True Ancestor

The Little Natural

A new phase of life has begun.  A phase of long afternoons in folding canvas chairs -- in Spring, swaddled in blankets like hypothermic geriatrics, clutching our lattes, and soon, in shorts and t-shirts, with cans of diet soda -- watching as young boys grind dandelions in the outfield with their cleats, or stir up "nuclear 'splosions" on the dry infield as they wait for something to happen.

The phase of moms sitting together in one cluster, discussing their childrens' weariness with matzah or their daughters' diligent search for a prom dress, and the dads in another cluster critiquing the skills of the boys on the field, shaking their heads and spitting like cynical scouts.

The phase of discarded Gatorade bottles and dusty shoes, of crumpled snack wrappers and post-game searches for batting gloves and grimy hats.

It's also, sad to say, the phase of arguments between parents and coaches, coaches and umpires, parents and parents: it's the phase of slavishly following a child to his athletic events. This phase may last a decade.

In this tiny, privileged corner of the world, at this tender age, my son has done something I never got to do: he has donned a little league uniform, taken the mound and struck out the side.

He also has scored more goals in his brief soccer career than I scored in a career that lasted eight separate seasons and countless pick-up games.

He doesn't really care, so I try not to. But I do care; I can't help it. When he's pitching against a really short kid with a low strike zone, and he drops down and throws sidearm and gets strikes that are less than a foot off the ground, I experience that most bittersweet parental feeling: the warming certainty that your kid has surpassed you in yet another way.

He sees me swelling with pride and trying not to, I'm sure he does; tonight I told him the minute started acting stuck up about anything, he'd be mowing the lawn. Even if it was December. He cracked up.

He knows it's my problem, not his.

--T.A.

The Invisible Uncle

Yesterday would have been my uncle Alan's 85th birthday. He died in February 1943, in Pensacola, while in training to be a Navy pilot.

I was lucky enough to be in Florida with my folks the last couple of days. My dad, after more than 60 years, still keenly and painfully remembers his brother and only sibling. Even now, at that time of life when old memories become newly vivid, Dad seems hesitant to dwell on his memories of Alan, and yet he cannot let anniversaries pass without making sure that we, his children and grandchildren, carry Alan's memory forward.

By a vicious turn of technological luck, last night Dad wrote on his blog an impassioned post remembering Alan -- but the post vanished. Dad was clearly heartbroken -- he doesn't often express emotion freely, but writing liberates him from this inhibition. He held back his bitter disappointment, but wondered why the computer gods would frown on this of all posts.

Nonetheless, we toasted Alan, marveled at what and who he was, wondered aloud about what he might have been. I told Dad that I sometimes thought about how different all our lives would be had Alan lived (not my brother Alan -- for better or worse, he's still with us). Alan (the elder) seemed headed for a life of prominence, political involvement, and perhaps a career in the law. More important, he would likely have married and had children -- there would have been a whole other branch of Gottliebs on our family tree. We would have surely been enriched their presence, but especially his, which is vivid even to those of us who never knew him.

In 1993, on the 50th anniverary of Alan's death, Dad wrote a brief history of his brother's brief but remarkable life. He made a copy for each of his children. On the cover, he put a picture of Alan, looking crisp and confident in his Navy uniform. He's got the Gottlieb "unibrow," a strong jaw, a clear gaze, a hint of perpetual mischief in his steady, confident look.

When his blog post disappeared into the ether, Dad decided instead to write his kids, and grandkids and various spouses, an e-mail about Alan. I thought of that mischevous, intelligent look on my uncle's face when I read Dad's e-mail, which said, in part:

April 28th should always be a day of celebration for Alan, and for dear granddaughter Molly Ferguson, who celebrated her 19th yesterday ... I remind you of the memorial I wrote about my brother Alan back in 1993. Please see that it is passed on to future generations so that he is always remembered.

Dad knows his brother was preparing to fight in a just war, but he also knows too well the bitterness of a young and vibrant life lost, and he believes such losses are callously and gratuitously foisted on us. So he added:

[In the lost blog-post,] I also railed against unnecessary wars, certainly including the current one in Iraq. I bleed for every young man and woman who [has] died or been severely wounded in this conflict, and for their parents, spouses, and other loved ones. It shouldn't have happened ...

I [deplore] the practice of old men and women sending young men and women to war unless it is absolutely necessary and all other efforts have failed ... Our going to war might become less frequent if it became customary for the commander-in-chief to personally lead his or her troops into war.

We were all lucky that Alan Gottlieb walked the Earth, and all a little worse that his time was so brief. I'll be damned if I'll let the capricious keys of my dad's cranky computer get in the way of celebrating his brother.

Here's to Alan Gottlieb. Long may he wave.

--T.A.

The Monitor

A post from someone else that makes you recognize something about yourself is the very best kind.

Danny Miller teaches me a lot that way. And no one reminds me more of my cranky inner voice than Danny Miller's cranky inner voice. This man really knows the bats in his belfry.

Some time ago, when "disappointment was my closest friend," as the irritating song says, I realized that my scolding, belittling inner voice had its own personality. He had a persona (non grata), he had a whole bank of controls at his fingertips, he was bland-complexioned and featureless like Bunsen on the Muppet Show, and he was totally without humor.

His name was The Monitor. He watched everything I did, and critiqued, after the fact, witheringly, whatever I did or said. It was kind of exhausting, really.

This guy still has his days, but he must have found another sucker, because he mostly exists to me as a memory.

But he was frighteningly real and omniscient for a long time. Danny reminded me of his existence, and of the fact that he is no longer smotheringly real to me.

Danny has exactly the right idea about how to enter into dialogue with our inner inhabitants. Read his post and take good notes.

--T.A.

The Land of Sleeping Trees

At my dad's suggestion, my route today from Orlando to Ft. Myers Beach took me down US Route 17, through towns like Wauchula, Arcadia and Zolfo Springs, and into Punta Gorda before finally running across I-75, which would have got me to the beach a little faster but with much dimmer memories of Central Florida, the Land that Time forgot.

Route 17 is an artery of the endangered ranching and agricultural life. It seems to be cheaper to grow oranges than cows, and many of these towns, which feature forlorn historic districts of two-story, early 20th century commercial buildings bookended by battered, formerly grand baronial houses, seem now to be heavily populated, if temporarily, by Hispanic and Haitian migrant workers.

This part of the state is surprisingly open, and the vistas are remarkably vast: open grazing land, a gentle hill or two from which you can see from miles in every direction, creeks whose banks are pure sand.

Then, when you get to southern DeSoto and northern Charlotte County, you're reminded: a huge hurricane passed directly over this area. There are entire stands of trees that are broken -- bent like giant editions of those elbow drinking straws, all bent in the same direction like dancers frozen mid-bow.

Some larger, older trees have simply fallen over. Most of the root system is up in the air, but the tree lives off the part that's still in the ground, and there entire forests tipped on their sides, still remarkably green. It seemed as though they were napping after a hard morning in the sun. A big, communal tree siesta.

And even now, the smashed trailers, collapsed porches and staved roofs remind you that you're in a place that's slow to recover.

I had a delicious broiled chicken breast and salad bar at the Nicholas Family Restaurant in Alachua. The waitress had a wry sense of humor, a husky voice, big rancher's hands. The restaurant, however, seems to be primarily a citrus industry hangout.

I got a little less work done because of the scenic route -- but how often do you get to go back in time?

--T.A.

Dream On

Orlando. Hazy heat. Boiling air above the pavement and the car hoods. Sweaty baggage handles. Teeth covered with a film of orange juice and vitamin C tablets, coffee stain on the left leg of my pants.

Avis. They thought they were doing me a favor, gave me Chevy Blazer, which I consider a hybrid -- that is, a hybrid between a tank and a riding mower.  I used half a tank (of gas, that is) just getting lost in Orlando, which seems to have no "there."

Lost on a two-lane road with mangrove swamp on either side. Ahead: "civilization": a roadhouse, and exiting it, a pickup truck with an American flag waving from one end of the tailgate and the Confederate flag from the other.

That was a nice little detour: 45 miles in the wrong direction.

In the gathering heat, a haze of apartment complexes, maps, brochures, business cards and tollbooths. Spent $7.50 in tolls today, 50 cents at a time (except for one two-dollar toll). Rode in the back of a golf cart during a rainstorm, driving along the sidewalks of an apartment property, holding the property's brochure over my head, getting a half-moon rain-stain on the seat of my pants.

The orderly progression of the planned urban megacommunity is a microcosm of our homogenizing country: trailer park to apartment complex to low-end condos to gated subdivisions with brick walls around them, then a band of commercial development -- copy shops, chiropractors, small office buildings -- and chain restaurants, Wal-Marts, upscale shopping, freeway interchanges -- then it starts over again. Everything is subtly separated from everything else, and in their cars, people are separated and yet together; as Jerry Seinfeld said, "You're inside, you're outside, you're moving, you're not moving..."

As I drive from complex to complex, I'm looking to buy something that makes economic sense as affordable housing well into the future, but I am also fighting despair: public policy is shifting away from the notion that the public sector bears any responsibility for helping underwrite the development of affordable housing. Left to its own devices, the market will either create value or devour it -- neither being a good scenario for the low- and middle-income individuals and families that must do their best in these megasegregated metropoli.

I am hoping to recognize, in each complex I visit, a dimly apprehended possibility: that here, something thats affordable and that still makes economic sense can flourish. Something that is not lavish that people are proud to call home, and that uses most of whatever cash it makes to tutor kids, to provide counseling, to offer relief to single moms, to help seniors stay healthy and active, and to create this fragile, vanishing ecosystem called a "community."

How can I hope to accomplish this in the face of diminshing government support, escalating real estate values, escalating gang and drug problems? Why bother?

You may say: Dream on

I may say, Don't mind if I do.

--T.A.

The Dean of Doggerel

Is a title that's sometimes been applied to me. I have a habit of writing these dorky doggerel poems memorializing significant occasions.

Today, being the birthday of the One True Wife, merited the following poem, penned (or typed) for the occasion. I honor her by sharing it with you, my blogfriends. (The references to health problems have to do with her persistent adult-onset asthma, which is triggered by Spring allergies and a host of other complaints.)

Blogolepsy

This is a troubling sign, or maybe it's just a change in my biorhythm: I'm waking up at about 4 each morning, unable to go back to sleep. Given all that's been going on lately -- and given that I have to hit the road again tomorrow -- I guess it's not that unusual: I get washed over by a kind of speculative dread, and I start missing home before I've even left.

I also worry about how much is not getting done, and I'm led helplessly to ruminate over issues of step-parenthood, financial denial and organizational impairment.

So I creep into my study and read blogs. And I greet you, my silent friends, hunched over your keyboards, peering into my blue-green world.

I'm hoping I'm soothed into sleep by your gentle humor.

But I'm afraid of fainting dead away at the keyboard, undone by what's been almost a week of sleep deprivation. I'll call it "blogolepsy."

--T.A.

The Mustang

Yesterday we found out that the girls' father was giving the oldest girl a Mustang, for the summer, as a graduation gift.

The One True Wife had told him, in an e-mail, that the oldest already had a car, so thanks, anyway.

However, yesterday, the car arrived. We expressed reservations about having another car: why? Who would pay for gas, repairs, insurance? What kind of shape is it in? And she already has a car: why does she need another car, for the summer?! And it's a convertible: is that safe? We said we had reservations.

Tears ensued.

More than that I will decline to say.

So, as of now, we are a household of five people, four cars, and only three drivers' licenses.

Wasn't this week supposed to be about liberation?

--T.A.

On the Road During the Season of Our Redemption

Even though Passover begins Saturday night, I find I must travel, at the behest of my day job, to Florida for most of next week.

I won't leave until Tuesday: Monday is the birthday of the One True Wife. Incredibly, I have no gift yet (and instead of shopping feverishly -- or working -- I am blogging. Oy...). The girls and I are frantically conspiring to concoct some fantastic fete, which will probably devolve into no more than dinner out a kosher-for-Passover restaurant. The rest of the week finds me in Orlando, looking at apartment complexes, and in Naples and Ft. Myers, checking up on my day job's one notable success, and on my aged and revered parents.

Despite the lengthy absence from my family -- I'm especially dejected at the thought of having to be away from my son during most of his week-long break from school -- I find the prospect of being on the road during Passover ... I don't know, bracing.

I'll have to cultivate a new level of mindfulness. The humiliating in-flight pretzels will be foregone. I won't eat at Denny's unless I'm ready to do without the toast.  Gotta watch what kind of creamer I put in the coffee. I'll drink wine at sunset with my old man, but skip the bourbon. All around me, the world will be being the world, and behaving as if time were simply time.

Even though I'll be hard at work (mostly), I'll also be contemplating the personal implications of the Exodus. I'll (try to) be mindful of the ideas and habits to which I'm enslaved. I'll meditate on freeing myself, aware that redemption is sometimes nothing more than a slight shift in perspective, a turn of a few degrees. I'll be motoring along in my rental car beside the Gulf of Mexico, imagining the parting of great oceans of obstacle, and the miraculous opening of passages to peace and freedom.

Time, like light, is omnipresent and yet invisible, breathtakingly fast and yet beyond the limitations of mere motion, of unfathomable origin and without discernible end. When we recognize unique passages -- historical, metaphorical, physical, psychological, all of the above -- time blossoms in all these dimensions, and yet it comes to rest in our hands. It is more than a second, or a season: it is a sacrament.

Moving toward that small patch of sand which our family has most keenly associated with liberation, I will be working, but I'll also be meditating, because, in this season more than any other, I will be traversing the edge, and perhaps plumbing the depths, of redemption -- my nation's, my family's, my own.

--T.A.

Our Hermaphrodite of the Ranch

Heavy rain in Chicago today has transformed the stain on an expressway wall that has come to be known as Our Lady of the Underpass.

The stain has taken on a startling resemblance to Michael Jackson.

--T.A.