Frank is Emptiness

November 5, 2017

“At West Point, All Cadets Learn to Take a Punch”

That’s the title of a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. It first appeared in the WSJ on October 28th. I saw it online today on MSN. I read the article. It was short and to the point. Boxing has been a mandatory class at West Point for close to one hundred years, so that is not news. It is news that now women cadets are required to box. I guess that qualifies as progress in a way.

The article was of particular interest to me because, as a graduate of USMA (Class of 1980), I have rather intense memories of boxing. I was in the boxing ring forty years ago, and that experience still takes me deep. I have to admit that the essay in the WSJ does not entirely match up with my memories. It could be that my memories are faulty. It could be that things have changed over the years. It could be that the author of the article didn’t have all the facts.

I have to take issue with the title of the article. It misses the whole point of the boxing program. The author states that “all cadets learn to take a punch”. That’s true, but that is not why plebes are required to box.  It would be better said that “all cadets learn to give a punch”.

I remember the very first day of plebe boxing. The instructor, who was an Army major, sat us all down, and he proceeded to explain to us what we would learn in the class. He stated that boxing would be the most important class we took while at West Point. At the time, I thought that comment was absurd. Now, many years later, I agree with the man. Boxing was crucial in a way.

Let me say up front that I sucked at boxing. I was terrible. I nearly failed the course. I am not sure why. I was good at wrestling, but boxing was a different animal. The author of the article says that “Students are matched by size, skill and experience.” That’s not how I remember it. In my class we were matched up by weight, just like in wrestling. I am a short, stocky guy. I went into the ring with young men who were tall and lean, and who had a reach far in excess of my own. That meant when I jabbed, I hit thin air. When my opponents jabbed, they moved my nose closer to my left ear.

I found it difficult to be adequately aggressive when I kept getting nose bleeds. The instructors kept urging me, “Get inside him! Get inside him!” The only way to get inside the reach of somebody who has longer arms is to get hit. I honestly wasn’t very interested in that option. Actually, I didn’t want to be in the ring at all. Some guys like to fight. I never did. I still don’t.

This brings me to the point of my essay. Plebes are required to box so that learn they how to hit somebody else without the slightest hesitation or regret. The instructors would put roommates together in the ring. Why? So that two young men, who have no personal animosity, and perhaps even like each other, will learn to beat the shit out of one another. The whole idea is to get comfortable with violence, with the act of hurting another human being.

This should come as a shock to no one. Cadets are soldiers, and soldiers hurt people. That’s their job description. I took another mandatory class, Military Science. In that course, the job of a military officer was defined as being “an expert in the management of violence”. When I graduated from West Point, I was supposed to be an expert in using violence, an agent of destruction and chaos. Even now, that sounds pretty twisted.

Young people show up at West Point for a variety of reasons. For me it was to get a good education, and to make my father proud of me. Others show up because of patriotism. Some want to prove themselves in a challenging environment. Some just like the military. Some arrive not being familiar with violence. Every graduate leaves that school being comfortable with it. Every one of them.

That’s why boxing is important. If West Point didn’t force people to box, it would have some other type of training to bring out the killer instinct. Somehow, the cadets would learn how to fight and how to inflict pain. It’s a necessary part of the process.

 

November 1st, 2017

 

We were waiting to get into Room 515 of the Milwaukee County Courthouse. Victor and I were sitting on a wooden bench in the hall outside of the courtroom door. The corridor was long, and hushed voices echoed through it. The walls had the look of marble veneer, and the ceilings were vaulted with large globe lights hanging from them. The benches were like church pews, and probably designed to be uncomfortable. People sat around, looking forlornly at their phones, and waiting. Everybody was waiting…and waiting. That hallway was a preview of purgatory.

At last, the sheriff’s deputy opened the door to the courtroom, and people slowly wandered in. A courtroom is one of those places where nobody wants to be. However, almost everybody there has to be there. I don’t think that the lawyers want to be there any more than the defendants. It’s like everybody who walks into the room is expecting to get a colonoscopy. I was one of the few people who were in the courtroom voluntarily, and even I felt that vibe which screamed, “God, just get this shit done! Let’s get out of here!”

Victor was there for a traffic offense. I was with him because he needed somebody to ride shotgun. Victor is a Latino, and he doesn’t have a drivers license at this juncture in time. I’m not sure why that is, and I really don’t care. Javier from Voces de la Frontera set me up to drive Victor to the courthouse, and to be his white friend during the court appearance. I know that sounds racist as hell, but that’s exactly what I did. I did nothing for Victor other than to be with him. I didn’t translate for him (because I can’t), and he already had a lawyer. I was there to keep him safe, somehow. The whole thing sounds a little crazy, but then we live in crazy times.

The courtroom had that old school, 1930’s vintage, WPA artwork look. Lots of wood paneling, and heavy wooden furniture. There were carved wooden eagles at the top of columns along the walls. It was actually a beautifully appointed government office.  The problem is that nothing beautiful happened in that room. It was all haggling between lawyers and the judge’s lackeys. Lots of lives were being adjusted, bent, and twisted. Most of the people in the room, at least the defendants, were people of color. I’m not entirely sure that justice is blind.

Victor was in and out of there quickly. He had to attend some classes, and return to the court at a later date. He would have to pay some heavy fines, but that’s the best he could do by playing the system. Overall, he seemed relieved with the outcome of his appearance. Despite his limited English (un poquito de ingles), and my nearly non-existent Spanish (un poquito de espanol), we still managed to have some good conversations. I’m glad that I was there for him.

I went back to Voces de la Frontera that evening to teach the citizenship class. I worked for a while with Sergio. Sergio is an older Latino, who has been in the U.S. on his green card for a long time. Now he wants to become a citizen. He’s an intelligent man, but he can’t write for shit. During his upcoming citizenship interview, he may be required to write (in English) the answers to some simple civics questions. Sergio knows the answers to the questions. He just can’t spell. I know plenty of native Americans who can’t spell, but they aren’t trying to become citizens. Sergio is. He has to be able to spell, at least some words. It doesn’t seem fair, but this is how the game is played. My job is to make sure he can write well enough to pass the damn test.  Sergio is almost there, but not quite yet.

Giselheid walked into Voces. She is an older German lady, in many ways similar to my wife, Karin. Giselheid has lived here for many years as a permanent legal resident, and now she wants to become a citizen. She is from the same general area of Germany as Karin. Freya set me up to work with Giselheid because I am a German speaker. Giselheid and I haven’t actually used German much at all, but it’s there if we need it. Giselheid is definitely an outlier at Voces. Almost everyone else who comes there is Mexican.

We worked on the civics questions for the citizenship interview. There are one hundred standard questions that applicants must be able to answer. Most people preparing for the interview know the book answers. I try to go deeper with the students to ensure that they actually understand the questions and the answers. I am ambitious. I don’t just want these people to become U.S. citizens. I want them to be active citizens. I want people like Giselheid and Sergio to participate in our dysfunctional democracy. I want them to get involved.

I asked Giselheid about the Bill of Rights.

“What is one right found in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution?”

Giselheid answered in her German accent, “Freedom of Speech.”

“Okay, say that I know nothing of America. Explain ‘freedom of speech’ to me.”

Long pause.

Then she said, “Well, you can say whatever you want.”

I told her, “There are certain limits on freedom of speech. I can’t tell people to riot in the streets. I can’t tell them to kill other people. Other than that, I can say almost anything.”

Giselheid frowned and said, “But it is okay to call people names and say mean things about them?”

“Well, yeah. There is a thing called slander. I cannot say something to hurt somebody else that is false and designed to hurt the other person. However, it is difficult to prove slander. Mostly, people get away with saying bad things about other people.”

“And this is okay?”

“This is something that we put up with. We can’t stop people from saying mean things. If we tell the Neo-Nazis to stop speaking against the Jews and the blacks, then somebody will complain about other people speaking against the Nazis. Eventually, nobody will get to say anything.”

“So, we just put up with it?”

“Yes, we do. We’re in America.”

I went on. “Freedom of speech isn’t always free. I have been in many demonstrations and protests over the years. In the spring I was at an anti-war protest in Nevada. I was involved in civil disobedience. I helped to block the entrance to an Air Force Base. The cops told me to move. I didn’t. I got arrested. I went to jail. I expressed my freedom of speech and I paid for it. Sometimes it works like that.”

“Oh.”

I went on to another question. “What is one responsibility for only American citizens?”

Giselheid said, “To be on a jury.”

I told her, “I have been on two juries.”

Giseleid looked at me and said, “I don’t think I would like to be on a jury and have that responsibility. I might send somebody to jail for life.”

I replied, “That’s true. It is a big responsibility. My experience has been that people rise to the occasion. People that are selected for a jury understand that they can totally change another person’s life. Members of a jury act like adults, and they try to do it right. They really do.”

“I don’t want to be on a jury.”

“Nobody does. Somehow it works, at least most of the time.”

I thought back to Victor and the courtroom. Even with all the haggling and horse-trading, maybe it all really does work out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

1 Corinthians 13:13

 

I was talking with Noa at the synagogue. She had asked me how I was, and I told her that I was struggling with recent events in my life.

She said to me, “You know, Frank, sometimes you just have to have faith.”

Faith

That was an interesting comment. Seeing as Noa is an Orthodox Jew, I doubt that she was referring to faith in Jesus. Her words did set some thoughts in motion.

I looked up the definition of faith. There were several available, and most of them had a strong religious connotation. One of the definitions simply stated that faith was “a complete trust in somebody or something”. I can work with that.

I think that humans are meant to have faith. I think that people have a burning need to believe in something. We require some sense of order and purpose. Carl Jung once commented that you could destroy a person if he or she thought that they were just actors “in a tale told by an idiot”. Faith doesn’t need to be religious in nature. It’s a matter of trust. For instance, I don’t know that the sun will rise tomorrow, however I have faith that it will.

John Lennon wrote a song called God. The lyrics of the song are essentially a laundry list  of things which Lennon refuses to believe. It is his testimony to his lack of faith. However near the end of God, Lennon sings these words:” I just believe in me, Yoko and me, and that’s reality.” So, even at his most skeptical moment, Lennon still has faith in somebody. He can’t get away from it.

What kind of faith did Noa mean? I’m not sure. I suspect she was referring to some kind of faith in God, trusting that He has things in hand. I think the assumption here is that God is all-powerful and all-loving. Does the evidence indicate that God is in fact all-loving? Maybe, maybe not. There is an awful lot of suffering going on. On the other hand, who else is there? The problem with monotheism is the lack of alternatives. I trust in God because I see no other options.

Hope

I think that hope is hard-wired into humanity. People are irrationally and exuberantly hopeful even in times of deep crisis. Why is that?

The alternative to hope is death. I don’t necessarily mean immediate death, but it will come. I am aware that we all die anyway, but a lack of hope accelerates the process. No matter what the evidence says, we keep believing that things will work out. We have to do that in order to function. Hope is a virtue, and it’s also a survival technique.

Love

Love is a word that is used in many ways, so that it often has no meaning at all. I define love as a type of self-sacrifice. It means giving up what I want so that somebody else can have what they need. Love is dynamic. It is an action. It is a verb. Love has very little to do with feelings. In my experience, the greatest acts of love have been accompanied by the most frightening or sorrowful feelings. Love is not for the timid.

I would like to think that love is also inherent in human nature. History is full of examples when love was absent, but that is partly because love is not very dramatic or exciting. Love mostly consists of small, personal acts of kindness. For some reason, those types of events don’t make the news.

Faith, hope, and love are all entwined. They cannot be separated. I have faith that, in the end, love prevails. I have hope that it will happen in my life, and in the lives of those I love. All three things are actually one.

 

 

 

October 28th, 2017

I arrived at the shul quite late. It was after 11:30, and the Shacharit was nearly finished. The synagogue was almost full. This made sense since it was the rabbi’s last Shabbat with this congregation. He and his family are preparing to move to London, England, very soon. They will be starting a new life in a new country. Everybody wanted to give the rabbi a fond farewell.

I found a space in a pew, and took part in the service as best I could. I didn’t plan on bothering the rabbi. It was his big day, and he had many people to meet and greet. Rabbi Andrews is a good man, and he has a big heart. He had helped me in the past when I was hurting. He knows about my struggles. The least I could do was to be present for him. I needed to be there with the rest of the community.

We were all seated during one of the prayers. The rabbi walked past me to put a book away on a shelf. I didn’t notice him again until he sat down right next to me and put his arm around my shoulder.

“How is she?” he asked.

“She’s okay… for now.”

We were both quiet for a moment.

Then the rabbi asked, “And how are you?”

I struggled to speak. “I’m…I’m a mess.”

We were quiet again.

Rabbi Andrews smiled gently, and then he said drily, “That’s understandable.”

He squeezed my shoulder, and then he stood up. He had things to do up front.

It’s strange. I was/am deeply moved by the actions of the rabbi. He didn’t do anything that was extraordinary. He didn’t solve any of my problems. He didn’t have any clever answers or profound insights for me.

He was simply and sincerely human.

I hate it when people ask how I am. Often, a person will ask the question almost unconsciously, as a matter of habit. Somebody will come to me with a smile, and breezily ask, “So, how are you today?”, and then they start talking about themselves before I can say anything. I find that offensive. I would prefer that the person greet me by saying, “I don’t care if you live or die.” At least it would be honest.

I am also uncomfortable when a person asks how I am, and they really do care. That forces me to feel, and I don’t like to do that. If I am hurting, and I tell a person how I really feel, it is like I am bleeding in front of them. I don’t know if I freak out the person asking the question, but I know that I freak myself out. I find it difficult to accept sympathy and compassion. I don’t know what to do with it. It’s somehow scary.

People sometimes feel like they are required to say something to “help”. I do that on occasion. I usually wind up saying something that sounds stupid. Words are clumsy. Often they are all that we have available, but they are still blunt instruments.

I have had people say things to me like: “It’s all part of God’s plan”, or “Look on the bright side”, or “Don’t worry, it will get better.” I understand that they say these things with the best intentions. They want to help.

I nod and smile at the person, but inside I am screaming, “Shut the fuck up!”

A person who is wounded generally does not need somebody to solve an intractable problem for them. The person doesn’t need words that provide a soft, fuzzy, Hallmark kind of solace. A suffering person needs somebody else to listen, and just to be there. That’s it. That’s all. That’s enough.

By the way, hugs really do help.

Rabbi, thanks for the hug.

October 27th, 2017

Hussein greeted me at the door. He’s a sophomore in high school. He looks like any other high school kid. He’s skinny with dark hair. He speaks English with barely any accent. A person would not know that he is a Syrian refugee, not unless he mentioned the fact.

There are eleven kids in Hussein’s family. People are constantly in motion. His mother is perhaps the only one who remains stationary for any length of time. I suspect that she is in a chronic state of exhaustion. Her older children help her to keep track of their younger siblings. I did the same thing with my six younger brothers many years ago. The Syrian family reminds me of my childhood in many ways: the relative poverty, the dumpy old house, the noise and the chaos. Except for the language barrier, it all feels familiar.

I walked into the house and said, “Assalam alaykum”.

Hussein replied, “Wa alaykum assalam.”

Um Hussein nodded to me, and I gathered some of the children to come upstairs and finish their homework. Nada had math to do, so we sat next to each other and tried to solve problems. Yasmin came over to us, and Ibrahim sat on the other side of me.

Nada had to add these numbers: 5+(-13).

I asked her, “So, what should we do here? Plus or minus?”

She looked at the numbers and said, “We add the 5 to 13, and get 18.”

I shook my head, “No, that’s not quite right.”

Ibrahim yelled into my ear, “I know the answer! I can do it!”

I told Ibrahim to quiet down. “I need Nada to do this one.”

Nada’s freckled face frowned. She shrugged, “I don’t know.”

“Look at the numbers. The 13 is a negative number. You see the minus sign?”

Her eyes brightened. “Oh, so it is a minus number. Then it should be -8!”

“Yeah, that’s right. Try the next one.”

A little boy with sandy hair came up to us. He wanted to see what we were doing.

I asked him, “What is your name?’

“Muhamed.”

“Hi, Muhamed.”

I thought to myself that Muhamed is going to grow up tough. He’s going to catch hell for his name. Nada and Yasmin, they will be able to slide by. Maybe even Ibrahim will be able to blend in with his peer group. Muhamed is going to meet a lot of bigots as he goes through life. People will hate him just because of his name.

Um Hussein came upstairs to find out what we were studying. She brought me a glass of hot, sweet tea. She set it on a metal tray on a chair in front of me.

“Shukran,” I told her.

She replied “Afwan”, and then she went back down the stairs.

Nada was struggling with a problem: 12-(-3).

“Do you see what to do?” I asked her.

Nada shook her head.

“You have two minus signs. Those are like having a plus sign.” I crossed out the two minus signs with a pencil, and I drew a plus sign in their place.

“Oh, I see”, said Nada.

She didn’t see.

We worked on some more problems. Eventually, Nada got the hang of it. She’s a smart young lady. Her siblings are sharp too.

The kids were tired of doing math. I asked them if they wanted to look at a book. I had brought along a book about San Francisco. I had bought it over thirty years ago when Karin and I lived in California. There were plenty of pictures to see.

I showed them the Golden Gate Bridge. One page had a large photo of the strip joints in the Tenderloin. We skipped past that page, and I didn’t attempt to explain what that picture was all about. We found an old photo from the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. The picture showed damaged buildings, leaning and burning.

Nizar piped up and said, “Like in Suria (Syria)!”

Yeah, I bet. But not because of an earthquake.

We looked at pictures of Golden Gate Park and Chinatown. I asked the kids to tell what me they saw in the photos. I tried to explain to them about cable cars. They didn’t understand what I meant. They were impressed with the steepness of the hills in San Francisco. They liked all the bridges.

I asked them, “Do have any other books?”, and I drank some tea.

Nada brought me a book about volcanoes. We struggled through that one. Nada can sound out words, but she didn’t have enough vocabulary to make sense of a lot of the book. Her brothers and sisters tried to read along with us.

The book took us a long time to read. I didn’t mind. Somehow it’s easier to be patient other peoples’ children. I can’t remember any more if I was patient with our own. I kind of doubt it.

It was time to go. I walked downstairs. The rest of the family was eating. There wasn’t enough room around the table, so Hussein was eating near the TV, with a plate on his lap. He looked at me and thanked me for coming. I told him that I would be back the same time on the following Thursday. Um Hussein actually smiled, and she thanked me too. I left.

We will try it again next week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

September 30th, 2017

St. Patrick’s Cathedral is an impressive structure, taking up an entire city block. Its neo-gothic architecture and soaring spires are worth seeing. However, it might not be worth going to Mass there.

While Jules, Tracy, Rose, Karin, and I were finishing up our Soviet-style lunch at the Ukrainian restaurant, Jules suggested that we all go to St. Patrick’s Cathedral and take in one of the seven Masses that they celebrate every day. Karin had shown interest in visiting St. Patrick’s, and Jules had initially thought Karin and I would make the excursion on our own the following day, a Sunday. However, since we were already within subway range of the cathedral, and it was kind of on our way back to the Port Authority Bus Terminal, he reconsidered and thought that we might as well check out the church after we were done eating. Everybody agreed with the revised plan.

Jules was raised Jewish, but he is currently a secular humanist, so I don’t think that he was expecting to receive any kind of religious epiphany during the service in the cathedral. He was going there as a favor to us, and we are grateful for that. Tracy, according to Jules, is some flavor of Protestant, so I don’t think she was expecting much either. Rose is Catholic. Karin was raised Lutheran, but converted to Catholicism sixteen years ago. I am a cradle Catholic with strong Buddhist tendencies. We were a rather odd group to be attending Mass at St. Patrick’s.

I think we entered the church off of Madison Avenue. There were plenty of tourists in the cathedral, besides us. There was also a wedding going on. We sat down in a side pew to watch. It seemed strange for people to have a wedding while being surrounded by milling crowds of strangers on the periphery of the event. I asked Jules how much it would cost to have a wedding there.

He said drily, “More than you can afford.”

Once the wedding was over, preparations for the next Mass began. I was intrigued by the ushers. They had professional ushers there. The man on our side of the church was over six feet tall, and probably tipped the scales at 300 lbs. or more. The ushers all dressed like characters from “Men in Black”. They had ear pieces like the Secret Service agents. The guy on our end looked more like a bouncer than anything else.

There were also cops in the church, officers from the anti-terrorist team. They made the liturgy slightly less spiritual than it might have been. Perhaps the police were necessary as a safety measure, but they made everything a bit less friendly.

The Mass itself was celebrated in a professional manner. It was technically perfect, but somehow soulless. The church was crowded, but there was no sense of community at all. We were surrounded by strangers, who seemed quite content to remain strangers. The Mass is supposed to provide a sense of connectedness. At some level, the participants should all feel like members of the Body of Christ. It wasn’t like that in the cathedral.

At one point, just prior to the beginning of the service, Rose remarked to me,

“I couldn’t believe that right at the entrance to the church there were vending machines.”

“What?”

“Yeah, there were these vending machines where you could get a commemorative Padre Pio coin.”

I told her, “That’s the sort of thing that started the Reformation.”

I left the Mass feeling underwhelmed. It had felt more like a tourist attraction than a religious event.

The next morning Karin and I went to Mass again, but this time we went to St. John the Evangelist Church, just a couple blocks away from Jules’ house. Bergenfield has a large Filipino population, so many of the pews were filled with members of that community. There were also quite a few whites and Latinos. The church was full, like St. Patrick’s had been. However, in this church it felt like the people belonged together. People interacted with each other. People sang. People cared.

At St John’s we were at a Mass. I’m not entirely sure that we were at St. Patrick’s.

 

 

 

 

 

October 1st, 2017

Jules suggested going on a very minor excursion. We had spent the two previous days running full throttle through Manhattan and Queens, and Jules thought we could do something at half-speed. Karin and I liked the idea.

Jules took us to the Palisades Interstate Park along the Hudson River. The park is a thin sliver of land at the water’s edge. It follows the cliffs on the New Jersey side of the river for miles and miles. Jules explained to us the origins of the park. Apparently, at the beginning of the 20th century, people were mining the stone on the Palisades. The rich folk on the other side of the river resented the fact that their scenic view was being demolished. Through the efforts of early environmental activists, and a healthy influx of old money, the land of the Jersey side was eventually all bought up, and the mining operations were banned. A win for everyone involved, including future generations.

From the top of the Palisades a person can see for miles. From our perch we could look south and see Yonkers, and maybe the northern edge of the Bronx. If we looked to our left, in a northerly direction, we could see the Tappan Zee Bridge in the distance. The water is brown and murky. The river is very broad and slow-moving. If we looked straight down, we could see the tiny images of boats on the stream. Jules joked that he had told the kayakers far below to launch just for us to see them.

Karin and I kept following the Hudson River north. We drove into New York State from Bergen County, and we followed 9W north along the west bank of the river. We saw signs for West Point.

Karin asked me, “I guess you aren’t planning to stop to visit West Point?”

“Uh, no”, I replied, and I just kept driving north.

West Point really is a scenic location, full of history and tradition. However, for me, it would be like returning to prison. No, that story is done. I’m not going back to reminisce.

After visiting the Peter Maurin Farm and staying overnight at Boughton Place, Karin and I drove into Highland to find breakfast stop. We initially parked next to a restaurant/bar that looked to be open. It wasn’t. There were just some people cleaning up in there.

An old Italian guy came out to talk with us. He had that Joe Pesci look. The man pointed down the street and said,

“You see that place over there? They serve breakfast. They’re Mexicans, but they are good people. I wouldn’t steer you wrong. Really. They are good people, and the food is good there. I wouldn’t steer you wrong.”

Okay. We went to the El Paso restaurant and had breakfast. The old guy was right. The people were nice and the food was excellent. Before we left, Karin bought some Mexican snacks for the road. Got to have snacks.

After that, we stopped at the Rail Trail, a former railway line that is now a foot and bicycle path across the Hudson. The Rail Trail connects Highland, on the west side of the river, to Poughkeepsie, on the eastern shore. There is a gorgeous view from that bridge. Karin marveled at the wake of a barge heading north on the river. The mountains on either side of the river are densely wooded. There was still morning fog in the distance as we stood on the bridge.

Karin and I crossed the Mid-Hudson Bridge (and paid a toll) to get to eastern side of the river. Karin wanted to drive north to Rhinebeck, the home of the New York State Sheep and Wool Festival. We were actually three weeks early for the festival, but at least Karin could tell her fiber friends that she had been in Rhinebeck.

Rhinebeck is a village with downtown that extends for two or three blocks. It has a touristy feel to it. There are a variety of restaurants, shops, and boutiques. With the exceptions of Stickles Variety Store and the CVS pharmacy, there are no stores that sell things that people need. Karin and I stopped in Stickles. Oddly enough, Karin found “The Yarn Garage”, a yarn shop tucked into the back of the store. I not sure how she finds these places. The lady running the shop was originally from Düsseldorf, so she and Karin could talk about knitting in German. Obviously, Karin made a purchase there.

Eventually, Karin and I found ourselves in a pricey shop where they sold free trade fabrics and hand made soaps. Women sniffed bottles of essential oils while their husbands wondered if there are any bars open yet. There were many items from many countries suitable for decorating an already over-filled American home. It was a store for people who had both time and money to burn.

I found myself conversing with the girl working in the shop. She had dark hair and large, black-rimmed glasses. A nose ring sparkled in her left nostril. She had a serious, thoughtful expression on her face.

I asked the girl, “Would you say that most people living in this town are well off?”

The girl shrugged, and “Yes, probably.”

I looked around. “I have never felt comfortable in this kind of place. I grew up in a gritty, industrial town. The town is still gritty, but there isn’t any industry left there. I just feel more at home in a working class environment. This feels alien to me.”

She stared at me.

The girl said, “A lot people have been here for generations, but new people with money are moving in, and that raises the home prices and taxes”.

“So, some people are rich and some are just hanging on?”

“Yes, my grandmother lives here in town. She is just barely making it.”

It was quiet for a moment.

“By the way, my name is Frank.”

The young woman smiled, “I’m Cassandra.”

“Cassandra?”, I asked. “Like the woman in the Greek myths. From The Iliad I think?”

The girl smiled again. “Yes! It’s from The Iliad. Cassandra was pursed by one of the gods. He gave her the gift of prophecy. When she refused his advances, he cursed her so that nobody would believe what she predicted.”

“That is a common fate of prophets.”

Cassandra was confused, “How so?”

“Well, in the Bible, most of the prophets were ignored. It goes with the job.”

She nodded.

Then I remembered watching “Antigone” at West Point forty years ago.

I asked Cassandra, “Have you seen one of the old Greek plays on stage?”

She shook her head.

“They are really interesting.”

“Why?”

“Well, the plays are a lot like life.  When the original audiences watched the plays, they already knew the stories. They already knew how the tragedies would end. But they still watched the show. They couldn’t look away. Sometimes, in life, you know how the story ends, but you can’t look away.”

“Oh.”

“It was good to meet you, Cassandra. I have to find my wife.”

“Okay. Goodbye.”

Karin and I saw the Hudson once more, heading west. It was up in the Adirondacks, near Speculator. We were weaving through the mountains when we crossed a small bridge. A turbulent, foaming stream flowed beneath us. The water was clear and swift.

It was the start of the Hudson.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

October 2nd, 2017

Jules took us to a park in Tenafly. It’s an urban park, which means that its open space really isn’t that open. There are houses up against three sides of the park, and a railway hugs the fourth edge. However, the park is a welcome patch of green, with mature trees and a walking path that goes around the perimeter. The park gets plenty of use. Even in the early morning, there are people exercising and walking on the trail.

It was our last morning with Jules, and he wanted us to walk with him and his friend, Curtis. We left Jules’ house at 6:45 AM. It was cool outside, and the ground was covered with dew. It was sweater weather. We met Curtis in the parking lot next to the walking path. Curtis smiled and greeted us.

Curtis is an old black man, tall and thin. He shook my hand when we met. His hand was strong and gnarled. Somehow, Curtis reminded me of an old hickory tree. Curtis has been around for eighty-six years. I would never have guessed that he was so old. He was alert and talkative. He was alive in a way that I seldom see in people half his age.

The path forms an oval that is a little less than a mile and a half in circumference. Jules and Curtis like to make two trips around it. They walk rapidly. Karin was only able to make one of the two round trips before she got out of breath. She retired to Jules’ van after the first cycle. While Jules, Curtis, and I made the second journey around the track, Karin said her morning prayers. She just managed to complete them by the time we returned.

Curtis is a vet. He was in the Army a long time ago. I mentioned that I had stationed in Germany. He told me,

“I was supposed to go to Korea, but the shooting was over before they could send me there. So, they shipped me to Germany instead. I was at Ulm, way in south Germany. I saw them mountains with all the snow on them. I ain’t never seen nothing like that before.”

He went on, “We was always in the field, nine months out of the year. I carried everything on my back. I was Infantry. Sometimes, those tankers, they gave us a ride, but mostly we walked everywhere.”

Jules and Curtis made an interesting pair. They were obviously close friends, but I am not sure what they all had in common. They just walked together almost every morning. I guess that’s enough.

We weren’t alone on the path. Other people were walking or running alongside of us. Jules and Curtis greeted an older black man who was resting on a bench. This guy walked a bit every morning too. He didn’t go as far as Jules and Curtis, but, hell, he’s  ninety-one years old. As we got near to Jules’ van, a jogger passed us by. He was wearing a t-shirt, shorts, running shoes, and a black yarmulke. Only in New Jersey.

On the way back to Jules’ house, I looked out the car window to view the neighborhood one last time. We passed the yeshiva and the Brazilian jujitsu school. We went by the New Jersey National Guard Armory, with its antique tanks rusting in front of the building. We drove near the Chicken and Rib Crib. I saw Bergen Pizza and the kosher deli, the Korean grocery store and the Filipino restaurant.

It’s a world of its own.

 

 

 

October 5th, 2017

“Oh the sisters of mercy, they are not departed or gone.
They were waiting for me when I thought that I just can’t go on.
And they brought me their comfort and later they brought me this song.
Oh I hope you run into them, you who’ve been travelling so long.”

Sisters of Mercy by Leonard Cohen

 

We took the back roads from Pete’s home in Pottersville, New York, to the retreat house in Rochester. The highway first took us through the Adirondacks with the trees flaming  autumn colors.  Flashes of scarlet, yellow, and burnt orange greeted us at every turn. Once we got past Rome, the landscape flattened out a bit, and we skirted the shore of Lake Ontario for a couple hours. Lake Oneida was on our left. We took a break to gaze at its waters and then eat a late lunch.

Karin and I had never been in Rochester before. I had been imagining a rust belt city, grimy and tired. We didn’t get to see much of the town, but what we did see did not match my expectations. The Mercy Spirituality Center occupies a huge house on Highland Avenue, a busy street that runs through a pleasant residential area. Highland Park is close by. The house itself dates back to the 1860’s. It has been used by the Sisters of Mercy since 1986.

Karin and I had not originally planned to stay at Mercy. We had hoped to spend a night or two at a Trappist monastery close to Buffalo. Unfortunately, the monastery’s retreat house was full. However, the house of mercy had a room for us.

The Sisters of Mercy (Hermanas de la Misericordia) were founded in Dublin almost two hundred years ago. They came to Rochester back in 1857. The nuns actively work on environmental issues. They run the retreat house to provide an oasis of quiet in an urban setting. They do a good job. The house is peaceful and inviting. When Karin and I arrived, a group of women were just completing a centering prayer retreat.

A lay woman named Karen greeted us and gave us the tour of the house. Our room was the only one with an attached bathroom/shower. The house is kind of set up like a bed and breakfast. Well, it’s a bed and breakfast with a chapel on the first floor, and an extensive library on the second floor. Karen showed us the dining room and the kitchen, and she explained that we could make ourselves a continental breakfast when we got up in the morning. We could eat whatever we wanted. Karen also showed us how to set the alarm system, since none of the staff would remain in the house after 4:30 PM.

After Karen from the Sisters of Mercy left for the evening, Karin and I had complete run of the house. It’s kind of wild to be all alone in a strange house. It was also interesting to have complete strangers place all their trust in us.

I wandered about the house, exploring it. I was tempted to be like Goldilocks, and try out every bed in every room. I checked out the chapel. It felt very Catholic with a slightly Buddhist sensibility. Karin noted that the chapel had prayer cushions just like in the Zen Center back home. The chapel also had a singing bowl to start and stop meditation practice. The library was well-stocked and comfortable. I read a book for a while lying on a couch. Eventually, Karin woke me up.

One thing that struck me about the house was the excellent taste in artwork displayed. There was a wonderful mural depicting the Book of Ecclesiastes. The nuns and their lay partners obviously had a deep love of beauty, and an intuitive understanding of it. I saw nothing there that looked cheesy or sentimental. It all fit into an attractive whole.

The Sisters of Mercy are dying out, in a literal sense. Young nuns are hard to find.  Karen told us the sisters are gradually passing their work and mission on to lay persons, especially lay women. For now, the sisters still exist, and they still bring Christ into the world.

I hope you run into them, you who’ve been travelling so long.

 

 

 

October 6th, 2017

Niagara Falls is a circus. It’s loud and boisterous and tacky, and most things there are designed to relieve the visitor of some of his or her money. I’m not talking about the falls themselves. Those are awesome works of nature, and absolute wonders. I am referring to the human aspects of the Niagara Falls experience: the vendors, the tourist attractions, the cheesy novelties. I am thinking of the shameless exploitation of a beautiful vision of earth’s power and glory.

Maybe this is just the American way. It seems to be so typically American to try and make a buck regardless of anything else. I’m not saying that everything at the oldest state park in the United States is a rip off. People need to eat. People want to ride boats into the mist of the falls. People want to buy souvenirs. That’s all cool. It’s just that it is so overwhelming. Why does every tourist trap have to have a wax museum? Is there a legal requirement for that? Is it necessary to be blaring loud rock songs from the 1980’s into the parking lot? Do we really need huge signs on neighboring buildings that say: “Buy AMERICAN here!”? Can’t we just pay a fee to the State of New York, and look at the damn waterfalls in peace?

Apparently not. Actually, the Canadians don’t seem to be any better.  A look across the falls will show the observer a Ferris wheel and monstrous sign that screams: “Casino!” Yeah. Nice.

Okay, back to Mother Nature. The falls are amazing. That’s just a fact. Karin and I paid $2.50 to go down to near the water’s edge and look at the American Falls from below. There was a narrow staircase that led from the shore of the river to near the falls. The stones were wet and slick, and I needed the handrail to go up the steps. The air was full of mist. To our right, the water tumbled over the edge of the falls, roaring and churning in turbulence. Now that was impressive.

The park was crowded. Like at the Grand Canyon or Yellowstone, there were foreigners in abundance. Karin and I talked to Romanians and people from India during our short time at the falls. The whole world comes to see these falls. I don’t mind that. I’ve done the same sort of thing. I have gone to see the pyramids in Egypt. I have seen the Eiffel Tower in Paris. I don’t begrudge people from overseas coming to see our sites. I’m just making an observation.

When I can filter out all of the human activity that surrounds Niagara Falls, I remember just the falls themselves. Then I remember incredible power. I remember something savage and uncontrollable. I remember something beautiful and violent. I remember God.