Margotlog: Inauguration Day, 2013
It is cold today in Minnesota--minus 10 on the thermometer on the backyard deck. Two thin-tailed squirrels shiver as they cram their mouths with sunflower seeds. All kinds of birds flock--blue jays dip into the heated bird bath, cardinals alight like rubies in the drooping needes of the white pine, and myriads of finches and nuthatches, chickadees and juncos, pigeons and sparrows select seeds from the ground or hanging feeders. More birds all at once than in milder weather--a feast for the eyes as I help them feast to survive the cold, cold night.
It is a day for inaugurating a president, cold and windy even in Washington, D.C., yet a huge hoard has assembled to celebrate. I love the TV closeups of children with peaches and cream, chocolate cream or honey-colored complexions, laughing eyes and tiny American flags. Our capital is a city of mostly African-Americans, a fitting place for Barack H. Obama, our first African-American president, to be inaugurated into his second term.
He is a rather formal man, though when he smiles, his face lights up. Yet, even then, there is nothing self-satisfied or teasing about him. He is a man familiar with struggle, even hardship. He emphathizes with those who struggle and with the wide-ranging challenges we must adddress. We, the people, he repeats again and again during his address. It is this appeal to our shared accomplishments and continued need to struggle that, I think, won him re-election
I hadn't planned to watch, yet now that the President and his lovely family are assembled, I begin weeping with pride. I take to heart his emphasis on democracy, on our past struggles: to abolish slavery, to assure civil rights to all. We have so much now before us, for as he says, our needs and challenges change, In clear and resounding language he identifies them.
Most compelling are the perennial economic needs to retain what is strong in our entitlement programs, and rein in excess medical spending. To educate citizens for changing jobs and then provide those jobs. To recognize that we are all linked in a central government, yet not to ask that government to do everything.
We must work for practical, sensible solutions, he says, even if partial. We must balance what we ask and what we as citizens can do on our own, in concert with neighbors, communities, businesses. We, the People--he calls on us to work great things. Passivity, he suggests, is as damaging as rigid adherence to narrow, ideological solutions. We must compromise. We must initiate.
Finally, he sounds new notes: On climate change. Whether we agree or not, the evidence of climate change is all around us, in droughts, super storms, fires. We must prepare to meet these challenges and (I add) to mitigate what we can.
On freedoms for all gay and lesbians to enjoy civil unions. On our right to vote swiftly without challenges. And on incouraging immigrants once again to come here and find acceptance, work, citizenship, and respect.
A Mexican-American gay poet Jimmy Blanco reads a sweeping evocation of this broad land, with its changing landscape, language, histories, and work. Like the President's speech, this was a very populist appeal. We, the Workers. We, the Immigrants. We, the People, entitled to protection and respect.
It is a day to feel proud that once again, We the People have helped inaugurate a hard-working, honest, sensible man, with a board vision, and yes, the ability to accomplish great things even if sometimes it seems the country falters, missteps, turns toward evil and destruction. This is a good time to hear from President Obama. In this cold season, We the People have time to think--about gun control and the right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." To plan how we can urge, inform, initiate political change. To remember that We the People means all of us doing what we can to conserve, reuse, protect our natural resources.
It's a heady challenge. A time to be proud of what we can accomplish together.
Monday, January 21, 2013
Friday, January 11, 2013
Margotlog: Oft, in the Stilly Night
Margotlog: Oft, in the Stilly Night
It is quiet now with the snow. Streets, sidewalks muffled. A dog barks. We are too far for church bells.
In Charleston winters when I grew up, we often had windows open to the clack of palm fronds and the cries of children playing in the courtyard. The bells of St. Matthew's rang the quarter hour. Yet, with windows shut and us all at home after eight o'clock, it was quiet, as dark came on, and my sister and I sat on either side of our mother, listening to her musical voice reading "In an old house in Paris, all covered with vines, lived twelve little girls in two straight lines." .
The human voice unmediated. Yes, there was the radio, a gothic affair that sat on the floor. We pressed as close as possible to the speaker cloth, trying to get on the other side to ride with the Lone Ranger and Tonto. Or to tremble with "The Shadow" But the volume was subdued and the fidelity so good I believed I could hear the shadow's wheezing threat.
Occasionally when our parents invited guests for spaghetti supper, we played duets, I on the piano, my fahter on violin. Then voices sang in our quiet, the Italian songs from my father's childhood, brought across the water by the earlier generation. Except when he vented his Italian fury and strode back and forth in agitation, except when I ran in from the courtyard, slamming the kitchen door and protesting that Bobby Star or Jimmy Moon or Mildred Cake was tormenting me, it was quiet. Now, looking back from my own quiet winter house, I recognize quiet as a household blessing.
It is also a civic blessing. Yes, I know. I danced the shag or other rock 'n' roll to very loud booming Elvis, the Coasters, Little Richard. By then a teenager, I had a huge upstairs bedroom in our Mr. Pleasant house--we've moved across the roller coaster bridge and my parents built a small bungalow on a lot with towering magnolia trees. My little radio and small phonograph played loud music. My father--his musician's ear sensitive to anything but his own ranting--would stand at the bottom of the stairs and shout, "Margot, turn off that infernal jungle music!" I slammed my door but I turned it down. The last thing I wanted was to have him storm upstairs and yank the record off its cradle.
We were on the edge of disrupting the civic peace and quiet. That was my mother's phrase, "peace and quiet." When my father and I argued, now downstairs, standing nose to nose in the kitchen--"Leonard, Margot," she would protest, "please give us some peace and quiet."
There were no gunshots outside our door. No backfirings of cars that sounded like gunshots. My parents were decent, law-abiding citizens. It was just that my father grew up in a culture where a range of vocalizing was required. Pater familias, he tried to lay down the law, and his own daughter sashayed and sassed him back. I wouldn't have dreamed of taking our argument into the street. There were no guns in our house, ever. If violence was what we were practicing--and his rants against Negroes and "those Commie, Northern infiltrators" wore on and on, threatening destruction and mayhem FROM THEM! though he was the one "raising his voice," as my mother said. "Leonard, lower your voice." If violence was what we were practicing, at least it ended with our walls.
Though I would not want to relive that era of my teen years with my father's hate-filled denunciations, yet they gave me a measure against which to gauge the moment when family conflict passes into violence so destructive that it becomes a civil menace.Violence that occurs within a public arena--and I'm not talking about the north woods or a huge lake--but city streets and parking lots, schools, churches, movie houses--the public arena belongs not only to individual liberty, but to community regulation.
We have a new law that motorists must stop when a pedestrian has stepped off a curb to cross a street. I've seen this new law in action: it is based on the obvious fact that a bus or car or truck has an enormous murderous capacity against a pedestrian. To allow vehicles to usurp the right of way, to rage pell mell across all intersections not only would cause damage to many vehicles, but would kill pedestrians very very dead.
Since many Minnesota drivers use their vehicles as weapons, this is a very precious new law. It puts protection of the "unarmed" first. Would that we could learn to see the connection between the gun and the largely unarmed walker on a stilly night. Just as we regulate who can drive a car--not a child, not a confirmed psychopath... Just as any of us can lose our license and have the civic privilege to drive taken away...Just so should we all be protected from guns outside our houses, in our streets, cafes, churches, schools. We do not drive cars into school yards. Churches. Schools. Guns don't belong there either.
Cars did not exist when our forefathers built the 2nd Amendment. Nor did automatic weapons and cartridges capable of delivering 100 rounds of ammunition within minutes. To pretend that everything capable of destruction today was heralded by our forefathers puts the Constitution within the same sacred category as the Bible. If we intend to treat it this way, then we should be willing to reduce our capability to the level intended by our forefathers. That is, very simple and not particularly deadly firearms. And we should give up our cars for mules and horses and carriages.
That's fine by me. And we can throw out volumes higher than is beneficial to the human ear. But I'd like to maintain soft electric lights and the power to fly, if you don't mind.
It is quiet now with the snow. Streets, sidewalks muffled. A dog barks. We are too far for church bells.
In Charleston winters when I grew up, we often had windows open to the clack of palm fronds and the cries of children playing in the courtyard. The bells of St. Matthew's rang the quarter hour. Yet, with windows shut and us all at home after eight o'clock, it was quiet, as dark came on, and my sister and I sat on either side of our mother, listening to her musical voice reading "In an old house in Paris, all covered with vines, lived twelve little girls in two straight lines." .
The human voice unmediated. Yes, there was the radio, a gothic affair that sat on the floor. We pressed as close as possible to the speaker cloth, trying to get on the other side to ride with the Lone Ranger and Tonto. Or to tremble with "The Shadow" But the volume was subdued and the fidelity so good I believed I could hear the shadow's wheezing threat.
Occasionally when our parents invited guests for spaghetti supper, we played duets, I on the piano, my fahter on violin. Then voices sang in our quiet, the Italian songs from my father's childhood, brought across the water by the earlier generation. Except when he vented his Italian fury and strode back and forth in agitation, except when I ran in from the courtyard, slamming the kitchen door and protesting that Bobby Star or Jimmy Moon or Mildred Cake was tormenting me, it was quiet. Now, looking back from my own quiet winter house, I recognize quiet as a household blessing.
It is also a civic blessing. Yes, I know. I danced the shag or other rock 'n' roll to very loud booming Elvis, the Coasters, Little Richard. By then a teenager, I had a huge upstairs bedroom in our Mr. Pleasant house--we've moved across the roller coaster bridge and my parents built a small bungalow on a lot with towering magnolia trees. My little radio and small phonograph played loud music. My father--his musician's ear sensitive to anything but his own ranting--would stand at the bottom of the stairs and shout, "Margot, turn off that infernal jungle music!" I slammed my door but I turned it down. The last thing I wanted was to have him storm upstairs and yank the record off its cradle.
We were on the edge of disrupting the civic peace and quiet. That was my mother's phrase, "peace and quiet." When my father and I argued, now downstairs, standing nose to nose in the kitchen--"Leonard, Margot," she would protest, "please give us some peace and quiet."
There were no gunshots outside our door. No backfirings of cars that sounded like gunshots. My parents were decent, law-abiding citizens. It was just that my father grew up in a culture where a range of vocalizing was required. Pater familias, he tried to lay down the law, and his own daughter sashayed and sassed him back. I wouldn't have dreamed of taking our argument into the street. There were no guns in our house, ever. If violence was what we were practicing--and his rants against Negroes and "those Commie, Northern infiltrators" wore on and on, threatening destruction and mayhem FROM THEM! though he was the one "raising his voice," as my mother said. "Leonard, lower your voice." If violence was what we were practicing, at least it ended with our walls.
Though I would not want to relive that era of my teen years with my father's hate-filled denunciations, yet they gave me a measure against which to gauge the moment when family conflict passes into violence so destructive that it becomes a civil menace.Violence that occurs within a public arena--and I'm not talking about the north woods or a huge lake--but city streets and parking lots, schools, churches, movie houses--the public arena belongs not only to individual liberty, but to community regulation.
We have a new law that motorists must stop when a pedestrian has stepped off a curb to cross a street. I've seen this new law in action: it is based on the obvious fact that a bus or car or truck has an enormous murderous capacity against a pedestrian. To allow vehicles to usurp the right of way, to rage pell mell across all intersections not only would cause damage to many vehicles, but would kill pedestrians very very dead.
Since many Minnesota drivers use their vehicles as weapons, this is a very precious new law. It puts protection of the "unarmed" first. Would that we could learn to see the connection between the gun and the largely unarmed walker on a stilly night. Just as we regulate who can drive a car--not a child, not a confirmed psychopath... Just as any of us can lose our license and have the civic privilege to drive taken away...Just so should we all be protected from guns outside our houses, in our streets, cafes, churches, schools. We do not drive cars into school yards. Churches. Schools. Guns don't belong there either.
Cars did not exist when our forefathers built the 2nd Amendment. Nor did automatic weapons and cartridges capable of delivering 100 rounds of ammunition within minutes. To pretend that everything capable of destruction today was heralded by our forefathers puts the Constitution within the same sacred category as the Bible. If we intend to treat it this way, then we should be willing to reduce our capability to the level intended by our forefathers. That is, very simple and not particularly deadly firearms. And we should give up our cars for mules and horses and carriages.
That's fine by me. And we can throw out volumes higher than is beneficial to the human ear. But I'd like to maintain soft electric lights and the power to fly, if you don't mind.
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Margotlog: Final Grades and the Fiscal Cliff
Margotlog: Final Grades and the Fiscal Cliff
'Tis the season to be taken to account. The US federal government has just averted a financial cliff of cuts and ups that would have, according to financial experts, thrown the country into a downward spiral. This is not news. During the agonizing attempts to reach some sort of compromise, I thought, "Hmm, maybe it would be better simply to fall off!" But this approach would have dragged many millions into precipitate hardship, or so we thought. Partly because, for the past sixty years, this country has been predicated on rising expectations and a rising standard of living. For a good portion of the 20th century, the promise also extended and was even realized for the working class. That is, until President Clinton's North American Trade Agreement allowed US companies to ship jobs overseas with little penality. Then the US working class suffered a significant decline in job offerings and wages.
During this past month, I've also been handing out final grades to two groups of students, one mid-level college writing class, and the other a master's level graduate class. Something happened to me during this semester: I became hard as nails. Yes, I still brought food treats to these evening classes and asked students to sign up to bring their share. I still wrote long (though hardly folksy) comments on student papers and even phoned up a few who seemed to be wandering in the wilderness of confusion or idleness. One I even reported to the "authorities" for rarely being in class and turning in assignments.
But these measures I've largely followed in the past. New this semester was my tone of insistent, direct requirement. "You MUST do such and so, if you want to pass this class." Or, "No, that is NOT right. A bibliography MUST include author's last name, title, date, etc." I squashed the notion that I should make friends with my students. That I should coddle them like tender shoots, lest they wither and die.
Over the past few years, I've read articles by child psychologists bemoaning American youths' belief in their superiority coupled with an unwillingness to work hard. Stands to reason: if you are superior by all definitions and evidence, your middling efforts should be sufficient, even praised. Everyone should earn an A. We have taught our young people entitlement. Raised them well into the age of adulthood to believe that the world/the economy/their parents owe them an easy, good time.
This is hardly the case with some of my students whose lives are so complicated and troubled--with single-parent work and childcare, with fractured families sometimes spread out across the globe, with mental health troubles that bring them up short--that they can't begin to function in a college class.
But for many others, I have come to realize that they engage in far too much partying and expenditure, neither conducive to college performance. They buy fancy expensive tennis shoes, they down so much alcohol and eat so little real food that their electrolytes take a nosedive and reduce them to a quivering mess.
This past semester, I told my mid-level writing class exactly what would happen if they pursued such ridiculous behavior. After the first paper revealed serious deficiencies in American English among some immigrant students, I took them immediately to the writing center and told them they MUST bring every single one of their papers there for help before turning it in.
So with the graduate students: I was also much more directive. I told them what was acceptable and what was not. I led them through outlining, writing opening paragraphs, using quotations in insightful ways. Of the mid-level writing students, many did outstanding work. They turned in weekly assignments, which previous classes had rarely done. They did the readings. They did a lot of research and they wrote clearly and well. Only a few faltered. These had such serious family problems that no teaching of mine could compete.
Back to this national cliff. I am a registered Democrat. I believe that government in some form (local, regional, national) MUST regulate food, water, pollution, environmental standards, traffic,building safety, GUNS, on and so on. But I also realize that we as a nation have built up an enormous debt. It is not my doing: I abhorred the wars in Iraq and Afganistan. The minute I heard MPR describe the North American Trade Agreement, I felt in my gut that it would leach jobs from this country, to the advantage of already huge corporations who hardly need the help. Yes, it would reduce the cost of clothing and other manufactured good, but it would not necessarily promise better products as a result.
As we confront the debt which we failed to manage with the recent tax measures, I, for one, will grit my teeth and urge significant belt tightening for all of us except the very very poor. Cuts to the military, cuts to some domestic programs, and yes, plans to reward companies who bring jobs back to the United States. It is the right thing to do. Let's return to a clear-headed vision of the importance of hard work and saving. Let's support our young people by helping them into college and requiring them to perform at their very best.
'Tis the season to be taken to account. The US federal government has just averted a financial cliff of cuts and ups that would have, according to financial experts, thrown the country into a downward spiral. This is not news. During the agonizing attempts to reach some sort of compromise, I thought, "Hmm, maybe it would be better simply to fall off!" But this approach would have dragged many millions into precipitate hardship, or so we thought. Partly because, for the past sixty years, this country has been predicated on rising expectations and a rising standard of living. For a good portion of the 20th century, the promise also extended and was even realized for the working class. That is, until President Clinton's North American Trade Agreement allowed US companies to ship jobs overseas with little penality. Then the US working class suffered a significant decline in job offerings and wages.
During this past month, I've also been handing out final grades to two groups of students, one mid-level college writing class, and the other a master's level graduate class. Something happened to me during this semester: I became hard as nails. Yes, I still brought food treats to these evening classes and asked students to sign up to bring their share. I still wrote long (though hardly folksy) comments on student papers and even phoned up a few who seemed to be wandering in the wilderness of confusion or idleness. One I even reported to the "authorities" for rarely being in class and turning in assignments.
But these measures I've largely followed in the past. New this semester was my tone of insistent, direct requirement. "You MUST do such and so, if you want to pass this class." Or, "No, that is NOT right. A bibliography MUST include author's last name, title, date, etc." I squashed the notion that I should make friends with my students. That I should coddle them like tender shoots, lest they wither and die.
Over the past few years, I've read articles by child psychologists bemoaning American youths' belief in their superiority coupled with an unwillingness to work hard. Stands to reason: if you are superior by all definitions and evidence, your middling efforts should be sufficient, even praised. Everyone should earn an A. We have taught our young people entitlement. Raised them well into the age of adulthood to believe that the world/the economy/their parents owe them an easy, good time.
This is hardly the case with some of my students whose lives are so complicated and troubled--with single-parent work and childcare, with fractured families sometimes spread out across the globe, with mental health troubles that bring them up short--that they can't begin to function in a college class.
But for many others, I have come to realize that they engage in far too much partying and expenditure, neither conducive to college performance. They buy fancy expensive tennis shoes, they down so much alcohol and eat so little real food that their electrolytes take a nosedive and reduce them to a quivering mess.
This past semester, I told my mid-level writing class exactly what would happen if they pursued such ridiculous behavior. After the first paper revealed serious deficiencies in American English among some immigrant students, I took them immediately to the writing center and told them they MUST bring every single one of their papers there for help before turning it in.
So with the graduate students: I was also much more directive. I told them what was acceptable and what was not. I led them through outlining, writing opening paragraphs, using quotations in insightful ways. Of the mid-level writing students, many did outstanding work. They turned in weekly assignments, which previous classes had rarely done. They did the readings. They did a lot of research and they wrote clearly and well. Only a few faltered. These had such serious family problems that no teaching of mine could compete.
Back to this national cliff. I am a registered Democrat. I believe that government in some form (local, regional, national) MUST regulate food, water, pollution, environmental standards, traffic,building safety, GUNS, on and so on. But I also realize that we as a nation have built up an enormous debt. It is not my doing: I abhorred the wars in Iraq and Afganistan. The minute I heard MPR describe the North American Trade Agreement, I felt in my gut that it would leach jobs from this country, to the advantage of already huge corporations who hardly need the help. Yes, it would reduce the cost of clothing and other manufactured good, but it would not necessarily promise better products as a result.
As we confront the debt which we failed to manage with the recent tax measures, I, for one, will grit my teeth and urge significant belt tightening for all of us except the very very poor. Cuts to the military, cuts to some domestic programs, and yes, plans to reward companies who bring jobs back to the United States. It is the right thing to do. Let's return to a clear-headed vision of the importance of hard work and saving. Let's support our young people by helping them into college and requiring them to perform at their very best.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)