Tree of Life

“All theory is gray, gut the golden tree of life springs ever green,” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Nanai people Tree drawing 

Mentioned in Genesis, the tree of life has come to symbolize the sustaining and enhancement of humanity.  Virtually all cultures have a tree of life myth growing from the center of creation, with branches sometimes containing magical fruit representative of layers of existence and understanding. The 2011 Terence Malick film “The Tree of Life,” starring Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, and Sean Penn and taking place in a Fifties Texas town, dealt with such universal themes as evolution, spirituality, and generational conflict.

 Bianca and Alex, 2017

Toni and I attended the wedding ceremony of Herb and Evelyn Passo’s son Alex to Bianca Angarola at Temple Israel in Miller in front of a stain glass window depicting the Tree of Life.  The invitation contained its image and the words, “Share love.  Spread light.”Our boys attended pre-school at the Temple; one day, after meeting the Rabbi, Dave thought he’d seen God.  We’ve known Alex, now an attorney, since he was a kid.  He took my survey American History course, performing brilliantly but often appearing to be lost in thought.   Rabbi Stanley Halpern, who had presided over Alex’s Bar Mitzvah, returned from Zionsville, Indiana, to perform the service.  Many friends were in the overflow audience. Cantorial soloist Sean Egan, a Hammond charter school principal and co-cost with Robin Rich of Temple Trivia Night, sang a haunting rendition of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” during the Processional.  The theme being renewal and continuity, Alex’s cousin Hayden Adam was flower girl, a task her mother Michelle performed 36 years ago at Herb and Evelyn’s nuptials. 

The reception was at Allure on the Lake, minutes from our condo.  We sat next to Judy and Steve Tallackson, who left early because early next morning Steve was taking Calumet College History students to Tippecanoe River State Park.  They will observe a replica of a Shawnee village, interact with Voyageur re-enactors, and visit the 1812 battlefield site of the massacre that propelled William Henry Harrison (“Old Tippecanoe”) to the Presidency.  Robin Rich told me that she and Rebecca Hanscom interviewed Fred Chary for the Temple Israel Newsletter and that he is home again after rehabbing after an operation at Rush Memorial Hospital.  Here are some answers Fred provided:

  I moved here in 1966 to take a job at Indiana University Northwest. Prior to that I worked on my degrees at the University of Pennsylvania and at the University of Pittsburgh. I’ve been a member of Temple Israel since 1967. I was very attracted by the diverse community. 

  [My Jewish identity] led me to Bulgaria. My uncle was in the military during WW2, when Bulgaria was an ally of the Germans, but Bulgaria protected their Jewish population. In 1939, before Bulgaria joined the Axis, there were 44,000 Jews in Bulgaria; after WW2 there were 50,000. The Jewish population actually increased. [During my frequent visits] I found no discrimination against Jews in Bulgaria. I never had any difficulties there. The most significant fight in Bulgaria was a religious battle: the Greek Orthodox vs the Bulgarian Orthodox. 

  I’ve traveled extensively, of course in Bulgaria, but also Germany, Poland, the former Soviet Union, Great Britain, and Israel.  I’d love to visit Central Asia and Africa.  I collect stamps and like old movies—especially from the 1940s. I am working on a historical novel about 17th century Russia. I look forward to research, reading and writing—those are my favorite things to do.

Fred is a huge Philadelphia sports fan.  Last time I visited him, he invited me over to watch the Eagles as soon as he got home.  Confirming that he was home, I rang him up. He sounded great and repeated the offer.

 at Konrady Plastics table

Toni and I were Bernie Konrady, Jr.’s guests for One Region’s annual luncheon at Avalon Manor Banquet Center in Merrillville.  His daughter Leah is its President and introduced dynamic guest speaker Tom Murphy, formerly mayor of Pittsburgh (1994-2005) and presently with the Urban Land Institute, planners of city revitalization.  At the Konrady Plastics table, a company Bernie and wife Sue founded now located in Portage but originally on Arthur Street in Gary, I introduced them and cousin John Konrady, an IUN Business and Economics major who studied under Leslie Singer, to IUN Chancellor Lowe, a former chairman of the One Region council. Seated to my right were Bernie’s sisters Dee Gee, a Delta Airlines stewardess (now called flight attendants) for 30 years, and Ronnie, who had former IUN chancellor Peggy Elliott as a teacher at Horace Mann and recalled her coming to class with a bandaged hand from burning it getting something out of the oven.

At the Archives two documentarians from IU interviewed me about Vee-Jay Records co-founder Vivian Carter.  I stressed Vivian’s Gary background, segregated but with opportunities for talented and ambitious African Americans during the 1920s and postwar years. I emphasized how influential Vee-Jay hits such as “Goodnite, Sweetheart” and “For Your Precious Love” were on 1950s teenagers like myself and credited Vivian, with her gospel background, for helping give birth to the emergent soul music. Henry Farag, whose musical “The Signal” deals with Vee-Jay doo wop groups, arrived next. We both encouraged producer Adam Carroll to videotape the next live presentation of “The Signal.”

I spoke to Kenny Kincaid’s Purdue Northwest history class on Latinos about Ramon and Trisha Arredondo’s “Maria’s Journey,” which they’re reading, and talked about editing it and helping them find an appropriate publisher (i.e., Indiana Historical Society Press).  I brought up oral histories I had conducted with Mexican-Americans Jesse Villalpando, Louis Vasquez, Abe Morales, and Paulino Monterrubio.  Since in addition to “Maria’s Journey,” students were also assigned articles by John Fraire and Dan Simon, I noted that John’s mother was a star baseball player on an Indiana Harbor team (the Chicks) and that Dan was a retired Business professor with a lifelong interest in history. I gave Kincaid the current copy of Tracescontaining an article about a family of agricultural workers who settled in Southern Indiana.

Kenny and his students are angry over the Purdue Board of Trustees intending to change graduates’ diplomas to read Purdue University Northwest rather than simply Purdue (IUN sheepskins say Indiana University without designating the campus).  The change was triggered because students and faculty on Purdue’s Lafayette campus were upset upon learning that online graduates attending former Kaplan University, now labeled Purdue Global, would receive diplomas identical to theirs. During the break I chatted with a bright student named Frank Rodriguez, a Munster resident who had located my blog on-line.  His dad was a union elevator repair worker.

I found the HBO documentary on Jane Fonda fascinating.  She once again apologized to Vietnam War veterans still upset over her misguided actions while visiting POWs and an anti-aircraft battery in Hanoi while under the influence of second husband Tom Hayden, who succeeded French film director Roger Vadim and preceded billionaire TV network founder Ted Turner.  Currently active in feminist causes, Fonda co-stars with Lily Tomlin in the comedy TV series “Grace and Frankie.” The 80-year-old was looking forward to an upcoming bedroom scene with Sam Elliott.

Novelist Sinclair Lewis’ creation George F. Babbitt regarded himself as a Solid Citizen and Regular Fellow and addressed Zenith Athletic Club lunch companions by such jocular epithets as “old Bolshevik” and “old horse thief.”  While talking to grandson James about best friend Paul Reisling, whom Babbitt often called Paulski or Paulibus, I brought up Paul Turk, who befriended me after my family moved to Birmingham, Michigan at Barnum Junior High (now a park with only the entranceway remaining) after entering eighth grade undersized and knowing nobody.  We played wiffleball and football; his mom was a great cook and his dad took us to an Indians-Tigers game. After my family moved back to Fort Washington we corresponded throughout high school and college.  His envelopes often employed clever take-offs on my middle name Buchanan (Buckmeister and Buckmillian were two of the shorter ones). In January 1965, Paul drove through a snowstorm from Ohio to attend our wedding. We still exchange occasional phone calls, usually after a sports event, but unlike me he does not like to reminisce.

Sports Illustrated writer Tim Layden’s “Fists of Fury” profiled Cahn Carlos and Tommie Smith 50 years after their clenched fist protest on the victory stand at the Mexico City Olympics.  Most photos only show winner Smith and Bronze Medalist Carlos from the waist up, which misses elements of their symbolic statement.  Layden explains:

    Their appearance on the stand remains riveting to this day.  Single shoes and bare feet covered only in black socks, signfying poverty at home. Carlos’s beads, recalling the lunching of black men.  Smith’s black scarf, highlighting a deep identity with his race.  The gloves, the fists shoved upward for the world to see, suggesting defiance and unity.

    The form of the protest came together only after the 200-meter race, in the well of the stadium.  “In the dungeon,”says Smith.  Smith’s wife Denise had brought a pair of black gloves. Carlos’s wife Kim had brought beads with her from the U.S. 

                                              

I’ve been listening to the Dandy Warhols, a Nineties alternative band from Portland.  One of their tracks, “Get Off,” refers to escaping everyday burdens and feeling a rush akin to sexual climax, not literally being on top of someone, like now-confirmed Justice Brett Kavanaugh allegedly hoisted himself onto Dr. Christine Blasey Ford at a high school party. In his day (and mine) dry-humping was considered within bounds – but not if met with resistance.  The Dandy’s most famous song, “Bohemian Like You.” Features this exchange between a customer and a waiter

So, what do you do?
Oh yeah, I wait tables too.
No, I haven't heard your band,
'Cause you guys are pretty new.
But if you dig on vegan food
Well come over to my work
I'll have them cook you

Years ago, Doc Lukas helped me lay out an issue of Steel Shavings,I gave him a Dandy Warhols CD after hearing that the band had a big gay following.  Turned out Terry was into electronic music. My bad.  Even more embarrassing was when I noted that he was wearing his “trademark pink shirt.”He shot me a hurt look. One time, seated across the gym floor at an amateur Mr. Bodybuilding contest at IUN, I waved and he waved back.  In 2013 Atlanta began hosting a world transgender bodybuilding competition. What I wouldn’t give to attend next year’s competition with Terry and Anne Balay.

Ray Smock wrote the latest example of Trump’s “ceremonial arrogance of power”:

  Donald Trump could not accept victory quietly, or gracefully. He had to rub it in. Justice Brett Kavanaugh was sworn in immediately after his confirmation. He went to work at the Supreme Court. But this was not enough for our president. There were some scores to settle and some salt to pour into wounds. He needed to do this on national television.

  In an unusual nationally televised ceremonial swearing-in at the White House the President took the opportunity to gloat and campaign for next month’s elections. Trump said the occasion was historic. There was nothing historic about it, except for the minor fact that this was the first time a former Justice of the Supreme Court, was able to swear in one of his former law clerks.

  It was retired Justice Anthony M. Kennedy who conducted the oath ceremony. Kavanaugh had clerked for him twenty-five years ago. I have no idea why Justice Kennedy was and is so outwardly friendly with Trump. Maybe it was because Kennedy’s son, Justin, had dealings with the Trump Organization as an official of Deutsche Bank. Kennedy said he was retiring to spend more time with his family, a standard Washington cliché. It gave Trump the opportunity to appoint his second Supreme Court justice.

  This event was the only time I ever heard Trump apologize for anything. And when he did, it was all wrong, it was ugly, and uncalled for. The president said that on behalf of the nation he apologized for the way that Brett Kavanaugh was treated during the hearings. Trump had no business declaring Justice Kavanaugh to be innocent of all the charges against him or to say that he was vindicated and proven innocent. He never once thought of apologizing to Dr. Ford, who has been humiliated by the Senate Judiciary Committee and the president.

  Early in the Kavanaugh hearings President Trump called Dr. Ford a credible witness and described her as a nice person. As the hearings heated up he mocked her shamelessly at campaign rallies and now calls her whole testimony, her personal anguish at coming forward, to be nothing but a hoax orchestrated by Democrats. Dear Dr. Ford, I humbly apologize to you for the way you were treated in your testimony and the way you have been so unfairly maligned by the President of the United States.

I’ve completed an essay John Cain requested for a South Shore Arts exhibit catalogue to go with “Urban Legend: Haunts,” opening in Munster.  Because I have included a paragraph on acclaimed photographer Camilo Vergara, who for a quarter-century has been documenting Gary ruins and am hoping he will include photos I’ve sent him of the Blackstone Hotel taken in 1993 titled “Survivor in a tough city” and City Methodist Church at dawn taken in 2004, titled “Rise of a City.”  My final paragraph rebuts the “Gary as abandoned city” stereotype:

  Outsiders sometimes mistake Gary for a ghost town.  To the contrary.  Often regarded downstate as a Hoosier stepchild and by suburbanites as a place to avoid at all costs, Gary has numerous viable neighborhoods.  True, signs of declension abound, but residents have demonstrated grit and resiliency. While the recent edition of “Gary: A Pictorial History,” covering the years 2004-2018,  includes photos of demolition efforts on the 800 black of Virginia St., most pages exemplify Gary’s ongoing spirit, diversity, and cultural life and are filled with signs of activity – church celebrations, sporting events, school activities, urban gardens, steelworker rallies, protests against locating an immigrant detention center adjacent to Gary Airport, crowds assembling at Michael Jackson’s family home, Calumet Artist Residency poetry workshops, Gary Air Show beach onlookers, and the IU Northwest campus, my intellectual home for 48 years.  Though Gary has lost much of its tangible heritage and remains a tough environment, especially for those  struggling to find work and raise families, potential exists for a brighter future not only in the development of the lakefront, airport, and academic corridor along Thirty-Fifth Avenue but even in downtown revitalization, with Gary’s alluring ruins hopefully surviving. Meanwhile, remarkable activities continue to occur in schools, churches, and community centers, some literally in the shadows of haunts that reflect its former glory.