Notes From A Burning House

Today is the birthday of President James Monroe, Harper Lee (80 years old), Saddam Hussein (69 years old – a simple farm boy who went to law school and grew up to be a ruthless, homicidal dictator), the food pyramid (14 years old), and Maryland’s statehood.  It is the anniversary of Mussolini’s execution, and Romano Prodi isn’t having an easy day either.

Penelope Cruz has much to be thankful for on her 32nd birthday, for she must be following the news of Katie Holmes’s weird, public betrothal to the Church of Scientology and must surely be sending her gratitude to whatever it was – good sense, a talkative gut, a wise parent perhaps – that kept her from embarking on Tom’s Cruise.

If you believe the industry talk, or the word of Cruise’s recently-parted publicist, the Katie Holmes pregnancy and childbirth were completely staged.  The publicist lost her position not because of her performance or a dispute with Tom.  It’s just that Tom has decided that his entire staff should be Scientologist, so he cleaned house and replaced several people.

Whatever happened, Miss Cruz is better off having no part in it.  Her
birthday inspires me to reflect on relationships I am better off without, roads that one traveled for a time and veered away, as it happens, shortly before the road was consumed in a sinkhole.  Perhaps you have one or two of those, worth remembering with a sigh of relief. It might be a lover, a vacation on Catalina you had to cancel and it rained anway, or an energy company that rejected your job application only to be consumed in an insider-trading scandal.

How many bullets have you dodged? 

It sets on like a cold sweat.  So what?  It don’t mean a thing, with or without that swing.  Religious values can get you through the night and up in the morning.  Nice for you, but it just might not mean anything.

Maybe I should not staff cocktail parties with diplomats.  Last night, an ambassador from the middle-east spoke in the parlor of a modest little taj mahal in Beverly Hills. He was impressive.  The invitation-only schmooze-op consisted mainly of wealthy and influential Jewish laypeople, and he was to come here and speak about middle-eastern politics, Hamas, the recent bombings, and Iran.  He would present the point of view of nations who oppose Israel on some issues.

The Ambassador (a prince) showed up in an English-cut suit, speaking English like a soft-spoken scholar, and treated potentially controversial topics with such gentleness and dignity that he won friends even among those who disagreed with his views.  He arrived at the house with no staff, not even security, and he rang the doorbell to be admitted.  The host sized him up and said, "How are we supposed to address you?" (We had been told to address him as "Your Royal Highness.")  The Prince said, "Call me anything."  As he began his presentation, rain fell outside and there were frequent roils of thunder.

The discussion was very pragmatic.  No good news in the middle east, few silver linings.  Servants offered hors d’oeuvres and drinks.  Wealthy industrialists
were helped to their seats by wives much younger than them.  There was
laughter, gossip about families, talk of golf handicaps and basketball scores, and the admiration of the exotic-looking fish in the fountain in the front yard.

It was the sort of evening that gets politicos and wonks all a-pother: lots of dispassionate talk about big issues, influential people in the room to mingle with, opportunities to forge new alliances.  This is where policy gets moved and alliances are formed - not in the public view, but on golf courses or over lunch. The transactions of wealth, power, sex, and death are not sentimental.  There is nothing idealistic in the push and pull of political pressure.  Not once in the conversation did human love or grace or God manifest in the discussion.  The cold chill of nihilistic realpolitik was not soothed by all the hardwood furniture and floral paintings, nor by all the coffee I drank. I left at 9:00 PM feeling empty, as the bright red fish darted around in their fountain.

Human beings are funny creatures.  And we are consistent. In spite of all our pretexts and doctrines and dreams, the real business of human life is eating, sex, and death, and we carry on.  So will I.

Asking the jury to impose the death penalty on Zacarias Moussaoui (the admitted co-conspirator in the 9/11 terrorist attacks), prosecutor David Novak put the question in stark terms yesterday: if not in this case, when would the death penalty ever be appropriate?

Zacarias Moussaoui is clearly a dangerous guy we don’t want walking around. At the same time, he appears to be assuming a larger, darker role for us than he may deserve.

Here’s what I’ve put together. In 2001, the FBI had Moussaoui on their radar. It took the perseverance of a dedicated officer to get him ON that radar, but eventually they agreed that he seemed dangerous. He attracted attention to himself with his efforts to go to flight training school. ("I don’t need to know about landing the plane!") On 11 September 2001 he was sitting in a jail cell in Minneapolis being questioned by the FBI about terrorist plots. The government’s case is that, if Moussaoui had told the FBI everything he knew, they might have prevented 9/11.

It is, to my knowledge, an unusual case for someone to receive the death penalty on a conspiracy charge alone. He didn’t actually kill anyone. He conspired with the perpetrators and then declined to cooperate with the FBI when he was arrested. Moreover, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s information suggests that Moussaoui was a fringe character – like the runty kid who wanted to play football, so you said, "Okay, you go long."

Zacarias Moussaoui is a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. He has a family history of mental illness. He exhibits disorganized speech, mania, grandiose thoughts. He has exaggerated his involvement with al-Qaeda. He has accused his own legal counsel of trying to kill him. This is the guy who pled guilty to conspiracy in the 9/11 attacks after denying it for years, and then spent the trial saying no, he was actually involved in a completely different plot to kill Americans (along with Richard "One, Two, Light Up My Shoe" Reid). He complained that his attorneys are conspiring to kill him. He has a notion that the President is going to pardon him and put him on a flight for London. He has proclaimed himself proud of the 9/11 attacks, wished out loud that every day was a September 11, and said a bunch of horrible things like that. We do not, no we do not, want this fellow out and about. What do we properly do with him? That question is academic, as I feel certain the jury is going to come back with a death sentence – we’ll see.

As I follow the sentencing phase of the trial, I am trying to observe the psychology of the process. 9/11 was a traumatic event, and here we have someone we can put on trial for what happened; someone we might execute, so that society gets the last word rather than the terrorists who are now beyond our reach (since they died along with their victims).

My problem is part moral and part political. Why must we content ourselves with the bloodletting of this poor, sick shlump? Why have we been denied the trials of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Mohammad al-Qatani (the supposed 20th hijacker), both of whom have been apprehended? (Is it because the facts of their treatment and the techniques used to interrogate them would come to light in a trial?) Why did the hunt for Osama bin Laden get dropped from the front burner? It is certain we will never hear from these perpetrators.

If the public is passionate for blood sacrifice, why are we letting the government serve us tuna and call it lobster? To my mind, Moussaoui is a weak candidate for the blood sacrifice. Moreover, I am concerned he is a convenient distraction from policies that have denied us the justice we seek. To say nothing of the queasiness I feel at the execution of the mentally ill. I don’t have an answer – I just wonder whether there is a better way.

Book Report: The Butler’s Guide To Clothes Care, Managing The Table, Running The Home, & Other Graces.  Stanley Ager and Fiona St. Aubyn.  Fireside Books, 1980.

The season of commencement speeches approaches.  The longer and more boring specimens are already being drafted – drafts that will mature into torrents of hot air.  Grand people will drone at length.  Some will rehearse weary platitudes.  Some will expound on concepts political or theological.  Graduates will shuffle in their seats and endure the exercise.  If they can get away with it, they may even play Tetrus on their cell phones. 

You won’t hear from the speakers’ servants (those that employ them) and more is the pity.  Put a butler up there, and hear him tell how to close a door quietly – that would be likely be more engrossing, and the graduates would be hearing something useful.  They might even extract a small lesson in living as an individual among others – with skill and grace.

Being an only child, I don’t know what it feels like to lose a sibling; but in a silly way, this might apply.  Tucker Carlson, a television personality and conservative talking head, has dropped his trademark bow tie. 

I have felt a certain kinship with Carlson.  He’s an opinionated guy who spent part of his childhood in Rhode Island.  (He graduated from St. George’s in Newport.)  We are similar in age, opinionated people, and we favor bow ties. Now, for some mysterious reason, he has announced that he is omitting his signature bow tie. 

Guys in their thirties who wear bow ties get a lot of abuse.  L.A. Times columnist Joel Stein took a random swipe at us just last week.  Hong Kong’s leader, Donald Tsang, is just old enough to get away with it and even he is considered eccentric.  Carlson may have stood accused of harming America by Jon Stewart, but as far as fashion was concerned Carlson was a valuable player. 

Oh well.

This blog wishes a happy 75^th birthday to Bill Kennison, founder of Beau Ties, Ltd. of Vermont.

In troubled times - and every generation considers their time to be uniquely troubled - there is a line of thought that goes like this: "I have a bad feeling about what human civilization (out there) looks like to me.  Therefore, I blame the state of human civilization (out there) for my bad feeling."

Thus the transaction is complete, but I haven’t really looked at the source of my passion.  This is something I see in too many activists.  What is really wrong with the world: not knowing what we are.

More and more, I look at "the state of human civilization (out there)" as the content, with my perception and relationship to that being the process; and I concern myself more and more with the process, not the content.  This moment of awakening exists independently of the socioeconomic arrangements under which I conduct my business. 

My instinct can perceive and respond to any situation, no matter what that situation looks like.  That awakening tends to look like "how can I help you?" and that awakening is reality. The reflection of our painful, suffering human civilization in our eyes is not reality.

That could be construed as hiding on the mountaintop; yet maybe it’s the opposite.  Maybe that is a path down from the mountaintop and into the marketplace with an open heart.  This open heart isn’t a polite heart.  It doesn’t fear to tell the truth if that’s what the situation requires.  Moreover, this open heart doesn’t make a difference in the world - it IS the difference.

The distance between where I am currently staying and where I am
working is about 18 miles. Los Feliz  is a lovely area to wake up on a
weekend.  I am near Griffith Park and the zoo, the artsy Silverlake district, Skylight Books, the House of Pies, the Vista movie house, and a lovely coffee shop, the Coffee Table.  Trader Joe’s is within walking distance - which is a real asset, since every single Trader Joe’s in the country fails to provide sufficient parking.  There is a talented and honest auto mechanic a short distance away, and while you wait for your car to be lubed and rotated, you can cut a rug at the Derby - the cathedral of L.A.’s swing dance scene.

The drawback is, it is 18 miles away from where I am working.  Mapquest doesn’t regard this as a problem; it estimates that the commute should take 24 minutes.  This can make you laugh if you can take the traffic lightly; that is, however, a jhana  I have yet to attain even after all these years of meditation.

In Colorado, a man named Jacob Niccum was recently ticketed for using a device that changes traffic signals.  It’s called an Opticon.  He bought it on E-Bay for a hundred bucks.  At the push of a button, the device sends an infrared signals that changes the signal light.  Firefighters use similar gadgets for genuine emergencies; chronic lateness doesn’t count as an emergency in the eyes of law, so Mr.
Niccum was fined $50.

Sitting on the 10 with Renee Montagne and Steve Innskeep updating me
on the news, an Opticon won’t help me get to the office on time.  For
that, I would need a car that could sprout propellers and lift me up
over the the Santa Monica Freeway.

Thirty miles east of Los Angeles lies the village of Claremont, parts of which resemble New England.  Last night, responding to a tip in the L.A. Times, we suffered the Friday evening traffic between Los Angeles and Orange Counties to go to this unfamiliar place and experience an art walk.  (Claremont has many art galleries in a three-block radius, as well as a Folk Music Center and many other wonderful shops I had heard about.) 

The paper was unambiguous about the date and time.  Upon arrival, however, when the rain mercifully stopped, the streets were dark and the galleries shut fast.  Hunting and gathering, we came upon a tavern on Harvard Avenue offering live music and a menu that is remarkably friendly for vegetarians.  I asked the hostess about the art walk.  “The only art walk I know about is on Tuesdays,” she said.  The food could not be beat, and it was pleasant enough to walk around and enjoy the gardens and trees – some of the oldest trees I’ve seen in Los Angeles County that are not on mountains. 

The website for Claremont’s Chamber of Commerce claims that this elusive art walk takes place on the first Friday each month (not on Tuesdays), at a time different than what was reported in the Times.

Now it has become a mild mystery – a weekend sort of mystery, and there will be more weekends.  Don’t know if I’ll ever catch the art walk; it could be a ruse to lure the curious into town.  I expect I’ll be back, even if it’s just to explore the Folk Music Center.  (They have ukeleles.)  If there is indeed art in Claremont, I will report in.

Today, Cardinal Mahoney has performed his annual blessing of the animals – the latter represented by unwilling domestic creatures dressed up in colorful outfits by their sadistic owners.  Tomorrow’s paper will document the travesty with photos on the front page.  Instead of witnessing their humiliation, I was up in the sky helping my friend John repair the roof at Dharma Zen Center.  I painted no eggs – but John is a good egg, and he did a fair job painting himself with tar.

We’ll see how well that roof holds up, with more rain coming in to swell the rivers and worry the levees up in the northern part of the state.  Perhaps the Cardinal could have left our pets alone this year and done something about that. 

In March of 2002, on the day that Robert Blake was arrested on suspicion of murdering his wife, there was another hot story in Los Angeles. It attracted the presence of the press helicopters and news vans and dominated the airwaves until Mr. Blake turned himself in later the same day. The news stories were, as far as anyone can know, unrelated.

The first story was perhaps even more dramatic than the tawdry spectacle of another well-known actor facing the music for allegedly icing his wife. This story featured suffering on a large scale, cruelty inflicted out of ignorance, and a messy rescue operation mandated by court order. The operation was masterminded not by the FBI or the U.S. Marine Corps, but by the SPCA. After all, we don’t call in the FBI or the Marines to rescue rabbits.

That’s right, rabbits; about three hundred of them. The SPCA swooped in with a small, non-violent militia and took custody of a rabbit population that had grown out of their owner’s control, and were living in appalling conditions in a hot Los Angeles back yard. The liberated bunnies were housed in an SPCA shelter that had stood empty since shortly after the September 11 attacks. In the nearly two years since then, the rabbits were spayed and rehabilitated and the majority have been adopted into good, responsible homes. There are plenty of rabbits left, however, and rabbits require daily care and attention.

One Saturday morning I drove to the shelter, near the Jefferson Park area of Los Angeles, and did some unglamorous work. We volunteers cleaned out stalls and cages, replenished supplies of water and food (consisting mainly of hay: oat, barley, and timothy), laid out fresh towels and made sure the cardboard boxes they like to play in were not wet or filthy. To help the animals get used to human beings, part of our job was to socialize as much as possible: talk to them, pick them up (properly) and handle them.

The concrete floors were slippery with straw all around. Water was dumped into convenient gutters that ran past the stalls leading to drains in the floor. In addition to each other, we maneuvered around piles of towels headed for the laundry, and the baskets which the rabbits use as their dining area and their latrine. Cleaning out these bleachy-smelling baskets and restoring them was the messiest task that confronted us, but even this wasn’t so bad.

My biggest challenge was Buster. Buster does not fit the prevailing stereotype of a gentle, beautiful, innocent bunny. Buster has been around a block or two. He looks like he has held his own in quite a few fights. He has eyesight reduced to 10% vision in one eye: in other words, he’s blind. “Close your eyes and have your friends move their hands around your head,” said our supervisor, who looked a bit like a rabbit himself. “That’s what his life is like.”

As I entered the stall, Buster gave me a warning hiss and feinted a bit with one of his paws. These rabbits have claws, you know. They are not retractable claws, either. These claws are long and they are always out – you can be scratched in self-defense or simply by accident. Mark you, these rabbits are wild creatures and they have defenses. Somehow, gentle reader, I don’t sense that you are feeling fearful. Is that snickering I hear?

Buster and I worked things out. I kept up a steady patter the whole time so he could hear where I was. He reacted with curiosity when I sang, as I scraped away at something on the floor of his cell with a blade. He didn’t like it when I removed the cardboard box he used as a cave, but the business was soon over and he reclaimed his cave with a satisfied grunt. I was told that Buster has mellowed out a lot since he got a girlfriend.

The rabbits all have individual personalities. Some are curious. There are certain rabbits referred to in the shelter as “stage hands,” who roam around freely showing a strong interest in everything that goes on, and taking everything in stride. They are also mostly coated in black, as becomes a stage hand. Some of the other rabbits are paranoid or simply fearful. Some creatures were very amenable to receiving care, and some were not. Others preferred getting attention from humans they were familiar with. Some quarreled with one another (they are territorial creatures). One technique used for bonding rabbits that aren’t getting along is to take them for a ride in a car. “My S.U.V. is neutral territory for them, and it’s a scary experience,” said rabbit man. “When you’re in the midst of a scary experience, what do you look for? A buddy!”

It struck me that all rabbit-man had to do was pile a couple of bunnies in the backseat of his Explorer and go for a ride on a bumpy street; humans have a much more difficult time of it, with one another. This is true even now as the finitude of our resources bring our populations closer together, when there is great need and those who offer care must work through obstacles that are human-made.

Is this a movie that is coming too soon to a theatre near you?

This question refers to United 93, a dramatization of the United
Airlines flight hijacked on 11 September 2001, which crashed in Pennsylvania after the terrorists were overpowered by the passengers.  The trailer generated press attention (and free publicity!) when some audience members reacted by shouting, "Too soon!"

Watching the trailer on television, I wondered.  I felt relieved that
the drama was not populated by celebrities.  It was not clear,
however, whether September 11 had escaped the Hollywood treatment.  A
trailer is not the movie itself.  The trailer aims only at publicity.  Unsurprisingly, the trailer built suspense, as if United 93 were a thriller with explosive special effects and a symphonic score.

Without seeing the movie, some people actually got face-time on
television, airing conclusions about the movie based only the trailer.
Put off by the advertising, the negative comments suggested that some
Americans (if not all of us) are unprepared to watch this story unfold
in a Hollywood movie.

There is an understandable mistrust of an event like this getting the
"movie of the week" treatment, for commercial profit.  The story has
been told and re-told in the press.  It is being re-told in court
right now, as Zacarias Moussaoui’s trial moves into the penalty phase
– how is that for uncanny timing?

What is the purpose of this movie, and what audience will go see it?
The notion that United 93 is a commercial product whose purpose is to
make money might be hard to take.  What will compel viewers to buy
tickets to see it?  Is this a ritual of certification, a la Walker
Percy?  Is it too soon to see this event on a movie screen?  If so,
why?

The good Rabbi Borak attended a screening of the film yesterday
afternoon.  When he returned, he said it was an excellent film and
elaborated no further.  Damn him, building up the suspense like that.