Category: Seeking Common Ground

My wife helps keep me literate and at least somewhat balanced in my thinking. She points me in the direction of newpaper articles, Blog posts and books that I should read to help me better understand the behavior of humanity. They help.

Sometimes she flips the TV remote over to the evening Fox commentators. She’s right that I need to keep adding ingredients to the recipe that makes up the stew that is my opinion. The stew would get pretty boring if the only ingredient was MSNBC. My wife’s wise advice is very helpful to all of you, especially since I now have the time and the medium to share my recipe with you.

In this time of large scale, paradigm shifting events, there is no shortage of stew recipes out there to choose from. Some of them you’re going to like, some you’re not going to like and others you can take or leave them depending on your mood at the moment. You may or may not like mine. The fact that you are reading my Blog doesn’t mean that you necessarily agree or disagree with me and my taste in stew. But, it does tell me that you, like me, are willing to spice up your recipe and try something new.

The stew analogy comes from the fact that we are trying out one of those packaged meal services. This one is called “Green Chef.” We decided to try it when friends recommended it to us. It is unlikely that we will keep receiving the meal boxes beyond the discounted promotional period, but it is likely that we will include some of the recipe ideas in our own cooking as we add spice to our diets and our lives.

Stay open to new ideas. If you are politically to the right of me, which is very likely considering where I am on the political spectrum, it would give your palate more choices to try out some new ingredients in your stew, say MSNBC or Public Television. For those of you over there with me, it is also good to enhance the flavors of your stew recipe as well. Take some time to read a conservative commentator or take a look at Fox, Newsmax or OAN to get a taste of their stews.

When it is all said and done, all of our individual stew recipes go into the pot with the rest of the stew recipes out there. The spice that you put in may be small, but it is important and it is important that we continue to sample the stew every day and share our ingredients with each other.

Bon appetit!

Do your part put to the Coronavirus Pandemic to an end.  It is not over yet.  It may be getting better for some of us, but it is not better for all of us.  Stay informed, get vaccinated, share your experiences and be well.  Best wishes, Bruce.

It’s been hidden for so long.

Far away, but burning brightly as a distant star

Waiting to be seen.

Waiting for my eyes to open and my mind to find what has always been there.

I am African. Science tells me so and I believe the Science. My soul includes the soul of my most ancient of ancestors, my inner African .

All of my ancestors likely had the same skin color when they started our out of Africa on the nearly two million year journey to where we are today. My gene contributors went to the north. One line to the Middle East and the other line to what is now known as Scandinavia.

Others stayed in Africa and their skin, like that of my ancestors, probably started pale and changed to a darker color later on to better adapt to the intensity of sunlight nearer to the Equator.

Skin color is a function of biological adaptation to one’s latitudinal location. Nothing more and nothing less.

Why worry about skin color? I, being from the privileged class of people called Caucasian or White have no standing to speak on the subject. End of subject.

I would still be living in blissful ignorance to the issues related to skin color if not for the magnification of that distant star, my African soul. A decade ago, even 18 months ago, I didn’t really get Black Lives Matter. I didn’t have a clue. By virtue of my pale skin I’ve been granted some sort of undeserved privilege. It doesn’t feel good.

People and conversations, school and church started bringing that distant star ever closer. Ta’Nehisi Coats in “Between the World and Me” brought that star a little closer. Robin DiAngelo in “White Fragility” magnified that star a little more. Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow” brought the star closer still. Colson Whitehead’s novel “Underground Railroad” added more magnification. Dr. Ibram X. Kendi in “How To Be An Anti Racist” brought further magnification to what I had unwittingly been and how to change. Add Isabel Wilkerson and her book “Caste” which I am still listening to and the star gets just a little brighter still. Unitarian Universalist Minister Nancy Palmer Jones and UU lay leader Karen Lin focus me in even more with their book “Mistakes and Miracles” and the challenges of bringing multiculturalism into UU congregations. My own church community trying to “Widen the Circle” of our own church family.

I can almost see it now, my African soul, my shining star. It is still in the distance, but it is much closer now. I can faintly see it. Its light shines brightly through the ages. Current events magnify it even more and make me proud that deep down within me are my African roots.

My African soul delights in the growth I have made and my yearning to continue that growth.

Let me close with some music to clarify what I’m trying to say.

The song “Be A Light,” arranged by Tim Hayden with words and music by Joshua Miller, Matt Dragstrem, Josh Thompson and Thomas Rhett Akins and performed by the Alegria Singers from the First Unitarian Church of San Jose, CA in the Virtual Choir format under the direction and sound engineering of John M. Ector, is a powerful message for these times

Listen real closely to the words at the end of the song.

There is one other song that wants to be included here as well. It was written by UU songwriter Amanda Udis Kessler. It is called “Just Such A Time As Now” performed by a quartet from the Alegria Singers of the First Unitarian Church of San Jose.

Do good and be well,

Bruce

Bruce

You might ask what the hell is he talking about. Yes, the analogy is a bit of a stretch, but hear me out.

It’s actually only about one at bat in one game of the 1988 World Series. Los Angeles Dodger star outfielder Kirk Gibson facing Oakland Athletics star pitcher Dennis Eckersley. Gibson was not at full strength, not even half strength. In Game 5 of the National League Championship Series against the New York Mets, Gibson had strained his left hamstring sliding into Second Base in Game 5. In Game 7 of that same series, he injured his right knee.

Gibson was not in the starting line-up (duh) for the first game of the series against the A’s. He could barely walk. Heck, he could barely stand up. There was no way that he was going to play in this game. In fact, this at bat against Eckersley would be his only appearance of the World Series that year.

So, baseball fans, especially Dodger fans, know that Kirk Gibson hit a home run that won the game. Dodger Hall of Fame Announcer Vin Scully let the crowd savor the moment before sharing the memorable sequence of words: “In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened.” The Dodgers weren’t supposed to be in this game and neither was Gibson.

Enter 2021 Vernal Falls. Yosemite National Park in California is a natural wonder. Iconic glacier carved rock formations named Half Dome and El Capitan, forests of Lodgepole Pines and Red Fir trees, water falls where streams used to run downhill on a normal path to the Pacific Ocean before giant walls of ice gouged the granite out from under them.

One of those water falls is named Vernal Falls. As far as the water falls of Yosemite go, it is nice, not spectacular, and a hike of what I would call “Moderate” (most trail guides would say Difficult) will take you to the top of the falls where your efforts are rewarded with beautiful views back to the west down the glacier carved valley and a nice slab of the omnipresent granite rock to rest, re-fuel and enjoy the view before making your way back down to the Yosemite Valley floor.

During the Summer, the return trip down would be a routine, crowded, moderately difficult descent with physical challenges that us outdoor lovers graciously accept as part of nature’s toll for sharing her beauty with us.

But, late March is not Summer. I was hiking with a group of, shall I say, well seasoned hikers and outdoors people. We accepted the 2.4 linear miles and 1000 feet of vertical up the stair stepped Mist Trail as part of our fee for the opportunity to enjoy this difficult but accessible natural scene.

We were not looking forward to going back down the Mist Trail. Aching knees, slick rocks and a well traveled narrow trail were not boding well for returning to our campsite the same way we had come up.

This analogy came to me on the car trip back home to San Jose. But, it only became necessary because of a consensus decision of the group to go back down the hill using the so called “Winter Route.” This route was a segment of the John Muir Trail called The Horse Trail. Some of us had experienced this alternate route down and it seemed like a good bet that this path would be preferable to the knee destroying staircase down the Mist Trail back to the Upper Pines Campground.

So, we were mentally preparing ourselves for the longer but more gradual descent to camp. Early in the climb down, we faced some climbing. Those of you who have hiked in mountains know that when your mind is thinking downhill and suddenly there is an uphill stretch, your mind does not respond in a favorable way. Your attitude starts to go south.

As we continued up and eventually down the trail in earnest, we met three groups that had come up the Horse Trail and gave us the news that it would be extremely difficult to navigate through at least four patches of trail covered with snow and ice. By this time, we had come far enough down the trail that it would have been highly improbable for us to turn around and go back up to where we had started and then go back down the known hell on knees route that we were all too familiar with already.

So, on we went. The first patch was mildly challenging, but we all made it through without incident. Then there was the second patch. I need to call it something other than just the innocuous second patch. Hielo Diablo (HD/ask a Spanish speaking friend) would better describe it.

A couple of our party took a daring route down the side of the hill to bypass the HD. I negotiated the treacherous curving, downhill ice field by sliding down on my backside. I was wearing slick, nylon rain pants which were not helpful in controlling my rate of descent. I had to shed my backpack with about 30 pounds of photographic gear in it to control my descent down a one butt cheek (OBC) wide section of trail.

My wife took a chance that the line of rocks along the lower section of the trail would stop her, so she just slid down at some speed in the hopes that the rocks would stop her. They did. Her timing was good because she arrived at my location just as I was reaching the one butt cheek section. She was able to muscle up and take the backpack from me before it slid down the hill with over $2500 of camera, lenses and related photographic gear. Once I got past the OBC, she was able to get the pack to a spot where I could reach it and drag it down the rest of the HD to meet up with our friends that had taken the shortcut.

Others in our party resorted to crawling along this stretch on their hands and knees. We all made it through HD, but there were still two more snow and ice patches to navigate before we were out of this stretch of fear inducing frozen water. I will confess that I was legitimately scared coming through HD.

It turns out that the other two patches didn’t require any of us to leave our feet and we slowly, but surely made our way back to the campground.

So, now the analogy. Remember Vin Scully’s words: “In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened” (See the video above to get this in context). In the 1988 World Series, it was unlikely that Kirk Gibson could function in a professional capacity, one that is difficult even on two good legs. His left hamstring made it improbable and his right knee made it even more improbable that he would successfully be able to succeed in his mission of hitting a baseball far enough to win the game. Kirk Gibson finding success in 1988 seemed an impossibility.

So too it was at Vernal Falls 2021. One trail was already an improbable, the other trail would prove to be even more improbable. The final results were the same. A happy ending for the home team. For Kirk Gibson and the Dodgers in 1988 it was a walk off home run. For Kathy, Jen, Meredy, Mark and Bruce it was getting back to our campsites alive, sore and safely.

If the COVID-19 Pandemic hadn’t hit us in early 2020 and I hadn’t made the decision to retire a year ahead of my planned age 65 birthday and the last day of school in June 2021, I’d be joining my colleagues at Cabrillo Middle School in welcoming students back to our incredible campus tomorrow.

My colleagues and I work hard for our students, our kids, our parents, each other. Those that are still actively preparing and delivering lessons are doing heroic work. They are returning back to work now because they are receiving (finally) the vaccine that many were waiting for before they would feel comfortable going back into the classroom face-to-face with our kids.

Even with only being able to see one third of their students in their classrooms at a time due to COVID safety protocols, tomorrow is a day that they had to fight for tooth and nail. Thank goodness the powers that be in this state held their ground and listened, for the most part, to the science before beginning the process of reopening our school and others like it in the Santa Clara Unified School District.

We, my colleagues and I, are often viewed by the public as having easy jobs with short hours, long vacations and pensions paid for the public. Our labor unions are attacked as being the cause of many of the problems that face educating the children that walk through our doors.

Yet, on the personal level, most of us have at least one teacher that we can look at as a person and thank for being a role model, a guiding light, a person to talk to when you needed help and guidance. Today, as I remember and pay homage to my colleagues at Cabrillo Middle School, I urge you to think of that teacher. Forget all your preconceived notions about teachers and send positive thoughts their way.

I know first hand how hard they work, the hours they put in, the vacation time spent preparing for the next school year and the next group of wide eyed students. Think positive thoughts about teachers today and join me in welcoming back the staff and some of the students of Cabrillo Middle School as they see each other in person tomorrow for the first time in over a year.

Cabrillo, when you get time to read this, welcome back and God speed to each and every one of you.

Addressing Climate Change is important to the survival of life on this planet. Voting rights are essential to making that life worth living. Without a commitment to the right to vote for all Americans, democracy as we know it and wish it to be will be gone.

H.R. 1 (House Resolution 1) has been passed by the House of Representatives and its passage is in the hands of the United States Senate. The link in this paragraph has the text of the whole bill.

Here is a summary of H.R.1.

There is a plethora of legislation at the state level all across the United States to either expand voting rights or to restrict them. I found this piece by the Brennan Center to be useful in getting a big picture look at the issue.

I personally find the number of voter restriction measures in several states to be troubling. First and foremost, they fly against the winds of freedom and the constitutional guarantees of free speech and the right to vote.

The 14th Amendment clearly states that “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

The 15th Amendment states in Section 1 that “The right of citizens in the United States to vote shall not be denied by the United States or any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

Georgia has been in the forefront of the effort to fully implement what what is fully codified in the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution. The expressed reference in the 14th Amendment of not denying any American “equal protection of the law” applies to the 15th Amendment’s guarantee that “The right of citizens to vote shall not be denied or abridged…”

There are a number of state legislatures, including that same state of Georgia, that are actively attempting to subvert the intentions of the Constitution by limiting full voting rights to the people that those in power think will keep them in power. This is wrong and it is illegal. Any state that passes legislation infringing on the rights of any American to vote is acting outside the the Constitution and therefore is acting illegally. There is no debating this point. Those states acting to limit voting rights in any way are breaking the law. They are law breakers.

Georgia is the target of the upper caste of American power brokers because it has dared to implement the 14th and 15th Amendments and make them real. How dare you Georgians, how dare you Stacey Abrams, to try and abide by the law of the land. I have begun reading journalist Isabel Wilkerson’s book titled Castes: The Origins of Our Discontent. It is connecting a lot of loose ends for me on what is going on in this country right now. See more about the book using the link for the word cast in this paragraph.

I’m very fired up about climate change, but climate change is but a tiny ember of the raging fire that I feel about voting rights. Which gets me back to Georgia. What can I do, little old Bruce Halen from San Jose, California, to do something meaningful in the struggle to fully implement voting rights to all Americans?

Here’s how you do it. America’s political system (Democracy) is a thin layer laying atop the churning forces of our economic system (Capitalism). The metaphor of plate tectonics applies here. The molten core of the Earth churns, burns and melts rock turning it into magma. It only solidifies and hardens when it comes in contact with the cool atmosphere above. It is here where life happens.

This hard layer which we know as the crust of the Earth is where we live, where our institutions rise and fall. It is subject to a never-ending cycle of construction and destruction driven by the molten forces under our feet. Capitalism provides the power that drives our institutions of governing.

But, we are not powerless against these seemingly irresistible forces. If you want to make a point with Capitalists, you do it with money. Georgia is home to a few corporations that you might be familiar with: Aflac, Coca Cola, UPS, Home Depot, Delta Airlines.

These corporations have been targeted by voting rights organizations in Georgia to take a stand against the unconstitutional anti-voting legislation making its way through the hallowed halls of the Georgia state house. The corporate response to being asked to take a stand against this institutional racism has been tepid, at best. That’s not good enough. Do you want to make a point to Capitalists? Hit them where it matters. In the bottom line of their ledger sheets.

Do you have dealings with any of these corporations? Do you know anybody that does? Stop using them. Urge your family and friends to stop using them. I have had frequent dealings with the DOY store, Home Depot, for many years. I hold one of their credit cards.

As convenient as it is for me to find a ready inventory of gardening supplies and home repair items, I will not be setting foot or doing any online business with Home Depot until they grow some balls and stand up for Democracy. If they don’t respond, let them succumb to the tectonic forces under their feet. I’ll do business with someone who cares about what I care about. I will be going out of my way to find out who and what is behind the people that I do business with.

Do you care about Democracy? Do something about it. There is no better time than now.

And one last thing on my mind. The 2010 Supreme Court decision in the Citizens United case. Briefly, Citizens United was a conservative no-profit group that had been denied the airing of an ad about Hillary Clinton too close to the presidential election.

The result of that decision has been that corporations have further solidified their influence over the voting process. Take a little of that influence back. Maybe we should also include the message to these corporations that they are only as powerful as we the people allow them to be.

Singer/Songwriter Amanda Udis-Kessler is a prolific Unitarian Universalist composer of music that gets to the core of what it means to be human. I have had the joy and pleasure to have been invited to sing three of Amanda’s compositions along with fellow musicians from the First Unitarian Church of San Jose (California) in a virtual way during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

I’m attaching a recording of our latest collaboration with Amanda, Just Such A Time As This because it is appropriate for right now. That and the fact that my wife and I are in the quartet singing this version of the song. I invite you to listen to it with a thoughtful ear and an engaged mind.

I’ve taken a break from blogging over the past two weeks or so to restore some balance in my life. In recent months, the Blog had been focused on a series of posts using Dr. Timothy Snyder’s book, On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From the Twentieth Century. The series was serious and intense. I am proud of my work on this project, but it took it’s toll on me. It’s difficult to read and write about the darkness associated with tyranny for weeks on end. I needed some time away from the keyboard.

Fortunately, about the time I needed a break from blogging, several music projects popped up for me and have kept me quite occupied. Those along with meeting my goal of bike riding 100 miles each week, getting my Medicare application completed, along with preparing my application for a Real ID which will take the place of my expiring California driver’s license, have filled in the void nicely thank you very much. The Medicare Application and the Real ID applications need to be in before my 65th birthday in April. We also made a trip up to Fortuna, CA to check in on my wife Meredy’s aunt last week as well.

A little Fantasy Baseball doesn’t hurt either. It puts a little much needed fantasy and some much needed baseball back into life as I’d like to know it. Thanks Yahoo!

There truly is just such a time as this. We really don’t have any choice but to deal with it the best way we know how and to help our friends, relatives and the vast majority of the human population that are still strangers to us, to not only get through this “Greatest Generation” moment, but to flourish within it.

Use this time to make yourselves better and while you’re at it, make life better for those around you as well.

Peace.