Miller Williams on Writing

Let Me Tell You

how to do it from the beginning.
First notice everything:
The stain on the wallpaper
of the vacant house.
the mothball smell of a
greyhound toilet.
Miss nothing. Memorize it.
You cannot twist the fact you do not know.

Remember
The blond girl you saw in the bar.
Put a scar on her breast.
Say she left home to get away from her father.
Invent whatever will support your line.
Leave out the rest.

Use metaphors. The mayor is a pig
is a metaphor
which is not to suggest
it is not a fact.
Which is irrelevant.
Nothing is less important
than a fact.

Be suspicious of any word you learned
and were proud of learning.
It will go bad.
It will fall off the page.

When your father lies
in the last light
and your mother cries for him,
listen to the sound of her crying.
When your father dies
take notes somewhere inside.

If there is a heaven
he will forgive you
if the line you found was a good line.

It does not have to be worth the dying.

God and Legal Rights

 

 

As we should have expected, a minor functionary in the Bible belt has brought attention to herself, and her community by refusing marriage licenses to gay people in New York State. Ms Belforti claims that God will not allow her to issue such licenses, despite civil marriage equality's legal status in that state, choosing instead to delegate the task to a deputy. Unlike straights, gay people seeking a license to marry must make an appointment, while the deputy is called in to do what Ms Belforti chooses not to do, even though it is explicitly her job. This poses several interesting questions. One that comes to mind is this: if gays are sinners, as she claims, thus not eligible for marriage, how do straights prove they're sin-free? Another is, if the deputy is called, who pays for this person's time? There are several others, but the whole issue is troubling, and instructive at once. Does there exist anywhere in this great land a government functionary who agrees with every issue, every legality that they must transact every day as part of they're job description? How many license bureaucrats, cubicle-denizens grit their teeth when giving a marriage license to two unemployed, uneducated, barely legal-age, underfinanced hetero kids? A lot of them, I'm guessing. How many of those office technocrats who keep the wheels turning look the other way when mere children apply for a driver's license? How many of them, if asked, would admit their true feelings about children of welfare parents obtaining what they feel are undue benefits? The point is that we pay those people to do their job, not to selectively choose who they feel deserves whatever benefit or civil document is at issue. We pay them not to make decisions like that. That's what legislators do. And legislators in New York have decided for 'we the people' that civil marriage equality is the law.  Ms Belforti needs to do her job or find another one, and our conservative friends need to challenge her selective enforcement of New York State law. Does she withhold voting registrations from LBGT people? Not give them driver's permits? Building permits? What else does she do that limits LGBT rights since God tells her not to recognize them? I'm guessing Ms Belforti has no trouble processing their tax deposits.

Why I'm involved

  

  “Why are you involved in the struggle for LGBT rights?” It’s a question I hear often as I attend rallies, gay rights gatherings, HRC meetups, the occasional Stonewall, or Equality Ohio, or PFFLAG event. I suppose as a straight, male, middle-class, white, recovering Catholic, the question is a good one. Why indeed?
    It came up again the other day. My wife and I were at a HRC evening in the Short North. I was asked to put in my nickel’s worth, so I did. Afterward, I decided to get serious about the question itself, commit to paper just why it is the gay rights struggle is indeed so important to me. And here’s the result: I’m not interested in gay rights; I’m interested in human rights. Does the LGBT community need straight allies like my wife and me? I would say yes, though I’m confident the community can speak for itself, so we’re grateful that our LBGT friends seem to accept us, even consider us safe, which is a bit sad when you think about it. Do gays have a legitimate reason to demand their rights? Well, let me see, can I get fired (or not hired)/evicted/booted out/beaten up/harassed/forced from a school board/kept from adopting/prevented from running for office/prevented from marrying the person I love for being a straight male middle-class formerly Christian white guy? Probably not. I take all those previously listed ‘rights and benefits’ pretty much for granted.
    When I start my day, I assume that I’m going to still have my job, my access to places, my safety, my marriage, my residence, my agency as an adult, and the other myriad facilities and comforts of my position in society (times 1138 if I’m married, which I am). Indeed, I never question any of those things. They’re available to me, just for the taking. Of course I can do all the listed things, come and go as I please, assume that I’m safe holding hands with my beloved walking down High street, or Low Street, whatever. This is twenty-first century America, right? The land of the free, and the home of the brave, right? This is a place where anyone who works hard, obeys the law, pays taxes, pays attention, tries to be a good citizen, avoids jaywalking to excess, doesn’t frighten the horses, and minds her own business should be able to assume everything I do, right? And we all can, of course--unless you happen to be gay. Then all bets are off.
    But wait a minute. Here’s where it gets really dense and complicated for me. You see, I’m a really simple man. I tend to see the world in black and white, no frills, no embellishment, just out front and easy, that’s me. Some would say naive,’ and they’re probably right. When I stood up in third grade and put my hand over my heart, stared at the flag in the corner of the classroom, and chanted along with those other bright-eyed, snot-nose kids: “...with liberty and justice for all...” I really believed that, see? That word ‘ALL’ was really comforting to me, somehow. The simplicity of it. ALL. There’s no wiggle room there, no shading, no ambiguity. It doesn’t say “...with liberty and justice for white, middle-class, heterosexual, Christian males who own a yacht. It doesn’t say that. It says--ALL. Comforting, isn’t it. I think so, but I’m a simple guy.
    Except it’s not simple, because we insist on making exceptions to it, slicing and dicing it, and getting ourselves ALL wrapped up in rules, and differences, and nuance that twists things into a pretzel shapes, and makes distinctions, and creates divisions, and that makes us look really hypocritical, and just bad. (Third graders would be confused by this.)
    So here’s the deal. When people ask me why I’m involved in the gay rights struggle, I have two responses: the first one is my standard smart-ass response--why are you not? It works only on certain groups, and not so much on others. My second response is this: As a guy who has taken all those rights and protections and benefits for granted all my life, as highfalutin’ and altruistic as it sounds, I really do feel I have a responsibility to see that anyone who is denied those things has at least the opportunity to acquire and enjoy them on an equal basis with me. This, to me, is the essence of being an American citizen. Anecdotally, it happens to be one of the reasons I spent more than 30 years in uniform defending the principles described above. I didn’t spend a year in Vietnam for instance, just for my health.
     In my opinion, the act of denying another citizen the rights, benefits, legal protections, and assurances of this society, that act is itself UN-American. For those who insist that our LGBT brothers and sisters be denied the rights heterosexual Americans enjoy every day, I say to you, you are un-American. There is no shading or ambiguity in that phrase. That denial is against what this country stands for, and thereby, in my simple mind, Un-American. In particular, for those who deny any citizen of this country access to civil marriage because of who they are, that, my friend, is un-American. And don’t drag out your Bible, or your Koran, or any other religious tome to justify this denial. I’m not talking about holy matrimony, or church weddings, or America’s brides and grooms industry. I’m talking about civil marriage. If someone visits a State office for a building permit, a tax matter, a driver’s permit, or to register to vote, they need not bring along their Bible. I can cite a few countries that use religious texts to back up their legal adjudications: Iran, Iraq, Saudi-Arabia come to mind. And civil marriage equality will only strengthen marriage, not threaten it. The threat to marriage in society today is heterosexual divorce. Good Lord, if only people who were sin free could marry we’d be a nation of singles. It sure as hell leaves me out.
    It’s a no brainer for me. LGBT rights are human rights. I’m no Tea Party Patriot. I’m no jingoistic, flag-waving, street-corner renegade, despite what my Republican friends might say, either one of the two. I love this country, and the idea behind it. When we Americans fail in our efforts to address the inequities around us, I get involved. I speak up. Why do I do that? You tell me.   

 

Speed Bumps

    When my wife and I lived on the island of Kauai, our condo overlooked a public park where young people would congregate. Nearly every night, well into the late hours, the young men of Kauai arrived at the park in the only thing of value in their lives, their hopped up cars. The ritual seldom varied: taking turns, they’d stop the car straddling the speed bump, the vehicle’s drive wheels against the raised surface. They would then depress the brake, and at the same time press the accelerator. The rear tires spun, screaming noise, sending clouds of thick, smelly, rubber-burning smoke into thin air, as the car--and its driver--went exactly nowhere. In both a metaphorical and a literal sense, this noise and smoke-generating, tire-ravaging ritual described the lives of those young men. Stuck on their island home, or assuming they were, lacking skills, credentials, hope of leaving, they reverted to the only thing they knew that gave them satisfaction, the very celebration of their inertia.
    In society today we find ourselves behind a speed bump. By complaining about current conditions, and blaming anyone who differs with our position, we’re spinning our wheels, emitting a screen of smoke and fog, angry, hopeless, and fixed on no particular purpose aside from raising more noise and smoke, celebrating our inertia. Our collective angst has become a purpose in itself, a way for us as a nation to find meaning in our lives, the degradation of meaning, almost a nihilism that feeds on itself. This is not to make light of current difficulties, economic, psychosocial, spiritual, or otherwise challenging current obstacles. It is, by way of metaphor, a way to identify with those young men trapped on an island in the middle of an ocean, and to see the similarities, and a path forward. In short, we need a collective, shared, positive goal of some sort, perhaps a national agenda aimed at reducing our collective ecological footprint, or the collective care and feeding of those unfortunates who are homeless. We need a moon shot, not a speed bump.  
    Speaking of moon shots, John F. Kennedy once told the story of a young Irish lad who saw a hat in a shop window, and decided that he simply must have it. The boy lusted for the hat. It was nothing special, just a standard soft-sided beret, a typical Irish hat. But the boy wanted it, pined for it. He pestered his father for months to purchase the hat for him. The father ignored the boy’s repeated requests.
    The boy and his father lived beside a wealthy man’s farm. Their properties were separated by a high wall, the top of which was just out of reach of the boy’s ability to scale it. The boy had grown up with the wall; its presence was his reality, and he never questioned its hold on his ability.
     One day the boy returned from school, to find his precious hat waiting for him, its box wrapped in tissue. Happily, the boy tore the package open, and he shrieked with delight as he pulled the hat from its box. It was perfect; the boy had his hat, and all was right with the world. Just as the boy began to fix it on his head, his father took the hat, and stepped into the yard. He proceeded to toss the hat over the wall. Then he waited for the boy’s reaction.
    Astonished and hurt, the boy watched his once-prized hat sail over the high wall, and disappear. “Why did you throw my hat over the wall, father?” The boy was perplexed.
    His father said not a word. He walked back to the house, and left.
    Again the boy accosted him. “Why did you throw my hat over the wall?”
    There was no response from his father, but the boy soon understood for himself.
   
    Of course we all know the answer. The father knew what the son did not: when something is desired, the best way to ascertain its value is to create an obstacle to it, then we will find a way to retrieve it. With that challenge in mind, there are no walls too high, no rivers too wide to stop our progress. The underlying message is that we have choices. Even not deciding is a choice. Like those young men on Kauai, we can choose to create that obstacle for ourselves, and then spin our wheels. Or, we can choose to believe that there are no speed bumps in sight, only those we place there ourselves, the self-imposed challenges that always exist. If we so choose, we can line up against them on purpose, then depress the brakes and the gas at the same time. The only result of that is noise, smoke, and the hopeless feeling of our lives drifting off into thin air with no purpose. Or we can choose to see the speed bumps for what they are, perhaps a way to slow us down so we can contemplate a different path, a new way to see a small wrinkle in some everyday thing we may have missed in our haste to be somewhere else.
    We humans simply must have a wall too high, an obstacle too challenging in order to avoid the self-absorption and self-imposed restriction of our lives. We must toss our hats over a wall too high, or life begins to lack meaning, a spinning of wheels raising smoke, when our lives could be spent stoking a fire.

Right, or left?

Antrim Park 6 A.M. 8/4/11

A recent hike along the path at Antrim Park brought these observations. For one, it's almost too easy to lapse into poetic, or pseudo-poetic rhapsody and prose on a misty morning walking path. The silence and serenity become a kind of muse, a source of inspiration that I'm never quite sure whether to trust. I read a lot of Rod McKuen as a youth, and somewhat less Robert Frost. Perhaps that's instructive. As I composed my own piece this morning, I sensed right off that it had more to do with, as I wrote, "...not so much what's right, as what is left."
This is what happened: I entered the park early enough that it appeared I was alone. Unfamiliar with the hiking protocols, "...seeing no officious signs," I chose to proceed along the path starting out by turning left, my default choice almost always. It became apparent rather soon that I'd violated some unspoken, unwritten understanding that on odd days, walkers must choose left, even days, right. This being the 4th day of August, I chose to join the path heading off the incorrect way. Yes, this has been my choice throughout life, it seems, to push on in opposition to the mainstream, often making things more difficult for myself in the process. But often, too, this perversity of mine becomes that source of inspiration mentioned above. The road not taken may well be, it appears, a road taken in opposition. I hesitate to suggest entering a one way street facing traffic, but it must be said that the exercise would be at least inspirational. Mister Frost was correct in this regard; it would make all the difference.
So I did today, and my muse awoke with a start, beginning her chant before the first turn. Other walkers passed behind, all staring at their day ahead, unaware of the vision I saw. The path ahead of me contained the way ahead, true, but the path behind as well, the double joy of, as I wrote, "...seeing not what's to do, but what is done." Not what's right, but what is left.

zero-sum world

We live in a zero-sum world. There is no longer a semblance of accommodation, compromise, or citizenship in a society in which those appointed to lead insist on being led. This diversion from my ordinary posting is prompted by the awful news out of our nation's capitol concerning the so called debt ceiling. If the government can no longer legally borrow money after next Tuesday, we will all be in default. I say we all, because this is part of the problem driving the zero-sum express. The government is in fact the 'we' in this equation. We are the government. All the Tea Party talk about The Government, the steady drumbeat of negative, trash talking, anarchic messaging from those who would dismantle 'the government' is meaningless, emotion-driven nonsense. There is a win-win proposition here, and we all know it; every American knows there are painful choices to be made, and they (we) even know what they are. They are increased tax revenues, spending cuts, accountability in funding and identification of unnecessary programs. In short, there's a need to rededicate ourselves as Americans to being who we are.  It can start with identifying who we are not.
We are not cruel, unforgiving, vengeful people. Instead, we're one of the more generous nations on earth, even though, despite what some claim, we allot only a minute percentage of our budget to foreign aid. We are not the country that should be forcing our form of government, or our values, on another culture, another country. It is time to get U.S. troops out of both Iraq and Afghanistan, and keep them home, unless some hapless country makes an actual threat against us. In that regard, we are not a country imperiled. Despite what a former high government official said, it is not a with us or against us scenario. We can hang up our cowboy hats now, and put away the six-shooter. That behavior was endearing in fourth grade, but the world has moved on.
We are not a country that can afford any longer the hypocrisy that maintains white, Christian, heterosexual males in positions of power, when our sacred document states in no uncertain terms,"Liberty and justice for all."
We are not a country founded on Christian, or Jewish, or Muslim, or Buddhist, or Atheistic values. We are a diverse, secular country which has thrived for 235 years because of, not in spite of religious (and non-religious)acceptance. The so called founding fathers, those white, upper class, propertied, heterosexual males were not Christian oriented men. They were, almost every one, Deists, educated and immersed in the dangers and divisions of a single-belief society, thus their endorsement of a strong Constitutional barrier between church and state.
It is time to demand of our leaders that they lead, and not be led, by those who insist on narrow, Pyhrric victory, the dismantling of whatever They insist the government is. Unless the rigid right wing produces a viable, workable, acceptable plan to meet our debt obligations, and a win-win compromise toward fiscal sanity, we only strengthen an already overbuilt zero-sum world.

Evening Street Review

 For your reading pleasure... What they don't tell you about returning to college at 62.

 Plus, it's am amazing, energizing, exciting, terrifying, gratifying experience. I highly recommend it. Link below.


http://www.eveningstreetpress.com/evening_street_review.html