paulmuses

Jimmy Buffet & Rebecca were right

*

That’s Rebecca in the bright blue coat on the left. I’m the guy in the cap next to her. We’re with a group of Fulbright Scholars in Romania in the fall of 2021. Dwarfing us was Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu’s white elephant Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest. We are at a Fulbright orientation. After this weekend, the group would spread out around Romania.

I taught American Politics at the West University of Timișoara. Rebecca used the Romanian she learned from two years of intensive study on Duolingo to help us maneuver around the beautiful country.

I took this photo the day we arrived in this western Romanian city.

Rebecca weighed a ginger root at Kaufland’s supermarket, a two-mile walk from our apartment. The scale’s directions were in Romanian. She passed her first language test, but it wasn’t easy, particularly with a mask. The N95 fit snugly around her nose and cheeks. Rebecca’s son Jonathan, a nurse practitioner, had smartly sent her a pack of state-of-the-art covers. She was Anthony Fauci’s poster person for proper masking.

Me? Well, this was my sordid story.

The Slow Train to Suceava

On Monday, November 1, 2021, I joined 16,000 others in Romania who tested positive for COVID-19. Romania was smack-dab in the middle of its 4th COVID wave, with 500 deaths every day in this country of 19 million. I felt lousy for a few days, so we went to a Romanian doctor one of my University of West colleagues recommended.

When she texted the positive diagnosis the next day, I was shocked.

How could this be? I’m twice vaccinated and wear a mask. “I know this is somebody’s fault,” whines Jimmy Buffet early in Margaritaville. I thought the same thing. In Romania, where 63% were not vaccinated, blame was easy to find.

I likely got COVID on a train trip from Timișoara to Suceava. But back to Jimmy and his signature song. At first, he agrees with others that a “woman is to blame” for his troubles.

On the Timișoara to Cluj train–the first arrow in the map–a young woman and child minus masks walked by us to their seats. There were also the three maskless male loggers who got on the Cluj to Suceava train–the second arrow–and hung around for a few stops in the aisle about 10 feet from where we sat.

Eventually, Buffet gives up the search for blame, accepts it, and concedes, “It’s my own damn fault.” In the song, his wisdom comes from a therapist. For me, it came from Rebecca.

“You’ve been wearing that cloth mask that doesn’t protect you. And I’ve been telling you that for over a year.”

This was a Margaritaville moment for me. Rebecca had worn the super protective N95 mask that fits snugly for months. Here’s another photo where her face cover fits better than the coat she tried on at Illius Town Shopping Mall.

Yes, I know. She’s protecting herself, me, and others. In contrast, I was sloppy, settling for comfortable cloth covers and letting them slide down my nose. On the slow trains to Suceava, my lame armor was a limp mask halfway down my nose. I felt smug with my two vaccine jabs on the many bathroom trips down the aisles.

You’ve been patiently waiting for this moment. Here’s the default me.

The poster person for how not to wear a mask.

Rebecca was mad

We’d been in Timisoara for a month and had established a routine. We walked two miles to Kaufland’s with our four bags. Then we discovered a Farmer’s Market. That’s Rebecca filling one of our bags with fresh produce.

We made one trip to Kaufland’s and one to the market each week. And we loved our late afternoon happy hours at an outdoor bar in Timișoara’s four beautiful Piatas (squares). Or along the enchanting Bega River. Two reasons why this city was named a European City of Culture in 2023.

Now our outdoor times were on hold for two weeks. And Rebecca would have to lug heavier shopping bags back from Kaufland’s and the market. You get the picture.

Fortunately, our apartment had two bedrooms and two bathrooms. Below is the main bedroom. Look closely, and you can see the top mattress was misshapen.

That’s because we laid two twin mattresses from the other bedroom onto the queen mattress, which was too hard. Below was the additional bedroom sans mattresses.

I know what you are thinking. No, Rebecca didn’t make me sleep on the slats. Nor did he send me to a hotel.

What we did

The Romanian government took COVID seriously. My students told me stories of how the Timișoara police would contact each positive-test person. A squad car would stop by daily, expecting the sick person to wave from the window. So I couldn’t cheat.

My symptoms were fever, fatigue, congestion, and loss of smell. Our apartment refrigerator offered the perfect smell test. We had tried everything to get rid of its odor. I poked my head into it the day I was diagnosed. Nothing. Eerie.

Later that day, I pulled my side’s twin mattress into the spare bedroom for my two week sentence.

Rebecca’s anger was clean, pure, and short-lived. It’s always been that way. At our little dinner table, we sat across from each other that first evening. Six feet apart.

She spoke, and I listened.

The next day, for lunch, she walked to a restaurant she had wanted to try, enjoyed a noon-time glass of wine, and wandered around Timișoara’s city center.

A prepared for my Saturday online classes.

On the 4th day, my fever died. On the 5th, the refrigerator’s sickening smell was back. Wonderful.

Rebecca shopped at Kaufland’s and the farmer’s market lugging home two heavy bags each time.

On the 14th day, we walked through the city center to one of our favorite restaurants.

I kept expecting one of Timișoara’s finest to put her hand on my shoulder.

We each had our N95s snugly around our noses.

And Rebecca never got COVID.

No thanks to me.

*

When I was growing up in the 1950s, my friends Timmy and Tommy lived next door. One summer day, we were in their kitchen. Their mom was at work.

Timmy pulled open a drawer packed with candy bars. This was the first time I had seen anything like it. A kid’s dream comes true. There were Snickers, Milky Ways, Three Musketeers, and Baby Ruths. These guys, I thought as I walked through their backyard back to my house, could eat a candy bar anytime they wanted. My mom met me at the back door and reminded me it was a yard work day on Thursday.

And took away my Snickers. But didn’t find my Baby Ruth.

After Sunday Mass, sans my agnostic father, my family always went to Iowana Dairy for ice cream lunches. Our family of five would sit at the counter, each ordering an ice cream Sundae, Malt or Shake, or Banana Split.

What does ice cream mean to me today?

Controlled indulgence.

Aristotle’s Golden Mean.

*

Three days ago I wrote a letter to the local newspaper. I was proud of the message. It described my feelings and thinking about a town controversy. This dispatch could play a small part in moving decision-makers toward the right outcome. But should I send it to the editor?

Because I mentioned a friend by name in the letter, I sent him a copy asking whether it was OK to make it public. A day later, I received his reply. He thanked me for being sensitive to his position, stated that I did not need his permission to publish the letter, and asked if we could discuss the pros and cons of this act. Here is my reply.

I’ve thought more and decided I don’t want to write anything public regarding this situation. It’s always good to let time pass. I can’t add anything other than my frustration. That’s heat and not light.

Too often, I’m more of a heat than a light person. My decisions can come before the thoughtful part of my brain has time to kick in. I imperfectly manage this tendency by building pauses into my life. Asking my friend for permission to publish a letter that refers to a decision he made in a positive light was not only the right thing. It gave my brain time to reflect. This pause habit came from an unusual source.

I ran the men’s and women’s basketball shot clock for the local college for 20 years. Basketball rules require teams to launch a shot within 30 seconds each time they possess the ball. In the photo above, the shot clock shows eight seconds.

Shot clock officials sit at a table on the sideline halfway between the two basketball hoops. The shot clock is reset with a click of their index fingers. In my first season, I clicked the reset button too fast. That’s easy to do when the ball is tipped around close to the basket. During that first season, one referee gave me this invaluable piece of advice: when in doubt, pause for one second by saying, “One hundred one.”

Accordingly, asking my friend for permission came from this count one-hundred-one mantra. When I pause, I give the frontal lobe part of my brain time to work its magic. It’s the thinking part of the brain, weighing pros and cons. Of course, designating part of the brain as thinking needs to be more complex. For a clear explanation of how the human brain blends thought and emotion, read Social Psychologist Jonathan Haidt’s The Happiness Hypothesis.

Here’s a way I visualize this pause process. The photo below shows the water filter under our kitchen sink.

The unfiltered water representing all the world throws at me each day comes into the filter through the hose on the left. The filter, my pause strategy, cleans out the contaminants or decisions made in haste. The clean water, more thoughtful decisions, are sent through the top hose into a faucet.

The shot clock metaphor and water filter image help cue me to manage my propensity to act too quickly.

Those around my age of 73 might remember the Coca-Cola ad, “The Pause that Refreshes.” The pause that enlightens me has been added to my mental arsenal.

We all need strategies to respond to those vexing situations life confronts us with daily. Haidt defines emotional intelligence as the “ability to understand and regulate one’s feelings and desires.”

The shot clock and water filter have helped my emotional IQ tick upward a point or two.

When it’s directed at me, not so much.

*

Yesterday, when I was old, a lady held my hand.

I had come in from the cold.

She noticed my white hands.

Raynaud’s Syndrome.

Her hands wrapped my left hand.

Startled, I wanted to pull away.

My armor penetrated.

Excuses: I’m OK. Raynaud’s is mild. The room will warm me up.

I gently pulled my hand.

She released.

I don’t need your kindness, unsaid.

It’s funny

I had just come from my weekly two hours at the Food Pantry.

Where I wrapped my arms around boxes of beef.

To this protest room.

Where my new friend and I joined thirty others speaking for roadside vegetation.

With our hands wrapped around signs.

Kindness aimed at others is excellent.

When I’m the target?

Perhaps I’m old enough to be young again.

*

The most famous athlete in America today may be Caitlin Clark, who plays basketball for the University of Iowa.

Two days ago, she made the front page of The Washington Post. You’ll be able to read the article here.

When I graduated high school in 1967, my female classmates had no organized sports teams.

I don’t recall ever thinking there was anything wrong with that.

What we didn’t see then that seems so obvious now is incredible.

I was born in 1949.

That America was a different country than the one I live in today.

Jackie Robinson became America’s most famous athlete two years before my birth.

Last year, Aliyah Boston, the Naismith Women’s College Basketball Player of the Year, led South Carolina to the national championship.

Fifty years after the first African American was admitted to The University of South Carolina.

Clark’s Iowa and Boston’s South Carolina meet tonight in a semifinal, with the winner advancing to the national championship game.

You can read here an article that compares these two phenomenal American athletes.

*

I grew up with the phrase America was the land of opportunity.

It was not a lie for me, a white, male, middle-class kid.

But it was for Caitlin Clarks and Aliyah Bostons of mine and previous generations.

For this story, I focused on one corner of American athletics.

The images of those included tell a story of how America has improved.

Truer to its ideals.

A story of progress.

Pick any facet of American society and conjure images of those on the inside.

Those images shout a similar story.

*

But nothing good comes without a cost.

When new people show up, they make new demands.

The best statement about this phenomenon comes from Jennifer Richeson, a Yale psychologist.

My lab is in an old engineering building and there’s exactly one women’s bathroom. No one noticed. And then slowly, Yale began adding women to the department, and they noticed it. They complained. Now there was friction. What had gone unnoticed by those in power in one era was unacceptable to those gaining power in another. When new people show up, they notice things and begin making demands.

From Ezra Klein’s Why We’re Polarized

The United States Women’s National Soccer Team has just won a demand for equal pay. You’ll be able to read about it here.

Alex Morgan, a captain on the 2015 & 2019 Women’s World Cup championship teams, said this about the settlement.

What we set out to do was to have acknowledgment of discrimination from U.S. Soccer and we received that through back pay in the settlement. We set out to have fair and equal treatment in working conditions, and we got that…And we set out to have equal pay moving forward for us and the men’s team through U.S. Soccer, and we achieved that.

Andrew Das, U.S. Soccer and Women’s Players Agree to settle equal pay lawsuit, Washington Post, May 18, 2022

But it looks years.

And struggle.

America was easy to run when only white males were in charge.

No one with power gives it up easily.

New voices with power make everything so much more complicated.

England’s George III would sympathize.

“Come on baby light my fire”

*

“OK, Boomer.”

I hear you, my Generation X, Z, and Millennial friends.

But the title and subtitle came unbidden.

That’s what The Sixties did to us.

So

Give me a break, as Albert Hammond so jarringly inserted into It Never Rains in California that I remember it 53 years later.

When I took this photo three nights ago, I wanted to capture the full moon set behind the tree branches and wispy clouds.

The photo itself uncovered an array of light.

But no moon.

Bummer.

Without warning or Spotify, my brain delivered

Ghosts from The Sixties.

A different array.

*

Creedence Clearwater Revival’s 1969’s Bad Moon Rising.

Judy Collins’ 1967’s Both Sides Now.

The Doors’ 1966’s Light My Fire.

After that playlist, a bit of poetry.

Timothy Leary’s mid-60s countercultural command to “turn on, tune in, drop out.”

*

Groovy?

Not really.

More like

Far out.

After all

It was a beautiful moon.

Judy admits she didn’t know clouds.

The Doors made the teenage me nervous.

Because I was too square to fit into Leary’s round hole.

Please,

Help me,

If you can.

*

Dig it.

Peace Brother Peace.

*

I should have seen it coming.

But my brain, mouth, and stomach were frozen on The Chocolate Malt.

Whitey’s Malts obligated Capital Letters.

And a gold star.

Unlike Dairy Queen’s upside-down performance of its blizzards, Whitey’s malt masters needed no tomfoolery.

The Culver’s Concrete Mixer? Truth in advertising.

At every Whitey’s, the customer witnessed this behind-the-counter miracle.

After scooping the ice cream into the metal-topped paper container, the teenage artisan pumped once at the chocolate station; and caressed the vessel onto the agitator. No milk was added.

Strong hands maneuvered to the perfect spot before flipping the start button. There were five seconds of turbulence before the first pause. More ice cream was layered in. Further grinding was required until the torment ended. The receptacle was placed on the counter. You’ve already paid.

A stand-at-attention straw and spoon handle awaited.

I’ve been quaffing Whitey’s Malts for 50 years and have never understood the straw. Why is it there?

It’s Ed McMahon to Johnny Carson.

Mr. Green Jeans to Captain Kangaroo.

A sidekick, but not necessary.

The thought of a Whitey’s Chocolate Malt ignited my hippocampus.

Distant memories overwhelm thought.

Mom, dad, my brothers Peter and Pat. 1950s Sunday lunches at the Iowana Farms Dairy in Bettendorf, Iowa. Under the Memorial Bridge.

Where we ate the Silver Star Chocolate Malt.

But back to the then present.

We turned off Highway 61 into the familiar parking lot.

*

It was February 2015.

I’m driving; Rebecca’s shotgun.

We’d been on the road for three hours.

Lunchtime.

The van passengers were five Luther College students.

The destination was Bloomington, Illinois, where the students would present papers at a Human Rights conference hosted by Illinois Wesleyan University.

I volunteered to chaperone because my hometown, Davenport, Iowa, was halfway between Decorah and Bloomington.

I had four Whitey’s to choose from as we motored through the Quad Cities, three in Davenport and one in Moline, Illinois.

I selected Davenport’s 53rd street location because, after ice cream, we could detour past my childhood home.

“We’re finally here,” I announced as I navigated the van toward nirvana. You can see our view from this photo.

The students came alive

Sans earbuds, books, and sleep.

*

The barrage hit Rebecca and me full force.

I don’t believe it.

It’s 2015.

Whitey’s, seriously?

Oh my God

How could they name it Whitey’s?

Rebecca and I looked at each other, dumbfounded, for a moment.

I explained the Whitey’s name came from the original owner, who was nicknamed Whitey, because of his blond hair. When he sold the business in the 1950s, the new owners kept the well-known name,

I thought about telling my young friends about my dad’s favorite gas station, Whitey’s Standard Oil. Or my favorite childhood baseball pitcher, Whitey Ford.

But I’ve learned when to fold with college students.

They listened politely.

And eased into the Subway next door.

I could have told them of my high school homecoming date at the most famous 1960s Quad City restaurant.

The Plantation.

But I didn’t.

I had a Chocolate Malt to help me.

Think.

Or…

*

America’s Constitution requires two qualifications for America’s president: age 35 and being born an American citizen.

It also prohibits any religious test for public office.

*

Was James Buchanan too unmarried?

Was Abraham Lincoln too unchurched?

Was Teddy Roosevelt too young?

Was Franklin Roosevelt too disabled?

Was Harry Truman too uneducated?

Was Dwight Eisenhower too martial?

Was John Kennedy too Catholic?

Was Jimmy Carter too born again?

Was Bernie Sanders, Michael Bennet, Marianne Williamson, Tom Steyer, and Michael Bloomberg (Democratic Party Candidates in 2020) too Jewish?

Was Mitt Romney too Mormon?

Was Barack Obama too Black or not Black enough?

Is Cabinet Member Pete Buttigieg too: gay, married, and fatherly?

Is Vice President Kamala Harris too: female, Black, Asian, and childless?

Is candidate Nikki Haley too Indian?

*

Is President Biden too Irish?

Catholic?

Old?

And neither was Donald Trump.

Happy President’s Day.

The view from my writing chair

While Mac is updating, I’m thinking.

And jotting ideas in a Moleskine, 5″ X 8.25″ ruled/lined, black 240-page notebook

Using a Pilot Precise V5 pen.

If you could read the Bose Radio clock, it would say 4:35 AM.

I’m usually up at 4 AM.

Rebecca follows a few hours later.

That’s her Scandinavian Stressless Recliner you see. She selected white.

My choice was grey.

Those silver Bose headphones on the ottoman are Rebecca’s.

Mine are black.

I’m a lifelong Democrat.

She’s independent.

I was raised Catholic.

Rebecca, Protestant.

From beginning to end, our days are filled with particularities.

Our own and those of others.

It is the peculiarity that makes each of us unique.

And gives us a particular perspective.

Also unique but limited.

*

One of my favorite movies is Miracle. It is the story of America’s 1980 men’s Olympic Hockey Team that defeated the heavily favored Soviet Union Team. Every time I see this film, I cheer again for my side and this miracle victory.

I just watched Of Miracles and Men. This film tells the story of that Soviet Team and another kind of miracle.

Two teams, two films, two miracles, and two perspectives.

I know the story of The Crusades from European and Roman Catholic perspectives.

Two weeks ago, at London’s Tate Modern Museum, I saw an art display by Wael Shawky that enlightened me with an Arab Historian’s perspective on The Crusades.

*

My world is big enough to include your point of view.

What a dull world it would be if all I could see was me.

I know where it came from

My week has been bursting with gifts.

My knowledge bowl is running over.

Tuesday

“It was magic realism, with an All-American twist.”

Enlightened Susan to 35 of us gallery-arraigned on a Zoom link.

Our book club was reading Leif Enger’s Peace Like a River.

Wednesday

“Draw the lines you see in this painting.”

Coached Bob at 20 of us sitting at desks in the darkened room.

The Life Long Learning class was American Scene Painting: From Ashcan School to Abstract Expressionism.

Thursday

“Neither Luther nor Bach was a good student. That’s why they became great teachers.”

Edified Jim for 15 of us sitting comfortably in cushioned chairs.

The Emeritus lecture was The Luther–Bach Nexus.

Early Friday morning

In a dream, I’m preparing to defend my Ph.D. dissertation.

It is my second Ph.D.

I ask myself, do I need a second Ph.D.?

A heap of papers lies before me.

On the first sheet, words were crossed out in red.

I flip to the second page and scratch out and replace words.

And wake-up.

*

This week I learned

Magic realism includes a miracle element in an earthy story.

Painters don’t look at lines. They focus on the mass inside the lines.

Theologian Luther wanted to be a musician. Musician Bach yearned to be a theologian.

But choo choo ing down the track after these experiences came that second Ph.D. dream.

What was I teaching myself?

Dreams sometimes begin an internal conversation.

Until I went to graduate school at 27, I had never been a serious student.

When I became a teacher at 22, I thought it was only because I needed a 5th year of college to stay out of the Vietnam war draft. I used the extra year to get a teaching degree.

Then, I thought I was making it up as I went along.

Now, I think I was born to want to know.

It was a gift from my parents.

My mother’s parents–her mom graduated from high school and her father from the 8th grade–put their four children (Florence, June, Dorothy, and Albert) through college in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

My father was the only one of four siblings and parents to graduate from college.

I believe there is often a first cause, a simple answer to why.

My comfort, no, my need to extend my arms for knowledge, is my parents’ greatest gift to me.

A gift that keeps giving.