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TheDutchMafia
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Interests: destruction as a form of creation, creation as a form of destruction, aging cooling systems on Saturn station wagons, and lobster bisque
Expertise: Las Vegas, Johnny Potseed
Occupation: Research and development
Industry: Art
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AIM:  tebman336
Member Since:
1/21/2004
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| Yesterday, Barack Obama was elected to be the 44th President of the United States. When I have some time, I'm going to get some of my thoughts and feelings down (right now they are almost all positive), but for now, here are some things that a few people around the world are thinking and feeling today. These are collected from the Washington Post and the New York Times.
Quotes on the election from around the world:
"The choice of an African-American president in the United States overturns the whole idea of the stiff and conservative America. This means that America did wake up. This means that America is again open for free and democratic values," he said. "Even I did not expect that America would cheer up after eight years of idiocy and lies. It turned out that America is a living and decent country. I am delighted with America today. . . . America has once again become a good model to emulate. It has again become a great country." - Viktor Yerofeyev, Russian novelist
“The margin of victory was emphatic and, whatever else follows, today the world changed.” - an editorial in The Times of London
Terumi Hino, a photographer and painter in Tokyo: "I think this means the United States can go back to being admired as the country of dreams."
"We have a new spring in our walk and our shoulders are straighter." - Desmond Tutu
Nelson Mandela in a letter to Obama: “Your victory has demonstrated that no person anywhere in the world should not dare to dream of wanting to change the world for a better place.”
“Your election raises in France, in Europe, and elsewhere in the world, an immense hope,” - Nicholas Sarkozy
"For the first time I feel the phrase, 'I hereby declare that all men are crated equal,' from the U.S. Declaration of Independence, really came to life for me today," said architect Mamdouh al-Sobaihi, a guest at a post-election reception Wednesday in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
Saudi journalist Samir Saadi said that Obama's election means "the U.S. has won the war on terror. Given Obama's name, his background, the doubts about his religion, Americans still voted for him and this proved that America is a democracy. People here are starting to believe in the U.S. again."
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| “Everybody moved as if in consideration, not of each other, but of the quiet itself - as if the quiet denoted some fragile peacefulness in Ben’s new sleep that should not be intruded upon.”
I visited Ben’s grave yesterday, September 28, 2008, with his family, my friend Daniel, and a few others - maybe 25 of us all together. Three hundred and sixty days before, I’d helped carry his body over to the grave, and then lower him in it. I hadn’t been back since. Where there was a hole then, grass had grown, over and around, seamlessly, timelessly. It looked as if the ground had never been violently upturned. It looked, ridiculously, natural. The small, spare, granite marker bearing Ben’s name was the only external clue.
The marker is in a small old-order Mennonite cemetery, behind the meeting-house, on the gentle slope of a small mountain. Once we drove up, parked our cars and walked through the gap between the buggy garages which marked the front side of the cemetery, the traffic sound from the highway below was so soft as to be easily covered by the mooing of the cows in a pen bordering the back fence. A squash patch was on the third side, and on the fourth side, Ben’s side, a cornfield. The season’s corn was still up. Last time, the field had been empty; it had been replanted this spring, and the corn was still up. As I tried to process this, Ben’s dad began speaking.
He said a few words, gave a few thanks to we who had joined him, and read a few verses from the Bible. He invited us to speak up, and one or two people did, although I don’t remember what they said. After some silence, he said a prayer. It was something, not entirely adequate, which is to say it was appropriate. The cows, which had wandered over as we arrived, moved away down the pasture, either not understanding and losing interest, or understanding completely, and more than we did.
The crowd dispersed somewhat, in silence or small-talk, around the grounds. Over a murmur of voices would come an occasional camera shutter or car door closing. Daniel and I wandered off to have a cigarette. (By the way, if anyone has ever thought themselves self-conscious about smoking, try lighting up behind a Mennonite church as congregants, on horse and buggy, arrive early for their second service of the day.) Ben’s mom came over, told us about the first time she saw Ben smoke, on a bench outside a Target, and how that bench made her sad. We finished our cigarettes, pocketed the butts, and walked toward the car to leave.
First, though, I went back into the cemetery. I wanted to be alone with him, maybe to cry, but more to speak. At least, to upset the quiet.
“Jack Beechum was party to that quiet. He made no sound. He said nothing, for his own silence had become wonderful to him and he could not bear to break it.”
Myself, I’d been quiet for a while. For most of a year. Now and then, I would open up to someone or another, a close friend or a blank page or a girlfriend. But not often. Now being guarded, reserved, is not necessarily bad, and private grief is as legitimate as public or shared grief. But here and there this past year I’d noticed myself overdoing it, becoming too closed-off to people at times. Every time I noticed, I would make a token effort at opening up - trying to write something, or crying with someone. After a while, though, the wound got too painful, and I would close it up again, resolve to work on it later, and put myself back where I began.
And where I began was surrounded by walls. After Ben died, there was so much to do. I found out before most people, at around 6 PM, after he’d drowned but before they’d found his body. I spent the next four hours calling people and telling them about it, and in order to break their hearts I had to shield my own. (To those of you I talked to that night, I’ve never told you I was sorry. It had to be done, but I am so, so sorry). That was the hardest day of my life up to that point, but by the end of the week I’d have four more to top it. The next day I had to drive from Michigan to Philadelphia, the days after that I had to get people to the visitation and the funeral, visit Ben’s body and carry it to the grave, drive to the lake where Ben drowned and then back to Michigan.
After that, I found more to do. I moved myself back to Philadelphia. I had to get my old job back, then find a place to live. Then I had to work, find another place to live and then another, restart old friendships and make new ones, resolve a relationship I’d left hanging back in Michigan. Through these last months of 2007 and first of 2008, I distanced myself from my grief. And when I couldn’t see it as clearly, it became unfamiliar.
When things are unfamiliar, they are fearsome. Around May of 2008, I stopped being as busy: I had a stable living situation, and I’d resolved to quit my job and spend the summer writing. I’d seen the dangers of the busyness and wanted out. I had more time for people, more time for opening up. Sure enough, it worked, but as my grief again began emerging it frightened me, and again I kept it at bay. Many things tried to get it out of me - friends, writing, dating, a new girlfriend - but I wouldn’t let them. I would go so far, but no farther: once it started to hurt, or frighten, I would stop. Instead of talking, feeling, thinking about it, I would talk, feel, think other, easier things - sometimes very good things, but easier. Or I would say, feel, think nothing at all, which was much easier still. And instead of merely being quiet to others, I had become quiet to myself.
Worse still, I was getting comfortable in it, or lazy in it, or dead in it. Emotions are appendages of the mind Daniel said yesterday as we drove home from the cemetery, and like the appendages of the body, without excercise, they become weak. Eventually a weak leg, say, one that’s been in a cast for months, neglected, not moved, not cleaned, will get numb and infected, and that infection will spread. That leg is my grief, and the neglect I’d shown to it had been covering my other emotions, and moreover had begun to move on to the rest of my mind as well.
“She said to the crowd, ‘I know you are [Ben’s] friends. I thank you. I, too, must ask you not to do as you propose. Mat has asked you; I have asked you; if Ben could, he would ask you. Let us make what peace is left for us to make.’”
This week, once again, I am being pulled out of myself, out of the quiet of my “wonderful silence.” This, of course, has happened before. And every time before, I’ve resisted the tug, falling back in and deeper. So this week had to be a hell of a tug, and it is. My silence hurt that new girlfriend enough to make her break up with me. I saw a beautiful play about two people, with stronger, higher walls than I, breaking them down. I read a short story by Wendell Berry, “Pray Without Ceasing,” from which the quotes in here are taken. And September 28th came again.
So I’m here, still holding myself above my walls while I can. I can’t believe I’ll not fall back in, but only that when I do, it won’t be as deep. This little essay is a part of that, a kicking of a few bricks off the top of the wall while it’s below me. If I can keep doing that, next time I’m inside the walls won’t be as high.
In the past, before Ben died, I’d ask for help from God for this kind of thing. But because what little of God I’ve been able to salvage since has, at best, finished with his work in the world, and at worst, never really started in the first place, prayer doesn’t make sense to me anymore. If it makes sense to you, though, and you want to pray for me, feel free. After all, I could be wrong.
So mostly, I’m asking for help from people - others, and myself. I’ll be investigating professional therapy this fall, and once I have a steady income again I’ll start seeing someone. And I’ll be helping myself when I can, too. But I also want to invite those of you who know me and are reading this to chip away at these bricks too, as you’re willing and able. If you’re not comfortable with that, I understand. I know some of you reading this - mostly other friends of Ben, but maybe a few who’ve lost others close to you as well - have had a similar year to mine: you’ve built defenses to others, and to yourself. Maybe we can help each other. It’s scary, yes, but it’s even scarier alone.
Everyone else who could had left the cemetery before I walked in again, after the cigarette. I watched my feet as they moved over the grass and across Ben’s grave. I leaned up against the fence separating his grass from the corn and tried to think of something about Ben, not just about me: most of my grief has not been over the fact of Ben’s death, but over how it’s affected me, and the shame of that was keeping me silent here. After a year of selfish defenses, selfish grief was all that was available to me.
But at least it was available. It was something, not entirely adequate, which is to say it was appropriate: I stood in front of his stone, knelt down, touched the ground and then the granite, and in a soft, quick, cracking voice said simply, “I miss you, Ben.”
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| Apparently, Sarah Palin still thinks that Iraq had something to do with the 9/11 attacks!
From this article on the Inquirer's website today:
"Gov. Sarah Palin linked the war in Iraq with the 9/11 attacks, telling an Iraq-bound brigade of soldiers that included her son that they would 'defend the innocent from the enemies who planned and carried out and rejoiced in the death of thousands of Americans.'"
I guess maybe the telegraph line to Alaska has been down for the past two years. | | |
| I've just started reading over John McCain's policy positions on his website, with the intention of writing an in-depth, lengthly reflection on them. It's already a bit scary; I'm about 25% of the way through it, and already there's repetition, lack of specifics, and telling omissions. Most of this I will leave to a later post. One section, though, I need to vent about before I can move on. Here it is, from McCain's section on Health System Reform (http://www.johnmccain.com/Informing/Issues/19ba2f1c-c03f-4ac2-8cd5-5cf2edb527cf.htm) (notice this long, complicated, seeminly random URL, by the way; in contrast, the URL for Obama's section on health care is "http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/" Not that the efficiency of your website is necessarily an indication of the efficiency of your administration, but... maybe it is.):
"Setting the Record Straight: Covering Those With Pre-Existing Conditions
MYTH: Some Claim That Under John McCain's Plan, Those With Pre-Existing Conditions Would Be Denied Insurance.
FACT: John McCain Supported The Health Insurance Portability And Accountability Act In 1996 That Took The Important Step Of Providing Some Protection Against Exclusion Of Pre-Existing Conditions.
FACT: Nothing In John McCain's Plan Changes The Fact That If You Are Employed And Insured You Will Build Protection Against The Cost Of Any Pre-Existing Condition.
FACT: As President, John McCain Would Work With Governors To Find The Solutions Necessary To Ensure Those With Pre-Existing Conditions Are Able To Easily Access Care. "
First off, of the four policy sections (out of maybe 18) I've read so far, no other is structured in Myth/Fact format, and this is the only subsection in the Health Care section to be as well. Take a look at the site; it seems out of place. It is also the only subsection in which Every Word Is Capitalized. This, Presumably, Lends More Authority To The FACTs (more on these later).
Second, the statement labelled as myth is not actually a myth. Even leaving aside the loose usage of 'myth' in general, as the sentence is structured, the claim itself is set up as the myth, not the denial of insurance. If he edited it to say what he wanted to say, it would read like this: "MYTH: Under John McCain's Plan, Those With Pre-Existing Conditions Would Be Denied Insurance."
On to the FACTs.
FACT #1 is actually a fact. Now I haven't actually read this Act, but I don't think I'm wrong in assuming that McCain supported it, and that it does provide "Some Protection Against Exclusion Of Pre-Existing Conditions." Some protection, though, is not total protection. So this FACT does not refute the MYTH.
FACT #2 is also a fact, kind of. It's a rather convoluted sentence though. A clearer way to state this FACT would be to say that in spite of McCain's plan, people who are Already Employed And Insured will have the opportunity to have some protection against paying more for pre-existing conditions. Of course, people who are already employed and insured are not the central issue here. The MYTH is about people who are trying to get insurance in the first place. And this FACT (kind of) clearly doesn't refute it.
FACT #3 is not a fact at all. It is framed as a hypothetical statement (McCain is not president, in fact), and uses a conditional verb, 'would'. Facts are not conditional. And there are a lot of clauses in this sentence between John McCain and easily accessible care. Even so, it still doesn't refute the MYTH. It doesn't say, 'As President, McCain would make sure those with pre-existing conditions had insurance.' That would at least posit a future refutation of the MYTH.
Now, someone skimming through this section (if they bothered to dig deep enough into the 19ba2f1c-c03f-4ac2-8cd5-5cf2edb527cf.htm policy position in the first place) wouldn't necessarily pick up on this. See, McCain's website is trying to use language not to reveal the truth, but to obscure it. The truth (not the FACT) is that at least some, and at most all, people with pre-existing conditions would still be denied health insurance. If McCain were president.
OK, enough for now.
PS - check out Philly musicians The War On Drugs. You'll be glad you did. And that's a FACT. | | |
| Hey, y'all.
I'm enjoying the political trend these posts are taking, and I do plan on writing my own long platform/diatribe/rant about this presidential election as well. But that's not going to happen for a couple weeks. Here's why: in a couple of days, my lovely girlfriend Laura and I are heading north. We're planning on being in NYC on Friday night (at Peter Dillon's!!!), for those of you in that neck of the woods, then Saturday Morning we are driving to Mount Desert Island in Maine.
We'll be there all week. Laura has a family vacation cottage there, and we're going to be hiking, reading, eating lobstah, burninating, kayaking, sailing - and not internetting. I'll be taking Obama's book with me, and will hopefully do some writing on this whole democratic-transfer-of-powers thing while up there. Ideally I'll post as soon as I get back, though I'm doing bartending classes that week too.
A brief preview: I'm voting Obama. | | |
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