Don't Be a Hater

Here’s an idea from a teenager’s T-shirt---“Don’t Be a Hater.”

Oh those crazy kids. What’ll they think of next? Give peace a chance? Make love not war?

I traveled with teenagers to the feared Soviet Union in 1990. One big surprise for naive me was that the hated people of the USSR, now Russia, were peace-loving. This was in direct opposition to all I had learned of them. What I knew was that we had better be prepared to defend ourselves against the Soviet threat.

That evil empire plotted through each night to decimate us. Each rising sun renewed their resolve to obliterate our soldiers and our school children. I was sure of this because I saw the stunning images of atomic bombs blasting the skin off mannequins and flattening buildings in the desert. I had to practice hiding under my desk or curled head-to-butt with my 10-year-old classmates in an interior hallway of Louisa Mae Alcott Elementary School. Our neighbors built bomb shelters in their back yards and let us come in to hide from the Soviet menace.

But almost immediately upon crossing into St Petersburg, I learned the Russian word “mir” because it was posted so frequently. Peace. The people valued peace. This knowledge flowed over me like warm oil. Of course. It’s not the people of the Soviet Union we’ve built such an enormous arsenal to annihilate. It’s the Soviet Government that’s hell-bent to kill us. They built a war machine, so we built a war machine. But the people want peace. Just like we do.

Wait. So, it was our fear, fueled by our press. Those among us who were truly fearful and lived their lives based on fear and the hatred and anger that arise from fear created a false image of the Soviet people. That’s all I listened to and all I knew. Fear-based ranting and hatred created the great demon Russia. We hated the Ruskies blindly and en masse.

Then I had the chance to travel there chaperoning students as a part of People to People / American – Soviet Youth Exchange. We spent three weeks around the Union, staying in the homes of the Soviet people getting to know them. President Eisenhower knew what he was doing when he established that organization.

He knew that most of us are just like Will Rogers. We rarely dislike a person once we’ve gotten to know him. We have to acknowledge that person’s humanity. We cannot ignore our bonds in human experience. Peace seems possible when you know the guy.

Right now we’re in the midst of another frenzy of fear-based hate building complete with book burning. Good citizens locked up in a frantic round of pin the tail on the enemy lash out with blindfolds in place. As though trapped in a corner, they swing wildly at anyone who could be threatening, especially if he’s non-Christian and brown skinned.

But what about our brown-skinned non-Christian citizens? The ones next door, on our kids’ soccer team, at the farmers’ market? Shall we burn their Qurans? Will we circle up and play the hurtful game of exclusivity? Tick tock, the game’s locked and only white “Christians” can play.

I’m unsure how each of us can get to know the Muslims around us, but it seems like one-to-one would be a good start. Or are we too wound up with fear and anger? Fear has tunnel vision and anger quashes opportunities.

Some who are angry and fearful will say, “Oh what? Just make nice?”

Well, no. I get that things are more complicated than that. We cannot pretend that our world is without danger, ignorance, and violence. We must be diligent and watchful. Prepared, of course. Proactive, certainly. These are the things our government must do for us.

For our part, for us, the people, acting on stereotypes is demeaning --- to the receiver and the giver. By design they minimize critical thinking and insight. Based on ignorance and its natural companion, fear, stereotypes weaken our culture. We, the people, are less when we employ them.

I think it would be good to take a breath, to listen, to think. To recognize a human being when we see one.

Act like Will Rogers: Get to know a person.

Don’t be a hater.

US Flag Protocol? Why bother?

I take pains here to keep the location and the person I refer to unidentifiable, since I hope and believe that that person would be mortified if s/he were “outed” publicly. S/He has lots of ‘splaining to do, and would no doubt prefer to do it in private.

I was in a government building the other day at closing time. As I wrapped up my business I glanced out the window to observe a government employee completing the end-of-the-day routine. The employee was taking down the flag of the United States of America.

The employee lowered the stars and stripes down the staff, detached it from the halyards and dropped it onto the ground, freeing up hands to secure the halyards. Once the halyards were fixed, the employee picked up our flag, gave it a little shake, and folded it like a teenager folds a bath towel, tucked it into an armpit, and headed back toward the building..

I saw something like this not once, but twice before, at schools where I worked. The honor of raising the flag in the morning and lowering it at day’s end belonged to custodians in those schools. Way back when, someone made the assignment, likely without designating the task as an honor or without providing any training as to proper protocol. Over time the honor morphed into a duty, a task, even a chore, and then finally, a bother. Like jury duty. Or voting.

I corrected the procedures at the schools where I worked, obtaining training for staff members charged with care of the flag. I can see now that I should have widened my vision for surely, in a district of 50+ schools, the carelessness I witnessed was likely widespread.

Why isn’t that honor assigned to students? Don’t know why I didn’t think of it then. It seems so obvious looking back. JROTC trained students at one of the schools where I worked before. I invited them to the other schools for special occasions to present the flags of the United States of America and the State of California. They always did an excellent job following protocol with dignity. Students and staff in my schools responded to such ceremony with their heads held high and hands over their hearts.

Why didn’t I think of training students to take on the daily honors at my schools?

And now, here it is again: An adult carelessly handling the flag. More than carelessly, thoughtlessly.

Again, I’m faced with my responsibility. What should I do in a case like this? You already know I did nothing. I even averted my eyes.

Should I have attempted to speak to that employee myself? Probably. Like most of us, that employee would most likely prefer to handle things like this personally, without their coming to the boss’s attention. But it’s uncomfortable to confront someone I’ve never met, even with the best intentions. That person couldn’t help feeling accosted and embarrassed. Maybe angry…who am I to tell you how to do your job? Who am I to tell you how to handle the flag?

I could have gone to the boss. Didn’t do that either. It was closing time after all. That’s my excuse, er, my reason for walking away, head down, distressed and inept.

I could go back. I could clip this column and leave it on the counter anonymously. Maybe I’ll highlight crucial passages so they will be sure to get the idea it was about their building, their employee. Then they’ll take it to the boss who will make things right. Yeah, that’s it. I could do that.

But why? What does it matter really? What difference does it make that one person in one place did one inappropriate thing?

On the other side, so what if one person learns to treat the flag with its due respect? An employee now follows protocol. Most of the time, no one’s looking anyway. Big deal.

I wonder who the honored employees are in other buildings where our flag is flown.

Who raises and lowers the symbol of our country in our banks, federal buildings, schools? Has someone smarter and more visionary than I established a process for teaching our employees and our young people the power of the symbol, the dignity of the task, and the weight of the responsibility?

I’ll vote for that person, the smart one with the long distance view…after I serve my jury duty.

Happy and Productive

Rob isn’t a suspicious guy. He’s the most supportive husband, really. But I get the feeling lately that he’s checking up on me.

So every day I prepare a list and memorize it. It’s like “What I Did on My Summer Vacation,” only it’s how I spent my Monday (or Tuesday, or Wednesday…) now that I’m retired.

To remain above suspicion, I am ready to recite my list at his daily prompting: “What did you do today, Honey?”

“I walked 4.3 miles,” I begin, having tracked this on my trusty pedometer. This always pleases him. I give him details of my walk to give it weight and credibility. “I went all the way to the Arsenal and up Jefferson to the Mansion.”

It pleases me too. I’m always glad to be keeping my word.

Rob’s not the only one. When I announced my retirement this spring, all manner of people began asking what I was going to do in my retirement. I think it was hard for them, and for me, to imagine how it would feel not to have the constant intense stimulation of being a high school principal. I loved the whipped up frenzy of a school day, doing important work, helping young people, making the world a better place, so I hoped.

But like most folks, I kept a list of things I’d do given the time bestowed by a big jackpot. That’s the jackpot of retirement --- time. But my dreams seemed mundane in the telling. Smiles of the well-wishers got rigid and eyes glassy when I said I wanted to learn to play the piano!

Yet when I said I would take a walk every day, people smiled. So that became my pat and only answer, unless I was talking to the kids at school. More than anyone, the kids took my retirement personally. So when they asked what I was going to do, I said, “Miss you!”

Our family developed a saying years ago. Having determined that we were happy when we were productive, we sent each other off each morning with, “Have a happy and productive day!” instead of, “Have a nice day.” It soon got shortened to simply “Happy and Productive!” This eventually morphed to the quick and cryptic, “H & P!”

It’s not a bad motto, H & P, but it does carry a burden. How to define “productive”?

When I was a principal --- never a doubt about my productivity. I helped every day. My charge and my goal was to ease pain, facilitate learning, lift up, make smile, pave the way to success for students and teachers. I was hard after it and secure in the H & P.

For Rob there’s no question. He works hard out in the world. Business attire. Commute. Office functions. Emails and flow charts. Oh yes. Capital “P,” Productive.

When he comes home, he’s a project guy. He’s not just handy; he’s skilled. He loves working on the house and the fruits of his labor are evident immediately, and at every stage. We can point to lots of things he’s done to improve our home. VP. Visibly Productive.

For me now, in my new role, if I point to a shelf of books I’ve read, am I productive too? Somehow reading gets little respect among the items of my recitation. Still I include it, resolute in its value. It feels like I’ve barely read anything for 30 years! I’m entitled.

I am learning to play the piano. Teaching myself at the moment with the help of Schaum’s Pop Piano Course and a Craig’s List digital piano. I can now play three songs with both hands well enough to perform right alongside any six-year-old. I’ll take “Instant Piano” through Benicia Parks & Recreation this fall, and real weekly lessons after that. Is that productive?

And I write. Of course, I write. A memoir. A screenplay. A blog.

You can see why I create the list, can’t you?

So I walked and I read and I practiced my chords. I wrote. I did laundry, bought groceries and more. Grew zucchini, tomatoes and spinach and dill. Tracked electric consumption and paid every bill.

There, Honey, that’s my list. That’s what I did today.

I know.

It sounds like Dr. Seuss.

I was happy.

But was I productive?

Animal Testing: A Deal with the Devil

Whenever we encounter a euphemism, it’s time to beware. From the war: “Collateral damage,” and “friendly fire.” From the airlines industry: “Near miss.”


Benicians are now presented with a euphemism of equally dubious merit: vivaria. It means animal testing laboratories, and it is part of a proposal for relaxing Benicia’s zoning codes in an effort to include clean energy, high-tech, and research and development uses in the industrial districts.

Thanks to Commissioner Donald Dean who says, “We want to know what’s going into the community. There may be a dark side to some of [this], and we want to know what [it is].”

We don’t have to accept animal testing laboratories in Benicia. We can rewrite and broaden our development plans to include lots of things to enhance our economy without selling our souls.

Remember the 1940’s movie "Picture of Dorian Gray"? Dorian, played by Tyrone Power, makes a wish ever to remain the beautiful young man he is in a portrait of himself, while the portrait takes on the effects of his hedonistic life. As in any good pact with the Devil, he gets his wish.

He gets women and wealth and an extravagant life. As he goes, he steps on the backs of others. He reneges on promises he made. He breaks hearts and disappoints those who thought they knew him, even admired his good looks and influence. Only his portrait, covered in heavy canvas on an easel in his spidery attic, shows the effects of Dorian’s short-sighted selfishness.

He goes to the attic periodically to view his own corrupt soul and assess its march downward. Once, seemingly distraught at the degeneration he sees, he goes and kills the artist, blaming him for his own ugliness and torment.

But ultimately, Dorian knows he is the ugly and degenerate one. It is his distorted soul in the painting. His outward beauty cannot disguise his corrupt and cynical self.

He stands in anguish facing his portrait and a sliver of conscience goes to work. He pulls out a knife; at first we think to tear at the painting. Then his servants, hearing noises above their heads, rush to the attic to find him dead on the floor, shriveled and grotesque. The portrait now restored to its youthful beauty.

Guilt never did do a person much good. Regret and apologies are most limited in their value.

So how shall we have it?

We can stick to the euphemism. We can allow vivaria without looking at the animals. After all, we won’t actually witness the tests. We won’t be present to document the effects on animals’ eyes, or skin, or breathing, or nerves.

We can keep vivaria in the attic of our industrial park and go along our way, pretending not to know what we’re sanctioning there. After all, there is much to be gained by the inclusion of businesses that harm animals for profit: greater city revenues and new job creation are dangled before us.

It won’t show will it? No one has to know.

Or, we could steer away from the ugly and degenerate. We could go to the trouble of writing our zoning codes specifically and precisely to include those businesses and industries we truly can be proud of as we profit from them. I object to the notion that there is no threshold that would allow the city to prevent laboratories from testing on specific animals. It’s our city, our zoning code. It will read as we say, set the limits we determine in good conscience.

We can add such categories as information technology, computer server farms, nanotechnology, semiconductor manufacturing and robotics so the city can “put out the welcome mat” for new businesses without leaving the door standing open for the unsavory business of conducting traumatic, painful, deadly, and crude tests on animals in Benicia.

We’re told that Benicia has an opportunity to be a leader by relaxing our zoning now so we will be ready when ‘the next Google’ walks through the door. Perfect! Google is funding research and development projects that provide alternatives to animal testing!

Why go there?

We can flourish without this unwholesome pact. We don’t need to step on the backs of animals dependent on us. We must not renege on our promises to be moral and ethical in our pursuits. We can expand our economic base while retaining our good looks and influence.

Vivaria be damned.

Most Likely to Shoot His Lawnmower

Once my colleagues voted me “most likely to shoot my lawnmower.” I guess I was showing some on-the-job stress.

I think I growled a little and raised my 10-key calculator above my head. It caught their attention.

Frustrated that the accounts wouldn’t balance in my humdrum job tracking barrels of oil for a private producer, I had a pronounced urge to heave that calculator through the floor to ceiling window in front of my desk onto the green, green lawn fringed with impatiens and agapanthus.

Then I put it back down.

Soon I got a more meaningful job in public service, and left all those numbers behind me.

My honorary title came from a note weeks earlier in the Police Blotter section of the Tulsa Tribune indicating that a local man had been cited for firing a handgun within city limits. He had dispatched his lawnmower with his daddy’s .44. The brief notice did not share what the final straw had been.

We can only assume that whatever fine he had to pay, he paid with satisfaction.

Which brings us to Steven Slater. He said he dreamed of slipping down that airlines escape chute for years, taking his leave with a Heineken in one hand and middle finger extended on the other.

Too much face time with the public put him off his good humor.

So Mr. Slater lost his cool (and his job and his rainy day funds --- forthcoming legal fees, you know).

I almost feel bad for the guy.

Then I remember the social contract: that agreement we made so long ago, consciously or unconsciously, to be nice to each other since we live so close together. We gotta bend a little here and there or nothing’s going to go smoothly.

Could be both Steven and that ugly woman at the overhead bin each needed the other to bend that day, at that moment.

But Steven loses the argument, because he took the job of serving the tired, the rude, the unreasonable exception, along with all the rest of us who are courteous, tolerant, self-contained and bending whenever we’re part of the public.

That’s right: Almost of all of us are pretty nice. We set aside our desires for personal space, the aisle seat, an armrest for our elbows, and easy access to the bathroom. We bend. We accommodate. We even smile our brief smiles letting those around us know that even though the cramped conditions suck, we’re going to mind our manners and get through it.

When Steven took the job, he knew there would be a few, a small percentage, who would be jerky, demanding, and inconsiderate. But even now, even he would say, I’ll bet money on it: The vast majority of the public are really nice.

All those flight attendants, cashiers, postal workers and waitresses across the country who hold him up with banners declaring him a hero for reaching his threshold, crossing it, and succumbing to the instinct to run screaming, if not the impulse to smack some other stressed person who didn’t make nice on the airplane---even they will say, even now, most of the people they serve every day are NICE.

The thing is, it’s hard to shake off the not-nice people of the world. It is a skill flight attendants and all other public servants learn early and practice often, or they pull a Steven Slater, or worse.

By his own declaration, Slater was a baggage “Nazi,” on a mission to ensure carry-on rule breakers didn’t enjoy the benefits reserved for carry-on rule followers. A lousy way to go through the workday, with a personal vendetta guaranteed to focus on the negative and take self-righteous pleasure in catching, embarrassing, and angering the offenders.

When he found himself lapsing into sarcasm and fantasies of escape, he could have and should have helped himself to stress management, anger management, a job in accounting, a vacation, a margarita, a massage, a funny movie, or maybe a lawn mower and a sledge hammer. No firearms, please.

Then if he disturbs the peace with his loud banging and cursing, he should pay the fine with a smile.

A Pretty Package for a Penis

I painted over the penis today. 

It was on my walking path.  Teenagers and spray paint:  A bad combination.  They painted a penis right on my walking path!

I'm retired now and making good on my promise to take a walk every day.  And there it was --- so annoying.  Sometimes I stepped over it; sometimes I stepped right on it.  Either way it did not feel good.

It's hard to measure the impact of such a negative gesture.  Once you know it's there, resist as you might, your eyes are drawn to it.  Damn it!  For those few moments every day I had to think about a penis I didn't want to think about.  Totally uncool. 

What's in the mind of a kid who paints such a thing on a path like that?  Here's a penis for all to see!  Hahahahaha!  (That's a feindish laugh.)

Old ladies, little girls!  Looook!  A PENIS!

Or maybe it's territorial, like a dog peeing judiciously as he goes:  I've been here!  This little square of pavement is MINE all MINE!  Again with the laugh.

Do penis painters go on to other crimes?  Yikes!  I shudder to think.  What's the next logical step?  Wagging it?

Once, at the school where I was principal, I came onto campus at 7:00am to find a kid had painted a giant penis on the asphalt quad over night.  It was easily twenty feet long in yellow paint.  Appropriate somehow.

I imagined that the kid was mad at me for some disciplinary action I had taken.  Quid pro quo.  You suspend me, I paint a penis.  But in this case, I couldn't think of any student who had reason to be mad at me---a rare circumstance for a high school principal! 

Nothing else to do but call Maintenance.  I asked if they would come out and paint over it before brunch time. 

Our District had a very good practice of painting over graffiti and tagging immediately, so it wasn't too long at all before I could see the maintenance crew first standing with their hands on their hips, staring down, and shaking their heads, then bending over the asphalt and painting.  When I looked again a few minutes later, they were gone, leaving a set of cones around the area to protect us from walking on the wet paint.

But then, when the bell rang for brunch and I headed toward the quad to supervise the students, I saw half a dozen of them standing around the edge defined by the cones, looking and laughing.  I joined them to find that the maintenance crew had indeed painted over the yellow paint.  Very carefully, with black paint, distinct on the greying asphalt, they had re-painted the outline of the penis.

"Mrs. Plath," a football player feigned serious concern, "what do you make of this?"  My turn to shake my head. 

Maintenance had to make a second trip out that morning to paint a twenty foot black box on the quad.  Only a hand full of kids and I know what's in the box.

So this morning, I carried a can of my own spray paint to the scene of the crime on my walking path and went to work quickly.  My only regret is that I didn't have concrete-colored paint. 

But let me assure you, my enigmatic silver box is much nicer than its contents.

A Note to Mrs. Grant

I'm about to be extremely presumptious.  Some will no doubt be disgusted.  How dare I?

If my own son were dead on the platform, I don't know that I could do what I'm asking.

Still, I just wish Oscar Grant's family would come out with a statement for a peaceful response to the Mehserle verdict, whatever it is.

I'm not saying no demonstration.  I'm just saying a peaceful demonstration.

The imminent protest after all is for an end to violence, isn't it?  We abhor violence. 

It seems to me that Oscar Grant's family is in the unique position to enlighten and educate folks on both sides of this terrible issue.

For his family (based on the media reports), Oscar's death is a blatant act of racist violence.  I believe they want an end to racist violence.  But in their grief, they seem focused solely on punishing Mr. Mehsele. 

Things were desperately wrong on the platform that day, no question.  Oscar Grant should not have been killed.

Will the harshest sentence be sufficient to right the wrong?  Will all who are watching and listening be edified by Mehserle's imprisonment?  What will be learned beyond crime earns punishment?

If the sentence is not sufficient to address the issue, will a violent riot help?  Will the oppressed and wounded be uplifted in their own eyes by a riot?  Will those they rail against learn the desired lesson?

Sorrowfully, no.  We will not learn enough from Mehserle's sentence.  And we will not be enlightened by a riot. 

Yet so many ASSUME we will have a riot.  Businesses are boarding up; commuters are avoiding the trains.  Children are watching and listening as we brace ourselves for violence, maybe racist violence, as though it must be expected as a response to this deplorable circumstance.

There is some logic to the anticipation afterall:  violence breeds violence breeds violence.... 

But violence doesn't seem to breed thoughtful growth.  Violence doesn't prompt the urge in one person to take on the other's experience or views.

Still, we are about to be caught in the cycle again.  We know it well and we're gearing up to repeat it.  If we do have a riot, some will no doubt call at some point for an end to it, having never learned that we each in our roles stoke and restoke the fire.
 
We all know the rage.  We are all enraged that we must face again the avoidable loss of a healthy young man.

We all want to lash out and issue the same pain we are dealt. 

But if Oscar Grant's family called out for peace, we might have peace.  We might stop and think and learn something new.  We might listen to his family's pain and grief and strive to break away from such horrible cycles and stunted growth. 

Oscar's family has a unique opportunity.  They might actually have the power to ensure Oscar's death bears fruit for the living. 

There will be no winners, that's clear. 

But some might hang their heads and learn.  Others might hold their heads higher, with courage and dignity, if we are forced by peace to reflect.