Stories can conquer fear, you know. They can make the heart bigger. —Ben Okri, Nigerian poet and novelist

Welcome, Readers,

. . .To this, our inaugural issue of Chalice, a compilation of prose, poetry, artwork and stories from members of our congregation at West Shore Unitarian Universalist church.

Creative arts open minds, open hearts and open doors. For the creator, a piece of writing or art allows a look backward, forward and inside. The publication of such a work values the insight and contribution of the artist while giving the viewer a glimpse into another universe. These pieces share an energy and a life force of unique expression. They prepare us for learning, living and loving as we take pleasure in them again and again. They give answers and ask questions. They encourage our discussion.

We hope Chalice will be an avenue of reflection, collaboration and connection for our community. We aim to provide a space for not only quiet engagement, but also a starting point for further communication about the topics for this Story Year and beyond in our congregation.

This first issue on ìFacing Our Fearsî shows many examples of what frightens us and how varied those fears can beó including our own as we attempt this publicationówhat we do to face them and turn their energy into recognition of our limitations and possibilities.

Yes, to say "humble beginnings" is a cliché, but an apt one in this case. This publication stems from a conversation, only a month ago, when the West Shore WRITE NOW! group sat down to brainstorm ideas for what our contribution to Story Year might be. The energy was evident, and a literary magazine was one powerful idea on how best to share our stories. That small spark quickly ignited a firestorm to make this publication happen, WRITE NOW!

The publication will be available each month through May 2013 in a limited printed run with a small donation accepted or online through the West Shore web page.

This publication cannot happen without you. We ask that you to contribute to its content with nonfiction and fiction pieces, with poetry and with art based on our monthly themes. These can be put in the Story Year mailbox in the church office or submitted digitally to Chalice@wsuuc.org. We hope to eventually expand coverage to accept audio and video work to be part of the expanded digital version.

We also ask for your fiscal and physical support. If you wish to be a personal or business sponsor of the publication, we welcome your support. If you have editorial or layout or business skills to offer, we welcome your support. If you have comments or ideas, we welcome those, too.

Come along in this journey with us, and as we are fond of saying, Write On!

The Editors of Chalice,

Barbara G. Howell Wendlyn Alter Keira Dodd Carter Marshall Barbara Walker Andrew Watkins

Theme Submission Publication Deadline Date

2013

November: Telling the Truth Nov. 10 Nov. 24

December: When Your Life Changed Dec. 8 Dec. 22

2014

January: A Mountaintop Moment Jan. 12 Jan. 26

February: Taking a Risk Feb. 9 Feb. 23

March: Your Hardest Lesson Mar. 9 Mar. 23

April: A Time You Grew Apr. 13 Apr. 27

May: Your Greatest Teacher May 11 May 25

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Chalice Volume 1, Issue 1, October 2013

Facing Our Fears

Table of Contents

2 The World Has Changed: Normal (1940 - 1946) - Tom Slattery 3 Fear of Failure - Anne Osborne 5 The Beginning of Fears - Katherine Campbell-Gaston 7 Driven by the Past - Ahmie Yeung 8 Rage - David Prok 9 The Two Biggest Fears - Susan Averre 11 Self Portrait - Pamela J. Hardy 12 Fear of Caring Too Much - April Stoltz 13 Fear - Warren Campbell-Gaston 14 Square Won, Part 1 - Bob French 20 No One Escapes Hell - Chuck Homer 21 What I Am - Keira Dodd 22 Falling - Wendlyn Alter 24 Ichabod Crane - Gaylene Sloane 25 The Tale of Pandora - Patty Heany-Pillow 32 Facing Fear through Social Justice - Barbara G. Howell 34 Slow Motion News - Barbara Walker

Chalice is an Independent Arts Publication of Members and Friends of West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church, published by the Editorial Board.

Submissions of fiction, poetry, nonfiction, artwork and photography accepted from members and friends of the church. Send all submissions, inquiries, comments, subscription or sponsorship requests to Chalice@wsuuc.org or by mail or in-person delivery to Chalice, West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church, 20401 Hilliard Blvd, Rocky River, OH 44116. 440ñ333ñ2255. Submission guidelines are available via e-mail at the above address or on the West Shore website. Persons who submit work for publication will be required to sign a release form available via e-mail or in the Story Year mailbox at the church office. If submitted photographs depict living persons, a model release should also be provided.

Subscriptions for Chalice during Story Year, October 2013 through May 2014, are $50. Individual copies are available by donation. A free, on-line expanded version of the publication will be available at the church website, www.wsuuc.org. Sponsorships are $25 per issue with acknowledgement included in each issue.

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The World Has Changed: Normal (1940 to 1946) by Tom Slattery

Consider this. When a child is born and suddenly goes from being a chemical reaction to being a perceiving and evaluating human being, it is a scary thing. We all begin existence fearing for our lives. Perception and evaluation begin working at birth and are moderated through the ancient protective instinct of fear.

Itís the same for puppies, kittens, and goat kids, but human kids begin life with far bigger brains and imaginations that can appreciate complexities and extrapolate threats from hypothetical futures. These big-brained minds might succumb to paranoia, but also have a talent to fabricate surroundings into something they feel is normal.

Like all creatures, my beginnings were crazy and scary, but my mind made it normal. It was the rock bottom of the Great Depression; I am told that my baby bed was a wicker basket.

By the time I was old enough to develop permanent memories and understanding, World War II was raging in Europe and Asia. I grew up with our whole planet at war. While it raged far off on other continents, it had its effect on everything, including a kid growing up on Archdale Avenue in peaceful Lakewood, Ohio.

It was a war like no war before. It was a war of Good versus Evil on a global scale. There were identifiable good guys and bad guys. We only found out how bad the bad guys really were as the war ended, mass-murder factories were revealed and massive disease experiments were made known.

Both good guys and bad guys were developing devices that would profoundly change the world after the waró jet planes, radar, guided missiles, synthetic rubber and plastic, antibiotics. When the war finally ended my normal world was fated to end, too.

An estimated 60 million people were killed by the brutal methods of the war, and another 20 million people died from disease and starvation. The war ended as the world's first nuclear war with the instantaneous obliteration of two Japanese cities.

In 1940 I was four. I was not oblivious to the war, but events were distant and the threat level was low. Adults around me were anxious but not

immediately threatened. The world was engaged in a great war involving the whole planet, but I was able to settle in with my kid toys and kid thoughts. Lurking in the back of my mind though were the talk, images, radio commentary and radio war sounds, so I grew up knowing what was going on.

There was no television, but newspaper and magazine images and radio reports of the war were part of my normal. Movie theaters showed clips of battles and destruction. A national chain of Telenews Theaters showed only newsreels 24/7; they were mostly war images and war descriptions.

I deeply felt the family worry that my father could be drafted into the war and possibly killed. After Pearl Harbor, it seemed physically possible that enemy bombers might somehow get through and bomb us like they did Europe and Asia as we saw in newsreels; those brutal mean troops of the enemy might actually land and take over. Those scary worries were part of the pervasive normal of a world at war.

In 1941, probably because my father got a new and vital job in a war-related industry, our family moved to a second-floor flat at 17622 Archdale Avenue in Lakewood, a house owned by my grandparents. These are mostly memories from that time.

The house was the third from the last house in the Madison Elementary School district; I walked about a half-mile to Madison School every school morning in rain, snow, bitter cold, or exhausting heat. I walked farthest, but all of the kids walked. The war had brought on gasoline rationing, and those few parents who had cars could not afford to waste valuable gasoline taking their kids to school. It was still a demographically rural country emerging from the Great Depression. Kids were expected to walk long distances to school, and as the poverty of Great Depression morphed into the scarcities of World War II, few people had cars anyway. My great aunts owned a 1936 Chevrolet that my father had access to only every now and then. To get to downtown Cleveland or anywhere, we took streetcars.

The distant but omnipresent world war was only part of my normal reality.

Continued on page 4

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Fear of Failure In high school I flunked friends, A misfit Sitting at the outcastsí table.

As I stepped out to life I learned of many things But never really felt That I, alone, was all okay. I seemed to need Approval of another To make me feel that I was whole.

I wandered, clinging, many years And found myself, at last, alone. I asked what was my meaning Found no answer

And so I wandered more Until I reached a Buddhist sangha.

I learned that fear is always in the future

That right this very second Iím okay.

And so the panicked edges gradually were smoothed But deep inside, still buried, Fear remained The fear of failure.

I went to UU leadersí school And when I left I wished for courage

Courage to speak up When louder voices disagreed

Courage to risk failure Disapproval

So tremblingly I stepped outside my comfort zone

And found Sometimes success Perhaps approval At the very least acceptance

I was not relegated To the outcastsí table

And so I stayed And grew And trembled less.

It seems the chalice flame And all it represents Has touched the me inside With healing light.

Courage to be me If I could find the me

beneath the layers

óAnne Osborne

by Carter Marshall

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The World Has Changed, continued The calendar said it was the 1940s. But due to

war demands on goods and services production, war rationing and conservation measures stayed in effect for the duration of the war. Factories that had made new cars now made tanks and bombers. There were no new cars for all of those war years.

My growing up was thus trapped in the 1930s. The 1930s themselves had been curtailed by the Great Depression, and that whole decade never fully emerged, so a disproportionately large number of 20ís cars and trucks still plied the streets; people rode streetcars built decades earlier. Living in World War II America was not that much different from living in World War I America.

There were no fast-food franchisesóno McDonalds, KFC or Burger King. No one even knew what a taco was let alone going to a Taco Bell for lunch. No one I knew on the far west side of Lakewood at the edge of Rocky River farmland would have even known what a pizza was.

The cityscape, instead, was dotted with small storefront Mom-and-Pop eateries specializing in meatloaf and mashed potatoes. These served real food free of additives, food bought that morning

from markets. No one had refrigerators, so food was kept as fresh as possible in ice boxes.

In the 1940s Eugene O'Neill wrote a play titled The Iceman Cometh . It was a time when an actual "iceman" still delivered a large block of ice for boxes. The iceman, a regular fixture of my childhood, came several times a week to our Archdale Avenue flat and used ice tongs and his broad rural shoulders to haul a huge block of ice up a flight of stairs. We did not get a refrigerator until well after the war ended. Inside the icebox, the huge block of ice melted. At the bottom was a pan to collect water. Once or twice a day the large, clumsy galvanized steel pan of melt water had to be emptied into the sink or toilet.

Another touch of meaning now lost was in the 1935 song "Lullaby of Broadway." The phrase "milkman's on his way" lets the audience understand that a night has gone by too fast. But the milkman, like the iceman, was a regular part of my childhood. Schneider-Bruce Dairy of small town rural Rocky River employed milkmen to deliver large round quart glass bottles with milk trucks made by Cleveland's White Motor Company. Because we lived upstairs in a double and did

photo by Pam Hardy

5

not have a "milk chute," the milkman left one or two of these awkward large glass bottles at the front door every morning.

Homogenized milk had not yet been invented, so the cream and the milk separated in the cardboard-capped glass bottles. Since the cream floated to the top of the bottle, it was poured off first. The remainder of the milk was skim milk, watery, and thin and, to borrow a word from another time, yucky. Since sugar was severely rationed, there was none to put on breakfast cereal. With only thin skimmed milk, breakfast corn flakes or oatmeal also tasted yucky.

There was also the "breadman." The breadman worked for Spang Baking Company and brought loaves in a delivery truck. Plastics had not yet been invented, making daily delivery of bread vital. Bread was packaged in wax paper that easily tore and did not hold in moisture for more than twenty-four hours. By the end of the day, sliced bread that remained in the package was partly dried. Try as a kid might, there was no way to restore it to moist. Peanut butter and jelly had to be spread on partly dried, marginally stale slices.

There was also a periodic vegetable man. I guess he came from the farms and greenhouses of Rocky River and beyond. During the war gasoline was severely rationed, so like the iceman, milkman, and breadman, the vegetable man arrived with a horse-drawn wagon. Oat-powered vehicles were not bound by gasoline rationing.

Garbage was picked up using low-slung gray-colored dump trucks that we naturally called garbage trucks. "Garbage men" would stand in these and receive battered galvanized steel garbage cans tossed up and dump them in a pile at their hip-booted feet.

During war rationing, two forms of money were needed to buy most things, real US currency and ration stamps and tokens. Tokens were made from pressurized cardboard. The rationing tokens had value equivalents of quarters, dimes, and nickels. Food was cheap. Bread cost a real silver dime, but most food, like sugar, needed additional rationing tokens to buy. Losing a dime meant an agonizing but tolerable financial loss, but losing a rationing token was a disaster.

Continued on page 6

The Beginning of Fears Saddle shoes skipping down the sidewalk. ìStep on a crack, break your motherís back.î Shiny black rubber rain boots running down the narrow wooded trail. ìYou know a witch lives in the woods there.î ìThereís a troll under the bridge ahead.î Patent leather shoes walking across the Baptist Churchís parking lot. ìIf you see the face of God you will die.î So much to fear, to avoid, to worry about! I have nightmares. Did I tell you? óKatherine Campbell-Gaston

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The World Has Changed, continued There were no supermarkets. Small grocery

stores, meat stores, vegetable stores, storefront bakeries, and small five-and-ten-cent stores filled needs for food and small implements.

There were no refrigerators let alone freezers. Sometimes there were fresh vegetables that might stay fresh in the icebox for as much as a week. There was no way to preserve food except in cans or jars. My mother and many other women preserved cooked fruits and vegetables in glass Mason jars with metal hinges designed to make a seal. If pressurized lids could not be found in that era of wartime scarcity, liquid paraffin was poured into the top of the glass jar. It sometimes shrank or cracked and broke the sterile seal, ruining vegetables or fruit inside.

Bulk storage of some foods like onions or potatoes was possible in the cooler basement. A large burlap sack of potatoes was stored in a wooden cupboard there, but after some time onions and potatoes shot out new sprouts and began life processes of digesting and thus rotting the potatoes or onions. Families bought only enough bulk potatoes or onions to use up before they began sprouting.

There was no air conditioning but only small electric fans with steel blades. In the summer, the upstairs flat was unbearably hot and humid. Windows were kept open, but the small electric fan moved very little of the hot, humid air. I sometimes slept on a blanket on the wooden floor of the screened back porch.

In winter there were no automatic furnaces. Each house had a coal bin in its basement, two coal bins for a double like our house. A "coal man" came and emptied a dump truck load of coal down a chute. This lasted for a month. All basements had coal bins and were, as a result, covered with gritty black coal dust.

On cold winter days and nights someone had to constantly shovel coal into the basement furnace to keep the house warm. We worried about water pipes freezing and bursting. Even with shoveling, the furnace fire was either out or almost out by morning. Kids like me wanted to stay in bed under warm covers rather than get up into a literally freezing bedroom.

The fear was always there. The war drew in everyone. At Madison Elementary School there were air raid drills where teachers would herd kids

into cloakrooms and have us crouch on the floor. My mother knitted me a sweater of green wool. I wore it as much as I could even though often the temperature was too cold for sweaters. She thought I liked the sweater that she had knitted for me, but my real reason was so that I could duck down near evergreen trees in yards on my route to Madison School, so Nazi or Japanese fighter planes could not see me when they were strafing Lakewood. Kids five or six years old get funny ideas.

Kids helped the war effort. Even though I was too young to fight, I helped to win the war. I went house to house with my little red wagon to pick up flattened tin cans and non-flattened cans filled with solidified fats like bacon grease.

Adults poured the liquid fats left over from frying into used tin cans. They left these outside where I could pick them up. The fats went to make explosives for the war effort. The flattened tin cans were recycled for their tin content, so the country wouldnít have to depend on tin from overseas that came in merchant marine ships vulnerable to being torpedoed.

There was a terrible toll from war even in peaceful Lakewood. Houses in the neighborhood would put blue stars in the windows when a family member went off to war in Europe, Africa or the Pacific. Eventually some of the blue stars would be replaced by gold stars. That meant the service member had been killed. The terrible grief would be betrayed by un-mowed lawns, unpainted house siding, un-repaired steps.

Then in late 1945 it was over. Americans had dropped some kind of new big bombs, and the war that had been my normal was over.

Soldiers and sailors started to come home by 1946. Newfangled gizmos like refrigerators came out. Cars with new postwar styling and vibrant non-black colors flooded the roads in the new economy. Commercial air travel resumed with new long-range planes developed during the war. In 1946 I flew from Saginaw, Michigan, to Detroit in a DC-3, formerly during a war-time C-47. I had to walk out across the tarmac in a misty rain and climb a set of temporary stairs mounted on wheels to board the plane. That's how one got around on commercial aviation in those days.

But it was changing the world. The old normal was not the new normal. The world had changed. The old scary evolved into the new unfamiliar. �

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Driven by the Past To a place I never drove before I feel driven

by the blood in my veins pulled by bones set in space ages ago in a place all I wanted to do was leave when there the air was stifling of all I longed to be But my memory is foggy with years and maturity I chauffeur myself with passenger-eyes back into a past I thought long suppressed if not healed. Before I only approached under duress in distress of what might come.

Now I will myself forward into this past

so much less intimidating with years and grown inches on my side

the child I was peeks out from where she hides quietly in my soul...

It's all so much less

than I remembered it. óAhmie Yeung

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Rage I rage against the relentlessness of death I rant at the inevitability of its coming I cry out for the loved ones it has taken from me that are no longer here to be nurtured or nurture me I sit transfixedófrozen by my inability to alter or dissuade the inexorable coming of that event horizon which will one day swallow me up as well. I weep and am drowned in the torrent of tears that eruptó creating cascading rivers of sorrow which I cannot navigate and which threaten to overwhelm me. I beseech the universe to assuage my painóto rescue my Soul from the loss, the piercing lacerationsóthe wounds and the bruises that weigh down my spirit and threaten to extinguish the essence of my being before my time has come. I do not acquiesce nor go quietly into that eternityó But, ratheróin the midst of this cruel sentiencyóunable to abate that which beckons in the shadows to transport me to the unknown beyond I am transformedóI become like a futilely whimpering childóbreathing in and drinking fully of the wondrousness which will too soon be left behindó The loved ones still among the livingóthat need to be loved. The flowers still bloomingówhose fragrance needs to be inhaled. The forests and fieldsóthe lakes, rivers and streams that still need to be gazed upon. The sky, the stars, the sun, the moonóthat still need to be held in amazement. All this and more in the time remaining needs to be savored and cherished before that quiet still and endless slumber comesówhich will embrace us all.

óDavid Prok

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The Two Biggest Fears By Susan Averre

The two biggest fears, in survey after survey, are public speaking, and coming in second place: Death.

Iíve spent some real time confronting both of those fears.

Iím a medium. That means I hear, see and sense people in spirit.

Just like you doóonly your spirits are all wearing bodies as not all of mine areÖ itís kind of a wardrobe issue.

I believe that we are all spirit, but that while we are having what we call a life we are residing in a physical body. Some of us keep hearing that we should get a life; but thatís another story.

I believe that upon physical death we just step out of that body. Or fall out. Or get tossed out; sometimes with great forceósort of like how my last marriage ended; but I digress. Anyway, it all depends.

But the main thing isówe, the real you and the real meódonít die. We canít. We just get a change of address.

I think Iíve always been aware of people who werenít in their physical bodies being around; I just never thought of it in those exact terms.

I remember being in my crib, so I must have been under the age of three. There were my mom and dad, whom I could see with my eyes. They picked me up after a nap and we interacted physically. And there was my Opa, who was there, but I wasnít seeing and hearing him in exactly the same way. I knew

it was different, but that it wasnít a really important distinction. It just simply was a fact.

Generally my Opa didnít interact with me in a physical way, having passed on a dozen years before in the second world war, but I do remember once being awakened by a playful swat on my backside. When I spun around onto my back, there was nobody in the roomóphysically; yet Opa was laughing and teasingóin Yiddish, which I didnít understand; except I got the over-all message, and he was clapping his hands. I remember being angry and, when I got mad, he simply laughed more. The way grown-ups sometimes do when small children donít handle their teasing well.

My parents picked me up and soothed me and that was all I remember about that incident. Later when I was about ten, I recall having an on-going game with my uncle, who also had passed in the war. I would ask a yes or no question and he would blink the lights once for yes and twice for no. This was a game played in places where nobody heard me talking out loud to himólike public restrooms and summer camp buildings when the others were outside.

A few years after that I began reading whatever I could find on the topic, but there really wasnít much out there yet. And once I discovered living boys, I didnít have much

interest in anything else. There were plenty of other incidents along the way, but, again, they didnít involve living boys so not important.

I was 19 when my father died suddenly of heart failure. He had remarried a short time before his passing, and I went with my step mother and her daughters to the funeral home as she handled the arrangements. There was a large room with several rows of casketsómostly with lids propped up to show the plush satin linings available. I lost track of the group as I wandered through the rows of caskets, marveling at the great detail and expense laid out for bodies that would not appreciate it in the least.

They all walked out, unaware that I was at the back of the room. The door latched shut and the lights and music automatically switched off, leaving me alone in the dark in a room full of open caskets.

I ran to the door, pounding and calling to be let out and the director was back in a flash; his eyes saucer wide, swearing this had never happened before. Behind me, in spirit, my father stood laughing so hard I knew he had his hand on his stomach and his head thrown back. I knew that particular laugh well. Imagine feeling the after effects of fear; a lot of adrenaline in that; plus grief at my dadís loss, yet also comforted by his presence. Iíd been told my

Continued on page 10

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Biggest Fears, continued whole life that I had a ëvivid imaginationí and I really didnít know if this was imagined or real, but I kept it to myself.

After his burial, I felt him around me again, as I drifted off to sleep. I felt the edge of the bed depress as he sat down and I heard him talk to me as I lay paralyzed between sleep and wakefulness. He was giving me advice, all the things he wished he had had time to tell me, and after 40 years, I donít remember much of it. But it was both frightening and comforting at the same time. By then I had pulled away from communicating with Spirit. I had been told it was wrong and spooky so by now I was frightened by it. In fact, I had worked up a pretty good fear of death and all that went with it by then.

Over the next several years dad approached me only in my dreams that I know of; I was shutting out everything in my waking world that seemed spooky or illogical. My dreams would always switch when he entered them and we would talk; Iíd be so glad to see him. Then Iíd remember he was dead and frantically try to get him to lie down and close his eyes, apparently what Iíd been told was proper etiquette for the

deceased. He would grow increasingly frustrated and heíd either leave or Iíd wake up.

After a number of years, he quit trying to reach me. In one last dream, he simply boarded a train, waved goodbye and off he went.

Not until I approached my mid-forties and had my own mid-life crisis did I get any more contact from Spirit. I needed to find out if there was in fact anything out there or had it always just been my imagination. I was having increasing anxiety over the issue. Only then did I begin to actively search for answers. I explored various religions, sought out psychics and mediums; but few could withstand my intense challenges. Finally I was told about a spiritual retreat in a place called Lily Dale, NY, a spiritualist community. I went to a weekend event there, hoping to get some answers.

I slept through the introductory meditation and recalled none of it. Between ëclose your eyes,í and ëon the count of three you will open your eyesí I heard nothing at all. Over the years I would find that to meditate and stay conscious was a real feat for me; I am best off meditating standing up or if I must sit, it

has to be on the front edge of the chair. The readings I got and gave as we moved through workshops were not substantial enough to mean anything to me. Finally they had us go through a lesson in spiritual healing. I was annoyed, thinking, ìgreató20 minutes sucked out of my life that I will never get back.î But I went along, grudgingly, since I didnít know anyone there and thought Iíd never see any of them again anyway.

And thatís when I had a powerful experience. With my hands on someoneís shoulders, rolling my eyes in impatience, joined in prayer with a small group of people positioned around the volunteer in the same way, I felt a sudden and unsought connection with what I can only describe as a powerful loving intelligent force that drove me to tears and shook me physically for over half an hour. It was enough to open me up to the possibility that there was something out thereóand thatís when I became willing to learn.

A lot of training followed and years of practice. Each time a connection was made and information was given to a sitter that was specificó descriptions of their loved ones, down to personality and cause of death; sometimes even namesóeach of these incidents

If you back down from a fear, the ghost of that fear

never goes away. It diminishes people. ó Hugh Jackman

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helped me to trust what I was getting a little bit more. It took years to fully trust.

Iíve had some real tests. Once I sat in a large circle of

about 40 people and instead of the usual relatives and friends coming in, I got an elephant. I vowed I would not humiliate myself by giving that elephant in a message but the more I tried to shut him out, the louder he brayed. Finally, too exasperated to be embarrassed, I asked a woman across the room why I was getting an elephant with her. She was shocked. It seems that one week before she had been on safari with her husband and had stood in front of a herd of elephants just 20 feet away.

It would be another decade before I had another elephant come throughóthat one, with a young man and a circus. And it turned out a woman had lost

her brother; who had in his youth, run away with the circus! But why was the elephant here too? It turned out that his job, for the circus, was to clean up after the elephants.

As I say; itís a trust thing. Every time you give a message, you risk being publicly embarrassed.

Some people donít remember their own loved ones; or worse, they do, but they think youíve made one small error so they deny publicly that youíve made the connection.

One time I had a man come through giving the names Bob and Lorraine. He went on to describe himself perfectly. I gave all this to an audience of about 100 people. Nobody took him. You could have heard my dignity drop. It was my worst

fear: nothing but crickets. Finally I sat down. After the service, a couple approached me. The man said: ìthat sounded just like my uncle Bob.î I was dumbfounded. ìWhy didnít you say anything?î I asked him. ìBecause,î he said, ìhis wife was Edith, not Lorraine. But everything else you said was right.î Suddenly his wife smacked him on the shoulder. ìBut Bob in Lorain!î She pointed out. ëBob and Lorain.í Oh.

Soóitís something of a risk to do this publicly, you see.

Then why do it? Because, if one person can get over their fear of death by hearing the right piece of evidence; if one person can get past their grief by knowing from the evidence and messages that their loved one is OK; then itís worth the embarrassment. Iíll risk it. �?

Self-Portrait

Colorful spirit,

captive within cold crystal,

forever frozen?

ó Pamela J. Hardy

photo by Pam Hardy

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Fear of Caring Too Much Presented by April Stoltz at WSUUC service, When I Am Frightened, Oct. 27, 2013

I have spent a good part of my life involved in

social justice activism. But when I think about actively working on environmental issues, it terrifies me. I really almost canít do it. When Matthew and I sat down with each other this week to talk about this service, he asked me for a personal story I might have about climate change. I thought about Sandy hitting Lakewood last fall. I thought about the recent flooding in Colorado. But what emerged from me was my never before spoken truth. I canít do environmental work because I am so afraid of losing. I canít emotionally bear the thought of investing my heart and soul in saving a mountaintop or a forest and then seeing it get destroyed anyway.

In Flint, Michigan, where I lived my first 18 years of life, I watched helplessly as all the elms on our old tree lined street were cut down. I saw the healthy ancient oak that stood guard across the street from my home sheared and removed for no apparent reason. I witnessed the acres of property, once the urban farm of Charles Stewart Mott, co-

founder of General Motors, get paved over with cement parking lots for the community college named for him. These acres were home to Gilkey Creek, full of muskrats and lined with giant willows whose large limbs we climbed into and where we imagined ourselves hunters or travelers from another era. Cut down. Gone. It still hurts beyond belief when I hear the sound of buzz saws. I cried in Matthewís office remembering these early losses of my natural world and the unbearable pain I felt as a youth.

I know that not getting active to save this planet will certainly mean losing the natural wonders we hold so close to our hearts, and the loss of healthy soil and water we all need to live and sustain ourselves. And yet, it is like I am in denial. I know intellectually what is happening. I listen to public radio and television and read investigative publications. But I shut down my heart because I am terrified of feeling the pain. Here is where I am reminded of what my counselor has been telling me for over a year now.

I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea

that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked

before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through

no matter what.

ó Harper Lee, in To Kill a Mockingbird

photo by Wendlyn Alter

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She says I have to go through the pain and feel it to heal. That there are no spiritual bypasses. I canít go around it, I must go through it. To let myself feel the losses of the nature in my life, the loss of other trees, rain forests, mountain tops. To actually feel the imminent death of that polar bear on a melting ice float instead of safely giving money to a group that sends me a stuffed toy version for my donation. Writing that check and putting it in the mail is actually how I numb my real feelings about what is happening to the earth and other species. ìLet those activists do it. I canít.î I did my piece, they are doing good work. Everything will be okay.

I have been thinking a lot lately about how and where I spend my time working for change. There are an endless number of important causes to fight for, including environmental justice. What I do know is this. Denial, numbing and running from my pain does not serve me. It keeps me stuck in fear of loss and creates an unspoken hopelessness. So what am I to do?

Relying on the wisdom I receive from my faith, my counselor and my deepest, wisest self, I believe the first step is finally, actually feeling my suppressed pain and fear. No spiritual bypasses. Breathing deep. Starting now. �

Fear Today I am living as a man, I am afraid and I am not running away. Fear moves me like a wave and I drift in its foaming. Fear rises in me, a silent spring, until I flood with breaking. It fits me, a skin of bruises. It is an ember at the base of my brain, a loaf of darkness in my stomach. But today I am living as a man. I am afraid and I am not running away. There is no place to hide from fear. You can only turn toward it, as toward pursuing footsteps in an alley of night, and say to it as strongly as you can, ìHello friend! What gift do you have for me?î Then fear will not kill you with its long blood knife, but will kiss you roughly and with fire. You will not be consumed and you will learn. And all who know fear will be sister and brother.

ó Warren Campbell-Gaston

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photo by Barbara G. Howell

Square Won A short story by Bob French

A ripple of unease caused Mike Shields to rake his eyes across Public Square: the grandly named Stouffer Tower City Plaza Hotel, tight knots of people sharing scraps of bus-shelter shade, a couple leaving the monument, the towering pink marble bulk of the BP America building.

Waves of August heat shimmered off the hood of his un-air conditioned jalopy, as the tall red-headed homicide detective waited for the blasted light on the south edge of the square. Heat-drugged pedestrians ambled along dazedly, inadvertently exposing purses and wallets. Pickpocket heaven. But he couldnít spot any deft hands or familiar faces.

In the few minutes heíd stolen for lunch, Shields ill-advisedly wolfed down the ìCleveland Indians,î as the venerable Alvies Deli labeled its

beef tongue-Swiss sandwich. His stomach, never happy in the fast lane, was rebelling, as usual. If he could, heíd arrest it, he thought irritably. A fervent Cleveland history buff, Shields enjoyed the deliís unabashed boosterism. That the chow was also honest, fresh, inexpensiveóand served in a hurryówas as reflective of the town as the décor.

He squinted at the Soldiersí and Sailorsí Monument. The bronze heroes, almost Centenarians now, appeared to move, as fleeting shadows rippled across their sun-patinaed muscles. Ahead, the age-blackened mismatched towers of Old Stone Church, smudged by heat haze, appeared illusory, too, like a period stage set.

Cleveland was a hotbed of illusions, Shields thought.

He admired the gutsy reality and diversity of

15

the city heíd called home most of his 34 years. But his choice of career never let him forget its soft underbelly. Sometimes he despaired for the future. Summerís heat always prompted minor violence, and as each new super tower rose on the periphery of the square, the heat factor increased.

Still searching, Shields frowned at the earsplitting ìyakata-yakata-yakataî of jackhammers that spelled the birth of yet another developerís dream. He faintly disapproved of all this change.

Conservative that he was, Shields admired the solidity, character and infinite detail of the squareís centerpiece Civil War monument. It was a Vietnam Memorial of its era. He was always surprised, after each of his ìDiscover Clevelandî talks, to meet people who had never really looked at it, nor set foot inside. The outside statuary groups, of wounded and dying warriors, however glorious they might have been intended to be, today emphasized warís hellishness. Inside, rainbows of light bathed marble walls bearing the names of the countyís 10,000 Union volunteers, and tableaus of bronze generals, governors, President Lincoln and supporting casts.

As a child, Shields had been so enchanted with the monument that he memorized all the lovely sounding, if incomprehensible, words of Henry Ward Beecher, engraved above one tableau. He still remembered snatches: ìOh, tell me not that they are deadÖ that airy army of invisible heroesÖ Are they dead that yet act? Öthat yet move upon societyÖ?î

The light finally changed. Passing the center of the square, Shields was swept by such a sense of menace that he instinctively gunned the motor. About two blocks later, he glanced in his rearview mirror to see people running into the squareís central intersection.

He wheeled left and circled back. He jumped out of the car, pushed through the now wide-awake crowd, looked down, and called the dispatcher.

The twisted body of a man lay diagonally across the intersection. Blood from a large puncture wound above the right ear dripped on the pavement. The man was tanned, medium height and weight, probably about fifty. He wore a conservative summer weight gray suit, white shirt, red and gray striped tie. A briefcase had tumbled from his out-flung right hand. Shields knelt by the body, lifted the head gently, noted the exit wound through the lower left jaw. Medical aid would be

superfluous. Intuition inherited from his Irish motherówhat

Shieldsí buddies respectfully called ìMikeís early warning systemîóhad been right again. But it had only urged self-protection. Disgusted at his failure to stop, and perhaps avert this tragedy, Shields vowed to see this case through to the bitter end.

Three other squad cars careened into the square and parked to block traffic. The men hurried to move the crowd back.

Sweat running down Shieldsí back was cold now. Had he driven right by the killer? Was somebody right now sighting down a gun barrel from several stories up? Please, God, no. One homicide in Public Square was more than enough.

The victim and scientific investigation unit were about to present a drama that few people see. This time, the actors would play to a full house. The Plain Dealer would front-page it. City Hall would demand an instant solution.

Shields flipped open his notebook and began to sketch. The wound was sickeningly large, though there were no powder marks. Still, the killer must have been very close to the victim. That eliminated the window theory. The impact might have spun the man around. No telling where the shot might have come from.

A yellow EMS ambulance screamed up. Medics jumped out, verified there was no need to hurry to St. Vincent Charity Hospital. The police photographer worked fast while the rest of the investigating team waited. A young Plain Dealer photographer snapped a more discreet shot, was quickly joined by the Channel 5 Mini-cam crew.

A slight gray-haired man, carrying a May Co. shopping bag, said he thought a motorcycle zoomed past the man just before he fell, but he hadnít been facing that direction and it all happened so fast. Others had simply assumed a heart attack.

ìGreat,î thought Shields. A drug execution from a bike in the middle of the square.

The man didnít look the type, but a lot more informationóa name, for startersówould be needed before making any assumptions. Medics lifted the body into the ambulance for its trip to the hospital for a death certificate, then the morgue.

Shields began searching for the bullet, near where the body had fallen. Maybe a careless

Continued on page 16

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Square Won, continued foot had sent it rolling. He asked for help. Searching the intersection and adjoining sidewalks inch by inch turned up nothing. At last, puzzled and exasperated, he gave up. There had to be a bullet.

Reporters closed in. Shields knew nothing yet. ìYou could say weíd welcome any information that anyone remembers later. Hereís the number.î

At the morgue, Shields waited until the clothed body had been weighed and pocket and briefcase contents inventoried. The victim appeared to be William Herrin, of Knoxville, Tennessee, in town for a computer conference at the Stouffer hotel. The wallet contained a logical amount of cash and travelersí checks, and rafts of membership cards for such upstanding organizations as the Wilderness Society and Civil War Round Table.

Shields jotted down the victimís apparent home address and phone number, arranged for a shocked fellow conferee to confirm identity, and headed to the Justice Center.

He always felt like Jonah when he entered the cavernous concrete-gray lobby, little relieved by its sprinkling of contemporary art. He assumed the powerless probably abandoned all hope right here, so he tried to treat every soul who came his way with as much humanity as he could muster.

He grabbed a cup of coffee, settled at his desk, glanced out the window, and began his report. About 30 minutes later, he got a positive ID from the coroner and called the Knoxville police to notify the widow.

The coronerís report next day didnít help. Neither did the widow, who went into shock when questioned gently by police. Later that day, though, Shields got a call from Susan Stark, a long-time friend from the old Parma neighborhood. Now she was a striking blond divorcee, holding at 39, and always on the lookout for a little action.

Just two nights ago, there wasnít any, so she had supper with a friend at Pat Joyceís and later met Herrin at a bar. Heíd talked about himself, nothing earthshaking, but from what sheíd read, Shields was desperate for information, so sheíd share her impressions. Sheíd meet him at the Rascal House because she needed a break from arranging schedules at Cleveland State University.

Glad to escape the phone, Shields bussed to the college hangout. He picked up two Michelobís and a plate of Buffalo wings and headed for the back room. Stark made her entrance in a swirl of white

eyelet and gratefully accepted the beer. ìYouíd have enjoyed Herrin,î said Stark. ìAfter

he mentioned his wife, kids, and grandchild, he talked about fighting the rape of the Smokies by Big Lumber. Then he said the old Soldiers and Sailors Monument really knocked him out. His great, great grandfather was in the Civil War, so heíd always taken an interest in it. He belonged to some club where they talk over every little detail of what happened.

ìBut he said until he saw those names, heíd never felt that the Civil War was as real as Viet Nam. And it gave him a look at the other side. He said heíd re-read a letter his ancestor wrote during the war from a whole new perspective. He said thatís what heíd remember about Cleveland,î said Stark.

He seemed very nice, she said, and even just meeting him briefly, sheíd felt bad when she read what happened. It must have been a case of mistaken identity or an accident, she suggested. No, he hadnít mentioned coke or private anxieties or far-out ideas.

Well, thought Shields, you never know what

photo by Barbara G. Howell

17

detail might prove to be significant. Outside, Shields glanced left and sighted the

lumbering red box-on-wheels that was Lolly the Trolley, stopped for a light. The driver was a slim young woman with loose-swinging blunt-cut hair, wearing a striking red and white slacks outfit and enormous shades. Jeanette Davis was extolling the cityís virtues to an apparently absorbed group of casually dressed visitors. Shields was sure sheíd let him pull a little impromptu security duty, so he could take the scenic route back to the officeóand think.

He dashed across the side street, rapped on the door. Davis jerked her head around, opened the door. ìGoiní my way?î asked Shields.

ìOh Mike, you know I could get canned,î she said.

ìWho could object to a personal police escort,î asked Shields, with his most ingratiating grin, knowing she wouldnít turn him down.

ìJust sit down and be quiet.î As Davis invited her passengers to imagine

now-urbanized Millionaires Row as it had once been, Shields thought back to the night theyíd met, literally thrown together at one of the more

raucous street fests in the Flats. Theyíd quickly sized up one another and left the noisy, over-crowded, boozy affair for an outdoor concert sheíd heard about. Theyíd since learned they had a lot in common.

She was pointing out one of the few remaining gemsógothic Trinity Cathedral. Charles Schweinfurth designed it with complete disregard for the congregationís budget, but steamship magnate Samuel Mather grandly forked over the $1 million difference.

Shields had heard it all before, but still marveled at the knowledge and wit displayed in the seemingly effortless patter. He knew it was carefully researched, written and memorized word for word.

Lolly rolled past University Club, an elegant dowager in a borderline neighborhood, paused in front of the Episcopal Church. Davis launched into the story of Mrs. Jeptha Wade, who had lived across the street. Her ears were so sensitive that they hurt when the church bells rang, so her husband paid the church $1,000 to refrain from ringing the bells while she was alive.

Continued on page 18

photo by Barbara G. Howell

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Square Won, continued Davis gave several vigorous tugs on the bell

cord, with resultant clangs. ìExcuse me, Mrs. Wade. Please donít break the rope this time!î intoned Davis.

Shields was unaccountably startled. ìHas that happened?î

ìYes, more than once,î said Davis. Shields felt another cold chill down his spine.

He had the odd sensation that someone was trying to tell him something. But what? He didnít hear another word during the tour.

A week after Herrin pitched forward at 2:10 p.m. in the middle of Public Square, Shields settled down to review what he knew about the baffling murder. Pressure to solve the case had given him permanent indigestion.

The still-missing bullet had had a helluva large hole, at an odd downward angle that ruled out a biker. No one could even pinpoint a gun type with bullets the required size. The coronerís best ballistics expert wondered if it might have been a collectorís custom job. And still no witnesses.

Herrin was 45, married, with two children. He made about $100,000 a year custom-designing automatic bank teller machines. The coroner reported heíd been in good health, with no evidence of substance abuse.

Knoxville reported heíd been a strong family man and natural leader, with interests as varied as rescuing national forests and promoting Tennessee history. Just an upright John Q. Public going about his business.

Lacking any leads, Shields wanted to know more about the man. He had an odd hunch heíd find a clue in Knoxville. Heíd always wanted to drive along the Blue Ridge Parkway and he had a little time coming. He checked the map. It was a straight shot down I-77 to the Parkway. And it should be restful and scenic.

Shields called Herrinís wife Jessica. She agreed to see him if he came. Then he called Channel 5 to ask that the murder be mentioned on Crime-Stoppers.

A day later, he was winding along the Parkway. It was NOT restful. Curves were incessant, dropoffs phobic. His ë81 Fairmont exhibited an occasional alarming looseness.

However, frequent turnouts and such spectacular observation areas as Clingmanís Dome offered tantalizing vistasóquilt-like farmlands, mist-enshrouded hills-on-hills, old log farmsteads,

quaint cemeteries. He shot lots of film. And thought a lot about Bill Herrin.

The man had seen these same views and been appalled at the potential effects of over-logging and development. Heíd supported strong measures to halt those activities. Had he offended someone powerful and greedy?

Shields finally headed northwest to Knoxville. He stopped and called Jessica for directions to her house. It was sheltered by oak treesóa big, white-painted welcoming place with a wide porch on two sides, Victorian gingerbread, a turret, and tall-lace-curtained windows. It seemed to have escaped the cycle of decline and recent gentrification that had obviously beset the rest of the street. Multi-colored paint jobs bespoke renovation on many houses, but a few were still derelict.

Shields stepped up to the wide front door and twisted the key-shaped brass handle in its center. A bell echoed in the house.

Mrs. Herrin opened the door. Intelligent, grief-smudged gray eyes assessed him. She was slender, with carefully styled short blond hair, high cheekbones and a pleasant mouth. She was girded for this meeting in an expensive, softly draped silvery-blue dress, matching shoes and a fresh manicure.

Shields felt definitely underdressed in brown slacks and pullover and beige open-necked shirt. But heíd wanted it to seem unofficial, and concerned.

She led him to a living room furnished with antiques, china figurines and fresh dahlias. He sat carefully on satin-striped upholstery, rubbed a hand over the chairís polished cherry arm. He explained he just wanted to know more about Bill Herrin.

ìWell, he refinished that chair youíre sitting on, and did it, as he did most things, very well. But you probably want basics.î

Bill grew up in Knoxville, stayed there to attend the University of Tennessee, where he met Jessica. He picked the family career even though his father had sold, for a good price, the bank his grandfather founded. Heís always enjoyed the outdoors and became active in environmental groups when he saw wanton destruction occurring in the wilderness.

His whole family had shared a passion for the Civil War, because an ancestor fought in it. Vacations often revolved around battle sites. When Bill inherited this house, which his grandfather

19

built, and decided to keep it, he plunged into learning historical restoration techniques too. The house and furnishings needed massive repairs.

He was treasurer of his church, ex-president of the Rotary ClubÖ No, he was not a radical environmentalist; he supported legal action.

Mrs. Herrin went to the kitchen for refreshments. Shields wandered over to examine a small metallic photo in a silver frame. It resembled Bill Herrin wearing a Confederate Army cap. Mrs. Herrin returned with a tray holding iced tea, lemon wedges, fresh mint and fragile sugar cookies.

ìThatís Billís great, great grandfather. He was Bill Herrin, too. He fought in the Civil War, as you can guess. Bill was named after him.î

She turned the conversation back to Herrin. ìJust before Bill went on this trip, he had a

premonition that he shouldnít go. He didnít like to travel. But he had to, of course. His father and grandfather refused to travel. They both considered it unpleasant and unsafe and I guess their attitudes rubbed off.

ìBut Bill blamed his stronger reluctance this time on reading too much about recent plane crashes. He said he must be getting superstitious with age.î

That was a common feeling these days, said Shields.

Privately, he reflected that Herrinís intuition must have been as good as his own. His refusal to pay attention to it had cost the world a valuable citizen.

Intuition. Shields had a sudden overwhelming urge to see the letter Herrin had mentioned to Stark. Why, he didnít know.

ìWhile he was in Cleveland, your husband mentioned a letter written by his great, great grandfather. He indicated it had an Ohio connection. Iím interested in the Civil War, too. If it wouldnít be imposing, could I read that letter?î

Mrs. Herrin said the letter was in the attic, in a trunk with other war mementoes of the first William.

ìBill knew he should send those things to a museum, but he couldnít bear to part with them. I suppose now Iíll let the children make that decision.î

She led Shields up a curving stairway, past neat bedrooms, to a tidy attic. A small, scruffy, leather-covered, brass-bound trunk reposed in one corner. She unbuckled the fastenings, lifted the lid, and gingerly removed a faded cap and aged canteen. The she lifted out a scrapbook and handed it to Shields.

ìThe letters are very fragile now, of course, so Bill encased them in archival plastic pages. The ink is faded, but you can get the general idea.î

Settled in the living room again, Shields began to read the words of William Herrin, Thirty-Second Tennessee Infantry Regiment, beginning in 1862: ìWe get mail about once a week. No men ever hungered more for letters. Itís a joy to hear from you, to hear about work on the farm, to receive your good advice.î

Shields wondered if the letters could have any bearing on current historic preservation efforts, but couldnít see any connection.

William wrote carefully, obviously not wanting to alarm his young wife or parents, but even his simplest details told more than he probably intended. Often the men had little sleep and their clothes were wet for days. They spent hours pulling wagons out of mud, slogging through it, subsisting on cured pork, hardtack and coffee. Fresh meat, roasted over a fire, was a luxury. William skirted the idea that he might have had a close call or two.

But in the third letter from the bottom, dated May 14, 1986, the tone changed to one of urgency. As Shields began to read, that familiar shiver chased down his spine. He took out his notebook and began to copy the letter, word for word. �

To be continued in our next issueÖ

As Shields began to read, that familiar shiver chased down his spine. He took out his notebook and began to

copy the letter, word for word.

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No One Escapes Hell By Chuck Homer

I was maybe five or six, maybe younger, when I first heard that I was destined to burn in Hell.

I was just a little boy, damn it. Talk about being traumatized! That's quite a load to dump on a little boy and hell had already been painted for me in detail by Mother, Motherís church and her holy-roller friends. In my child's mind, Hell was a choking, burning, horrible nightmare of a place where our loving God sent people thought unworthy and evil, to be abandoned (didnít take much to become evil) and left to burn in agony forever, mind you, forever! Think of itó20 years of being despicable earns more than a million-billion-trillion years of agony. Hmmm some ratio ósomewhere between a quadrillion and a quintillion years to one. Hey Godóthose are pretty lousy odds andÖ ahÖ not very ëLOVINGí! HELL-O!! Are you listening? Hell-o?

A five year old doesn't understand God, let alone the concept of hell. All we knew then was the terror associated with the condemnation, burning, and abandonment. Oh, my! For mother to be able to describe it in such colorfully vivid detail, Hell had to be a place she knew quite well. And she knew all the words (later discovered to be the same as those delivered by 'men of the cloth,' as some called them) like original sin, agony, damnation, eternity, gnashing, writhing, screaming, suffering, crucified, body, blood, blood-of-Christ, and so forthóan interesting vocabulary for a religion that claims love and peace, donít you think? Talk about macabre. Grownups were invited to drink blood and eat body parts. Animals! Anyhow, she certainly talked about hell enough. Motherís high-pitched, scouring, demanding, blood-

dripping and accusing voice was, I'm sure, designed to strike fear in me and shake me right down to my bones. It worked quite well and she'd have me in tears in no time. There are times when I think Iím still living in the tears of that time.

Ma loved drama, and I was a little kid and gullible enough to believe her. Face it, who else was there for me to believe in? For example, how many times did she die? HmmmÖ She would come down with a cold or something and walk around the house moaning and groaning. Then she'd go sit on the toilet and cry out to me to get her a cold washcloth. "I think I'm dying," she'd cry as I'd wipe her forehead, holding my breath to avoidóyou know wható it smelled bad! Then I'd go into the living-room and wait for her to die! I was terrified at first, my little naïve mind rolling over and over on what I should do nextóHELL! What if she does fall off the toilet? How does a little guy of forty five pounds roll someone that fat over on her side so she doesnít strangle in her own vomit?

Then I got used to her dying spells. It took a few more years of growing up for me to get wise to her bullshit and an equal amount of time to realize the glaring contradiction between her "loving Godî and the gnashing-screaming-suffering, et cetera that I heard from her and from the pulpit of her Baptist church. There are still unbelievably evil men preaching that crap in today's churches and plenty of gullible folks lapping it up. By the wayó mother didnít die; not from that; not until she was eighty-six and not from her imaginary diseases. A plain old stroke took her down with her scratching and clawing all the way (to hell?)

Hell? I was living it! �?

A five year old doesn't understand God, let alone the concept of hell.

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What I Am I awaken with a jolt, cold slab against my back, my limbs twitching, stitched together from unwanted parts, but no one is here to celebrate how alive I am. Instead I am buried in silence, a cruel way to experience birth. The night is a cloak I wear to protect me from the harsh light of staring eyes I imagine are waiting in the shadows. I am clumsy. The world breaks around me into piercing screams, and the shards cut into my flesh, scarring my already wounded skin. The noises coming from my own mouth donít match the thoughts throwing sparks in my feverish brain. The moon rises above. I imagine she is my mother, trapped in blackness, and the stars are her tears. Even they cannot reach me. I have left the screams long ago. I find myself walking. The moon grows small as the night expands in all directions. It is no longer a cloak. I am naked and lost. Soon I come upon a stream. Its icy sweetness revives my hope until I catch a glimpse of my faceó I run screaming into the night, trying to escape the terror of who I really am.

ó Keira Dodd

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Falling By Wendlyn Alter

ìWe thought you had polio," he says, "when you were three years old."

I know this story. My mother would tell me how the white-robed nuns at the Catholic hospital loved to hold me on their laps and brush my long golden hair, like a little doll. I was in for observation for a couple of weeks. What a scare you gave me, she'd say. But luckily I didn't have polio after all.

Grown up and sitting here with my father, it occurs to me for the first time to ask, "What made you think I had polio?"

"You were acting funny. But it turned out it wasn't polio, it was the fall."

He knows my mother never told me this part... and why. He's telling me now. There was a family picnic, he explains. Everyone was there, the aunts and uncles and my Grandma Nannie.

"You were standing on the picnic table, and..." He pauses. Averts his eyes, guilty of tattling. "Someone... said, 'Come here, Wendy,' and they

held out their arms. And just when you stepped off the edge of the table, somebody called their name, and they turned around.

"You stepped right off the edge into empty space." Agog, seeing it again in his mind's eye. "Right into empty space. You fell on your head. Onto concrete. Knocked yourself out cold. You were out for a few minutes."

I gape wordlessly, stunned. "So a few weeks later you were acting funny.

We thought you had polio. You had to go into the hospital." Now we're back on familiar ground. But again the story takes a new turn.

"You had to have a spinal tap. You were wide awake for it, and you were scared to death. You were just screaming. Well, you were three years old! And the doctor didn't appreciate it one bit. He said, 'Somebody shut that kid up!' And he smacked you right across the face."

"He did what?" "He smacked you. We saw it through the glass.

I was so mad, I was ready to barge right in there and punch the daylights out of him. Your mother had to hold me back. She said I couldn't go in

there because it was sterile. She convinced me to take her home so she could put on her nurse's uniform, and then she could go in. Of course by the time we got back, it was all over.

"She knew it would be, she was just trying to get me out of there. They found blood in your spinal fluid, from the fall."

Well, that explains the falling dreams. And the big lump I had on my forehead for much of my life. And the reason why, when I feel stressed, I start accidentally bumping my head on doors, on furniture, again and again. And why I can't seem to remember things. But something in me was remembering.

We're crammed inside a tiny plane, hunching

with the awkward weight of our parachutes. There's not much conversation; for one thing, the engine noise is too loud. Occasionally someone attempts a joke and the rest of us laugh with subdued hysteria. None of us has ever leaped out of an airplane before.

To make matters worse, each of us was forced to pack our own chuteóthe old, round military type, better for beginners, we were told. Packing the chute is an elaborate process of pleating and folding that has to be done precisely right, or you risk a malfunction. Should that happen, you must assess the situation, pull the cut-away cord, wait in free fall until you're sure you're clear of the fouled parachute, then pull the ripcord to open the emer-gency chute. It's small, so you'll fall much faster and with less control, risking a bad landing. You

23

may be broken, but you'll probably live. Someone with more experienceóweíre hopingóhas packed our reserve chutes.

It's patently obvious to me, riding up in the plane, that I stand no chance of rationally stepping through that procedure. The beginner's first four jumps are static line, meaning a cord attached to the plane yanks open the parachute for you once you've fallen a safe distance so that the chute won't become entangled with the plane. I'm fervently grateful for that static line. I'm sure I wouldn't have the presence of mind even to open the main chute myself. If I've packed my parachute badly, well, I'll die, that's all. An acquaintance of mine on her fourth jump experienced a Mae West,

where the chute has a single twist, giving it the shape of a monstrous brassiere. The instructor had told us we could choose to ride a Mae West down ó it wouldn't be too much worse than the reserve chute. But this woman coolly made the choice to cut away and pull the reserveóon her fourth jump. She looms legendary in my mind.

But that was her, not me. I'd die, that's all. This was during my NASA years, when I was

angling to qualify as a Mission Specialist on the Space Shuttle. Flying weightless missions on the KC-135 would give my resume a nice boost. I was a research engineer on a team investigating low gravity casting of nickel-based superalloys. NASA's KC-135 low gravity simulation aircraft provides weightlessness in 30-second bursts as it quickly goes from a steep climb into a steep diveóthink of the way you rise up off your seat as a roller coaster begins its plunge. Diving at a 45 degree angle, the aircraft loses 9000 feet of altitude in half a minute. As it tips over the top and starts its dive, you and everything else not strapped or bolted down rise up off the floor in free fall, which is essentially what weightlessness is. The process is computer-controlled to provide just the right speed and angle to keep you from bouncing off the ceiling. As the Gulf of Mexico rushes up to meet the plane, it pulls up sharply and you hit the floor, plastered flat to the mat at nearly twice normal gravity until the plane achieves altitude and begins its plunge once more. The KC-135 does this 30 times in a row. You try to ignore your stomach while you feverishly work your equipment. Fortunately, there are no windows, so you donít see that you're really falling out of the sky.

Needless to say, performing this flight pattern day after day puts tremendous strain on the aircraft. Since my metallic materials group also performed failure analysis for the Space Shuttle (at

Continued on page 24

Everything tells me that I am about to make a wrong decision, but

making mistakes is just part of life. What does the world want of me?

Does it want me to take no risks, to go back to where I came from

because I didn’t have the courage to say ‘yes’ to life?

ó Paulo Coelo, in Eleven Minutes

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Falling, continued least one component failed, or nearly failed, on every Shuttle Flight), no one knew better than I all the many, many ways the KC-135 could break.

Thus to be allowed to do research on board, we had to go through a rigorous training in which we practiced using an ejection seat mounted on a rail to feel the acceleration, sat inside a sealed chamber while all the oxygen was pumped out so we could learn to recognize the symptoms of oxygen deprivation, and underwent a variety of other interesting experiences and classroom lectures. We practiced strapping on a military parachute in case we had to make an emergency exit. They showed us what to pull to open the chute and explained the proper sequence of events. But that was one skill we didn't actually practice. A colleague told me it was because we weren't expected to survive in any case. There'd be no time to put on a parachute if the plane broke up.

But ifóas I hopedóhe was wrong, I was uneasy with the idea of negotiating my first parachute jump during emergency conditions. It made sense to get a little experience first. Hence I'd signed up for a beginner's parachuting class at a skydiving school. On the ground, we learned about the parts of a parachute and how to wear and steer it; we jumped off a platform to practice our sideways roll on landing, quickly cutting loose the chute to keep from being dragged. We learned, by doing, how to pack a parachute. Now we're about to put our theoretical knowledge to the test.

Pulling the lever on a simulated ejection seat and being giddy from lack of oxygen had been great fun. But parachuting is... different. Hunched inside that tiny plane, climbing higher and higher, knowing I am very soon going to fall out of it, I'm in almost a blind terror. This is so unlike me. I've ridden a motorcycle. I've worked in a coal mine. There's almost no adventure I haven't been willing

to try. But jumping out of a plane is in a category of fear all its own.

Iím the last one to go. I canít make myself jump; the plane has to loop around for another pass and a second try. The instructor tells me, ìItís your decision. But if you donít jump now, you never will.î

The door is wide, the wind buffeting. I'm supposed to grab the strut and step out onto a tiny grate suspended under the wing. It's barely large enough for my two feet. I'm to pause there and wait for the go-ahead. Then, the instructor reminds me, I just let go and step backward. The static line will take care of me.

Blind terror. All mental thought at full stop. Very slowly, with repeated prompts, I lean out and take hold of the strut with the grip of rigor mortis. Very slowly, I step out onto the tiny grate. I look down. I freeze.

The instructor is growing impatient. The plane will soon be past the drop zone. ìNow step backward,î he calls to me, again and again. Still I cling, frozen in space, battered by wind, deafened by the roaring engine. I can't do it. I can't step off the edge into empty space.

But here I am. I will do this. With that tiny flicker of conscious thought, I

let go of the strut, twist around and throw myself forward.

The next seconds are lost to memory. I may even have passed out. All I know is that I plunged into hell.

Then with a sharp snap, the chute catches me and I am floating. I am alive. I'm going to live! Bliss wells up, a deep happiness. I have all the time in the world to look around, to appreciate how beautiful the earth is so far below, how clear and spacious the sky, how quiet and peaceful I feel, suspended safely in the midst of it all. Alive. �?

Ichabod Crane When I was young, the prospect of giving a speech in class reduced me to a stuttering fool. Upon graduating I entered nurse's training, only to find I did not possess the courage to complete the clinicals. I later entered respiratory therapy training with much the same result. In the course of my life, I often did not speak up or act when I should have. Courage was not my traveling companion. Imagine my surprise when, faced with the diagnosis of cancer, I turned and faced the headless horseman.

óGaylene Sloane

25

The Tale of Pandora

By Patty Heany-Pillow O blessed wind that howls beneath the light of the moon, O sacred flame that burns within every heart, Look upon this unworthy poet and give your gentle touch! For your voice, your light has burned a place upon my parchment, And to you I must beg the gift of eloquence: For the legend of your humble daughterís daughterís daughter Is nearing its end, and soon none shall recall it. Pray spirits, above and below, grant me That few last wisps of strength that must yet flow within me, So that the memory of the damned may not yet be forgotten! Now and ever long ago have gods ruled, Unchallenged and unbidden in their high homes above the clouds. Only one, Noble Prometheus, dared challenge The power of these ancient creatures, and oh! the torment he endures for our sake! But here, his daughter by right and by blood, Shall make thanks to his sacrifice by raising her voice to the heavens, And lowering her hand to the page. For even now, Base men of small minds seek to forget The words and deeds done on their behalf, And soon naught shall remain but the distant memory, shrouded in falsehood and fear. For it was the gods upon their high perch Who first created the race of common men, Destined to be servants and laborers given To toil which the gods themselves deemed worthy. All men and all women, all children and all grandchildren, All the creatures that thought and could make good things, Were set to work in the building of temples and statues, The offering of feasts and sweet waters unto the gods. None knew pain ñ but none could know joy. None knew hunger ñ but none could know satisfaction. And above all ñ none knew suffering, but none could know hope. For it was in the high house of the gods that Zeus, Son of Chronos and King of all Olympus, Saw that he had molded his men too well, Recognizing that their cleverness and wisdom could someday Change them into creatures far above what the Olympians, In all their majesty, could ever become. And so, to keep the lowly sons of Earth From achieving the greatest of heights, Zeus and his kin Gathered up the many sufferings that roamed freely oíer the world, And imprisoned them within a great vase Stoppered with a book of all knowledge. For the sufferings would force men to grow beyond their station, And knowledge would free them of labors the gods could wish of them. And Zeus made this vase his footstool by day, and his pillow by night,

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So that no thief could dare to steal it from him, And thus rise above the place Zeus had given for man. But Zeus, the great and powerful, had in his arrogance Forgotten his own sins, for it was not he, But ancient Chronos that stirred within the Well of Time. And the Elder Titan saw what his son had accomplished in his own way, And saw his chance to avenge himself upon his imprisoning son. With a whisper of will, Chronos rippled the workings of time and fortune, Chance and change, and in the slightest way Shifted the growth of two sons, yet unborn within their mother's womb. So in this way, Prometheus was granted great cleverness, And his brother Epimetheus rendered much foolishness. Thus, when the two were born, it became clear to Zeus And all the other Olympian Gods that the two were creatures Who must be dealt with in the manner of greatest care, For while the meddling of Chronos was clear in its works, None could yet see what end the ancient Cannibal Father Could hope to accomplish. And so Zeus, seeing rightly That Prometheus was the more dangerous of the two, Kept the boy as a poet in his court of the gods, And threw his brother to the Earth to live as a man within the villages. But Epimetheus grew weary of this life, for he could see No great good gifts in any of the men he saw. Thus did he lift up cries to be rid of the cursed life he found himself in. His lamentations reached Heaven, and were so piteous in their nature That each of the gods wept with sorrow, and begged mighty Zeus To grant Epimetheus some comforts as he toiled amidst the animal men. The mightiest of Kings first scoffed, but was soon softened by the weeping Of Aphrodite, whose tears are the sweetest of all things, And whose cries can soften any heart. And so Zeus granted to this, His loveliest daughter, the right to give any gift she chose to the outcast Epimetheus; and Aphrodite asked for him The best and most beautiful wife that had ever been known. Thus, Zeus bade famous Hephaestus to make haste And mix earth with water and to put in it the voice and strength of human kind, And fashion a sweet, lovely maiden-shape, in face like to the immortal goddesses. Zeus then commanded Athene to teach her needlework And the weaving of the varied web, And golden Aphrodite to shed grace upon her head and warmth to fill her heart. And the bright-eyed Pallas Athene girded and clothed her, Bedecking her form with all manners of finery, And the divine Graces and queenly Persuasion put necklaces of gold upon her, And the rich-haired Seasons crowned her head with spring flowers. Also the Guide, the Slayer of Argus put into her gentle speech and a sturdy mind, So that she could comfort her husband better upon the world of men. Thus, with the fair maid completed, Aphrodite's son, The mischievous Cupid, kindled within her

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A fire of love for the outcast Epimetheus That could only be sated when she was made his wife, And so she begged to leave the bright house of the gods To be with the man who had been promised to her as husband. So she traveled upon the wings of doves, And fell lightly into the arms of the one whom she would ever after love. But Prometheus, in his wanderings, saw that neither wife nor wealth Could satisfy the needs of his brother's heart, Nor the longings that ever plagued the souls of men. He knew that Epimetheus would always be Without the comforts that were his due, and that his wife, The All-Giving, would ever feel loss deep within her soul. And so he crafted a plot against mighty Zeus, Seducer and Lightening-Wielder, To aid both man and brother and to bring hope Where before there had been only toil. He waited until the mighty King was at his sport in hunting Upon the forests of the Earth, and there hailed him: ìGreatest King! Father of all that is Good and True in this World! Bearer of Lightening and Cunning! Pray hear your humble poet's little favor, That I might know Joy in my heart! A fair and comely wife has been made For my brother, and tonight he shall know his wedding night ñ but lo! He has naught but hard stone and animal skins to rest his head upon. Wouldst thou grant me the right to make a wedding gift Of one of the many pillows that so comfort The heads of the Gods upon mighty Olympus? For in your kindness and great generosity, You have seen fit to add but a little beauty into his world. Could I not but give him even the smallest comfort?î And Mighty Zeus, who had grown fond of his poet For his clever turn-of-phrase and mighty battle-language, Saw no great harm in giving this small gift. He called upon the Furies and Graces, and told them To let Prometheus pass by them into the world of men With any of the many pillows that graced the beds of the gods. Then he returned to his hunt, seeing that he was himself Most generous and kindly to his creatures, And thus deserving of his leisure. But Prometheus ñ clever one! - traveled into that high place Where the gods so make their home, And took not a bundle of silk and feathers, But the selfsame vase stopped with the book of knowledge, From which all the hope of man must come! With his burden he raced from the halls of the immortal gods, And sped with golden wings unto the village where his brother Was soon to make his wedding night. But within the Olympian Halls one god, Too lame to hunt with his kin, spied the treachery as it occurred And hastened to send a messenger to his father Zeus.

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He had hoped that this act would move the king of all the gods To restore him from his lameness, But instead witnessed only the wrath that the mighty Zeus Has so long been apt to set forth. The King of the Gods Screamed his fury at the message, and rode upon a storm cloud In chase of the good Prometheus, desperate to avert the act Which even then was taking place. For Prometheus had only just reached his brother's house, And held the jar to the creature of infinite beauty, Pandora the All-Giving, As the first of the storm clouds reached him. He had time to say only ìHope lies withinî before he was snatched away By the capricious hands of the storm. As he flew away, He tried desperately to separate the book-stopper from the jar, But pulled away from within the book of knowledge only a single parchment page, Which landed in Pandora's golden hair and was thus hidden. Before the couple then appeared dark Hades, lord of all the dead, Who told them this: ìYour brother Prometheus Saw the little Pandora as she was being made, and within him Grew the seeds of jealousy and lust. My brother, Mighty Lord of Olympus, Has only just taken him away before his foul treachery could befall you. His gift is a jar of poison, meant to rid the world Of all creatures who can think or feel, and so is too dangerous for this world. But as he has given it to you as a wedding present, Hospitality demands that it remain with you. So hear me, and keep it safe, For it will be the ruin of all if it is ever allowed to be opened!î Thus spoke and departed the Dark Lord of the Underworld, And in fear and respect for his mighty power the couple Sealed the jar deep beneath the hearth of their home, Not daring to tell any of their neighbors of the great tragedy That had befallen the family of Epimetheus. But in the morning, as Pandora took The many flowers and golden diadems from her lovely hair, She found mixed among them the scrap of parchment that had been torn From the book that stopped the vase. Upon this parchment was no writing, But a small picture of a woman making fire from sticks and bits of cloth. Pandora was much amazed, for she had never seen fire In any of the halls of men and thought it to be A toy the gods employed for their own use. But the picture was clearly that of a mortal woman, And so she imitated it in the company of her neighbors (Who were there to wish her well upon her first day as a bride), And all were delighted by the bright light and warmth that came from it. Yet Zeus, Tyrant of Man and Gods, could also see what Pandora had done, And so cursed all of the creatures of the world in such a way That any who touched fire would be horribly burned by it. Then he loudly spoke through every temple and statue upon the Earth, proclaiming,

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ìSee, men of the world! I have sought ever to give you comfort By ridding you of all cares, yet these creatures called women create fire, Which eats your crops and causes flesh to wither from searing pain!î Thus did he plant those first seeds of cruel thought against women, Who until then had ever been equals of men. Now many years had passed, and Pandora and Epimetheus Had celebrated the joyous arrival of Pyrrah, my own mother, In the quietude of their home (for still the ranks of all other men Knew not the craft of joy). Epimetheus frequently traveled beyond his home, Seeking out more vestiges of the Gods that he felt was his due. But Pandora, in her cleverness, had begun to perceive that the vase, Gifted to them by her brother-in-law, may not have been The evil that the gods would have her believe. For fire granted her sight and safety in the darkest hours, And turned their food and drink in to richer stuffs then ever they had known before. But still she was tempered by the warning of the Underworld God, And so cautious in her every thought and deed. But it was in her dreams that her brother-in-law, Still chained to the rock of his punishment, Whispered sweetly of the need to open the vase that waited beneath her hearth. And it was at last in her sleep, walking without knowing, That she went from her bed to the place where the gift lay hidden. She woke to find herself staring at the jar, still sealed, But free from its coffin of Earth. She looked upon it in wonder and fear, and at last realized That there was another picture upon the parchment that Stopped up the top of the vase. It was near, But just beyond the full reach of her sight. Carefully at first, and then with vigor Did she pull and pry at the book-stopper before, alas, The whole text sprang from the grip of the vase and into the air! This calamity was immediately followed by a roar of wings, As every trial and sorrow we know, besides many other we have yet to find, Flew from their prison, devouring the book of knowledge, And once more alighted into the world of mortal men. At once did Pandora feel the pang of loneliness for her lost husband, The fear of mothers for her child, the grip of hunger in her belly. She was the first to know the sufferings she released, And the first to perceive that all the gods had warned her Against the very act she had then committed. Her husband Epimetheus then burst through their door, And saw his wife upon the hearth with the vase that Had been their wedding gift in her hands. He flew into a great rage, but tripped upon the door frame Before he could reach his wife. In his clumsiness, She had time to flee from him and travel deep into the world. For years Pandora wandered, cold and weary, Hated by the gods and despising herself for the agonies she had inflicted.

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She carried the vase beneath her bosom, Hoping to once more ensnare the sufferings she had loosed upon the world. But Zeus had long ago destroyed their voices, For their cries for freedom caused a great aching Within his head when he tried to sleep. Then at a great distance, Pandora found her brother-in-law Chained upon a great rock, and she cursed him, Saying: ìYou cruel beast! You serpent! O, that I had the wisdom To heed the warnings of the Dark Lord Of The Underworld! Now shall my daughter and all the creatures of this world know the poison That spreads even now from your treacherous gift!î Thus she spoke, but Prometheus, even in the great agony that he bore As the eagle tore his liver from his belly, could only smile in response. He told her then why the vase had been hidden, And why Zeus had been so cruel in his denouncement of her. He told her of the talents of the generations that were to come, And how the sufferings she even now bore were the ladder By which they could climb to even greater heights then Olympus. And she heard, and she understood. But the eagle that tormented Prometheus was no simple bird, And it, too, heard his words and went to his master Zeus To ask if they were true. And Zeus heard what Prometheus had said, and raged. He struck the beast, erasing its mind of the memory, And went to counsel with the other gods. ìHear me, Great Gods of Olympus! For the treacherous Prometheus Had told his sister in law, the All-Giving, of the promise of man. How can we stop her from spreading this news? For if man comes to understand what he truly is, And how great his race can become, we are finished!î And so the gods railed against this fate, and sought to find a way To destroy this hope that mankind had been given. At last it was decided that all the creatures of the world Would come to despise Pandora, And come to see her as a creature of infinite deceit. And so the Guide, the Slayer of Argus, contrived to go to the Earth And tell men that Pandora had been created as their punishment, And within her, lies and crafty words and a deceitful nature Had been made at the will of loud thundering Zeus, And that she was a plague to men who eat bread. Then the creatures of the world cried out, And begged to know how best they could make amends To the Gods of High Olympus to rid themselves of such a terrible creature. And the Guide, the Slayer of Argus, said unto them: ìYou, Who were the village and family of the dread creature Pandora. You who gave her comfort and food and every good thing. Cast her from your midst, cause her to become outlaw,

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And Mighty Zeus shall take all sufferings from you!î So Pandora arrived at her home to find herself cast out, Pelted with small stones and cursed by those creatures Who had pledged love and friendship to her. And her own husband, whom the gods had obliged her to love, Spat upon her face and forced her from his house. Only her daughter wept, For she was like her mother in that she was kind of heart And slow to form hatred to any creature. And the men of the village saw that she wept, And cast her out with her father and mother, For they deemed him equally guilty of his wife's offense. And when that was done great Zeus kept his promise, And the village was rid of all troubles. They were given Sacred lotus flowers to eat, and lost all remembrances Of time and sorrow, and dwelt forever outside of such things In a haze of forgetfulness. Pyrrah, though, sought out her mother, whom she found weeping In a glade for the cruel treatment by her foolish husband. She learned the truth of the acts that had occurred, And came to know the good things that Prometheus had done For all the creatures of the Earth. She begged her mother to go with her To the house of Prometheus that he had kept on Earth, But her mother refused, saying: ìAll my life, I have always known That I am for your beloved father Epimetheus. I must be with him, Even if he despises me: for I can know no other reason for my living. Go, my daughter. Marry the son of the one who brought us hope, And remember that all sorrows are only the vehicle by which We may someday ascend to the greatest of heights.î Hear me o wind! Hear me o moon! For this unlovely and stumbling poet still bears the blood Of those women who would defy the gods themselves! I beg you carry this tale to each corner of the earth. I beg you whisper it in the ears of every story-teller. I beg you remember it in your long journeys through the night; So that man may yet learn how hardship is never the curse it appears!

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Facing Fear through Social Justice By Barbara G. Howell

While institutions of religion and spirituality can address the fear of things we cannot controló illness, death and sufferingó it is the task of people to tackle the fear of things we can control like oppressive government actions and unfair economic conditions. One way we tackle those fears is to work to eliminate the things and circumstances that create them.

William F. Schultz, current Unitarian Universalist Service Committee Chair and director of Amnesty International for ten years, charges us to ìsupport the processes of possibilityî as we consider facing our fears in a larger, global context.

The fears Schultz has seen, some of which are discussed in his recent book What Torture Taught Me, are impossible for most of us to fathom. Schultz, according to the Huffington Post, has traveled from ìrefugee camps of Darfur, Sudan, to the poorest villages in India; from the prison cells of Monrovia, Liberia, to the business suites of Hong Kong to Louisianaís death row.î He has seen starvation, torture, squalor, hopelessness and, of course, deep fear.

In a conversation in early October, Schulz defined fear as an ìutterly debilitating emotion and experience. Fear is one way to define what civil and human rights are all about,î he continues. ìThese rights are designed to expand the circle of

Continued on page 28

Unexploded ordinance—

unexploded bombs—from

the Vietnam War still kill

hundreds and maim

thousands in South East Asia

each year, necessitating

organizations like COPE in

Vientiane, Laos, where free

prosthetics and life skills

training await those

accidentally injured by UXO

from a war that ended

almost 40 years ago. Fear

from war seldom ends when

the conflict "stops."

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safety, the boundaries in which we all live, without the threat of political oppression, physical danger, without the constant fear of impoverishment of us and our children.î Schultz speaks of the fears he has seen in his global fight for human rights. ìThe immediacy of execution or torture for you or your loved ones or that your ethnic or religious community will not survive beyond your generation. Fear collapses and restricts our possibilities as human beings to flourish. Defeating fear is necessary for human rights.î

Lest we think those fears, ìover there,î are not our concern, Schultz points out that fear is dangerous, that people who have fear react violently, at times endangering thousands or millions of others. He lists American oppression, economic injustice and the death penalty. The consequences of these violations, Schultz warns, is rage.

ìThe death penalty,î he suggests, ìis not about keeping people safe but about our fear that fills us with rage and desire for revenge.î Whether the rage is expressed through demonstrations and self-immolations in faraway countries where there is ethnic cleansing and famine or in the community next door where there is a fear-producing economic divide, Schultz cautions we must face those in fear. He quotes Eleanor Roosevelt.

ìWhere, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to homeóso close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the

factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.î

With this warning, Schultz also remarks that fear can be a positive force. ìFear can paralyze or mobilize. Fear can be a motivator for work for social justice, to motivate ourselves to get children out from their current conditions.

ìEven in Darfur and the Sudan, I was struck by how

entrepreneurial people can be when they fear that their children, their religious or ethnic communities or way of life may become extinct. When they try to build hope that their children will lead better lives. They band together to set up businesses, to set up shelters, to find sufficient food. It is the fear that drew people together to allow them to build community together.

Schulz urges us to come together around the work for social justice whether the needs be in our town or in our larger world. ìWe need to support the process of possibility thatís what social justice is all about. We can ameliorate conditions that create the reasons for the fears that we CAN control. We can help shape human history.î �

William F. Schulz is the President and CEO of UUSC, the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, a nonsectarian organization that advances human rights and social justice in the United States and around the world. Previously, he served for 12 years as executive director of Amnesty International USA, until spring of 2006. An ordained Unitarian Universalist minister, Schulz is a former president of the Unitarian Universalist Association.

Slow Motion News ÖFear comes in the ringing of that goddamn phone, the receptor of bad news and good, that red cordless, almost old fashioned piece of non-committal judgment, 3 a.mÖ 6 a.mÖ incessant ringingÖ

Groggily, Wanting,

with all the early dawn energy I can muster, to hurl it at the wall, let it lie in a heap, with the five broken alarm clocks, hoping beyond reasonable hope, that it will break as well

BEFORE the voice on the other end has a moment to be the bearer of any news.

Wondering, is it any more frightening, on the other end, hitting the talk button, staring blindly at the keypad, trying desperately to recall if this is the phone you have to dial "1" and what IS that area code? Ö it matters not the time you waste, staring at your contact list, to discover the needed number no longer there, THAT person you need to tell, momentarily out of reach, the pause of that state of limbo, where no one seems to know your news and only a phone connection keeps you from the frightening exposure, a world can inexplicably fracture, that glass shattering moment

BEFORE you hear, "Hello?" that heart sinkable moment, when you answer that question.

ó Barbara Walker