Flashback 1997: Hoover tapes reveal details of gang life

Larry Hoover

     My colleague Mary Mitchell made a bold plea Thursday for gang leader Larry Hoover to be released from prison. Her argument is that police often lie, and Hoover has been in prison for nearly half a century. True enough. She also scoffs at the idea that Hoover could control his gang from prison. My understanding is that this is not outrageous.  I covered Hoover's conspiracy trial here in 1997, and he seemed quite open about it. My central memory of listening to those tapes is looking over at Hoover in court and thinking, "Lex Luthor he is not."

     Beatings with baseball bats and Larry Hoover's envy of fellow gang leader Jeff Fort were part of a glimpse inside the Gangster Disciples' lifestyle Monday in federal court.
     Hoover, who is serving a 150- to 200-year sentence for a 1973 murder, is being tried with six associates on drug conspiracy charges.
     On tapes played in court Monday, Hoover seemed familiar with the minute details of his operation. "Who on 47 (Street) that's working? Is they folks?" Hoover asked, urging that problem members be brought down to see him.
     "You got to bring these chumps in," he said. "Get Pops and get a crew together and ride. You got a problem with me, you see me."
     Elsewhere, Hoover expressed admiration for the Black Panthers, calling it "the most beneficial organization in the 20th century."
     "It's lean; it's strong," he said, leading into a nostalgic reminiscence about his days of freedom.
     "I was king at 19," he said. "Eighteen—at 18, I was king."
     Hoover remembered seeing El Rukn gang leader Jeff Fort at a church meeting in the late 1960s.
     "You could hear a pin drop when he was walking in," said Hoover, recalling their snazzy suede jackets. "I told myself I could have a mob like that . . . I remember it like it was yesterday."
     To record those discussions, investigators put transmitters in the badges of people visiting Hoover. Recordings were made on weekends from Oct. 30, 1993, until the transmitters were found by a visitor on Dec. 19, 1993.
     Convicted felon Thomas London, 29, was one of several witnesses to discuss Gangster Disciples "literature"—the rules they were forced to memorize, such as: "Nothing can hurt a duck but its beak," meaning they shouldn't talk.
     Gang members who broke rules were subject to varying degrees of "violations," from being punched in the chest to being beaten with baseball bats.
     "There was always someone getting violated," said London, who added that the supposed gang truce arranged by the Gangster Disciples was intended to help Hoover personally.
     "They said they wanted peace because the Old Man was trying to get paroled," he said.

                      —Originally published in the Sun-Times, March 25, 1997

They do, obviously.

 

    
     Now "crap" is an interesting word. Anglo-Saxon, I guessed, upon seeing this carton from Who Gives a Crap brand toilet paper left out for our delayed trash day Wednesday in would-be tony Northbrook.
     I was not particularly surprised to see the moderate oath being introduced by toilet tissue makers. Even mainstream paper mills have gotten bold lately, with their pudgy bears and angel babies growing more, ah, specific. What's the line? "Enjoy the go." In your dreams, Charmin.
     I should say, I'm not offended by the more direct advertising for toilet paper. Like most marketing, it veers from annoying to forgettable. But as someone who has tied his business wagon, so to speak, to a mild oath with everygoddamnday.com, I was interested to see an actual company assume a curse word moniker.
    The company, which we'll call WGAC for brevity, was started by three young men in 2010 who are interested in worldwide sanitation, according to their smart who-we-are video that raised $66,000 on Indiegogo. I always assume that protestations of noble intent and concern for the world at large are mere corporate puffery, a slick patter to distract consumers while snaking a hand into their pockets. But a banner on WGAC's bright, fun web page announces they've just donated $5.8 million Australian (or $4 million American dollars) to WaterAid.
     That's a lot. As is their pledge to donate 50 percent of profits to sanitation and water charity. 

      Add to that a consideration that the giant toilet paper companies just blow completely: attractive packaging. Look at the rolls. They're sort of wild and fun, graphically, are they not? The kind of rolls you'd expect in trendy lofts in in Bucktown or ... maybe ... big old farm houses in Northbrook. The lady down the block obviously took the plunge. Maybe we will too. With that in mind, I checked the price: a buck a roll, or about three times what Charmin costs. Ah. We'll have to think about that...
     Forgive me for being sidetracked. We were supposed to parse the word "crap." Man, was I off-base with my guess that it was some ancient Teutonic word.
     I was worried the Oxford English Dictionary might turn up its nose at "crap" (sorry) the way it hurries past "fuck" without a glance. But it's there, though not at all what I expected.
     The Oxford finds its origins obscure or dialect, and begins by suggesting the word is identical with the earlier Dutch krappe and then fires off, without preface or translation, this 1599 string of Latin, 'carptus, carptura, res decerpta, rustum, decerptum siue abscissum, pars abrasa siue abscissa; pars carnis abscissa; crustum; offella, offula; placenta; pulpamentum." which Mr. Google Translate renders semi-helpfully as: ""Nipped by, GATHERING, a plucked, rust, off or cut off a part of the drying out or removed; a part of the flesh is in the abscissa crusts; offella, a snack; cake; meat."
     Setting the stage, in a garbled fashion, for the first three definitions of "crap," starting with "1. The husk of grain; chaff," and running through plants and weeds and buckwheat, then residue from rendering or boiling, dregs in beer.
     Notice anything missing? Not a word about excrement, beyond it also being something left behind (sorry) which what I thought of as the primary definition of the word. (I don't know why. I'm far more likely to toss away the newspaper with, "I'm so sick of this COVID crap!" than I am to say, "Excuse me Mr. Ambassador, but I've got to step away to take a crap. Continue the discussion without me."
     This tendency is reflected in Wentworth and Flexner's "Dictionary of American Slang," which drives home that, despite pretensions, I don't know my own language. They identify crap as taboo, though its first definition is "Nonsense; cant; lies; exaggeration; insincerity; mendacity' bull," traced to the relative yesterday* of 1939. "Pally, I never heard so much crap in such a short time in my life," from John O'Hara's Pal Joey.
     They derive the word "from the taboo but otherwise standard 'crap'=feces." then get to "2 Anything inferior, cheap, ugly or insulting by its very presence, sp. merchandise that is of inferior material, workmanship, or overall quality; shit."
     Which circles us back to using crap in a product name. Before I checked out Who Gives a Crap's web site, I questioned whether associating any product with the word crap is a wise marketing strategy, even for toilet paper. But that might be my three score years talking. Looking at their presentation, and the actual dollars they've given to world water and sanitation distribution and education, plus the presence of an empty cardboard box on our block as evidence they actually do distribute the stuff, I've decided the name is sharp, effective marketing. Had they called the product, "Hands Around the World Toilet Paper" or some such tripe, my curiosity would never have been piqued. The big Wisconsin mills are so focused on making toilet paper cheap and comfortable, and friendly, they forgot to make it cool. "Who Gives a Crap" does, and while, looking at the name again, we could wonder if there being no question mark at the end is an oversight—Who Gives a Crap?—this has already gone on too long, and we can leave that for my loyal commenters to hash out.

* The dangers of quick-and-easy, on-the-fly etymology. After this was posted, in checking to confirm that the 19th century British toilet maker, Thomas Crapper, has nothing at all to do with the development of the word, I found this, from Hotten’s 1859 "A Dictionary of Modern Slang, Cant, and Vulgar Words: “CRAP, to ease oneself, to evacuate.”

Lori Lightfoot takes a victory lap in the middle of the race.

     As a fan of newspapers, I subscribe to four. Two electronically: the Washington Post and the Chicago Tribune. And two in print, the Chicago Sun-Times and the New York Times.

     I could include The Economist. They call themselves a newspaper, putting on airs. But it's a magazine. I could call myself the King of Northbrook. Doesn't make it so.
     I read them in different ways. The Post I almost always read on my iPhone. The Sun-Times is read in the morning at the kitchen table, always before the New York Times, as a matter of principle. The Tribune I check online when I want to read Eric Zorn, Rick Kogan, Steve Johnson, Mary Schmich, or any of its other fine columnists.
     So Monday, I was at lunch when I read Lori Lightfoot's interview with the New York Times. It struck me as odd that she would claim the Chicago Teachers Union has aspirations to be "akin to a political party" and run the city. Where did that come from? I wrote it off as the typical collapse into a heap that control freaks do. You HIT me back! Nobody cries like a bully.
     Then Tuesday, I read Fran Spielman's piece, which viewed the Times interview through the lens of Lightfoot's campaign promise to turn control of the schools back to parents, then dragoons a cast of the knowledgable to gather, like mourner's at a funeral, to gaze down pityingly at Lightfoot's damning self-praise, "We would never have opened without mayoral control."
     Fran quotes CTU vice president Stacy Davis Gates that “exalt mayoral control in a post-Trump America is the wrong direction.”
     Yes. Autocracy isn't only bad when Republicans do it at a national level. But even Democrats in cities. What mayor ever fixed the schools alone? Except in their own estimation, that is.

     And yet. Being old enough to cover what in the 1990s were called "Local School Councils" I don't view parental control as a panacea either. If I recall, much effort was put into cashiering principals who were guilty only of being a different race than their students.
     It's more a question of optics. Maybe Lightfoot couldn't resist preening for New Yorkers, in that dismal, though common, Midwestern tendency to want to shine on the coast. That sounds about right. Maybe she doesn't think anyone in Chicago reads the Times—there may be some truth there. As it is, some days the thing is so smug and tone deaf that I'm ready to save the $95 a month it costs to have that blue bag thrown at my house every morning.

     I'm sure Lightfoot never imagined that Fran would take her interview and use it as clay to construct a more damning portrait. Would whittle it to a sharpened point, and then ram it so far up her ass it came out the top of her head—of course in a dignified, understated, professional manner.
     But if you read the two pieces, as I suggest you do if you haven't already, they're a master class in why reporters cover beats. Note the credulous, do-tell-us-madam-mayor tone of Gotham's Gray Lady. Then Fran's burning of mayoral hubris down to the waterline.
     Honestly, after the disappointment of Rahm Emanuel, I'm not quite ready to give up on Lightfoot. She's charmless and grim and self-pitying and holds the media in contempt, but that isn't anything new or different in a mayor. Yes, Lightfoot was dealt a series of civic disasters on a Jobian scale that can make one forget that Chicago was royally screwed before the pandemic/civic unrest/economic sclerosis of 2020. Yes, the Chicago Teachers Union can be maddeningly focused on serving its members instead of pushing whatever initiative the mayor of the moment has in mind. 

    And in Lightfoot's defense, I still cherish her calling that FOP clown a clown into an open mike, and give her credit for the Harold Lloyd act she pulled trying to get people to wear masks.
     But geez, don't spike the ball until you're in the end zone. A little, ah, premature to be taking credit for anything regarding the opening of the schools. Particularly since they were all closed on Tuesday. Mother Nature, yes. But one doesn't want to piss off Mother Nature, does one? Or Fran Spielman, for that matter, a force of nature herself. 

Rice pudding completes the meal

     "This rice pudding likes your shirt," I said, with a smile, nodding toward the round take-out container I was holding up for her to see.
     She was puzzled for a second, looked, then smiled. 

     "I get it," she said.
     We had ordered take-out for Valentine's Day, from our favorite Indian place, Tava in Morton Grove—tandori fish, chicken tikka masala, spinach, two types of nan. They had included a free dessert, in honor of the holiday. But my wife had baked a pumpkin pie, so we saved the pudding for Monday's dinner.
     "Of course it's spelled wrong," I said, looking at the handwriting on the cover, where someone had written, "Happy Valentine's Day! Complementary Rice Pudding" and added a heart. English is a difficult language to master, filled with complexities, like words that sound the same but are spelled differently and mean different things.
     As a longtime restaurant goer, that note really impressed me. I've had take-out from Alinea, and nobody wrote anything on the containers, or the bag—someone at Tava had also penned "Happy Valentine's Day," large, on the bag. 

     I understand why most places don't do things like that. The little extra flourish takes time and, beyond that, someone has to think to do it.  Restaurants are busy, frenetic places, and just preparing the food, getting together the orders, checking that everything is included, is challenge aplenty. More than one favorite place, that we ordered take-out from mostly just to be supportive, botched the order, which I have to admit, left us a little less enthusiastic, pawing around for something that wasn't there. You should finish a meal from a place feeling grateful and satisfied, not disappointed and sympathetic.

     "Although," I continued. "Maybe they meant it was supposed to augment the meal. As opposed to being free. That would also work."
     "Complementary" means something that enhances something else. "A thing that completes or brings to perfection" another. Which speaks to its second meaning, the usual number for a group. Four players is one short the usual basketball team complement.
     And "compliment," as you know, is an expression of admiration.
     Which gives us a chance to play my Homophone Smackdown Challenge, and see which usage is older.
     "Complement," the Oxford tells us, is from the Latin, complementum, that which fills up or completes—the source being agreeableness, think, "comply-ment," and traces it to 1419. "Compliment" only goes back to the end of the 17th century, from the identical French word and Italian complimento, an "expression of respect and civility to another by words acts." The Oxford goes on a bit, but one sentiment stands out. "Compliment is thus a doublet of COMPLEMENT. (The form directly from the Latin). The latter was in use in this sense about a century before the introduction of the French word, which slowly took its place between 1665 and 1715."
     Hey, we've all been there. I wasn't familiar with "doublet" beyond being an article of clothing—a man's padded jacket—in Shakespearean times. Linguistically, doublets are twinned words, like compliment and complement, that have the same root, but proceeded through the language through different routes, and so have different spellings and meanings, like "pyre" and "fire" or "frail" and "fragile."
     But language is infinite, while people are not, so time to get on with the day. We've come very far from rice pudding, which was good, particularly with a little cinnamon sprinkled on top—though the pudding was too sweet for my wife's taste, so she set hers aside for me for yet another day. And I have to admit, my pang of disappointment that she didn't like her dessert was immediately replaced by the thought, "More rice pudding for me!" We are all but human, alas.

Shut off.

 

 

    "I smell gas," my wife says, coming up from our basement, which is like the setting of a Stephen King novel.
     "I do too, sometimes," I muse, from the sofa. "The house is 115 years old. It must be because of the cold."
    It was 0 degrees this morning. Now it's warmed up to 16.
     "I'm going to call Nicor," she says. It's about 2 p.m.
     I did not leap up, shouting, "The hell you are!" Which, had I known what is coming, I might have done. I would suggest we instead crack a window in the basement and wait for spring.
     But nobody wants to blow up. Houses sometimes do that. Ka-boom. I raise no objection. She calls.
     Meanwhile the dog, which has had tummy troubles, fixes me a meaningful look. We go outside just as the Nicor guy arrives in a white pick-up truck. My wife goes to let him in.
     The dog and I walk. I'll draw the veil. When we return, the Nicor guy is in the basement, waving a wand attached to some device around some rusty pipes by the far wall, by the fuse box. He explains that he's shutting off the gas. Get a plumber, fix the leak.
    "And then you'll come back?" I say, hopefully, trying to get up to speed and process this development.
     "Someone will, yes."
     I did not foresee this development. It seems important to get all the information I can from him while he's here. He shows me where the leak is.
     "Shouldn't you tag it or something?" I say, worried about my ability to point out the proper spot should a plumber actually arrive in the near future. 

     "We only do that for complicated leaks," he says. He shows me the valve he used to shut our boiler off, the boiler that would normally be filling the radiators with hot water, heating our house. But now won't be doing that. Because the gas is off.
     Then he's gone.
     He briefly reappears outside the house, locking the meter no doubt. I suppress an urge to bolt outside, wading up to him in the snow, drop to my knees, hands clasped in front of me. "Please, PLEASE turn our gas back ON!"
     It's about 2:30 p.m. 

     "Panic" is the wrong word. "Focus," is closer. Get a plumber, get him in here, get the pipe fixed, get Nicor back, turn on the gas. I feel magnificently focused.
     My wife steps in. We have a magnet. In the kitchen. With the phone number of Village Plumbing. I call. Explain the situation.
     "I'll call you back," the lady on the other end says.
     While I'm doing this, my wife remembers that we pay $5 a month for Nicor Home Solutions. Which, in theory, is supposed to help with this kind of thing. She phones and gets put on hold. I open the taps to a trickle in all the bathrooms, the kitchen, and the slop sink in the basement. Keep the pipes from freezing. That feels like decisive action.

     I stand in the living room, and can feel the house cool. 
     Twenty minutes pass. I phone the plumber back. "He'll be there within an hour," she says, with a note of exasperation. "I'll call you when he's on the way."
     "Within an hour?" I say, grasping at hope. Yes, within an hour. 
     Nicor Home Solutions finally picks up after a half an hour. They want to know if any of us have COVID. My wife explains we do not. They too have a plumber who would also be here, also within an hour. My wife wonders should she have him come.
     "Yes!" I say, con brio. "Between the two of them, one of them should show," I am normally the most laissez faire, let-things-work-themselves out kind of guy. Let's wait for the free Nicor plumber. We've been paying five bucks a month for, Jesus, probably 20 years. Might as well get a return for our investment.

     But this does not seem one of those coast-along situations. Plus I do not have faith in people. Nicor took half an hour to pick up the phone. It would take them half a week to get here. I have no point of reference here. I don't remember this happening to anybody I know. 

     I leap on Twitter and Facebook to inform the Hive. I could see needing to tap their intelligence. I lay out the story, ending, "The plumber is, in theory, on the way. I'll keep you posted."
     The Village Plumbing plumber arrives, and I somehow resist the impulse to hug him in greeting. Tall, handsome, he has worked on our boiler before. I lead him to the the fitting that the Nicor guy had pointed out. He applies wrenches to it, conducting a monologue on the relative merits of gas company practice now versus in years past that discretion dictates I do not record. He opens the pipe up, observes that it is rather loosely sealed.
     Even as he is doing this, he informs us to call Nicor back up right now and tell them that the problem is fixed and they were to come back now and turn the gas on. Star the process.
     "Do you have any space heaters?" Eric the Plumber asks. 
      "No," I say. "I don't think they would be much help in a place this large."
      "They can do a surprisingly good job." This worries me. I do not want to heat my house with space heaters. I want the heat back on, and just raising the subject seems to imply that is in question. He speculates whether Nicor will pressure test the lines when they return—could cause other leaks. Old house like this, one you jiggle one pipe, others could go.  

     "Yeahhhh..." I imagine the Nicor guy saying, "You're going to need to replace ALL these pipes. And your basement is a foot too shallow. That's not up to code..."     

     I try not to think about it. I do think about all the people everywhere who this happens to who aren't johnny-on-the-spot types. Who don't leap to get that plumber. Or can't find one. Or pay for it. And wonder which is more dangerous: a slow gas leak? Or a house without heat in February when it's 10 degrees outside?
     My wife reaches Nicor, and is told someone will be by before midnight. Eight hours away. I place my fingers on a radiator. Still warm. That's good. Minutes to cut your heat, hours to get it back. That's life as I understand it.

      The plumber sent by Nicor Home Solutions arrives, about 15 minutes after Village Plumbing leaves. He seems very young. We send him away with apologies.
     There seems nothing to do but write a column, which I am doing now. If a meteor were headed toward earth to destroy it, I'd probably do the same. I can decide later whether this is the sort of hale, we're-in-it-together problem that readers can relate to, or a terrified bleat of white privilege by a suburban burgermeister who for a few hours glimpsed the skull of bureaucratic bungling that normally is kept well-fleshed out and smiling for me. (Editor's note: the latter, which is why you're reading it here and not in the newspaper).

      My wife goes in the basement, finds a space heater the size of a large lady's purse that I didn't remember we had, and sets it up near her computer in the living room. I place my hand two inches from its grill.

     "It heats the air for inches," I say. But after a while, it does have some slight effect.

      The snow is falling, in big flakes. Quite pretty, under usual circumstances.
     At 4:30 I say, "Whatever we do for dinner, let's bake something." 
     "Right," my wife replies, "I'll make some corn bread..." She pauses—do you see this coming? I don't—then starts laughing.
     "The gas is off," she says.

      We put on our Land's End fleeces. I slip on a pair of fingerless gloves. It's 60 degrees in the house. At 5:30 we eat an early dinner. Hearty tomato soup with gnocchi. It feels very Eastern European, to be sitting in our kitchen in our coats eating hot soup. Almost an adventure. Like camping in your kitchen.

     Darkness falls. I notice that all the trivial crap that usually dominates my low-level consciousness has fallen away. Getting the heat back on is all that matters.

     At 6:30 p.m. another Nicor guy shows up. Before he even knocks on the door he tramps around to the side of the house and turns the gas on. First thing, he goes into the kitchen to see if the stove lights. Then we tramp into the basement and he lights the pilot light on our boiler and fires it up, then does the same on our hot water heater. He is niceness itself. 

      After he leaves, I first of course inform social media, which shares my relief. Then wonder if we handled it properly. Maybe we should have saved money by not calling Village Plumbing and just waiting for Nicor Home Solutions to send somebody. But I had no reason to assume Nicor would get somebody out, and quick action seemed important. Anyway, done now.

Flashback 2005: How to bluff your way through another Valentine's Day

Veselka, East Village, NYC, Feb.14, 2020

     Exactly one year ago today, my wife and I were having a madcap Manhattan weekend with our two boys, and spent a festive Valentine's Day doing stuff we love all day long... a lingering breakfast at Caffe Reggio in the Village, a long morning stroll through the Whitney Museum, lunch and conversation with an old friend at Miznoun in Chelsea Market, shopping, a mid-afternoon pick-me-up pizza at Lombardi's, shopping in the Strand, and late night chowing down on excellent Eastern European grub at Veselka.   

Breakfast, Feb. 14, 2020

     Skip a year. Now we're in Day 9 of The Liquid Nitrogen Deep Freeze February from Hell, which came hard on the heels of Sedition January, which followed Deceit December, not to forget COVID summer and Civic Unrest Spring. A time when no one goes anywhere or does anything or can imagine going anywhere or doing anything but occasionally checking on the news to confirm that half the country is still crazy, plus occasionally heaving a sigh of gratitude that we're not all dead. Yet.

     Having spent Saturday working on the book, I'd rather put my hand in flame then write something else. Luckily, there is an infinity of old stuff slumbering in the computer, such as this, back when the column filled a page. I kept the old headings. Happy Valentine's Day, if you can swing it, if anything can said to be happy anymore.

Opening shot

     Today is Valentine's Day. If you had forgotten until just now, my sympathies. That forehead-slapping stomach-dip is an awful feeling. I hope at least it's morning, and there is still time to juggle meetings and skip lunch and scramble to find a last-minute token of affection. 

Lunch, Feb. 14, 2020

     If not, if you're on the train heading home, you're a dead man and would do better to face the music than to rush to a White Hen to pick up a limp clump of dyed carnations, the gift that says, "I don't care."
     Instead of that, stick with indifference. Don't grovel and apologize—women hate that. Set your face in a "hard day" look of exhaustion, walk in, sigh, shake your head, and go collapse on the couch. Refuse to talk about it. Accept her gift with a heavy sigh, a weak smile, a crushed "thanks" and toss it wearily away. Maybe she'll buy it. Or, better yet, maybe she'll have forgotten, too.

Heeeee-yah!

     The aerial snapped off our car. As a result, the only station we get in is WBBM-AM, whose signal is so strong you almost don't even need a radio to hear it. We usually keep it off, but on the hour I try to shush the incessant prattle of the boys in the back seat, reaching for the knob and announcing importantly, "I want to hear the top of the news"—one of those clenched dad phrases they'll probably be repeating back to each other with guffaws for decades after I'm gone.
     I'm not looking for breaking stories as much as I like to hear the urgent, jittery CBS Radio Network jingle and the newscaster, whose tone is the last gasp of the old-fashioned, hand-to-ear, loosened necktie, teletype clattering in the background gravitas that once defined radio news.
     The top story Saturday night, at 7 p.m., as we drove downtown for dinner—Greek Isles!— was Howard Dean being named chairman of the Democratic National Committee. They played a snippet of the announcement, and then something that shocked me—he famous "Heeeee-yah!" burst of crazed enthusiasm that doomed Dean's faltering primary campaign early last year. The newscaster quickly added that while Dean didn't primal scream again, he instead said this, and then cut to a quote.
     That seemed so unfair. No wonder politicians are such cringing cowards. Howard Dean is no doubt a man of accomplishment; he was governor of Vermont, after all. But he might as well be an escapee from a lunatic asylum who almost seized power before being betrayed by a spectacular public breakdown. He's carrying on, bravely, trying to make a contribution. But what good will it do him? He could escape to the South Seas, like Lord Jim, but strangers will sneak glances over at him as he stands rigidly at the bamboo bar, nursing his dark rum, then grin at one another and whisper, "Heeeee-yah."

Just keep going

     Speaking of things breaking off the car. We had an extraordinary moment last month. The family was in the Camry. As I backed it out, the right side mirror collided abruptly with the frame of the garage door. It shattered with a bang.
     Once, this would have upset me. Once, my wife would have commented upon it. Now, no one said anything. I put the car in park, went around to inspect the broken stump of the mirror. I gathered up the shattered shards of glass and plastic from the garage floor, disposed of them, got back in the car and we drove away without a word. You would think this kind of accident happened every day.
     I wish I could convince myself that is some kind of Zen-like calm. Don't sweat the small stuff. ... But I have the sneaking suspicion it more has to do with being so completely overwhelmed and burnt-out that nothing much upsets you anymore. The drown reflex kicking in, smiling at the rising bubbles as you settle slowly to the soft silt on the bottom. Not an unpleasant sensation, really.

Closing shot

     Getting back to Valentine's Day, the only reason I have exactly what my wife wants, wrapped and waiting for her this morning, is because she told me precisely what to buy, and reminded me until she was certain it had been taken care of.
      That's the beauty of marriage. It's more difficult for new couples. A new girlfriend wants to test her love's devotion. So she doesn't just tell him what she wants for Valentine's Day. That would be too easy. Instead, he's supposed to prove his worth by reading her mind.
     By the time they are engaged, a fiancee might drop hints, bread crumbs the guy is supposed to follow to the right gift.
     A wife doesn't have time for that, nor does she think her husband is smart enough to figure it out himself. At least mine doesn't. So she just tells him what she wants and then, when he gives it to her, feigns surprise and delight.
     That's love.
     —Originally published in the Sun-Times, Feb. 14, 2005

Texas notes: All that glitters

     Sometimes you flap and flap, and just can't get off the ground, and I felt for Austin bureau chief Caren Jeskey this week, admiring her professional determination to get airborne. Been there. She finally soared away, and for the first time I felt tempted to insert an editorial aside along the lines of, "Editorial note: Old journalism maxim, 'It is easier to apologize than to get permission.'" You'll see what I mean. 

     This week was hiccupy to say the least. I am writing this piece propped up in bed in my tiny house, in frozen Austin at 7:30 Friday night.
     Since COVID began, I dedicated myself to what I call radical self-care. Healthy food, long walks, meditation, lots of rest, and refusing to take on too much. The word “no” is such fun to say. Who knew? This approach has kept me relatively balanced, and when I’ve had slumps I’ve been able to get back on the saddle.
     This is the first Friday in ages I’ve felt squarely thrown off. There were times this week I was precariously hanging off the side of a horse from one boot, my rag doll body helpless to right itself, my hair grazing the dusty ground.
     Talk about curve balls. Just when I thought I’d safely fielded one, another came whizzing up. I had unexpected and uninvited financial news, and a rocky start with a new contract. I’ve had to beat down a few rounds of carpenter ants who came marching in from the cold. (If you need to know the best ant bait, I can tell you). A creepy neighbor made a couple balls jokes to me, and when I shut him down retaliated by insulting me. I’ve tried for hours to secure a COVID vaccine for a relative, to no avail.
     My blog post did not go as smoothy as usual. My first idea just didn’t gel. I had completed a new piece, edited it, sent it Neil and was ready for bed. I had contacted the person I wrote about for some clarification and their response was “I am not comfortable with you writing about me.” That piece got ixnayed. And to top it off, as I sit here writing, I just got stung by a bee. Yes, a bee. Ouch! The Texas critters are trying to come in from the cold that’s for sure. Lest I sound too whiny, I must say that all of the good things in my life are not lost on me, and I know this too shall pass.
     While reflecting on my week I have come to realize that I threw the hardest ball at myself. A few weeks back, I did not trust my intuition. Things snowballed to the angsty place I have been trying to extinguish all week.

   Here’s what happened: I reached out to an acquaintance from my teen years who I wanted to write about. We have not seen each other in over 30 yeas, and though our connection at the time was powerful and memorable, it was brief.
     He decided it was a sign— citing several synchronicities— that I’d reached out to him and we, therefore, were meant to be together. He’s in Texas now (as am I), and in his eyes that’s even more of a reason to rush into something blindly. As a person who would rather be in partnership, a part of me was intrigued and fell for his charms. Since we had a childhood connection and have friends in common, I felt a false sense of intimacy with him.
     I entertained a short flirtation (a few weeks) of phone calls, texts and FaceTime with him. I quickly saw that we are not compatible. When I set boundaries around my availability to talk or text, he became mean and harassed me with messages. Instead of immediately running away, as I should have, I decided I would try to wean him off of his delusional dream.
     We’d talk, I’d remind him that I am not seeing anyone due to COVID, plus I feel we are not compatible. He’d fuss, I’d ignore him and/or respond with more boundaries, and he’d apologize. I’d go back to chatting and laughing with him until the cycle resumed. He lost his temper more than once, and cussed at me. In my rational moments I was scared. Then there was the part of me that wanted to be patient with his process. He clearly has deep attachment wounds and my presence activated them.
     I didn’t realize how bad it was until, the other morning when I heard a snippet on NPR. It was about the fact that coercive control (exactly what he was doing) may soon be illegal in the U.S. as it is in other parts of the world. I realized with crystal clarity that this person was trying to manipulate me into staying in contact with him and I want no part in it. I cannot help him.
     The mistake I made, and the stress I felt this week will help me relate to others when they take similar missteps. Each unwise decision I make renders me a better therapist with real life experience to pull from. It also propels me further into keeping my life small and safe, with plenty of radical self care. Now I will drink my ginger tea and cozy up for the night. Exactly where I want to be.
     If you want to listen to the piece that woke me up, here it is: 

     https://the1a.org/segments/coercive-control-domestic-abuse/