Habemus... What?

Elusive and ephemeral as the ritual white smoke at the Vatican some weeks ago, but nevertheless real, "Habemus" (we have) ... something, someone, even if we grasp nothing. Ironically, that is good  - because what we need most is to be unencumbered and focused, listening, alert and aware that we are "there" (everywhere and always), and not forgotten. And neither are we ever nameless nor discarded.  Habemus... What?  Whatever we need, of course! Argentinian bridge builder moving forward, Italian philosopher caring for truth, liturgical harpist plucking "Were You There" melody ... All pretensions aside, another  stark Good Friday. 

And then there's this splendid excerpt, perfect for today, in the Bercovici's (Forbes) interview with Chris Hayes. It explains the rationale for naming his new MSNBC show "All In" - and struck me as brilliantly descriptive of genuine, deeply mystical Christianity: 

Bercovici: “All in” is a poker term. Do you play?
Hayes: I’m not a poker player but I liked the idea of total, full, un-back-outable commitment and of everybody being included. 

Obviously, I also liked the idea and know something of its challenge. I daresay it parallels our need for deeply mystical spirituality, an experience of God that tells us we are known by name, that we are securely held, that bigotry, greed, war, hate and cowardice, no matter how pervasive, are ultimately nonsensical. "Total, full, un-back-outable commitment and everybody being included" is possible. But no one says it is easy.  So having a Doctor at Calvary would be just fine with me, not to anesthetize but rather to recognize the cards being played and whether one has a winning hand. 

 Cross: Gift From Ursula aka Uriela

Uneasy Alumna

Only recently have I been thinking that I'd probably feel pretty lost if I once again walked the UCLA campus, and feel similarly estranged returning to Mount St Mary's Doheny and Chalon campuses in Los Angeles. For graduates who have regularly returned for Homecomings it would be easier. And so it dawns on me that those annual  events have real value. But how can so many years have passed?  Those Commencement ceremonies launched me onto another  personal journey, but I've been reflecting on what was, and what now is, back there. Only by returning will I know, but I suspect it'd be a paradoxically befuddling and fun experience!  

What would I review first? Well, at UCLA, the URL (University Research Library which was renamed Young Research Library in 1998), the Art Department (which is newly housed in the Broad Art Center ) on the north end of Campus, and Akerman Union, the Student Store in the center of campus are at the top of my list.  I wonder about all the URL card catalogues I used, and how much of that is now computerized. Online catalogues and searches had certainly begun in 1982, but the look of that first floor  and thirty years of changes would probably stun me!  And the Akerman?  I loved wandering through it way back when, and remember how I was blown away by it's department store size and merchandise... and the books! I imagine books are still a huge expense for every student, but still so intoxicating even in a computerized age!

And what about the Doheny and Chalon campuses at MSMC?  The building projects completed since 1990 would definitely be inviting but also disorienting for me.  The Doheny library is near the Graduate Religious Studies (GRS) department (I think), but spans what used to be the street running to that end of the campus. I know I'd still find  and recognize the historic mansions, but finding new buildings and the new technologies in them might make me feel ancient!  After all, I was an improbable trailblazer when I began to computerize GRS  student lists and courses!  True, a computer network was being introduced on campus, but it had not yet reached our Department, so it was like coming out of the Dark Ages to set up a PC in my office.  It was an indispensable effort and did make my job more manageable. How great it must be now!

The Chalon campus has also undergone massive changes, and seeing what they are would be wonderful.  I did not spend much time there ( my GRS program was based at Doheny campus), but the new architectural projects at Chalon had begun in earnest when I received my 1990 degree in the blazing sunlit ceremonies. And if I was always nervous about driving up that winding hill to a parking area, what would I feel now?  How scary would the parking structure built into the mountain be? And how many stairs to climb, or is there an elevator? And how about the best views of that new kid on the block, The Getty Museum - just a mountaintop away!

So there'd be many changed (and improved) physical elements to explore and experience on "my" campuses, but that is only part of the picture in my mind.  There's the whole alumna thing, which is pretty astounding.  I never really understood the deeper aspect of it until the last few years. Being proud of my education and opportunities and degrees is a fairly constant lived  reality for me, but realizing that huge changes have come because huge chunks of time have elapsed... that is quite another (and very existential) thing!  

Nevertheless, it is comforting to know that the pace of change in every sector  of our culture has accelerated enormously in the past 50-100 years.  Medical research,  Communications, Weather Satellites,  Clean Energy, Digital Imagery - each a leap forward and benefiting us daily. But I dearly need soul food strengthening when personal, specific need to update makes me weak in the knees!  Yes, I have a digital camera, an iPhone,  PC and Mac laptops; Yes, I stream Netflix programs, pay bills online, e-file my taxes, think aloud  on email, Facebook and Twitter, write a blog, and enjoy tracking the latest manufactured  (fake) congressional crisis by all manner of modern media; Yes, I have figured out how to "do" a lot of these things, with or without a manual. 

But I need to say how thrilled I am that my gadgets and books coexist with the paintings and prints I created long ago. Hopefully, they and I will continue to survive the test of time, and I'll remind you (and myself) that works I created long ago still express and  feed my spirit. How else could I see and enjoy them every day for all these years? Or notice the difference between the museum quality mattes and the other ones that now look a little less pristine?

So I admit being occasionally uneasy about those disappeared chunks of time urging me to abandon old, archaic "stuff" like my 35mm cameras. And I am sometimes saddened that I cannot realize the needed transition until the dust settles or my finances grow. Certainly, I could learn and would love new toys, but for now I am mostly content, kept  busy searching, selecting and scanning  many hundreds of negatives!   Should I just relax and  smell the roses? Maybe. But avoiding atrophy, relishing ways of keeping the little gray cells working, must be carefully juxtaposed with the sheer earned laziness which balances my life. This is a time for ordering my chaos, for gathering and scattering, for record keeping and history making, for covering my tracks even while satisfying my curiosity.  And so I see there are clear and everyday advantages for an uneasy alumna like me.  Fortunately, I now have a research library at my fingertips and when I wander those precious campuses again, I'll not only be prepared, I'll probably be quite exhilarated!  Let's hope I can soon get back to walk where I used to run!  I am sure the Eucalyptus and Jacarandas  and towering Palms would still be heart-stopping! 

Jacarandas (image from: clarencetours.com)

Ashes and Oranges

Some years ago, 2006 in fact, I went to a marvelous exhibit called ashes and snow at the Santa Monica Pier, about a mile from where I used to live.  As the flyer  so aptly stated: "These stunning photographic artworks illuminate a timeless realm in which all living things communicate and coexist in a state of grace." The artist, Gregory Colbert, spent 14 years  exploring places in "India, Egypt, Myanmar, Kenya, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, Tonga, the Azores, Namibia, Antarctica,  and Borneo." His images are magnificently serene and original.  Perhaps one can still access information and images online at ashesandsnow.com. The show was housed uniquely in "the nomadic museum" and I was blown away by the entire experience. It was fabulous!

Again, some years ago, perhaps in 2006, on a visit to the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco as a guest of my brother, I fell in love with a painting done around 1890 by William J. McCloskey, who coincidentally died the year I was  born. His Oranges in Tissue Paper was not typical (if there is such a thing) of my taste in art, but if there'd been a print available in the Museum Store, I'd have bought it to display at home along with my print of Matisse's "The Girl With the Green Eyes."  Alas, I had to settle for  postcard and greeting card reproductions.  

Just why these works came to mind now is hard to say. But since yesterday was Ash Wednesday and today I am finally marking Lent's beginning here, I suppose that factors in. There is also this: I need relief from the evil that men (and women) do. I need to feel empowered against the stupidly childish antics of those who would be king for a day and (thank God!) who never will be more than the madman in the marketplace. So now I retaliate! My brain works, my heart shares a post-liturgical musing, and you can make of it what you will:

Ashes ... Hidden God and hidden works ... All we do and are is less than nothing by comparison ... What? Need to blow a horn? Get over it. Weep, as did Medal of Honor recipient this week. That past battle never should have been. But lonely courage trudges on: tearful, honest, totally without guile. Ashes remind, cajole, witness... Lurch ahead humbled.

That soldier's Afghan outpost was inadequately protected. He who fought and survived an overwhelming enemy attack, declares oneness with his military brothers, discounts his own heroic actions, laughs with Letterman about that post-battle Dr. Pepper break, and teaches us more than hope.  That ceremony, that Medal, made him re-live a terrible day and I felt guilty that we made him, once again, struggle to hold himself together so publicly. Maybe the sight of his tiny son, gotten loose near the podium, gave us something more than entertainment before the Medal Ceremony. Could the boy have been more innocent, the hero's battle buddy, the one who snatched the child from the stage and delivered him into his mother's arms,  more gentle?  That interlude was another exquisite lesson, one I want the world to see.  

We have ashes; we have snow; we also have oranges in tissue paper. What a marvelous menu to keep  us heart healthy!  

Ashes and Snow (G. Colbert), Oranges in Tissue Paper (W.J.McCloskey)

Compare and Contrast?

It was a UCLA summer English course, designed for new low-income and minority students, and a Teaching Assistant was in charge.   It actually proved invaluable to me since I was returning to  academia after an 18+ year contemplative absence and was definitely low-income with no savings. It also provided survival skills for some younger students, notably one athlete who could barely read.  A nice bonus was the tuition/book rebate we got when we finished the course. 

I am reminded of this long-ago opportunity as I wonder: Has anyone ever done a "compare and contrast" paper on Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince and Antoine de Saint Exupery's The Little Prince?  I am just beginning to mull over a few thoughts in this regard, not at all sure where it will lead.  But it seems worth noting, even superficially, that I keep wondering whether or not "the sheep has eaten the flower."  

And one has to consider the dangers of the sheep being unmuzzled, simply because no strap was drawn for the muzzle.  No matter how protective of his flower, no matter how watchful over his sheep, "At some moment or other one is absent-minded, and that is enough!"  Even the Little Prince could be momentarily absent-minded.

One might conjecture that the defeats Machiavelli's  Prince suffered bear no comparison to the departure of the little golden haired man who "fell as gently as a tree falls" and without any sound, "because of the sand." One might  rightly say that their ultimate concerns were vastly dissimilar, and dismiss any possible comparison.  But that would be wrong, I think, because surely someone before me has examined points of comparison with great precision - and been able to contrast them and link them to our own times.  That would be a significant and enlightening effort, no? Has it been done? 

Clearly, The Prince Machiavelli so loyally advised, was not devoid of ambitious political power, nor was Machiavelli. But aren't some traces of love and care for the populace evident,  even though Machiavelli dearly hoped his hard earned and shared wisdom would be rewarded?  In any case, Machiavelli's loyalty is laudable, and he did not want the sheep to eat his flower either.  

But then there is the matter of the snake.  "It is true that they have no more poison for a second bite."  That is some comfort to the Little Prince, and to his counterpart, the Prince who would regain governing power.  But it can comfort us also. Why?  Think about it.  In Chinese culture, the year of the snake, the New Year  just beginning  today, has positive, hopeful connotations. It is greeted with all-night fireworks and  wonderful celebrations.  

As for me, I think I must reexamine the texts before going any further.  Perhaps I will also uncover a brilliant comparative study some scholarly person has done. Very probably it will engage in less poetic license than what I say here. Hopefully, it will be something I can grasp!   

Happy New Year of the Snake! ¡Feliz Año Nuevo de la Serpiente!

The Burghers of Calais, Rodin (Stanford University)