Frank is Emptiness

March 11th, 2019

Last week my wife and I decided to watch a movie on Netflix. We searched randomly through the titles, and I saw that they had “Black Hawk Down”. Karin and I had never watched the film before, so we picked that one.

I used to fly Black Hawks, back when I was in the Army. When I first got out of flight school in 1981, I flew Hueys. Those were Vietnam War vintage. A year later, Sikorsky started fielding Black Hawks in West Germany. I transitioned from Hueys to Black Hawks, and I flew them until I left the Army in August of 1986.

Black Hawks were fun. A pilot could do all sorts of things with that aircraft. We typically cruised at treetop level at a speed of 140 knots (161 mph). We could put the helicopter into a 90 degree bank (basically flip it on to its side while making a turn), and we wouldn’t lose any altitude. We could carry a total of eleven soldiers as passengers in the back of the aircraft. Each Black Hawk had a hook on the bottom to haul loads up to 7000 pounds. It was a sweet machine.

It could also be unforgiving. Aviation is not for the timid or the careless. I remember spending hours practicing emergency procedures while flying the helicopter. A pilot has to be ready to react almost instantly to any crisis. There was no room for error. In a helicopter, if you have a problem, you can’t just pull over to the curb. It is not a good thing to run out of altitude, airspeed, and ideas all at the same time.

I served in the Army during peace time. I was just lucky. I never had anybody try to shoot me down. However, I did have a couple instances when I was scared shitless while flying. Those special moments stay with a person forever. So, I could feel my body tense up when I watched the two Black Hawks get shot down in the film. All I could think was, “Oh man…”, and shake my head.

I was thinking about the movie today, and I was thinking about Hans. The movie was mostly about the soldiers on the ground, and they reminded me of my son. Hans was in Iraq in 2011. The movie takes place in Mogadishu, Somalia. Even so, I figured that location probably closely resembled the places where Hans fought.

I texted him, “Did you ever watch Blackhawk Down? What did you think of it?”

Eventually he replied, “Yeah and it was alright the hole deal was messed up though.”

I wrote back to him, “Was the movie realistic?”

His answer: “It was.”

Later on he wrote to me, “Why u ask about the movie?”

I replied, “I watched it with Mom. I kept thinking of you and I felt sad.”

He texted back, “another good but sad movie is lone survivor very realistic.”

I wrote back, ” Okay. By the way, I miss you.”

His response: “Miss u to.”

He called me a little after that.

I answered the phone, “Hey, what’s up?”

“Oh, not much”, he said in his Texas drawl.

Hans then proceeded to bitch about work. I listened. He has a number of legitimate complaints. His pump truck broke down on the way to a concrete pour, and the customer and the salesman were upset about that. Hans vented for a while. It’s good for him. Then his mind wandered back to the subject of the movie.

I told Hans, “That was ugly when the Black Hawk got its tail rotor shot off. The pilot just drilled that thing into the dirt. We always trained what to do if we lost a tail rotor. It’s not too bad if you are at cruising speed, say 140 knots or so. Then the airflow around the helicopter will straighten it out. But if you are at a hover, you’re fucked. The rotor spins one direction, and the rest of the helicopter wants to spin the opposite way.

In the movie, they tell the Black Hawk pilot that he has smoke coming from around the tail rotor, and that was not good news at all. Then, when the pilot says, ‘I got some vibration in the pedals’, I knew that was bad. Really bad. He needed to get out of there. Like right now.”

Hans told me, “Yeah, the movie was realistic. I felt for the guys on the ground. I did stuff just like that. Remember in the movie those guys were stuck in that building on the corner, and they couldn’t get to the crash site?”

“Yeah, I remember that part.”

Hans went on, “I was in places like that. Just waiting and hoping that the support shows up. There were a couple times when I thought it was all over. We were out manned and out gunned. I thought it was the end.”

“Yeah.”

Then Hans said, “I learned to love the sound of a Warthog (A-10 jet), or an Apache helicopter. That was the sound of a good day.”

“Warthogs make kind of a mess on the ground.”

“Yeah, but they also let me know that I had some fire power up above.”

“True.”

Then Hans told me, “Other realistic movies are ‘Lone Survivor’ and ‘American Sniper’. ‘American Sniper is about Chris Kyle, a Texan.”

“Yeah, I remember reading about when he got killed.”

Hans said, “Yeah, he was helping a guy with PTSD. They were at the shooting range and the guy killed Kyle.”

“When I first read abut it, I thought it was crazy that Kyle went shooting with a guy who had PTSD. Then when you came home from Iraq, and we went shooting at that range in Caledonia, it all made sense to me.”

Hans replied, “You remember how focused I was?”

“Oh yeah. You were relaxed and totally focused. It was just you, the weapon, and target.”

“It was like that over there too. When things went south, and it was just me and the people shooting at me, time slowed down. I mean the bullets kept my attention, but it was like time just slowed down.”

“I believe that.”

“Well, I’ll let you go. Love you, Dad.”

“Love you too.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

March 7th, 2019

“Repent, and believe in the Gospel.” – that is what is said to a person when they receive ashes on their forehead

” In the Jewish tradition, repentance is called teshuvah (תשובה), a Hebrew word translated as “returning.” One of the Hebrew words for sin is chet, which in Hebrew means “to go astray.” Thus the idea of repentance in Jewish thought is a return to the path of righteousness.” – from “My Jewish Learning”

Yesterday was Ash Wednesday. It is a profoundly Catholic sort of day. It’s a day to fast and to abstain from meat. It’s a day to walk around with ashes on your forehead. Mostly, it’s day to change.

Our church had three services yesterday. I read to the congregation from the Scriptures at the noon prayer service. I proclaimed a short passage from Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians. One portion of the reading made a deep impression on me. It was:

“For he says:

‘In an acceptable time, I heard you,
and on the day of salvation, I helped you.’

Behold, now is a very acceptable time;
behold, now is the day of salvation.”

The word “now” is very important to me. For some reason, Christians get stuck in the past or in the future. We are either gazing back at the events of two thousand years ago, or we are looking forward to the Second Coming. Ash Wednesday forces us to be right here, right now. This day forces us to examine our lives, and that is always uncomfortable. This day encourages us to repent, to change, and to do it right now.

I don’t want to change. That’s a problem.

The Jews also have a day of repentance: Yom Kippur. I have found that the Jewish notion of sin is different than that of some Christians. As mentioned in the quotation cited at the beginning of this essay, one of the Hebrew words for sin, “chet”, simply means “to go astray”. I have heard that another Jewish definition of sin is “to miss the mark”, as in archery. The implication is that the sinner is not utterly depraved, but lost and confused. That matches my life experience. I have seldom, if ever, met bad people. I have met many who are completely clueless, and I count myself in that group. I am convinced that people seldom commit destructive acts out of malice or hate. People usually hurt others because they just don’t know what the hell they are doing. They (and I) miss the mark.

These Jewish terms do not have that connotation of inherent perversity that is often found when Christians of the Cotton Mather sort talk about sin. Calvinists, and some Catholics, are convinced that we are all pond scum, and utterly unworthy of God’s grace. They think of repentance as a way to avoid God’s righteous anger. There is this notion that we can somehow beat the rap. Sometimes, when I talk to other Christians about the troubles we encounter, they shake their heads sadly, sigh, and say, “Well, it’s a fallen world.” This roughly translates to: “We’re all fucked.” That is not exactly the “Good News” that the Gospel is supposed to be.

Ash Wednesday is not a time for people to beat themselves up. It is a time for people to get their act together, at least a little bit.

Later during the service, I was one of the people, along with our priest, who distributed ashes. I had never done that before. I stood in front of a line of people, as I was holding a small bowl of ashes. Each person came up to me and patiently allowed me to smear black stuff on their faces.

I used my thumb to trace the sign of the cross on each forehead. As I did so, I said to each individual,

“Repent, and believe in the Gospel.”

I cried.

I don’t know why.

 

 

 

 

March 3rd, 2019

“Midnight at the oasis
Send your camel to bed
Got shadows painting our faces
Traces of romance in our heads”

from The Brand New Heavies

 

Being homeless sucks. A lot.

I got to learn all about it on Thursday and Friday of last week. The girl we love got out of jail on Wednesday. She was only in there for three days, but that was long enough for there to be some serious repercussions. One of negative effects was the fact that she no longer had a home.

On Thursday afternoon the young woman had to move out of the sober living house. That was painful for everyone involved. The community of women at the sober living house have a zero tolerance for relapses. That makes sense. If a person is going to live there, they need to stay sober. While the girl was dragging out all her belongings and I was loading them into my car, several of the other residents of the house spoke to her. Most of the other women are much older than our loved one. According to the girl, all of these people were compassionate and sympathetic. They all know what the struggle is like, and they understand how hard it is to keep clean. The women there encouraged our girl to reapply for residency in thirty days. So, they want her to come back. That’s good news.

The bad news is that we had to figure out temporary housing for thirty days. Per the girl’s probation officer, the new residence had to be in Kenosha County. That limits the options significantly. Kenosha County is semi-rural, and good, inexpensive housing is hard to come by. The probation officer gave the young woman 72 hours to get a new address. The pressure was on.

We worked on the housing problem on Friday. We started out by looking at a cheap motel that the girl had found online. The Beach Aire Motel is right on Lake Michigan. It has a nice view. That’s a plus. The minus is that it is not close to anything else at all. It is a mile walk to the nearest bus stop. There are no stores anywhere nearby. A person without a car, like our young woman, would have problems. We arrived too early at the motel to get a chance of looking at a room. So, we moved on.

The next stop was the Shalom Center in Kenosha. The center is the only homeless shelter in the city. According to the folks at the shelter, our girl showed up one hour too late. They were all out of beds. Overall, the people at the center were kind and helpful. They gave us a list of other possible places to stay. They also told the young woman to call the shelter every day to see if there was an opening. The population at the center is transient, and it is not unusual for a bed to become suddenly available.

We tried the Plaza Inn. That is in downtown Kenosha, and it is a location near to bus stops and places of business. Unfortunately, this hotel was also full up. The gentleman who spoke with us told the girl to fill out an application, and to check back in a month. We appreciated the offer, but it really didn’t do us any good.

The girl looked on her list and found another cheap motel. It was the Oasis Inn.

I asked her the address.

“It’s on 120th Avenue.”

“That’s way out by the freeway. Do you know how to get there?”

“No.”

“Can you look it up on your phone?”

She did.

The motel is on the frontage road next to I-94. The only thing nearby is the Mars Cheese Castle. Kenosha is close to the Illinois border, so there are a number of restaurants and stores in the vicinity that specialize in selling Wisconsin cheese. The flatlanders from Illinois love to buy cheese. I don’t know why. They just do. So, the Mars Cheese Castle (which actually looks like a castle) is a major tourist trap along the freeway heading north. Except for the cheese castle, there are only farm fields and woods in the area.

We got to the motel to find that the office was closed for lunch. It wasn’t closed very long. An older lady came up to us and let us into the office. She talked to the girl.

“So, you want a room at the weekly rate?” The woman spoke with a heavy Slavic accent.

The girl answered, “Yes.”

The woman went on, “I only take in people who are working. Do you know why?”

The young woman replied, “No.”

The lady continued, “Because people who stay here must have money to pay. If they don’t work, where do they get this money? Maybe drugs. Maybe prostitution. I want to sleep at night. I don’t want the police to be pounding on the door. You know?”

The girl nodded.

The woman gave the girl a form to fill out.

I asked the woman, “You have an accent. Where is it from?”

She eyed me suspiciously. “Eastern Europe. Why do you ask?”

“My wife is from Germany.”

The old woman relaxed a bit. “Yeah, I am from Croatia originally, but I am a Serb. Things were better when all those little countries were together as Yugoslavia.”

“The war did nobody any good”, I said.

She agreed. “Of course not! All that killing, for what? I think it was all for money.”

“No doubt.”

The Serbian woman gave the girl a key. We went to check out her room.

It was small. A queen size bed filled almost the whole thing. There was a little refrigerator, a microwave, and a television. The place had WiFi. It looked clean, but cramped. The bathroom was tiny, but adequate.

Later we moved in the girl’s belongings. The room was suddenly even more cramped. My wife went to bring the girl her meds the next day. Karin told me on her return,

“That place is a dump!”

Perhaps. It’s a matter of perspective. It’s still a place to stay, and the price is right. It will probably be a very temporary residence. I am sure that very few people make the Oasis their long term address. I am also sure that most of the occupants would much rather be living some place else. I doubt that many of them have much choice in the matter.

So, for the time being, this young woman is enjoying her stay at the Oasis.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

March 3rd, 2019

“You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“Our real discoveries come from chaos, from going to the place that looks wrong and stupid and foolish.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters

“It’s a cruel and random world, but the chaos is all so beautiful.”
― Hiromu Arakawa

“‎Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I’m an agent of chaos…”
― The Joker – Heath Ledger

The twelve-step folks like to use the phrase “one day at a time”. I have my issues with the twelve-step program overall, but I wholeheartedly agree with that particular slogan. I don’t know how people can actually plan ahead for a week, or a month, or a year. I can’t. It’s not for lack of trying. In fact, I have just meticulously planned a cross country road trip for Karin and myself. I have everything written down, and all the reservations made. And I know that, at any moment, all of these plans may come to naught. Chaos hovers very close to me.

Chaos is a very Zen thing. I look for patterns. I look for order, even in places where it does not exist. I am not always comfortable with chaos. Maybe no one is. Zen implies that sometimes there is no perceivable order. Sometimes we cannot make of sense of things. They just are. 

Zen is all about being in the moment. Zen is about seeing what is in front of you, and then accepting it. It’s very simple, but often very difficult. “Simple” and “easy” are not the same things.

Zen is not the only tradition that deals with chaos. Read the Book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible. The entire book wrestles with the meaningless of life. Ecclesiastes is not often quoted by religious authorities, nor is it often used in Christian liturgies. This is probably because that text does not give a person a warm and fuzzy feeling. Many people seek comfort and solace in religion, and this book offers very little of that. Ecclesiastes, like Zen, does not give anyone safe answers. But then life doesn’t give any either.

All this sounds theoretical. It’s not.

I woke up at 3:00 AM wondering if somebody I love will survive the new day. I don’t know if she will, and I have no control over her situation. It’s a karmic crap shoot. She might be just fine. Or, I might get a call from the cops saying that she is lying in the morgue. I don’t know. I can’t know.

I can only love her.

This goes back to the “one day at a time” idea. Sometimes, “one day at a time” isn’t good enough. Sometimes, it needs to be “one hour at a time” or even “one minute at a time”.  Or maybe it needs to be “right fucking now”.

Now is all that I have. It’s all this girl has. It is all that anybody has.

Chaos is not necessarily evil. It is simultaneously beautiful and scary. I prefer chaos to a suffocating sort of order that allows nothing new to happen. Even when I am worried and scared and profoundly disturbed, I still prefer to live in a world of surprises.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

February 27th, 2019

“My dear, here we must run as fast as we can, just to stay in place. And if you wish to go anywhere you must run twice as fast as that. ― Lewis Carroll, “Alice in Wonderland”

“I’m going to jail!”

I had hoped never to hear those words again, but I did.

The girl that we love said that to us on Sunday afternoon. She was riding in the back of a squad car at the time. Apparently, one of the arresting officers was handling her cell phone for her, seeing as the young woman was handcuffed at the time. The woman was mostly concerned about her boyfriend, and the possibility that he might dump her because she was soon to be incarcerated. The girl urgently wanted Karin to text the young man for her, and to tell him that she loved him. Considering everything else that was happening at that moment, it was a touching request. Karin sent the text.

I have spent a great deal of time with this young woman during the last two months. I have tried to help her find work and to find a place to live. I have always known that everything we have worked to build was extremely fragile. I always knew, in the back of my mind, that all of our work could be swept away at any moment.  It was.

I don’t know all of the details of what happened to get this young woman busted. I suspect it was a decision that can only be described as unwise. In any case, she has run afoul of the police and her probation officer, and that is not good, not at all.

The effects of her actions are already being felt. She has certainly lost her job. She is probably going to lose her place in the sober living house. She might get her probation revoked, and end up going to prison. As I mentioned before, her primary concern is her relationship with her partner. She is very worried about that. This woman had been diligently rebuilding her life, and now…who knows?

Why did she do something to get into trouble? I don’t know. Honestly, she doesn’t even know. We are in the realm of the irrational. Things don’t make sense, and there is no requirement for them to do so. These things just are. 

“History doesn’t repeat itself but it often rhymes,” as Mark Twain is often reputed to have said. We have been in this situation before, at least to a certain extent. But it’s never exactly the same. Times change. People change.

Although this girl has been arrested and jailed numerous times in the past, there is a significant difference with this particular event. Previously, she was overwhelmed by fear and despair. She still feels extreme anxiety, and rightly so. However, she is calmer this time around. There isn’t that feeling of total panic. The biggest difference that I can see with this iteration is that she is mostly concerned about somebody besides herself. The woman’s focus is on her boyfriend, and his situation. This is something new. This might be something good.

The young woman asked my wife on the phone if I was angry with her. She always asks that question. Just for the record, I am not angry. Years ago, I would have been angry, but not now. I am sad and hurt, but not angry. The girl is sick. Being angry with her would be like being angry with a cancer victim. What is happening is largely beyond her control. She is trying to do the right things, and sometimes she just can’t.

I do get angry with people who try to moralize the situation. I get irritated with the people who do not understand mental illness, and then try to tell me that it is all a matter of learning to make good decisions, or being around good people (whatever that means). Or maybe, they say, it’s just matter of accepting Jesus as your personal savior. In any case, they imply that this girl’s problems are all her damn fault. That is bullshit.

What do we do now? Not much. The young woman saw her PO liaison yesterday, and now the probation officer has to make a decision. The girl will probably not get her probation revoked and go to prison. That is good. However, she has to start all over again, which means that we have to start all over again with her. Karin and I are prepared to do that. We plan on it.

We will pick ourselves off,  brush ourselves off, and start again.

 

 

 

 

February 23rd, 2019

I was walking Shocky along Oakwood Road. It had been raining earlier, rain mixed with snow. I took Shocky out after the rain stopped, even though the skies were still cloudy and dark. I usually walk Shocky for two miles. It is one mile from our house to the railroad tracks, and then another mile back home.

There is a subdivision next to Oakwood that screams: “Money!” The subdivision is filled with McMansions that surround the shores of a man made lake. Each house is different is a similar way. They obviously have a strict building code in the neighborhood. It’s all about keeping the property values up and the riffraff out.

As I walked the dog, I noticed that a girl and her mom had set up a table at the entrance to the subdivision in order to sell Girl Scout cookies. They have sold their cookies at this exact time in February during each of the last few years. Their presence on the street is almost like the first sign of spring. I never stopped to buy cookies from them in the past, but now they were literally in my way, so I decided to stop and talk with them.

Both the teenage girl and her mother wore dark sunglasses. I found this to be odd, since the sky was overcast and the weather was gloomy. I felt like I was meeting a female version of the Blues Brothers. I walked up to talk with the daughter, who reminded me of Elwood.

“Hi”, I said.

The girl looked at me (well, I think she looked at me), and she smiled. She also said, “Hi.”

Her mother, Joliet Jake, said nothing.

The daughter had long auburn hair, and she wore a vest adorned with a variety of Girl Scout merit badges. I would guess that she was fifteen or sixteen years old. She had on jeans and ugg boots.

I broke the silence, “Well, give me you sales pitch.”

Awkward pause.

Then I asked her, “So what do Girl Scouts do?”

She wasn’t expecting that. Her mind was racing behind her sunglasses to come up with an answer.

She said in a sing song voice, “Well, we just had a big meeting where we celebrated the diversity of Girl Scouts. You know, like, we talked about scouts from China and Germany.”

“Really? What do Girl Scouts in China and Germany do?”

She smiled, “Oh, they do the same things that we do.”

“So, you celebrated the fact that other Girl Scouts are the same as you?”

“Oh, well, not exactly…”

Joliet Jake was getting edgy next to us. I could sense the tension.

I asked, “So, really, what do you guys do?”

The girl replied brightly, “We do community work.”

“Like what?”

“Well, when people ask us, we donate cookies to them.”

I was stunned by that answer. “Uh, yeah, sooooo when somebody asks you for help, you give them cookies?”

The mom piped up, “We also donate the proceeds from our cookie sales. We give to food banks and that sort of thing.”

I told them, “I do volunteer work with refugees. Do you get involved with people who are struggling, or is this kind of a white bread, suburban thing?”

Joliet Jake answered, “Oh, we go into the inner city.”

I bet you do.

I asked the girl, “How much are the cookies?”

“Four dollars.”

I reached into my wallet and pulled out a five. I handed it to her.

“Okay, this is what we’ll do. I will give this. I don’t need change back. I am going to walk my daughter’s dog down to the tracks and back again. When I come back, you will hand me a box of cookies. You decide what to give me. Make it a surprise.”

She nodded.

By all objective standards, I was a total smart ass with this Girl Scout. I felt good about it. She needs to be able to intelligently describe her organization. I laughed to myself as I walked along.

Shocky and I made the return journey. As I got close, I saw that Elwood had a box of cookies in her hand. She saw me coming.

I got up to her and she handed me the package of S’mores.

I asked her, “So, what is your name.”

She smiled and said, “Meghan.”

I turned to the mother and asked the same thing.

She replied, “I’m Brenda.”

I laughed and said, “I thought you went by ‘Mom’ “.

She laughed and said, “That works too.”

“I’m Frank and this is Shocky.”

They smiled and nodded.

I told them, “Thanks for the cookies!”, and I walked off.

When I got home, Karin and I opened the box and sampled the contents.

The Girl Scouts have awesome cookies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

February 23rd, 2019

Yesterday the Capital Times of Madison, Wisconsin, posted another letter from me. Once again, I wrote about immigrant rights. I am passionate about that issue.

The article is as follows:

“Dear Editor: The Trump administration recently announced that asylum seekers would be required to remain in Mexico while they wait for a decision as to whether they can reside in the United States. This policy is both illegal and immoral. It violates both U.S. and international law. A country cannot force a person seeking asylum to wait outside its borders. This defeats the entire point of asylum. A person seeking asylum is doing so out of fear for his or her life. People trying to get asylum status in the United States are doing so because they feel that they are safe only when they are in the United States. If refugees thought they would be safe in Mexico, they would apply for asylum in Mexico.

In practical terms, forcing asylum seekers to remain in Mexico greatly diminishes their chances of ever being accepted into the United States. There is an extremely high standard of proof required from asylum seekers to show that they are in danger. It is nearly impossible for an asylum seeker, especially those who do not speak English, to prove their case. They almost always need access to a lawyer. The Trump administration is ensuring that these people do not have access to legal counsel. The federal government is doing everything it can to make sure that these refugees will not get a fair shake.

Trump and his associates are hell bent on keeping the poor and the desperate out of the United States. Our government wants to exclude anybody who really needs to be here with us. This is a tragedy and an obscenity.”

 

February 20th, 2019

“Ohh, backstabber, backstabber, backstabber, backstabber
Backstabber, backstabber, backstabber, backstabber
Backstabber, hope grabber, greedy little fit haver, God, I feel for you, fool
You shit lover, off brusher, jaded bitter, joy crusher
Failure has made you so cruel.”

Refrain from “Backstabber” by the Dresden Dolls

Stefan came home a few minutes ago. He was more than little grumpy. This was understandable, seeing as he worked all day in the freezing rain. However, his irritability was primarily caused by the knowledge that he would be laid off in two days. The lay off was not really a surprise to him. Iron Workers are expected to deal with lay offs during the winter months. That’s just the way the work flows. Stefan was involved with a construction project that was nearing completion, and he knew it meant that apprentices like himself would soon be superfluous. The lay off itself wasn’t what upset Stefan. What bothered him was the fact that he learned about the lay off from somebody other than his boss. Stefan wondered when his boss planned on telling him that he was laid off. Perhaps, the guy was going to wait until the last possible moment.

Firing somebody without warning seems to be a standard practice in corporate America. I have seen it happen plenty of times over the years. I have seen people, including managers, walk into the office, and then immediately be told by a superior that their services were no longer needed. The person being discharged then gave up their keys and other company-owned property, and was unceremoniously escorted back to the parking lot. Sometimes, employee sensed that the ax was going to fall. Sometimes, it came as a total surprise.

Stefan’s comments made me remember an event from over thirty years ago. At that time, I was working for a trucking outfit in Salinas, California. I was only out of the Army for maybe a year, and I had become a supervisor/dispatcher with this company. I was working at a tiny outpost of a large, nation-wide corporation. We usually only had four drivers making deliveries and pick ups each day. We had two supervisors; I ran the early shift, the other guy worked in the afternoon and evening. Our boss was the facility manager/salesperson. We all worked long hours, and everybody had to know how to do everything.

Have you ever read “The Screwtape Letters” from C.S. Lewis? It’s a short book in which Lewis, who was a Christian apologist, described hell as being like a corporate bureaucracy. The demons in the story devoured the souls of the damned, and failing that, they devoured their co-workers. This particular trucking company was just like that. It had an ingrained culture of ruthless competition and distrust. There was constant fighting between the Teamsters union and the company management, and there was also a lack of cooperation, and a kind of false camaraderie between members of management. The corporation fostered an environment that encouraged employees to cut corners and fudge numbers. It also encouraged backstabbing. The unofficial motto of the corporation was: “We Eat Our Young”. It was a profoundly toxic place to work.

I was friends with the other supervisor. His name was Dave. I trusted him, and I think he trusted me. Hans was born in the spring of 1987, and Dave’s wife, Maria, served as Hans’ godmother. I still write to Dave and Maria, to tell them how Hans is doing. They don’t write back any more.

Dave did not get along with the manager who hired me. That is actually an understatement. The two men loathed each other. The manager who hired me was unique. He is the only man I have ever met who had no code of ethics. He wasn’t necessarily a bad person, but he was utterly amoral. Working for this guy was like working for Trump.

Being as this manager was amoral, he got promoted. His replacement was a woman who still had a bit of a conscience. Unfortunately, the manager from hell left a time bomb ticking when he left. He made certain that Dave would be fired, and he left this firing to his successor.

I remember being called into the new manager’s office on a Monday morning for a top secret sort of meeting. The new boss told me that Dave was going to be fired soon, but they had to wait for the new trainee to take over his position. She planned on letting Dave go at the end of the week. I don’t understand why she told me this. She knew that Dave and I were friends. For some reason she wanted me to be a co-conspirator. She swore me to secrecy.

“Don’t tell Dave.”

For some strange reason I still felt loyalty to the company, but I also felt that this whole thing was totally wrong. I felt dirty, really dirty. Even now, after all these years, I feel ashamed.

My shift and Dave’s shift had some overlap. We typically spent a couple hours working together before I left for the day. I made it through Monday and Tuesday without mentioning Dave’s impending doom. I don’t have a poker face, so on Wednesday Dave asked me if something was wrong.

I blurted out, “You’re getting fired! You’re done!”

Dave started crying. At that moment the manager came back from a sales call. She figured out quickly that her plans had failed. She immediately terminated Dave and took his keys. Once he left, she told me, “I handled that badly.”

No shit.

The manager cancelled the rest of her sales calls for the week, and she ran Dave’s shift until the trainee was ready. She should have done that right from the start. but she wanted to do what was best for the company. She was loyal to the company. I was loyal to the company. That’s why I kept my mouth shut for two days. We both manipulated and hurt Dave because we cared about an organization that didn’t give a fuck about us. It was pretty sick.

That episode shook me to my core. I stuck around for a few more months, but I was broken. I couldn’t function at that place, and eventually I quit. I am glad that did. If I had stayed with that company, I would have lost my soul.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

February 19th, 2019

It had snowed all day on Sunday, and most of the following night. The last few flakes fell at around 4:30 AM on Monday. I was up by then, and I started shoveling out the driveway for the third time in the last twenty-four hours. The street in front of the house was still snow covered. No plow had been through recently.  I had to throw the white stuff high in the air in order to get it over the already tall and substantial snowbanks that edged the driveway. I wanted to at least get the portion of the driveway around Stefan’s truck cleaned up before he went to work. Otherwise, Stefan would run over the snow, and make it damn near impossible to scrape it off the pavement.

I was about halfway done with the driveway when Karin appeared in the front doorway of the house, holding her cell phone. She yelled to me,

“She needs to talk with you!”

I knew that the girl we love was at work, but I couldn’t figure out what she could want now. I had planned to pick her up at 9:00 AM to take her to her mandatory group session, but I had hoped that the roads would be clean before I had to drive to Kenosha to get her.

I walked to the door, and Karin handed me the phone.

“Yeah?”, I asked.

The young lady said, “I can’t get a ride home with Lyft. If I take the bus, I will never make it home in time to get to the meeting in Racine.”

I sighed.

I asked the girl, “What time is it now?”

“It’s five o’clock.”

I told Karin, “I have to get her from work.”

The girl would finish her shift at the hotel at 7:00. Considering the road conditions, I needed to leave our house an hour before that time. That meant I would have just enough time to finish cleaning up the driveway, rest for a few minutes, and then drive south to the hotel. I was not looking forward to this ride.

Let me pause here for a moment. I want to explain, especially to any reader who has never driven in snow, just how important road conditions are in winter. A little snow or a little ice can turn a fifteen minute trip into an hour-long nightmare. It can turn a relaxing drive into a terrifying experience. Often the effect that winter weather has on a commute is dependent on the reactions of local municipalities to the snowfall or icing. Some communities, like Milwaukee County, are usually on top of the situation with trucks ready to plow and salt immediately. Others are not. It is not unusual to drive on a main road that is relatively clean in one town, and then have it turn into an absolute mess as soon as you reach the border with the next locality.

In any case, I left home at 6:00 and drove south on I-94. I was relieved to find out that two of three lanes on the freeway were clear. Only the rightmost lane was snow covered. Traffic was moving more slowly than normal, but at least it was moving. I got to the hotel on time (actually a bit early), and I texted the girl. She texted back that she was going to finish work late. The person from the first shift hadn’t arrived yet to take over from her.

I sat in my Ford Focus and waited. I was parked facing to the east, and I could see the clouds acquire a red tinge as the sun rose behind them. A ripped and ragged American flag fluttered in the wind in front of the hotel. I sat and listened to a CD from “The War on Drugs”, an Indie band that reminded me a lot of Bob Dylan without the rough edges.

The girl came out to the car. She got in. She looked exhausted, because she was. I drove her across town to the sober living house where she currently resides. I told her that I would be back in an hour to drive her to Racine for her meeting.

I had time to kill, so I drove a few blocks to a local coffee shop, Harborside, that was on the edge of Lake Michigan. The side streets in Kenosha were a full of snow. I slid around a bit trying to get to my coffee. I made it to the cafe, and I got a cup of java and two cookies with white chocolate and macadamia nuts. I had thought to do some writing there, but I was distracted by the local customers. Apparently, the coffee shop is a hang out for old men who gather together and ramble on about chronic illnesses, ungrateful children, and a world that is clearly going to hell. I left there quickly, praying that I never become part of that sect.

I returned to the sober living house. I almost got stuck in the snow on that street corner, but I managed to get free of it. After a few minutes, the young woman came out to the car. She got in and remained silent during the trip to Racine. She looked beat. Energy drinks can only take a person so far. Eventually, there is a crash. She was almost there. I was too. I could feel fatigue seeping into every part of my body.

The drive to the meeting was uneventful, at least until we got to the street where the session was to be held. The City of Racine had not plowed any of the side streets. The main roads were okay, but the residential areas were untouched. There was five inches of snow in the street, much of it run over and ground down until it was almost ice. Bastards. I barely managed to slip and slide my way out of that neighborhood.

I took care of an errand for Stefan. I needed to drop off a couple truck parts for him at a local body shop. Then I went to Mocha Lisa for more coffee. It made no sense to go back home, since the girl’s meeting would be finished in an hour or so. I did some writing.

I got a text from the young woman we love. She needed to buy groceries. She was out of food.  Would I take her to a store? Yes, of course. Then another text came. A girl at the meeting needed a ride home. She had walked all the way there from her house. I told our young woman that we could give her friend a ride.

I got to the meeting house at 11:00. I almost got stuck in the snow again. Our girl and her friend came out of the session, and I started driving the other girl home. She had walked a long way, maybe four or five miles. That was impressive. We got close to her house, and she told me at the last minute,

“There’s the driveway! Make left turn now!”

Too late.

I missed the turn, and decided to make a right turn into the next street in order to turn around and get this young lady home.

Fatal error.

That street was clogged with snow. When I tried to make a y-turn into a driveway, I got stuck. I was suddenly, seriously, and totally screwed. It kind of pissed me off.

I tried to use my well-learned tricks to get moving, and nothing worked. I finally got out of the car, and told the girl I love to get into the driver’s seat. I tried to push the car backward as she revved it in reverse. Nothing. I could feel my heart rate and blood pressure reach critical levels. I thought to myself,

“Christ, I’m going to die pushing this fucking car, because these useless mother fuckers in Racine can’t plow their damn streets!”

My mental rant ended when a black lady from the house across the street yelled to me,

“You want a shovel?!”

I said hoarsely, “Yeah.”

“Well, I got one here.” She pointed toward the garbage cans, and then she ducked back inside her house.

I leaned against the hood of the car, trying to catch my breath.

“Okay, thanks.”

I walked over there and grabbed the shovel.

I told our passenger, “You know, you probably should just get out now and walk the last block home.”

She did.

The girl I love tried to get the car moving. I tried to shovel around the right-front wheel to get traction. Things were not going well. The wheel turned the snow to slush and then to ice. I finally managed to scrape down to a couple feet a asphalt in front of the tire. I told the young woman,

“Come forward a couple feet. Stop. Then put it in reverse and floor it.”

She did that. We got moving…a little. She moved over to the other seat, and I tried to drive again.

The problem was that the whole fucking street was just a morass of slush and snow, deep and heavily rutted. We kept getting stuck trying to go forward.

The girl asked me, “Could we just drive in reverse to the next street?”

Not a bad idea. I tried it. Unfortunately, the street starts to go uphill as a person drives in reverse. I was hurting. I had the windows open because I was overheating in the car. I finally drove back far enough to get a running start going forward. I got some traction and just kept going. Not too fast, because then the tires would spin. Not to slow, because then we would stop and be dead in the water (or snow) again. We limped the car to the next main street (which was clear and clean).

Then we went shopping.

The young woman, at this point, clued me in that she had no more food stamps.

I thought for a moment, shrugged, and said, “Well, I guess that I am buying you groceries.”

She nodded.

You know, what the hell? She needed my help. I helped her. It needed to be done. So, I did it. It wasn’t that hard. It just was.

After buying food together, I got her back to the sober living house. I was nervous about having another issue with the snow. The young woman suggested that I just slow down enough for her to grab her bags and jump out of the car. It would be kind of like a winter storm drive by. I actually did come to a complete stop before she left me. I could do that much. She took her stuff and went into her house.

That girl is doing pretty well. She is funny and smart and resilient.

She’s not spinning her wheels.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

February 15th, 2019

Nisrin wanted me to read a book about “Frog and Toad”. Nizar was good with that too. So was Yasmin. I sat in my usual chair in the upstairs living room, and the three kids gathered around me. Nizar decided that he wanted to read, instead of having me do it all. So, he started on the first page of the story. He struggled with some of the words.

Nizar looked at the page intently. He said,

“Frog and Tide…”

Nisrin interrupted her brother, “That’s ‘Toad’, not ‘Tide’ .”

Nizar corrected himself, “Toad”.

He read a little farther and mispronounced the word “along”. Somehow he thought it said “around”.

His sister quickly pointed out his mistake.

I told Nisrin, “Let him read. Just let him work it out on his own.”

She was remained quiet for a few moments.

Nizar successfully navigated the rest of the page. Then Nisrin said,

“Now I read!”

She read the page flawlessly, much to Nizar’s irritation. After that, Yasmin read a page. Then it was Nizar’s turn again. He once again struggled with a few of the words.  From that point, the three siblings took turns reading as we went through a series of “Frog and Toad” tales. They didn’t get bored. This went on for an hour.

I often read to these kids. They are all from Syria, and Arabic is their mother tongue. However, they speak English well, and their reading comprehension improves with every week. The children are smart. More importantly, they want to learn. They are really interested in learning.

That visit to the Syrian family made me remember things from years ago. When my own children were young, I would read stories to them. Hans always found reading to be very difficult. He is dyslexic, or something like that. I would read to him for hours, just so that he would be able to appreciate books. I read to him the entirety of “The Lord of the Rings”. We would lie in bed, and I would read a chapter or two to him every night. Hans would listen to me and gaze into the distance as he did so. Nizar and Ibrahim do the same thing when I read to them. They hear my voice and they imagine the story in their heads.

I read books to Stefan too. He heard me read the story of Middle Earth, just as his older brother did. I read “Of Mice and Men” to him once. Somehow reading a book out loud has an deep emotional effect on me. I felt like crying when I read about the death of Lennie at the end of the novel. I asked Stefan what he thought. He said to me, with a wise sort of innocence,

“Sometimes bad things happen to people.”

Indeed they do.

I came home after my visit with the Syrians. I didn’t want to watch anything on a screen, so I dug out my copy of “The Lord of the Rings”, and started paging through it. I know the tale by heart, but it still appeals to me. I was reading the description of the great battle on the plain in front of Minas Tirith, when Stefan walked into the room.

He stood before me and said,

“I just want to thank you and Mom for all the support you’ve given me. I don’t think that I would have progressed so far with out your help.”

I thought for a moment and told him, “You’re welcome.”

He went on, “I want to pay you all back some day.”

I put down the book, and looked at him more closely. Then I said,

“You don’t need to pay us back.”

“Well, I want do something for you.”

I replied, “Do this: when you have kids of your own, do for them what we do for you.”

He paused and said, “Yeah, when I have my kids I’ll do that. I just wanted to give something back.”

“It’s okay. You will.”

Maybe Stefan will read to his children.