Can a tree sneak up on you?

    Walking the dog is my job. I'm not complaining. I like walking the dog. It's the most normal thing I do. Fun too. Exercise. Air. Interaction with a dog, the one sentient being in my life who is always, always, always glad to see me. Often conversation with other people who are walking their dogs though, to be honest, more often than not we merely introduce our dogs to each other—"Kitty, I'd like you to meet Nelson. Nelson, this is Kitty"—and never bother to introduce ourselves. Which is odd. 
      Still, it's all good. I let the dog pick the route. Often, first thing in the morning, I'll let her pull out of my grasp, go bounding down the stairs and tearing around the house, hard to the left, through the side yard. I lope along after her, knowing she'll pull up on the raised ridge of pine trees between our yard and the village property behind it. She's very considerate that way, for a dog. 
     So I catch up, lean over, snag her leash from the pine needles, and we traipse into the parking lot for the Village Hall. She assumes what I consider the "Standing on a dime" position, all four paws draw together, doing her business, looking up at me, slightly abashed, and I'm watching her, intently for some reason, to return her gaze I suppose, and lean forward, a little, and feel something damp and fragrant slap me on the forehead.
     The fat white blossoms shown here, wet and cold with the morning dew. I had been so focused on watching a dog shit, as if my observation were a necessary component to the act, as if I had to monitor it to ensure it was done properly, that I never noticed the glorious white tree in full bloom—a "Sugar Tyme" flowering crabapple. An inch above my face, my head was practically among the branches. I thought there was a lesson there. It's spring. Look up, and around. See the flowers. The dog will take care of herself. 

A lesson in vocabulary and hate

   

     Who wants to learn new words today? I do! I do! Three vocabulary words then. So if everyone will find their seats, we'll begin.
     The first word is contrapasso, a literary Italian word, from the Latin for "suffer the opposite," used to describe the torments Dante cooks up for sinners in his "Inferno." The damned are not just assigned any random gruesome fate, but one based on their sins in life, a kind of poetic justice, their former joys transformed into eternal woes. Thus, the lustful are buffeted by storms, to show how they let their passions rule their intellect, and the violent are boiled in rivers of the blood they spilled.
     We don't need a fictional hell to see examples of contrapasso. It occurs in real life too. Addicts are punished by being compelled to consume greater and greater quantities of the substances they crave. Those consumed by hatreds become locked in the embrace of the thing they hate.
     For instance, the most sordid gay bathhouses exist between the ears of the fanatics who hate the people they imagine frequenting them. Emails minutely cataloging these sexual practices are sent, not by triumphant gays — I don't believe I've received one, ever — but by sputtering religious fanatics supposedly disgusted by the practices they're chronicling, as if straight sexual acts would look beautiful given similar trip under disgust's microscope. Their own self-assigned torment, to pass their lives gazing at what revolts them in cathexis — our second word, a psychology term, "the concentration of mental energy on one particular person, idea, or object (esp. to an unhealthy degree)."
     I hate stuff too. I just don't spend my life staring at it.
     Which brings up America's poster girl for freedom of speech, Pamela Geller, whose Prophet Muhammad caricature contest in Texas drew two would-be Islamic terrorists, who attempted to shoot it up Sunday and were themselves killed.
     Geller managed to contain her glee.
     "This incident shows how much needed our event really was," she told the New York Times. "Freedom of speech is under violent assault here in our nation. The question now before us is: Will we stand and defend it, or bow to violence, thuggery, and savagery?"
     And how do we defend free speech? Oh right, by insulting Islam. An oddly selective defense. If Geller's show was a general collection of sacrilegious art, I might be tempted to buy her ruse. But it isn't, it's a stiletto designed to stab at Muslims. To prove how free we are.
     Actually, Muhammad shows up in the "Inferno," receiving a particularly gruesome punishment, split from chin to anus, his entrails hanging out, as contrapasso for his splitting of his world by forming a new religion. Muslims do not, to my knowledge, attack those reading the 700-year-old work of literature because, unlike Geller's stunts, the "Inferno" isn't a hate carnival designed to stigmatize and marginalize a certain group (Well, it is, but that group is Florentines, and they've adjusted themselves to it by now).
     Extremists of varying stripes pretend to be in opposition, but actually they form a tacit confederacy, and here comes our third word — symbiosis. You might remember the word from high school biology; it means two different organisms interacting for mutual advantage. The classic case is sea anemone whose stalks are poisonous, but not to clownfish, who feed among them and provide benefits.
     Islamic terrorists commit their nihilistic violence, their crimes are seized upon by the Gellers of the world who say, "Look, this is what they all are." And the stock of hate, that both embrace, rises.
     It's easy to get worked up by specific horrors, hard to step back and look at the grand scheme. Muslims are terrorists in the same sense that Jews are rich bankers, or the Irish were loafing drunks and Italians, gangsters. It's just another slur, and the fact that real examples of the slur can be found in the living world doesn't change anything. I haven't done the math, but I guarantee you there are far, far more Jewish bankers, Irish drunks, or Italian mobsters than there are Islamic terrorists.
     The story never changes; every generation we get a new cast.
     Class dismissed.

The laity speaks

     The prudent thing to do is not to answer emails from people too far gone into zealotry. That's safest, as you never have to regret a reply you didn't make. And they disappear faster if you don't respond. Were I sharing beekeeping tips, I might do that.
     But I write about issues I care about, and when readers offer these harsh opinions, I feel compelled to answer some of them. Call it a hopefulness. People are rational and they will yield to reason, eventually. Or maybe I just get tired of ignoring something vile and feel the need to send up some return fire. 
     I won't bore you with even a selection of the emails I received yesterday replying my column talking about gay marriage with Archbishop Blase Cupich. Processing them is my job, not yours. 
    Well, okay, just one, so you can gauge the tone. This from Mike Feehan, under the subject heading, "You are an Obama lover/liberal so GO FIGURE, YOU AND YOUR TYPE support homo marriage...BOY, WHAT A SHOCKER.....YOU think the fraud in the WH is some kind of Christian as well....WHAT A JOKE YOU ARE...."
     Feehan writes:
     "Why don't you open your O.T. Jewish Bible and see what Holy God has to say about homo marriage?? Let me guess, you also support a woman's right to CHOOSE (CHILD SLAUGHTER/ABORTION, RIGHT??? Obama a Christian??? ARE, ARE, ARE YOU KIDDING ME???"  
     That actually is one of the more comical, less disturbing emails, in the way that he drags Obama into it, and in that he avoids rolling in the sexual practices that so fascinate/repel these people. I easily ignored it. 
    But two exchanges, I did get drawn into.  I'll warn you, they go on a bit. But future historians might wonder the intellect behind the last ditch efforts to suppress the rights of gays, and this I think is a fairly accurate snapshot of the average revanchist, circa May, 2015.

No. 1 begins: 

Mr Steinberg:
Keep dreaming. As liberal as Cupich may be, there is absolutely no way he will ever endorse so-called homosexual "marriage". And, by the way, yes indeed, you are obsessed with this issue as are many of your Jew friends in the media. It's not your fault. It is just the way your ticket has been punched - to be revolutionary for the sole purpose of being revolutionary. You see things as needing to be wrecked. Two thousand years ago in Jerusalem, you shouted "give us Barabbas" and now you are shouting "let men marry men and women marry women". Same bullshit, same rejection of the Logos - the natural, moral order to the universe. Just different words.
Michael DeCleene

I'm always shocked that these people sign their names. I replied:

Thanks for writing. I won't waste words on such a stone heart.

Which drew:

"Thanks for writing. I won't waste words on such a stone heart. Words fail me in the face of such bold truth".
There. Fixed it for ya.

"Bold truth"? I couldn't resist:

Don't be silly. Hatred is not bold. It's cowardly and lazy and repulsive. "Jew friends in the media"? Really? I have a hard time believing that such people exist. Aren't you embarrassed to say that, Michael?

NS

I used his name at the end because I have a theory that doing so reaches toward whatever
humanity is within a person. It didn't work. He wrote:

Oh, please. Jews dominate the media and you know this to be true. Jews are overwhelmingly liberal and you know this to be true. Jews have dominated revolutionary thought for thousands of years. Just look at the Frankfurt School and its influence on American academia the past 100 years. Whether it be anthropology (Max Boaz), psychology (Freud), human sexuality (Kinsey), philosophy (Marcuse/Fromm), Marxism (Marx), mass execution (Einstein/Oppenheimer/Trotsky) etc., it pretty much came from the Jews and it is all revolutionary. Look at the board members at the ACLU and SPLC. Mostly Jews. Look what they promote: disordered gender theory, homosexuality, pornography, child sexuality, abortion, etc. And again, all revolutionary.
Why would you take issue? I would think you would be proud.

I could wrote this carefully, realizing we were straying onto fraught ground:

Don't project your bigotries onto others. Jews tend to be sympathetic with the oppressed, being oppressed themselves. And Jews tend to have to live by their wits, being denied easy access to trades by the prejudice rolling off you in waves. I can see that you are proud.
Let me ask you this? Are you hoping to convince me? Or just abuse me? Because I certainly have no hope of convincing you. I'm just curious, like a doctor confronting a disease of particular interest to him. So if Jews are dominated revolutionary thought, which might have some validity, then which group dominates hidebound, rigid, narrow, ossified thought? Any clue? Take your time.

Thanks for writing.
NS

He ignored this, and went on a tangent.

Tell me, Neil, whats wrong with screwing your sister? Explain this one to me. The progressive LGBTQIA community demands us to believe that gender is an accidental construct of social customs - subjective and flexible - but ones sexuality - either normal or homosexual - is genetic and hard-wired in our brains at conception birth when we are brought home from the hospital.
How does one come to believe such a laughably incoherent argument?

It struck me that now it was truly time to stop. So I sent this as a parting thought,
and it worked, since he didn't reply.

As Louis Armstrong said when somebody asked him to explain jazz, "If you have to ask, you'll never know."
Thanks for writing.

That's plenty for one day. But I'm including a second one because it shows what I'm aiming at. Here's No. 2:


Obsessing is putting it mildly. The gay population is a little over 2%. Out of those about 1% are pushing to change the definition of marriage. How does a group so small keep itself constantly on the front page? Answer.. People like you!                                                     
Bob Gregori


I replied:

So the civil rights of 2 percent of Americans don't concern you? And you mock people who do care? That's just sad. If a toddler fell down a well, the rescue would be on the front page of every newspaper in America for a week, and you'd never stand up and say, "It's just one baby!" (Or maybe you would; I try not to pretend like I can read the minds of people). The U.S. Marines are an even smaller group than gay people, and I care about them too. If you would just ignore our brave American Marines, just because there aren't "enough" of them to matter, in your book,well, then I want nothing to do with you. Thanks for writing.
NS

I thought that would silence him, but he came back.

You don't change what's been a standard in our lifetime and previous lifetimes because of less than 2% of the population marriage is between a man and a woman if they would like to have a civil union God bless them no need to change anything. I am sick and tired of having these kind of issues force down my throat.

I missed the above, in the crush of similar emails, and so he tried another sortie.

And I was not talking about Marines or toddlers! Typical liberal response to confuse the issue and not stay on point. My apologies for being harsh but I am very passionate about what is going on in our world today. You have every right to think and support the issues as you see fit. I just do not want a government/judicial mandate on the definition of marriage.

Bob Gregori
Senior Account Manager

I don't know about you, but I was ready for this to end. Still, one more reply.

So help me to understand the point. "You don't change what has been a standard in our lifetime." Do you use that logic with any other realm of life? With medicine? With cars? With racial justice? Or do you just adopt that when dealing with people you want oppressed? I brought up the Marines because you said there just weren't enough gays to care about what happens to them, and I was trying to point out how flawed and arbitrary that thinking is. The point is you are being harsh—not to me, my interest in your reasoning is purely academic. But to your fellow American citizens whose rights you would trample. The fact that you are passionate in wanting to harm American citizens is not an excuse. So is al Qaeda. So is ISIS. And the government is not mandating these changes, your fellow citizens are, at the ballot box and through the legislature and the courts. It just seems strange to see someone rejecting the outcome of the Democratic system based on ... what? Tradition? Your own personal bias and fear? I have biases and fears too. I just don't expect the country to conform to them. Do you really think that because people were bigoted in the past, that excuses you now? Because times have changed. Don't hate me for telling you.
Thanks for writing.

NS

Then the miracle. He wrote:

Spirited discussion. Thanks for replying.And I wrote: 

Indeed. Thanks for sharing your thoughts with me.

Perhaps this is naive of me, but I consider that last little burst of parting civility a kind of victory. Because that is what is deciding this gay marriage issue. People trot out their fucked-up religious dogma and, in the face of counterargument, yield a little, or at least are polite, and that's a start. Bigotry isn't routed in epic battles, it's nibbled away, like water eating at rock. The Supreme Court won't decide this issue. It was decided already, in a million living rooms and street corners. The Supreme Court either will recognize that, or, like my correspondents today, refuse to recognize it. 

Archbishop outlines reasons for gay marriage, sorta

     Several readers last week accused me of being “obsessed” with same-sex marriage, as if the U.S. Supreme Court weren’t right now debating what the New York Times calls “one of the great civil rights issues of the age.”
     It isn’t just me. When I asked on Facebook for suggestions what I should ask Archbishop Blase Cupich when he stopped by the newspaper Thursday, the first suggestion was: “What are his thoughts on civil rights for LGBTs, regardless of Church teachings?”
     A good question. But awkward. I was in no rush. As our hour was winding down, I diplomatically observed that his predecessor, Cardinal George, had strong views on this topic; where did he stand? Cupich’s answer was elaborate, but I’m going to share it in its entirety:
     “In Washington state there was a referendum on this and, my position was very clear. First of all I didn’t want anybody using this debate to in any way demean or denigrate people who have same sex attraction — gay people, lesbians, bisexual, trans — I didn’t want to be part of any of that, because there were voices in fact to demean people. My issue was, not against somebody, but what are we doing in re-defining marriage? Because marriage traditionally has been that union by which we continue the next generation, and there was specific code of law that would support families that take the risk and the responsibility of bringing children into world and preserving the human race. My argument was, what are we doing in not giving those kind of special laws and protections to that group of people who do something to benefit society.”
     Let me interrupt here to point out two things: first, in the 2012 referendum he refers to, Washington State voters approved of gay marriage, 54 percent to 46 percent. Second, that his answer would fit perfectly had I asked, “Hey, is it a good idea to scrap marriage entirely for straight people?”
     The archbishop continued:
     “There was a domestic partnership law in the state of Washington which gave the same rights as marriage, the bill was to just rename it and make it all marriage. I objected to it because I think there’s something unique about the marriage between a man and a woman.”
     Here, I did object: it isn't as if gay couples don't raise kids (kids whom, I didn't have the chutzpah to mention, often are the products of failed heterosexual relationships, adopted from unions that fail for reasons other than being undermined because gays are allowed to wed in 36 states and the District of Columbia).
     "For instance, I found it interesting the new marriage law in Washington state placed within the code the same requirements that a heterosexual couple previously had, that is, the law against consanguinity marriages, in terms of relationship."
     ["Consanguinity," by the way, means blood relations.]
     "That's there because of the genetic deformity that could result in consanguinity marriages. But that's being imposed on gay couples and you wonder: Why? That gives a hint there's something different and unique about heterosexual couples coming to marriage, for society. I think families are so much in trouble, they're under so much pressure, it does take a risk to bring children in the world, to educate them, to preserve the human race, I think society has a vested interest in specially helping those couples do that. That was my argument."
     To me, everything the archbishop said, except for his conclusions, is an argument for gay marriage. First, the risks of incestuous children—not a huge social ill, certainly—is not a concern for same-sex marriages. Second, he emphasized the difficulty of raising children. As the father of two teens, I can vouch for that. But you know what makes it even tougher? Society refusing to acknowledge the full validity of your union.
      Assuming Cupich isn't slyly advocating for gay marriage, and I don't think he is, the core of his argument hangs on an unspoken, unsupported assumption: He's implying a harm; that we need marriage to help straight couples, and gays wreck it, ineffably, by their participation. But there is no harm. The only harm is imaginary and self-inflicted, the exact demeaning degradation he adjured at the start of his remarks. Someday an archbishop will acknowledge this. But that day is not today.

I guess they're for Brian Urlacher

     On Tuesday, a publicist invited me to "Come meet former Bears player Brian Urlacher." 
      I'd say I ignored the invitation, but I might never have seen it. I don't recall seeing it. I get a lot of email. On Thursday, she asked again, more personally: I tend to notice my own name. It's a failing.
     Brian Urlacher...well, I know he's a Bears player, or was. She spilled the beans on that much in her invitation. And he's ... bald. I remember that much.
     Thus drains my entire knowledge of the man. I vaguely remember him leaving recently. Something about a contract. That would explain the "former Bears player" part.
     So the honest answer was, "God, no." Particularly not late on a Friday afternoon. But I am a newspaper employee, still, and take my responsibilities to my publication seriously. A team player, in my own right. So I stepped out into the newsroom. I have an opportunity to talk to Brian Urlacher, I said to the sports folk, should I? Is there anything you'd like to know? The sports department said there was.
      Okay, I told the publicist, who told me that, as with Aladdin and the lamp, I would be allowed three questions ("Your last question should be to ask for three more questions," said a wag in sports) and could she know what those questions are? This is sometimes requested by the biggest celebrities and most important captains of industry, and normally I wouldn't do it in this situation. But I have no knowledge of the man, as I said, and didn't want to divert my schedule—we were to talk at 4:40 p.m. on Friday—only to have him refuse to answer some question on a verbotten subject. Or get mad. He's a big guy.  I knew that much.
      "We're wondering whether the Bears are going to retire his number, and what his relationship with the Bears is now," I said, repeating what I had been told to inquire about. She instructed me that I was not to ask about his personal life—I assume it must be interesting; which is why he didn't want to talk about it, and I honestly replied that I have no interest in his personal life, managing not to add, "or his professional life."
     That was acceptable,and I arrived 15 minutes early, checked in—this was at the Microsoft store on Michigan. Urlacher was running late, as is celebrity's privilege, so I wandered into the tall, narrow, North Bridge mall, where I hadn't been in years. A vigorous young Israeli woman tried to hand me some kind of facial creme. No thank you. A guy hawked time shares. "Let's not waste your time," I said, wishing I had put it, "Let's not waste our time." There was Nordstrom's, and I went into the men's section on the second floor.

   There I noticed this rack of shirts. Let me point out that they are not in a glass case, or behind a velvet rope. The rack is right next to the aisle, near the mall entrance. You practically bump into it.
     The above is known as "foreshadowing."
     I happen to be in need of dress shirts, as the collars on a few of mine are fraying from repeated use over a period of years. And I like Ralph Lauren, I own a number of their shirts, paying as much as $30 apiece for them at places like T.J. Maxx. Quite a bit, but I feel they're worth it, just for the psychic boost that the Ralph Lauren label brings, giving me the pleasant delusion that I am of the pony and pied-a-terre set when I put one on.
     Of course I would expect to pay more for these, in an actual Nordstrom's, not even a Nordstrom's Rack. But heck, I have my job, still. Perhaps I would splurge on an expensive shirt. I looked at  the label.
     The shirts cost ...
     You know, when I told this story to my wife, I asked her to guess. She hummed in thought, pursed her lips, looked up, and, reaching into the upper limits of her imagination of luxury, said, "$175."
      Now your turn to guess. Got it in mind? 
      Three hundred and fifty dollars. These shirts are $350 apiece. I looked around at the store in disbelief, as if expecting an audience, snickering. The place was not depopulated. People were trying things on, hurrying here and there. I felt as if I had discovered a crack in the universe, in my universe anyway. This was like opening a restaurant menu and seeing they are charging $27 for a cup of coffee. At some point, while I was busy doing other things, the world leaped past me.
      The middle class must really be hollowing out. When I was a young man, I shopped at Mark Shale and Neiman Marcus, Marshall Field's and Lord & Taylor. True, I looked for sales, but I was in the store, and paying full price was not unthinkable. Now the first price tag I look at makes me feel like a bum being shooed away from the kitchen door by a haughty maitre d'. I not only can't imagine my paying that, I can't imagine anyone paying that. And I have a pretty good imagination. 

Postscript

     Oh, and Brian Urlacher was very polite and pleasant and answered my three questions, but I must have asked the wrong questions, because the answers were not remarkable, certainly not as remarkable as those shirts. I did take a picture.

     

Saturday fun activity: Where IS this?

     Man this job is fun, sometimes. Over the past week, I spent time talking to both Archbishop Blase Cupich and former Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher (the former was more interesting and circumspect, the latter, nicer and more candid). I had lunch with Bill Daley by complete accident. We happened to be sitting at the same table at a luncheon at the Union League Club, which I visited shortly after touring this singular place, a short drive from Chicago. Journalism might be in trouble, but it's still here, and weeks like this, you just want to look up at the sky and say, "Aw geez, does this really all have to go away?"
     To be honest, I thought of using a less revealing picture. But this one really pleases me—it reminds me of my father's paintings—and I figured, somebody is going to guess it anyway, they might as well guess it from this dramatic photo as from something more oblique. 
     So where is this? Winner receives one of my not-dwindling-as-fast-as-I'd-like stock of 2015 blog posters. Place your guesses below.  Good luck.
     

There's a word for that

     Call me a sap. But my heart bleeds for people handing out stuff on the street. Talk about a tough job. The public ignores me, too, but I don't have to watch them do it. These poor folk have to stand there, like a rock dividing a stream, while indifferent humanity flows around them, spurning whatever pathetic scrap they're trying to give away, inevitably some green flier about a barber shop opening or new deli.
     Unless of course it's a mini granola bar. Samples! Then a crowd form as if they've never eaten, reaching out with one hand while pointing at their open mouths with the other, going "Oh! Oh! Oh!"
     Food or flier, I grab their offering as a matter of principle: what's the harm? And sometimes I am rewarded, such as with a small, ticket sized coupon: "roti: MEDITERRANEAN GRILL. Win Roti every day for a year."
     Cool. Prizes. I eat there. Decent salads. On the back, under "Random Acts of Roti," four instructions. 1) Go to a web site. 2) Enter a password. 3) "Write Down Prize Code." and 4. "Bring this card to Roti for free Food or Drink!"
     OK. It's a quiet day. So I go to their site, It wants my name, email address .
     I enter my info, and am informed I have won a free fountain drink.
     Hmmm...I usually don't even order a fountain drink. But all right. I take my coupon to Roti, meeting a buddy for lunch last week. While we wait in line, I explain my sense of violation at surrendering my precious data only to have Roti spit some cola on my shirtfront: I had been hoping for rice pudding.
     "Information rape," he laughs. I'd never heard that phrase.
     "Is that a thing?" I wonder. He's younger. Maybe he has a handle on the lingo.
     "No, it was just something I said."
     Information rape. That seems a useful concept to toss into the aether, to describe dupes who fork over their data and get little in return.
     I immediately felt the chill. While "rape" in my Oxford Dictionary is defined first as "The action or an act of taking a thing by force, esp. violent seizure of property" and doesn't mention forced sex until the third definition, that won't help me when I'm dragged into the electronic public square by angry feminists ready to deliver punishment for seizing their word and re-purposing it.
     I understand their argument: you're watering down a horror to give oomph to the commonplace. I wince whenever any random bad thing is described as a "holocaust," and Michelle Obama's push against obesity becomes a genocide of fat people.
     But I don't fall ravening upon them. It's a free country, sort of. People are allowed to use language. I think the delicacy over what the newspaper requires me to call "the N-word" is an insult to black people and an affront to history that we'll look back on someday and cringe, the way we view Victorians putting skirts on piano legs.
     Yet how could that argument stand up against somebody's pain? Somebody looking to offload that pain, and what better recipient than a person who seems insensitive? I don't want to be that guy. And yet. If I say I'm crazy for the Bulls, people coping with the mental illnesses of their loved ones will complain they're being insulted. Best to tread carefully. When it comes to those trying to share their anger, as with people handing out fliers, I sympathize with their plight too much not to just take it with a silent nod and keep walking.

CORRECTION: In Wednesday's column on the fall of Saigon I giddily reported that Lyndon Johnson was the only president not to seek a second term, somehow overlooking James Buchanan, Rutherford B. Hayes, Calvin Coolidge, Harry Truman and maybe others, the way this week is going. I did fact check, or thought I did, but bobbled that in a manner too involved to be worth recounting. Nor did I realize it was Eisenhower who first sent advisers to Vietnam, in 1955. I regret these errors.