Journalism 1st version of history: “New details in case of Levante Williams” “CA lawmakers propose bills on bilingual education, jury duty exemptions” “Residents assess damage after deadly storms ravage multiple U.S. states” “White House Denies Violating Judge’s Order in Deporting Venezuelans” “Israel Carries Out ‘Extensive Strikes’ in Gaza”
Opinion Columns: like this one, 1st reactions to history.
WARNING! Patches of sentimentality ahead
There’s an old retired guy I somewhat know, walking Black Bart Trail with dog on the ridge between Redwood and Potter valleys. They’re walking what they’ve agreed is the off-leash 3/4 mile section of their two-mile walk. Nose down, tail up, the dog gets in 10-15 paces for each one of the old guy’s. What with dog taking frequent dig-and-sniff-and-leg-lift breaks the two of them hit their various check-in and check-out points at about the same time.
Homeward bound, at check-point Trampoline (Poppy and Coral’s parents set it up for them a few years ago) father Max catches the old guy’s eye . . . and of course I mean my eye. Max is gracefully dancing on the trampoline. No gymnastic moves. Simple and breeze-like rhythmic movement. He’s holding Sassy, now about 3 weeks old, swaddled and asleep and secure on his left arm. He dances her to the rhythm of their time, the dance incorporating his lifting the edge of her white wrap so he can look on her face. – I know that gesture and look (but not the trampoline) from my long ago times with my infant daughters. 100 yards down the road dog Nick has been waiting for me to catch up. He decides something unusual is going on—he’s right—and trots back up, hoping for a reason to bark. Just as satisfied without reason or bark, he sits and we watch the dance for a few seconds. – ”Max,” I call, “that’s plain lovely! I wish I had a camera!” He smiles and waves his free hand. Nick and I walk off down the ridge, heading for home.
“Hey!” I yell, taking out my phone. “I do have a camera, keep it up, Dad!” I fumble with the phone. Max and Sassy dance. Nick doesn’t bark, I get 7 seconds of video which I later send to mother Gracie, who’s resting indoors. “Aw I love this—so sweet!! Papa’s way to rock the baby!” she messages.
Farther down the road, now signed both as Potter Valley and as Evacuation Route, man and dog pass Vulture Oak. For years every late May mother vulture and hatchling would sit on a branch, drying wings and waiting for first flight. This year a PG&E subcontractor, blandly asserting safety maintenance, felled the tree.
Nick and I come to the head of our driveway, Nearly 30 years ago my then wife Christina and I stopped at the For Sale sign, then drove down the telemark turns toward the doublewide. Fifteen yards on my wife said “This is it!” Twenty-five more yards and I agreed. Some years later, her cancer having recurred, she said she wanted to die here at home. She did, on President Obama’s inauguration day during his acceptance speech (audio off). ‘Twas Morning on the West Coast. I closed her eyes.
16 years later and back indoors, Nick and I have breakfast. He then dozes while I read the NYTimes Sunday Opinion Section, now several days past its consume-by “The Targeted Destruction of Free Thought,” “How Far Gone Are We?” “Pope Francis Projects a Lonely Moral Voice in Today’s Politics,” “We’ll Miss Universities When They’re Gone.”
On the table, two flyers for a live theater binge this weekend: “Instructions for Living in a Broken World” at the College and “Company ‘Rules!’” at UPT—Haven’t seen my instructions yet. “Company” is the real thing. Also on the table a print-out of this poem:
You were so small in my hands no shrapnel could hit you, but the dust and smoke of the bomb rushed into your lungs. No need for any gauze. They just closed your eyes. No need for any shroud. You were already in your swaddle blanket.
Gazan Mosa Abu Toha ought not to have had to write that poem, nor we to read it.– Israeli pilot, American bomb. Broken world, instruction please.
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1) Alternate layout of poem:
You were so small in my hands/ no shrapnel could hit you,/ but the dust and smoke of the bomb/ rushed into your lungs./ No need for any gauze./ They just closed your eyes./ No need for any shroud./ You were already/ in your swaddle blanket.
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