, UC San Diego, and the Naropa Institute.

Of her own writing, Scalapino says “my sense of a practice of writing and of action, the apprehension itself that ‘one is not oneself for even an instant’ – should not be,’ is to be participation in/is a social act. That is, the nature of this practice that’s to be ‘social act’ is it is without formation or custom.” Her writing, unbound by a single format, her collaborations with artists and other writers, her teaching, and publishing are evidence of this sense of her own practice, social acts that were her practice. Her generosity and fiercely engaged intelligence were everywhere evident to those who had the fortune to know her.

Scalapino has three books forthcoming in 2010. A book of two plays published in one volume, Flow-Winged Crocodile and A Pair / Actions Are Erased / Appear will come out in June 2010 from Chax Press; a new prose work, The Dihedrons Gazelle-Dihredals Zoom will be released this summer by Post-Apollo Press; and a revised and expanded collection of her essays and plays, How Phenomena Appear to Unfold (originally published by Potes & Poets) will be published in the fall by Litmus Press.

Her play Flow-Winged Crocodile will be performed in New York at Poets House on June 19th at 7pm and June 20th at 2pm by the performance group The Relationship, directed by Fiona Templeton and with Katie Brown, Stephanie Silver, and Julie Troost. Dance by Molissa Fenley, music by Joan Jeanrenaud, and projected drawings by Eve Biddle. This production is co-sponsored by Belladonna* and the Poetry Project.

There will be a memorial event for Scalapino at St. Mark’s Poetry Project on Monday, June 21st.

A Zen Buddhist funeral ceremony will be conducted by Abbott Norman Fisher in about a month with the arrangements in a subsequent announcement. Tom requests that in lieu of flowers, Leslie's friends consider a charitable donation in her memory to: Poets in Need, PO Box 5411, Berkeley, CA 94705; Reed College for the Leslie Scalapino Scholarship, 3203 Southeast Woodstock Boulevard, Portland, OR 97202-8199; The AYCO Charitable Foundation, PO Box 15203, Albany, NY 12212-5203 for the Leslie Scalapino-O Books Fund to support innovative works of poetry, prose and art; or to a charitable organization of their choice. Condolence cards may be sent to Tom & Leslie’s home address, 5744 Presley Way, Oakland, California 94618-1633.



to make my mind be actions outside only. which they are. that collapses in

grey-red bars. actions are life per se only without it.

(so) events are minute — even (voluptuous)

––Leslie Scalapino