French Pond Road - Chapter Three

A flashback to 1995 and Angela, Kagan's mother-in-law, is deciding to leave for Venezuela with Mickey.

"Reiss began to choke on a meatball."

Can This Be Real?

I have been following the global warming saga since 1994 when I worked as a campaigner for Friends of the Earth in Europe on energy and atmosphere issues. For over a decade I have felt a growing sense of despair at my country's inability to take on this issue and its responsibility as the world's largest polluter. I turned against Gore at one point because the Clinton White House did nothing about it after taking a beating on Gore's proposed BTU tax. While Bush was in the White House, I did what I could, helping green candidates in their quixotic attempts to run for local office, taking on garbage incinerators when the neighbors said I was misguided. At least, I told myself, I can tell my grandchildren, and my grandparents someday, hopefully, that I tried. I voted for Obama with a hope that at last the tide was turning as we faced down a collapse on all fronts. But now, reading Gore as he speaks to the Senate, there is a giddy sense of a revolution taking place and I can only hope that the dinosaurs are heading to the exits as fast as their big feet can carry them.

Forgive and forget? Pass the amnesia

Why do our instincts for forgiveness and mercy find their highest expression when exercised on behalf of the most powerful in the land? An example - Martha Stewart walks free after a couple of months at a spa that doubles as an incarceration unit for white collar criminals while some unemployed black kid with a couple of marijuana joints for sale gets sent up for twenty years. 

So here is Barack Obama saying he'd rather concentrate on the future then spend time recriminating about the errors of the Bush administration. At first glance, about the time we get to focus on a headline before moving on to other concerns, a ringing cell phone, a child whining for lunch, it seems an admirable decision, in line with Obama's high road political style which has won him so much in so little time. But there's the matter of accountability that gets left out when we rush into the future. On the other hand I believe our easy going democracy is what sets us apart from many nations.  I remember for instance when I lived in England and watched parliamentary dealings on the BBC and couldn't help but cringe when the Honorable George Jones from Merseyside bellowed for someone's hide because the pound had devalued unexpectedly. Here Washington seems so far away it's easy for us to pretend it didn't happen - there never were orders for torture, never was a rush to war based on misinformation and propaganda that made the Soviets seem like amateurs, never was an energy policy drawn up behind closed doors in sessions with oil industry executives. Our ship seems righted once more, so why not get on with things? Don't worry, be happy.

But wouldn't it be great if the rich and powerful were made to actually feel the pain of their decisions? Or is it better to forgive and forget? I believe the criminality of the Bush administration, carried over from past Republican administrations, needs to be dealt with in a more serious manner if we aren't intending to suffer historical amnesia. Do I think there will be commissions appointed, war crimes trials and the like in Washington any time in the future? Not any more likely than the revolution of the powerless. A better bet is a black guy getting the death penalty for shooting a cop. If you want a morality play go to the movies. Every thing else is also anesthesia.

French Pond Road - Chapter Two - No Man's Land

Mickey and Cata burning up the road on a Kawasaki 650. Listen to Mickey's thoughts as they find a place to camp for the night.

In the new year I could use a little escape myself, but am at the stage in life where there's no going back, and the way ahead looks long and arduous. That's why writing this was fun, because I could look back on my teenage years when burning up the road was the imperative need, felt right, was right was the code to live by, and didn't have many people I needed to apologize to at any one time. Now, it's a different brand of coffee I drink. But that's another story, another conversation. 

Not that I'm having many good conversations, either. This blog is an interesting theoretical construct in that it resembles a void. But there is a sense that there must be some consciousness touched somewhere on some level, even if it's just some large machine, some form of groupthink that's being raised. And let's not kid ourselves, entire careers can be spent in the dark. Down all the days.