He would be 89 years old this month…

I'd so wanted to write something last week about the inspirational Martin Luther King, Jr. But, how does one begin to find the proper words and then to combine those words in an emotionally significant manner to laud one so iconic?

I had this vague idea that I would begin my post with our five-year-old daughter excitedly bounding into the house to tell us, Sweet Husband and I, of the great person about whom her kindergarten teacher had spoken, “Martin Luther, the King” —her phrase so endearing to us at that moment that we still, smilingly, use it to this day.

And then I thought I would segue into a eulogy I'd heard. A highly-regarded attorney friend (caucasian) known for his eloquence, “borrowed” (his word, not mine) a quote from MLK to describe his personal feeling at his long-suffering mother’s death. He hijacked this as his closing statement: “...free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, (we are) free at last.”

And how there I sat there, in church, with a bitter taste of resentment forming at the back of my throat at my friend’s misappropriation of that quote. Like swallowing tainted food, it just didn’t sit right with me and does not to this day.

Then I might mention Martin Luther King, Jr’s education. Starting with his graduation from high school at the age of fifteen (the age where I sat zoned out in my high school sophomore history class, engulfed in a wash of ennui and staring blankly out the window.)

And how in 1948 he received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Morehouse College in Atlanta, and then in 1951 a second degree from Pennsylvania’s Crozer Theological Seminary as the elected president of a mostly caucasian senior class.

At the age of 26 he became “Dr.” King when he earned a PhD at Boston University.

When he was thirty-five years old Dr. King became the youngest male recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He chose to donate his prize money of $54,000+ to assist in the continuation of his non-violent civil rights movement.

Would I then, I wonder, mention the spiritual revelation he experienced as the result of a threatening telephone call he received on January 27, 1956? Or, the explosion heard blocks away from his home, it’s epicenter, just three days later:

“Your house has been bombed.” 

I asked if my wife and baby were all right. 

They said, “We are checking on that now.” 

—(Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, Martin Luther King, Jr.)

And would I include something about the burned cross he found on the lawn of his new house in April 1960?

I’m quite sure I would finish things up with his assassination using something like the poetic lyrics from U2’s “Pride (In the Name of Love):

Early morning April four 

shot rings out in the Memphis sky 

Free at last, they took your life 

They could not take your pride

He was 39 years old.

2018 marks the 50th anniversary of his death.

He was 39 years old,

He * was *  39 *  years *  old.

***

But the busyness of life, as it frequently does, ate away at my writing time… a nibble here, a bite there and before you know it, it has all but disappeared.

This day Sweet Husband and I are “on call.” Our almost four-year-old grandson, offspring of our “Martin Luther, the King” daughter, may or may not be ill. Daughter, son-in-law and grandson, live away —a two-hour commute. We have volunteered to drive into the city and care for Grandson, if he is too ill for preschool/daycare.

Concerned about Grandson’s reported low-grade fever, lethargy and disinterest in food, SH and I have readied overnight bags. We are prepared to dash out at 6 a.m., if needed. Like Minutemen, we are readily mobile and quickly deployable.

While I could not carve a slice of time for myself, I’ve instantly put aside all obligations to await word about the status of our little guy.

As I wait, I type. I look up and notice our digital photo frame, a gift from our “Martin Luther, the King” daughter. She gave it to us fully loaded with photos of our family throughout the years.

The frame sits in our living room and is triggered by motion. So on occasion I pass it or move in such a way that I trip the sensor. Out of the corner of my eye I will notice the display light and a photo of my past will flash before my eyes, the start of a slideshow.

Quite often I am in the photos and they are of moments that, for whatever reason, are not stored in my memory bank. I don’t remember that! And yet I recognize the photo as somewhere I probably would have been or some activity in which I might well have partaken.

Where was my brain on that occasion? Why did it not register this particular moment? I’ve a pretty good memory, so how do I not remember this scene? Can a person be so absorbed, comfortably ensconced in a moment that they miss it? No, more likely I was thinking ahead to some chore that needed tending or perhaps ruminating over some past disappointment. Tsk, such a waste to not be in the moment…

They say that your “life flashes before your eyes” when you die.

If so, what will my life show me?

Will it be similar to the ever-changing slideshow I have now in my living room?

Will I be able to fast forward through events I consider unimportant? —like my sophomore history class? "Alexa, skip."

Will I be able to hit a “slo-mo” or “repeat” button to savor treasured significant occasions?

—my oldest son playing Für Elise at his piano recital? 

—reading and re-reading my middle child’s written words?

—my 3rd and youngest child gracefully scoring a soccer goal?

—my husband’s sweet temperament?

—laughing uproariously with family and friends?

—all of the people who’ve motivated and inspired me?

—the birth and gift of each of my grandchildren?

—will I see myself baking and gardening and reading books?

—surely I will see each of my three children’s first smiles.

Will the snapshots be in sequence??

***

And then I wonder: What did Martin Luther King, Jr. view as his life flashed before his eyes?

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. removing a burned cross from his front lawn, with his son at his side

***

“The mortal heart of Martin Luther King was stopped by an assassin’s bullet. But no power on earth can stop his work.”

—Rev. Ralph D. Abernathy

A Stroll Down Melancholy Lane

I sit calmly looking out of the curved window of my intergalactic craft. It is a bay-type viewing area and it is my eye to the universe in which I am currently traversing. The space outside is still, serene, and in fact quite pleasing to my eye. But I know it to be savagely and bitterly cold —cold enough to cause grievous harm, or be of threat to my life. If I were to, even momentarily, step outside of the vehicle, and without proper protection let’s say, gently bump my hand, my hand would snap off of my arm and shatter into pieces. 

My thought process is disrupted as I view a creature zipping across the cold vastness. This is quite unusual. “Good luck, little being,” I think.

I glance at my horology apparatus. There are still three hours to go before the time I have determined most beneficial for my partaking in my allotment of nourishment —without depleting my current supplies, that is. So with a push of a button I procure a warm, non-nourishing liquid to quell my hunger pangs…

 ***

Ah shucks, I spot my nearest neighbor’s bold combination of neon, LED and other multi-colored pulsing Christmas lights. How the heck am I supposed to visualize in my mind that I am an alien being viewing outer space when there are these glaring, flashing, tacky lights going 24 hours a day. Can't they please put them on some kind of a timer? I mean, what the heck! What about the wildlife in the area that, for their defense, for their cover, for their very survival, depend on a portion of a day’s hours to be in darkness or semi-darkness. What about them?…

Where was I?… Oh, yes, fantasizing about being an alien traveling the universe and alighting upon planet Earth…

***

I will relate the account of my adventure, (actually “our” adventure since I travel with a companion) using a new software that will automatically translate into one of over one million of the most widely used and known languages in a dozen of the nearest parallel realities to where I am now visiting. Anyone who has ever used automated translation-ware will know that there will, of course, be the usual linear transformation and vector space mathematics errors, but also that language is just so doggone subjective… --For my own amusement, I used a bit of jargon in that last sentence. I wonder how that will translate. 

I was chosen for the mission because I am a polyglot.  

My companion was chosen for his engineering abilities. I use a male pronoun here to describe my companion. There are many parallel realities where there are primarily two genders, as there are also places where beings are endowed with a single neutral gender and yet successfully reproduce. And let us not forget, as some of you reading this will know, the plural locations with productive multiple genders, six of which are quite commonly known. But, for our purposes now, we will stick with two of the common genders, female and male…

***

Seriously, as I look out of the window of the back of my house, I feel at home, content, grateful for a wonderful life partner. But, when I venture outside and encounter my neighboring community members I feel like an alien being, like I live in a completely different parallel realm, or dimension, or spectrum. And it’s not anyone else’s fault. This is all on me. The people living nearby are generally quite kind and welcoming of friendship.

But if I had to point a finger of blame for my feeling a bit like a foreigner in my own community I would say it is more than the fact I tend to be what a behaviorist might label an “introvert.” The deeper alienation I’m experiencing at the moment, the feeling that has driven me under the shelter of my carapace came about just over a year ago, on the fateful day of the latest U.S. presidential election.  And since that day, I’ve found it difficult to view any but a handful of my neighbors without suspicion that they may have voted for our current president and thus embrace his philosophical ideals, (if you can call them that and by "that" I mean ideals.) 

The current president is a man who did not hide his agenda. It was there for all to witness —to witness his hatred, his misogyny, his sexual predatory behavior, his dishonesty, his bias against those less fortunate in acquisition of money and in physical appearance, his bias against those of any religious belief beside his so called "Christianity"and against those with preferences as to which gender to love, and, and --and if you can believe it, his desire to deny health coverage to the chronically sick… 

And then from "day one" in office, his horrendous agenda was carried out by his GOP cronies! He puts out easily provable lies (largest inauguration attendance?) And the group of them, like some kind of antithesis of the fabled Robin Hood and company, the bunch of them will collectively do their best to rob the poor and give everything they steal to the richest…

Despite all of this, I still occasionally drag my otherwise happily-introverted body to a local community social event. Like last Spring when I attended a meeting for women interested in participating in an informal golf league. Maybe two dozen or so women attended. We ordered lunch seated in a squared-off, skinny u-shaped table formation, which might have been fine for a UN meeting or a formal presentation of some kind where only one person spoke at a time, but…

Anyway, I found myself sitting near the bend of the narrow U, with women on six sides of me. How do humans do it? How do they listen and engage in small talk with so many people at once? —to my left is a someone describing falling on broken cement in front of J.C. Penney’s —kitty-corner to my left someone is telling an engaging tidbit about neighbors who locked themselves out of their home on a stair-less upper balcony (on a frigid day, no less.) —kitty-corner to my right a women shows off her new jewelry —somewhere nearby I hear an interesting story about how someone met her husband on a blind date. I begin to partake in a topic I love: gardening, but I am tapped from behind by someone I recognize as a fellow introvert, who says, “It is so nice to see you here.”

It is all too much for me and I can see it in the face of a friend, the one who encouraged me to attend this gathering and who is sitting directly across from me, staring at me in surprise as she recognizes that I am virtually struggling for breath in a din that is nearly drowning me.

So what am I getting at? What is the impetus of my writing today?

Today we are invited to visit friends we have not seen for a couple of years, friends from our former Chicago-area home. Plus, the visit will allow us an additional chance to meet up with a treasured friend visiting Chicago from Erie, PA. Friends I am missing so dearly at the given moment. But we have awaken to a -17 Fahrenheit temperature. Cautious Husband is not very keen on making the four-hour+ roundtrip drive in our five year old car. And not to put it all on Cautious Husband, as I kind of agree that it’s best that we stay home on this arctic-like day.

Do I really miss these old friends so much, or am I simply nostalgic from hearing Auld Lang Syne on New Year’s eve last night? Is this post-holiday melancholy after a lovely Thanksgiving and Christmas spent with loved ones and friends, beloved family and real friends who get my humor, who have political views similar to mine, people with whom there is often laughter until our tears flow, because we know each other so well…

I think of this statement that I copied from a recent NYT or NewYorker article:

...Stanford neurobiologist, …: “People who do best are those who have become more selective about whom they affiliate with… You don’t need a lot of friends; you just need a few very good ones.”

And I turn my electric blanket up to number five and I crawl back under my shell.

So sorry we won’t see you today, Jodie, Jen and Mike. Please forgive us. And do please visit us, if you can. You know where to find us: Planet Earth, just make a sharp right at the garish tacky Christmas lights that flash 24/7.

***

Here on planet Earth

The Chincoteague ponies keeping their heads above water, or struggling for breath??

I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.

~~~ Martin Luther King Jr. 

***
Oh, yes and Happy 2018 everyone!!!