I looked for a name…

of human endeavors, of looking to the heavens – durhamtown, Oct ’18

Pittsburgh. Synagogue. Couldn’t recall their level of faith.
Google took me to words written, a description of the life after – ‘retrofitting a hundred-year-old Victorian house in Pittsburgh’s East End’
Google ‘pittsburgh east end‘ – see that it’s a few places in town (wonder if the tree-house apartment, from where a short jaunt to a ceremony in New Hampshire started and ended)  – damn, close to Squirrel Hill. damn.
More googlin’ because … because why? I certainly didn’t want to be associated, aquainted with such pain and horror. Others in my life had strange qualities of ‘being there’ for the worst of our recent-memory atrocities; at the time it was surprising, now I see it as concerning.
No.
As much as I know more of myself now than I did then my sincere hope has always been to be a good person, and as such I ponder those folk I’ve known, I ponder their welfare and hope – hope all is well.
Google allows an amount of knowledge which isn’t good – but I see – a sigh of releif – I see the current arc of their life is not in western Pennsylvania. I am okay with that, with the prying to find out… still, I will look at the names, worried that the good people I had met might have been in harms way.

they were not.

At times I feel like a simple and small man. Raised with minor challenges mostly of my own device. Loved and supported when I probably should have been allowed to flounder, suffer a bit.
I feel great … something (bet there’s a great Yiddish phrase) – ignorance which was not a bad thing to have – for I was not raised to fear those different than myself; be it a heartfelt lesson given from the heart from my parents and family, or … well, perhaps the side effect of chocolate covered sugar bombs and lots of Saturday morning cartoons.

The church with the funny christmas lights out front on Gennesee street, just down from the New Hartford town line. The lights were straight across – sometimes only one was lit – how odd.

How odd. That was the sum total of the judgement I brought to the situation – I noticed, I pondered compared to my world, and thought ‘perhaps the bulbs had burned out’.

See – ignorance. Massive. But … not ill-minded, not with malice. Just – I didn’t know.
Even after Pat and Lisa and Jonathan, all of the Island, such strong examples – I wonder what they thought of my bumpkin-ness. Jonathan was always given cab fare to get home; we didn’t have cabs (of course we did, I just rode my bicycle everywhere); Jonathan had two kitchens in his home and if I recall would occasionally bury the silverware – I didn’t know, I didn’t ask (that perhaps is the one true fallacy of my benevolent ignorance) – it seems odd, but then again – they went to movies where they threw rice & toilet paper – such wild and seemingly crazy differences between the city and Upstate, eh?

I laugh a little at the fondness the Tribe has had for me – truly they were overly kind, are overly kind. I am not the best example, but my heart is true, my ignorance merely an offshoot of my laziness. Apparently I was good enough. The Tribe has always been welcoming. It made the hatred expressed seem so … woefully ignorant.

these paragraphs above are about me.
I don’t have the words for how Boo has been hurt.
I don’t have the thoughts for how my life, now as a parent, is under duress. Good madam Lis made a post that punched me in my heart. I am extremely lucky, privelaged, untouched by the madness of cultural animosity merely by chance.
My son – merely by chance – will see the world through a different lens, he will see the hatred of strangers directed at him and his because … ?
I understand the concepts, I understand the ‘situation’ – but I am not talented enough to be able to speak to what this means. I hope I can learn enough to be helpful someday. It hurts my mind to start down the road of ‘we exist, yet there are those who not merely want us not to exist, but take actions to bring that to fruition’ – just what the fuck, where to start?
How to speak to it and yet still hold out hope for a better future? A better world?

I looked for a name, and was sadly happy when it was not on the list.
The list is small, but the names – the people on the list, they seem to have been mighty.
Much better words and stories have been made in these last 48 hours – if you’re here go read them.
One speaks of good sir Fred – how he lived in the same neighborhood – how the Tree of Life was part of his neighborhood, and how a wonderful example of such a good neighborhood to have. That one hurt to read.
A post about his doctor, who had compassion to go with his knowledge, who cared – and was able to save the man’s life during a time in America when his life wasn’t valued in the least.

Much better words.

it’s nature’s path to create gems and jewels from intense pressure, right?  perhaps Rumbly there will be a shimmering stone from this time which can be held up to shine light into the darkness of small men’s hearts.

/3:22p+28Oct2018=sunday afternoon || the hum of laptop fan, clackityclack of the keyboard, the gentle breathing of Boo on the settee, and sunlight dappling through the leafs//