Seeing the Contours

“The color is innocent enough, but things with which it is coupled make it hated. Slavery, ignorance, stupidity, servility, poverty, dependence, are undesirable conditions. When these shall cease to be coupled with color, there will be no color line drawn.” Frederick Douglass

One

I compost kitchen scraps and leaves and clippings in a medium capacity plastic composter in our backyard. One of those drum composters, with two compartments and rollers that allow it to be spun. I’ve composted in our narrow backyard for years, in bare piles and homemade bins fashioned with scrap wood and chicken wire and, until it fell apart, a plastic bin from Smith and Hawken that was my mother-in-law’s. The drum is the best composter yet, even though the aperture is a bit small. I like the idea of turning waste into fertilizer. Seems like a good metaphor for life. It takes time to make fertilizer, some patience and care, just as it takes time for the contours of life to start making sense. What I mean is that it takes time to learn to see the contours, how they fit together. It’s easy to miss a lot of signs along the way. What seems monumental today may be meaningless further down the road, and the apparently meaningless might turn out to be monumental. 

Two

The real criminal types aren’t satisfied with taking over a street or village or city. Real criminals think much bigger. They take over governments and entire countries, fix the laws for their own benefit and the benefit of their compatriots and collaborators. Hasn’t this always been so? 

Three

My congressman, Salud Carbajal, put his finger to the breeze begun by others with more courage, and only voiced his support for the impeachment of President Trump when it was safe to do so. Political pragmatism, I guess. Courage is more admirable in my book, especially when the most fundamental principle of representative democracy is at stake. Even while we watch Trump take hammer and chisel to the integrity and legitimate authority of the Legislative branch, Salud waited, hesitated, calculated. On the question of whether the chief executive is immune to, exempt from, and above the law, Salud followed the herd, but only when it was politically safe to do so. Not exactly a profile in courage. 

Four

Fiesta time in Santa Barbara. For some, a time to remember the city’s Spanish and Mexican origins, for others it’s all about commerce, hotel occupancy rates, bed taxes. We saw some of the parade on State Street, men on horses waving and calling out, “Viva La Fiesta!”, horse-drawn carriages or wagons hauling local bigwigs. Ladies on horseback, their colorful dresses flowing, flowers in their hair. Little girls in traditional dress tossing flowers into the crowd lined along the street. Horse hooves clip-clopping on the pavement. The image that stuck with me was of a vaquero holding an American flag. I imagined the days when State Street was packed dirt and Fiesta was a much smaller, more local affair. Progress. Maybe. 

Five

We used to think big in America. Send a man to the moon and bring him back safely. Eradicate poverty. Establish the Peace Corps. Now we think small. Once we had confidence, now we’re afraid, all the time, of shadows and just about everything else. What happened to us?

Six

I’m reading Sam Shepard’s last book, a slim volume called Spy of the First Person. Just finished Stony The Road by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.