The Power of Betrayal

In Santa Fe this week-end at the Tony Hillerman Writers Conference. This writing community feels like family. Some things work out and some things didn't. Good instructors, good food, good setting. The Finale is Valerie Plame Wilson speaking about her new book; the story of our government's betrayal of her trust in their capacity to protect her other identity--the identity of a covert CIA agent. She is very articulate and very passionate and is trying very hard to toll the bell for the rest of us--the ones who don't think about power and how it is abused by those that have it and those who only want more. Pay attention! Close your eyes and listen with your heart, can you hear the drumbeats of the future rising up to meet us when we will no longer be able to contain it? Can you hear the clarion call of the center shielded by our friends, neighbors, family, and total strangers who have woven their arms into a circle that can be moved but cannot be broken? A circle that holds what we all hold dear, our national pride, our community of pluralism and assimilation, our personal integrity--our character and values.

Is betrayal a sword of power used to threaten, intimidate--wielded by those who would not join with us and now want only to cleave us one from the other, to sublimate the fading memories of what we were and why we struggled so dearly to hold the line?

Memorial Day #2: Unmarked Graves

The first scene in my first novel, Seven Days at Oak Valley, takes place at the cemetery of the Oak Valley State School and Hospital in 1978. The maintenance men finish shoveling dirt into the grave of one of the residents who has died. Then, they place a numerical marker on the grave. No name, no epithet; only a number to make note of the deceased's short presence on this earth. Across the country, state-run institutions carried out this practice for decades. The cemeteries that have been left behind as these behemoths have closed are in many cases overgrown and even the markers can no longer be located. Invisible lives, invisible deaths.

It wasn't until tonight that the chords of my own life began to sound in resonance with the ignominious deaths of those lost souls. It wasn't until tonight that my childhood memories of Memorial Days spent watching parades while playing with paper poppies passed out by the Women's Auxiliary of something or other came creeping out the closet again. In those days, Memorial Day was Decoration Day, and the parades were followed by the obligatory trip to the cemetery to seek out our ancestors, the fallen soldier, or in my case, my baby sisters. It was during those annual sojourns that I learned their stories and committed them to memory.

As an adult, I made a trip back to my roots to unearth the reasons for my troubled childhood. During that trip, I made a pilgrimage to Mary Jean's grave, in a location far removed from the more modern, tidier memorial gardens. Several years later when my father died, I was part of a larger contingent that went to the cemetery where he would be buried along side his parents. That time, I went in search of Kathy June's grave, located along side the road that looped around the Beckwith section of the historical graveyard.

Until tonight, each time I thought about the neglected resting places of all of the lost and forgotten souls, I thought about them within the context of my professional passion. Tonight, while updating the website about my book, my thoughts unearthed the place where my professional passion intersects with the wounded heart of my youth. Because of this, I won't be watching any parades on this year's Memorial Day or playing with any paper poppies. This year I'll going to make another trip to those old family graveyards to place some real flowers on my both of my sisters' unmarked graves.

Upon the Anniversary of My Mother's Death

Ten long years have passed since Mom was killed in a car accident one late, rainy, South Carolina night. She had mistaken an on ramp for an off ramp and was cruising down the Interstate going the wrong way when she ran head on into a truck. The trucker was o.k. except for the DUI ticket he got. It wasn't his fault, Mom always seemed to be going the wrong way, or at least her way which didn't seem at all similar to the path my friends' Moms were walking. Even so, Mom still had her own way of seeming to fit in, even when it seemed the most unlikely of outcomes.

Mom wanted badly for me to fit in but, unlike her, I had no desire to fit in. She remained confused by my non-conformity until the day she died. But looking back and thinking about it over the past ten years, I have turned out a lot like her. She just couldn't recognize the Ruthie-Marie version of herself. I travel a great deal, Mom always had her foot out the door. I like helping people, Mom always had an extra plate made up for the unfortunate elderly man who lived next door. I like to have parties (and then gracefully send people home), Mom liked to have parties that sometimes lasted for days. I have strange little superstitious sayings, Mom used them all the time.

I talked to Mom the day she died. She had a doctor's appointment to go to and she told me she would call to give me the results. I told her I loved her and that I would be waiting to hear back. It's ten years later now and I don't think I'll ever stop wanting to hear her voice on the other end of the line.

Baus Haus

the women wove impossible visions

connectedness in the fabric of their dreams

the men drew and painted elaborate schemes

that could not be borne on fragile wings