Liberty and Justice for All?
There are times that I realize things about myself that seemed obvious before but simply had not been put into any kind of conscious order. This past week I've been dealing with the realizations that I'm probably not much of a Southerner despite my familial pedigree (Floridians really don't count much as Southerners in the long run, something happens at the St. Mary's River I just can't explain but it definitely winnows out the Rebel from the Buffet Parrothead). The other realization is that, despite my protestations to the contrary, I really am a lawyer at heart (assuming such a combination is not by definition a contradiction in terms).
Mind you, this is quite a confession I am making. I tell people regularly that the happiest day of my life was the day I stopped practicing law, a line I stole from my fellow seminarian entering classmate, Phillip Jackson (there were three ex-lawyers in our entering class who represented 10% of the whole class, a percentage I saw as generally expectable among seminarians). In many ways, I was poorly suited to law, a native iNtuitive Feeler Perceiver (NFP) in a highly Thinking and Judging profession. I went into law school with the notion that I would be working for justice, learned my first year that the law was a jealous mistress, and spent the next nine years after admission to the bar figuring out that I was poorly placed in a profession that didn't care what was just or how human societies would be best served, just make sure you're at pre-trials on time with the requisite files.
At the wedding at which I officiated today, I got a chance to talk with the bride's father, a high powered lawyer originally from South Carolina who now practices corporate law with some of the best known firms in Orlando. I remembered almost immediately why I hated practicing law - the competition, the posturing, the "who do you know" one-upmanship. Even as the father of the bride began loosening up over his Scotches, the jugular mode was still in full force: "Where did you go to law school? UF? Oh." "Where did you serve in a parish? FSU Chapel? Oh." G-d save me from yuppie Southern lawyers.
But G-d *did* save me from the practice of law. The "calling" to be a priest (now, G-d, what was *that* all about?) allowed me a plausible out as I left behind the world of game playing professionals who constantly worried about who had the biggest dick and how we could observe that in the way one practiced. I was able to walk away from law after eight years, and few colleagues even questioned my judgment other than my father whose wished-for law career I embodied and the sincere, well-intentioned fellow assistant public defender who asked me "But, Harry, if you leave, who will care about the kids the way you do?"
I've never regretted leaving the practice of law. I know I'm a happier and healthier person for that decision and, frankly, I had to work against my natural inclinations the whole time I practiced. I tell my students that they need to be sure they want to put up with the pain that law school and legal practice entail and I readily lay out for them my observations. But if they still want to go, I write them letters of recommendation. So, I’m not prone to engage in a mindless cynicism which begins with Shakespeare's quotation taken totally out of context "First, we kill all the lawyers." Rather, I'm just glad to have realized when I did that I was poorly placed in the field of law and had the opportunity to escape with minimal economic damage.
That being said, I've found myself the past couple of weeks feeling a sense of absolute despair about America. While the Bush administration promises to provide one depressing saga after another in every arena from the planet's health to the probable dismantling of social security,
it's the appointments to legal positions that have managed to once more wrench my guts and make me wonder how this could happen in an America I once believed in.
Certainly John Ashcroft was an embarrassment. A fundamentalist who pressured his staff into daily prayer meetings and a demonstrated puritanical aversion to human nudity causing him to have Victory covered up because her bare breast might incite sexual feelings in whoever was watching the press events with the statue in the background, Ashcroft was at some level predictable. He satisfied the religious right whom the Bushies demagogue into voting against their financial interests. And he got the US government off Bill Gate's tail long enough to "settle" that case (read: hand it to Bill on a silver platter).
But the past two weeks have brought news of Alberto Gonzalez' confirmation as Attorney General and John Negroponte's confirmation as our first "intelligence czar." Gonzalez is the one who suggested that the Geneva Convention is "quaint" and wrote the legal memos which convinced the Bushies to conduct torture-driven interrogations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo. Negroponte is the godfather of Central American terror imposed upon all the non-submissive Central American "protectorates" during the Reagan years. I've seen Negroponte's work in El Salvador and Panama. I know how to say "human suffering" in working poor Spanish. The word is "Negroponte."
What astounds me is that I find myself still clinging to perhaps romantic notions that the US government still could believe in "liberty and justice for all." What astounds me is that I apparently still can be shocked when the rights of the accused guaranteed by the Bill of Rights is denied political prisoners we have deemed "enemy combatants" or any other semantic way of saying "We don't plan to follow our own law."
Years ago I went to law school believing that I was there to fight for justice. And I did, for years after I should have figured out that I was really misplaced in the practice of law. What surprises me today is that I still have those ideals, albeit largely tarnished by the cynicism of post-Bush election realism. I find it surprising I am still able to be shocked by the confirmation of terrorists to positions of legal power. I'm still able to feel despair over the complete failure of justice in the face of legal power personified in people like Gonzalez and Negroponte.
I guess at some level I should be glad that I can still be shocked. My feelings of depression suggest that I am still able to be angry about injustice, even if it is largely directed inside these days. At the same time, I wonder aloud: where are we going as a people? I look at the history of the Third Reich and the creeping normalization of terror and fascism and worry mightily as my own country exhibits those signs.
Maybe I really did believe the things I said in my oath of office to the Florida and Southern District (federal) Courts of Florida: that I would defend the Constitution of the United States of America so help me G-d. Maybe I continue to believe in that fleeting possibility that "liberty and justice for all" will be the mark of the American legal system and not the anomaly. Maybe the notion that terror, prison abuse, lack of legal counsel and a fair trial are not the American way even as our nation finds Orwellian disingenuous labels to rationalize wrong doing.
I don't know what has caused my discomfort this night. But I do find myself feeling a sense of gratitude to those who instilled in me a value for American legal and constitutional ideals, for those who encouraged me to seek the living into of those ideals and for those who to this day stand with me as I enter once more the prophet mode, railing against the actual holding up against that performance the ideal I still believe should be the rule and not the exception. Will it make a difference? G-d only knows and this night, she ain't tellin'!
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding.
Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Saturday, February 19, 2005
Sunday, December 12, 2004
You are what you eat....
I'm an ova-lactic vegetarian. I eat that which does not require the death of its producer. I do know that most farms on which the products are created are incredibly exploitative and sometimes cruel. But for me the principle is simply about killing for food.
I grew up on a beef and citrus farm in Central Florida. In ninth grade, my father, a teacher in the local high school where I attended (and had him for two years) required me to join the Future Farmers of America. I excelled in public speaking and parliamentary procedure, ornamental horticulture and forestry. I sucked at using band saws and welding. But I also did well at meat cuts identification. Until the second year.
The second year followed the life cycle of a cow from gathering semen for artificial insemination (I will spare you that story) to the insemination (that one, too) and the birth of the calf, which I think is probably one of the most spiritual moments of my entire life. Then we went through the castration process to create a steer, the showing of the steer at the county fair, and finally the inevitable trip to the slaughterhouse.
I am not sure what I expected that day. But I remember like it was yesterday what I saw: terrified animals bleating horrendous sounding dirges; the air hammer used to supposedly knock the animal unconscious so his throat could be slit (bleating all the time); the hanging of the now headless animal by his hoof on a hook suspended from the ceiling; the rubber boots the packing house employee wore around which a swirl of blood ran down a drain in the floor; the now separated organs stacked like bowling balls on racks, the sound of saws ordinarily heard in the sawing of lumber but here sawing apart the body of animal only minutes before alive.
I have never forgotten that day in 1967 when I lost the luxury of naiveté in eating dead animal flesh we euphemistically call "meat." And I have never forgotten the sound of that terrified bleating or the thud of the air hammer on the skulls or the swirling blood running down that drain. And I know that's why I've been vegetarian three different periods of my life, the most recent now in its eighth year.
I'm not an evangelist for this. I would note that meat is the most labor and materials intensivefood human beings eat. The grain used to feed cattle alone could feed the world several times over. I'd also say that for me, humane treatment for animals is a natural extension from myinsistence that human beings treat each other in a humane way. There are clearly some health benefits from vegetarianism - even more from veganism which I am slow to embrace - butfor me those are secondary to the ethical and spiritual concerns.
The Buddha instructed his followers to tell those who would feed the mendicant monks not to kill to feed them but if they had already done so, to eat what was offered with gratitude. Similarly, Francis of Assisi and his followers lived lives of simplicity which both honored the animals of the very good creation as well as eating a diet which was itself simple, usually vegetarian as most religious observed in the middle ages. But, if someone had prepared a meat dish for the friars, they were to eat it with gratitude because such was the generosity of the creator G-d being offered. It is my policy to do the same. Don't kill for me. But I will not refuse your hospitality if you have already done so. Such a response would reject the generosity of the Creator and spits in the eye of G_d.
There are a number of good quotes about vegetarianism I've gathered over the years. One which I keep on my refrigerator under the obligatory magnets is from Leonardo da Vince which reads, "I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men."
Well said, Leo.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an
unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding.
Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I'm an ova-lactic vegetarian. I eat that which does not require the death of its producer. I do know that most farms on which the products are created are incredibly exploitative and sometimes cruel. But for me the principle is simply about killing for food.
I grew up on a beef and citrus farm in Central Florida. In ninth grade, my father, a teacher in the local high school where I attended (and had him for two years) required me to join the Future Farmers of America. I excelled in public speaking and parliamentary procedure, ornamental horticulture and forestry. I sucked at using band saws and welding. But I also did well at meat cuts identification. Until the second year.
The second year followed the life cycle of a cow from gathering semen for artificial insemination (I will spare you that story) to the insemination (that one, too) and the birth of the calf, which I think is probably one of the most spiritual moments of my entire life. Then we went through the castration process to create a steer, the showing of the steer at the county fair, and finally the inevitable trip to the slaughterhouse.
I am not sure what I expected that day. But I remember like it was yesterday what I saw: terrified animals bleating horrendous sounding dirges; the air hammer used to supposedly knock the animal unconscious so his throat could be slit (bleating all the time); the hanging of the now headless animal by his hoof on a hook suspended from the ceiling; the rubber boots the packing house employee wore around which a swirl of blood ran down a drain in the floor; the now separated organs stacked like bowling balls on racks, the sound of saws ordinarily heard in the sawing of lumber but here sawing apart the body of animal only minutes before alive.
I have never forgotten that day in 1967 when I lost the luxury of naiveté in eating dead animal flesh we euphemistically call "meat." And I have never forgotten the sound of that terrified bleating or the thud of the air hammer on the skulls or the swirling blood running down that drain. And I know that's why I've been vegetarian three different periods of my life, the most recent now in its eighth year.
I'm not an evangelist for this. I would note that meat is the most labor and materials intensivefood human beings eat. The grain used to feed cattle alone could feed the world several times over. I'd also say that for me, humane treatment for animals is a natural extension from myinsistence that human beings treat each other in a humane way. There are clearly some health benefits from vegetarianism - even more from veganism which I am slow to embrace - butfor me those are secondary to the ethical and spiritual concerns.
The Buddha instructed his followers to tell those who would feed the mendicant monks not to kill to feed them but if they had already done so, to eat what was offered with gratitude. Similarly, Francis of Assisi and his followers lived lives of simplicity which both honored the animals of the very good creation as well as eating a diet which was itself simple, usually vegetarian as most religious observed in the middle ages. But, if someone had prepared a meat dish for the friars, they were to eat it with gratitude because such was the generosity of the creator G-d being offered. It is my policy to do the same. Don't kill for me. But I will not refuse your hospitality if you have already done so. Such a response would reject the generosity of the Creator and spits in the eye of G_d.
There are a number of good quotes about vegetarianism I've gathered over the years. One which I keep on my refrigerator under the obligatory magnets is from Leonardo da Vince which reads, "I have from an early age abjured the use of meat, and the time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men."
Well said, Leo.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an
unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding.
Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Saturday, November 13, 2004
Psalm for a Security Society
Pentagon Envisioning a Costly Internet for War
By TIM WEINER
The Pentagon is building its own Internet, the military's world wide web for the wars of the future. The goal is to give all American commanders and troops a moving picture of all foreign enemies and threats - "a God's-eye view" of battle. This "Internet in the sky," Peter Teets, under secretary of the Air Force, told Congress, would allow "marines in a Humvee, in a faraway land, in the middle of a rainstorm, to open up their laptops, request imagery" from a spy satellite, and "get it downloaded within seconds." The Pentagon calls the secure network the Global Information Grid, or GIG. Conceived six years ago, its first connections were laid six weeks ago. It may take two decades and hundreds of billions of dollars to build the new war net and its components.
http://nytimes.com/2004/11/13/technology/13warnet.html?hp&ex=1100408400&en=27b47c63b0a8e037&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Here is my rather perverse response to this:
Psalm 139
1 O Government, you have searched me out
and you know where I am.
2 You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
3 You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
4 Before I have hung up my cell phone,
you know my conversation completely, O Government.
5 You hem me in-behind with your Tasers and before;
you have laid your satellites upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too frightening for me,
too high security for me to attain.
You would have to kill me should I know it.
7 Where can I go from your satellite Internet?
Where can I flee from your spying cameras?
8 If I go up to the heavens, your orbiting satellites are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, your listening devices are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your reconnaissance will find me,
your troops will hold me fast.
11 If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
with your night vision equipment
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is no problem for you, O Government,
Indeed, you cherish keeping your citizens in the dark.
13 For you seek control of my inmost being;
your laws require me to be born from my mother's womb.
14 I fear you because I am powerless before your technology;
your works are hegemonic,
I know that full well.
15 There is no place that is hidden from you
I have no refuge, there is no secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
16 your sonogram saw my unformed body
and your laws require it be born.
All the laws ordained for me
were written in your book
and there shall be no exceptions.
17 How frightening to me is your power, O Government!
How vast is your military and technological might!
18 Were I to count the ways you can control your people,
they would outnumber the grains of sand.
When I awake, you are still with me.
There is no escape from you.
19 If only you would slay the wicked, O Government!
And keep away from us those bloodthirsty men
of whom you keep us constantly concerned.
20 Your corporate media daily speak of their evil intent;
your designated enemies regularly grace our televisions.
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O Government,
and abhor those who cause our Amber Alerts?
22 I have nothing but hatred for them;
I count them my enemies
Because your sound bytes so instruct me.
I have learned my lessons well.
23 Search my home and car, O Government, and know my life;
remind me why your security state should relieve my anxious thoughts.
24 Monitor my speech for any dissent,
and force me in the way which is patriotic.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Pentagon Envisioning a Costly Internet for War
By TIM WEINER
The Pentagon is building its own Internet, the military's world wide web for the wars of the future. The goal is to give all American commanders and troops a moving picture of all foreign enemies and threats - "a God's-eye view" of battle. This "Internet in the sky," Peter Teets, under secretary of the Air Force, told Congress, would allow "marines in a Humvee, in a faraway land, in the middle of a rainstorm, to open up their laptops, request imagery" from a spy satellite, and "get it downloaded within seconds." The Pentagon calls the secure network the Global Information Grid, or GIG. Conceived six years ago, its first connections were laid six weeks ago. It may take two decades and hundreds of billions of dollars to build the new war net and its components.
http://nytimes.com/2004/11/13/technology/13warnet.html?hp&ex=1100408400&en=27b47c63b0a8e037&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Here is my rather perverse response to this:
Psalm 139
1 O Government, you have searched me out
and you know where I am.
2 You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.
3 You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.
4 Before I have hung up my cell phone,
you know my conversation completely, O Government.
5 You hem me in-behind with your Tasers and before;
you have laid your satellites upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too frightening for me,
too high security for me to attain.
You would have to kill me should I know it.
7 Where can I go from your satellite Internet?
Where can I flee from your spying cameras?
8 If I go up to the heavens, your orbiting satellites are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, your listening devices are there.
9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
10 even there your reconnaissance will find me,
your troops will hold me fast.
11 If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,"
12 even the darkness will not be dark to you;
with your night vision equipment
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is no problem for you, O Government,
Indeed, you cherish keeping your citizens in the dark.
13 For you seek control of my inmost being;
your laws require me to be born from my mother's womb.
14 I fear you because I am powerless before your technology;
your works are hegemonic,
I know that full well.
15 There is no place that is hidden from you
I have no refuge, there is no secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
16 your sonogram saw my unformed body
and your laws require it be born.
All the laws ordained for me
were written in your book
and there shall be no exceptions.
17 How frightening to me is your power, O Government!
How vast is your military and technological might!
18 Were I to count the ways you can control your people,
they would outnumber the grains of sand.
When I awake, you are still with me.
There is no escape from you.
19 If only you would slay the wicked, O Government!
And keep away from us those bloodthirsty men
of whom you keep us constantly concerned.
20 Your corporate media daily speak of their evil intent;
your designated enemies regularly grace our televisions.
21 Do I not hate those who hate you, O Government,
and abhor those who cause our Amber Alerts?
22 I have nothing but hatred for them;
I count them my enemies
Because your sound bytes so instruct me.
I have learned my lessons well.
23 Search my home and car, O Government, and know my life;
remind me why your security state should relieve my anxious thoughts.
24 Monitor my speech for any dissent,
and force me in the way which is patriotic.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Monday, July 19, 2004
She was quite a little girl
Her name was Ratzinger, an unusual name no doubt, particularly for a cat, but she was an unusual cat, to say the least. She came from the Guardian Angel Rescue folks who always sets up shop in front of the Petsmart on weekends, seeking to adopt out dogs and cats who have been abandoned, dumped, some of them abused in the process, all of them neglected and forgotten.
We needed a cat to catch the rats who were taking over our yard. Seems when you maintain a small semitropical jungle for a yard, rats come with the territory. We had tried the humane mouse traps, glue traps, everything short of poison. We already had two cats, both of them kept indoors, so the agreement I negotiated with my partner was that Ratzinger would be an indoor-outdoor cat who slept outside at night to catch rats.
She was a beautiful animal, orange tabby, gold eyes, and six toes on her feet. I told people she was a Hemingway cat since there seemed to be a lot of those six-toed cats in the flock to which he left his mansion in Key West. But regardless of her origins, she quickly lived into her name, Ratzinger. It was intended as a double entendre, the zinger of rats on the one hand, redemption of the name of the Roman cardinal with the morbid obsession over matters sexual on the other. During the five years she graced our lives, Ratzinger brought the remains of 34 rats to the door, often left on the mat. (I cannot tell you how disgusting it is to step out in bare feet, enroute to pick up the weekend New York Times, and to come down on the remains of a rat.)
What I hadn't anticipated was how bright she was. Ratzinger was a highly extroverted animal. We had put a tag on her with her name. About a month after she arrived, she disappeared for three days. I went into major mourning, my kitten taken from me. As it turned out, she had gotten caught under the house in a glue trap for the rats, extracting herself only at the cost of one of her extra digits on her left foot. I knew then a couple of things. One, that she was an extraordinary animal. Everyone in the neighborhood knew she was missing, knew her by name and helped look for her. Ratzinger had simply made her acquaintance with all the neighbors. But I also knew that Ratzinger's presence in our lives was not a guaranteed thing and that one day I might lose her.
Ratzinger spent her days in the yard, often sleeping in the sun or on top of the fence by the door where she could keep an eye on our coming and going. The minute our car doors had slammed her little voice could be heard, prancing across the driveway like she owned it. Ratzinger was self-possessed if anything. She frequently joined the dinner table on the nights the Francis-Clare Community met in our home and more than once I held her across my shoulder during parts of our eucharist. Somehow, she just seemed to fit in, one of G-d's most wonderful creations that we celebrated in our eucharist (which literally means "thanksgiving").
This past Easter season, I began to notice that Ratzy was not doing so well. She seemed listless, lacking in energy. I put off taking her to the vet thinking she just had a little bug, she'd get better. But she didn't. One night I noticed she was having a difficult time remaining atop the aquarium where she often slept. She insisted I let her out, something she often did by ringing the bells strung from the back of the front door. I obliged her, but when I called her later that evening, no Ratzinger. Ten o'clock, midnight, 2 a.m. came and went, no Ratzinger. I cried myself to sleep that night, afraid she'd gone off somewhere to die.
It was that night that I knew she would not be with us much longer. I was back up at 6 a.m. the next morning as the sun was coming up, out into the yard, choking back tears, calling her name. A flood of relief came as I heard her little bell. She came from the neighbor's house across the street, one of her favorite hiding places. And off we went to the vet. I left her with the good doctor, hoping for good news. The doctor's ashen face when I arrived that afternoon told me there would be no good news that day.
Somehow, one of her kidneys had failed. The other seemed to be sufficing for the time being. That was the good news. We began talking about a kidney removal. But her iron count was very low. Her HIV test had come back equivocal. More tests needed prior to the surgery revealed her heart was enlarged and her lungs were filling with fluid. She was so miserable that afternoon when I came to get her. She seemed to know her daddy was absolutely heart broken. We sat on the cold floor of the vet's office and I sobbed. And I knew, this was the second time she'd left and returned. The third time would be goodbye.
About $1200 later, we emerged from the vet's office with special food, iron supplement, a diuretic which she had to take twice a day and a syringe to force feed her. She was down to 8 pounds and would die of starvation if I didn't force feed her. For awhile, she was good about letting me do all of that. She tolerated the force feeding and meds well. She began to rally, gaining back weight, showing spark, even fussing at the other cats. Then one day, about
a month after the doctor's visit, she began to decline again. She wouldn't eat despite my locking her in her carrier with food, water and a box.
On the Fourth of July afternoon, my parents had come to town. I was headed to my brother's to see them and have dinner. Like I had done many times before, I had Ratzinger on the floor, syringe only partly full of food and water mixed up. Suddenly she choked. She leapt from my arms, up on the counter, gasping, eyes wide in terror. She leapt from the counter to the floor, convulsed a couple of times and died. I have lived through many hard times in my life. But this one 30 second interval of watching her sheer terror is probably the hardest thing I've ever faced in my life. I screamed at her to breathe, tried mouth to mouth, Heimlich maneuver, tried to help her now erupted heart to begin beating again. Nothing. She died in my arms as I rocked her, crying, aching. I have rarely felt the urge to die quite as strongly as I did that moment.
I tried to go to my brother's for dinner but I was too distraught. I excused myself early, tears brimming in my eyes, headed home to bury my little girl. I wrapped her in a turquoise towel, dug a hole in the corner of the yard where one day soon Charlie Beagle, now 15 years old, will soon rest as well. I lit a candle beneath the Celtic Cross in my yard, placed incense around
the grave and the bench where I sat cradling my little girl. I poured a glass of wine to celebrate a far too short but joy-filled five years. I spoke to her of how loved she was, of how much she had brought to the lives of all she knew, of how the rats were breathing easier these days, and of how much I would miss her. I sang the song I always sang to her: "You are my sunshine...my only sunshine...." Then I buried her, placing a round paving stone over the grave and surrounding it with border grass and lilies.
I was supposed to go to a Fourth party that night at the home of my friend, Judy, out on Lake Conway. All the Francis-Clare Community would be there. I called, uncertain what to say, blurting out through my tears that Ratzinger had died. They insisted I not stay home alone. So, I went to the party.
I will never forget the sky that evening. It was a shade of orange I've rarely seen before, the result of thunderstorms earlier that afternoon and the setting sun. Across the eastern horizon, a double rainbow stretched, periodically punctuated by long forks of lightning and erratic bursts of Fourth of July fireworks from around the lake. A cool breeze blew in off the lake. It was a masterpiece of nature. Despite the grief I felt, it was one of the most beautiful nights I had ever seen.
Days later, I found in my email a story about rescue animals waiting for their rescuers to cross the Rainbow Bridge into heaven. I smiled. Ms. Ratzinger was not waiting for me to cross that bridge. She had crossed a glorious sky on a double rainbow into heaven that night. As always she had gone in style. There were other animals and people to meet and charm.
It's been over two weeks now since I lost my little girl. There has not been a day yet that I have not cried over my poor Ratzinger. Having recently read The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari, I have started looking for lessons that painful events have to teach me. Ratzinger's death taught me several things. One, there are human limitations. Even the best vets and the most profound desires to keep a living being alive are sometimes not enough. My sense of helplessness - powerlessness - as I watched her die was a lesson - sometimes you can't prevent death, you can't make things better. They simply have to play out as they are destined to occur. I've also learned once again that I need to be mindful of the moment, grateful for the loving time together I have with all those many wonderful living beings G-d has graced my life with. I suddenly realized last week that I had been ignoring my other cats almost completely during the time Ratzinger had been so sick. I've been making up for lost time the past few days.
Finally, I realized I'm probably not as OK with death as I thought I was. I don't worry about what happens after death. Concern about heaven or hell don't make much sense to me. I trust G-d with whatever happens. What I've figured out is that I simply have a hard time letting go of those I love, of contemplating being without them. It's not so much attachment as it is aversion to the pain of loss and loneliness. At any rate, it's something I need to work on at midlife with many potential losses staring me in the face.
The statute of the smiling kitten, rolling on its back, arrived last week. I ordered it off the internet from the Better Homes and Gardens site, no less. Andy and Luci both said, "Oh yeah, that's her!" when I showed it to them. Today I put it on the spot where Ratzinger is buried. And once more I cried. Andy says I should be more patient with myself, give myself some time. I know I have survived the loss of animals, friends and family members before. I will survive this as well. Funny thing was that the statue, though concrete, was coated with some kind of stain and a burlap string tied around its neck. I hesitated to put it on her grave, afraid that in the torrid summer weather, even this reminder of her would deteriorate and fade away. Even in death, my grasp of Ratzinger is fragile, fleeting, momentary.
I know this is a bit maudlin. Unlike some of my other posts, this one was for me. I needed to write this even as I've put it off for a couple of days since the statue arrived. For those of us who will never have children, the loss of our animal companions is particularly profound. It's always a devil's bargain to be a pet owner because the chances always are that they will die before you do. The question I find myself asking these days is whether my heart can survive the loss of the animal I am always happy to adopt and bring into our lives. In years past, it was not a hard question. As I get older, I'm not so sure.
I really miss my little girl. One day I will think of her and smile. She was quite a cat. In five years, she managed to completely capture her daddy's heart. There have been times she's seemed like she was just around the corner. I find myself looking for her, waiting for her little bell to signal her procession in. The neighbors have an orange tabby named Crush who looks an awful lot like Ratzinger. In some ways, it's like she's still around, watching, waiting.
For tonight, all I can say is that I'm thankful for knowing her, for being owned by her (humans never own cats!) and for the things she taught me. There will be a day when I no longer cry for her. But there will never be a day when I will not be a better human being for having the far too brief five years I was given with a little extroverted six-toed orange tabby with a big heart and an unusual name, Ratzinger. Thank you, little girl, for all you were and all I became because of you.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Her name was Ratzinger, an unusual name no doubt, particularly for a cat, but she was an unusual cat, to say the least. She came from the Guardian Angel Rescue folks who always sets up shop in front of the Petsmart on weekends, seeking to adopt out dogs and cats who have been abandoned, dumped, some of them abused in the process, all of them neglected and forgotten.
We needed a cat to catch the rats who were taking over our yard. Seems when you maintain a small semitropical jungle for a yard, rats come with the territory. We had tried the humane mouse traps, glue traps, everything short of poison. We already had two cats, both of them kept indoors, so the agreement I negotiated with my partner was that Ratzinger would be an indoor-outdoor cat who slept outside at night to catch rats.
She was a beautiful animal, orange tabby, gold eyes, and six toes on her feet. I told people she was a Hemingway cat since there seemed to be a lot of those six-toed cats in the flock to which he left his mansion in Key West. But regardless of her origins, she quickly lived into her name, Ratzinger. It was intended as a double entendre, the zinger of rats on the one hand, redemption of the name of the Roman cardinal with the morbid obsession over matters sexual on the other. During the five years she graced our lives, Ratzinger brought the remains of 34 rats to the door, often left on the mat. (I cannot tell you how disgusting it is to step out in bare feet, enroute to pick up the weekend New York Times, and to come down on the remains of a rat.)
What I hadn't anticipated was how bright she was. Ratzinger was a highly extroverted animal. We had put a tag on her with her name. About a month after she arrived, she disappeared for three days. I went into major mourning, my kitten taken from me. As it turned out, she had gotten caught under the house in a glue trap for the rats, extracting herself only at the cost of one of her extra digits on her left foot. I knew then a couple of things. One, that she was an extraordinary animal. Everyone in the neighborhood knew she was missing, knew her by name and helped look for her. Ratzinger had simply made her acquaintance with all the neighbors. But I also knew that Ratzinger's presence in our lives was not a guaranteed thing and that one day I might lose her.
Ratzinger spent her days in the yard, often sleeping in the sun or on top of the fence by the door where she could keep an eye on our coming and going. The minute our car doors had slammed her little voice could be heard, prancing across the driveway like she owned it. Ratzinger was self-possessed if anything. She frequently joined the dinner table on the nights the Francis-Clare Community met in our home and more than once I held her across my shoulder during parts of our eucharist. Somehow, she just seemed to fit in, one of G-d's most wonderful creations that we celebrated in our eucharist (which literally means "thanksgiving").
This past Easter season, I began to notice that Ratzy was not doing so well. She seemed listless, lacking in energy. I put off taking her to the vet thinking she just had a little bug, she'd get better. But she didn't. One night I noticed she was having a difficult time remaining atop the aquarium where she often slept. She insisted I let her out, something she often did by ringing the bells strung from the back of the front door. I obliged her, but when I called her later that evening, no Ratzinger. Ten o'clock, midnight, 2 a.m. came and went, no Ratzinger. I cried myself to sleep that night, afraid she'd gone off somewhere to die.
It was that night that I knew she would not be with us much longer. I was back up at 6 a.m. the next morning as the sun was coming up, out into the yard, choking back tears, calling her name. A flood of relief came as I heard her little bell. She came from the neighbor's house across the street, one of her favorite hiding places. And off we went to the vet. I left her with the good doctor, hoping for good news. The doctor's ashen face when I arrived that afternoon told me there would be no good news that day.
Somehow, one of her kidneys had failed. The other seemed to be sufficing for the time being. That was the good news. We began talking about a kidney removal. But her iron count was very low. Her HIV test had come back equivocal. More tests needed prior to the surgery revealed her heart was enlarged and her lungs were filling with fluid. She was so miserable that afternoon when I came to get her. She seemed to know her daddy was absolutely heart broken. We sat on the cold floor of the vet's office and I sobbed. And I knew, this was the second time she'd left and returned. The third time would be goodbye.
About $1200 later, we emerged from the vet's office with special food, iron supplement, a diuretic which she had to take twice a day and a syringe to force feed her. She was down to 8 pounds and would die of starvation if I didn't force feed her. For awhile, she was good about letting me do all of that. She tolerated the force feeding and meds well. She began to rally, gaining back weight, showing spark, even fussing at the other cats. Then one day, about
a month after the doctor's visit, she began to decline again. She wouldn't eat despite my locking her in her carrier with food, water and a box.
On the Fourth of July afternoon, my parents had come to town. I was headed to my brother's to see them and have dinner. Like I had done many times before, I had Ratzinger on the floor, syringe only partly full of food and water mixed up. Suddenly she choked. She leapt from my arms, up on the counter, gasping, eyes wide in terror. She leapt from the counter to the floor, convulsed a couple of times and died. I have lived through many hard times in my life. But this one 30 second interval of watching her sheer terror is probably the hardest thing I've ever faced in my life. I screamed at her to breathe, tried mouth to mouth, Heimlich maneuver, tried to help her now erupted heart to begin beating again. Nothing. She died in my arms as I rocked her, crying, aching. I have rarely felt the urge to die quite as strongly as I did that moment.
I tried to go to my brother's for dinner but I was too distraught. I excused myself early, tears brimming in my eyes, headed home to bury my little girl. I wrapped her in a turquoise towel, dug a hole in the corner of the yard where one day soon Charlie Beagle, now 15 years old, will soon rest as well. I lit a candle beneath the Celtic Cross in my yard, placed incense around
the grave and the bench where I sat cradling my little girl. I poured a glass of wine to celebrate a far too short but joy-filled five years. I spoke to her of how loved she was, of how much she had brought to the lives of all she knew, of how the rats were breathing easier these days, and of how much I would miss her. I sang the song I always sang to her: "You are my sunshine...my only sunshine...." Then I buried her, placing a round paving stone over the grave and surrounding it with border grass and lilies.
I was supposed to go to a Fourth party that night at the home of my friend, Judy, out on Lake Conway. All the Francis-Clare Community would be there. I called, uncertain what to say, blurting out through my tears that Ratzinger had died. They insisted I not stay home alone. So, I went to the party.
I will never forget the sky that evening. It was a shade of orange I've rarely seen before, the result of thunderstorms earlier that afternoon and the setting sun. Across the eastern horizon, a double rainbow stretched, periodically punctuated by long forks of lightning and erratic bursts of Fourth of July fireworks from around the lake. A cool breeze blew in off the lake. It was a masterpiece of nature. Despite the grief I felt, it was one of the most beautiful nights I had ever seen.
Days later, I found in my email a story about rescue animals waiting for their rescuers to cross the Rainbow Bridge into heaven. I smiled. Ms. Ratzinger was not waiting for me to cross that bridge. She had crossed a glorious sky on a double rainbow into heaven that night. As always she had gone in style. There were other animals and people to meet and charm.
It's been over two weeks now since I lost my little girl. There has not been a day yet that I have not cried over my poor Ratzinger. Having recently read The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari, I have started looking for lessons that painful events have to teach me. Ratzinger's death taught me several things. One, there are human limitations. Even the best vets and the most profound desires to keep a living being alive are sometimes not enough. My sense of helplessness - powerlessness - as I watched her die was a lesson - sometimes you can't prevent death, you can't make things better. They simply have to play out as they are destined to occur. I've also learned once again that I need to be mindful of the moment, grateful for the loving time together I have with all those many wonderful living beings G-d has graced my life with. I suddenly realized last week that I had been ignoring my other cats almost completely during the time Ratzinger had been so sick. I've been making up for lost time the past few days.
Finally, I realized I'm probably not as OK with death as I thought I was. I don't worry about what happens after death. Concern about heaven or hell don't make much sense to me. I trust G-d with whatever happens. What I've figured out is that I simply have a hard time letting go of those I love, of contemplating being without them. It's not so much attachment as it is aversion to the pain of loss and loneliness. At any rate, it's something I need to work on at midlife with many potential losses staring me in the face.
The statute of the smiling kitten, rolling on its back, arrived last week. I ordered it off the internet from the Better Homes and Gardens site, no less. Andy and Luci both said, "Oh yeah, that's her!" when I showed it to them. Today I put it on the spot where Ratzinger is buried. And once more I cried. Andy says I should be more patient with myself, give myself some time. I know I have survived the loss of animals, friends and family members before. I will survive this as well. Funny thing was that the statue, though concrete, was coated with some kind of stain and a burlap string tied around its neck. I hesitated to put it on her grave, afraid that in the torrid summer weather, even this reminder of her would deteriorate and fade away. Even in death, my grasp of Ratzinger is fragile, fleeting, momentary.
I know this is a bit maudlin. Unlike some of my other posts, this one was for me. I needed to write this even as I've put it off for a couple of days since the statue arrived. For those of us who will never have children, the loss of our animal companions is particularly profound. It's always a devil's bargain to be a pet owner because the chances always are that they will die before you do. The question I find myself asking these days is whether my heart can survive the loss of the animal I am always happy to adopt and bring into our lives. In years past, it was not a hard question. As I get older, I'm not so sure.
I really miss my little girl. One day I will think of her and smile. She was quite a cat. In five years, she managed to completely capture her daddy's heart. There have been times she's seemed like she was just around the corner. I find myself looking for her, waiting for her little bell to signal her procession in. The neighbors have an orange tabby named Crush who looks an awful lot like Ratzinger. In some ways, it's like she's still around, watching, waiting.
For tonight, all I can say is that I'm thankful for knowing her, for being owned by her (humans never own cats!) and for the things she taught me. There will be a day when I no longer cry for her. But there will never be a day when I will not be a better human being for having the far too brief five years I was given with a little extroverted six-toed orange tabby with a big heart and an unusual name, Ratzinger. Thank you, little girl, for all you were and all I became because of you.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Saturday, July 17, 2004
Because I wasn't there…..
It's odd how you can go much of your life and not understand why things happened the way they did. And, then, when you least expect it, a moment of clarity occurs when an answer to a question you have never been able to even articulate suddenly presents itself. Revelation. And suddenly so much makes sense.
I had one of those Larsen cow (where the cow suddenly realizes "Grass! This is grass we've been eating!") experiences last week. I had taken my friend Juicy Luci to see her grandmother and aunt and uncle up in The Villages (why do I always think of the 1960s British series The Prisoner when I hear that name?). Afterward we had driven down to see my parents and have dinner with them. As I was sitting in the home where I had spent the last six years prior to graduating high school (getting the hell out of Dodge the day after graduation, literally), the home which sat on the land my father, brother and I had cleared together, I suddenly became aware of the photos on the walls. Photos of my brother and sister and their children - the grandchildren. And so I got a wild hair - why not show Luci my photos from my growing up days?
I began to casually search the house for my photographs. There was the portrait of the three of us taken when I was a senior in high school. And there was one down the hall taken when I was four years old, an innocent toe-headed face peering back at me across the nearly 50 years. (Lord, has it been that long?) The rest was filled with photos of weddings, my parents' and my brother's and sister's. And siblings with children. And grandchildren alone. Long dead forebears peered from my father's room which has become genealogy central for him. All of a sudden it began to dawn on me: but for the two pictures from my childhood, I simply wasn't there.
Suddenly I remembered the funny photo of Andy and I my sister had taken last summer over at the beach. I had framed it and given it to my mother for Mother's Day a couple of months ago. I looked around, trying to remember where I had last seen it. It was nowhere in sight. Finally I detected the edge of the frame peering from behind a photo of my brother and his family. There it was, my partner and I, buried under the socially respectable heterosexual family photo, removed from sight of visitors and occupants alike. I doubt my parents consciously covered up the evidence of their oldest child's adult life. But regardless, for all practical purposes, I wasn't there.
I'm not sure why this surprised me. Surely I could have seen that coming. But a wave of sadness spread over me. I felt the tears brimming in my eyes. And I resolved immediately that I would not let anyone see me cry over this. The last thing I wanted to do was to have to explain why I was upset. "I need to go outside for a minute," I said. "I'm not feeling too good."
The revelation was not yet complete. Blinking back tears and rubbing my burning eyes, I surveyed the wooded 12 acres in which I had spent the bulk of my teenage years. Familiar sights swam into view. The palm tree Daddy gave me for my Christmas present in 1970, now well over my head. Banks of azaleas I had planted, so brilliant in the springtime, rendering the state highway beyond invisible. There was the large oak, its trunk split into two arching giants, where we used to shimmy up between the two and then step out onto the moss and lichen covered branch large enough for a teenager to walk on. Behind the house, past the small citrus grove we had spent many frosty nights building fires to keep alive, was the half acre rock garden I had built over the years. Its concrete fish pond now filled with leaves and weeds, its bricked paths and the wishing well built from a discarded washing machine agitator now grown over with out-of-control ivy and ferns. Yet even in its overgrown appearance, it still soothed me with a warm feeling that came unbidden.
That's when the revelation came into focus. Of course my photos weren't in the house. I wasn't there. And I hadn't been for a long time. It was the woods that had been my refuge in the last years of high school when my father had made life so difficult for me, struggling to deal with a son he feared was probably gay in a town where he had been raised and now taught school. It was the woods where I escaped, pouring out my grief, exchanging uncried tears for rock-lined flower beds brimming with azaleas and ferns, a monument to sublimation and transformation. And it is these same woods from which I have transplanted so many of those plants to my current lot-sized confinement in the heart of a city which does not understand the need for greenery to shield a fragile soul from a world which does not understand it.
Suddenly a number of pieces began to fall into place. For one, my affinity for the woods. I have always loved the woods as long as I could remember even as I despised the small towns - farms and ranches at their edges- with their little minds and even littler hearts. The woods were a place of recharge and refuge, my true alma mater where my broken heart found rest. The psalmist described it well: "It restoreth my soul." I have sought to recreate those woods in every place I have ever lived. Suddenly, I understood why. The woods were my solace, the place I sought out when rejection began to pile on rejection in the little farmer and jock dominated school to which I was sentenced for 11 and a half long years. In the woods, I could be myself hidden from the hostile, judgmental eyes of the townspeople and my increasingly perplexed and anxious father. The woods were the place I belonged.
I also suddenly understood why when my mother asks me what I want of her estate, I have a hard time thinking of anything. The furniture, the wall decorations, the dishes all speak to a house - indeed, a world - to which I never truly belonged. What I really want is outside, where I had existed.
Upon reflection, it has occurred to me that there is a reason my photos stop appearing in the house at the point in my life where they do. At four, I was still the little boy my parents always wanted, the toe-headed, bright child who read at three and whose curiosity about the world was unbounded, the little boy who liked people and invited complete strangers right off the street to his fourth birthday party. At 17, I was still the son with much promise, high scores on standardized tests, good grades, a state merit scholar, a good son who grated at the reins but still was respectable in the little town which raised him. Thereafter came the struggles in earnest, the long, painful coming out process, the failed heterosexual relationships, the alcohol whose abuse escalated toward disaster which would come some 20 years later on a highway in California. There would be no wedding photos or grandchildren to add to the collection of the socially respectable. And the many graduation portraits (five from colleges alone) and the many photos of me with dear friends or my partner of 30 years I gave my parents would never make it to the walls. It's essentially as if Harry, the toe-headed boy and the serious-faced promising high school graduate, the tragic oldest son, simply vanished into the night at graduation from high school that sultry May evening in 1971.
I need to hasten to say that I have never doubted that my parents loved me. Even in my darkest hours of coming to grips with my sexuality and struggling to survive the persecution I experienced as a teacher in Inverness during the late 1970s, I always believed that, at bottom line, my parents still loved me. Their pain at my absence from their immediate lives those four years I spent in California was palpable, one of the major reasons I returned to Florida. But I also have become very clear in my middle age that they have never really understood me though I suspect they have tried. Perhaps no one is ever completely understood. But I think my father, whose world of reference was that little town which had produced him, and my mother, a saint for sure but lacking any kind of experience upon which to relate to a gay son, simply didn't know what to do with the son that emerged after escaping the little town which had held him captive those years. The photos missing from their home bear witness to their response: I simply wasn't there.
I find myself oddly detached from these words as I record them. I don't feel any particular sorrow or anger. I simply find a sense of relief in finally understanding. It's odd to realize such things at midlife. I love my parents no less. And I think I probably understand them a little better than I did. I will be sad the day that I can no longer walk the grounds of the home where I spent the last years of my teenaged life. But I have long since said goodbye to the house where I was at best nominally present those six years. I now have my own home which I love, a home surrounded by a wall of green, some of it from the woods in which I lived those many years. It is a home brimming with photos and mementoes of a very full life, wonderful friends and a loving partnership of some 30 plus years. This is my place, my home. It is a place where my presence is inescapable and its rightful place unquestioned. And it is from that place that I today give thanks for the woods that were my true home and my refuge those many years and for the lesson they have afforded me these many years later. Deo gratias.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
It's odd how you can go much of your life and not understand why things happened the way they did. And, then, when you least expect it, a moment of clarity occurs when an answer to a question you have never been able to even articulate suddenly presents itself. Revelation. And suddenly so much makes sense.
I had one of those Larsen cow (where the cow suddenly realizes "Grass! This is grass we've been eating!") experiences last week. I had taken my friend Juicy Luci to see her grandmother and aunt and uncle up in The Villages (why do I always think of the 1960s British series The Prisoner when I hear that name?). Afterward we had driven down to see my parents and have dinner with them. As I was sitting in the home where I had spent the last six years prior to graduating high school (getting the hell out of Dodge the day after graduation, literally), the home which sat on the land my father, brother and I had cleared together, I suddenly became aware of the photos on the walls. Photos of my brother and sister and their children - the grandchildren. And so I got a wild hair - why not show Luci my photos from my growing up days?
I began to casually search the house for my photographs. There was the portrait of the three of us taken when I was a senior in high school. And there was one down the hall taken when I was four years old, an innocent toe-headed face peering back at me across the nearly 50 years. (Lord, has it been that long?) The rest was filled with photos of weddings, my parents' and my brother's and sister's. And siblings with children. And grandchildren alone. Long dead forebears peered from my father's room which has become genealogy central for him. All of a sudden it began to dawn on me: but for the two pictures from my childhood, I simply wasn't there.
Suddenly I remembered the funny photo of Andy and I my sister had taken last summer over at the beach. I had framed it and given it to my mother for Mother's Day a couple of months ago. I looked around, trying to remember where I had last seen it. It was nowhere in sight. Finally I detected the edge of the frame peering from behind a photo of my brother and his family. There it was, my partner and I, buried under the socially respectable heterosexual family photo, removed from sight of visitors and occupants alike. I doubt my parents consciously covered up the evidence of their oldest child's adult life. But regardless, for all practical purposes, I wasn't there.
I'm not sure why this surprised me. Surely I could have seen that coming. But a wave of sadness spread over me. I felt the tears brimming in my eyes. And I resolved immediately that I would not let anyone see me cry over this. The last thing I wanted to do was to have to explain why I was upset. "I need to go outside for a minute," I said. "I'm not feeling too good."
The revelation was not yet complete. Blinking back tears and rubbing my burning eyes, I surveyed the wooded 12 acres in which I had spent the bulk of my teenage years. Familiar sights swam into view. The palm tree Daddy gave me for my Christmas present in 1970, now well over my head. Banks of azaleas I had planted, so brilliant in the springtime, rendering the state highway beyond invisible. There was the large oak, its trunk split into two arching giants, where we used to shimmy up between the two and then step out onto the moss and lichen covered branch large enough for a teenager to walk on. Behind the house, past the small citrus grove we had spent many frosty nights building fires to keep alive, was the half acre rock garden I had built over the years. Its concrete fish pond now filled with leaves and weeds, its bricked paths and the wishing well built from a discarded washing machine agitator now grown over with out-of-control ivy and ferns. Yet even in its overgrown appearance, it still soothed me with a warm feeling that came unbidden.
That's when the revelation came into focus. Of course my photos weren't in the house. I wasn't there. And I hadn't been for a long time. It was the woods that had been my refuge in the last years of high school when my father had made life so difficult for me, struggling to deal with a son he feared was probably gay in a town where he had been raised and now taught school. It was the woods where I escaped, pouring out my grief, exchanging uncried tears for rock-lined flower beds brimming with azaleas and ferns, a monument to sublimation and transformation. And it is these same woods from which I have transplanted so many of those plants to my current lot-sized confinement in the heart of a city which does not understand the need for greenery to shield a fragile soul from a world which does not understand it.
Suddenly a number of pieces began to fall into place. For one, my affinity for the woods. I have always loved the woods as long as I could remember even as I despised the small towns - farms and ranches at their edges- with their little minds and even littler hearts. The woods were a place of recharge and refuge, my true alma mater where my broken heart found rest. The psalmist described it well: "It restoreth my soul." I have sought to recreate those woods in every place I have ever lived. Suddenly, I understood why. The woods were my solace, the place I sought out when rejection began to pile on rejection in the little farmer and jock dominated school to which I was sentenced for 11 and a half long years. In the woods, I could be myself hidden from the hostile, judgmental eyes of the townspeople and my increasingly perplexed and anxious father. The woods were the place I belonged.
I also suddenly understood why when my mother asks me what I want of her estate, I have a hard time thinking of anything. The furniture, the wall decorations, the dishes all speak to a house - indeed, a world - to which I never truly belonged. What I really want is outside, where I had existed.
Upon reflection, it has occurred to me that there is a reason my photos stop appearing in the house at the point in my life where they do. At four, I was still the little boy my parents always wanted, the toe-headed, bright child who read at three and whose curiosity about the world was unbounded, the little boy who liked people and invited complete strangers right off the street to his fourth birthday party. At 17, I was still the son with much promise, high scores on standardized tests, good grades, a state merit scholar, a good son who grated at the reins but still was respectable in the little town which raised him. Thereafter came the struggles in earnest, the long, painful coming out process, the failed heterosexual relationships, the alcohol whose abuse escalated toward disaster which would come some 20 years later on a highway in California. There would be no wedding photos or grandchildren to add to the collection of the socially respectable. And the many graduation portraits (five from colleges alone) and the many photos of me with dear friends or my partner of 30 years I gave my parents would never make it to the walls. It's essentially as if Harry, the toe-headed boy and the serious-faced promising high school graduate, the tragic oldest son, simply vanished into the night at graduation from high school that sultry May evening in 1971.
I need to hasten to say that I have never doubted that my parents loved me. Even in my darkest hours of coming to grips with my sexuality and struggling to survive the persecution I experienced as a teacher in Inverness during the late 1970s, I always believed that, at bottom line, my parents still loved me. Their pain at my absence from their immediate lives those four years I spent in California was palpable, one of the major reasons I returned to Florida. But I also have become very clear in my middle age that they have never really understood me though I suspect they have tried. Perhaps no one is ever completely understood. But I think my father, whose world of reference was that little town which had produced him, and my mother, a saint for sure but lacking any kind of experience upon which to relate to a gay son, simply didn't know what to do with the son that emerged after escaping the little town which had held him captive those years. The photos missing from their home bear witness to their response: I simply wasn't there.
I find myself oddly detached from these words as I record them. I don't feel any particular sorrow or anger. I simply find a sense of relief in finally understanding. It's odd to realize such things at midlife. I love my parents no less. And I think I probably understand them a little better than I did. I will be sad the day that I can no longer walk the grounds of the home where I spent the last years of my teenaged life. But I have long since said goodbye to the house where I was at best nominally present those six years. I now have my own home which I love, a home surrounded by a wall of green, some of it from the woods in which I lived those many years. It is a home brimming with photos and mementoes of a very full life, wonderful friends and a loving partnership of some 30 plus years. This is my place, my home. It is a place where my presence is inescapable and its rightful place unquestioned. And it is from that place that I today give thanks for the woods that were my true home and my refuge those many years and for the lesson they have afforded me these many years later. Deo gratias.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
the loneliest animal in the forest
Back in the late 1980s, we lived near a large park downtown on the site of a former lake in which a sinkhole had opened and drained its waters years before. It was largely a swampy area and the parks department had created a series of trails and boardwalks through the area to allow people to appreciate nature in the midst of a city of over a million people. The park was adjacent to a housing project in which allegedly a good bit of drug dealing was occurring. It was also the site of some homosexual cruising which local police claimed resulted in sexual acts being committed in park restrooms and in the bushes. I say allegedly because for all the hype that came out of OPD, the statistics rarely bore out the alarming incidence of crime the public was being warned of.
I was practicing law those days and we saw increasing numbers of misdemeanor city ordinance violations as the OPD sought to harrass ghetto kids they presumed were dealing drugs and gay men whom the presumed were planning sexual contacts in the parks. They prosecuted these targetted people through the use of obscure ordinances like "leaving a designated path" or "being in a park after sundown," broad charges which fit any kind of suspicious act. Never underestimate the power of the combination of a Calvinist religion, a Hobbesian anthropology and the power and authority of local law.
Most of the agents sent to sweep up these heinous criminals were undercover. Many wore revealing skimpy outfits designed to attract gay men or the beard and baseball cap uniform of the stereotypical drug dealer. These agents often hid in the bushes, wired for sound, waiting to spring their traps on those they saw as menaces to society. In addition to the irritation I felt as a public defender whose time was being wasted on bullshit city ordinance misdemeanor harrassment, the obsession with the city over sex and drugs (those things our puritan culture cannot deal with because they represent an unthinkable loss of control) played out in a more personal manner for me. My new jeep had been broken into in my carport and some things stolen from it. I called the police, they said they'd be over but none ever showed. I knew for a fact the undercovers were down in the bushes that afternoon because I saw them there. And after a couple of days when LEO never showed, I simply wrote the mayor a letter laying out what had occurred. I said that while the department was busy trying to bust misdemeanor departures from the path a mere block away, the felony occurring in my home was ignored. So what's wrong with this picture?
Years later, a friend would tell me of the night his father had died. He had driven to a parking lot overlooking Lake Underhill a block from where I now live. A young man in revealing clothes had come up to his car, pounded on the window and struck up a conversation punctuated repeatedly with offers to engage in sexual activity. After about a half hour of this, my friend agreed to go somewhere with the man. Out came the wiretap and the handcuffs. There is no small amount of predatory motivation in this practice. Knowing this man was grieving the loss of his father and was in a state of vulnerability, the officer continued until he had bagged his game. Who protects us from the protectors?
The last event which gave rise to this post occurred about six months ago. The park where I often go to meditate overlooking Lake Underhill has become a notorious cruising and drug dealing spot, according to the OPD. Local television channels have secretly planted television cameras to record supposed illicit activities in the park. One day as I was meditating, a middle aged man from south Florida came up and struck up a conversation. At one point he suggested we might go into the park restroom. The purpose was fairly clear. Politely declining the offer, I told him that this was a very dangerous place to be doing what he was doing, noting the undercover surveillance. He walked away. A couple of months later, the latest confusion of police operations and entertainment appeared on the local "news" in the form of a story about the park. In the story, the reporter noted that the Orange County Sheriff's Department had created a website on which the photos of those caught in undercover operations like those at the park were posted. I could hardly believe tax moneys were being used in this fashion. So I looked up the site. And there amid the photos was the man I'd warned that day in the park.
I'm not sure what drives these men to engage in risky behaviors in public venues. I know that many are married. I know that others fear the public acknowledgement of their true sexual orientation. The closet has long been a refuge for those who want to have their cake and eat it, too. I'm guessing some like the thrill of doing something risky. I'm also guessing that some have such terrible views of themselves that the venue of a public restroom smelling of stale urine and feces acknowledges their low self-value.
But what I do observe about the many men I have seen in these parks is the absolute and profound sense of loneliness, often mixed with despair, that they evince. For whatever reason they are there, they are there seeking a shred of human contact, a momentary forgetting of their lives of lies. The poem that will be posted in a separate post has been ruminating for about 17 years since the days of living near that downtown park, the boardwalks long since removed by city fathers seeking "zero tolerance" (which usually translates to zero intelligence) of such heinous crimes as departing designated park paths. It speaks to the desperation of the liver of lies, the stupidity of their predators and the ultimate destructiveness of homophobia in a society that long ago should have figured that out.
Continued....
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Back in the late 1980s, we lived near a large park downtown on the site of a former lake in which a sinkhole had opened and drained its waters years before. It was largely a swampy area and the parks department had created a series of trails and boardwalks through the area to allow people to appreciate nature in the midst of a city of over a million people. The park was adjacent to a housing project in which allegedly a good bit of drug dealing was occurring. It was also the site of some homosexual cruising which local police claimed resulted in sexual acts being committed in park restrooms and in the bushes. I say allegedly because for all the hype that came out of OPD, the statistics rarely bore out the alarming incidence of crime the public was being warned of.
I was practicing law those days and we saw increasing numbers of misdemeanor city ordinance violations as the OPD sought to harrass ghetto kids they presumed were dealing drugs and gay men whom the presumed were planning sexual contacts in the parks. They prosecuted these targetted people through the use of obscure ordinances like "leaving a designated path" or "being in a park after sundown," broad charges which fit any kind of suspicious act. Never underestimate the power of the combination of a Calvinist religion, a Hobbesian anthropology and the power and authority of local law.
Most of the agents sent to sweep up these heinous criminals were undercover. Many wore revealing skimpy outfits designed to attract gay men or the beard and baseball cap uniform of the stereotypical drug dealer. These agents often hid in the bushes, wired for sound, waiting to spring their traps on those they saw as menaces to society. In addition to the irritation I felt as a public defender whose time was being wasted on bullshit city ordinance misdemeanor harrassment, the obsession with the city over sex and drugs (those things our puritan culture cannot deal with because they represent an unthinkable loss of control) played out in a more personal manner for me. My new jeep had been broken into in my carport and some things stolen from it. I called the police, they said they'd be over but none ever showed. I knew for a fact the undercovers were down in the bushes that afternoon because I saw them there. And after a couple of days when LEO never showed, I simply wrote the mayor a letter laying out what had occurred. I said that while the department was busy trying to bust misdemeanor departures from the path a mere block away, the felony occurring in my home was ignored. So what's wrong with this picture?
Years later, a friend would tell me of the night his father had died. He had driven to a parking lot overlooking Lake Underhill a block from where I now live. A young man in revealing clothes had come up to his car, pounded on the window and struck up a conversation punctuated repeatedly with offers to engage in sexual activity. After about a half hour of this, my friend agreed to go somewhere with the man. Out came the wiretap and the handcuffs. There is no small amount of predatory motivation in this practice. Knowing this man was grieving the loss of his father and was in a state of vulnerability, the officer continued until he had bagged his game. Who protects us from the protectors?
The last event which gave rise to this post occurred about six months ago. The park where I often go to meditate overlooking Lake Underhill has become a notorious cruising and drug dealing spot, according to the OPD. Local television channels have secretly planted television cameras to record supposed illicit activities in the park. One day as I was meditating, a middle aged man from south Florida came up and struck up a conversation. At one point he suggested we might go into the park restroom. The purpose was fairly clear. Politely declining the offer, I told him that this was a very dangerous place to be doing what he was doing, noting the undercover surveillance. He walked away. A couple of months later, the latest confusion of police operations and entertainment appeared on the local "news" in the form of a story about the park. In the story, the reporter noted that the Orange County Sheriff's Department had created a website on which the photos of those caught in undercover operations like those at the park were posted. I could hardly believe tax moneys were being used in this fashion. So I looked up the site. And there amid the photos was the man I'd warned that day in the park.
I'm not sure what drives these men to engage in risky behaviors in public venues. I know that many are married. I know that others fear the public acknowledgement of their true sexual orientation. The closet has long been a refuge for those who want to have their cake and eat it, too. I'm guessing some like the thrill of doing something risky. I'm also guessing that some have such terrible views of themselves that the venue of a public restroom smelling of stale urine and feces acknowledges their low self-value.
But what I do observe about the many men I have seen in these parks is the absolute and profound sense of loneliness, often mixed with despair, that they evince. For whatever reason they are there, they are there seeking a shred of human contact, a momentary forgetting of their lives of lies. The poem that will be posted in a separate post has been ruminating for about 17 years since the days of living near that downtown park, the boardwalks long since removed by city fathers seeking "zero tolerance" (which usually translates to zero intelligence) of such heinous crimes as departing designated park paths. It speaks to the desperation of the liver of lies, the stupidity of their predators and the ultimate destructiveness of homophobia in a society that long ago should have figured that out.
Continued....
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
the loneliest animal in the forest
under the green awning of live oak trees
along the creek beds
where little boys catch tadpoles in dixie cups
and old men tend to smoking barbeque grills
azaleas are blooming
camellias and gardenias, too
the park a mass of color
and wonderful smells
the birds sing joyous songs of creation
in the air a chorus of buzzing
bees hovering over the gaping mouths of lilies
and bold squirrels daring to retrieve
corn chips from the hands of project children
momentarily disengaged from their teeter-totters
swings and merry-go-rounds
but he doesn't notice
like prey instinctively listening for the trigger
he whips his head from side to side
looking over first one shoulder
then the other
scanning the horizon
waiting
wondering
hoping
praying
will he find what he is seeking
will he find the one
who will make him forget
even for one second
the miserable life of lies he leads
his face bears the signs
of desperation
of a loneliness so profound
a chasm so deep
that no fleeting moment of pleasure will ever satisfy
for he is seeking himself
a self he has long since learned
never to love
never to acknowledge
never to trust
never to affirm
a self now so atrophied and withered
the image of god it once bore so plainly
now unrecognizable
he pretends that he is the hunter
the one seeking prey
seeking to be sated
of the gnawing hunger
for intimacy
for a moment's forgetting
for an accidental lapse
into total honesty
but it is he who is prey
the men in their binoculars
and walkie-talkies
their wiretaps hidden
under the scanty "plain clothes"
they believe he will trust
just long enough
for the net to drop
the snare to swallow
the trap to snap shut
its iron teeth digging into
his vulnerable exposed paw
and then he is caught
entrapped
though he can never prove it
no one will believe him
he will be guilty as charged
from the moment of arrest
berated, dehumanized enroute to booking
public humiliation to follow
on newspaper local pages
and tax payer funded websites
his so poorly kept secret now out
his co-conspirator wife
who never believed the stories about working late
now forced to face
the web of self-deception she has spun
the "i always knew it" spoken in whispers
behind his back
at work
at home
at church
where he will once again give his soul to jesus
and pray to be delivered
of this demon which possesses him
appearing unchecked in his dreams
and emerging with the shadow's power
in moments of weakness like these
wreaking of whiskey
though he tries to forget
he knows the trap is being laid
he tells himself he'll be careful
he won't get caught this time
he knows he is lying to himself
once again
like always
and yet he has returned
to the boardwalks and paths
lined with lilies and water maples
seeking the unattainable
amidst the deceitful and treacherous
praying this time it will be different
and that the fire in his loins
and the abscess in his soul
will go away
even if just for a few fleeting moments
he is the loneliest animal in the forest
a creature beyond reason
beyond love
beyond self-respect
who surrenders his dignity
and sells his very soul
for ever-conditional affirmations
of a world who reviles his very being
and who seeks to redeem it
in danger-filled venues
of fleeting passion
and willful forgetting
- Harry Coverston, 2004
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
under the green awning of live oak trees
along the creek beds
where little boys catch tadpoles in dixie cups
and old men tend to smoking barbeque grills
azaleas are blooming
camellias and gardenias, too
the park a mass of color
and wonderful smells
the birds sing joyous songs of creation
in the air a chorus of buzzing
bees hovering over the gaping mouths of lilies
and bold squirrels daring to retrieve
corn chips from the hands of project children
momentarily disengaged from their teeter-totters
swings and merry-go-rounds
but he doesn't notice
like prey instinctively listening for the trigger
he whips his head from side to side
looking over first one shoulder
then the other
scanning the horizon
waiting
wondering
hoping
praying
will he find what he is seeking
will he find the one
who will make him forget
even for one second
the miserable life of lies he leads
his face bears the signs
of desperation
of a loneliness so profound
a chasm so deep
that no fleeting moment of pleasure will ever satisfy
for he is seeking himself
a self he has long since learned
never to love
never to acknowledge
never to trust
never to affirm
a self now so atrophied and withered
the image of god it once bore so plainly
now unrecognizable
he pretends that he is the hunter
the one seeking prey
seeking to be sated
of the gnawing hunger
for intimacy
for a moment's forgetting
for an accidental lapse
into total honesty
but it is he who is prey
the men in their binoculars
and walkie-talkies
their wiretaps hidden
under the scanty "plain clothes"
they believe he will trust
just long enough
for the net to drop
the snare to swallow
the trap to snap shut
its iron teeth digging into
his vulnerable exposed paw
and then he is caught
entrapped
though he can never prove it
no one will believe him
he will be guilty as charged
from the moment of arrest
berated, dehumanized enroute to booking
public humiliation to follow
on newspaper local pages
and tax payer funded websites
his so poorly kept secret now out
his co-conspirator wife
who never believed the stories about working late
now forced to face
the web of self-deception she has spun
the "i always knew it" spoken in whispers
behind his back
at work
at home
at church
where he will once again give his soul to jesus
and pray to be delivered
of this demon which possesses him
appearing unchecked in his dreams
and emerging with the shadow's power
in moments of weakness like these
wreaking of whiskey
though he tries to forget
he knows the trap is being laid
he tells himself he'll be careful
he won't get caught this time
he knows he is lying to himself
once again
like always
and yet he has returned
to the boardwalks and paths
lined with lilies and water maples
seeking the unattainable
amidst the deceitful and treacherous
praying this time it will be different
and that the fire in his loins
and the abscess in his soul
will go away
even if just for a few fleeting moments
he is the loneliest animal in the forest
a creature beyond reason
beyond love
beyond self-respect
who surrenders his dignity
and sells his very soul
for ever-conditional affirmations
of a world who reviles his very being
and who seeks to redeem it
in danger-filled venues
of fleeting passion
and willful forgetting
- Harry Coverston, 2004
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
https://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~ncoverst/
frharry@cfl.rr.com
If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things of value do not lend themselves to production in sound bytes.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)