Frank is Emptiness

June 29th, 2019

This article from me was printed/posted in the Capital Times (Madison, Wisconsin) today.

Maybe it’s worthwhile.

“President Trump has recently pledged to deport “millions of illegal aliens.” He plans on beginning this process within the next few days. Trump loves to use hyperbole, and he loves to make exaggerated promises to motivate his political base. He has often backpedaled on statements when reality has raised its ugly head. However, the president has consistently followed through on threats made to undocumented immigrants and asylum seekers. His animosity toward these people is palpable. His actions concerning immigration have usually matched his words.

So, perhaps we should take Trump at his word. Maybe he really does plan on deporting millions of immigrants. The effects of his actions would be catastrophic, and not just in a humanitarian sense. Deporting that many workers and consumers would be devastating to American industry and agriculture. It would cause immense chaos. It could very easily throw this country into a recession. Has he actually thought any of this through?

Let’s say that Trump is just talking nonsense, and he does not plan on deporting that many people. The damage is done. He has already terrified millions of people. Perhaps that has been his intention all along.”

 

June 27th, 2019

Turki is a father from Syria. I don’t know his exact age. I would guess that he is in his mid-forties. He and his wife, A’isha, have eleven children. Turki was a farmer when he lived in Syria. The civil war there forced him and his family to move, first to Turkey, and then to the United States. They arrived in Milwaukee, of all places, two and a half years ago. Turki and his family have had a long and eventful journey. They are now living in a strange land, among people whom they do not understand, and who do not often understand them.

It was in 1976, almost forty-three years ago, that I was a plebe at West Point, beginning my studies to become a U.S. Army officer. West Point required every cadet to learn a foreign language for at least two years. I had to choose a language. At that time, USMA offered seven languages: French, German, Russian, Chinese, Spanish, Portuguese, and Arabic. The school taught Arabic for the first time that year. I signed up for it, and I studied Arabic and Arab culture for four years. I don’t know why I did that. I never used the language while I was in the military. It seemed like a waste of time.

Until now.

I don’t remember much Arabic. I cannot hold a conversation in the language. However, my studies from decades ago have brought me to Turki and his family. My path to find them has been as twisted as their path to meet me.

I have known them all for about two years. I have been visiting them in their home, sometimes tutoring the kids, sometimes just hanging out. I am not sure that I met them with any specific goal in mind, except to help in some way. I just showed up at their house one day, and then things took their course. I didn’t see Turki very often. He was always busy at work. I have spent almost all of my time with the children, helping them with homework, or just reading stories to them. A’isha always brought me a pot of hot, sweet tea when I came to visit. It was kind of a ritual. It still is.

A couple weeks ago, while I was at their home, Turki asked me to help him to find a new job. He has been working for the last two years as a janitor at a local Muslim school. It’s not a bad job, but it isn’t going to be good enough for him in the long term. He needs more money, and his boss isn’t willing to give it to him. That, of itself, is not an unusual situation.

However, Turki has other challenges that are not so common. He is an immigrant, and that often makes things harder. He is here legally, which is helpful, but he is still a foreigner in the United States. Turki struggles with the English language. He struggles with American society. If he could have his way, I think that Turki would stay among Arabs, and remain in a sort of a cultural cocoon. That’s normal and understandable. It is also a dead end.

Many years ago, I lived in West Germany, courtesy of the U.S. Army. When I arrived there, I knew nothing of the German language. I remember, quite clearly, how hard it was for me to function among the locals. I remember how difficult it was for me to do simple things, like buy groceries, or ride the train. I remember distinctly feeling isolated and alone. It wasn’t until I started dating my wife, Karin, that I started to feel comfortable living in Germany. Even then, it took a long time to understand other people. Karin’s family and friends spoke no English, so I was forced to learn German. It was confusing and frustrating at times. I remember that. I remember it very well.

I understand, at least somewhat, Turki’s current struggle. It’s hard for him to reach out. It’s hard for him to look for work. I get that. I want to help him find a new job, but I can’t do everything for him. I couldn’t do that, even if I wanted to do so.

I asked Turki,

“What kind of work can you do?”

He replied, “It is no problem. I can do any work. I do anything for my family.”

I asked him, “Can you drive a forklift?”

He looked at me quizzically, “Forklift?”

“Yeah, you know, a machine to pick up things?” I made the sounds of a forklift and pretended to have move a pallet with the blades.

He shook his head. “No, I don’t drive forklift. You teach?”

I sighed. “No, so what can you do?”

Turki smiled and said, “I can do all work. Anything.”

I looked at him and thought, “No you can’t.”

The fact is that Turki’s skill set is limited, really limited. I know that he is smart, and I know that he works his ass off, but that may not help him much. He needs to be able to sell himself, and he has no idea how to do that.

Turki and I worked on an application for Milaeger’s Nursery and Landscaping. Turki was a farmer and he knows how to grow plants. It seemed like a good fit. Turki gave me the necessary information for the application, and I filled it out. When we got done, he asked me,

“So, I just mail it in?”

I knew he was going to ask that.

I replied, “Well, we can mail it in, but we won’t. You and I are going to Milaeger’s and turn it in ourselves.”

He looked at me, and then he said, “Oh.”

A couple days later, I drove Turki to the nursery, and we went into the office. I told Turki to talk to the people there, and give them his application. He tried to do that, but he got stalled. I explained things to the employees there, and asked a few questions. Turki listened and watched.

I am convinced that Turki had never filled out a job application before in his entire life. I am sure that he never went out to look for a job before. This was all new to him, and I am sure that it was a little scary. Well, you have to start somewhere. Maybe he won’t get hired by Milaeger’s. That’s okay. That wasn’t really the point of the exercise. I needed to nudge Turki out of his comfort zone to briefly explore the frightening world of work.

We are going to try other places. My son, Stefan, suggested that Turki try to get into the Laborers Union, and then get an unskilled construction job. We will work on that. Shovels are the same here as they are in Syria. Maybe we can apply at other landscapers. I don’t know. It’s going to be a long process. I know that, and I think that Turki knows it now too.

This father from Syria and I will learn together.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 25th, 2019

“When I’m no longer rapping, I want to open up an ice cream parlor and call myself Scoop Dogg.” –  Snoop Dogg

 

“Bread pudding makes me weak. I have been known to be moved to tears by cookies and ice cream, and ribs are a spiritual experience for me.” –  Bill Rancic

 

The girl finally sat down across from us. She was wearing her standard, bluish-green, prison garb. Her hair was wet and unbrushed (she doesn’t currently own a hair brush, but we’re working on that). Karin and sat on the other side of a low coffee table that was clearly marked with the number 11.

The girl had previously told us over the phone that she wanted us to get her some snacks from the vending machines in the visitor center. Only visitors can use the vending machines, which makes it slightly awkward for both the prisoners and their guests.  After we had all hugged, I asked the young woman,

“What kind of ice cream do you want?”

She thought for a moment and smiled. Then she said, “I want something with caramel and chocolate, if they have it.”

I walked over to the ice cream machine, carrying a plastic baggie full of small change. Every visitor in that room was carrying a bag of quarters. A person was allowed to have up to $20 worth of change on them. That would seem to be like a lot of money, but it isn’t. It was pretty easy to run through that much cash.

Karin and I had spent almost half an hour getting through security prior to arriving at the visitor center. There were several people waiting there before we showed up, and the process was more than a little tedious. The guard was friendly enough, but he had to go through a long series of instructions with each visitor:

“Fill out and sign this form.”

“Let me see you ID.”

“Put everything in your locker.”

“Remove your shoes and belt.”

“Pull out your front pockets. Do you have anything in your back pockets? Are you sure?” 

My unspoken response: “Yeah, I’m fucking sure.”

Then he said, “Go through the metal detector.”

I am always surprised that I don’t set off metal detectors. I had my right foot and ankle crushed at work ten years ago. Since the surgery to rebuild the leg, I have been carrying around six titanium screws and an titanium plate. Nothing ever happens.

By the time Karin and I finished running the gauntlet, I had absolutely nothing on me but the key to the locker, and a bag of change. Karin didn’t even have that.

But I was talking about ice cream.

The vending machine had a limited selection of ice cream treats. I finally settled on a Klondike Choco Taco. It cost $2.50. I don’t know if that is expensive or not. It’s kind of irrelevant. There was only one ice cream machine available to me in Taycheeedah, and I could use it or leave it. I used it.

I brought the Choco Taco to the girl. She devoured it in a state of ecstasy. Simple pleasures become important when everything else is stripped away. The girl told us between bites,

“We only get ice cream twice a month, and it’s in one of those little paper cups. Wow, this is good.”

I had also bought her a Mountain Dew. Another simple pleasure.

She took a slug off of the soda. Then she asked me,

“Do you know how to hot wire a car?”

“Uh, no.”

She went on, “I think the only way to get out is to crash a vehicle through the fence. The fences have that wire on top, and I think they are electrified.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. There are these yellow signs on the fences. I think they say that the fences are electrified.”

This made me remember something from thirty-five years ago. When I was stationed with the Army in West Germany during the Cold War, there were free tours of the East German border for all GI’s. I went on one of them. A border guard from the Bundesgrenzschutz (West German Border Police) explained in detail about the barriers that the East Germans had set up to keep their citizens inside the country. The East Germans had electrified fences with razor wire on top, just like the prison at Taycheedah. Some things don’t change.

I asked the girl if she wanted another ice cream. She nodded. Then she asked me,

“Do they have Dove Bars?”

“Yeah. What do you want? Dark chocolate or milk chocolate?”

“Milk chocolate.”

I went back to the vending machine.

Once again, she savored every bite of the ice cream.

Another prisoner was walking around with a camera. Apparently, she was assigned by the guards to take pictures of inmates and their guests, if those people wanted photos to remember these special moments. Our young woman told us that it cost the visitors money to get a picture taken. This came as no surprise at all. All the photos were taken in front of a back drop that looked just like a brick wall. How appropriate.

We talked a little about what will happen to her after her time in prison. She said that she will be on probation for a while. I asked her about how it would be if things did not go well while she was on probation.

She laughed and said, “Don’t report your car as stolen until I am across the border.”

She was making a joke. As Stalin once said, “Dark humor is like food. Some people don’t get it.”

The girl was still hungry. We had been talking for almost two hours. I bought her a gyro. It was very hot when it came out of the microwave, so she had to let it sit for a while.

It was pouring rain outside. The girl told us that she had to walk outside to get from the visitors center to her cell block. We decided to talk some more and wait for the weather to clear.

She asked us to put some more money the prepaid phone account so that she could call her boyfriend. I told her that I would take care of it. It seems to help her a lot when she can call her beau. He is one of her lifelines. Karin and I are her other connection to the outside. It is hard to overstate how important it is for a prisoner to have contact with people in the real world. I really believe that those contacts keep an person sane.

It was almost six o’clock when Karin and I left the young woman. We had to drive an hour and a half back home. We told her that we would come back next week at the same time. We plan to come back to see her every week. We all need that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 22nd, 2019

“I read the news today, oh boy…” – The Beatles

I got up at 4:30. I wake up predawn every day. I don’t know why. It have something to do with the fact that I worked third shift for over twenty years. I suspect that my sleep cycle is permanently trashed.

After I get up, I am in the habit of switching on the computer. and then reading the headlines on NPR or the BBC. That’s almost always a bad move. The heavy dose of negativity is enough to make me want to crawl back into bed.

However, when I get up, Shocky gets up. Shocky is a border collie/lab mix. Karin and I are caring for the dog while somebody we love is incarcerated. Shocky drinks some water out of her bowl, and then she expects me to take her for a walk. We do that.

Shocky and I usually go for about two miles. We wander west on Oakwood Road to the railroad tracks, and then we turn around. At this hour there is a minimal amount of traffic on the street. We go past farm fields, small wooded areas, wetlands, and expensive subdivisions. Objects are indistinct in the twilight when we begin our walk. Sometimes a mist rises that obscures the houses in the distance. Animals cross our path. We see deer, or an occasional raccoon. The sandhill cranes stand silent and still in the empty fields.

This morning the waning moon was still high up in the sky, looking cold and white. We walked toward the east on our way back to our house. The sun was still below the horizon, but its light painted the bands of alto stratus clouds. They were initially a bright pink that slowly changed to orange and gold. The colors of the sky were reflected in a pool of standing water. It was like a multicolored mirror.

Timing is everything. Shocky and I were nearly home when the sun peaked over the edge of the woods. It was just bright enough to light up the highest of the tree branches. The sunlight sparkled in the leaves that moved restlessly in the wind.

Shocky and I stopped for a moment.

I looked at the sun and said, “Thank you.”

 

 

June 20th, 2019

“Remember when you were young
How the hero was never hung
Always got away
Remember, how the man
Used to leave you empty handed
Always, always let you down
If you ever change your mind
About leaving it all behind
Remember, remember, today

Don’t feel sorry
‘Bout the way it’s gone
Don’t you worry
‘Bout what you’ve done

Just remember when you were small
How people seemed so tall
Always had their way
Do you remember, your ma and pa
Just wishing for movie stardom
Always, always playing a part
If you ever feel so sad
And the whole world is driving you mad
Remember, remember today

Don’t feel sorry
‘Bout the way it’s gone
Don’t you worry
‘Bout what you’ve done.”

“Remember” from John Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band

Memory is a tricky thing. It is never objective (if there even can be a thing that is “objective”). It isn’t like a simple recording of events. Memory might be that at first, but eventually that initial recording gets edited in order to fit a particular narrative, or at least to make some kind of sense. My life has never made sense, certainly not while I am actually living it. Sometimes, later on, after I have reviewed what occurred, it seems a bit rational. However, in order for that to happen, I have to cut and snip the recording in my own mind. I have to take the raw material that my senses provided for me, and turn it into a story. I do that all the time. I am doing it now.

My wife and I visited the Taycheedah Correctional Institution on Monday. We visited a young woman that we love. We sat and spoke with the woman for about an hour. The girl seemed edgy. She was nervous, and she was hesitant to do anything at all around the guards. She was always watching, always alert in the way that animals are alert when they know the predators are near. I don’t think she relaxed at all during our visit.

I remember how it felt forty-two years ago. The situation then was somewhat different. I wasn’t in an actual prison, like this young woman is now.  I was at United States Military Academy at West Point in my plebe (freshman) year. I could have quit. I could have left that place. This young woman cannot do that. Thinking back, maybe I didn’t really have the option to leave West Point. This young woman is stuck in Taycheedah because of the power of the Wisconsin Department of Corrections. I was stuck at USMA because I knew that, if I left, my father would have branded me as a failure and a weakling for the rest of my life. I was in another sort of prison.

There are some eerie similarities between my experience at West Point and this woman’s current situation in Taycheedah. In both places, a person’s time and movement are rigidly controlled. In both places, there are no choices concerning clothing or food or activities. In both places, a person learns (if they are wise) to shut up and do whatever they are told to do. In both places, somebody else has complete control over a person’s life. In both places, the goal of the institution is to break down a individual completely and then make that person into something unrecognizable.

As an aside, I have also been in jail. That felt just like West Point.

I remember during my first year at West Point that I was only allowed four possible answers to any question from a superior: “Yes Sir! No Sir! No excuse, Sir! Sir, I do not know!” That was it. That’s all I could say.

What can this young woman say to those who currently run her life? Probably not much more than I could, maybe even less. It is a terrible thing to have no voice.

This young woman has a roommate (i.e. cellmate). They do not get along. This young woman did not choose her roommate. At West Point, at least at first, I could not choose mine. I did not get along with my cellmate either. In fact, I remember sleeping one night with a bayonet on my hand, just in case violence occurred in the room. I wonder if this girl wishes she had a knife with her.

Prison changes a person. It changes the person in a fundamental way. The effect is like a brand or a scar on the soul. West Point changed me in a similar way. A person who serves time in prison is in many ways the same as a person who serves time in the military. The experience is intense and unforgettable and totally alien to everyone else. An ex-prisoner cannot explain what the experience was like. A veteran cannot explain what it was like. Only those who are also initiated can know. We don’t need to join a secret society. Like it or not, we already belong to one.

 

 

 

 

June 18th, 2019

Taycheedah has a nice campus, if you can ignore the razor wire on top of the high chain link fences. The prison is located amid woods and farm fields near Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. It’s a beautiful setting, but most of the people staying at Taycheedah don’t get to see it very often. The inmates get maybe an hour a day to go outside. They spend the vast majority of their time in their cells.

Karin and I went to Taycheedah yesterday to visit a girl that we love. We parked our car in the lot, and went to the visitors entrance. I wouldn’t necessarily describe the entrance facility as being welcoming, but the guards there were friendly. One guard greeted us and had us fill out a visitors form. Then she checked our ID’s. Then she had us put all of our possessions into a tiny locker. Then we went through the metal detector. Then Karin and I each received a stamp on the back of our right hand, a stamp that only showed up under ultraviolet light. Finally, we went out of a door, through a briefly unlocked gate, and walked down a stretch of sidewalk to the visitor center.

We will get to go through this entire process again the next time we visit this young woman.

At the visitor center, there was a guard sitting at a desk. She eyed us warily. She asked us for our visitors form, and she checked our glow-in-dark hand stamps. She looked at the name and number of the young woman. Then she said brusquely,

“Sit at Table 7.”

We did.

The table was about the size and height of a coffee table. There were two chairs on one side of the table, and a single chair on the side. The only things on the table were two laminated sheets of paper. Each sheet was filled with rules for the visit. I glanced through them:

“The inmate shall sit facing the guard (in the single chair).”

“Then inmate shall not go to the vending machines. Only visitors may approach the machines.”

“The inmate will have nothing covering their lap.”

The list went on and on and on.

Karin and I had to wait for the girl to brought into the visitors room. That gave us time to look around. Karin and I were facing a mural on one of the walls. The mural contained a series of supposedly inspiring and uplifting messages. One of them said, “You were given this life because you are strong enough to live it.” A second message said, “Be patient and trust your journey.”

After I finished reading all of them, another slogan suddenly popped into my head.

“Arbeit macht frei.” (Work sets you free.)

I’m aware that the comparison is over the top. The young woman is in a prison, not a Nazi death camp. On the other hand, a tiny bit of her life is trickling away every day she is inside of Taycheedah. A person’s spirit can be killed a little piece at a time.

Other women were already visiting with friends or family.  Most of the prisoners were young and white. Some of them were snacking on food that the visitors had purchased for them from the vending machines. A few people were outside, sitting at picnic tables.

I saw another mural on the wall behind us. Part of it displayed a sunny, daytime scene with flowers and green trees. Part of it showed the stumps of dead trees in a swamp, under a moonlit sky. It was pretty twisted.

The girl arrived.

She sat in the required chair facing us. The young woman was nervous. She kept working her hands. Her left hand was still red from when she burned it a few months ago. It was hard to converse with her, because the ceiling fan was very loud.

We could have stayed for three hours. I don’t know what we would have talked about for that long. The girl told us that she spends most of her time in her cell with a woman she can’t stand. She reads, writes, and stays in her bunk. She told us about her activities, or lack of activities. We had ordered a number of things to be sent to her through an approved vendor. The stuff is all at Taycheedah now, but the girl hasn’t seen much of it yet. It apparently takes weeks for the staff there to sort through property sent to the prisoners. She uses her limited free time to call her boyfriend, or to call us.

We stayed with her for about an hour. She wanted to cut the visit off early, because she was worried about missing supper. That is a legitimate concern. We were running out of things to say anyway.

We said goodbye, and gave her a quick hug.

We can try this again next week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 13th, 2019

Hans got into an argument with one of the local cops. Apparently, this sort of thing happens a lot in Texas.

The policeman was hassling Hans about having his Harley parked in the street, although it was legal for Hans to have it there. To placate the police officer, Hans attempted to get the bike into his already over-filled driveway. Apparently, the motorcycle didn’t quite fit, and the cop informed Hans that he was calling a tow truck to take it away.

Hans looked at the policeman and said, “The hell you are!”

The officer ignored Hans’ comment, and called the tow truck.

Hans lost his temper at that point. This could have been because Hans had just worked an extremely long shift, and he only had three hours of sleep. It could have been because this law enforcement officer was consciously choosing to be a dick. In any case, Hans told the cop,

“Well, I guess I wasted four years of my life!”

The cop was confused, and he asked Hans what he meant.

Hans told him, “I was in the Army, fighting in Iraq, to protect your sorry ass!”

The cop still insisted on the tow truck, which arrived shortly.

Hans held up his phone and explained to the officer, “I got your name and your badge number. You think you can treat me like white trash. The next thing I do is call the TV station, and tell them about you harassing a combat vet!”

The police officer called his supervisor, who spoke with Hans. When the conversation ended, both the cop and the tow truck left (without the motorcycle).

Later, the supervisor called to apologize to Hans. He told Hans that the officer in question was to be reprimanded.

Hans told the desk sergeant, “I want a copy of that reprimand.”

Hans was assured that he would get a copy in the morning.

Hans played the “combat vet” card, and did it well. That’s a good card to play, especially in Texas. In many parts of the U.S. veterans are held in high esteem. This certainly true in the Lone Star State. If a person is a veteran, they are put on a pedestal. A combat vet is just one step lower than God.

Depending on who is reading this essay, my comments may or may not make sense. I’m not trying to tell you how things should be. I’m just saying how things are. This incident with Hans reminds me of a story from Wilhelmine Germany, when civilians would move off of a sidewalk to make way for a Prussian officer. We don’t adore the military as much as the people did in the Kaiser’s time, but we are getting close to that.

Should we respect vets? I think they deserve respect. When Hans called to tell me his story, I was just walking out of the VA hospital in Milwaukee. I had been spending time with the veterans in the psych ward. All of these men and women were messed up, and I think that I understand why they are. Every one of the people in that ward made a sacrifice. They all lost something: their youth, their strength, their sanity, their innocence. Whether they were in combat or not, they left the military twisted and bent, just like me. Just like Hans.

Are these people heroes? Somebody once cynically asked Hans, “Do you think you’re a hero?”

Hans replied to him, “No, I just did my job.”

Vets aren’t often heroes. They (we) are just people who made an open-ended commitment to something we did not understand. We may have been stupid, but I think that we were at least brave.

I detest the slimy, fake patriotism that exists now. People shout about how much they support the troops, but these same folks won’t do anything more than shake a vet’s hand and say, “Thank you for your service.” Fuck that.

It is wrong to idolize a vet. It is also wrong to dismiss and ignore that person.

Try to understand the person. Maybe you can’t, but try to do that much.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 9th, 2019

“And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each.

Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘Are not all these who are speaking Galileans?
And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language?

We are Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes,
Cretans and Arabs–in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power’. ”

Acts of the Apostles 2:6 – 2:11

Karin and I went to Mass on Pentecost. Karin sang with the choir. I got up and read a passage from the Acts of the Apostles to the congregation. Father Rich wore a red chasuble over his other garments. Red vestments signify a number of different things. The color often implies bloodshed. So, the priest wears red on Passion (Palm) Sunday, and on the days when we remember Christian martyrs. Red is also the color of Pentecost. It might be because Pentecost is about the coming of the Holy Spirit, who is often imagined as fire, and fire is often connected with the color red. Anyway, Father Rich was clothed in scarlet during the Mass.

Father Rich talked at length about the Holy Spirit, that one Person in the Trinity who is impossible to define. Our priest got emotional about his topic. He said,

“The Holy Spirit goes where it wants and when it wants. We often hinder the work of the Spirit, because we try to control it. We try to box it in. We need to open our hearts to whatever the Spirit wants us to do.”

I had wanted to go to Shavuot at the synagogue the night before. Shavuot is the original  Pentecost. I was too tired to go. I stayed home, and I looked forward to being with my son, Stefan, on Sunday.

In the afternoon Stefan took me to the Locust Street Festival. Locust Street is a major road on the north side of Milwaukee. It starts in the east near Lake Michigan and then runs straight as an arrow westward through most of the city. Locust Street passes through several starkly different neighborhoods. On Milwaukee’s Eastside the street is home to wealthy liberals, college students, and assorted hipsters. That community ends at the bridge crossing the Milwaukee River. A couple miles further west, just beyond Martin Luther King Drive, the street turns into Desolation Road. It gets ugly in a hurry. In between the Milwaukee River and MLK Drive, there is the Riverwest neighborhood, a place that defies any neat or tidy descriptions.

Most of Milwaukee is intensely tribal, and often rabidly racist. Different ethnic groups do not mix, not at all. Social and economic borders are clearly defined. People are not necessarily unfriendly. They just tend to stick with their own group. Riverwest is unusual in that people there do mix. Riverwest is full of large, older homes, but it has a younger population than other parts of Milwaukee. Riverwest has a gritty, working class feel to it, but it doesn’t have the sense of despair that a person encounters in some of the other neighborhoods.

Locust Street is in the heart of Riverwest and it’s radical, not liberal. There’s a difference, I think. Liberals tend to be comfortable. Radicals are not. Riverwest is a tight community, but it is not a comfortable community. People struggle there, but somehow they seem to thrive, or at least survive. There are lots of taverns on Locust where the residents can drown their sorrows in glasses of beer from local micro-breweries. On the other hand, Locust Street is also home to the T’ai Chi Ch’uan Center and Woodland Pattern Books. My  home away from home for many years was the Great Lake Zen Center, which had to move from Locust a while ago due to rent issues. Even after the Zen Center left the area, I have kept a fondness for the neighborhood. I just feel at home there.

The festival was going strong when Stefan and I arrived. Locust Street was closed down for several blocks from Holton Avenue to Humboldt Street. These two streets serve as unofficial bookends to Riverwest. Stefan parked his truck near the corner of Center Street and Pierce Street, and we walked a couple blocks to the block party. The street has rows of quiet, modest, well-kept homes, and a canopy of mature trees. It was a nice place to walk and look around.

When we hit Locust Street the volume cranked up quickly. We bought a couple beers and plunged into the swirling crowd. All of Locust Street was lined with tents and booths. I was fascinated by the variety of people. There was a black man wearing a turban. There were Harley riders, on foot for once. A couple Latinos talked rapidly in Spanish as they hit the taco stand. There was guy with his hair bleached blond and glitter in his beard. He was holding the hand of his partner as they wandered through the throng. I saw an Asian girl with green hair and John Lennon glasses. A Muslim woman hurried down the street, looking chic in her robe and hijab. A Hasidic Jewish family walked along the edge of the crowd; the father with his black fedora and a beard of biblical proportion, the two little boys wearing their kippahs, and the mom with her long, billowing skirt. It was a seething, flowing mass of humanity, and it was beautiful. God, it was beautiful.

Stefan and I listened to a couple bands, and then we walked back down Locust Street to find something for lunch. We got back to Pierce Street and saw a BBQ stand. A young black man from that booth yelled to the crowd,

“Y’all don’t be afraid! We got us soul food here! Try some!”

Yes, they did have soul food. Stefan and I looked at the menu. Stefan saw the “rib tip sandwich” for $12 a pop. We decided to get two of them. Another young man took Stefan’s order. A couple other guys started to get the food ready for us. I saw an old black guy sitting in the back, minding the smoker. He had the best job of all. I grabbed a flyer off the counter for the ‘2019 African Cultural Festival” that is coming next weekend. I might go with Karin to that.

I asked Stefan, “You want me to get us a couple beers?” The tent for the Lakefront Brewery was right across the street. Stefan said, “Sure.”

I walked over to the bar. A guy with a t-shirt that said “support veterans” asked me what I wanted. Stefan wanted a “Rabbit Hazy IPA”. I was okay with a “Riverwest Stein Beer”. The man walked away for a moment, and then came back apologizing.

“I’m sorry, but they are just now tapping a new keg of “Rabbit”. You wanna wait? Or do you want different beer?”

I looked at the list of beers.

“Okay, how about an ‘India Pale Ale’, and the ‘Riverwest’?”

The guy replied, “Cool.”

He came back to me sheepishly with two cups of beer, that looked almost exactly alike.

“Hey man, They just ran out of ‘Riverwest’. I got two IPA’s here. Is that okay?”

I nodded. Then I handed him a ten. He handed me the beers.

I looked at the guy and asked, “What branch were you in?”

He got interested. He said, “Army”.

I smiled and told him, “I was in the Army too.”

He smiled back. “Really, when?”

“1976 to 1986.”

The barkeep nodded top me. “What did you do?”

I replied, “Well, I went to West Point. Then I flew helicopters for five years.”

The guy raised one eyebrow slightly. “Cool. Where were you stationed?”

“Mostly in West Germany. How about you?”

The guy shrugged his shoulders. “Vietnam.”

“Oooooooooh…”, I said, wincing a little.

He nodded again and walked away.

I found Stefan and gave him one of the beers. He handed me a cardboard container full of rib tips.

“Damn, this is a lot.”

Stefan said to me, “Yeah, it is. I find it ironic that that they call this a sandwich. I got you a fork. You’ll need it. You’ll need these too”, as he showed me a big wad of napkins.

Stefan and I stopped talking for a while. We were busy with the ribs. They were swimming in barbecue sauce. I used my mouth as a vacuum cleaner to suck all the meat off of those bones. I needed napkins often. I wanted to eat the ribs, but not wear them. The sauce was sweet and very tangy. It stung me sometimes, but I couldn’t stop eating. At the bottom of the dish was a slice of bread. It was only there to soak up the drippings. I ate it after all the meat was gone.

Stefan went to take a piss. I sat on a stoop, and waited. As I waited, an old black man tried to hustle me for some cash. The music nearby was really loud, and the guy was mumbling, so I couldn’t quite understand him. But I knew he was hustling me. I’ve been hustled by the best: military officers, corporate lackeys, and sleazy politicians. I didn’t mind this guy hustling me. He needed the money. Those other bastards, they were just vampires. I slipped the guy a bill, and he wandered off. I don’t know what he used the money for, and it’s not any of my business.

Stefan and I walked back on to the street. We walked all the way east to Humboldt. There was a bandstand there, right in the middle of Locust. It straddled the street between Ma Baensch (producer and purveyor of Milwaukee’s best pickled herring) and The Tracks Tavern and Grill.

The band on the stage was Shonn Hinton and the Shotgun. Those guys played the blues so hard that it made you cry. The bass player was excellent. He was like a rock in that band. Shonn sang his heart out and the rest of the band had his back.

I looked around me as they played. Some people nodded their heads to the rhythm. Some folks tapped their feet. Some people moved their whole bodies. They all heard the music in their own language. They all heard the Holy Gospel according to Blind Lemon Jefferson and Mance Lipscomb. They all felt the pain and the hurt and love.

The Holy Spirit was there. Alleluia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 8th, 2019

Reno is not a very spiritual place. Well, it is probably more spiritual than Las Vegas, but that isn’t setting the bar very high. I doubt that many people have a mystical experience while in Reno, unless they come up with a straight flush while playing high stakes poker. It is a very materialistic city, in a profoundly hedonistic state, in a country that worships the Almighty Dollar. In short, Reno is a place that God probably avoids. Reno isn’t quite in the same class as Sodom, but it leans in that direction.

Karin and I had time to kill before we met Joseba for breakfast at Mel’s diner in The Sands Hotel. Karin and I try to go to morning prayer and/or daily Mass whenever we can. That clearly was not going to happen in Reno.

The early morning (or late, late night) crew was in the casino. Almost all the people in the casino were sitting at the slot machines, chain smoking and staring grimly at the glowing screens. Maybe they were having fun, but they certainly didn’t look like they were. I did not see anybody win while we were at The Sands. I’m not sure that winning would actually make much of a difference. The winner might smile briefly, and have a momentary adrenalin rush, but then he or she would slip right back into the strange, distorted world of flashing lights and ringing bells. The bar was open and it was already crowded. I couldn’t decide if the folks on the stools were drinking early, or if they had been there all night. I guess it doesn’t matter.

Karin and I left the hotel as soon as we could, and we stood outside the casino in the early morning light. The air was crisp and clean. At 8:00 AM the town was ugly. At night, Reno looks flashy and exciting, kind of like an adult version of the Emerald City from “The Wizard of Oz”. In the morning, Reno looks exactly the way a hangover feels: dull, physically exhausted, and thoroughly unpleasant.

A few blocks from The Sands, there stands a church. We didn’t know what church it was, but we walked in that direction anyway. Once we got clear of the cluster of casinos, the neighborhood got decidedly ghetto, almost instantaneously. Most downtown areas that I have visited have nice restaurants and shops within walking distance of the hotels. Not Reno. The casino/hotels are self-enclosed environments, in an odd way similar to the International Space Station. Once a person leaves the casino, they are in a vacuum.

Anyway, I wanted to talk about the church.

When we got up close, we could see that the large, red brick structure was the Cathedral of St. Thomas Aquinas, the heart of Catholicism in Reno. We wanted to go into the church. As we expected, it was locked. Karin and I were ready to walk away. As we moved back toward the street, a man spoke to us. He had been sweeping the sidewalk in front of the cathedral.

He asked us, “Do you want to go into the cathedral? It is closed now, but there is a Mass at noon.”

We told the man, “We will be long gone by noon.”

“Why do you want to go into the church?”

That seemed like an odd question. We answered him by saying, “We want to go in there to pray.”

The man nodded, and stopped sweeping.

“Okay, I let you in. Come with me.”

We did.

The man met a co-worker as we entered the building. He told the woman,

“I am opening the church for these people. They want to pray in there.”

The woman replied, “Okay. I’m going to the office to start some coffee.”

The man said, “Good.”

He unlocked the door to the sanctuary.

Before we went into the church, I said to him,

“Thank you for doing this for us. Sir, what is your name?”

The man looked at me for a moment, and then he said, “My name is ‘friend’.”

He walked away.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

June 6th, 2019

Zion National Park is beautiful, truly beautiful. It has soaring mountains and deep valleys. The towering cliffs are a rust color which is only broken by the green of the trees that hang on wherever they can. Only a soul that is truly dead could fail to be awestruck when looking at that scene.

Karin and I drove along the Zion-Mount Carmel highway to the east entrance of the park. Somehow, I was surprised when we were actually entering the park. It kind of snuck up on me. We then followed the long, winding, windy road all the way through Zion to Springdale, Utah. The drive required intense concentration, considering all of the hairpin turns, tunnels, steep grades and heavy tourist traffic. Damn tourists. I was behind the wheel for most of this journey. Unfortunately, we got to Zion at the end of a very long drive from New Mexico. I didn’t enjoy it as much as I should have.

We stopped a few times on the corkscrew highway to soak up the scenery. Karin took many  pictures. I struggled with vertigo. I could deal with the high mountains, but the deep, sudden drops got to me. We parked at a turn off, and I just sat down on a rock and tried to hold on to that piece of the earth. Karin asked if I wanted her to drive. The answer to that was an emphatic “yes”. We could have stayed longer in the park, but I was exhausted. Our park pass would allow us to return in the morning. We decided to go to our hotel.

We stayed at the Majestic View Hotel. It is the most expensive place we have ever stayed. I suppose that we could have found more economical accommodations, but not anywhere near Zion. If a person wants to see the park, they have to pay, and pay a lot. That is just how it works. We knew that before we ever left home.

I have a good friend living in the Dominican Republic. He is currently unemployed because the economy sucks there. The monthly wage in that country is less than what we spent for one night at the Majestic View. That bothered me while we were there. It still bothers me.

The Majestic View really does have a “majestic view”. The hotel is set up so that every occupant of every room can have a truly excellent picture of the surrounding mountains. I have to give the hotel that much credit. Otherwise, the hotel was just a hotel. The rooms had a weird elk motif, and the furniture had a faux rustic look to it. Staying there was like roughing it in the Wild West with air conditioning and room service.

When we got to the hotel, we anxiously asked about places to eat, hopefully within walking distance. The only real choice was the hotel’s own restaurant, “Arkansas Al’s Steakhouse”. We ate there. It was a typical hotel restaurant: a fancy room with fancy menus, and fancy prices for average food. Neither Karin nor I had any intention of driving to any other eatery, so we just went with the program.

An apathetic hostess us placed at a table surrounded by noisy patrons. Karin and I could barely hold a conversation while seated there. It was exactly the wrong place to be at the end of a long day.

A young man came to our table. I immediately asked him if we could sit somewhere else. Anywhere else. The restaurant was nearly empty, so we could have any of a dozen different tables. He guided us to a table for two. We ordered drinks. I wanted a beer. The young man disappeared for a few minutes. He brought us our beverages, and some warm sourdough bread on a cutting board. Karin and I suddenly realized that we were hungry.

Karin ordered a salad, and I had some kind of BBQ sandwich. The waiter eventually brought out our food, which was actually quite good. He asked if we needed anything else.

I asked him his name.

He seemed surprised by that, and he answered, “Donny.”

I asked him, “Where are you from?”

Donny shrugged and said, “Well, originally, I’m from California, around Sacramento. But I’ve been here for a while, so I consider Utah to be my home now.”

I told Donny that years ago, Karin and I lived in Monterey, courtesy of the U.S. Army.

He replied, “Cool. did you like it there?”

“Oh yeah. It was good. It’s just that it’s too expensive to live in paradise.”

Donny nodded.

We talked some more, or rather I talked some more. I told Donny about about our cross-country journey. I told him about our kids. He listened patiently. After a while, he left us to attend to another customer.

Karin ate her salad and asked me,

“Why did you have to tell him your whole life story?”

“Honestly, I don’t know why. Maybe it’s a good story. I wanted to hear his story too.”

Donny came back. I think Karin might have ordered a dessert. Before Donny walked away, I asked him,

“How do I tell your boss that you did a good job?”

Donny seemed surprised by this question.

“Well, we have a form that you could fill out with your comments.”

“Good. Get me one.”

He did.

I wrote on it that Donny was friendly, professional, and that he really cared about us. After we paid for the meal, I shook his hand and thanked him for everything. He wasn’t quite sure how to respond. That was okay.

We left the restaurant. We never saw Donny again.