It happened Today

“Out of deference, defiance, the choice
Closing on a promise after all I’ve done today
I have earned my voice.”
REM, “It Happened Today”

REM’s new album, “Collapse into Now,” has guest appearances by two of my favorites, Eddie Vedder and Patti Smith.

Made a final plea to the chancellor to reconsider an unjust decision adversely affecting the History department. Starting out “just between you and me and with malice toward none,” I proposed a scenario that might have saved the day and stated that nothing had given me more grief during my long association with the university than the way the matter had been handled. I concluded: “I thought long and hard before composing this email, and if I am out of line, I apologize.” His reply, as expected, didn’t change anything, but he did thank me for the message and added: “Please know that there is never a need to apologize for sincere advocacy in behalf of a colleague.”

I was fortunate to have been able to convert my PhD dissertation into a book and to carve out five articles from it in such journals as Maryland Historian and Social Service Review. I also adopted the gimmick of reading books of urban literature such as Piri Thomas’ “Down These Mean Streets” and Claude Brown’s “Manchild in the Promised Land,” taking notes about the author’s use of symbolism (the tree, for instance, in Betty Smith’s “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn”), looking up info about them in “Book Review Digest,” and finding a suitable place to publish them (i.e., English Journal for Piri, American Negro Literature Forum for Claude). I even did one for a popular culture journal about Harold Robbins’ “A Stone for Danny Fisher.” Piece of cake.

My colleague Rhiman Rotz neither had a publishable dissertation nor the variety of journals available in which to submit articles. He did have an original insight about the Hanseatic League and spent five years traveling to Europe and perusing documents in medieval German. By the time he went up for tenure, a first-rate medieval journal had accepted his important. He was awarded tenure because P and T committee members trusted the History department – Fred Chary, John Haller, Bill Neil, Jim Newman – when they vouched for Rhiman’s scholarship. Rhiman went on to become a master teacher, founder of the History Club, and, after graduating from law school, adviser to prelaw students. Bruce Sawochka went to IUN while holding down a job thinking he wanted to be a lawyer, but in his senior year he was drawn to teaching. Rhiman told him that while there were plenty of good lawyers, there was a crying need for dedicated teachers. Bruce, like me, chose teaching and has never regretted it. Teaching World History, Rhiman became interested in the development of English Common law in the colony of Rhodesia, which became the independent African country of Zimbabwe. He traveled to London and (at great pains) to Harare (formerly Salisbury) and his research findings were truly original. Though small in number, his scholarly articles were far more important than mine. Rhiman was adviser to the campus Muslim organization, and his last words to me as he was dying of cancer shortly after the World Trade Center bombing was concern for his Muslim students. At his memorial service, the most eloquent speakers were students he had mentored.

Suzi Hummel sent me a YouTube segment on a spiral that’s a common phenomenon in nature and conforms to something known as Fibonacci’s Numbers (i.e., 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, etc.), a sequence made by adding the last two numbers. A twelfth-century Italian mathematician studied under Arabic scholars and was responsible for much of Western Europe switching from Roman numerals to Hindu-Arabic numbers. Some see patterns based on the sequence in spirals found in everything from fingerprints and sand dollars to ocean waves and galaxies.

Sheriff Dominguez and I looked over the IU Press Author’s Questionnaire due at the end of the month. We filled out the form, which I will mail out. Recently the Mayor of East Chicago fired him from the library board in a political ploy that Roy is challenging in court. Hopefully the stupid move will backfire on the interim mayor, the successor to convicted felon George Pabey.

George Bodmer saw my blog entry on the “Forgotten Planet” documentary about Gary and Hashima and showed me a sketch he did about the abandoned Japanese community. Before Mitsubishi closed its coal mining operation, over 5,000 people lived on the tiny, 15-acre "Battleship Island."

I met Jackie Gipson for lunch at TGIF Friday. Since a kitchen grease fire in February, she and Floyd have been living in a motel suite. So far, she reports, the insurance company has been responsive to their needs. She likes Ragen Hatcher, my choice in the upcoming Gary mayoralty election, but is leaning toward attorney Karen Freeman-Wilson, a former Indiana attorney-general and city judge who has helped her in the past without expecting anything in return.

Despite the traumatic world events, the morning news shows extensively covered the death of actress Elizabeth Taylor, who seemed much older than just ten years my senior. One segment discussed her jewelry, another her eight marriages (she was a self-proclaimed serial monogamist) and friendship with Michael Jackson. I recall the fiasco surrounding the making of “Cleopatra” and her portrayal, opposite then-hubby Richard Burton, of a professor’s drunken wife in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”

Saturday Toni and I traveled to Grand Rapids for Phil’s forty-third birthday. Miranda was in Detroit as part of a leadership outing, but eight of us went out for Chinese food, including Alissa’s boyfriend Josh, a charming young man whom I met for the first time. He grew up in Indy a Pacers fan and is trying to woo Alissa into not rooting against Michigan, at least when they are not playing her alma mater Michigan State. Home in time to cheer on the Butler Bulldogs, who made it into the Final Four for the second year in a row.

The Times reported the resignation of Brad Cooper, an Indiana prosecutor who emailed Wisconsin governor Scott Walker suggesting he fake a physical attack on himself to discredit the public employee unions protesting his draconian anti-union agenda. Last month Hoosier Jeffrey Cox, a deputy attorney general, was fired after suggesting that live ammunition be used against the demonstrators.

Sunday:Five of us game-tested Evan Davies’ latest version of Air Lords (dubbed Zeta Beta by T. Wade), which he has been fine-tuning for over 15 years after Avalon Hill put out his game Air Baron. Tom, Dave, and I love the original version of Air Lords, but it involves lots of math, so Evan has been struggling to find a simplified modification. It went on for over two hours but was enjoyable. We had a few constructive suggestions. Tom made burgers and brats before a game of Ra that I won quite handily.

More upsets in the NCAA; in fact, for the first time ever no number one or two seeds made the Final Four. Eleven-ranked Virginia Commonwealth would not even have been in the tournament had the number of teams not been expanded to 68. During Kentucky’s win over the Tar Heels, I turned the sound down and played XTC “Nonsuch.”

RIP: Italian-American Geraldine Ferraro, Walter Mondale’s 1984 running mate. The press raised questions about her husband’s finances and alleged mob connections. Debating V.P. George Bush, she chided her adversary for his patronizing attitude. In 2008 she supported Hillary and foolishly claimed that “If Obama were a white man, he would not be in this position.” Of course, had the three-term Congresswoman been a man, she wouldn’t have been on the ’84 ticket.

Monday: I thanked Suzi Hummel for informing me about the Fibonacci Sequence and said it would be fun to talk to our high school math teacher Ed Taddei about it. She wrote back: “Oh, I had such a crush on him!!” “Taddei-Laddie” was a spectacular teacher. I never could read Math textbooks but didn’t have to, he was so good. He taught us probability – i.e., what are the odds of drawing to an inside straight in poker or flipping heads five times in a row with a coin – and I still recall how to figure that stuff out. One time at the end of class, after I had said something insightful, he hugged me right in front of others as I was going out the door– what we call a “man hug” rather than anything sexual.

James has finished “Scat” and is now reading “The City of Ember” by Jeanne DuPrau. It’s a post-apocalyptic novel about an underground city that is running out of power. Heavy.

Ron Cohen sent me a NY Times review of old Marylander friend David Goldfield’s “America Aflame.” The reviewer called it a masterly and provocative synthesis that blames the Civil War on both Southern and Northern evangelistic extremism.

I saw that Alan Barr was showing a Richard Gere movie, “Days of Heaven,” in his Film class, and George Bodmer said was his favorite movie, so I went and loved it. It is about three people who leave Chicago and end up harvesting wheat in America’s heartland. The question the class had to write essays about involved the director’s use of animals. While the movie is a morality play involving class against class as well as a romantic triangle, the plentiful animals – buffalo, pheasants, grasshoppers, rabbits – are amoral creatures in nature following their primal instincts – mainly to eat. At one point grasshoppers completely infest the fields and destroy the crop. There are some domesticated farm animals – cows and geese – and dogs frolic with farmhands bathing in a lake or hunt game with their master. There’s a great scene where a young girl is looking at a photo of dinosaurs and realizing there are phenomena beyond her imagination. Some of the animals are meant to be symbolic – buffalo herds, for example, that no longer would have been alongside a farm, even in the Texas panhandle. Just as there are three types of animals – pets, domesticated animals, and wild animals, so one might view human beings as seen by employers in that light. The farmer (Sam Shepard) who convinces the Chicago trio of Bill, Abby, and Linda to stay on after the harvest treats the girl like a pet, hopes that Abby will become more to him than a domesticated animal, and in the end comes to regard Bill (Richard Gere) as a wild animal who – like wolves or grasshoppers – needs to be eradicated. The movie takes place in 1916 – Woodrow Wilson’s campaign train comes to the prairie – at a time when horse-drawn vehicles and farm machinery are on the way out. Director Terence Malick’s most famous previous film was “Badlands,” about the crime spree of a character based on Charles Starkweather.

Got my toenails cut for five bucks at L.A. Nails. Near me two women were getting leg massages. When I tipped the full-breasted Asian woman two dollars, she said, “Thanks, honey.”

President Obama was on TV explaining his decision to attack Libya to prevent a bloodbath, distinguishing our limited action in conjunction with NATO with Bush’s regime-change policy in Iraq that involved ground troops and cost a trillion dollars. I came away impressed and convinced that we acted properly.

Ready to Start

"Now I'm ready to start, my mind is wide open." Arcade Fire

Always think of colleague Rhiman Rotz, who died nine years ago, on Nine/Eleven. MSNBC replayed without commercials a “Today” show tape from nine years ago when the Twin Towers and Pentagon were attacked. Until the second plane struck, Matt Lauer and Katie Couric weren’t certain whether it was the work of terrorists or an accident. When the first tower collapsed, they were speechless for a couple seconds. People leaped to their death rather than be incinerated, but you can’t see it, nor was there mention of it during the telecast. Nobody knew the extent of casualties or that people on the upper floors had called their loved ones to say goodbye. On the way to class that morning I learned about the Flight 93 plane going down in western Pennsylvania, supposedly after passengers stormed their captors (one of them allegedly said “Let’s Roll”). Conspiracy theorists speculate that an American fighter plane shot it down, fearful that its destination was the White House. I talked to my students about previous shocks such as Pearl Harbor and the Kennedy assassination, even though what happened was unprecedented. One guy asked that I cancel class or put on the TV, and I responded that anyone could leave who so desired. At “Ground Zero” they still read off the names of the 2,700 casualties. Looking back, it’s inconceivable that 19 Arabs with knives could cause such carnage.

Inside Town and Country throngs were lined up waiting to meet Dan Hampton, a standout defensive lineman on the 1985 Bears, who went on to win the Superbowl under Coach Mike Ditka and defensive genius Buddy Ryan. “Danimal” looked tanned and handsome. He was among the players honored at Soldier Field on opening day. The Bears won when an apparent TD catch by Calvin Johnson was ruled incomplete due to an idiotic rule even though he had both feet down in the end zone and landed on his butt before the ball came out of his hand. The 1960 Eagles were honored prior to Philadelphia’s opener against Green Bay. Quarterback Norm Van Brocklin would be 90 if still alive. His favorite receiver, Hall of Famer Tommy McDonald, was one of 22 old-timers on hand, as was warrior Chuck Bednarik, who played center on offense and linebacker on defense. Thanks to a dorm-mate whose uncle was athletic director at Penn, I was at the 17-13 win over Vince Lombardi’s Packers. Bednarik tackled Jim Taylor near the goal line on the last play of the game. The current Eagles wore throwback uniforms but lost their QB Kevin Kolb to a concussion and the game by seven points despite heroics from Michael Vick (back in the NFL’s good graces after serving time for being connected to a dog-fighting ring). Redskins beat the hated Dallas Cowboys after an apparent last-second tying TD was called back because of offensive holding. My Fantasy opponent “Pittsburgh Dave” (to distinguish from my second born) had both quarterback Matt Schaub and wide receiver Andre Johnson. Fortunately most of Houston’s 38 points came on the ground; at the end of the day I was only down eight points with both running backs still to play in Monday’s doubleheader.

The Vietnam novel “Matterhorn” dramatizes a fragging incident; soldiers kill an unpopular officer by throwing a grenade under his bunk while he is sleeping. At the end the main character realizes that the North Vietnamese won’t quit unless annihilated and that the war is hopeless. Seeking something more pleasant, I picked up Richard Russo’s “That Old Cape Magic” for a second read. The protagonist is the son of two English professors, serial adulterers who bemoaned being stuck at a Hoosier state university. I like that the chapters have titles such as “Slippery Slope” – a cliché I often use. Urged the Portage librarian she should order “Maria’s Journey.” She had seen the newspaper piece and wrote down the information.

Responding to Toni’s notice on the Internet about free appliances, two men carted away our old stove and washer, plus many logs for firewood. One with a full beard and hair longer than mine said he was helping his daughter get her life together. A woman took our old TV and converter box. Dave and Angie rented a U-Haul and with Tom Wade and John Teague moved the piano and other heavy items. The night before, I won both games of Inca Gold (which Jef Halberstadt taught us), which we taught to James and Becca, but got shut out during our normal rotation of Amun Re, St. Petersburg, Acquire, and Stone Age.

A Times article by Marisa Kwiatkowski called “Reality Stranger Than Fiction” documented wacky “off-the-wall” 911 calls. Panicked parents have sought help when willful children have refused to go to school. Police have dealt with runaway pigs, horses, and ostriches. Jackie Gipson, identified as an IU Northwest professor even though she quit in August (tired of departmental bullshit), told the reporter that people are more likely to ask for help in nonemergency situations when they have a positive image of law enforcement officers. On the other hand, she concluded, “Where you feel police show up and you are the target of harassment, you are much more reticent.” Jackie was a brilliant student who graduated from Valparaiso Law School before becoming a lecturer in the School for Public and Environmental Affairs (SPEA).

Suzanna’s eye surgery was a success, and she went to a Blues Festival in Sharon, PA, which started out with a solemn 9/11 dedication. She recalled our going on roller coaster rides at ancient Willow Grove Amusement Park (it was around when my mother was a kid. Our boys liked to go to a place in Merrillville (was it called Merriland, I wonder?) that had little roller coasters.

Laughed during “Going the Distance” at the antics of the male lead’s buddies, played by Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis, but the plot was pretty pedestrian and the sex jokes (involving dirty phone talk, pubic hairs on a dining room table, and dry humping) rather lame. Drew Barrymore, as always, was intriguing as Jason Long’s love interest and a “thirtysomething” trying to balance adult responsibility and remaining a free spirit. The granddaughter of actor John Barrymore, Drew was in “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” and has hosted “Saturday Night Live” six times, including in 1982 at age seven.

At the Patio to discuss the impeachment of Andrew Johnson, during a debate about whether the Senators were motivated by idealism or were corrupt, I argued that lawmakers did what was in their best political self-interest and defended Thad Stevens against those for claimed he was vindictive. Who wouldn’t be against rebels who caused a half million people to die and wanted to force freedmen back into virtual slavery. Ray Arredondo showed up and sold three copies of “Maria’s Journey,” which the group will discuss in March. On the way home, when the Ravens-Jets broadcast went to commercial, I heard Arcade Fire’s “Ready to Start” on WXRT. It repeats the line over and over, “If I was yours, I would, but I'm not.” I only needed nine points to start the Fantasy season 1-0 but sweated out subpar performances by Ray Rice and Ryan Mathews barely won 65-62. Will need to do better next week against Pittsburgh Dave’s girlfriend Kira who has Aaron Rogers, Tony Gonzalez, and Anquan Boldin (on her bench but after last night’s showing ready to start).