WILD GEESE-Jackels and Clowns-The Gnashing of Teeth and the Ice-Cold Reality-The Winter of our Discontent

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love

what it loves. Mary Oliver

Some days I am happy to let the soft animal of my body love what it loves. It is easier to do in retirement, most decidedly. #1-My body is softer. #2-I can take naps. #3-I do not have to protect my office philodendron. The sub-text is that I do not have to deal with anyone I do not wish to deal with anymore. I am contained...or am I?

The only rub is that we are entering the Fall of Democracy so the philodendron is off the table. No more soft underbelly...in theory. My animal body is on red alert. Dave and I are peripheral vision people. We can't help it. We have a fair amount of love stored up and ready for action.

My market, Hannaford's, supports DEI. Some of the checkers and baggers are young people who fall into various DEI categories. They are unfailingly friendly, thoughtful, hard-working young people. I respect them. They enhance my shopping experience and believe me, I am not a patient shopper. I would rather do almost anything else. Three quarters of every store is filled with food none of us should be eating. This brings me to a segue. If you are a shopper who cruises the periphery of the market to buy produce, meat, refrig stuff...then you can boycott the following.thomasnet.com/insights/general-mills-brands/ General Mills does not represent what I believe is a thriving democracy. So long, Wheat Chex and Bisquick etc...If I want to support my community and elevate my shopping experience, I think I'll start here. (I include Walmart, Amazon, Target and, TJMax, Home Depot, but remember, shopping in a big box store is my personal Orwelling Room 101. It is not a sacrifice for me.)

At the turn of the 20th century, I was visiting a high school friend in Pasadena. She lives on a beautiful, wide, tree-lined street, thoughtfully designed between 1900 and 1920. These streets flank Colorado Blvd. and are lovely for a morning walk three seasons of the year. In summer, you can fry an egg on the sidewalk. But three lovely seasons is plenty and far more than most places.

I was out on a walk one morning and greeted a man who was about my age now. He had a little dog and I commented about what a nice dog. Mind you, if I did this today, I would have to stop every 30 seconds since a dog has become an essential walking accessory. This very lovely man struck up a conversation. He was retired. He had taught music in all forms, mostly band, in the Los Angeles County Schools for 35 years. God bless him. I told him I, too, was a teacher; this comment invited all privileges to the war and peace stories of education in the public sector. He lamented that band as a subject was no more. The funds had been cut after 50 years of a dedicated music programs. Music was essential. Every child learned an instrument and that instrument was provided by the state. It was part of the curriculum and free. First, it was the music, he told me, then theater, then art, pork barrel stuff. The humanities were no longer necessary. All the instruments were stored away somewhere to rot. There was a warm and fuzzy 60 Minutes on this, I think, many years later. Some Soul was cleaning all the instruments, and wasn’t that noble of him. I recalled this 10-minute interlude with a retired teacher and his dog on a spring morning in my hometown. He told me that California was one of the highest-achieving state in education during his tenure. Then, suddenly, around the 70's, it was declasse to be a teacher. Worse than that, the rhetoric was that teachers were paid far too much. There were all of these unnecessary programs. This negative chatter was soon followed by Proposition 13 I started teaching school right about this time. The superintendent of my fast-growing system ushered me into my classroom and said without a smile or a word of encouragement. There are no supplies but crayons, some paint and a few easels. You will have to purchase anything else on your own. The room was a shell with two bulletin boards and a sink. 23 years old with a BA in Fine Arts and Art History and a California state teaching credential for K-9, what did I expect…a standing ovation? I was thrilled to have a job, elated by the thought of teaching, and happy to spend my whelping 8k per annum on my darling students but part of that experience withered my soul for a long-term stay in the arid desert and demise of education in California. I remember that moment with the superintendent, an unhappy soul who died rather young. Perhaps, he did not fulfill his dream in life…to play first violin for a noted symphonic orchestra and ended up in Bumblef*%k, escorting over-zealous teachers to their inadequate facilities.

It took a while to dismantle state education. California did not have private schools to amount to anything until much later when the haves and have-nots became more distinct, white flight seemed to make sense and the orange groves from Los Angeles to the Mexican border became an unending blight of bad architecture, unmitigated greed and freeways. All this is fall-out. My chat will a co-teacher lasted a quarter of an hour but has stayed with me as an epiphany ever since, an enlightenment, a reminder to tuck away and remember 25 years later..."Suddenly, the arts were no longer important." There has been an ebb and flow since then, of course, and there are many very good public schools in California but something was lost and the status of national excellence for the "Eureka" state passed into the shadows. My husband and I left our home state to teach in International schools in Europe. I could not bear the thought that I was choosing this career because I could not do anything else or because I wanted my summers off because teaching is such a gravy train.

Another moment, a turning point in my memory bank, took place in the late 90's, shortly after my husband and I had bought our first and only home in Maine. I was at a light summer, drinks evening with some people I knew at the time. Their relative had recently moved into my small town. I met him once. This time, there were no sun-dappled recollections of teaching music. The conversation had gone south as the wine flowed. Looking back, I realized for the first time, I had to be careful of my liberal commentary. I had called the newsgirls on FOX "bimbettes," not hardcore or painted or ill-informed or disgraceful or even provocative...just "bimbettes." The relative flew into a rage of irrational argument and attacked me. He foamed at the mouth. I felt like I was in a bull ring without the picadors and with only a paper napkin for a cape. I felt like Theseus before the Minotaur. The subject was changed but this guy had found a platform and someone to attack. Before or since, no one has ever spoken to me in such a misogynistic, aggressive tone. But I learned that night that there was a new type of dangerous, monied arrogance on the rise. This man was loaded and had underwritten the campaign of someone I found appallingly dangerous, a ramped-up, mouth-foaming extremist. That night, this clash over one word undid me. I never forgot it because it was another turning point, another point of no return. This man wasn't an anomaly; he was the new norm. He made that superintendent from long ago look like Gregory Peck in Roman Holiday. This was a new kind of American…out for blood and that, dear reader, was 30 years ago.

This week, I had a new experience, a new notch on the belt of the eternal where God sends an angel in the form of an experience and the angel says, “WAKE-UP, Fool, be brave, be proactive, take the next step, start your engines, make a decision. It is 11:55 on the crisis clock!” I had to call a business counselor for a tax question and I mildly (thank God) said, “Are you worried about the coming year?” This is the kindest, most generous, thoughtful, concerned, and empathetic accountant in Amerika. She answered in rote, “There will be pain, of course, but there are plenty of jobs out there. I was far more concerned last year because the country was in such a terrible state.” This lovely woman recited to me from the FOX playbook. It is easy to look at January 6, 2022 and loathe the mouth-foamers, but this? This is a new turning point. I would trust this woman with my life and she speaks as though she has a bug implanted in the back of her head. Just days later, I was walking on the track because it is 25 degrees out in the great northern climes. A captive audience to the chatter of my walking partner, I listened to how a “good” conversation was had with a friend of hers. Friend wants Janet Mills to know that she has it all wrong about transgender athletes. Thank you, Friend.

According to the National Collegiate Athletic Association President Charlie Baker, who testified in front of a Senate panel in December, there are fewer than 10 transgender athletes that he is aware of who currently compete in college sports and, nationally, just around 1 percent of adults identify as transgender, according to the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law—a reality that highlights the outsized fixation from the Trump administration. Vanity Fair.

By Katie Herchenroeder

February 22, 2025

Is there anyone who can not see that this is a smoke screen, a litmus test for further “fixations?” But, Walking Partner wants to say that she is communicating with the other side, expressing viewpoints, and sharing ideas, so proud she is! Bravo, Walking Partner. Continue to play the harp for the buffalo; maybe you will make significant in roads in regard to Gaza or Ukraine, as well. One never knows with the new normal. Maybe, we just have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Keep me posted.