RESPECT

You may have played fair last night, but you didn't play smart. There's lots of talk about how Hillary Clinton will need Bernie Sanders supporters in the fall so she should be careful not to alienate them. It does not seem to have occurred to Sanders supporters that if he wins the nomination, the reverse will be true - perhaps more so - for him. Last night was your chance and you blew it.

I'll give you that the physical layout wasn't helpful in clarifying that we are all one party. Sitting on opposite sides of the gym made it feel like a football pep rally and you responded in kind. Running up and down the sidelines prompting the wave, cheers and foot stomping before we began was a nice display of electoral enthusiasm (that is what it was, right?), but not once, then or later, did any Sanders backer cheer our party, our unity.

And once the caucus started, it was clear you were there to demonstrate not caucus. You see, a caucus rather than a more traditional primary vote, is used when a party actually wants to achieve unity. Note I did not say consensus. Yes, we vote and the Sanders turnout was overwhelming and clear from the beginning. But the whole point of a caucus is to discuss the candidates and for each to try and persuade the other that they have the better candidate. At the very least to educate. Vote Blue, No Matter Who is more than a slogan. And if we can't talk to and persuade each other, how the hell are we going to win an election that depends entirely on persuading less involved and less sympathetic voters?

Those who spoke for Sanders did not even turn in our direction, used pep rally speech rather than persuasion and never recognized that the goal was to bring us together in common cause. Pumping up the already committed is for Sanders rallies, caucuses have a very different goal. No Sanders speaker indicated they would be behind whichever candidate won the nomination.

As a Clinton supporter, I did not expect to win the vote last night. But I did expect to be respected. When our speakers turn came they faced hoots, hollers, boos and derision. It felt like a Trump rally.

If you are a Sanders supporter who was present last night, why should you care? You "won". Here's why. While I may not believe you will get the nomination, you clearly believe so. And if that happened, you need us. The caucus was your chance to show us how we would be treated in a Sanders campaign; to persuade us that he was worth not just our vote, but our efforts. Because here is the dirty little secret of political campaigns...they are damned hard work and take every one's top effort.

You know the 300 of you last night? In order to win in November, EACH of you will need to contact, persuade, convince and convert about 30 more people. At least. Not just friends, not those who are already on board. They don't count in your total. Once the Convention is over in July you will give up your summer and fall, you holidays and weekends, your sports, your family outings and you will work. Unglamorous work this is; a phone to your ear, door-to-door, begging for money and votes, early mornings and late nights, side by side with those who may have initially backed a different candidate. And then you will have to do it all over again on election day to get each of those voters to the polls. For the many of you who caucused with us because you are in school here, but do not actually live here...will you be back to help not just the top of the ticket, but all those local candidates you barely acknowledged last night?

I've spent the better part of the last month promoting the Vote Blue No Matter Who movement. In nearly fifty years of campaigns, caucuses and conventions, I've always understood that in the end we needed to be united behind whichever candidate prevailed; to work willingly and unceasingly on their behalf in the election. But I left the caucus last night feeling terribly disrespected and in doubt about how I could possibly vote for Bernie. Enthusiasm cannot substitute for respect for the process and the other participants.

LOOKING INTO HEARTS

"I don’t think Trump is spreading bigotry and racism in this country — I think he is unleashing it. He is saying the things that a lot of people already believed but were too polite or afraid to say in public." ~~Saqib Bhatti

Over the last weeks, I have watched with horror our country's descent into madness lead by Donald Trump. I've re-posted on Facebook dozens of opinion pieces and then taken Facebook time outs because my helpless anger and despair went beyond my ability to stay sane. Now, with a deep breath, no little trepidation and some help from a poet, I hope to make sense of our evolving politics, both for myself and for my country; to look into the hearts of my country and, much harder, to look into my own heart.

Saqib Bhatti, quoted above, said squarely and openly what many of us are thinking. The problem isn't the abomination that is Donald Trump. Without supporters, Trump is just one more representative of humankind's worst and most evil; easily avoided and dismissed.

So, who are we really as a country? Are we the land of the free and the home of the brave? Are we the Statue of Liberty:

"A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles."

...

  "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Or have we become an island in the world that protects our glorious bounty at the cost of our humanity? An island that not only fails to welcome others, but openly rejects our own if they don't look, worship or act like white male elders? An island where one person's success MUST come at the expense of another? A zero sum game of life. A "business model" for the soul.

What have we become? What do we think we are? What are we really? Is this a new us or just the peeling back of a false face? Did we grow up to become the bully down the street?

When I look into hearts will I see compassion or loathing? Empathy or repugnance? Harmony or singularity? One of many or many of one?

Much has been said about fear and anger as the motivators to support Trump. This idea seems merely a weak excuse for hate. Yet these are our neighbors, members of our congregations, owners of local businesses, parents of our children's playmates. They walk the same paths we walk. Are we sure that it is not possible for us to become them? And can we keep the promise of America on a steady course through turbulent times and the fierce headwinds of fabricated fright?

This political season has brought us the, perhaps unwelcome, need to examine our own hearts.  Can we look at ourselves, our children and our grandchildren and declare that when we traversed the great political divide of 2016 our judgment was fearless, sound and humane? This is truly a battle for the soul of America and for the conscience of each American citizen.

"Once to every man and nation, comes the moment to decide.

In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side." ~~James Russell Lowell

Beam Me Up

"If you can dream it, you can do it."

~Walt Disney

Tomorrow morning Al and I will climb in the car and travel three hours so that he can undergo an ultrasound and a fine needle biopsy. And then we will drive three hours home. A trip we have already made once. Eventually we will go back for surgery, requiring a multi-day stay as well. What's wrong with this picture?

The distribution and availability of health care, or lack thereof, continues to plague our country and our world. If you or your family have the means, distance is no problem. Steve Jobs received a new liver, not because he jumped over others on a list, but because he could afford to fly to all the facilities that kept lists; an action that was perfectly legal and recommended by his doctors. (Jobs lived in California where the wait was three times longer than Tennessee where he received his transplant.)

However, if you are just an average citizen, you face significant hurdles. Where medical treatment is available and how to get to that treatment can make such a decision life or death. This dilemma is especially true if you live outside a major population center. Those, as we are, who are semi-solidly middle class (but retired on a fixed income) jump in our car, spend extra time recovering from the stress of travel on top of the medical stress and, in the long run, hope we and our finances survive.

And if you are poor, well, everything is worse and often catastrophic.

None of this is news to any sentient being.

Today I am dreaming just a little bit. The big dream, of course, is fixing the health care system. But a smaller dream is fixing transportation. And personal cars are not the fix; although I'm open to self-driving, electric cars. Extensive mass transportation is the only way to level the playing field. Think buses, trolleys, trams, light rail, passenger trains, metros, undergrounds, subways, ferries, high speed rail, hovercraft, share taxi, paratransit or my long time personal favorite: Star Trek Transporter. Before you sneer, reread the quote at the top of this blog. We need more folks to passionately and doggedly follow the dream. Beam me up.

STEPPING DOWN: THIS DECADE OF MINE

It began with Roy William, beloved brother to my Mother, dead at 20 of lymphosarcoma; the Uncle I never knew but heard about all my life. Grandpa, who sat me on his lap and entertained by putting olives on all ten fingers, was my first funeral at five years old, brain tumor. And Aunt Sylvia whose matter of fact sharing of her “different bra” and what that meant in an era of silence. Then Aunt Billie whose lungs were riddled with cancer and Grandma, whose pain from colon cancer lasted a terrifying three years. 

I grew up, life passed. Then the impact hit home again as body parts disappeared; my husband’s kidney in 1988, my sister’s entire lower jaw in 1992, my Mother’s breast in 1998. Fortune smiled, survivorship, unnamed but welcome, reigned in our lives. It would be after retiring from work life and encountering the LIVESTRONG Foundation before I truly began to understand “Cancer may leave your body, but it never leaves your life."

It is always dangerous to try to assess something that is not quite over. In 2004, wandering through retirement and wondering which on the list of my fifty great volunteer ideas I should choose, the LIVESTRONG Foundation gently intruded. So much for my list. But finding my passion more than made up for the unexpected detour. I became a LIVESTRONG volunteer; a LIVESTRONG Leader and then Senior Leader to be exact. Positions from which I am stepping down on March 31.

Now, after a decade of attending LIVESTRONG Summits, becoming a LIVESTRONG Leader and then a Senior Leader; participating in dozens and dozens of conferences, coalitions, committee meetings; reading and talking to anyone who cared about cancer; designing fliers and cards and notices and events, and always fundraising; here is what I know has been important. People.

For ten years the stories of cancer patients and their families have consumed my life. Many were LIVESTRONG Leaders themselves. Many were participants in what became our first and continuing local project, the Cancer Support Group. More than I can count are those who became Facebook friends because the cancer community tends to share stories, resources, triumphs and pain. And, most dear, are those who I met here in Lewiston because they had a need and I could help.

A cancer diagnosis when you live in a rural community often means fewer options for treatment; perhaps traveling many hundreds of miles for treatment; figuring out transportation when you can’t or shouldn’t drive, air travel is out of financial reach, friends and family can’t get away; arranging for long periods of time away from home, family and work for either local or distant treatment, recovery or travel; clinical trials too far away to be feasible; fewer support resources; fewer financial resources. In summary everything’s fewer, fewer, fewer and harder to access. The loneliness of a cancer diagnosis magnified.

It is their stories, successes and sometimes their loss, that will be with me forever. Each person, each story was unique like a quilting square. And like a quilting square, each story formed a piece of the larger pattern that became the encompassing base for my life. Each person, each story touched me in ways I never anticipated. And each motivated me to work harder and longer to see that their stories continued to matter.

My companion LIVESTRONG Leaders, hundreds scattered in all corners of the world, became a precious, treasured family. Both their stories and the stories they brought of others, became the oxygen in my air, the soil for my growth, the energy for my work.

While I'm not leaving the field, just changing where I fall in the lineup, now is a point of summing up. This decade of mine has meant the sadness and pain of loss, the joy of group support and caring, the shared determination of cancer fighters and the elation of each individual's personal triumph. This decade of mine has brought love and friendship unimaginable before my venture in LIVESTRONG. This decade of mine has meant stories in which I will find comfort and meaning as long as I live and love. May the next decade offer as much reward.

This blog is dedicated to Ty Wakefield and Courtney Clifford - the first two young adult cancer fighters I encountered on my LIVESTRONG path. Both were lost very young. Both had an impact that not only went far beyond their years, but continues to this day.

Perhaps

I get it. I really do. When you are famous your death makes waves. And if the cause of that death is the current illness du jour, cancer, then the numbers who identify are literally millions. Yet once my shock and sadness at a safe distance are sated, the appropriate Facebook meme posted, I always wonder about the other deaths that occurred that day. More numerous, but mostly unseen; grieved only by close family and friends.

Does the size of the grieving circle say anything at all? It's is hard to believe anyone would say that one life, one death was more important than any other. So can we just celebrate that our reaction to the famous makes us widely compassionate? Or does that reaction obscure those deaths closer to home that go unnoticed?

Perhaps our willingness to look at a famous death makes us more compassionate for the unseen deaths that surround us.

Perhaps our willingness to look at famous death makes us consider our own mortality more closely and honestly.

Perhaps that is enough.

"HELLO, IT'S ME."

Thanks Adele for the title and the comeback example. Me too.

I began this blog in 2007 because I genuinely like writing and I inevitably, perhaps endlessly, have 'stuff' to say. Being both opinionated and ruminative, the blog filled a space in my world that was at once outlet, reflection and battle cry. My sole New Year's resolution for 2016 is resuscitate this blog. Plus, my mind really does meander and it seemed time for a bit of discipline.

So Hello, It's Me. When last we spoke my life was consumed by the decline and eventual death of my Mother. It was a drawn out and painful chapter about which I will eventually write - later. Today, on a long and chilly walk, I paused to consider my place in the family. In particular the oddness of being the oldest living member of my birth family.

My sisters and I recognized at my Mother's death the common insight that there is no longer an "older generation" between us and our death. I don't think any of us were particularly troubled by this inescapable fact of life. And, yes, I have always realized I was the oldest sibling; advantage of which I have sometimes taken to my sisters' distress. Yet somehow today, having recently celebrated my 68th birthday, I have suddenly been struck by the fact that not only is there no generation in front of me, but that I am the oldest living member of my birth family.

This recognition was followed by both wonderment (wow, I really got here) and discomfort (wow, I really am here) and not a little of confusion (wow, how am I suppose to feel/act about this).

And that is probably about right; pleased and amazed to be here, awed by everything around me, waiting for the other shoe to drop and often uncertain how to behave but showing a good face. The story of my life in a nutshell.

I hope you all will stick with me on what is sure to be a peripatetic journey. Feel free to read older entries (I did before I wrote today) and comments are always welcome.

Does The Tragedy of Death Depend on Witnesses?

Is a tragedy more tragic because more people witness the event? The tragedy of death passes by us everyday and frequently strikes friend or family. However, deaths, especially in large numbers, are usually considered both personal and community tragedies simply because they are witnessed by large numbers of people.

Is the death of my friend Ty any less tragic because it was witnessed only by his wife and children? Is the death of any one of the 2,977 who died on 9-11-2011 more tragic because it was witnessed by millions? What about the thousands of others who died the very same day, but not on TV?

Or perhaps it is the cause of death that creates tragedy. Was Ty's cancer at the age of thirty less tragic than a terrorist attack? What about car accidents, disease, murder or just old age? Are they less tragic? Why? To whom?

The act of terrorism on 9-11 was a blindingly grievous and cataclysmic event. As such, it deserves energetic response and heartfelt remembrance. But the tragedy of death was very individual and the equal of, no less than but also no more than, any death witnessed by many, few or no one at all.

If we truly believe in the value of life - every life - then every death is an equal tragedy; whether we see or know of its happening or not.