Relative Safety

For the second time since school began this year, my route to work was blocked by police activity. Yellow tape stretched across the intersection. Numerous emergency vehicles and crime scene investigation truck. The first time it happened, I chalked it up to wandering into a coincidental catastrophe, not unlike the one I encountered last year when I had to bike several blocks out of my way to stay clear of the major intersection that was blocked off after two police cars had collided in the early morning hours.
In the rain.
Happily, my two encounters with crime scenes this year have not included the complication of precipitation. The less happy part of these experiences is the part where I have to wonder if the corridor which I have picked for my commute is the safest one. I tend to consider the route I take from my home to school to be my neighborhood. This is primarily because there are houses all along the way that share a friendly wave, or at least a head bob as I pass in the afternoons. The mornings are a different deal, since for a great portion of those trips, I travel under cover of darkness. The interactions I have are limited to those on either end, farewell from my wife and greetings from our custodian when I arrive on campus.
Unless my way is blocked by police barricades.
Then it starts to occur to me that these are dangerous times, and that this is a dangerous place, and maybe I should be more cautious in my commute. I know that if I were to examine a map of crime scenes I might be hard pressed to find a path that would take me on a crisis-free journey from point to point. Instead, I should probably be happy to count my blessings and continue to enjoy the way I manage to avoid trouble by plunging into the heart of it. Or slide neatly into its wake.

Pants

Sometimes it's hard not to think in terms of us versus them. Outnumbered twenty to one, we band together in those moments we share before the next barrage is unleashed. In the faces of my comrades I recognize that thousand yard stare of fatigue. How long can we keep up this way? When will there be some relief?
Maybe a day pass, a few moments away from that front line where every interaction carries do-or-die weight. In close quarters like this, it's hard to know how to proceed. Each turn could prove deadly. Ever decision has a question mark next to it. This is especially true if you have a hole in the seat of your pants.
Fifth grade girls were giggling behind my back, which is nothing new since it is something to which fifth grade girls are prone. As is my custom, I turned to glare at them, a tactic that tends to work for brief periods. At least I could finish giving the instructions to the class before they dissolved into tearful fits of full on laughter.
But that didn't work. When I turned around, the giggles had spread to the adjacent table. That's when I went to my next grown up rhetorical question: "What's so funny?"
Except this one had an answer. One of the girls stifled her amusement long enough to tell me, "Mister Caven, you have a hole in your pants."
"Two of them," chuckled her friend.
It occurred to me at that moment that I had two choices: Absorb the embarrassment and move on or run red-faced from the room, surrendering all authority and dignity in this situation. I was tempted to flee, but instead I held my ground. "Thank you. Now can we return to today's lesson?"
In my head, I imagined the gaping hole that must be expanding with each moment. I only hoped to finish out the hour with a shred of self-esteem with a chance to come back the next day to reassert my dominion.
With a new pair of pants.

Fear

Donald Trump Jr. says he fears more for his sons than his daughters in the current #MeToo climate when more and more women feel empowered to come forward with their allegations of sexual harassment and assault. “I’ve got boys, and I’ve got girls. And when I see what’s going on right now, it’s scary,’ he said during an interview on British television. When asked which of his children he fears for more, he said “I mean, right now, I’d say my sons.”

I won't say if I agree or disagree with Junior here, but I can say that I understand why he would feel this way.

Again: I didn't say I agreed. I said I understand. The product of a broken home, he has a father who provides him nothing in the way of a character building example. Like this little nugget from pre-candidate daddy: "Yeah, that’s her. With the gold. I better use some Tic Tacs just in case I start kissing her. You know, I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything."

That bit comes from a transcript of a taped conversation with American TV celebrity Billy Bush, and is by far the least objectionable of the comments made during the exchange. 

At the time, if  you recall, this was excused as "locker room talk." It did little if anything to stir or discourage the Trumpian base. If anything, it gave us all a preview of things to come. Like this exchange with ABC News' Cecilia Vega: 

"President": "She’s shocked that I picked her. She’s in a state of shock.

Vega: “I’m not. Thank you, Mr. President.

"President": “That’s okay, I know you’re not thinking. You never do.”

Vega: "I’m sorry?

"President": “No, go ahead.”

And so it goes. Why would his son worry that his sons would be afraid? It seems to be genetic.

Rebukamunga!

This post is brought to you by the word "rebuke." 
If you are unfamiliar, verb 1.express sharp disapproval or criticism of (someone) because of their behavior or actions. "Sessions rebukes Trump." Or "Trump rebukes 'stupid question' from ABC News star reporter." Maybe "Senate overwhelmingly rebukes Trump with tariff vote."
And so on. There is a lot of rebuking taking place in Washington, D.C. Which makes me wonder how, with all of that sharp disapproval and criticism, anything gets done. I understand that this is very much a two-way street, with Democrats rebuking Republicans and Republicans rebuking Democrats, and everyone rebuking Rand Paul. 
Last week there was this interesting moment when, after being confronted by two victims of sexual assault while boarding an elevator, Senator Jeff Flake summed up the business of the past few weeks: "This country is being ripped apart here." He may have been describing the events of the past two years, and the effect to which we are all witness. Which is probably a result of all that rebuking. 
For just a moment, I tried to imagine a rebuke-free zone. A place where everyone worked together to solve problems and find solutions that were beneficial to all the people all the time. A cooperative place where the benefits of the many outweigh those of the few.
Or the one. 
I am pretty sure that if we took just a few weeks off rebuking one another, some of the things that have been troubling us all for the past couple years or so might get solved. Or, if we are still committed to rebuking, maybe we could take a few days off at the end of each month, just to give us all a break from being rebuked. 
But honestly, none of this will work if there is a rebuke to be found anywhere. If you are just going about your day, trying to get along, and someone rebukes you, well chances are you're going to want to rebuke them back. Or someone else, and the whole rebuke chain begins again. 
I apologize if this entry was a rebuke of anyone who is especially fond of rebukes. 

Animals

I went to college in the eighties. My generation did not invent binge drinking, but I like to kid myself into believing that we somehow elevated it. I grew up in a world of dollar pitchers and a terrifying event known as Animal Drown Night. This was an evening set aside for patrons to come to a particular establishment, pay a nominal cover fee, and then drink "for free." Rather than having this bacchanal once or twice a year, it was held weekly, usually on a slow night during the week when coaxing folks out of their dorms was a little bigger chore. This promotion worked on me. I didn't miss many of these opportunities to show off my mad drinking skills. Looking back, I wonder what sort of business plan included cramming a college bar full of undergraduates and letting themselves get blind drunk. I understand I had a choice in this. I could have stayed in my apartment, or the library or hung out at a friend's place. I didn't. I plunked down my eight dollars and proceeded to do everything I could to make sure that I drank my fill. And that of several others.
This was an age that helped define drinking games. While it is true that finding ways to get yourself or your friends inebriated through some contest or other dates back to antiquity, I lived in a world that required quarters not just for laundry but for bouncing off a table. Into a glass of beer that would then be designated for someone else to drink. At no point did the strategy for this game suggest that the person who had been picked a few times get any kind of break. The point was to get drunk. Or at least ensure that someone else did.
Which brings me back to those college bars that also had promotions called Ladies' Night. Ladies got in free, and drank one dollar pitchers all night. Again, the notion being that boys would come and drink without much excuse, but filling the place with ladies drinking one dollar pitchers would be the tiniest incentive to get all the boys who may have needed another reason to show up on a Friday night. I tended to go with ladies I knew, and would happily buy me pitchers of beer for a dollar. This was not every boy's tack. Many hung on the edges, waiting to see where all that beer was going, and finding a table full of ladies who may have spent their laundry money on beer might be a little worse for it.
And just up the street, there were fraternities running much the same concession, only with bedrooms upstairs and no one who might be held "responsible" for the bad things that might ensue. It was a party, after all. And we were all animals, weren't we?
I went to college in the eighties. So did Brett Kavanaugh. I am not proud of everything I did in those days. My abuse was primarily verbal, mostly unintelligible, and aimed at myself in waves of self-pity and loneliness. How about you, Brett? And remember, you're under oath.

In The Room

I was asked by my wife to accompany her to one of the events for her college reunion. There was a movie being shown in the alumni hall. Friday evening, have a little dinner, take in a film. Sounds like a nice way to start a weekend. But this wasn't just any weekend. Aside from being Alumni Weekend, this was also the weekend that the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to move Brett Kavanaugh ahead for approval by the full Senate. There were a lot of people who were unhappy with that decision, and many of them were at my wife's college reunion. The Mills College reunion.
If you're not up on your women's colleges, Mills is one. My wife was part of the protest that kept trustees from turning her school go co-ed. Two weeks later, the trustees agreed to keep Mills the way it was. The way it is now: A women's college. This was the room into which I walked that Friday. There were already a few people sitting around a table filled with college swag. They didn't seem to be actively involved in selling the T-shirts and scarves. They were focused on the topic of the day: an accused sexual assault by a Supreme Court nominee and a bunch of Republican senators decided that this shouldn't keep him from a lifetime appointment. The folks that were sitting around the table had absolutely no respect for Judge Kavanaugh or the senators who had made the decision. Those were the men. The group discussing this matter in the room in which we were going to watch the movie were women. All of them. Except me. And the guy who was setting up the projector and screen.
And the movie we were about to see? Gaslight. If you're up on women's colleges but not familiar with 1944 films by George Cukor about a woman being manipulated into believing she is insane by her husband, then take the time to check it out.
But maybe not at a women's college reunion the day that the Senate Judiciary Committee decided to give a pass to a Supreme Court nominee in spite of the ugly evidence that he is not qualified to judge anything.  I can say this because once the lights went down (nothing wrong with the gas) and the movie played out in front of us, I was as aware as I may ever have been that I was one of a very few men in a room full of women. I enjoyed the movie, but felt completely responsible for Charles Boyer being such a cad. And for the shriveled husks on the Senate Judiciary Committee. And for all the men who ever got in the way of a woman. In any way. Ever.
Quite a Friday evening.

Rocky Mountain Way

I used to work with a guy who called me "Colorado." No, he called me "Calluhraduh." I took this as a deep and abiding compliment, as a transplanted ex-pat from the Centennial State. I continue to take pride in those things that work out well for the folks back home, and feel a twinge when they don't. That's why it felt so good to have South Park take on "school shooting fatigue." 
If you are unfamiliar with the longest running scripted show on television, it tells the story of a group of ten year old boys in the tiny town of South Park, Colorado. It has been alternately praised and reviled by parents, critics and pundits of all stripes. It has caused even your erstwhile narrator to blush at times. The young men who created this animated treat graduated just a few years behind me from our Alma Mater, The University of Calluhraduh. 
These were guys who were interviewed as part of Michael Moore's Bowling For Columbine, were not far removed from their own suburban Denver high school experience when Dylan and Eric went on their rampage, sparking one of the initial outrages against school shootings. That was in 1999. Since then, there have been plenty of opportunities for folks to get all riled up about school shootings. Since Columbine, there were forty-nine additional school shootings resulting in fatalities. Dead kids. Is it any wonder that the nerve that used to twitch at these moments has gone numb? 
And that's what Matt and Trey depicted in the first show of their twenty-second season: The boys sitting in math class, unfazed as shots ring out, screams are heard in the halls, and sirens wail. “Shooter down,” says a police officer outside the classroom. Says the teacher, “Now, let’s move on to the next equation.”
I was immediately reminded of the Texas student's reaction to the shooting at her high school: “It’s been happening everywhere,” seventeen year old student Paige Curry said in an interview hours after her school became a part of that list. “I’ve always kind of felt it like eventually it was going to happen here too. I wasn’t surprised, I was just scared.”
Back in South Park: “Who shot up the school?,” Randy, Stan’s dad, asks. “Was it you?”
“No,” says Stan.
“Did you get shot?”
“No.”
“Oh, well. What’s this about failing a math quiz?”
I suppose I could be embarrassed that these miscreants are making fun of a horrible situation, but I'm not. I'm proud to call them Calluhraduhns.