Gypsies

The Romanis parked their home, a twisted bit of rolling metal, garish enough to make a Pakistani taxi look austere, right on the coal mine property.  While there were hundreds of acres of land unencumbered with buildings or derelict heavy equipment or the geometric multitudes of conveyors that looked put together by M.C. Escher, they chose to park inside the sharpest part of the angle where one of the coal belts, with a walkway running its length, met the ground.  They had gone up the walkway a bit and hung laundry.  An antenna of sorts, made of snapped-off aerials from cars, pieces of wire, stripped at the ends and lashed to a length of stick, a fencing foil, pieces of other metal, all taped together, end to end, metal touching metal, rose high above the caravan and attached to the structure above them.

They had a gasoline generator that only ran for one purpose: television.  Otherwise, it was cook-fires, candles and washtubs.  The little television, whose screen could be completely covered by a Cinnabon, was always watched outside by the fire ring where they had stumps of wood for seats.  By night, you could see its blue glow on the congregated faces of the entire family sitting before it.  By day, you could hear the faint strains of “Come on down, you’re the next contestant…,” wafting through the air while the family went about the day-consuming chores of sustenance living.  Except for Mama Romani: she was always glued to the set when “The Price is Right” came on and it is said that she knew the prices of 83% of the featured items to within pennies.  And she could not understand why Bob Barker has not yet ousted “the Bradley Peet” as the sexiest man in the world.

The Romanis were gypsies.  They were gypsies in every way but in their hearts.  The mistrust of gadje (non-gypsies) was in their DNA, so was the call of the road and the feeling of entitlement to live off the ignorance and naiveté of others.  But the Romanis had a secret they could not share with other gypsies, friend or family.  To wit: they wanted to own major appliances and vote Republican.  I don’t think they knew a whit about the Republican Party but it was just part of the persona of 21^st century Americans they wanted to embody.

They wanted to take possession of a refrigerator half the size of their caravan (or non-recreational vehicle) after a Barbie-doll model had whiffed the air around it with the grace of the hands of Michelangelo.  They wanted to read the newspaper over bagel schmears and complain about the reception of their cell phones while waiting in line at Starbucks.  They wanted to be able to like the watery beer that American men drank to make them attractive to American women.

They wanted it all, everything they saw on the television.  And they knew that happiness would be theirs, if only the father, Hanzi, could push himself past the brink and get on the grid.

Oh.  Yeah.  And they had a bear.  A dancing bear.

Earthquakes, Tornadoes and Hurricanes (oh my) - An excerpt from Grand Duchy

I don’t pay much attention to news about hurricanes.  Southern Illinois is about as landlocked as a place can be in the United States.  We have the threat and reality of natural disasters here in the forms of tornados and earthquakes.  I’ve been in both.  An earthquake is over by the time you know what it is.  Or at least that’s been my experience.  A tornado is scary, to be sure, as everyone knows from The Wizard of Oz.  But the scariest part of a tornado, to me anyway, is its random nature.  A house might be completely obliterated while the folks next door are untouched.

But a hurricane seems to be another thing entirely.  Compared to an earthquake or tornado, it’s a fairly predictable event with oodles of time to react, board windows and even evacuate.  But many people don’t evacuate; they stay and ride it out.  This is most confusing to us Heartlanders.  Most of us think: “What is WRONG with you?  Get your hat and GO!”  For those that do not leave, we seem to have little empathy.

The empathy tied to natural disasters or any desperate condition, I believe, depends on the source of the catastrophe or malady.  If the cause is perceived to be a random act of destruction from God, people seem to bind closely and quickly to the victims.  However, in other cases, most folks appear to believe that people get what they deserve, for example: AIDS or poverty or homelessness.  “Can’t help those folks, they brought it on themselves.”  Or they, at least, failed to prevent it, whatever “it” is.

Hurricanes, then, are a quandary for the landlocked, I think.  Yes, Mother Nature, or God, is throwing one bitchin’ hissy fit, for certain.  But there’s warning that it’s coming.  And, well, what are you doing living next to water like that, anyway?  You think you’re better than us?  Oooh, sexy beach people with tans and edible seafood!

Some hearts soften once pictures of the suffering and devastation become available and some people mobilize to help.  But many just gawk and email the pictures around and marvel at the awfulness of it.

And while people are basically good, in my view, they have an incredibly shallow focus and attention span.  Once the news shows help arriving or a little time has passed, people go back to their own lives of struggle.  There is an expectation that people dispossessed or dislocated or distressed will get the help they need from others.  Right?  So, Sean Penn or Brad Pitt shows up, throw a few sandbags and people let their minds rest easy, all is well!

Fletcher’s aunt was in New Orleans in August, 2005 when devastation came ashore.  Hurricane Katrina took her life away, needlessly, and it was Hurricane Katrina that broke Fletcher’s heart and soul.  It was the final nail in the coffin of the United States of America that he knew.  His country was dead to him.

Once, when I had not been at the Duchy long, I overheard Fletcher say this: “The sun no longer casts a familiar shadow to the people of New Orleans.”

Lady Liberty (an exerpt from Grand Duchy)

A group of Frenchmen were gathered together one summer night in 1865, probably eating cheese, in a suburb of Paris.  They discussed their admiration for American independence, democracy and their struggle to preserve a country bitterly divided on the issue of slavery.  It was postulated and agreed upon that France would craft a gift, a really big gift, to commemorate the centennial of America’s freedom.  I bet someone said, “Splendid!”  I hate that.

However, raising the money for the gift was not easy, to say the least, and the French didn’t start the effort until 1875.  It was slow going and became evident that the gift would not be completed in time for the 1876 centennial. 

By 1876 they had enough money for a hand (and torch!).  They sent the hand (and torch!) on tour and it alone was present at the Philadelphia World’s Fair that centennial year.  One less couth than I might say that France had, at that point, given us a hand job.

They displayed the head of Miss Liberty, only, at the 1878 Paris Exposition.  Feel free to insert your own joke here.

By 1880, the final stage was being constructed.  The copper sheets were riveted into place, starting with the big toe on the left foot.  They had to start somewhere and, understanding that we’re talking about the French, the left, big toe was a welcome choice.

The framework necessary to support such a statue was a challenge in itself and no less than Gustave Eiffel was given the task.  (Yes, him!)  But his famed Tower was not completed until many years later, at the 1889 Paris Exposition.  Until then, Gustave had his hands full with the underthings of a very large lady.  Most Frenchmen have such experience.There was still a problem: though the statue was completed, in France, in the summer of 1884, America still lacked a place to put it.

At the risk of sounding ungrateful, who gives a statue – a monumental statue, I might add, at 151 feet tall and 225 tons - and not something to set it on?

Was it an oversight on the part of the French? 

“Oh, Gustave, eet ees so beautiful, set eet up so I can see how she will look.  Oh. Oh no!  Reely?  Oh, well, maybee zhey weel not notice.”

Or was it some kind of sniggering joke?

“Oh, America, you are vehree welcome.  We weel come over to see eet next week.  We cannot wait to see eet in place.  Snigger.” 

American enthusiasm in regard to the gift was underwhelming.  After all, it would be a French statue and many people didn’t think we needed a statue from France, even for free, thank you very much.  Though the US Congress voted and approved the acceptance of the gift, they would not appropriate any money to the enterprise.  Neither did the state of New York.  Neither did the city of New York.

That pissed off one Joseph Pulitzer!  Or he saw an opportunity for self-promotion.  Or both.  He had, not long before, assumed the role as publisher for the newspaper, New York World, and he used the paper to launch a campaign to raise the money needed for a pedestal.  After two months of nearly constant haranguing his readers, the effort had netted a total of $135.75. 

Okay, now Joseph Pulitzer was really pissed!  Not being a quitter, he renewed his efforts two years later.  By that time the New York World circulation was over 100,000 and, thinking he had the readership needed, he again used the paper to address the subject.  Day after day he would plead for readers to send in what money they could.  No amount was too small, said he, and every contributor, regardless of the size of their contribution, would be mentioned in the paper. "The statue is not a gift from the millionaires of France to the millionaires of America," he wrote, "but a gift of the whole people of France to the whole people of America. Take this appeal to yourself personally."  That time, contributions came in from 2,535 people and totaled $2,359.67.

Joseph Pulitzer was double-dog pissed!  Oh, boy was he pissed! 

However, when he announced that the statue was completed, dismantled, loaded on a ship and making its way to us, the enthusiasm began to build.  In a couple of months, $50,000 had been received, enough to begin work on the pedestal.  That amount, however, was a fourth of what would be required to finish the work.

Then the makers of the laxative, Castoria, came forward and offered to kick in $25,000 toward the project if just one little condition was met.  To wit: the makers would be allowed, for a period of one year, to place the word “Castoria” across the pedestal.  The offer was declined.  Can you imagine? 

With the late start, the pedestal was not completed until April, 1886.  The statue, at that point, had been in New York, in crates, for nearly a year.

Once the pedestal was finished, the re-construction of the statue was accomplished in just four months.  And, thus, the gift was dedicated in 1886 by President Grover Cleveland – a full 10 years later than the original plan.  And it was later still, 1903, that Ms. Lazarus’ poem made its way to the plaque at the base of the work.  So, the poem’s call to the world’s masses was not the catalyst of the great migration.  By the time it was written, auctioned and put in place, the human floodgates had already been opened.  It was sort of like sending a party invitation to someone two weeks after they had crashed it. 

America, Fletcher said, was formed to be separate from other control or rule.  There was no call to the world’s masses in the Declaration of Independence.  Its purpose was to disengage from the powers that had controlled them.  Only.  It was later that the swell of humanity saw America as a do-over and rushed to join the party.  It was later, still, that Ms. Lazarus penned her poem and, by that time, she wrote of the migration that had been already witnessed.  It was simply not an issue in the Revolution.  There was enough to be done in forming a representative government, without a nearly-Biblical influx of people. 

Throughout my time at the Duchy Fletcher stressed, with great passion, that his actions were, too, of separation, not to become a safe port for those suffering from infinite varieties of personal storms.  But he learned that the world is full of disenfranchised, broken souls in search of some new Colossus to stand guard and protect them while they healed from the wounds of this world.