Black Lives Matter

"We all need to learn.  We all need to listen.  We all need to be a part of the solution.  We can do it peacefully together.” Tony Dungy

 

Those who disparage the slogan “Black Lives Matter” and counter with the argument that “All Lives Matter” don’t comprehend the necessity of making dramatic the point that the toll of African-American victims of police violence - and murder even – has become totally unacceptable.  Of course, all lives matter but until these killings cease the message of “Black Lives Matter” needs to be heard loud and clear.  As veteran Post-Tribune reporter John Mutka has written, in America all citizens are supposed to be created equal, but “unfortunately some are created more equal than others, especially where civil rights are concerned.”

Denzel Smith

On Facebook son Dave performed the Buffalo Springfield protest song “For What It’s Worth,” written by Stephen Stills, and dedicated it to Denzel Smith, a thoughtful, intelligent East Chicago Central grad now attending Bethune-Cookman University who has been grievously affected by the murder in Minneapolis of “gentle giant” George Floyd.  Calling Denzel a “brother from a different mother,” Dave introduced the song with these words: “It’s time to love each other, it’s time to listen to each other.  I stand with the young people in the streets.  Denzel Smith, I love you.”  “For What It’s Worth” begins with the line, “There’s something happening here, what it is ain’t exactly clear.” Another couplet goes, “A thousand people in the street, singing songs and carrying signs.”  And this verse:

There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind

 

Granddaughter Alissa called, conflicted about attending a peaceful rally in Grand Rapids scheduled to begin at 7 P.M.  In Valparaiso an 11 A.M. rally went peacefully, but both Toni and I counseled against being part of something at near dusk, when agitators on both the right and left were likely to foment trouble.  We called a few hours later and, finding nobody at home, left a message hoping to hear from her.  She called soon afterwards, having venture downtown with Josh and witnessed the rally from a distance. Next day, we learned that the protest had turned ugly with looting and the torching of police vehicles.  We were happy she was not caught up in it. Alissa posted this message:

    Don't be silent about the murder of George Floyd (and countless other black/brown people) and outraged at property damage. Be outraged at a justice system that has failed so many times that it makes people feel like rioting is the only choice. Be outraged at the silence from so many who should use their privilege for good.  I was proud to stand in solidarity with my city yesterday (from a social distance) and inspired to see all the protests around the country. Please everyone be safe (COVID is still here) and we need each other more than ever. Also, don't let the news coverage on the damage distract you - yesterday was a 99.9% peaceful gathering of people coming out in solidarity

After a couple days of uncertainty, authorities in Minneapolis and elsewhere are cracking down on protests, which continue to take place all over the nation. Even so, in many communities, officers have taken a knee to show solidarity with those mourning Floyd’s unnecessary death.  Locally, peaceful vigil took place in several other locations, but demonstrations that continued into the evening hours sometimes got ugly.  In Hobart stores got looted at Southlake Mall and demonstrators surged onto Route 30, stopping traffic.

Southlake Mall photo by Marc Chase

 In Hammond, Indiana, county police were on hand to prevent protestors from blocking the Frank Borman expressway (80/94). Former IUN colleague Linda Anderson reported:

Since this morning things have been other-worldly here.  From my window I have watched as police showed up to block access from Illinois into Hammond. Lots of police cruisers! Then an hour later came the big yellow road building equipment to block the road, and shortly after, they began placing large concrete barricades across the road. Then, arrived the National Guard. I could whistle and get their attention if needed, but other than assuming my sleep tonight will be punctuated with more sirens and the flashing red and blue lights through my windows, right here things seem calm, with an occasional driver honking in annoyance when they discover their route is blocked. My kids have offered I can come stay with them, but actually I feel fine being here. This morning there was rioting and looting at a shopping mall near here in Illinois so this is our city's response. Yesterday, tear gas/pepper spray was directed at a peaceful protest march in town. Very disappointing. I am hoping things cool down but not optimistic. I am in support of the protests and speaking out. Yet, as every newscast reports this is a systemic problem that must be solved I hear no real solutions and with the pandemic, unemployment sky high and a political stage that presents as a nightmare, it is going to take more effort and listening than this country has ever had to collect. Sadly, I am not sure we are up to the task. Too many politicians, religious leaders and educators unfortunately must have majored in "talk".

Hammond photos by Kyle Telechan

Trump continues to tweet incendiary comments about shooting looters and unleashing vicious dogs on citizens.  While he claimed to have talked to George Floyd’s family, a brother said the President never let them get a word in, whereas Joe Biden’s call lasted more than 30 minutes and was a true interchange. Floyd had worked as a bouncer at a conga Latin club and several people described him as a “gentle giant.”  The owner of the store where Floyd bought a pack of cigarettes with a counterfeit bill, not on the premises at the time, told reporters that Floyd was a regular customer who was unfailingly friendly and never gave anyone a hard time.  Vice President Mike Pence claims to believe in peaceful protest, drawing this retort from Ayo Edebiri: “Remember, Pence, when Colin Kaepernick peacefully protested and you stood your ass up and walked out of the stadium?”  Many have pointed out this hypocrisy and compared the NFL quarterback subsequently blackballed by NFL owners taking a knee to the Minneapolis cop killing George Floyd with his.

 

Evan Davis toured his neighborhood in the Fort Wayne area with a “Black Lives Matter” sign and reported:

  The Maplecrest walk with my Black Lives Matter sign went well. A former newspaper colleague and I walked for about half an hour and got no responses on the first half, but several on the way back, when we were facing oncoming traffic more directly. We got what we interpreted as three or four friendly beeps, plus a plea for All Lives Matter, a muttered reference to bovine feces and a long, loud beep accompanied by the middle-finger salute. If I do this again, I need to make a sturdier sign, but, otherwise, I figure at least a hundred people got to see two somewhat elderly (masked) white folks walking for racial justice in the heart of St. Joe Township. I hope we gave them something to talk about. ... Meanwhile, I think a couple of my Aboite Township friends were doing a neighborhood walk near their home. I'm looking forward to their report.

 

Brittany Schoel filed this report from Flint, Michigan:

    We weren't sure what to expect. With everything we have been seeing on the news, it wasn't clear what would happen but as we were walking, it was beautiful to see people of every race, age, demographic come together and unite.

    When we reached the police station, the officers were lined up and everyone immediately took a knee.

    The Sheriff asked one question...

    “We are mad, too! What can we do?"

     And the crowd responded, "Join us.’”

 

WLS news team, Coleman on left

 We’ve had ideal weather over the weekend, sunny, low humidity, and in the low 70s – perfect for getting out of the house and joining a Black Lives Matter demonstration.  As legendary ABC Chicago meteorologist John Coleman would say, “Today was one of the ten best weather days of the year.” During the 1970s the Channel 7 news team of Fahey Flynn, John Drury, Joel Daly, and sportscaster Bill Frink (plus my favorite Mark Giangreco) was number one, even surpassed the Channel 2 team of Bill Kurtis and Walter Jacobson. They had so much rapport that some accuse them with popularizing a news "happy talk" format. After playing a major role in launching the Weather Channel, Coleman was chief meteorologist on ABC’s “Good Morning America” before ending his career at a San Diego station. Coleman is credited with creating the first chroma key weather map. He died in 2018 at age 83.

 

 Walt Whitman

Ray Boomhower passed on this advice from poet Walt Whitman:

  This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.

Hold Steady

‘There's gonna come a time when the true scene leaders
Forget where they differ and get big picture’

    “Stay Positive,” The Hold Steady

Rolling Stone gave a plug to The Hold Steady’s forthcoming CD “Thrashing Through the Passions” on its latest “Quick List” of top new albums.  The Brooklyn band formed in 2003. Josh Leffingwell burned me their 2006 CD “Boys and Girls in America.  The first song, “Stuck Between Stations,” has a line that references Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road” (1957):

There are nights when I think that Sal Paradise was right

Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together

“Chillout Tent” is about two young people at a rock concert who meet in a chill-out tent after being taken there by paramedics when they’d overdosed on mushrooms, then given oranges and cigarettes (for nourishment and stimulation?).  My favorite track is “Southtown Girls,” which contains a line “Hey Bloomington, what’d you let them do to you” (an IU reference perhaps?)and the much-repeated couplet:

Southtown girls won't blow you away
But you know that they'll stay

We celebrated Dave’s fiftieth birthday at BC Osaka in Merrillville, a Japanese restaurant whose buffet included a wide variety of dishes.  Many seemed spicy so I favored the roast beef, crab Rangoon, and salad along with small portions of Mongolian beef and a noodle dish, then finished with jello, ice cream, and cream-filled pastries.  Toni especially enjoyed the sushi selections, not my cup of tea.  The night before, Dave and Angie dined at Ivy’s Bohemia House, where Becca works, with several old friends.  Dave asked Toni details about the day he was born (in Washington, DC), and we discussed summer of ’69 news events, including the Apollo 11 moon landing, Chappaquiddick, and Woodstock. which would become a counter-culture symbol peace and harmony, with a half-million hippies gathering in a rain-drenched field without violence.  I’m not sad to have missed it, but those who went gained bigtime bragging rights. Toni and I saw Martin Scorsese’s documentary in the spring of 1970 at a venerable theater near Kensington and Allegheny in north Philly while visiting her parents Blanche and Tony. Performing at Woodstock fiftieth anniversary festival will be original artists John Sebastian, John Fogarty, Carlos Santana, David Crosby, and Country Joe McDonald, whose antiwar “I Feel Like I’m Fixin’ To Die Rag” chorus went, “One, two, three what are we fighting for?”

I could hardly watch the news with two mass shootings that took dozens of lives in El Paso and Dayton – within hours of one another. More people died at the hands of the white supremacist in ten minutes than the average in El Paso for an entire year. Trump stayed away from El Paso mercifully and instead delivered a mealy-mouthed address from the White House and said nothing about banning assault rifles or mandating universal background checks. Kyle Telechan posted this comment:

    It's weird how quickly mental health suddenly becomes important to Republican politicians and pundits the few moments after a mass shooter is found to be a white supremacist, and how unimportant it becomes soon thereafter. If you want to claim that "mental health" is the base cause of these shootings, sounds like maybe we should work on getting a system where everyone can get the help they need regardless of their economic status?  No? We're going to forget about this in a few days until the next white kid with obvious supremacist views extinguishes more human lives? Also related, can you imagine how quickly they'd be racing to address this instead of hand-wringing and "thoughts and prayers"-ing if the mass shootings were inspired by ISIS? If you don't see their inaction as speaking volumes of their motives, you're not paying attention.

Mike Olszanski posted this Carl Sagan quote: “For me, the most ironic token of [the first human moon landing] is the plaque signed by President Richard M. Nixon that Apollo 11 took to the moon. It reads, ‘We came in peace for all Mankind.’ As the United States was dropping seven and a half megatons of conventional explosives on small nations in Southeast Asia, we congratulated ourselves on our humanity. We would harm no one on a lifeless rock.”

On category in the Jeopardy Teen tournament was Vinyl.  I knew four of the five answers, including Juke box, revolutions per minute, turn-table, and 21 Pilots, a pop group Miranda turned me onto.

Knowing I’d seen Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” Jonathyne Briggs asked if it was worth seeing  in a theater. I gave him an emphatic yes!  As Rolling Stone’s Peter Travers wrote: “The action jumps off the screen while setting up psychological provocations with a reverb that won’t quit.”

IUN math professor Jon Becker just published a book titled “The Flunked-Out Professor,” based on his college experience.  Here’s how Amazon advertised the Kindle edition:

   Jon has been kicked out of college.He spends his days playing video games and his nights delivering pizzas, with no motivation to develop a sustainable plan for the future. Recognizing this, Jon's girlfriend decides that she doesn't want to be stuck with a video game-addicted pizza delivery man for the rest of her life. So, she tells him to get his act together, or she will have to end their relationship. Jon feels like a total failure.
  SOUND FAMILIAR?

  Failure is a common part of life for everyone. But when we fail, most people make the mistake of identifying themselves as the failure instead of recognizing that they have experienced failure.In The Flunked-Out Professor,readers follow Jon as he makes a series of bad choices which get him kicked out of college and beaten down in life. Eventually, he chooses a new path--one that ultimately leads him back to the same college that kicked him out...as a faculty member!

Lou Nimnicht wrote a piece for Barb Walczak’s Newsletterabout competing in a tournament in Las Vegas.  He claimed that in the Friday Knockout he and his partner came in second of 25 teams, “despite losing to a squad whose average age was about 10!” Now if that was not a facetious exaggeration, it would be most unusual, as most competitors are seniors.  I will have to investigate.  Last year IUN student Meriah Isaza (below) interviewed Nimnicht for an oral history assignment.  I asked Terry Bauer, recently elected president of bridge Unit 154 for Northern Indiana, and he quipped that Nimnicht considers anyone under the age of 60 a kid. He added, however, that he’d lost at a tournament to 12-year-olds.

Home Alone Redux

“You bomb me with one more can, kid, and I’ll snap off your cajones and boil them in motor oil.” Harry (Joe Pesci) to 8-year-old Kevin (Macaulay Culkin) in “Home Alone” (1990)

Adria-Joi Jackson from Evanston and Miriam Espinal from Spain at Jackson home; photos by Kyle Telechan

I thought of “Home Alone” when reading about the Maxwell family renting the lame sequel from Blockbuster in Stewart O’Nan’s “Henry Himself.”  Despite the unlikely premise, the original had its comic moments, as well as a few comments (the reference to snapping off a kid’s balls, for one) and scary scenes that earned the film a PG rating.  Michael Jackson befriended child star Macaulay Culkin, who stayed at Neverland Ranch numerous times, often sharing a bed with the pop icon. He steadfastly claims Michael was never sexually inappropriate and apparently is Paris Jackson’s godfather.Crowds gathered at Michael’s childhood home in Gary to commemorate the tenth anniversary of his tragic drug-induced death.

Home alone for the weekend as Toni went with Dave and Angie to attend Becca’s recital at the University of Cincinnati, I took the opportunity to invite James to lunch.  When we arrived at the Portage Steak and Shake, we found it shut down, according to local scuttlebutt, by the Board of Health. We settled for a nearby Culver’s, our favorite destination after bowling.  I got a kids meal for $5.99 that included a scoop of frozen custard topped with chocolate syrup for desert.  James asked if we could swing by Game Stop and emerged with Super Mario Maker 2, which, he explained, allows the operator to set the preferred level of difficulty.   It was the first day the video game was for sale.  I asked James if the place sold board games; the answer was no although James reported that young people still participate in role-playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons.

I interviewed Lori Montalbano for IU’s Bicentennial project.  The youngest of seven who attended Warren G. Harding School in Hesville (made famous by Jean Shepherd) and then Hammond Morton, Lori was the first in her family to attend college, enrolling at IU Northwest in 1981.  I had thought her name was Mexican, but her dad, who died when she was ten, was Sicilian.  With Reagan in the White House, Pell Grant opportunities evaporated, but financial aid director Leroy Gray put a package together for her.  A theater major with a minor in communication, Lori recalled Garrett Cope, Dorothy Ige, and Jim Tuihuizen as mentors and role models. Forced to take two semesters of Western Civilization, she admitted Rhiman Rotz was formidable but a good teacher, as was Paul Kern, who lectured with no more than a glance at his carefully prepared notes. Awarded a PhD from Southern Illinois University, Lori taught at IUN for 17 years, including in the Women’s Studies program and stints as Communication Department chair and Associate Dean of Arts and Sciences under Dee Dee Ige.  The two co-authored a textbook, “Public Speaking and Responsibility in a Changing World.”  Lori was reluctant to say anything negative about IUN other than to intimate that a glass ceiling existed.  She is presently Dean of Academic and Student Affairs at IUPUI in Columbus.

Megan Rapinoe; Alissa and Josh in foreground

Alissa called during the waning minutes of America’s World Cup match, as the French were trying to tie the score 2-2. Half in jest, I admitted hoping they succeeded (call me unpatriotic).  Co-captain Megan Rapinoe announced she’d turn down a White House visit if the Americans won the World Cup.  Go girl! Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez invited her and teammates to tour Congress instead.   Alissa sent a photo of members of her soccer team, including hubby Josh and poppa Phil. A rainbow is in the background.

Avi Gupta won the JeopardyTeen Tournament after surviving a tiebreaker in the semifinal round.  He and Jackson Jones each finished with $39,200.  The extra category was American History, and the clue was, “Types of it you could find in Boston Harbor on December 16, 1773 included souchong and bohea.”  As easy as the answer, tea, was, I’m certain Jackson knew it, but Avi buzzed in first.  On day two all three finalists knew Final Jeopardy, an Ancient Lore question about Lancelot and Camelot, but the others couldn’t catch Gupta. 

The Sports Illustrated“Where Are They Now?” issue with nattily-dressed Alex Rodriguez on the cover included a montage of stars from 50 years ago, including Arnold Palmer, Joe Frazier, Joe Namath, Hank Aaron, and O.J. Simpson – all senior citizens now if still on the right side of the grass, as bowling teammate Terry Kegebein likes to say.  In Rolling Stoneveteran moviemaker John Waters, whose films include such gems as “Pink Flamingos” (1972) and “Hairspray” (1988), claimed that the secret to aging gracefully is staying away from nude beaches.  He declared: “If you go to the gym every day, people still don’t want to see you nude at 70.”Claiming that political correctness can go too far, Waters, a frequent guest on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher,” said: “When I hear about ‘theybies,’ where you don’t tell your child what sex they are until they decide, I had to roll my eyes.  Give me a break.  That child will be in a psychiatric unit early.”  Maybe, maybe not.

 John Waters

posted by Anne Koehler

Without mentioning Trump by name, Pete Buttigieg told a Rolling Stonecorrespondent, “It is the nature of grotesque things that you can’t look away.”  Attending a G20 summit in Osaka, Japan (In 1994 I flew in and out of Kansai International Airport for a speaking engagement in nearby Kyoto arranged by colleague Roberta Wollons), Trump met with pal Putin, who declared liberalism obsolete and in its death throes.  When a reporter asked a beaming Trump whether he planned to bring up Russian meddling in the 2020 election, he smiled and repeated question to a smirking Putin smirked, who said of course not.  Ha, ha, ha. Trump couldn’t resist tweeting about the Democratic Presidential debates, pronouncing them “BORING!”  He prefers bombast and ridicule to serious policy discussions. After Jimmy Carter asserted that Russian meddling determined the 2016 election outcome, Trump called him a poor president.  Reporters should press him on why he thinks so.

I have to admit I fell asleep both evenings after the first hour but caught the highlights on “Morning Joe.” Elizabeth Warren’s strident style attracted attention, as did Kamala Harris confronting Joe Biden, claiming he opposed school bussing during the 1970s (only forced, not voluntary, he countered).  While Bernie Sanders, Warren, and Harris enunciated valid arguments, the electorate, I believe, seeks restoration of civility, not revolution.  The most poignant moment was when Rachel Maddow asked Pete Buttigieg about the worsening race relations in South Bend in the wake of a white cop shooting a black man, and the Mayor replied, “I couldn’t get it done.” What a powerful admission that politicians cannot solve every problem.  I’m still for Amy Klobuchar and either Buttigieg or Julian Castro as her running-mate; all three acted more Presidential than pretentious Beto O’Rourke and Cory Booker, who showed off their knowledge of Spanish.  Klobuchar reminded voters of her Midwestern roots, where the general election will be won or lost, and that the women on the stage had been fighting for women’s rights longer than many Johnny-come-latelies. Biden is still paying dearly for disrespecting Anita Hill decades ago.  Ray Smock wrote: 

    Joe Biden took it on the chin from Kamala Harris's attack on Joe's comments about working with segregationists in the past. She took a good shot and it worked in the glare of the TV lights. Today, in news coverage around the nation she stands out as a "winner" of this preliminary encounter. This may be a good indicator of her rise in the polls, but I will reserve judgment about the long-range importance of this exchange. 

    [California Congressman] Eric Swalwell, who I admire for his work on the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees investigating Trump, and his public efforts to educate the public about Trump's transgressions, fell flat in my opinion for his attempt to grab the torch from Joe Biden's generation. Pass the Torch, he said. Give his generation a chance. This campaign may turn out to be a generational feud.  Joe Biden is one of the politicians I have admired since he first entered politics. His is a remarkable, positive career and it is still ongoing. Joe's age shows in this kind of rapid fire, gotcha TV reality contest that our debates represent. His experience, his character, his knowledge of government would be an asset in the White House. It would be an asset in his knowledge of the world and its leaders. It would be a tremendous asset in uniting his own party and bringing unity to the nation. Without unity, without defusing political extremism, the Harrises and the Swalwells will not be able to get things done. Trump proved that emotion alone can elect a president. But all he had was hate and division. 

    Whoever gets the Democratic Party nomination should be a healer, a unifier, not just a new brand of fiery rhetoric carrying a new red hot torch that fizzles and goes dark in a divided nation.

Anne Tyler’s 2018 novel “Clock Dance” about a 61-year-old woman provides vignettes about her early life.  Willa’s temperamental mother sarcastically called her father St. Melvin, similar to Toni branding me St. James when I become self-righteous.  Her younger sister became a rebellious teenager whose eyes in 1977 “were so heavily outlined in blush that she resembled a pileated woodpecker.”A poster in her bedroom read “Nobody for President.”  Willa’s son wanted to quit school and hitchhike around the country to meet people. Her self-indulgent husband died in an auto accident driving recklessly in anger. Twenty years later, Willa (named for lesbian Willa Cather, one wonders, whose forte was depicting loneliness) receives a call that lures her to Baltimore to care for a girl that someone mistakenly thought was her granddaughter.  Remarried to an overbearing man and bored with life in Tuscan, she is ready for a change of scenery.  Tyler writes: “She knows the world, which has largely ignored her, expects her now to coast along that deferential rut into oblivion.”  Aware her time clock was ticking, she had always conformed but now was open to adventure, ready to dance.

NY Knicks Barnett, Frazier, Bradley, DeBusschere, Reed in April 1970

New York Knicks fan Spike Lee’s memoir “Best Seat in the House” lists his favorite teams as the 1970 and 1972 NBA champs, regarded by many as representing the American melting pot.  Knick players included Princeton blueblood (and future Senator) Bill Bradley, sons of immigrants Dave DeBusschere and Mike Riordon, plus, in Lee’s words, “the brothers, ranging from deep southern rural to Midwestern to Chicago slick to Gary, Indiana, hard.”  These included Earl “The Pearl” Monroe, Willis Reed, Walt “Clyde” Frazier (Lee’s favorite) and Gary Roosevelt grad Dick “Skull” Barnett. By 1978, when Phil Jackson left to play for a rival, there were hardly any white players left, causing racists to label the team the “Niggerbockers.”

 E'Traun Moore basketball camp photos by Kale Wilk

IUN coaches Javier Heredia and Eric Roldan participated in E’Twaun Moore’s summer basketball camp at East Chicago Central, by now an annual tradition.  So did 6-foot-11 Angel Garcia, who starred on the 2007 championship Cardinals with Moore and Kawann Short.  NWI Timesreporter James Boyd wrote that the New Orleans Pelicans guard wowed the kids demonstrating his typical shooting warmup, draining 9 straight 3-pointers, including one from nearly half court.  Kids begged Moore to dunk the ball, but he deferred to professional dunk artist Jordan Southernland.  Boyd wrote: “Southerland pulled off a variety of rim-rocking jams and ended his showing by jumping over former E.C. Central center Garcia, who stands 6-foot-11, and nine participants.”
                                                        Gabrielle Frigo at IUN graduation 

Simone De Beauvoir photos by Art Shay

At Miller Beach Aquatorium Nelson Algren Museum director Sue Rutson hosted a French-themed event that included Eve Bottando as Simone De Beauvoir, George Rogge as Father Marquette, French champagne and buffet, plus talks on French-American engineer Octave Chanute and novelist (and Miller summer resident) Algren’s relationship with French feminist De Beauvoir and African-American émigré to France Richard Wright.  One presenter showed nude photos of Simone that Algren buddy Art Shay took after she’d showered. She sun-bathed in the nude, scandalizing some neighbors, and never closed the bathroom door.  A free spirit, Simone sun-bathed in the nude, scandalizing some neighbors, titillating others.  I was delighted to discover that recent IUN grad Gabrielle Frigo had received a museum internship.  I told Nancy Cohen that I had heard Gabby (as I know her) recite poetry at a Women’s Studies conference and that she is bright and self-confident.

 Terry Hemmert on XRT float; photo by Marianne Brush

As Pride Month concluded, Chicago’s annual parade attracted record crowds.  The South Shore ran extra trains to and from Northwest Indiana.  Marianne Brush waved at peerless dejay Terry Hemmert, who recently announced her impending retirement, aboard the XRT float.  With her was Lin Brehmer, whose favorite expression is “It’s great to be alive.” I thought of them listening to CDs by Widespread Panic and Night Ranger. Track 6 of Widespread Panic’s “Earth to America” album, which I found at Chesterton library, is “When the Clowns Come Home.” It begins”

One of these days my back won't bend
My fingers might hurt swollen
Live another day, get lucky that way
Sound of thunder when the gods go bowling

I listened to “Eddie’s Comin’ Out Tonight” for homoerotic hints in the Night Ranger song about a guy who “likes to rock it all night long.”Here are the first two verses:

He wears his trousers real tight
And his skin is so white
He lives beyond his means
He wear Italian shoes
. . .

He live a tenderloin life
The street's his type
In the alley's where he's king
He got a grin on his face

Thirty years ago at Sociologist Jack Bloom’s end-of-the-semester party, I danced to an entire Night Ranger album with Phil, Dave, Jimmy Satkoski, and Tom Horvath, and we rocked – at least that’s my memory.

 Kaden Alexander 

Post-Trib columnist Jerry Davich profiled 24-year-old F to M transgender Kaden Alexander, a recent IUN grad who will attend IU Law School in the fall.  The article began:

   Kaden Alexander is so comfortable with his body these days he went to a local nudist resort to hang out while letting it all hang out.

    “I wasn’t any more uncomfortable than the best man from my wedding who went with me,”Alexander said with a smile.

Davich added, unnecessarily, in my opinion: “Alexander has no plans in the near future for gender reassignment surgery to alter his genitals. It’s too expensive, too risky, too complicated, costing tens of thousands of dollars for multiple procedures and revisions.”  Last year Kaden confided that he was uncomfortable attracting attention because intolerant folks might resent his lifestyle, yet he granted Davich permission to photograph him and even provided a picture of when he was 16 and known as Kaitlyn.

Toni was home earlier than expected, and I saw on Angie’s cell phone a number Becca performed a number at musical theater camp in Cincinnati from “Jawbreaker,” based on a 1999 film about three girls who accidently kill the prom queen with hard candy.

Living Mayors Forum

“I’m glad to be participating in a panel of ‘living mayors.’ For me, it could have gone either way.” Richard Gordan Hatcher, Mayor of Gary, 1968-1986 

 Richard Hatcher, Tom Barnes (holding "Gary: A Pictorial History) and Karen Freeman-Wilson; 

Post-Trib photo by Kyle Telechan

Close to 200 people came to IUN’s Bergland Auditorium for a “Living Mayors” 90-minute forum featuring Richard Hatcher, Thomas Barnes, Scott King, Dozier Allen, and moderator Karen Freeman-Wilson. Beforehand, I presented copies of “Gary: A Pictorial History” to the former Gary mayors. In his opening statement Hatcher mentioned meeting an audience member who was a Hatcherette during his 1967 grassroots campaign and explained that local candidates commonly attended up to a dozen neighborhood get-togethers in a single evening.  The Hatcherettes would show up first to let people know that Hatcher was on his way.  Mayor Freeman-Wilson’s first exposure to America’s first black Mayor was when her parents set up folding chairs in their unfinished basement and hosted such an event.

 Scott King and Dozier T. Allen

Dozier Allen said he first met Hatcher when the two were virtually the only African-Americans at Valpo University, Dozier an undergraduate and Hatcher in law school. With other young black professionals they helped found Muigwithania, which became their political base, and Dozier was a candidate for city council when Hatcher ran for Mayor.  “When I told my friends about my plans,”Hatcher added, “they told me to lie down until I came to my senses.”  Post-Tribreporter Carole Carlson quoted him as saying, “When I decided to run for mayor, it wasn’t something that was easy. During course of the campaign, there were threats, and the city itself was extremely polarized.”  He talked about staying up all night traveling around town to urge people to remain calm in the wake of Martin Luther King’s assassination in 1968 and being summoned to the White House to meet with President Lyndon Baines Johnson as riots were erupting in most major cities (but not Gary), including the nation’s capital. When the President suggested that black leaders urge ghetto residents not to riot, Hatcher bluntly told him that they were not the cause of the crisis. 

Mayor Freeman-Wilson asked her predecessors to talk about the importance of networking downstate and in Washington, DC.  Hatcher complimented her on having been elected head of the National League of Cities and expressed displeasure that a local newspaper criticized her for seeking the post, adding: “I could empathize with that. I would go to Washington and negotiate millions of dollars in grants for our city, and by the time I got back to O’Hare, the local paper was criticizing me. You have to go out of town.”  Hatcher noted that former Indianapolis mayor Richard Lugar was sympathetic to Gary’s problems and helpful when a U.S. Senator. Dozier Allen brought up working with Republican governor Otis Bowen, a physician, on funding to combat sickle cell anemia.  Scott King recalled meeting with Bill Clinton’s attorney-general Janet Reno and securing some $4 million annually for the Community Oriented Policing (COPS) program, which got reduced to almost nothing after Republican George W. Bush took office.  

Thomas Barnes, a classmate of Freeman-Wilson’s mother in Roosevelt’s rowdy Class of 1954, got a big hand when he revealed that his administration rejected awarding Donald Trump’s company a riverboat casino (my friend Clark Metz headed the search committee) “because his record at that time was not a good one” but state officials overruled him.  Scott King, whom Freeman-Wilson first encountered in the courtroom when he was a defense attorney and she was a young lawyer on the county prosecutor’s staff, emphasized that public safety, both the reality and perception, was his top priority when he took office in 1996.  All four mayors emphasized roadblocks from state officials regarding public education, tax and assessment policies and emphasized that, compared to Indianapolis, Gary has been short-changed.

 audience members at Living Mayors forum; Pst-Trib photo by Kyle Telechan

Sitting next to Paul Kaczocha and Mike Olszanski, I brought up needing to renew my driver’s license, which now requires several identification documents (a Republican voter suppression measure, many believe). Oz had problems since he did not use his first name, Sylvester, on his passport of driver’s license.  Until Sylvester Stallone came along, Oz explained, the name got him in several playground fights.

 Harriet Lane portrait at Coast Guard Academy

Belated Christmas presents from the Hagelbergs included a Kidstuff Playstations hoodie that came in handy as the temperature dipped into the teens and a children’s book about Harriet Lane, my great-great-great Uncle James Buchanan’s First Lady.  In her early 20s when hostess for the future bachelor president, who was appointed U.S. Minister to the Court of St. James in 1853, she favored low-cut dresses then fashionable in Europe that showed off her ample breasts, attracting the attention of the Prince of Wales, heir to the British throne, and many suitors.  Authors Ginger Shelley and Sandie Munro wrote:

  Harriet was enormously popular. Uncle James and the famous poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, were to receive the honorary Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford University.  Harriet accompanied her uncle to the grand festivities.  When the students at Oxford saw Harriet, they greeted this fashionable woman with cheers and much whistling.  She became the center of attention at an event which was supposed to be for her uncle and the English poet.

Grandson James’ paper on Sinclair Lewis’ “Babbitt,” titled “A Midlife Psychoanalysis,” is beyond awesome.  It begins, “Most people experience what is known as a midlife crisis in their lives.  Doing the same mundane routine day after day can cause someone to desire change and/or excitement.  Thoughts like these can cause people to make rash decisions in an attempt to, as they say, ‘make up for lost time.’”  In the case of George F. Babbitt, this includes, James points out, questioning both his political views and bourgeois lifestyle.  He quotes Babbitt as thinking, “I’ll be 50 in three years.  60 in 13 years.  I’m going to have some fun before it’s too late.”  His new personality led to friends and business acquaintances shunning him, forcing Babbitt to realize, James wrote, “the hopelessness of not having any choice, making his return to his previous beliefs and social acceptance bittersweet.”  James used the word exegesis (meaning critical interpretation), which he said was a word the class had recently learned. 

I binge-watched Sally4Ever, an English comedy series on HBO co-starring Catherine Shepherd, whose life is in a rut until she has a torrid affair with Emma (Juliette Davis), a free-spirited bohemian actress whom she meets on a commuter train.  When her boyfriend of ten years asks why she is leaving him, she replies that she found their sex life boring for the past seven.  One reviewer wrote: “This is a portrayal of a woman's midlife crisis going horribly wrong but in a hilarious fashion. Julia always likes to go way beyond the boundaries and that is what black comedies are all about. Julia Davis does it so well and really you need to just accept the dark and shocking humor or just don't watch it if you are easily offended. It's as simple as that!”  I loved Davis in “Camping” as the free-spirited Jandice and her portrayal if Emma is similar on the surface but much, much darker and controlling.

 scene from "The Day the Earth Stood Still"

Trump seems eager to exploit the government shutdown as a means of proclaiming a national emergency in order to build his stupid wall at our Southern border.  Ray Smock wrote:

  When the classic science fiction film of 1954, “The Day the Earth Stood Still” was in theaters, the nation was experiencing the frenzy of the fear of communist infiltration of our government, led by the demagoguery of Senator Joseph McCarthy. It was the Cold War and we were in an atomic arms race with the Soviet Union. In the film, a spaceman comes to Earth to warn us that if our petty squabbles and war-like tendencies spread too far, our planet would be reduced to a cinder.  To demonstrate his awesome power, Klatu, the spaceman, made the world come to a complete halt for 30 minutes to get the attention of Earthlings. Our military forces, shocked and dismayed by their impotence, announced that the president was going to declare a state of national emergency! 

I watched the film again as the president seems on the verge of declaring a national state of emergency, as if the aliens were indeed from outer space and only his unilateral action to find the money to build a wall to stop the hordes would solve the problem and save the nation. Never mind that it might take ten years to build the wall, we need the money NOW! We need the money because President Trump wants it to prove he is boss of America. 

  Trump, like Klatu the Spaceman, thinks he can stop the world to make his point. Well, maybe not the world. But Trump has stopped the government of the most powerful nation on Earth for a political whim. As the scientist in the movie, played by Sam Jaffe, says to the spaceman, “I didn’t know such power exists.” 

  To think that a single man, even though he may be the President of the United States, can shut down the government to score a political point. I thought the job of the president was to run the government, not shut it down.