Our Creche

This is our creche -- proudly taking center stage in Waller household Christmas decor since 1982. 

Now, this may surprise those of you who know that I am not a Christian. Raised in a proper Christian home by a Methodist mother and a father raised in a devout, nominally Baptist home under direction of a skeptical mother who could swear like a cavalry trooper and a YMCA Secretary father, "Secretary" being the title for what you would call CEO. 

I absorbed and accepted the ethical and moral precepts of Christianity with one glaring exception: I cannot affirm a belief in the Apostle's Creed, that essential statement of Christian belief adopted by Charlemagne in early 9thC -- an affirmation that God exists, that Jesus was bodily resurrected after three days in the tomb, and risen, he shares with God responsibility for the universe. Bodily, physical resurrection? No, not I. And when it comes to God, I am an agnostic. I cannot profess belief in God, especially an interceding God; I simply don't know. And for me to affirm belief in resurrection would be dishonest. 

Millions of Christians, I am sure, share my disbeliefs. Many accept the hypocrisy; as a Sicilian might say, futtatini, fogedaboudit. Many Christians take refuge in a rationalization that the words are symbolic, not literal. That sophistry won't wash with me. The Cardinals of the 5thC and 6thC Gallic churches who developed the creed believed the words literally. Those early Christians who pegged their membership in the brotherhood of Christ to the Creed, espoused its literal truth, The oath they were taking when reciting the Apostle's Creed was binding acceptance. So, I cannot be a Christian.

Perhaps, I am Christian in form but not in substance. But, if not a Christian, why the creche? Well, first it's part of a comforting tradition; we're used to embracing it in the usual story of Christmas. Second, this creche has some special meaning for my family, which I'll tell you about. Third, it suggests some important truths about the life of Jesus of Nazareth, and about the Gospels. And last, it gives us some clues about the birth of Jesus, the Nazarene. 

The first point -- a comfortable, familiar part of Christmas -- is self-evident. Let's move on: our Creche.

In 1981, after 23 years with General Mills, I was recruited to join Marriott as Senior Vice-President of Sales and Marketing, We moved from Minneapolis to Bethesda, MD. That first year was very stressful, very intense; lots of travel, lots of difficulty explaining to my peers and my employees what I was up to as I strove to transform a  transactional, sales culture into a marketing and customer service culture. 

My wife, Barbara, was seven years along her journey, our journey, from alcohol dependency to sobriety and self-development. The damage her illness inflicted on the family was evident in our lack of confidence and in the kids' inability to engage with new people and new situations. And our relationship, hers and mine, was slowly developing but in a new and uncomfortable way. 

As we entered fall of 1982, I conceived a Christmas trip to a destination in which we could relax and enjoy one another away from ties to parents and old acquaintances, to build a new experience and new memories. I wanted to avoid a Marriott resort and the gossip it would inspire, but it was getting late for access elsewhere. My secretary told me Bill Marriott had a casita con servicio at Las Brisas and would rent it out when not in use. I checked with my friend, head of Marriott's HR; he assured me there would be no reputational repercussions about my renting the chief's get-away, and so in mid-December off we went to Acapulco.

Christmas in Mexico: we learned trees were sold in the market, mainly to ex-pats at exorbitant prices, but what about decorations? We gathered candles, flowers, and banners that proclaimed “¡Feliz Navidad" y "Próspero Año Nuevo!”

One afternoon before Christmas Day, Barbara came home with a Mexican creche featuring a black-eyed, dark-haired, brown-skinned Holy Family. We were charmed, and for the next 43 years they have taken center stage. And now it all takes on new meanings, given J D Vance's neo-Catholic genuflecting before a white, blonde, blue-eyed Mary thoroughly vetted and approved by Steve Miller.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I love our creche for its story, undoubtedly false, but with important hints about and links to historic truths. The author(s) of The Book of Mathew had to invent an apocryphal census ordered by Caesar Augustus with a mandate that families had to register at the original home of the male head of household -- Mary on an Ass and no room at the inn and all that -- in order to get Joseph and Mary to Bethlehem to fulfill Micah's prophecy that the Messiah would be born in the city of David i.e., in Bethlehem. The Book of Matthew is clearly aimed at a Jewish audience and argues that Jesus is indeed the Messiah, the Christ for which they wait. Apocryphal? There is no record, no mention in Roman or Greek chronicles of such a census, Not a trace of what would have been a pivotal event in the history of Rome's sponsorship of Herod's reign over Judea and Galilee.

Another link to probable truth: the Three Wise Guys following a star in the East. This is the best clue we have to date the birth of Jesus. A helical rising of Jupiter, i.e., a rising of a celestial body in the pre-dawn East illuminated by the sun which is still below the the horizon. This one in mid-august of 3BCE, a beaut because Jupiter was in conjunction, that is, lined up with, Regulus, the brightest star in the Constellation of Leo and at 1.4, one of the brightest stars in the night sky. Out in the desert, with the planet and star blazing away in the pre-dawn sky, this would have been impossible to ignore. Coming as it did in the Constellation of Leo, court astrologers would have said it foretold a royal birth, the birth of a King. Greek, Roman, Sumerian, and Babylonian astrologers all related Leo with royal, kingly qualities. Given Herod's tenuous hold on power and, as the scribes tell us, his paranoia, it seems to me perfectly believable that he would send counsellors to investigate (brown-skinned, semitic counsellors, as in our creche.) Ergo, the three Magi, whom we have come to call Gaspar, Balthazar, and Melchior (they are not named in the Bible.)  The celestial conjunction recures, of course, a pattern of every 71 years, then in 12; it recurred in 1873 and 1885; 1956, and 1968. The next recurrence will be in 2039. But I don't expect to be here for that one, either.

Our creche is special. You can see why. Its simple peacefulness, its balance and hand-crafted beauty, its meaningfulness make it magical. When I go, where will it go? Who will be its caretaker, its custodian for Wallers/Stoners/Janes-Wallers/Janes yet to come? Someone will, for our creche is treasured and growing more so every year.

 

A Voice to Heed

These times call for new leaders . . .

, , , at least of the opposition and, ultimately, of the nation. We are faced with faltering faith in democratic republicanism, in ethical leadership, in fairness and equity of capitalism, in the relevance of the Constitution, in expertise, in compromise and community , , , I could go on and on.

I recommend to you one voice to heed, one person who offers executive capability; an ethical rudder; a determination to collaborate and to cooperate, to develop consensus; and a proven track-record of having done so.

I am recommending you take a long and thoughtful look at Senator Cory Booker as potential  Senate Majority (or Minority) Leader and as prospective President of these disunited States of America.

Booker is smart and broadly educated, with a BA in political science and a MA in Sociology from Stanford (where he started at tight end for the Cardinals), with a Fulbright and a year at Oxford studying history, followed by a JD from Yale Law School.

He entered politics and was elected mayor of Newark, NJ, no simple undertaking. Crime, poverty, unemployment, and failing schools had earned Newark membership in America's FUCC, the Failed Urban Cities Club. Over his seven years as Mayor, Booker rebuilt civic pride, reduced crime, straightened out and instituted reforms in the Newark school system which increased student attainment scores, and increased affordable housing stock through zoning revisions, incentives, and collaboration with the Chamber of Commerce and the real estate industry. Booker knows, as only do mayors and governors, how things really work and how to make them work better.

Booker was elected to the Senate in 2013 where he has concentrated on economic equity, health care access, and criminal justice reform. He and Chuck Grassley -- there's an unlikely partnership! -- authored and lobbied for the First Step Act, the first major reform of criminal justice in decades. It was signed into law at the end of 2018 by then President Donald J. Trump.

Courage and honor? In April this year, Booker delivered a 25-hour filibuster in opposition to Trump's policies cutting Medicaid access, impeding voting rights, relaxing police accountability, and revising criminal justice measures. That it is the longest speech in Senate history is interesting, but it is his expression of ethical, powerful, and reasonable pragmatism that really counts.

In all Booker has done and does, his preference for pragmatic problem solving over politics, his strong ethical rudder, his commitment to community and his skill at building coalitions make his a voice to heed and his leadership to be sought.  

I recommend to you Sen. and Mrs. Cory Booker

A Suggestion to President Trump

Every member of the committee which will award the Nobel Peace Prize is Norwegian, appointed by the Stormont, Norway's parliament. Norway is a founding and active member of NATO. They share with Sweden, which just joined NATO after years of standing aside, growing alarm about Russia's sabotage and disinformation campaigns, submarine intrusions into national waters, and air space violations.

If you so hunger, Mr President, to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, would it not be prudent to be seen as an even-handed mediator, a conciliator favoring neither one side nor the other? Whether so or not so, you are increasingly believed to be catering to Putin's wishes. Is not your claim to be seeking to broker a just peace weakened by use of a Manhattan real estate developer to negotiate, one who appears to seek accommodating Putin and who coaches Russian counterpoints on how to win points with you?

Is this the way to impress the Norwegians, to be regarded as helping find a settlement that awards and encourages Russion aggression? 

Autumn Leaves

A couple of weeks ago, before the onset of our steady November rains, I lay abed one morning idly staring out our window wall into the back yard. (Until recently, I awoke and the feet hit the floor. Now, suddenly, I can laze about in bed for ten minutes or so. Must be that the trazadone Doc has prescribed to help me get to sleep is working its pharma-magic but on the other end of the night.)

Anyway, the oranges of the big leaf maples, the umber Japanese snowdrop leaves, the brilliant reds (I’m told) of the Japanese maples were drifting down in a gentle breeze from the south. Of course, Johnny Mercer’s Autumn Leaves became my ear worm for the day.

(I’d best explain that “I’m told.” I am partially color blind. I see oranges and yellows – at least my version of them: I have no idea what you see. But for reds and greens, they just don’t register. This time of year, Ann will call out some apparently vivid red which I don’t see. She gets mad at me: “Of course you do; you’re just saying that!” Now, if I had lung cancer or a broken leg would she get angry? But my inability to share in her joy of color enrages her. I don’t get it.)

I asked Co-Pilot to help me trace the evolution of the song. I knew it was originally French; Yves Montand, Edith Piaf, and Juliette Greco among others made it a favorite from 1947 on. The French original, a poem by Jacques Pre'vert set to music by Joseph Kosma entitled The Dead Leaves, Les Feuilles Mortes, is a sad, philosophical lament on the inevitability of loss and death of one's love.

In 1947, Jo Stafford recorded an English version with adapted lyrics by Johnny Mercer. Adapted, not translated. Mercer’s take is more romantic, more focused on longing, nostalgia and sweet memory:

                But I miss you most of all my Darling,

                When autumn leaves start to fall.

I acquaint it with high school, perhaps Jo Stafford's version mixed up with Nat King Cole's; he didn’t record it until 1955, by which time I was either ending junior year or beginning senior year at Hamilton. It was Cole’s recording that set Autumn Leaves into the pantheon of the American Song Book, since recorded by everybody: Miles Davis, Sarah Vaughan, Bill Evans, Frank Sinatra, Chet Baker, Billy Eckstine with Benny Carter, Ella Fitzgerald  and tons more.

Nat King Cole was a phenom. He was topping the charts in ’44 and ’45 (with whites, just as was Jackie Robinson to erase the color line in baseball) and steadily thereafter. Whatever he brought out, sold out. We danced to and necked to Nature Boy (’48), Mona Lisa (’50), and Too Young (’51.) Are you old enough to remember those?

By the time I got to Hamilton College, fall of ’52, the tail-end of the GI Bill vets were gone a year. But they left a legacy at my fraternity (yes, regretfully, I’m one of those) of revering Edith Piaf and of making an annual pilgrimage to Hickory House to hear Mary Lou Williams or Marian McPartland or Dinah Washington. And, of course, Nat King Cole continued to mesmerize us – and our parents.

So, are you still with me? Since watching autumn leaves literally drift past my window the other morning, the song has popped up again and again: “Alexa, play a Bill Evans track, please:” Autumn Leaves, first up. (I always say please to Alexa and to Co-Pilot; my mother taught me to be polite.) Tuning in to KNKX: Autumn Leaves.

Last night, Ann and I attended Seattle Opera’s Recital Series’ presentation of Patricia Sings Piaf featuring Patricia Racette accompanied by pianist Craig Terry. Ann enjoyed it more than did I: for me, Racette’s operatic voice did not quite catch the anguish of the original. But it was a fine evening – and there again, of course: Autumn Leaves. I suppose it’s inevitable in November, but again and again, there it is: the sad, nostalgic longing triggering sweet memories of my own on this, my 92^nd journey around the sun.

 PS I was reading this draft aloud to Ann in the kitchen. Alexa, in the adjacent dining area, must have been eavesdropping. She interrupted my reading to dutifully deliver Bill Evans' Autumn Leaves again.

PPS, four days later: Last night, I was clearing the piano in preparation for Max's and his accompanist's audition tape rehearsal. Atop a pile of Ann's Dad's organ and piano sheet music, there it was again: Autumn Leaves with lyrics in French and English! 

Have You No Shame, Sir, At Last? Have You No Shame?

I echo the famous question “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at last? Have you no sense of decency?” asked of Sen Joe McCarthy by Joseph Welch, counsel for the US Army at the 1954 Army-McCarthy hearings. That marked the turning point of McCarthy's career.

To President Trump, I ask: Have you no shame, sir, at last? Have you no shame?

Yesterday, President Donald J. Trump disgraced himself and the Presidency in his hypocritical remarks at Arlington National Cemetery, put into his mouth by some lackey, perhaps Stephen Miller who prepares many of his speeches. This Draft-Dodger Donald J. Trump, who received in 1968 a 1-Y deferment from his Queens draft board after his fourth student deferment had expired (and later, in ‘72, a re-classification to 4-F) on the basis of his claim to have a letter from a doctor (Podiatrist Larry Braunstein who, it turned out, was a tenant of Fred Trump’s) attesting that Donald J. Trump had bone spurs. Trump later said the bone spurs were “minor” and “cured themselves without treatment.” How convenient. And where is this purported letter?

This is same Donald J. Trump who during the 2017 wreath-laying at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, turned and asked his chief of staff, General John F, Kelly “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?” General Kelly, who rose from enlisted infantryman to four-star General, was renowned for his leadership, presence, and accountability. Kelly was stunned.

This is the same Donald J. Trump who in August of 2018, upon the customary lowering of flags to honor Sen John McCain’s death, stormed “What the fuck are we doing that for? Guy was a fucking loser.”

Yesterday, President Trump indulged in hyperbolic eulogies for “fallen heroes”, who answered their nation’s call, “borne the battles” and “formed ranks of mighty walls of flesh and blood”, “lived through nightmares so that we could live the American Dream” and so on and on. What hypocrisy!

He also broke the law forbidding political use of National Military Cemeteries for political purposes by calling out by name his predecessor and lying about the Biden administration’s management of the VA.

In the past, I have shrugged off Trump’s lies and stupid claims (yesterday’s? That we won WWI) but now he has gone too far – cynical, hypocritical claims of loving, respecting, revering veterans and military service – this from a first order draft-dodger. He has defamed those buried at Arlington; has dishonored men like Gen. Kelly; men like Major General Bill Boice with whom I travelled in Sicily; like close friend USMC Capt. John Meredith, who voluntarily undertook two combat tours in Viet Nam.  Trump has made a mockery of such service. 

At the recent Hegseth meeting of general officers from across the globe, Trump accused them of being soft, of "wokeness", of not being martial. He threatened that if they did not like his directives, they should get out, losing their rank and their retirement. He had previously said, to Kelly, that he "wants generals like Hitler's generals", evidentally totally ignorant of their disdain for Hitler and of Operation Valkyrie's attempt to assassinate him.

Moreover, yesterday at Arlington and Tuesday, a week ago, at the Pentagon, he disgraced himself. 

With his hypocrisy and disdain for selfless service he has besmirched the office of POTUS – and this is unforgiveable. 

Have you no shame, sir, at last? Have you no shame?

 Fletch Waller (SSgt. USAR, 1958 - 1964)

The Middle Eastern Nation I Long to Love

Yesterday, at the Olympic Club, I gave a speech under that title. It was suggested that I post it to give others access to it. This is a blog version of that talk. Which middle eastern nation? I dedicated the talk to Kourosh and Darius, new members of the Club, both Iranian-American.

Yes, it is Iran that I would most like to admire, to visit, to love. But of course, I am not talking about today's Iran, but of the Iran it once was and could become again. Five reasons I long for that new Iran.

First, I long to love Iran because of its Persian Heritage.

We, educated in the Western canon, focused on Greece and its heritage, and most of us don't know of or appreciate what Greece's implacable enemies, the Persians, have given our culture. The first monotheist of which we have records was Zoroaster, founder of what became Persia's state religion, Zoroastrianism. Though dating is fuzzy, he preceded Akhenaton and Abraham in preaching monotheism to polytheistic societies. Zoroastrians also believed in an affirmative evil. To Christians who might ask how a loving God could make a Hitler, a Zoroastrian would answer that there is a competing evil God,  not just an absence of good or demonic possession but an affirmative Evil. Zoroaster also gave us judgement day.

Moreover, Persia gave us civic order by rule of law (at about the same time as did Hammurabi) and in architecture, the arch -- long before Roman engineers came on stage. 

Shiraz, a lush valley surrounded by dry mountains

And man-made oases with gardens and water features, not for supply, but in which to relax and fuel the soul with beauty.

Eram Garden, Shiraz

Second, because of its modernity

Until the advent of Fundamentalists Khomeini and his son Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran had a middle class -- now battered and impoverished, caught between Iran’s fundamentalists and our hostility and sanctions -- but still aspiring to middle class lives.. Before the theocracy, Iran had a representative parliamentary system; Iranians know how to run elections. For the first 3/4 of the 20thC, Iranian women enjoyed access to education, workforce participation, the professions, and had legal rights of property and independence. Under Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi, Sharia law was suppressed. Iran increasingly urbanized.  True, the Shahs Pahlavi, father and son, had autocratic powers over the legislature. None-the-less, Iran's economic, social, and political structures had much ours could relate to and work with. Iran has experienced more modernity than its neighbor Islamic states.

Third, because it’s Shia, not Sunni

This may strike some of you as prejudice, but reflect with me:                        

• Of the 19 airliner hijackers who attacked America on 9/11, all 19 were Sunni.
• Sunnis appear to grow radicals: ISIS, Al Qaida, The Islamic Brotherhood, the Taliban, Boko Haram, al-Shabaab, Salafi Jihadism, etc.: all Sunni. Yes, theocratic Iran sponsors Hezbollah, the Houthi, and Hamas as instruments of state policy, but they don't have such a track record as have the Sunni of home-grown terror movements. 
• Traditionally, Shia have shown more tolerance of non-Muslims than have Sunni though Khomeini changed that for the worse.
• There is no in-grained history of animosity to the US until the modern era of oil politics. British Intelligence with CIA aid and encouragement changed that in 1953 by deposing democratically elected Prime Minister Mossadegh because he moved to nationalize Anglo-Iranian Oil (now known as BP.) By contrast, prickly Sunni governments, especially the Saudi Wahabis, have long resented US interference and presence in the region.

Fourth, I'd love to love Iran for the sake of my old friends – i.e., my 13^th & 14thC friends, the great medieval Persian poets.

Persia was polylingual: Arabic was the language of theology; Turkish, the language of administration; and Persian, the language of poetry. Persians revered their poets. Rumi, of the13thC, is perhaps the most famous, but in fact he was not Persian. He wrote in Persian, but he was born in what is now Afghanistan and raised in Turkey (Ann and I have been to his grave at Konya.)

My favorite bed-side companions, a century younger than Rumi, are from Shiraz. Shiraz, the beautiful, lush city of vineyards and rose gardens, of nightingales and wine shops. Yes, wine. In medieval Iran?  Shiraz was governed liberally at that time, though from time to time, conservative reformers shut down the wine shops. The wine shops were to Persian villages and towns what the pubs are today to English and Irish towns.  

Hafez wrote of love: love lost, lovers lost, unrequited love's despair, love of wine, of wineshops, and of youthful wine servers (picture barkeeps.) Hafez loved beauty and youth. He wrote of his love for girls and for boys. Muslim critics and clerics have woven a veil of propriety over Hafez's words, claiming his talk of loving boy or girl was a symbol of his love for his celestial maker, for God. Well, there is no evidence from Hafez for that. I don't believe Hafez ever gave a hint of that interpretation. My translator, Dick Davis, applies Occam's Razor to the work and simply takes at face value what Hafez says about liking boys and girls. Hafez's poetry is moving and beautiful despite what to us are occasional references to the unacceptable. (Persian society was not alone; the ancient Greeks and Romans condoned homosexuality and adolescent sexuality.)

Tomb of Hafez, Shiraz.

His companion on my beside table is Jahan Malek Khatun, an educated woman of the 14thC, a published poet, a royal princess, who sincerely and movingly wrote of love from the distaff side, but with little of the self-deprecating humor that endears Hafez to me.

The translations I use are Dick Davis's from Faces of Love (in which he also includes the works of Obayd-e Zakani, the bad boy of Shiraz who loved to write about his naughty bits and shock the 'nice' people of Persia, causing much clutching of pearls, I'm sure. I don't know this, but my guess is that some of the Pythons must have found him amusing.)   

And my Fifth reason for longing to love Iran are my new Iranian-American friends and acquaintances 

        such as

• beautiful Shiva S, Dir. of marketing and communications for the Friends of Waterfront Park. Shiva fully lives up to her name, which in Farsi means charmingly expressive;
• Shawn T, a medical entrepreneur in San Diego, a B’hai refugee from fundamentalist persecution; and
• Kourosh and Darius T whom I met through their/our Olympic Club. Kourosh, another refugee from fundamentalist persecution, has found acceptance here in hopefully still tolerant America.

Those, then, are my five reasons for longing to accept, to reach out to, to love Iran. But obviously, one cannot do so today. 

What would it take for me to come to love Iran? Change: big change in Teheran and Qom, big change in Washington and Miami Beach.

       From Qom:

• The passing of Ayatollah ali Khamenei and a return to moderation; 
• A middle-class uprising against theocracy; the dismantling of the Guardian Council and the Assembly of Experts;
• A blossoming of participatory republicanism;
• A restoration and opening of Shiraz -- its rose gardens, vineyards, and nightingales (and its wine shops;) 
• And for Kourosh and Shawn, the freedom of choice, to choose to go back or to make their homes here, the freedom to visit their homeland in confidence and safety.

       And from Washington:

• A suspension of ideological intolerance; a repudiation of blood and soil as a litmus test of Americanism;
• An end to needing an "enemy” to justify autocratic rule by Executive Order; (fill in the blank _________. Venezuela? China? Iran? Canada? Who will be next?)
• A willingness to listen, to be present and really listen, and to discuss rather than bluster and threaten, or economically punish with tariffs;
• An acknowledgement of our differences but without judgement or proselytizing or coercion;
• A genuine search for common ground for collaborating on addressing common concerns. 

Iran is significant. Three times the land mass of France; half again as many people. Can we just feud and strangle this potential, modernist Middle East nation, or should we work toward an accommodation with it? My answer is evident if you have read this far. 

Yes, it will take regime changes, here and there, to enable me to love Iran, the Middle Eastern nation I most long to love. Will I live to see it? Probably not, but if my children persist and demand  change, my grandchildren might. Some of them might visit Shiraz one day and raise a glass to me. I sincerely wish so.

Fletch

For Those Who Care

My recent post (below) urges you Democrats to leave ideology aside for now and deal in proposals and programs that address people's life problems: e.g., accessible and affordable healthcare; universal preschool and day care; affordable housing; education expense and quality; inflation and the cost of living; protections of alien residents from arbitrary deportation; -- these are the issues that effect people's legitimate pursuit of happiness each day. 

Now, some have responded that they do care most passionately about threats to our democratic-republic's institutions and rights. I certainly agree that these are critical issues that must be addressed, just not now at the cost of investing our resources, energies, and voices to winning back the power of majorities in the House and Senate. Win back the power and you can roll back the autocracy.

But, for those of you to whom the threat to democratic-republicanism is uppermost, and for all of the rest of us, here is a sort of primer cobbled together from recent and forceful commentaries. Read these, ye who care. (To open these, click on each and then on re-direct; you will get the article in a new page,)

• An Extraordinary Opinion for Extraordinary Times from Preet Bharara
• Trump Is Not Afraid of Civil War. Neither Is Stephen Miller. from Tomas Edsall
• There’s No Precedent for This Shutdown  from Michelle Goldberg