The Voice of Treason

“Aw. Liz Claiborne died.”

“So?”

“She was the designer responsible for my big red ones.”

“Oh. Well, in that case, she deserved it.”

Sounds harsh, but T was never a fan of “the big red ones.” I mention Liz Claiborne for a couple reasons. One, I read an article on NRO by Nancy French recalling her relationship with The Liz way back in the nineties when Nance was in – gasp! – high school. Amusing stuff.

And two – my “relationship” with the cult of Claiborne, but further back for me. It was in the Eighties and I was already out of college and in my second job. There was a girl. Actually, there were several, and they were all about fashion and hair and accessories. They shopped at trendy boutiques and knew when things would be on sale at Macy’s. I watched them the way a cat watches finches in a cage. So colorful. So mesmerizing.

One was not so flashy. I’ve written about her before here – Elizabeth, who always wore a simple strand of pearls and wanted to be a travel agent. The one who married the Belgian and who served tiny portions of attractive food on enormous platters. Definitely the loft type.

Liz was tall and slim, and she kept her dark curls clipped short. Peaches and cream complexion with the most subtle spatter of freckles across her delicate little nose. She stood straight. She wore simple flats or a sensible heel, and usually wore those well-tailored sleeveless shifts that made her look like something out of the Sixties. Something Hepburnesque. And I’m talkin’ Audrey.

She always carried a small handbag. Not a satchel, not a shoulder bag. No, this was something like a clutch. This always fascinated me. How could she fit everything she needed into that bag?

It was a Liz Claiborne bag. Clean lines, minute, but it had compartments for anything she needed to put in it. I’d been dreaming of a purse like that. So did I run out and buy one? No. I did not. (Well, not until many, many years later.) I believe at the time I was dragging around an oversized electric pink zip up hobo bag that looked like a deflated hot air balloon.

Anyway, unlike me, Liz, who was so tasteful, sporting those clean lines and such simplicity, always, as they used to say about a previous generation of young women, looked “smart.”

And there was another girl. Shorter, more athletic looking, someone my mother might have referred to as “masculine.” She spoke slowly, almost as if she had a Southern drawl, and she always wore Claiborne sportswear. Perfectly fitting trousers – slacks – and lightweight sweaters and crisp blouses. She seemed comfortable and competent. Confident, too. So much so that she approached a fabulously handsome black man in a store and told him that he smelled good. He told her the name of his cologne, then asked her to dinner. Soon they were an item.

Could Liz Claiborne clothing make women do such bold things? Liz traveled the globe and married that Belgian, then bought outrageously expensive dinnerware. If I wore Claiborne, would it change my life?

I’d been wearing contact lenses but was considering a new pair of glasses since frames had become interesting again. My sister was in serious need of a new pair, but I knew she’d never go get an exam and pick out frames if I wasn’t there doing the same thing. Our father, I reminded her, could drink a bar dry, but always managed to be at work in the morning. The only time he missed a day, our mother always marveled, was when he broke his glasses.

You see, this story haunted me and my blind sisters since childhood. We, if we were lucky, had one pair of glasses and nothing had better happen to them. I used to fantasize that one day I would be wealthy. Furs? Of course not. Cars? Just need one that runs. Mansions? Too much to dust. No, all I wanted was a drawer full of eyeglasses so I never had to wear the same frames two days in a row.

My sister had always had the same fantasy so off we went to the mall. It’s where we found the Liz Claiborne frames. At last! I could buy designer items, I told myself, and not feel pretentious or extravagant because eyeglasses are practical. I wanted the cat’s eyes because I’d always liked the style and maybe on some level I guess I wanted to look like something out of Gary Larson.

But for some reason I chickened out (I bought a similar pair, years later, as sunglasses) and picked out the LC 22s in red and in black, and the LC 19s in tortoise. My sister also chose the same red and black, but picked up white and royal blue in the LC 19s. These frames were outrageous in that they were so ENORMOUS.

Usually when the two of us planned to be together at the same time we managed to show up wearing different frames. Either the BIG circles, or the BIG rectangles. However, there were those incidents when we planned badly and found ourselves in public wearing identical frames. Like the time we had picked up Kate and Gwen – my sister’s gigantic St. Newfs – from the groomer. Their heads were like beachballs yet the dog stylist felt it necessary to affix tiny green bows on their heads after blow-drying their coats.

We drove down El Camino Real, through Sunnyvale and Mountain View, in my sister’s metallic blue AMC Hornet station wagon, with the two giant dogs in the back seat, wearing their little green bows on the tops of their heads. One over each ear. We were in the front of the Hornet, wearing the giant red Liz Claiborne frames, our hair to our shoulders with bangs. And I suddenly felt as if we were being watched. I looked at the other cars on the road and it was so: People in the other cars were staring at us.

It was then that my sister and I looked at each other and realized, simultaneously, how absolutely ridiculous this must have looked. It is a memory, thanks to a certain short-haired and bespectacled designer, that I will always cherish.

R.I.P.

“So it’s home again and home again, America for me.
My heart is turning home again, and there I long to be.
In the land of youth and freedom beyond the ocean bars
Where the air is full of sunlight, and the flag is full of stars.”

We’re coming up on a birthday. I don’t think Hallmark makes a card for a 231st anniversary of a birth, but it doesn’t really matter. We don’t have to go out and search for one before Wednesday: Peggy Noonan has done the work for us. In her column, she captures precisely what it is some of us have been trying to say throughout this debate on immigration reform. No, we’re not racist. No, we’re not xenophobes. No, we’re not nativists. No, we’re not heartless. We’re quite the opposite, really.

Peggy simply writes about the process of becoming an American. “Anyone can become ‘American’” she says, “but they have to want to first.” It’s sort of like intervention, then. You have to want it. And you have to be willing to give something up to get what you want.

She writes about what it meant for immigrants like her grandparents and mine to “cast their lot.” To make that “decision” that would change their lives, our lives, and the life of a nation. A nation that is coming up on a birthday.

I’m reminded of the things my grandparents gave up when they made the decision to cast their lot, and I think about my uncles who enlisted in different branches of the U.S. military to fight a war against the country where their parents had started their lives. But there was no angst. My uncles were born here – their lot had been cast. My mother’s family was American and had no allegiance to “the old country” or to the fascist who was running it.

Peggy Noonan has once again grasped it. Again, just one more reason I love the woman.

It has become all too apparent that the U.S. Senate has been involved in some very self-destructive behavior. Several individuals have not been applying themselves to the jobs they were hired to do, and they have used valuable time to insult the very people who hired them. Some of us have learned that it’s rarely a good idea to badmouth the people who pay your salary.

And it’s also a poor idea to attack your coworkers just to make yourself look good. You know, those “younger guys who are huffing and puffing” – no doubt out of breath from working so hard at the jobs they were entrusted to do, while the rest simply abuse the privilege of their employment?

But we like the huffers and puffers. And we appreciate our fellow Americans who intervened in order to save not only some wayward senators, but who saved themselves and many others from some badly engineered legislation. It was a successful intervention and we should all be grateful. Encouraged. Inspired.

Can this same group of concerned citizens intervene once more to save the rest of the Republicans? Why, wouldn’t that be just grand for the old party? A key to successful intervention, however, is to get the afflicted party to commit to change. To accept that it is high time to get help. To agree to alter evil ways and improve their situation so that they can once again be positive contributors to society.

Can we count on our elected officials to make that sort of commitment? Will they accept our help to straighten up and fly right? Or is their addiction to power and self-importance just too strong to overcome?

If they’re not willing to help themselves, perhaps it’s time for us to withdraw our support and forget we know them. I was in the middle of forgetting my own senator. The one who probably should have retired a few years ago. The pork-bearer. But he has temporarily redeemed himself by declaring that the bill before him was “neither workable nor realistic” and had an “unintended effect” in his home state. My! So nice of him to consider us.

A reprieve. Amnistia, if you will. Uh… for now.

“What is an intervention? What is its objective?

A formal intervention, like we are discussing here, usually involves several people preparing themselves, approaching a person involved in some self-destructive behavior, and talking to the person in a clear and respectful way about the behavior in question with the immediate objectives being for the person to listen and to accept help.

Although the intervention process has been formalized, the idea is not new. Thinking back, most of us can remember a time when someone or something - a teacher, friend, or set of circumstances impressed us in a seminal way which altered how we understood ourselves and changed our perspective. Moments like these constitute turning points where new vistas open allowing us to see things differently and to recognize opportunities we did not know existed before.”

– www.intervention.com

Man, oh man, has this been a week of stories about stupid women, or what? No, no, I’m not talking about Paris – although she is dumb as a stump; no, I’m talking about the dead stupid women. Like the one in Ohio who managed to get herself impregnated by the married cop – not once, but twice. And the dead wife of the wrestler with “roid-rage.” Yes, stupid. And I’d also like to address the other women: the brain dead ones who stood by and watched what was happening to the now dead ones.

Women like to say that they’re smarter, more intuitive, than men. It’s true that there are some sharp females out there, but there are also some really stupid ones. What’s really frustrating are the ones who are smart, yet still do really stupid things. And what’s really, really frustrating is that these women are often surrounded by the same types.

The story of Jessie Davis curls my toes because once she disappeared, all the women around her came forward to say that they knew what had happened. Why, it was that Bobby Cutts. Yes, they had seen the train coming down the track – and there are several women who have come forward to illustrate his violent patterns – but not one of these “intuitives” was successful in pulling Jessie aside and telling her that it was time for an intervention.

I’m sure she heard from friends and family that it probably wasn’t a good idea to have a relationship with a married man. I’m sure they shared concerns about her raising an illegitimate child, and I’m certain that they warned her about doing an encore. Or did they?

Sure, some women are blockheads, and it doesn’t matter how obvious the facts of their situation are, they are going to stay in it no matter what. At that point, it’s probably a good idea to forget you know them.

But, no. Women might not condone the behavior, but they understand it, so they think it’s helpful to make lemonade from rotting lemons. Yes, she had this baby, and he’s perfectly beautiful, and it’s not his fault that his daddy’s a loser. And now she’s having a second child. It’s unfortunate, but we cannot hold it against this innocent baby. So let’s throw her a shower to celebrate!

Oh, yes, a big party to validate the stupid decisions she has made. Look! We’re all here, pouring punch, unwrapping gifts, and playing silly shower games, so we must – on some level — agree with and support your decision to be a complete dumbass and endanger your children.

Yes, Bobby Cutts is a lowlife sonofabitch, but all the women around him and his dead receptacle and their baby need to take a moment and reflect on their role here, and accept the responsibility of being just as vile.

“Among the interesting people encountered by my wife and me, during some recent vacation travel, were a small group of adolescent boys from a Navajo reservation. They were being led on a bicycle tour by a couple of white men, one of whom was apparently their teacher on the reservation.

The Navajo youngsters were bright and cheerful lads, so I was surprised when someone asked them in what state Pittsburgh was located and none of them knew. Then they were offered a clue that it was in the same state as Philadelphia but they didn’t know where Philadelphia was either.

These Navajo boys seemed too bright not to have learned such things if they had been taught the basics. They also seemed too positive to be the kinds of kids who refused to learn.

– Thomas Sowell, NRO

Don’t get me started. I quote Sowell here for two reasons. One: I just adore the guy. And two: He’s written something that people should read. Both Liberals and Conservatives — and teachers, especially. Sowell makes the point that “no culture can stand still.” It’s a double-edged sword, change, but it’s inevitable. He and his wife were concerned that these boys were being taught inside the prism of their particular culture, as citizens of a Navajo reservation – not as citizens of a larger world: America.

And if you’re a globalist, why stop there? These kids aren’t only citizens of this country, they’re citizens of the world. Depending on how we fund NASA, maybe even citizens of the universe. But it appears their teachers don’t see it that way.

Sowell sees this as an attempt by the multi-cultis to maintain a particular culture. “But any culture,” says Sowell, “whether in or out of the mainstream, is not just a badge of identity or a museum piece to be admired by others.”

“A culture is a tool for serving the many practical purposes of life, from making a living to curing diseases. As a tool, it has to change with the ever-changing tasks that confront every culture as time goes on…

Worse yet, too many multiculturalists want many groups to cling to their historic grievances, if not be defined by them.

But among the many ways that various groups around the world have advanced from poverty to prosperity, nursing historic grievances does not have a promising track record — except for those who make a career out of keeping grievances alive.

The youngsters we saw deserve better than that.”

I remember when I was doing my student teaching back in the early 1980s. I was horrified that so many teenagers – 16 to 18 years old – hadn’t yet grasped simple concepts and were, for all intents and purposes, marginally illiterate. It was frustrating because a lot of these kids were sharp and had potential, but for too long they were left to just make their way through the system, mediocre at best.

It was explained to me that 1) the other teachers did not want to see these kids the following year, and 2) I shouldn’t worry about them because “they will be taken care of.” I asked for clarification. Give them a “D” if you must, I was told, but these kids have to pass. They have to be moved through. Don’t fret – they’ll be fine. The girls will get married and have kids – someone will take care of them. The boys… they’ll manage, too. Someone will take care of them.

Who?, I asked. The taxpayers? Isn’t the point of education to prepare them for the world out there? To teach them that there is more for them out there? Life isn’t just their little town in Northern California. There’s a whole world of possibilities. Shouldn’t they be equipped to make a choice, not just be forced to settle? Shouldn’t the objective be to learn as much as possible?

No, not really. For a few, perhaps. Yes, some will go to college, some will succeed. But not every kid wants that. Some will be fine just doing what they’re expected to do. They’ll be fine. They’ll be happy. Don’t worry about them. They’ll be taken care of. Change your records and make them Ds. Understand?

Yes. Yes, I understood that these teachers were making a choice on behalf of their students. I understood everything at that point. And that’s why my teaching credential’s still in a drawer, unused, after twenty-five years.

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

– Amendment XIV, Section 1

When I met with my “personal immigrant,” I’d been led to believe that his English skills were so minimal that I should start with the very basics: namely, our alphabet. I’d gone shopping for items that might be helpful and I found some flashcards for letters, numbers, and an introduction to phonics.

To get a sense of where my P.I. was at, I pulled out the cards that had some basic images for each letter of the alphabet and held them up. For instance, A/apple or B/bear. He knew apple, but did not know bear. I continued. When we got to F, the picture was of a white picket thing. He looked at the card and said nothing. And suddenly I felt uncomfortable saying the word.

“Fence. F. It’s a fence.”

I understand those who hate the idea of a fence separating our nation from others, but the argument against border security has become less convincing on so many levels. I’ll pick out just two here. One: the argument that cultures and countries change and that it’s a natural and healthy process. You can’t stop it. America, which prides itself on the melting pot, has been changing forever and is a work in progress mainly because of the influence of the “new” Americans who come here and contribute. Don’t, say the critics, try to keep America stuck in the 1950s. That America is dead. There is a new America and we just have to deal with it. Embrace it.

That argument makes sense to a point. Times change. Politics change. Cultures change. Demographics change. Depending where you are, wait five minutes and the weather will change. If the world is changing so rapidly, why is it that the one thing that cannot change is the status of our borders? Yes, there was a time that our borders could be unsupervised, but there was also a time when people were more inclined to obey the rule of law. And there was a time when we were more inclined to uphold the rule of law. We used to be at war with the Italians, the Germans, and the Japanese. Now we’re at war with others. That much has changed. Aren’t we told on a daily basis to change our attitudes towards oh-so-many things? If there has been so much change, so much evolution, then don’t we have sufficient justification to change our attitude about securing our borders and build some fences?

“Born in the U.S.A. Don’t take my Mommy or my Daddy away.”

There is that argument, too. It’s un-American to break up families by deporting parents of children who were born here and are, technically, U.S. citizens. Parents are sent to prison, and parents are deployed overseas. Families are broken up all the time. Why don’t deported mothers and fathers, who have demonstrated that they cannot obey the laws of this country, take their children back home with them? Look! No more broken families! Incidentally, what does it take for a toddler who is a U.S. citizen to get dual citizenship? Is it automatic? Or is it illegal for one of these children to relocate across our borders to a different country? If so, why? Aren’t borders just arbitrary lines on a map?

I keep hearing that. Borders mean nothing. Borders are made up. There are no such things. If that is the case, then why is it so important to cross an imaginary border to deliver a child in order for him to gain rights that aren’t imaginary?

Oh. So suddenly a border is important. Important only when it benefits someone else. Selective importance doesn’t work. If we don’t have a border, then maybe citizenship is imaginary, too. And maybe I live in Texas. Lines on a map, that’s all. Who says this is New Mexico? I say there is no border. This is Texas and because it is Texas, I shouldn’t have to pay income tax.

Wishful thinking. Some laws, you see, can be enforced.

“You’ve got to turn off the Spanish television set. It’s that simple. You’ve got to learn English. You’ve got to listen. I know this sounds odd and is politically not correct thing to say, and I’m getting myself into trouble. But I know, I know that when I came to this country, I did not, very rarely speak German to anyone. Not that I didn’t like Austria. My heart was always in Austria, but I wanted to, as quickly as possible, learn the English language.”

– Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, at the annual convention of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, in San Jose, Cahleefohrniyah

“Alba is my last name and I’m proud of that. But that’s it. My grandparents were born in California, the same as my parents, and though I may be proud of my last name, I’m American…

My grandfather was the only Mexican at his college, the only Hispanic person at work and the only one at the all-white country club. He tried to forget his Mexican roots, because he never wanted his kids to be made to feel different in America. He and my grandmother didn’t speak Spanish to their children. Now, as a third-generation American, I feel as if I have finally cut loose…

I had a very American upbringing, I feel American, and I don’t speak Spanish. So, to say that I’m a Latin actress, okay, but it’s not fitting; it would be insincere.”

– Jessica Alba

“Explain to me what Italian-American culture is. We’ve been here 100 years. Isn’t Italian-American culture American culture? That’s because we’re so diverse, in terms of intermarriage. Most everybody who’s Italian is half Italian. Except me. I’m all Italian. I’m mostly Sicilian, and I have a little bit of Neapolitan in me. You get your full dose with me.”

– Al Pacino

When the Governator was asked for his opinion on how Latinos can improve their academic performance, he said new immigrants should avoid Spanish-language books, television programs, and newspapers, pointing out that immigrants from some European countries have an easier time learning English because they don’t have as many opportunities to speak their native language in America. “You’re just forced to speak English,” he said, “and that makes you learn the language faster.”

When Alba was interviewed she admitted she was uncomfortable being labeled “Latina” because she and her family have been here as Americans for so long. Cameron Diaz, she says, is more ethnic because her father is (second generation) “Cuban.” (Yeah, and Cameron isn’t too sharp, either. Next time she mixes and mingles with Peruvians, she should leave the trendy Maoist totebag at home.)

As for Al, we “Italians” are all guilty of calling ourselves Italian, whether we’re from the North or the South, or even from Sicily. Yet the most vocal of ethnic groups on this issue of immigration reform – or amnesty – are those whose grandparents came here from Southern Europe through Ellis Island.

I say I’m half Italian, but it’s because my mother is Italian. But is she, really? Hell, no. I mean, genetically she’s Italian, but she was born in Erie, PA. Her parents were born in Italy. I’m typing this as I’m sniffing the lasagne I’ve got in the oven… and sipping my wine. Red, of course. Am I Italian? Technically, no.

Got that damn bump on the nose, though, and that weird toe. But, like many Americans, I am a mongrel. My mother’s family came from Italy and my father’s family was probably here a couple centuries longer, but his father’s roots were English and his mother’s were Dutch. We are and were all Americans. My mother’s parents, although born in Italy, got off the boat and became Americans, too.

I picked up the information packet the other day for my “personal immigrant” and we have formally met. In case you haven’t kept up, I’m not talking about the underpaid person who’ll be doing the work around my house that I, as an Amurrican, won’t do – I mean, it’s not like I’m Linda Chavez, after all. No, I’m talking about the student that I’ll be tutoring in English.

I wanted someone a tad more exotic, but this is Nuevo Mexico, so I got precisely what I’d pictured. He is from Chihuahua and he works as a landscaper. He had a tutor before me, but things weren’t working out. His skills are minimal. The program director thinks I’ll be a good tutor because I am so, as she describes me, “patient.”

Yeah, patient. Comes from making all those goddamned pizzelles when I was a kid. People are quick, in this debate, to say that America is a country of immigrants. This is not really accurate. I did not move to America from somewhere else. I was born in Chicago. But as a Chicagoan who hasn’t lived on the Northside since 1970, I can appreciate cultural diversity. I was raised in a Jewish neighborhood, which is now a very different place, but it is merely populated by another group. I’m not Jewish, but I feel connected to Jews because of the place where I spent my formative years.

No one is telling anyone to abandon their culture or their interests. Sure, some of us would prefer if you kept the good and rejected the bad (tres leches? YES! dog fighting? NO!), but hopefully those undesirable traits will work themselves out of the gene pool in a couple generations.

The last time I visited my mother in hospice I had just come from the literacy program office and had picked up my packet. My mother was fairly lucid that day but she’s deaf as a door, so I wrote it out:

“Your parents didn’t speak English when they came here. How did they learn English?”

She stared at the paper for several moments, then smiled. She looked at me with the most quizzical expression on her face.

“You know… I never really thought about it! How did they learn?”

I wish I knew. It certainly wasn’t from television – it hadn’t yet been invented. And they weren’t enrolled in school. I have an adult who lives, drives, and works here in America and I need to figure out how I’m going to teach him how to speak the language I love.

That he drives with his wife, who is also learning, all the way down from Santa Fe each week gives me hope. He must really want to learn. But it’s a little depressing, too. With all those liberals up there in The City Different, don’t they have their own literacy program?

We were at the park with the dog, watching a father and his three kids on the playground. The two little girls were running in circles, climbing, sliding, jumping, skipping – all the while talking to and over each other non-stop. Two little chatterboxes, never ever stopping to take a breath.

The little boy, on the other hand, was off by himself, staggering around the play structure, ricocheting off the metal bars, never uttering a word. Like many little boys, it is possible that he hadn’t yet figured out speech. My parents, for instance, thought my older brother was retarded because it took so long for him to finally say something that sounded like English. All the time that he was making those strange animal sounds, he was absorbing the world around him. He remembered tiny obscure details – probably in order to blackmail family members at a later date. As he grew older, raised around so many females, he learned to dismiss a lot of these details, so much so that he completely forgot that he was related to any of us. Meanwhile, my mother and sisters chatted away, their verbal skills having been mastered long before they could even walk.

This is proof that men and women communicate quite differently. It’s true – there have been countless studies. It’s just one more reason I’m not hoppin’ on the Hillary Train, just so I get to vote for the ovaried candidate. Women complain endlessly about the men who never listen to them and never hear what they say. I will go out on a limb here and say that this is only partly true.

It’s very likely that Hillary was in the room when she was telling Bill to keep his pants zipped and his cigars in the humidor, but somehow he didn’t hear her. Not hear Hillary? I know, I know. It’s like saying you didn’t hear the smoke alarm going off, but if you’re hearing something 24/7 you tend to tune it out. Much like the way women tune out their children. (Admit it, ladies. You go completely deaf, but the rest of us can still hear. Please address this ASAP.)

So we have these women complaining about men who don’t listen and never hear what they say. Republican Senator James Inhofe hears Hillary and Barbara Boxer discussing the Fairness Doctrine and engages them in a conversation. And now they’re pissed off and insisting that this never happened.

The same way women get pissed off when men look at them (you know that worried look they get? just like the one the poor dog gets after you find your favorite book reduced to bite-sized pieces?) and say: “I’m sorry… I have no recollection of that conversation, even though you say we discussed in detail for several hours. And I’m sure we did… my bad. Please don’t hit me.”

Do we really want a woman having these “imaginary” conversations with Putin, Kim Jong Il, Musharaff, Abbas, Karsai, and al-Maliki?

“They’ve Gone Squirrely!

That’s the terminology used by one teacher I was talking to about the ‘spring fever’ that takes over young minds and turns them into rabid creatures incapable of concentrating on work or studying or sitting down.”

– Mr. Lawrence at Get Lost, Mr. Chips

It never, ever f*cking changes. I did my student teaching during the Reagan administration and a few months teaching in the public school system was enough for me to abandon my “To Sir, With Love” fantasy and find another way to earn a living. Time has passed and occasionally I meet one of those exuberant, idealistic types who wants to teach. Poor things. They’re enrolled in some sort of education program, working towards certification, and already they’re getting a sense of what they’re in for. When people ask me why I’m not teaching for a living I explain that I don’t want to work in the public education system. But what about private schools, they ask. And charter schools. Aren’t those better?

Yes… some. But many things turned me off about teaching and one of them was the oft-repeated instruction: “Whatever you do, don’t ever, ever, under any circumstances, ever put your hands on the students.” Every teacher illustrated the point with the same story. Say a student of yours is falling out a window. Let him fall. It is better to let the student fall to his death than for you to try to save him and lose your credential because you put your hands him. Just let him die. Got it?

We exuberant, idealistic types heard this and thought the teachers were making some sort of joke. They weren’t. It seems shocking, but what’s more disturbing is that, twenty-five years later, I’m hearing the same thing from new teachers.

I admit it. I sometimes visit “edublogs.” That’s where I found the “squirrely” comment. Another thing that does not change. The master teacher at the high school where I was doing my student teaching described the kids that way. The blogger, “Mr. Lawrence,” makes it sounds like it’s just a spring fever thing. Oh, no, not at all. It’s so much more than that.

Students, children more precisely, are merely — and I don’t mean to sound like Tony Blair here — feral beasts. Watch animals before a storm or an earthquake. They’re little barometers of what’s to come. Walking down the halls of a school, you can sense it. You may hear a seasoned instructor mumble under her breath: “The students are getting squirrely.” Vaguely reminiscent of: “The natives are restless.” And that was rarely a good thing.

I was saying yesterday that the pundits are lining up to say the voters are angry. Favorability polls are nearing the single digits for Congress. People don’t much care for either the POTUS or the SCOTUS. We, they say, are just soooo angry. Sure, there’s that, but I think it’s something more. We’re squirrely.

I’ve got to go on a tangent here. When I think of squirrels, I think of many things, and one of those things is dogs. Whether it’s Millie Bush, stalking them on the White House lawn, or Jonah Goldberg’s adopted Cosmo, the “IT” Dog of the American Right, and his quest for the Jacobin variety, dogs and squirrels just go together. Cats and squirrels? I’m not so sure.

Just as we were building our collection of rare Westside squirrels, White Cat and Gray Cat appeared in our yard. The squirrels have relocated to avoid the cats. T heard them the other day, and it sounds like they’ve moved a few backyards away. But we did see one on the wall yesterday.

But I digress. Mainly because I’m putting off a confession. If voters are squirrely, it is because they are either disgusted or embarrassed by their party, and are looking for an alternative that still really does not exist. Some, like those new teachers, are still holding on to their exuberance and idealism, but just don’t have the energy to defend their politicians or make excuses for them anymore. But the energy is there, misdirected. This is prime time for candidates to take advantage of the voters’ squirreliness and help them direct that adrenalin. If they don’t, we squirrels will find something else to do with all this pent-up vitality, and it won’t be good for the two parties. We squirrels are sensing that something’s out there. We’re sniffing the air, and we know something’s coming. We don’t know what or when, but there’s a chance that whatever it is, it isn’t good. We’re edgy. Nervous. Feeling helpless. Want to do something. Need to prevent… oh, there it is again. Did you catch that? You can smell it. There – sniff.

My confession? I once became so disgusted by the Democrats that I soon became just as disgusted by the Republicans. I was, in a word, squirrely. I had to do something. I had the anger and the energy, but it was misdirected. Someone came along and harnessed the squirrel. I was given direction. I not only canvassed for, but I actually voted for, an Independent candidate… once. Again, it was at a time in my life when I was so disenchanted by both major parties that I became what I can only describe as an “anarchist.” Or, like I said, just real squirrely. That’s all I can say for now. It’s something about me that only a handful of people who know me knew about, and several of those are now dead. Those who survive probably don’t remember the indiscretion or even me. This is a secret that I could easily let die. But maybe Catholicism is in my genes – my mother being lapsed and all – so I feel I must confess and share the details. And I will. But another time.

Remember when I was posting the very long R and D Lists – all the 2008 candidates whether or not they had formally announced their candidacies? An excerpt from April:

Still crouching in the wings:
12. Newt Gingrich
13. Fred Thompson
14. Chuck Hagel
15. George Pataki

Jumpers:
3. Bill Frist
4. Frank Keating

Which reminds me. Whatever happened to Pataki? And while we’re here again, allow me another revision: Pataki and Hagel have joined Jeb and Condi on the big boat, and it is the Titanic. But my prediction about Bloomberg has come to pass. He may or may not be running, but the question of which party was valid. Not that he was ever really a Republican, but now he’s a… what is he, again?

What is anyone these days? Well, besides apathetic, betrayed, cynical, deceived, exhausted, and f*cking pissed? (Why do I always alphabetize when I’m upset?)

No one’s happy. I have a theory, but more on that tomorrow.