Closing Out the First Decade of the Twenty First Century

Whew! Ten years! Gone! Poof!

I was laying a bed this morning and suddenly could not remember what happened this last decade. It went so fast I couldn't remember? It scared me. Yes, it did go fast. And I have more behind me than I have before me. That scared me too. At first. Then I thought, somewhat inapposite to my "glass half empty" nature, that there was an opportunity here, to treasure what was left far more perhaps than I did in the days gone by when I thought I had all the time in the world. Does this make sense?

The time has been a gift and I have been so in the middle of doing and thinking and worrying and wondering that too often I have failed to savor. You know. The moment.

I won't promise that I'll change. I am though recognizing that the window of opportunity is closing and it's up to me, no one else.

And as for the last decade, yes, how could I forget? The big, and the sad, first. The 2000 election that preceded the worst attack on the United States ever on September 11, 2001. A new generation was born after that, and the rest of us have sanitized the event such that we are ripe for another if we aren't vigilant and insistent on American values rather than variable, relative global ones. The 2008 election of the first black president, a landmark proof of the legacy of the American dream, if only we don't deny it.

For me, there were new friends, old friends who moved to new places, a train trip to Chicago, a discovery that Missouri has lovely wineries and beautiful countryside, and that I really could move to the quaint old towns of the South Shore Massachusetts cause it was so beautiful, except for that darn cold weather in winter, that I really could kayak with a bunch of 20 year olds in Hawaii, that it is fun to go home again to the old college radio crowd, and stay in a cool revolutionary home now hotel called the Kittle House, an installation of a new Archbishop in San Francisco and a second trip to Sausalito by ferry, a wedding in the dry Ventura river bed in Ojai, my father's 90th birthday celebration weekend with Sophis and Len, Chris, and Andrew, many movies and dinners with friends. It was also a decade of horrible loss, Fran Bassios, Gerry Markle, Bill Tilden, my father too soon after the celebration of his life, people who were integral to my life in various ways they could never really know.

So, I raise a glass (that photo is really me raising a glass one day at lunch at Cork in downtown LA), to the ten years past, to the people and places that populated my experience of it, to a grateful moment of memory.

Testing. . .Testing. . . .

I made this appointment about a month ago. A few more tests so that my new doctor will have the fullest (internal) picture of me, my heart, and I, as well as to determine whether I am in danger of breaking any bones during those recent games of racketball I have been playing. I am at that age where the level of calcium in the bones determines whether osteoporosis will render me eligible to replace Sally Field as the spokesperson for Boniva. This morning it occurred to me that it might be better to blow off the appointment and remain in blissful ignorance regarding the state of my carotid artery and the transport of oxygen to the brain. I am certain I have before expressed my regret that I compelled my late father to see his doctor about some trouble he was having, when he'd have rather waited. The cure was worse than the disease. My father did not die at 90 of either a heart attack (he had his first at 51) or of the bladder cancer he was diagnosed with (and he had bladder issues his whole mid-life as well), but of sepsis caused by stents to his kidneys for a condition he did not realize he had in the first place. I am not that trusting of doctors or their tests, and so the idea was compelling indeed to save our soon to be extant health system from the cost of this preventative testing.

But they had confirmed my appointment on Friday, so the idea of standing even the technicians up today seemed, untoward. So dutifully I sallied forth. Got my three hour parking courtesy of the City of Beverly Hills for three dollars. Advised the desk staff of my presence and appointment time of 12:15-filled in some paperwork advising that either my insurance would pay or I would. And then, I waited. For over an hour as the first shift in the room became the second. There are 17 doctors in this group and remembering how much of a nudge I sensed I had become at my internist of many years previously, from whom I have removed myself save for his name on the insurance card (I have the ability to go out of network), because I would inquire and then complain about the inevitable wait, I said nothing despite my increasing anger. Seeing Debbie Reynolds coming out after her appointment distracted me for a few moments, and then I sat, and prayed for humility. Watching the interactions of the desk staff and the incoming elderly patients (the doctor is a heart specialist), I saw my father standing there announcing his presence and the time of his appointment to the inevitable indifferent response, "Take a seat". By the way, doctors make out like bandits at this holiday time of year, with shopping bag after shopping bag of gifts pouring in from grateful patients. My pessimistic sense as the girls at the desk (they were all girls; this is not sexism) collected them is that the doctors won't remember the gift givers from the non-gift givers and that the gesture is largely unappreciated given the number of faces and other parts of bodies these people are forced to see over time. But then, I was not feeling festive at this point in my experience of my "new" doctor's office. True, it wouldn't be him I'd be seeing since this was all laboratory like stuff. Could I really blame him? I was considering my next action, more money in the three hour meter, leaving in a huff, leaving silently, when I was finally called to the next waiting room downstairs. Not too long this time and as Janet the technician (whom I liked very much) put goo on my feet and my neck (alternately) to check the old pumping of blood form head to toe, she let it slip that they knew I had been waiting a long time. Why? I had come at the lunch hour (that was when the appointment was made) and they, well, forgot about me. She said this was unusual for them, and the next time, I should wait only about ten minutes and then check at the desk.

It is amazing to me how things that do not usually happen when it comes to the doctoring world, seem to happen to me. Ok. I am being dramatic. Basically, I haven't had much need for doctoring, so I have been pretty blessed. And they got to me finally, and as it turned out, though I was eleven minutes past my three hours, I did not have a ticket!

The hardest of the several tests (the bone density test was merely me being passed in and out of a donut, and apparently also included my heart for good measure), was the echocardiogram stress test. I came in and saw what appeared to be a portion of a bicycle on the examining table. First thought, "I can't climb up there!". Idiot. Of course you lie on the table and spin until you hit the heart rate appropriate for your age and weight (in my case, past middle age and fat). They take a resting echo and then one while you are well, stressed, by the exercise. You do sign a little form just before, just in case. Stroke. Death. But the good news is that along with the technician, there was a physician assistant there watching the computer, and taking the blood pressure regularly. Since my blood pressure when I finally was called to my testing was high, I am guessing that was an issue for my taking the test today and yet, though I do not know the results structurally, (I peeked a little; there was no danger, happily, of ischemic attack, but I do show whatever it is that indicates I have hypertension), I recovered quickly and I felt quite fine. I suppose the approximately month and a half at the gym (which I hope to continue) helped a little bit to prepare me for the pushing I'd have to do at one point). I do know that I have a small window of opportunity to get in better shape before my shape becomes such that it is too late, inside and out. There is a certain irony in the good possibility that what they are testing me for is not what will ultimately kill me. Still, at least I can say I have taken some steps toward my potential longevity. I am kind of a crap shoot, my mother having died at 48 and my father at 90. You do what you can.

Pre-Christmas Reveries

It is precisely two weeks till Christmas Day.

I have been hitting the malls for gift buying, and observing the secular "spirit" of the season, the good, and the not so good. The religious Spirit, the second Person of the Trinity whose birth is the nominal genesis of the secular frenzy, is always hovering around and infusing me, although my ability to receive Him varies. I suppose it varies as well when it comes to the secular "spirit".

About a week ago, I was over at the Grove, and I passed the little Santa Clause house they put up smack in the middle of the centre. I never noticed that there was a window that the passerby could stop at to watch the children as they each sat on Santa's lap and had their pictures taken. I am pretty sure it wasn't there before, or I am certain that I would have stopped before, as I did that weekend. It is as if you are watching an old movie, even Miracle on 34th Street. Some children are delighted. Some are fearful, crying for their mothers before the picture to memorialize the occasion can be taken. Outside of American Girl, a father and his daughter open the package to expose the doll she cannot wait till Christmas to carry.

This weekend. Even the weather cooperated to create the sense of fa la la, as much as California can do such things. It has finally rained a thorough rain. I could almost believe I were in New York 30 years ago, as the dark cumulous released their wet force. As I wrote, finally, Christmas cards on Thursday night, the drops sounded on the buildig roof, and the warmth of my wall heater and flannell comforted me. Joy, though, has been hard to come by, even with the prayer, the gift buying, the pre-holiday parties. It comes in transient moments. And then it is gone. This is life. This is the suffering, in very small portion, of which we are promised as our portion before the revelation of all. And I resist it. Right now, as I write, I am in between watchin EWTN, the Catholic Network. They are playing something from the 50's, a program in black and white featuring someone most people would never remember, Pat O'Brien, praying the rosary as the then well known Father Peyton used to encourage, as a prelude to tales of the time just before Christ's birth, with people like Raymond Burr, and Emlyn Williams, long dead actors, playing legionnaires and saints to the television orchestral strains of "Ave Maria". It makes me sad, and happy, at the same time, to remember a simpler time, and I do remember it, that has passed us by in favor of the prideful knowledge of man that laughs at a Higher Power.

Oh, well, it is up to us to save our souls or not, by the light that we have been given, however much or little that might be. I leave that to God, for myself and others, and hope that I don't disgrace Him to much and need to spend too much time in the purification of the Purgatory in which I do believe. I had a rosary blessed today, one I bought in a non-religious affiliated store. It is from Italy. It is colorful, artistic and large. I hope that I will use it well in occasional and honest prayer for myself and the world.

Thanksgiving Thoughts

Did you know that George Washington, the first president and father of our country established the Thanksgiving holiday? I didn't until I happened to hear a rerun program of one of my favorite thinkers and talk show hosts, Dennis Prager. Yes, he is a conservative. But he also posits clarity in the service of truth as his mission. Clarity does not mean that "we agree." Some things are whether you and I agree. And, I guess, here's one such opportunity for us to disagree. I am not trying to convince anyone. Only evidence can convince, and frankly, I am not sure, as this society is wending its way toward self-destruction, even evidence is enough. You read. You decide as you will, or as an agenda may require. I imagine a bumper sticker. "George W. was a right winger!" Who are we talking about? I digress.

Thanksgiving isn't just a day or two off and an opportunity to gorge on tryptophan laden turkey topped off by a nap and further gorging on popcorn and beer while football teams run and tackle. The proclamation that established the holiday exhorts the people of the United States, now terrified of any mention of religion or tradition, to give prayerful thanks to-----gulp, God.

Historical reality.

This does not mean that those who do not believe in God have no place in this society. Au contraire. Because of a belief of a founding people in a Divine Will that helped bring about this still young country, which we take for granted, those who prefer to be agnostic, or unbelieving, or of a philosphy or faith which does not include God, share the table of thanks, without restriction. Separation of Church and State means not that the essence of this country's founding, a Judeo-Christian building block, and the God of Abraham, be abolished and unmentioned in some revisionist compulsion, but that there be no established religion that by its nature forbids the freedom of belief of others. The belief in God of these progenitors made possible the pluralistic society under the banner "In God We Trust". The benefit is everyone's alike. It would be lovely if that protective banner of In God We Trust be used as something to celebrate still rather than something to be chiselled off the Halls of the Senate and Congress.

Abandon Hope and All that Jazz

I was over at "The Grove" after Church today. Tonight is to be the tree lighting for what I understand is the second biggest "holiday" (to be politically correct, which agitates me) tree after the one in Rockefeller Center in New York. I did ot realize that when I was looking for elusive parking.

I made my way to Barnes and Noble and picked up some DVD's one a to be present for a friend. I had my lunch at Patsy D'Amore, two slices, and a coke, and read Entertainment Weekly (I am not offended by the adaptation of Sherlock Holmes in the movie to open December 25; I eagerly await it). I ran a few other errands. The elevator coming down to the main level when I arrived, in one of the smaller, I thought, less known banks, had be empty; I hoped for the same going back.

It looked like I was in luck but I had to go to the machine downstairs to see what I owed, which turned out to be nothing. Turning around, the bank was still empty and an elevator was open, a man or two having just gotten in. It was a few feet only and all either man had to do was put his hand in the still fairly wide open door. I yelled "hold the elevator" and met the eye of one of the men. He looked at me steadily and I at him, as he let the door close before I could quite get to it.

My first thought, yes, it was my first, well maybe the second after an expletive. . . .was "Abandon hope all ye who enter here" a well quoted line from Dante's Divine Comedy, specifially the part where there is a tour of hell, where sinners reap the punishment of their less than stellar existences on earth. I try not to feel this way, and for most of the week, I resisted it, but we live in an all but hopeless world and society. Usually you see it in big things, the politics of the day, the loss of the idea of America as a society founded on a premise of Divinely inspired right and responsibility, but when you see it right in your shopping center, in a small uncivil exchange, it becomes surprisingly intolerable.

Not that I am so stellar myself. I have far to go to be a passable human being, but I cannot imagine that if someone was looking me in the eye and asking me to hold an elevator while he or she took a few more steps toward it I would disregard the plea so readily. This chills me almost as much as something that happened to me many years ago, in a supermarket. I had just walked in when I saw a man pulling a cereal box from a bunch of stacked ones. One fell to the ground and he started to walk away without picking it up and replacing it. I happened to notice and when he saw me watching him, he went back to the box and with what a remember as a defiant look in his eye (as opposed to the indifferent one from "elevator guy" today) he kicked the box with an angry fervor. Perhaps he thought I had disapproved of his unwillingness to pick up the box. Perhaps I did. But that my silent remonstration would cause him to act in what was an undisquised moment of violence, fortunately against the inanimate box rather than me, caused the hair to rise on the back of my neck then, and now, in recalling it.

I seem to be feeling apocalyptic today. Oh well, I hope, when the time comes I have not to answer for too many such moments in my life. I realize that it is possible there have been some. I hope not, of course, but we rarely see our own faults, sins, if you will. But, if there have been such moments, I hope one of those friends will tell me. And forgive me.

MJ, You Have a New Fan

My friend, Len, of Len Speaks wrote an entry a week or mor ago about seeing This is It, the compilation of the rehearsals for Michael Jackson's comeback tour, aborted by his untimely death. I hoped to see it, as I have had a long time grudging admiration for the man (grudging because of the well publicized eccentricities and swirling accusations), but I had no sense that I would ever write about it, if I saw it. Taking a few days off, I have interspersed meditative thoughfulness (or what passes for that in my impatience) with shopping, and now movie going. I happened to hit the theatre just before a showing of This is It, yesterday afternoon. So, why not?

It was apparently Mr. Jackson's routine to have his rehearsals documented, to watch later, to mark the preparation of performances. I wonder if he had some prescience also about his early death. Maybe it wasn't prescience, because he knew what abuse he had to know what abuse he was heaping on his body with the obsessive plastic surgery and the drugs. Watching him in rare quiet moments working with the musicians, it was clear he couldn't stay still, his hands moving always. And for the most part, even in a darkened theatre he wore sunglasses. Perhaps his handlers were thinking ahead, just in case, which, as it turned out was the case. He'd never do this tour, but we have its essence now for posterity.

Once he was dancing, you'd never know that he had any impairment. He seemed indestructible. And twice or more the age of probably all of dancers backing him up, he moved with an ease that rivalled theirs. I was mesmerized. I could not take my eyes off him. They were mesmerized, even giddy watching him during their breaks. He could conjure what he wanted the performers and himself to do in tandem with an uncanny precision. His timing was transcendent, where to put a beat, where to hold, where to have silence, when to have a startling note. His life was whole here, while it was in shambles everywhere else. And it was a visual truth projected into the theatre.

All I could think of was, this film is a treasure. Yes, AEG and the Jackson Estate is making money. Their motivations are clearly not altruistic, for if altruistic, they would simply give the documentary to the world without remuneration. But it doesn't matter. It's here. This is not everybody's kind of music, I know, but the spark of genius is visible as much here as I imagine it was in its time for a Mozart. I have this odd feeling that in many ways these men have similarities in their inner lives. All is poured into this one thing. Music. And everything else is effectively damned. It's a drive, like a salmon going upstream. Does it allow for forgiveness of responsibility? Maybe not. But all things being equal, what is left behind, this one true thing, is a pearl of great price.

Confiteor

It is Veteran's Day, and a day off from work for me. Actually, it has generated my taking several more days' off. I have a large number of hours and am about to hit the cap I am allowed to bank. My idea is to take the time, not only to rest from a stressful work interval, but to consider possible future directions. It's unlikely I'll come up with anything, but that's all right, no worries, there is no deadline nor requirement that I do so.

Slept in, which is always a pleasure for me, but thought that maybe I would go to a daily Mass. The idea of moving from my cocoon apartment, cluttered and comfortable, caused resistance, but I placed the contact lenses and applied quick makeup, sweater and sweat pants and went.

It was pretty empty at the Church. There is never a huge crowd at a daily Mass, but usually a few more people are praying in the pews. It's early though, 20 minutes before the celebration.

This is the former pastor's to celebrate. He is nearly 83 and debiltated by the damage of a benign tumor taken from his spine years ago. Even with a walker, though, he manages to command any space in which he appears, and this, the Church, is his life's stage. This is the thing he will fight to continue, the celebration of the Eucharist. All else he is willing, even content, to forego. Belief gives him the energy, the persistence, the mission and the reason to continue.

Usually, when I come in I can hear him chatting with the server who will assist, but today, there is silence. It is clear he, or some priest is in the sacristy, because the candles are lit. But no one comes out to arrange the altar and it is close to the time to begin. I cannot serve. Yes, in today's society women often act as acolytes. But my former pastor, and my friend, limits such engagement, still believing that the role is a subcategory of priesthood, and priesthood is only for men, as Jesus was a Man, and founded his Church naming 12 males as His apostles. Acolyte is a minor order which is bestowed upon a priest in training. I can hear some reader saying, "Why don't you leave that parish?" because so many women have deeper involvement in other parishes, or "Become an Anglican/Episcopalian" where they allow women priests, let alone other ministries. Here's the thing, my membership in the Catholic Faith is not about the "right" to become a priest, or to have some more intensive minstry, like deacon, or server. It is about the Center, the Eucharist Himself, the Really Present Lord, before me, in my hand as I receive. Although human beings imperfectly guide the Church, they guide it with this Essence at its center, and I will leave it to the Holy Spirit to direct what, if any, ultimate change there is in individual parishes or in the Church at large. Meanwhile, this erstwhile pastor is also my friend and has been good to me, and, has even allowed some inroads into his resistance to a woman on the altar, when there has been a lack of servers. I have stood by him as he receives the "gifts", the bread and wine before the transformative miracle. I have held the book as he reads the gospel. I have told him that the rarity of my being able to do this makes me appreciate it even more.

Nonetheless, knowing that he would be loath to use my help beyond these moments, I went into the sacristy to see what help might be needed since no other server was yet there.

I expected him to be sitting in a chair, given the difficulty he has in standing for any period of time. But when I came in, his back was to me. He was fully robed, and leaning over a platform reading. There was something startling about the figure, with the markings of his role on the back of the vestment, the sign of the Good Shepherd. In that brief moment, I had the the feeling, not just the intellectual comprehension of, In Representio Christi. I almost hated to interrupt him. Seeing me, he said he had been reading the order of the Latin Mass. I had noticed the old lectionary on Sunday. He suggested it would be hard for him to celebrate the Mass in Latin. I noticed the heading of one of the prayers, "Confiteor", "I Confess", the one in which we together profess our sinfulness to our Lord. I asked him if he needed whatever help he would allow. He said, "A woman?" but in that way that has always been a friendly and humorous exchange between us. I said, "Can't do anything about that. But I will do whatever you will allow." He said that it was likely that someone would come at the last minute, but he did want me to place the unconsecrated water and wine, the Book, and the Chalice onto the altar. I had never done that. This is the sacred work of the acolyte. He noted my informal dress but said nothing to inhibit me. I placed each item, sneakers squeaking, one at a time, onto the altar. I wanted to put the key into the Tabernacle but the lock was not obvious to me close up, as often as I have seen it from something more of a distance, so I did not. I placed each item, first bowing to the Tabernacle where He is, and then again as I went for the next item.

I returned to the sacristy to tell him I would be about if he needed me. He did not. A minute or so before Mass the server arrived.

The homily was about transformative moments of two or three saints, the moments before the complete giving over of themselves to God, in which their paths were set. For Martin of Tours, while still a soldier, there was tearing his cloak in two to give half to a cold pauper. For St. Francis of Assisi, it was giving a coin to a man consumed with sores, and then going back to take his hands and kiss them. For Damien, the priest of the lepers at Molokai, it was (he speculated because no one really knows) it might have been the day he discovered the first sore on his body that said he was one of them. What was ours? Will we have one? I wondered. I wonder now. When or will I have a moment of such transformation. Helping today, was that such a moment--when belief becomes something more transcendent? Did the saints mark that moment? Perhaps the essence of the moment is not to be aware of it and to proceed steadfastly on the road, believing and confessing and thanking God for His forgiveness and Grace praying for that moment, but not grasping it as something owed to us.