SafeSummer 2015Eula Biss on how a threat becomes a plagueAlternatives to policing in the Black Freedom MovementThe worlds rst allAsian American dance rock band wrangles with trademark lawOvid and the literature of rape$8editorKathleen HoltartdirectorJen WickassistanteditorsEloise HollandBen WaterhousecopyeditorAllison Dubinskycommunications/ publicationsinternJulia WithersOregonHumanities(ISSN2333-5513) is published trian-nually by OregonHumanities,921 SWWashington St., Suite150, Portland, Oregon97205.We welcome letters fromreaders. If youwouldlike tosubmit a letter for consider-ation, please sendit to theeditor at k.holt@oregon-humanities.org or to theaddress listedabove. Letters may be editedfor space or clarity.Oregon Humanities is providedfree to Oregonians.To joinour mailing list, emailo.hm@oregonhumanities.org, visit oregonhumanities.org/magazine, or call our ofce at (503) 241-0543 or (800) 735-0543.12Plague Fearsby eulabissInanongoing apocalypse, howdo we knowwhento panic?17Trademark Offense by simontamAnAsianAmericanmusiciangets into trouble for naming his bandthe Slants.21Civil Rights with Gunsby kristi anwilli amsAlternatives to policing duringthe Black FreedomMovementDepartments4Editors Note6Field WorkVanport Multimedia Project Grand Ronde museum and cultural center Humanityin Perspective mentors OHNewsThanks to our funders Talking about Dying11From the Director40PostsReaders write about Safe.44Read. Talk. Think.The Great Detective byZachDundasThe Life andLegendsof Calamity Jane byRichard W. EtulainSoundingRace in RapMusic byLorenKajikawa Belowthe Radar byAlisonL. GashWhat the DyingHaveTaught Me about LivingbyFred GreweFoundingGrammars byRosemarieOstlerTurtlefaceandBeyondbyArthur Bradford CrookedRiver byValerieGeary46CroppingsDaily Objects at the Arts Center in Corvallis3 Oregon Humanities 2 Summer 201525Group Therapyby dionisi amoralesCopping out at anuptownslumber party31This Is Not Just a Cloud by michaelhealdEmbracing grief inthewilderness36The Rim of the Wound by wendywillisAnopenletter to the students of Columbia Universitys Multicultural Affairs Advi-sory Board, witha special note to my daughterseditori aladvisory boardDebra GwartneyJulia HeydonGuy MaynardWin McCormackGreg NetzerCamela RaymondKate SageRich WandschneiderDave WeichMatt YurdanaOREGON STATE PENITENTIARYFeatures: SafeOregon Humanities 4 5 Summer 2015This issues cover is by Hye-Ryoung Min, a New Yorkbased photographer whose work was on display earlier this summer at News-pace Center for Photography in southeast Portland.If youre an artist and have work that we might consider for the Fall/ Winter 2015 issue, on the theme Move, wed love to know about it. Please familiarize yourself with our publication (back issues viewable online at oregonhumanities.org), then send us the following by October 12, 2015: A high-resolution digital image (300 dpi at 8 x 10; scans or photographs, JPEG or TIFF) Your name, the title of the work, the type of media, as well as contact information (email and phone number) Description of the relationship of the image to the themePlease consider the constraints of a magazine cover (e.g., vertical orientation, nameplate, and cover lines). We are most interested in works by Oregon-based artists.Submissions can be sent toart@oregonhumanities.org or by postto Oregon Humanities magazine,921 SW Washington St. Suite 150, Portland, OR 97205. Safely and BravelyTHI SSUMMER, MYDAUGHTERLEARNEDSELF-defense at a music camp for girls. At the weeklong camp,kids formbands, compose music, write songs, playmusic, makezines and T-shirts, and revel in girl power, but they also take a workshoponhowto physically protect themselves.Ifsomeonecomesuptoyouandgrabsyourthroat,mydaughter said, pretending to reach for me, you make your armreally straight and shove your ngers right here. She gestured tothe vulnerable hollowat the base of her neck. She showedmea couple of other techniques, eachdetailing howtoescape fromvarious attacks. Watching her move clumsily fromone pretend scenario to the next, I felt my heart break a little bit.Im a parent, so Im used to heartbreakthe tiny little s-sures that form with every step my children take toward adult-hood. But this one felt different because my perspective was suddenlydifferent:ratherthanseeingherasmovingawayfrom me toward some vague place, I clearly saw the place, theonefilledwithexternalthreatsofviolence,accidents,and earthquakes, and internal ones, like failure, disappointment,and despair.And whenI imagined my child inthis place, I felt newdoubt.Thelistofinstructionsonkeepinghersafehasbeen,sofar,pretty straightforward: wash your hands, wear your seat belt,wear your helmet, dont chase a ball into the street. But I knowthese warnings wont be enough. Ill soonhave toexplaintoher whysheis learningself-defense, whyshemust bealert whenshewalks through our neighborhood alone, why she must learn totrust her own instinctseven if she offends someone or seems unfriendlyabove all else.ButhowcanIteachherthatinprotectingherselfsheshouldnt isolate herself fromthe rest of the world? As our JulyThink&Drinkguest, writer EulaBiss, said, theideathat wecaneach create our own little societies in our homes is disturbing: What do we owe each other as citizens? This obligationthatwe move together toward good, generous, compassionate lives despite the myriadways we hurt eachother dailyis what I feel pressingonmeevenwhenmystrongesturgeistolockthewindows anddoors anddrawmylittlefamilycloseinaroundme.But again, doubt: canmy daughtercanany of us, reallylearnto live bothsafely andbravely inthe world?The essaysthat follow explore threatsof wordsandideas,fearandvulnerability, wayswe challenge one another, ways we protect one another. That many of these rise out of relation-shipsbetween parentsandchildren isnt surprising:Perhaps the last times we felt truly safe were in our childhood. Perhaps we instinctively conspire to preserve those timesandrecre-ate themwhen possible. Or perhaps we revisit themagain and again to test oldfrailties, draw new insights, andwieldnewtools for living in a precarious world. kathleenholt, Editork.holt@oregonhumanities.orgEditors NoteCover Art Ideas for Move7 Summer 2015 Oregon Humanities 6With Hope and StrengthVolunteers are workingto preserve memories of Vanport, Oregons lost city.THE1 9 4 8 VA NP ORTF L OODA ND Portlands response to the housing crisis itbroughtaboutdidmuchtoshapethecity.Today,adedicatedgroupofvolunteersareworking to document the experiences of thosewho livedinVanport andsurvivedthe ood.OnMay30, 1948, therailroaddikeonSmithLake,justnorthofPortland,wasbreached.Water from the Columbia River, swollen withHUMANITIES ACROSS OREGONField Workearly snowmelt, rushed in through the crack.Inits pathlayVanport, Oregons second-largestcityandthenationslargesthousingproject,built in just 110 days in 1942 to house the tens of thousands of new Oregonians who came toworkinPortlandswartimeshipyards.Thecitys18,000residents,manyofwhomwereblack,hadbeenassuredearlierthatdaythattherewasnoneedtoevacuate.Thecitywas completely destroyed.TheVanportMultimediaProjectwas startedin2011asaprogramoftheSkanner FoundationsNorthPortlandMultimedia Audience members at an over-capacity 2014 presentation of The Wake of Vanport at Oregon Historical Society7Want to keep up with the humanities in Oregon? Visit oregonhumanities.org to sign up for our monthly enewsletter Like us on Facebook Follow us on TwitterTraining Center. In2014, Laura Lo Forti cameonboardas project director, leading a series offree workshops inwhichvolunteers combined recordings of Vanport survivors stories witharchival photos and video to create short mul-timedia pieces.Theyre talking about the same event, butfromverydifferentperspectives,LoForti says. We edit [the interviews] with other lay-ers of storytelling, andthenwegobackandaskthe survivors if thats a good representation oftheir story.Theeditedstories,collectivelytitledTheWake of Vanport, were rst screenedlast fall toastanding-room-onlycrowdat Vancouver Ave-nue First Baptist Church. Subsequent screen-ings have beensimilarly packed.That was fantastic. It really made me feel goodtoseethatoutpouringofpeople,says Marge Moss, a Vanport survivor who contrib-uted her story to the project. Its importantthat people knowthe history. The people thatlivedthere,wewerehumanbeings,andwedidnt matter.ThescreeningsdrewinterestfrommanymorePortlanderseagertohavetheirexpe-riencesrecorded.Moreandmoreformer Vanportresidentsarecontactingusandsay-ing, What about me? I also have a story, LoForti says. And not just people fromthe blackcommunitythis is a story that touches manycommunities.Moss, who was born in Louisiana, says sheremembersVanport,whichhadintegrated schoolsbutsegregatedstreetsandmedical facilities, as a place of relative racial tolerance.Itwaslikecultureshockwhenwemoved there, she says. I had never associated withanyotherraces.InLouisianawewerenotallowedtolookat white people inthe face. Theexposure inVanport was very good.Startingthissummer,LoFortiispartner-ingwithlibraries, churches, schools, andsenior centersaroundPortlandtosetuprecordingbooths where volunteers will interviewformer Vanport residents inwhat she is calling a storyharvest. Her goal, she says, is to create better understanding across communities in this cityweall love.More screenings are upcoming, includingone on August 28 at Embassy Suites in down-town Portland and one as part of the VanportMosaicFestival,whichwillcommemoratethe sixty-eighth anniversary of the ood withworks of music, dance, theater, art, andlm.This is a story of community strength and resilience,LoFortisays.Weareacknowl-edging that Vanport was a community. Peoplecamewithhopestobuildafuture,escapingawfulrealities.Theycamewithhopeand strength.Itistheentireexperiencewearecelebrating.Tolearnmoreaboutupcomingevents relatedtotheVanport oral historyproject, visitvanportmosaic.org.BEN WATERHOUSEChachalu RisingGrandRonde museumandcultural centerdisplays history while lookingto the future.LASTYEAR, GRANDRONDEHOSTED aconferencecalledTerminatingtheTribes, Restoring the People, an event funded TIM LABARGEOur supporters makethis magazineand so much morepossible. Take a look at how much donors like you helped Oregon Humanities accomplish around the statein our 2014 Annual Report, now available onlineat oregonhumanities.org.INTISAR ABIOTOOregon Humanities 8 9 Summer 2015NEWCONVERSATIONPROJECT PROGRAMSOur201516ConversationProjectcatalogisnowavailable.Topics includehiphopinthePacificNorthwest,the role of privacy in our lives, and incomeinequality,amongmanyothers.Oregonnonprotsandcommunityorganizations can apply until September 30, 2015, to hostprograms this winter. Visit oregonhuman-ities.orgformoreinformationortonda conversationnear you.FINAL THINK&DRINKOF 2015Join us inPortlandonSeptember23at7:00p.m.attheAlbertaRoseTheatreforourfinal Think&Drinkof 2015, featuringGenevieveBell, a cultural anthropologist at Intel. Visitoregonhumanities.orgformoreinformationabout theevent andhowtopurchasetickets.NEWBOARDMEMBERSOr egonHumanitiesispleasedtoannouncetheaddition of two new members to the board of directors: Nels Johnsonis withtheThornRunPartnersOregonlegislativepracticeandtheMultnomahEducationServiceDis-trict, and Alberto Moreno is the executivedirector of theOregonLatinoHealthCoali-tion and chair of the Governors Commis-siononHispanic Affairs. Weseeknominees forourboardwhoareinterestedincon-nectingOregonianstoideasthatchangelivesandtransformcommunities.Find moreinformationatoregonhumanities.org/about-us/nomination-process2016PUBLICPROGRAMGRANTSOregonHumanities PublicProgramGrants arebetween$1,000and$10,000andareawardedtononprofitorganizationsinOregon to support programs that promotediverse perspectives and explore challeng-ing questions. The deadline is October 31,2015, for letters of interest, and guidelines are nowavailable at oregonhumanities.org.WE VE MOVED Our home for the lastsevenyears will soonbe turnedintoa hotel,sowevemovedourofficejustdownthestreettothePittockBlockindowntownPortland. Our newaddress is 921 SWWash-ingtonSt., Suite 150.Oregon Humanities News history, and interviews frommembers. Accord-ingtoCole, phasetwowill consist of interactiveexhibits,alanguagelabtoteachthereserva-tionlinguafranca, ChinukWawa, andspacefor revolving andpermanent exhibits.Chachalumeanstheplaceofburnttim-bers. It refers to the yearly controlled burns yielding new growth in the valley. For Grand Ronde,itsymbolizesthetribescontinued growthfromthe ashes of cultural destruction.AARON M.SMITHPairing UpMentor programprovides freshperspectives to bothstudents andvolunteers. DIONNEMA R KEYFI R S THE A R D about Humanity in Perspective (HIP) atapoetryworkshop. Afellowworkshopattendeehadgraduatedfromthefreecollege-level course for adults living on low incomes, spon-soredbyOregonHumanitiesinassociationwithBardCollege, Marylhurst University, and ReedCollege. Markey hadlivedinPortlandfor fiftyyears,andshewasmostlyretiredafter A display at the Chachalu Tribal Museum and Cultural Center in Grand Ronde features a carving of salmon returning to their birthplace to restart the circle of life.inpartbyagrantfromOregonHumanities.AccordingtoKathyCole, thecultural educationandoutreachprogrammanagerat GrandRonde,theconferencewasachancetosharewithtribal membersmanyof theexcitingdiscoveriesmadeinresearchingthecultureandhistoryofthetribes at GrandRondeandinwesternOregon.In 1954, the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, which consisted of more than twenty-seven different nations from western Oregon,southernWashington,andnorthernCalifor-nia,hadtheirfederaldesignationstripped whenCongresssignedtheWesternOregonIndian Termination Act. The various nations had been living on a reservation in the south-ernYamhill Valley since 1856. Inthat year, theUS military, in its continued effort to move all NativeAmericannationsinwesternOregonawayfromencroachingwhitepeople,com-pelledthenationstosignseventreatiesced-ing millions of acres to the United States andremovingthemtothereservation.Withthepassing of the 1954act, the seventreaties werenulliedandeachmember of GrandRondewas paid $35 for their share of the sold land. ManymembersdriftedawayfromGrandRonde,wheretheyhadbeenvirtuallyimprisoned,unable to come and go without permission, for nearly a century. The tribal cemetery was oneof the fewremaining links to the past.Stories, exhibits, and recordings about this history are nowhoused at the Chachalu Tribal MuseumandCulturalCenter.Thetribalgov-ernment haslaidout twophasesof developmentfor Chachalu. Phase one is now complete. It isa permanent collection that includes photos ofchieftains and tribal members, sacred objects,mapsof theoriginal locationsof varioustribesinwesternOregon, andrecordedtribal mythology,Where There Are People Who Care,There Is Community.We are proud to work with nonprots throughout our region that share our vision of building healthier communities. Working together, we are dedicated to beter health for individuals, families and communities. Learn more about how Cambia Health Foundation gives back at cambiahealthfoundation.org.BRADLEY LENODionne Markey shakes hands with Adam Davis at the 2015 Humanity in Perspective commencement.twenty-nine years in customer service at Nor-dstrom. She was intrigued by HIP but unsure.I said, I dont knowits beena long time sinceIve gone to school, she recalls.Markeyeventuallyenrolledinthecourseandwasmatchedwithamentornamed SandraDixon,aPortlandCommunityCol-legeemployeewhohadgraduatedfromHIPKYLE WEISMANN-YEE11 Summer 2015 Oregon Humanities 10 FROM THE DIRECTORONTHEWAYFROMTHE AIRPORT INAtlantatoafamilyreunioninSouthCar-olina, I heard that people had been murdered inachurchinCharleston.Iheardthatthevictims were black and the shooter was white.There was too little informationand too muchtoabsorb, andmykids wereinthebackseat and before I knewit we arrivedat the beachhouse.The next morning thirty-ve people werecomingandgoing,andtherewerehugsand catch-upsandtripstoandfromthebeach.In the house nobody said anything about theshootingeventhoughitwasinthenewspa-per and on the news. That evening as we held hands and bowed heads, a young cousin whohad been asked to say grace offered thanks for the opportunity to be together as a family, toshare food and health. When he nished, peo-plesaidamen.Nobodysaidanythingaboutthe shooting.The next day I xated on sun blockevery-one applied it, reminded each other, applied itagain. Bottles andtubes wereeverywhere. Pro-tection for all these pale bodies, all this whiteskin.Itwashardnottomakemuchofhowattentive we were inprotecting ourselves.By thenthe Charlestonshooting hadbegunto arise spottily in conversation: family mem-bers shook their heads, cast their eyes down-ward. Then it was back to the beach, the kids,the next meal. There was no talk of why it hap-pened or what it might mean for South Caro-lina, for the country, for us.IfoundtomysurpriseandshamethatI was able to check out. For hours at a time I did not think about Charleston, about the peoplewhowerekilled,thefamilymemberswhorespondedwithstartlinggenerosityandgrace.Oneday,Iforgotordecidednottoapplysun block and ended up with a fresh burn. Mywifescousinscommentedonthehueofmyskin. We all laughed. At night I was kept awakeby the heat rising from my chest and arms. I nallyfellasleepandawokeinthemorningrefreshed: the air conditioning, the big quiethouse, the locked door.FortherestofthetripIwonderedaboutthe hour before the white man at the Emanuel AfricanMethodistEpiscopalChurchpulled agunfromhisbag.Hewas,Ilearned,wel-comed into a bible study session. He sat with a group of people who were, I imagined, makingmeaning of their lives together, perhaps try-ing to make sense of how to live well in a world that makes it more difcult than it should be.They welcomed in a stranger, listened to him,talked with him.They could have locked the door. They had goodreasons to. They couldhave done more toprotect themselves, the risks having declared themselves over and over again. This commit-ment to trustthis is the risk that democracyasks for andrarely receives.ItmaybeobviousbutIbelieveitbears repeating: to ask anyone to trust is to ask a lot.To ask some people to trustpeople who havegreat reasons not tois to ask a great deal.Inequityshows upinmanyplaces andways.Itshoweduphorriblyforpeopleconnected with the Emanuel African Methodist Episco-pal Church in Charleston. I wonder where and howit shows upfor you.The Risk of TrustADAM DAVISKIM NGUYENThats why Andrea Cano, a seasoned groupfacilitator andintercultural communityleader,is excitedto be one of eight Oregonians chosento travel the state from now through January2016 to lead Oregon Humanities communityconversations about deathanddying.Itssuchaspecialinvitation,Canosays.Myhopeisthattheseconversationsbringtogetheranintergenerational,intercultural audience. The Talking about Dying program,whichOHispresentinginpartnershipwithCambiaHealthFoundation,willofferpublic opportunitiesinthirty-eightcommunities throughoutthestateforOregonianstohavewhat OHprogramofcer AnnieKaffencalls a toughbut critical conversation.ThisprogramspeakstoOregonHumani-tiesmissionsodirectly,Kaffensays.Thetopic transcends many boundaries. Its some-thing thats going to happento all of us, but its not going to happen the same way, and werenot going to talk about it the same way.In fact, a 2013 PewResearch Center surveyindicates signicant differences across racial and ethnic groups when it comes to questions about deathand dying. For example, black and Hispanic respondents were twice as likely as whiterespondentstosaytheywouldpursueeverypossiblemedicalinterventiontopre-serve life, even when faced with incurable ill-ness andgreat pain.These differences may be explained by cul-tural views on family and religion, as well asdistrust rootedinalonghistoryof institutional racismwithinthe Americanhealthcare indus-try,whichhasbeenshowntoprovidepeopleofcolorwithlessaggressivecareandworsehealthoutcomesthanwhites.Theseissues,along with personal stories and questions thatare more spiritual in nature, are all up for dis-cussionas part of the program.Our state is expanding ethnically and cul-turally, Cano says. We need to be able to talkabout howwelivetogether, but alsohowwedietogether.TondoutwhereaTalkingaboutDyingconversationishappeningnear you, visitthe Oregon Humanities calendar at oregonhu-manities.org.ELOISE HOLLANDherself some years earlier. Volunteer mentors provideacademicandmoralsupporttoHIPstudents,checkinginwiththemviaweeklyphonecallsandoccasionalmeetingstokeepmentees engaged in their studies and on tracktocompletethecourse.Thepairdiscussed class materials such as the Declaration of Sen-timentsfromthe1848SenecaFallsConven-tion on womens rights. Id ask her questions, Markey says, and shed break it down for meand make it simple. Having a mentor who is inschool straightens youout. Its a very goodpro-gramthat they have.ForDixon,whoistakingmasters-level classes in educational policy at Portland StateUniversity,thementorshipwasanotherstepin a long relationship with HIP. Her son, whoattendedthefreechildcareprovideddur-ing her HIP classes when he was young, later wentontoenrollintheprogramhimself.As forworkingwithMarkey,Dixonsays,Sheenhancedmylifeingeneral.Itwasgreatget-ting the perspective of someone who had lived throughsome of the things we discussed.Some of the course material was challeng-ing,bothacademicallyandotherwisefor example, a unit on the nations founding doc-uments.ShesAfricanAmerican,andImAfricanAmerican.RealizingthattheConsti-tutionwas not writtenfor us, Dixonsays, was difcult. A lot of times historical documents have a lot of pain in them. We looked at it and said, That was then, this is nowotherwisewewouldntbeinaclassandhavethisopportu-nity to learnandgrow.Having graduatedinApril, Markey says her studyofAmericanhistory,classicalphiloso-phers such as Plato, and art have had a lastingimpact.Ilookatpicturesdifferentlynow, she says. She looks forwardto returning to her poetry workshops witha newperspective.ERIC GOLDTalking about DyingCommunities throughout Oregonwelcome acritical but challengingconversation.A GROWI NGMOVEMENTOFPEOPLEis hard at work, in Oregon and nationally,tobringdiscussionsaboutdeathanddyinginto the public sphere. Still, its relatively rareto talk with friends and neighbors about this sensitive topic.Funders Keep Oregon Listening, Learning, and ExploringThanks to the support of our generous funders, Oregon Humanities connects tens of thou-sands of Oregonians to life-changing ideas. This year so far, the following funders have helped us make Oregon a more dynamic and vital place to live: Meyer Memorial Trust: $75,000 two-year award for core operating support The John R. Gatewood and Mary Z. Gatewood Fund, the Redtail Fund, and the Ward Family Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation: $30,000 for capacity building The James F. and Marion L. Miller Founda-tion: $25,000 for Oregon Humanities magazine The Collins Foundation: $18,000 for Humanity in Perspective and Idea Lab The Kinsman Founda-tion: $15,000 for Conver-sation Project The PGE Foundation: $10,000 for Idea Lab Juan Young Trust: $7,000 for Idea Lab Jubitz Family Founda-tion: $5,000 for Conver-sation Project Autzen Foundation: $3,500 for Idea Lab Leotta Gordon Founda-tion: $2,500 for Idea Lab13 Oregon Humanities 12 Summer 2015SafeSHORTLYAFTERHETURNEDFOUR,my sonslept inmy arms like a heavy new-bornbaby while a doctor impressedonme thathisallergies,whichnowincludedsomefood allergies,couldposeaseriousthreattohis health. My observations, in part, had broughtus to this diagnosis, but I doubted both myselfandthedoctorasIlookeddownatmyson,whoappearedperfectlyunthreatenedinhis sleep.Afterthedoctorlefttheroom,anursedemonstrated the EpiPen I would need to useif my son ever had a life-threatening reactionto nuts. I know, she said when she saw tears well up in my eyes while she pretended to jabherself forcefullyinthe thighwiththe syringe.I hopeyounever havetodothis. Later I would dutifullyreadalltheinformationthedoc-tor had given me, while still maintaining thesecret belief that none of it was true and thatfoodcouldnot hurt my child.In the lists upon lists of things my son was advisedby the doctor to avoid, one iteminpar-ticular caught my attentionthe seasonal ushot. Children with egg allergies can react tothis particular vaccine, whichis grownineggs.Mysonhadalreadybeenvaccinatedagainstthe u, just as he had already eatenmany eggs,but I could see the irony in the possibility thata vaccine posed him special danger. Thinkingwith the logic of a Greek myth, I wondered ifmy interest inimmunity hadsomehowinvited immunedysfunctionforhim.MaybeIhadPlague FearsEULA BISSIn an ongoing apocalypse, how do we decide when to panic?JEN WICK STUDIO15 Oregon Humanities 14 Summer 2015Safefromwithout andcannot be anticipatedby our medicine. Both speak to our most basic fears.Butnoveldiseases,intheircapacitytoserveas metaphors for foreign others and anxieties about the future, tend to generate better copy.AsIwrite,twonewdiseaseshavebeenmak-ingheadlines.Oneisanavianinuenzathatemerged in China, the other is a novel corona virusthatwasrstdetectedinSaudiArabia.The latter, which is the most threatening newdiseaseofthemoment,hasbeengiventheunfortunatenameMiddleEastrespiratorysyndrome.Inthepastcenturytherehavebeenthreemajor inuenza pandemics, including the 1918Spanishupandemic, whichkilledmorepeoplethantheFirstWorldWar. Thatpandemicproved particularlydeadlyfor youngadultswithstrongimmunesystems, as it causedanoverwhelmingimmune response. In 2004, the director of theWHOannouncedthat another major pandemic is inevitable. Its not amatter of if, but when, a bioethicist friendtellsme. Withthisprobabilityin the air, novel inuenza outbreaks are oftenaccompaniedbyaflurryofmediaattention,someof whichtipsintofearmongering. But evenwhen inuenza is made foreign or animal witha newname, like Chinese bird u or swine u,we do not seemeager to imagine it as a plague.Inuenzaistoocommontoevokeourfearof theunknown. It is not exotic or remote enough totrigger our fear of alienothers. It is not disgur-ingenoughtothreatenour senseof self. It is notspreadinawaythat inspires moral repulsionor thethreatofpunishment.Inuenzadoesnotserve, in other words, as a very good metaphor for other fearsit has to be frightening simplyfor what it is.ThepediatricianPaulOllitmentionedtome,duringaninterviewabouthiswork,thathehadrecentlyseentwochildrenhospital-izedwithinuenza. Bothhadbeenimmunized against everything on the childhood scheduleexcept the u, and both ended up on heart and lung machines. One lived, and the other died.And then the next day, when someone comes intoyourofceandsays,Idontwanttogetthat vaccine, youre supposed to respect thatdecision? Ollit askedme. Youcanrespect thefear.Thefearofvaccinesisunderstandable.even at the Pores with the Air, and there generate, or emit mostacutePoisons strikes himas unlikely. Hehas heardthat if aper-sonwiththeplaguebreathes onapieceof glass, theremight liv-ing Creatures be seen by microscope of strange monstrous and frightful Shapes, suchas Dragons, Snakes, Serpents, andDevils,horrible to behold. But this, he writes, I very much questiontheTruthof. Facedwiththeplagueandunabletomakesenseofhis ownobservations, thenarrator is left toreckonwithimprob-abletheories andpurespeculation. Several hundredyears later,I ndhis predicament eerily familiar.Bubonic plaguestill exists, but it has ceasedtobethePlague.Theafictions that takethemost lives worldwidearenowheartdisease, stroke, respiratory infections, and AIDS, which is theonly one of these that tends tobe characterizedas a plague. Thenumber of lives a disease claims, as Susan Sontag observes, is not what makes it a plague. In order to be promoted to plague,a disease must be particularly feared or dreaded. I have lived throughtheemergenceof anumber of well-publicizeddiseases,but I never felt threatenedbyEbola, or SARS, or West Nilevirus,or H1N1. When my son was an infant, I feared autism, whichseemed to be spreading like a plague, particularly among boys.And when he developed allergies, one after another, I began tofeel dread. Perhaps the nal qualicationfor what constitutes a plague is its proximity to your ownlife.Can you imagine, I ask a friend while reading AJournal of thePlague Year, seeing people all around youdying froma diseaseand not knowing what is causing it, or how it is passed, or whowill be next? Even as I say this, it occurs to me that my friend lived in San Francisco at the height of the AIDS epidemic, and sawnearlyeveryoneheknewdieof adiseaseabout whichalmostnothing was known. SanFranciscoin1989, he reminds me, was not entirely unlike Londonin1665.Later, perhaps becauseI amstill reckoningwiththestrange-ness of howboth near and far the plague of London feels to myowntimeandplace,Iaskthesamequestionagain.Canyouimagine? I ask my father. By his silence I understand that he can.Myfatherseesthesickeverydayaplagueisendlesslyunfolding before him. We dont have bodies falling out of win-dows, I say to himhopefully. We arent digging mass graves.Yes, he says, but were seeding a bomb. He is referringto antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The overuse of antibiotics has led to strains of bacteria that are difcult to rid fromthe body.One, C. difcile, is evennamed for its difculty. Inthe case of C. difcile, over 90 percent of infections occur following a courseof antibiotics. Analarmingnumber of thepatients hesees inthehospital, myfather tells me, areinfectedwithresistant bacteria.The persistence of resistant bacteria and the emergence ofnovel diseases are among the top public health threats of thetwenty-rst century. One of these threats comes from withinandistheresultofourmodernpractices.Theothercomes givenhim, like poor Icarus, fragile wings.I did not admit this fear to the doctor, but I didaskher what I haddonetocausethesealler-gies. I hoped to reverse the damage, or at leaststemit. The possibility that I was not to blamedid not initially occur to me. The doctor, her-self amother, spent sometimeassuringmethatalthough the origin of allergies is mysterious,there was probably nothing I could have donedifferently. I myself have allergies, as does myhusband,soifIwastoblame,shesuggested,it was only for carrying the genetic material I carry. This did not satisfy me. Neither did any-thing I went on to learn about allergies, aboutwhichwe seemto knowvery little.THERE IS A PASSAGE IN DANIEL DEFOE SA Journal of the Plague Year in which his nar-ratorwondershowthediseasefindsitsvic-tims. He does not believe, as others do, that itis simply a Stroke fromHeaven. He is certainthatitispassedfromonepersontoanother.SpreadbyInfection, that is tosay, bysomecer-tain Steams, or Fumes, which the Physicians call Efuvia, by the Breath, or by the Sweat, or by the Stench of the Sores of the sick Persons,orsomeotherway,perhaps,beyondeventheReachof thePhysicians themselves . . . Indeed,itwouldbeover150yearsbeforephysicians wouldknowthat the plague is passedby eas.As the plague spreads, Defoes narrator has anunderstandingthatcontagionisatwork,andsome inkling of germtheory, but he rejects thattheory.TheideaofinvisibleCreatures,whoenterintotheBodywiththeBreath,or But novel diseases, in their capacity to serve as metaphors for foreign others and anxieties about the future, tend to generate better copy.17 Oregon Humanities 16 Summer 2015SafeButyoucantrespectthedecisionitsanunnecessary risk.The fact that the 2009 H1N1 inuenza pan-demicdidnottakemorelivesissometimes cast,oddly,asapublichealthfailure.Whenall was said and done, Dr. Bob [Sears, author ofTheVaccineBook:MakingtheRightDeci-sion for Your Child] writes, the hype and fear around the H1N1 u turned out to be unwar-ranted.Thepandemicwasnotasbadasitcould have been, but it was not inconsequen-tial. Somewherebetween150,000and575,000people died fromH1N1, over half in SoutheastAsia and Africa, where public health measures werescarce. Autopsies suggest that manyof thepreviously healthy people who died of the uwerekilledbytheirimmuneresponsetheydrownedintheir ownlung uid.Thecomplaint that preventivemeasures against theuwereout of proportiontothethreat strikes meas better appliedtoour militaryactioninIraqthantoour responsetoanunpredictablevirus. Vaccinating in advance of the u, critics suggest, was a foolish preemptive strike. But preemption in war has differenteffects than preemption in health carerather than generat-ingongoingconict,likeourpreemptivestrikeagainstIraq,preventivehealthcarecanmakefurtherhealthcareunnec-essary. Either way, prevention, of war as well as disease, is notour strong point. Theidea of preventivemedicineis faintlyun-American, the Chicago Tribune noted in 1975. It means, rst,recognizing that the enemy is us.In2011,studiesofanH1N1vaccineusedonlyinEuroperevealed that it caused an increased incidence of narcolepsy inFinlandandSweden.Initialreportssuggestthatthevaccinetriggered narcolepsy in about 1 out of every 12,000 teenagers vaccinatedinFinland,andabout1outof33,000inSweden.Researchisongoingandthereismoretoknow,particularlyhowexactly the vaccine may have contributed to narcolepsy inthat particular age group and population, but the incident has already beenusedtoconrmexisting fears that we are our ownenemy. Aproblemwith a vaccine is not evidence of the inevita-ble shortcomings of medicine, but evidence that we are, indeed,going to destroy ourselves.Apocalypse, Sontag writes, is now a long-running serial: not Apocalypse Now but Apocalypse From Now On. Apoca-lypse has become an event that is happening and not happen-ing. Inthis era of uncertainapocalypse, my father has takentoreading the Stoics, which is not an entirely surprising interestfor an oncologist. What he is drawn to in their philosophy, hetells me, is theideathat youcannot control what happens toyou,but youcancontrol howyoufeel about it. Or, as Jean-Paul Sartreput it, Freedomis what youdo withwhats beendone to you.What has been done to us seems to be, among other things,that we have beenmade fearful. What will we do with our fear?Thisstrikesmeasacentralquestionofbothcitizenshipand motherhood. As mothers, we must somehowsquare our power with our powerlessness. We can protect our children to someextent. But we cannot make theminvulnerable any more thanwe canmake ourselves invulnerable. Life, as Donna Harawaywrites, is a windowof vulnerability.ExcerptfromOnImmunity.Copyright2014byEulaBiss.Reproducedwiththepermissionof Graywolf Press, Minneapo-lis, Minnesota, www.graywolfpress.org.Eula Biss is the author of three books: On Immunity: An Inoculation (from which this essay has been excerpted), Notes from No Mans Land: American Essays, and The Balloonists. She was a guest at Oregon Humanities Think & Drink in Portland in July 2015.A FEWYEARSAGO, MYBAND, THESLANTS, WASINVITEDTOPERFORMATTHEOregon State Penitentiary. To many, sending an all-Asian American dance rock band intoa prisonwitha signicant neo-Nazi populationseemedlike aninvitationfor disaster. However, I didnt questionthe decisionuntil we actually showed up and were handed bright-orange vests towear over our clothes. Our singer askedif it wouldbeokaytotakethemoff mid-concert, since our suits andvests couldget quite warm.Sure, the guard said, but if an incident occurs, the orange vests let the sentry towers knowwho to avoidshooting. Got it: keepthe safety gear on.Wecontinuedthroughsecuritywithsignicant precautions at everystep. Therewerebars and armedguards everywhere. Theclangingof thedoors wouldecholoudlyfor awhileeverytimeonewas openedor shut. It was a place designedfor containment, not comfort.SIMON TAMHow I named my band The Slants and gotinto trouble with the government.TRADEMARK OFFENSEWhat will we do with our fear? This strikes me as a central question of motherhood.SARAH GIFFROW19 Summer 2015Safe Oregon Humanities 18Eventually, we steppedontoa large eldsurroundedby con-crete wallsa place called the big yard. The stage was set upat one endwitha thinline of plastic police tape stretchedacross the frontthe only thing separating us from nearly two thou-sand convicted criminals. Wed been scheduled to performtheyear before, but a large riot had put the place on lockdown, sotheydpostponedthe concert. This fact didnt do muchto settlemy nerves. I admit I was making assumptions about the kinds of peoplewhoaresent tomaximum-securityprison: murderers,rapists, anddrug dealers.Whileweplayed,asmallcrowdassembledinfrontofthestage, anda larger one walkedaroundthe yard, getting the onlyhour of outdoor time theyd have for the day. As we launched intoour cover of Paint It Black, hundreds of prisoners jumped andcheered.At theendof theconcert, asmall groupof shirtless whitemenapproachedthepolicetape.Severalofthemwerecompletelycoveredinswastikasandwhitepridetattoos.Alargemaninfrontcameup,toweringoverme.Heseemednervousashehandedme a piece of paper andaskedfor anautograph.Its for my daughter, he said. I want to tell her that I metthe band.He went on: I know I have these tattoos, and I know whatyoumust be thinking. Ive made a lot of mistakes inmy life, and theyremistakes that I dont want mylittlegirl tomake. Hesaid he wanted to showthat he could learn, that he could change his heart andmindevenif hecouldnt changewhat was stainedintohis skin.That concert was oneof themost powerful experiences of mylife. I went in with all kinds of assumptions, but those changed whenwe talkedwiththe prisoners.I started the Slants nearly a decade ago because I wanted tochangepeoplesassumptions.IrememberwatchingQuentinTarantinos Kill Bill on DVD in 2004. I paused the lm duringthe iconic scene of O-Ren Ishii and her gang of Crazy 88s walk-ingintoarestaurantnot becauseof thegoreor thesoundtrack,but because I realized it was the rst American-produced lmIdseenthat depictedAsiansinacool andcondent manner. Thelm industry was bad, but the music industry may have beenworse: I couldnt think of a single mainstreamAsian Americanmusic artist.I wanted to change that withthe Slants, the worlds rst and only all-Asian American dance rock band. Not only did we cre-ate our own brand of 80s-inspired synth pop, but we also gotinvolvedwithsocial justice: we touredthe country ghting ste-reotypesaboutAsianAmericans,leadingworkshops,raisingmoneyfor charities, andsharingour culturethroughour music.Letters of support frommarginalizedcommunities pouredin.During this time, our attorney recommended that we reg-ister the trademark on our band name, something thats com-monlydonefornationalacts.However,theUSPatentand Trademark Ofce, or USPTO, swiftly rejected our application,claiming our name was disparaging to Asians. To support their claim, ofcials usedsources like UrbanDictionary.com, a photoof MileyCyrus pullingher eyes backinaderogatorygesture, and anonymous posts on Internet message boards using the word slant as a racial slur.I named the band the Slants because it represented our per-spectiveor slanton life as people of color. It was a deliberateact of claiming an identity as well as a nod to Asian Americanactivists who hadbeenusing the termfor decades.Ivebeenfightingincourtstoregisterournameforthepastveyears.Ivesuppliedthousandsofpagesofevidence,including letters of support fromcommunity leaders andAsianAmericanorganizations,independentnationalsurveys,and an etymology report fromone of the countrys leading linguis-ticsprofessors.Thetrademarkofficewasnotswayed.Theycalled our effort laudable, but not inuential. With just a fewkeystrokes, they wiped away the voices of thousands of AsianAmericans.We starteddigging deeper. Rather thanfocusing onwhether or not Asian Americans actually believed our use of the word tobedisparaging,westartedquestioningwhytheUSPTOaccused us of using a racial slur to begin with. After all, slantcanmeanany number of things, andthe racial connotationwas relatively obscure. In fact, over the years, the trademark ofcehas receivedeight hundredapplications that include variations oftheword,butnotonewasrejectedforbeingracisttoward Asiansuntil anAsianapplied.Trademarkofcialsadmittedtheyconsideredtheworda racialslurinourapplicationbecauseitisuncontestedthatapplicant is a founding member of a band composed of mem-bers of Asiandescent. Theythenpresentedevidence, includingphotographs of Asianpeopleonour website, astylizeddragon onanalbumcover, andanillustrationof anAsianwomanonanalbumcover.Ironically,ourbandwastooAsiantousethewordslant.USPTOthoughtpeoplewoulddrawtheconclusionthatour bands name was a reference to our ethnicity. In other words,anyone who wasnt Asian could register a trademark for slantwithoutitbeingconsideredaracialslur.Itwasstartlingand deeply frustrating torealize that despite trying touse languagetohelpprotectmycommunityfromstereotypesandracism,Iwasbeingdeniedtherighttotrademarkmybandsnamebecause of my race.Throughthis process, Ive come to understand that laws aredesigned to maintainthe status quo. But shifts inlanguage and identitypolitics requirethat bureaucracies movebeyondsimpleculturalcompetencyandinsteadnavigateinconvenientand unknownwaters.Somemayarguethatthetrademarkofcesactionswerenot racist. But racismdoesnt look only like white supremacists burning crosses or wearing white hoods. Racist actions donthave to t a stereotype of what racismis to be racist. Denying a right based on race is the very essence of racism. It is evidenceof a racist system. And like all other systems, this is one that is resistant to change.In my opinion, the role of the government shouldnt includedeciding howa group can dene itself; that right should belongtothecommunityitself. Its clear inexampleafter examplethatthedominant groupis not onlyinconsistent but alsosometimes completely off base when it comes to understanding the senti-ments of people who have beenmarginalizedfor centuries.Were ghting for more than a band name: were ghting for the right of self-determination for all minorities. Things likethis are the subtle indignities that people of color have to faceeveryday: slights that dont seembigenoughtomakeafuss over,yetcontinuallyremindusthatchallengestothenorm(read: white, homogenous culture) are not welcome. One of the moreamusinginstances was thetrademarkofces denial of theJapa-nese word for luckfukuas a restaurant name, for fear that itmight look like anobscenity.The USPTO can say it doesnt have enough resources to doresearch on every application that comes in, or that it has towaitforamassiveshiftinpopularcultureoversentiments towardaparticularword,phrase,orimage.However,this subjective application of the law brings a chilling effect to freeexpression, especially on the part of individuals who wish toconvey irony, neutralize slurs, convey artistic or political ide-als, or engage in parody.Andit issubjectiveindeed: TheUSPTOhasrefusedwanker for use onclothing, but approved it for beer. Pussy Power was rejected for entertainment services, but Pussy Power Revolu-tion was considered acceptable for clothing. Madonna was rejected for wines on the grounds that it would be scandalous,but a different Madonna application was then approved. And nearlyeveryracial slur knownfor AsianAmericans has becomearegisteredtrademarkat somepoint: jap, Oriental, chink, slope,and, of course, slant.The fact of the matter is that this lawhas been unfairly tar-geting minorities since it was drawn up in the 1940s, and over-coming it would be a small but important victory in the greater battleforequality.Foranyonewhohasbeenmarginalized becauseof race, sexual orientation, gender, age, religion, or any-thing else, this is especially meaningful, because the law says that our communities should have the right to set the tone onappropriateness, rather than some disconnected governmentagency that believes it should protect others from uncomfort-able or disagreeable ideas.InAprilofthisyear,theUSCourtofAppealsfortheFed-eral Circuit afrmed the trademark ofces decision about our bandsname.Oneweeklater,inanunprecedentedmove,thecourt vacated its ruling and issued a legal order for me to arguethe constitutionality of the lawso the court couldreexamine it.Our case suddenly proved to be useful, especially to a federal judgewhoroutinelyhasexpressedinterestinprotectingthetrademarkedname of the WashingtonRedskins.Some fear the disruption of this law: after all, if it were tobe repealed by my bands trademark case, then there would bealmost no legal recourse to have the Redskins trademark reg-istrations cancelled. Some also worry that my case will serve as a Pandoras box or oodgate for disparaging or offensive trade-markregistrations. For instance, thelawthat couldcancel Red-skins might also be used to cancel the NAACPs registration,since the phrase colored people in the organizations namecouldbeconsidereddisparagingbymanypeople.Yes,thesethings might happen, but weshouldnt let thefear of someoffen-sive trademark registrations trump the rights of marginalized communities.Andif we believe that the trademarkofce has beenprotect-ing minority groups, then weve all been fooled. As it is beingappliedinour case, this lawis discriminatory. It onlymaintains the norm, and that normis white homogenous culture, with norecognitionof peoplewhoarepractitioners of change. Weliveina country where equality has beendened by white, heterosex-ual, cisgender men for hundreds of years, and its time to bringI named the band the Slants because it represented our perspective or slanton life as people of color.It was a deliberate act of claimingan identity as well as a nod to AsianAmerican activists who had beenusing the term for decades.21 Oregon Humanities 20 Summer 2015Safeother communitygroups tothetable. Weshouldnot beafraidofusing the expressionof who we are to catalyze change.Artists dont begin their careers thinking about howto dis-mantlelaws that theyarent evenawareof, andImcertainlynotan exception. When I rst started the band, the intention was totake onstereotypes about AsianAmericans, inject pride intoour ethnic heritages, andincreaseour communitys visibilityinthe entertainment industry.ButwhatIvecometoseeisthatassumptionscanbeef-cacious.Thetrademarkofficeassumedthatournamewas inherently a racial slur and that the Asian American commu-nity would feel disparaged by it. When our community loudlyexpressedotherwise, ofcialsassumedthat approvingournamewould set a precedent that would create more paperwork and open the door for other controversial trademark applications.What if, instead, they treatedus as applicants of any other race,as people instead of ideologies? What if our governments laws reectedthecapacityfor people, entirecommunities, andwords andidentities to change?As it is, our legal systemon trademark lawfeels like a prisoncreatedtokeepdisruptiveideasfromcomingintothemain-stream.Ofcialsmaybelievetheyareprotectingthegeneral publicfromharm,buttheyareactuallyerectingwallsthatdiscourage people from mobilizing for social justice by usinglanguage to reappropriate ideas. Just because we dont under-stand or agree with howsomeone creates social change doesntmeanweshouldpreventit.Whenitcomestosocialjustice,weshouldaskquestionsandhavemeaningfulconversations insteadof making assumptions.In the winter of 201112, our band spent the holidays per-forming for soldiers serving overseas. While one branch of thegovernmentwasworkingagainstourband,anotherbranch,the Department of Defense, called on us to do some outreachon its behalf. This was shortly after news spread about harshhazingpractices usedonAsianAmericanmilitaryrecruits. Oneencounter onthat tour really stoodout.We had just nished playing a concert at a NATObase whenthe local commander approachedme. That was incredible, hesaid. Wevehadalot of actsherebignames, toobut Ivenever seen soldiers fromall of the different countries dance together like that. He continued: Also, I have to apologize. As the commander of the base, Im expected to make appearances at these kinds of things. But when I rst saw your poster, I didnt know whatto make of this Oriental band. However, now I know I should never really judge these things onthe surface.Thank you so much. Its an honor to be here, I said. Also,youshouldntusethewordOriental,becauseitmakesyousoundlike a racist. But thank you.That night, ghting stereotypes of Asian Americans didntcomeintheformof alectureor aworkshoponthemodel minor-itymythor adebateover Asianprivilege. It happenedthrough sincerefellowshippoweredbyChinatowndancerock.Thatnight, the victory happened simply by showing up and having a meaningful conversation.Simon Tam is best known as the bassist and founder of the Slants. He is also an author, musician, and self-proclaimed troublemaker.COLLECTION OF THE FREEDOM ARCHIVESBLACK PANTHER PARTYKRISTIAN WILLIAMSAlternatives to police in the Black Freedom MovementTHEREISAQUESTIONTHATHAUNTSevery critic of policenamely, the ques-tionof crime, andwhat to do about it.Sincethe1960s,therightwinghasmadecrimeapoliticalissueandidentifieditwithpoorpeopleandpeopleofcolor.Becausetheleft has largely refusedtomake crime anissue,its also failed to challenge this characteriza-tion. Successive waves of politiciansof bothparties,ateverylevelofgovernmenthavelearnedtostokethepublics fears of rape, mur-der, drive-bys, carjackings, school shootings,andchildabduction,aswellasriotingand terrorism, and present themselves as heroes,as saviors, as tough-talking, hard-hitting, no-nonsense,real-lifeDirtyHarryswhowilldowhatever it takes to keep you and your familysafe. Thesolutions theyoffer typicallyhavetheappeal of simplicity: more cops, more prisons,longersentences.Theunspokencostscomeintheformoffewerrights,limitedprivacy,greater inequality, and a society ever less tol-erant of minor disorder. These political tactics arenothingnew, of course, but thescaleof their effect2.2 million inmates in 2010, accordingto the Bureau of Justice Statisticsis unprec-edented. And unless the left can do better, wehave to expect that these same solutions will be the ones offeredinthe future.The fact is, the police do provide an impor-tantcommunityservice:protectionagainstcrime. It is not their chief function, andtheydoBelow: Cover of an issue of the Black Panther newspaperRight: Robert F. Williams, president of the Monroe, North Carolina chapter of the NAACP in the 1950s and early 1960s, and his wife, Mabel WilliamsThe Slants signing autographs (left) and performing (bottom) at Oregon State Penitentiary.OREGON STATE PENITENTIARYOregon Humanities 22 23From an issue of the Black Panther newspaperCharles Sims, head of the militant African American civil rights organization the Deacons for Defense and Justice, displays replicas of Ku Klux Klan robes in 1966.BETTMANN/CORBISBLACK PANTHER PARTYnot always do this part of their job well or fairlybut they doit, and it brings them legitimacy. Even people who dislike andfear police often feel that they need the cops. Maybe we can dowithout omnipresent surveillance, racial proling, andinstitu-tionalizedviolence, but most peoplehavebeenwilling toacceptthesefeatures of policing, if somewhat grudgingly, becausetheyhavebeenpackagedtogether withthings wecannot dowithout: crime control, security, andpublic safety.Because the state uses this protective function to justify its own violence, the replacement of the police institution is notonlyagoalofsocialchange,butalsoameansofachievingit.The challenge is to create another system that can protect us fromcrime, and cando so better, more justly, with a respect for humanrights, andwithaminimumof bullying. What is needed,in short, is a shift in the responsibility for public safetyawayfromthe state andtowardthe community.Thethoughtthatcommunity-basedmeasurescouldulti-mately replace the police is intriguing. But if it is tobe anythingmore thana theoretical abstractionor a utopiandream, it mustbe informed by the actual experience of history. One place tolookfor communitydefensemodelsisinplaceswheredistrust ofthe police and active resistance to police power have beenmostacute inother words, the Black community.CIVIL RIGHTS WITH GUNSAs early as 1957, Robert Williams armed the NAACPchapter inMonroe, NorthCarolina, andsuccessfullyrepelledattacks fromtheKuKluxKlanandthepolice. Soonother self-defensegroups appearedinBlackcommunitiesthroughouttheSouth.Thelargest of these was the Deacons for Defense andJustice, whichclaimedmorethanftychapters intheSouthernstates andfour in the North. As documented in Lance Hills book The Deaconsfor Defense: ArmedResistance andthe Civil Rights Movement, theDeacons madeit their missiontoprotect civil rights workers and theBlackcommunitymoregenerally. Armedwithshotguns and ries, they escorted activists through dangerous back-countryareas, andorganizedround-the-clockpatrols whenracists wereattacking Black neighborhoods. As one Deaconexplained, Youwasnt goingtoreceivemuchprotectionfromthepolice,soBlackpeoplehadtoprotect ourselves.Infact, theDeaconssometimes had to protect Blacks fromthe police. As one member told jour-nalist WilliamPrice, theyeavesdroppedonpoliceradiocalls and responded to the scenes of arrests to discourage the cops fromoverstepping their bounds. The Deacons also served as a disci-pliningmechanismwithinthemovement. Ontheonehand, theyworked to calmtrigger-happy youths seeking revenge againstTheMan. Ontheotherhand, theyconfrontedUncleToms,seiz-ing anddestroying goods purchasedfrombusinesses under boy-cott. Theyalsohelpedidentifyinformers, whowerethenpubliclyupbraidedbyagroupof womenfromtheNAACP.WilliamsandtheDeaconsinfluencedwhatbecamethemostdevelopedcommunitydefenseprogramoftheperiodthe Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (BPP). The Panthers,as Bobby Seale put it in his memoir Seize the Time, patrolled pigs.Visibly carrying guns, they followed police through theBlackghettowiththeexplicit aimof preventingpolicebrutalityandinformingcitizens of their rights. Whenpolicemisbehaved,theirnamesandphotographsappearedintheBlackPanther newspaper. The Philadelphia chapter pushedthe tactic further,withwantedposters featuring killer cops.ThePanthersalsosoughttomeetthecommunitysneeds in other waysproviding medical care, giving away shoes and clothing,feedingschoolchildrenbreakfast,settinguphous-ingcooperatives,transportingthefamiliesofprisonersfor visitationdays,andofferingclassesduringthe summer at Liberation Schools. (Several oftheseprogramsaredescribedinacollectioneditedbyJudsonL. Jeffries, entitledComrades: A Local History of the Black Panther Party.) InBaltimore, they offered direct nancial assis-tancetofamiliesfacingeviction,andduringthesummer providedafreelunchtoschool-agechildren (in addition to the free breakfast). InWinston-Salem, the Party ran an ambulanceservice andofferedfree pest control. The Indi-anapolis branchprovidedcoal topoor families inthewinter, heldtoydrives at Christmastime,foundedcommunitygardens,maintaineda foodbank,andcleanedthestreetsinBlackneighborhoods.InPhiladelphia,thePanther clinicofferedchildbirthclassesforexpect-ant parents; in Cleveland and New York, drugrehab.TheseSurvivalProgramssoughttomeetneedsthatthestateandthecapitalisteconomywereneglecting,atthesametimealigningthecommunitywiththePartyand drawing bothintooppositionwiththe existingpower structure.Thestrategywasappliedintheareaofpublicsafetyaswell.Asmuchastheywereconcernedaboutthepolice,thePanthers alsotookseriouslythethreatofcrimeand sought to address the fears of the communitytheyserved.Withthisinmind,theyorga-nized Seniors Against a Fearful EnvironmentAs much as they were concerned about the police, the Panthers also took seriously the threat of crime and sought to address the fears of the community they served. 25 Oregon Humanities 24 Summer 2015Safe(SAFE), an escort and busing service in whichyoungBlackpeopleaccompaniedtheelderlyontheir business aroundthe city. InLos Angeles,the Party opened an ofce on Central Avenueandimmediatelysetaboutrunningthedrugdealersoutofthearea.AndinPhiladelphia,neighborsreportedadecreaseinviolentcrime after the Party opened their ofce, and an increase after the ofce closed. There, theBPPpaidparticular attentiontogang violence,organizingtrucesandrecruitinggangmem-bers to helpwiththe survival programs.It may be that the Panthers reduced crimebyvirtueoftheirveryexistence.Crime,and gangviolenceespecially,droppedduringtheperiod of their activity, in part (in the estima-tionofsociologistLewisYablonsky)becausethe BPP and similar groups channeled youngblack and Chicano youth who might have par-ticipatedingangbangingviolenceintorela-tivelypositiveefforts for social changethroughpolitical activities. GANG PEACEWhentheBlackPantherPartycollapsed,gangsespeciallytheCripslledthevacuumtheyleft. Yet theinuenceof thePanthers gangabatement workcouldstill befelt decades later.In 1992, shortly before Los Angeles exploded in rioting after the Rodney King verdict, sev-eralofthecitysgangsenteredintoacease-re. As documentedby anthropologist Joo H.Costa Vargas in his book Catching Hell in theCity of Angels, the process of negotiation had begun more than a year earlier and continued foryearsafter.Itwasinitiatedbyoldergangmembers and was supported by the CoalitionAgainst Police Abuse (CAPA), an organizationfounded by former Panthers deliberately try-ing to keep the Partys legacy alive while alsolearning fromits mistakes. CAPAserved as anintermediary between gangs early in the pro-cess, andtheNationof Islamprovidedsecurityduring direct talks. Later, CAPA helped found the Community in Support of the Gang Truce(CSGT). Inadditiontosupporting gang negoti-ations, CSGTofferedyoung people video, com-puter, andjobtraining, andagitatedfor reformof the criminal legal system.OnMarch27,1992,representativesofBloodsandCripssetsfromfourhousingprojectsinWattsNickersonGardens,Jor-danDowns,ImperialCourts,andHacienda Villagesignedanagreementmodeledonthe1948ArabIsraelicease-re.Gangviolenceimmediatelydropped. That summer, truce areas averaged two gang-related homicides each month, down from sixteen the previous year.Whats more, peace provedcontagious. Inhis bookStreet Wars: Gangs and the Future of Violence, Tom Hayden reports that ata 1993 meeting of more than a thousand gang members in LAsElysian Park, the Mexican Maa declared an end to drive-byshootings andthreatenedthat thosecontinuingthetacticwould bedealt with inprison. Theyspecicallyforbadethekilling ofwomen and children, and suggested that disputes be settled bysingle combat. Drive-bys immediately declined by 25 percent.By 1998, gang-relatedhomicides were down36.7 percent.Thetruceheldformostofadecade,andevenlongerinWattsno thanks to the cops. The police did everything theycouldtodisruptthecease-fires,usingmanytacticsfamil-iarfromtheCOINTELPROcampaignagainstthePanthers.Hayden reports that police conspicuously surveilled negotiat-ing meetings, andcops raidedparties celebrating the cease-reor promoting neighborhoodpeace. Truce leaders were arrested onold, minor, or dubious charges, andweresometimes targeted for deportation. Groups like Homies Unidos, which promoted intergangdialogue,foundthemselvessubjecttocontinuous harassment.Policeeventriedintimidatingwitnesseswait-ing to testify about the truce before the California state sen-ate. They also inltrated the negotiating teams, spread rumors intendedtocreatedistrust,andwronglylabeledgangmem-bers as informants in a bid to provoke retaliation. CAPAleader Michael Zinzun photographed uniformed cops spray-paintingone gangs colors over anothers, a likely trigger for a turf war.(The photo was later publishedinCovertAction Quarterly.) Itseemsthat,howevermuchthecopsmayhavedisliked gang violence, they liked gang peace even less. Banging keptthe gangs divided, thus weaker, and produced fear and hostil-ity in the broader community (which could then be leveraged intoameasureofsupportforthepolice).Trucingmaynothave united the rival sets, but it did mean they werent shoot-ing at each other quite so much, and the effort brought them a level of community support. Its not hard to see why the cops wouldprefer oneover theother. Whatever their limitations and contradictions, in the period of rebellion, gangs represented an armed challenge to state control. As with so much of policeactivity, here, too, reducing crime is less of an issue than main-taining power. Anexcerpt fromOur Enemies inBlue: Police andPower inAmer-ica by KristianWilliams. Reprintedwithpermission.Kristian Williams is the author of Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America, the third edition of which is being published by AK Press in August. He is also a Conversation Project leader, facilitating the program Keeping Tabs on America: Surveillance and You.Group TherapyCopping out at an uptown slumber partyDIONISIA MORALESTHE SIX OF US SAT CROSS-LEGGEDINFLANNELNIGHTGOWNS AROUND THE GAMEboard.Its my turn, Susan said. She picked a card fromone of the stacks in the middle of the board and read it out loud: Assume the fetal position, close your eyes, and rocking back and forth, makeappropriate sounds. She got aneasy one.It was afewmonths intothestart of seventhgrade. Theweekbefore, Susanhadcalledtoinviteme to her sleepover. She had lots of plans for the party. She wanted to put on a cabaret where wemade up the songs and dances. She thought we could build a stage using books and pillows, and make a curtaininthe doorway. She wantedeveryone to dress inmens clothes as costumes.27 Oregon Humanities 26 Summer 2015SafeBe sure to bring an oxford shirt and a necktie, shed said over the phone. The shirt can be any color but needs to havelittle buttons onthe collar. Okay?Okay, Idsaid.But it wasnt okay. My father didnt have that kind of shirt.His button-downs had spread collars, the ones with thick tri-angles that ared stify. And he didnt wear pale blue, white, or pastel pink, likeSusans father did. Myfather woreshades of yel-lowandbrown, whichcomplementedhis darkcomplexion. And my fathers shirts didnt have a logo onthe pocketno alligator,or poloplayer, or sheepsuspendedbyaribbon. But I couldnt tell Susanthat; I didnt knowher that well. Infact, I didnt knowany-oneat myschool well enoughtoadmit that I didnt havetherightshirttobring.Thatafternoononthephonewedtalkedonlyabout the cabaret; shednever saidanything about the game. Afterherfetal-positionperformance, Susanreceivedvewithit votes from the rest of us and moved her piece on the board. Nowme, said another girl. She drewher card: Do an inter-pretative dance that shows how you feel when you think nobodylikes you. Another easy one, I thought. We were playing GroupTherapy. WhenSusanhadgottenthebox down off the bookcase outside of her parents bedroom, theother girls either seemed to have heard of or played it before. Inwhitewritingontheall-blacklid, theboxread: Is it reallyagame? Game night at my house was sporadic andtypically involved rounds of Clue or Monopoly. When Susan unpacked the pieces forGroupTherapy,Ididntseeanysilvermedallions,fakemoney, or golf pencils. The playing board was a circle divided into yellow, red, and blue segments labeled hung up, grouptherapist,andfree.Besidesthebulbous,whiteplayingtokens, the rest of the game consistedof stacks of cards. I dont knowhowto play, Idsaid, hoping to sit out. Its easy, Susansaid. Youll get it right away. Inthegame,eachplayertakesaturnandchoosesacard fromoneof thethreepiles of color-codedtherapist cards. Theplayer thenperforms the actionthat is statedonthe card. After the player responds to the card she has drawn, everyone elsevotes to determine whether the player was with it by actinghonestly or had copped out by not being open with the group.Theplayer whodrewthecardthenmoves her pieceaccordingtothe results of the group vote. The object of the game is to get somanywithit votes that youaretherst toreachthefree spotontheboard. I didnt knowit then, but thegamewas thebyprod-uct of the sensitivity training experiences andpersonal growthgroups popular in the 1960s. By the time of Susans party tenyears later, thesetherapeuticprinciples hadbeenboileddowntothe dimensions of a ten-by-twenty-inch box and were availableinretail stores. Sofar, I was losingthegameandtryingnot tobeobvious thatI was losing onpurpose. I went to a private middle school, where I wasnt like most ofthe kids. They wore sneakers I couldnt afford and spent week-ends at their country houses in the Berkshires. They often ateout at restaurants andknewhowtoski. Andwhat impressedmethe most was that they lived in apartment buildings with door-men. WhenI was invitedfor playdates, I measuredthedistancebetween my life and theirs by whether they had a housekeeper,a cook, a nanny, or all three. My family hadnone.Myparentsworkedhardtoaffordtheschool.Wewerentpoor, but we werent rich either. I never invited kids over to myapartment because even if I could trust themenough to ignorewhat I considered the obvious deciencies of our small, three-bedroomapartment, I couldnt riskthat theymight discover wehad cockroaches. During the day, the bugs usually didnt showtheirtwitchy,antennaeheads,butyouneverknewwhenyoumight spot apaperybrowneggcaseonacounter or inacorner. Inseventhgrade, I lookedforwardtomeeting newkids. Susanwas new, and I thought maybe she would be more like me or maybeshe wouldnt notice whenI was pretending to be someone else.MELISSA MCFEETERSSusan was new, and I thought maybe she would be more like me or maybe she wouldnt notice when I waspretending to be someone else.29 Oregon Humanities 28 Summer 2015SafeI hadbeento Susans house once before and wed had a good time listening to records and flippingthroughcopiesofSeventeenmaga-zine, but withthe other girls around, there was more pressure to impress her. Seventhgrade is atimeof developmental awkwardness, marked bytrainingbras,sanitarynapkins,andacne.That makes going to a sleepover with a bunchof twelve-year-old girls you dont knowa formof social risk-taking: everything has to be justright. WhenI toldmymother that I didnt wanttogotothepartybecauseof theshirt, sherum-magedthroughmy fathers clothes to ndone.Howaboutthisone?shesaid,holdingup a tan button-down. Or these? She had a light brown shirt in one hand and a gold onein the other.IF I HAD GIVEN HER A MOMENT LONGER, shewouldhavealsofoundthepeach-and butter-colored ones. But I turned to leave theroombefore she couldask, Whats wrong withthem?becauseIdidntknowhowtotellher that everythingwas wrongwiththem. Andtheywerent just thewrongcolor withthewrongcol-larstyle. Myfathersshirtsliveddowntown, and the shirts belonging to the other girls fathers liveduptown.Myfathersshirtscamefromstores in our neighborhood and not the stores east of the park. Andeventhoughthe shirts theothergirlswouldbebringingmightbesubtlydifferent in cut or color, they would have a gen-eralsamenesstothemandwouldntlooklikeanything myfather wore.Thedaysbeforetheparty,Ichewedtheinsideofmylipsandcrackedmyknuckles until they felt hollow and wide. Being invited toSusanswasasignofinclusion,butbeingincluded was no guarantee of acceptance. Thenight beforetheparty, mymother foldedoneofmy fathers shirts and a tie in a plastic bag and put it by my door. In the morning, I pushed itunder my bed, told my mother I had packed itwith my things, and strategized how Id lie toSusanabout forgetting it. WhenI arrivedat Susans, thecabaret plan-ning was already in full swing. Susan opened the door and swept me up in the action. WhenI told her I had forgotten a shirt, she ran out ofher roomandyankedanextrafromher fathers closet.Thetightcottonweavewassoftlikepajamas;itwas perfect. We spent the late afternoon making up routines and scavenging for props. When the girls asked my opinion aboutwhether we should build a stage, I didnt take a side. A stagewould be cool, I said. But maybe we dont need one. I wanted tostayongoodtermswitheveryone.Afterdinner,Susans parents politely sat through our haphazard production beforeretreating to their bedroomand surrendering the living room,where we unrolled sleeping bags and made pallets out of sofa cushionstosettleinforthenight.Theoxfordshirtsandties were scattered on the oor like shed skins. I felt free of them.WemadepopcornandhuddledaroundtheTVtowatchtheABCSaturdaynight primetimelineup: Love Boat andFantasy Island. Anyonetakingaquicksurveyoftheroomwouldnthavepicked me out as different inmy plaid annel nightgown, fuzzybluesocks,andponytail.Acasualobserverwouldnothavedetected my secret: how much it mattered to me that I didnthavetheclothes, trendyshoes, fancyapartment, or richparents theother girls had. Inscienceclass wedlearnedabout howsomeanimal species have natural camouage that helps themavoid attack. Some change their appearance to blend in to their sur-roundings and others alter their behavior. Then there are spe-cies that dont try to hide at all and instead protect themselves bystandingout. Wedreadabout brightlycoloredtreefrogs thatclashwiththeir greensurroundings becausevibrancysends themessage that they might be poisonous. For me, Susans partywas like a small ecosystem within the larger, hostile environ-ment of middle school. I just wanted to look and act like every-one else; I felt safest whenhiding inplainsight. WhenRicardoMontalbndeliveredhisclosinglinesonFantasy Island at eleven oclock, I thought I was in the clear. I thought wed turnoff the TVand get ready for bed. But instead,Susantiptoeddownthehall toseewhether her parents werestill awake and returned with the box shed pulled from the book-case. Shedidnt saythat wewerent supposedtoplay, but thewayshe carefully closed the door between the living room and thehall leading toher parents roommade the act feel forbidden, as if shedpluckeda copyof The Joy of Sexoff the shelves insteadofthe GroupTherapy game.WHEN WE D STARTED THE GAME,EVERYONE HAMMED uptheir responses therst coupleof rounds, mostlytryingtogettheother girls tolaugh. But Susanwantedus totaketheinstruc-tions on the cards seriously and told us we should stop goongaround. She wantedus to play to win. Now, it was my turn. I drew a card. It read: Talk about yourloneliness. This card would have been hard to answer honestly, but itwas aneasy one to dodge. Mybrothersdontliveathomeanymore,Isaid.AndI really miss them.I lookedaroundthecircleof girls. Theyseemedtobewaitingfor more.Theyre much older than me, but were really close. I feel lonely nowthat its just me at home withmy parents. I got one withit vote andfour copouts. I movedmy play-ingpiecebackwardontheboard. If I hadbeeninterestedinwin-ningthegame, I couldhavetoldthegirls about thetimeingradeschool when a group of kids snickered at my polyll jacket thatwas supposed to imitate the downjackets that were so popular.I couldhave toldthemthat I never saidanything about the inci-dent tomy mother because it only wouldhave made her feel bad about not being able to buy the fancier coat. But saying thosethings wouldhave blownmy cover.The instructions to the game didnt include any explanationof an effective therapeutic group. We didnt know, for example,that goodgroups emphasizetheuniversal truths that bindindi-viduals together. Nor didweknowthat groups havegroundrules aboutcreatingasafeenvironmentforsharingthoughtsand feelings,reservingjudgment,andprotectingcondentiality. Or maybe the instructions did include that information, and we skipped over it. Growing up with two brothers, Id learned that boys tended to test their boundaries witheachotherthroughphysicalfeatsandghts.Butmyexperiencewithgirlsatschoolhad taught methat theycoulddomoredamagewithanover-the-shoulderglanceorawell-timed raised eyebrow than with any thrown punch.That, after all, was why I hadnt dared showupto the sleepover with the wrong kind of shirt,andwhy, now, I didnt dare tell the whole truthwhen I drew my cards. I just wanted someoneto winso we couldstop.Looking around the living roomI pictured Susansparentsplayingwiththeirfriends,chairspulledaroundthecoffeetable,emptywineglasses set downonthe oor by the couchorononeofthebuilt-inbookcases.Thiswas a game for people who entertained; it was nowonder that my parents didnt have a copy. MyparentswentbowlingonFridaynights,butneverinvitedanyonefromtheirleaguebackto the apartment for a drink. My father was analcoholic, andmymother refusedtohaveliquor inthehouse,somyfatherdrankatthelocal bars instead. Each night we didnt know whattoexpectwhenweheardhiskeyinthedoor.My mother never suggested hosting a cocktail partyandbristledwhentheyhadtoattendone.It was too easy to imagine howquickly an eve-ning of GroupTherapy at my house wouldturnsour after my father had had a fewbeers. Of all of my secrets, this was the most important oneto conceal. It was the one that even my mother didnt tell anyone. As we played, I made a listof the questions I prayed werent hiding in thestack of therapist cards: Pantomime your fathers greatest aw.Inonesentence,tellthegroupwhatyoud change about your parents.Whatsthelastthingyouwantanyoneto knowabout you? Act it out.When I suggested we all go to bed, the girls accusedmeofwantingtoquitbecauseIwaslosing.WhenIaskedifIcouldjustdropout,they toldme not to be a baby.Okay, I said. Ill keepgoing. Two turns later, one of the girls drew this For me, Susans party was like a small ecosystem within the larger, hostile environment of middle school. I just wanted to look and act like everyone else;I felt safest when hiding inplain sight.31 Oregon Humanities 30 Summer 2015SafeWE RECAMPEDONABLUFF, ANDtheearlyafternoonsunisunrelent-ing. In this kind of heat, everything looks sortofwashedout.Mytentshimmersacoupleoffeet fromthechasm, or at least what feels likea chasm, aminiaturegorgecarvedbythestreamthatemptiesfromthelake.Overbythelake,theforestistoodensetospreadoutin,plus the bugs, plus the snakes, and the funny thingabout old growth is that the trees have takensucha beating over the centuries andare miss-ing so many limbs that they dont provide thekindof shelter youdndeveninastandof babytrees. Sowereout intheelements. Ontheother side of the clearing, Aly and Mollie are playingwiththedogs.Theothersarebushwhackingsomewhere above the lake, looking for a nine-hundred-year-oldtree.Dempsey and I end up scooting our CrazyCreeks into the hollow behind my tent, wherewewaitfortheshadetoarrive.Itsactuallynot my tent, its my parents, the ageless grayREI wonder, still standingafter morethantwodecades. I wonder whentheylast slept init. Has card: Whichone of your fellowplayers is the leasthonest? She didnt hesitate before pointing atme,sayingthatmyanswersweretoopoliteand that I was trying too hard to be everyones friend.Yeah, its a game, but youre not really fol-lowing the rules, someone said.Ithought,Eventhemakersofthegamedidntthinkitwasagame.Itsaidsorightonthe box.Andyouneverhadanopinionaboutthecabaret, saidanother.Nooffense,thefirstgirlsaid.Butits really annoying.Everyonehelduptheirwithitcardsinsupport of her frankness about my lack of hon-esty. They waited for me to vote. I had a choicetomake: lashout, red-hot angry, andgive thema reason to think twice about hurting my feel-ings in the future, or go along with it. I held upmy with it card. It was the rst honest thingIddoneallnight.Myfacefeltwarmandmythroat started to purse. I willed myself not tocry.Ithoughtthegirlswerebeingmean,butreally I was upset withmyself because I hadntbeen fooling anyone all day. I pulled my knees up to my chest and tugged on the inside of mylower lip with my teeth while the girls playedon. I tested howhard I could bite down on theeshwithout inching or breaking the skin.Idontrememberhowmuchlongerweplayedorwhowon.Whenwefinallyturnedoff the lights, I only remember pretending tobe asleep while the others talked in whispers.WhenIwokeup,therewereGroupTherapycardsscatteredaroundthefloor.Someonemusthaveswattedtheboardwithanarmor apillowinthenight.IknewIdidntwanttohelpcleanthemup,soItoldSusansmother that I felt sick and wanted to call my mother topick me up early. I got dressed and packed mythings,andsatinthekitchenwiththeother girls while they ate breakfast and I waited for my mother to arrive.Thegirlslaughedrememberinghowmuchtroublewed had putting up the curtain for the cabaret and sang lines fromthe songs wed made up. But I focused my attention on Susans mother, who was making pancakes for everyone. She worked two pans and served each girl one pancake at a time. I thoughtthis was inconsiderate, because its never satisfying to eat themthat way. My mother had a much better system. She kept pan-cakes warminthe oven, put a whole stackonthe table, andthendoledoutfreshonestoaddtopeoplesplates.WhenSusans mother offered me a pancake, I told her I felt too sick to eat. Butreally I was thinking that nothing I could eat here would sat-isfy me. At my house, I could put a pat of butter between eachpancake and keep a small lake of syrup on the side. My father liked an extra-tall stackve or six in a tower that he soaked in syrup. He wouldnt have liked eating breakfast here either. I asked Susans mother for a glass of water. Drinking it made mefeel less hungry.When my mother arrived, she instinctively raised her hand tomyforeheadtofeelforafever.IthankedSusanandher mother for inviting me andtoldeveryone Idsee themat school.They waved and screamed my name. Feel better, they said. I could still hear them at the elevator after Susans mother had closedthe door. Didyouhave a goodtime? my mother said.I nodded.Didyoufeel sick all night?I shrugged.Onthe way home, I askedmy mother if she wouldmake pan-cakes for me.I dont feel as sick anymore, I said. We walked to the subway station and while we stood on theplatformwaiting, I made a plan for retrieving the bag with theshirt fromunder my bed. Idget it while my mother was cooking,bringit tothekitchen, andset it onanemptychair. ThenIdsit inmy usual spot at the kitchen table, in the corner facing the win-dow. Id rest my feet on the supports and press my hands on thetabletop to settle into my chair. This always made the tabletopcreak when it shifted on the pedestal. I could hear that sound soclearlya low wooden groan accented with a throaty pop. Thetrain roared into the station, and we boarded and found seats. A tensionsoftened inthe space betweenmy shoulder blades as thedoors closedandthetrainlurchedinthedirectionof home.Dionisia Morales is originally from New York City but now calls Oregon home. Her essays have appeared or are forth-coming in Crab Orchard Review, Hunger Mountain, Colorado Review, the MacGuffn, and elsewhere. This Is Not Just a CloudEmbracing grief in the wildernessMICHAEL HEALDMIA NOLTING33 Oregon Humanities 32 Summer 2015SafeT H R E E S I L HOU E T T E S E ME R G E A G A I N S T T H Ecloudless sky: Jack, Russ, Brett. Past the poison oak, over thefallentrees,throughthewildflowers,uptheledges,theyvefoundtheirwaytothetopofthemountainabovethelake.Theyve probably even found the tree. Their arms are raised. Itis their hills, not mine, that are alive.ONEWEEKBEFORESHEDIED, IWASLYINGAWAKEINher room, thinking about raisins. Awatchedpot will never boil,but we were quickly learning that stage four sarcoma doesntobey the laws of physics. Over the thrumand gurgle of the oxy-genmachine, I couldhear her slowly drowning.I had a curfewall the way through high school. Midnight as a freshman, 12:30 as a sophomore. It got progressively looser as I neared the end, but one thing that didnt change was that,nomatterthetime,Iwasalwaysexpectedtocrackopenmyparents door and let Mom know Id made it home safely. Shecouldntfallasleep,sheexplained,untilsheheardmyvoice.Their roomwas at the end of a long hallway on the second oor of our house. If Id been drinking, I would stop in the kitchenand scoop a handful of whatever I found in the pantry into mymouth. Cereal, chips, or, if there were any, raisins: raisins werelike tiny sponges, erasing all evidence of my evening ina matter of seconds.Inolongerchewedraisinstodisguisemydrinking,eventhough, for the past month, I had been drinking far more thanwas goodfor me. I hadalsobeenkissingher nonstop, kissingher everytimeI enteredtheroom, everytimeshesmiled, everytimeI accepted the truth of what was happening. One of the strang-est things about the illness was that her breath smelled differ-ent. Sweet, unexpectedly fresh, as though the cancer bloominginside of her were in tune with the arrival of spring. It was therst week of April, andPortlandhadbecome terribly beautiful.I sat up in bed, opened my laptop, and e-mailed my friend Andy to ndout if it was normal for cancer to smell this good.Is she still eating? Andy asked. Andy, a doctor, was onlineat weirdtimes because he was inRwanda.Well,shecertainlyhasntlosthersweettooth,Ireplied proudly, almost deantly, before admitting that it hadbeensev-eral days since shed eaten anything other than applesauce or ice cream.Have you ever known an anorexic? Andy asked, as gentlyas possible. That sweet smell is one of the things we look for. Itmeans shes starving.I blinked at those words, angry at Andy for thinking I was ready for the truth. Gradually, I realized her voice was comingtoward me through the dark. What are you doing? she was asking. Sorry, I said, closing my laptop, regretting its glow. Did I wake you?The blankets, she said, picking at them.Ipiledthematthefootofthehospitalbed.Herfeverhad jumped to 102. I grabbed a washcloth, soaked it in cold water,and pressed it to her neck. I could feel the heat radiating fromher skin. Every few minutes I rushed to the bathroom to runmore coldwater onthe washcloth. Whenshe was feeling strongenoughto roll onto her side, I slid the washclothto her back. All this time I was ghting the urge to wake my brother, or Dad, or Auntie Carol, but tonight was my turn, and they needed to rest,andwhat couldthey do that I wasnt already doing?ASTHESMOKEFROMOURCAMPFIREBEGINSTOCURLskyward, I feel adroponmyforearm. Or maybeImjust imagin-ing it. Didanybody feel that? I ask. Its just a wet cloud, Jack says, blowing onthe re. Come on, I say, youre not evenlooking up. I wouldnt worryabout this turningintoanything, hesays. Nevertheless, we quickly gather everything weve scattered aroundthebluff andthrowit inour tents. If it does rain, I confesstoJack, Icant vouchthat theagelessgraywonderwill keepus dry.WhenIwasakid,whenwewerenewtoPortland,Ilovedtherain.Theideaofthings just going on as planned, no matter howwet itgot, was mind-blowing. In NewYork, all it had takenwasaforecast andwewerestuckat home.But out here, middle-school soccer was just a bunch of slide tackling in the mud. Sometimes we couldnt evennd the ball, but the ball ulti-matelywas besidethepoint, whichwas toget as dirty as possible. In high school cross-countryIdswimthroughthestuffwithawild-eyed thirst. But ever since I moved out on my own,its been different. Wet clothes arent so greatwhen you have to go to the laundromat. Not tomentionthat gettingsick, suchapleasurewhenMomwas there to take care of me, has becometheloneliest part of livingalone. I knowImnotsupposedtosaythisasaPortlander,buttherain? It makes me feel vulnerable.This is not just a cloud, I say, digging outmy poncho. Its really starting to come down.Everyones layering up around the re, tryingnottogivein.Everyoneexceptforthedogs,whoknowbetterandhavealreadybegged their way into Russ and Mollies tent. Whereas wehumans, wemayhavewhiskey, wemayhavestoriestotell,butwevestillgot,whattwo,threehours of daylight toget through? Thereis hissing sort of sadly, the coals rolling toward each other, looking for dry spots, then glaringupat us likewhy eventry. I dont thinkI candothis, I tell my friends. I tell themImgoing togo standunder a tree.They think Imjoking.ButIvealreadyleftthefire.Myplan,I it been eight years? Ten? At what point will itstopbeing theirs?ImreadingabookbymyfriendScott.Scottsgoingtobefamous,ItellDempsey; infacthealreadysortofis,becausehesnotafraidtotell the truth. The theme of this book isa sound, I readaloud. It goes like this: Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.Hmm, says Dempsey.Isnt it great?I think I needmore context, he says.Here,Isay,gesturingvaguelyattheancient,fucked-uptrees.Howsthisfor context?Dempsey rocks back and forth in his CrazyCreek.Whatever, I say. Tick, tick, tick. I couldntask for a better book to bring out here. As longas it doesnt rain, Ill be happy.We retreat into our usual cozy silence. Inchby inch, the sunbegins tosinkbehindthe crestof thetent. Howgrateful I amfor theshadeand the book and the tired legs. Howgrateful I amforfriendswhoputupwithme,friendswhocall me on my shit, friends who get me out ofmyapartment.HowgratefulIam,Irealizewithastart,forhowquicklyMomdied,thather dyingdidnt goonall summer, all year. Thatthis weekend, inaway, was oneof her nal gifts tomeoh, but howcanthat be true? HowcanI be grateful for that? HowcanI be happy?One answer comes inthe formof our friend Jacks unmistakable tenor, echoing across thevalley. Uphere! Jack hollers. Uphere!Getting sick, such a pleasure when Mom was there to take care of me, has become the loneliest part of living alone. MIA NOLTING35 Oregon Humanities 34 Summer 2015Safeguess, is tostandsomewherewithinearshot, as if were all just waiting for the bus and theyrethe dummies getting wet. But as I look closer,I notice that the trees at the edge of the clear-ingarentjustbeatenup;theyliterallyhaveno branches. Its kind of like being stuck in a crowd:youvegotthisillusionofshelter,butwhenyoulook uptheres nothing there.T H E H A R DE S T PA R T OF HO S P I C Ehome care was the change in philosophy, thefact that therewerenomoreemergencies. Evenwhen her fever spiked, even when she couldntstop coughing up blood, the ERwas off-limits.It was up to us and the growing pile of meds onthe bathroomcounter to see this through.Is that any better? I asked, pressing thewashclothto her collarbone.Youre so goodto me, she said.I didnt deserve those words. I knew therewas more I could be doing, things I was over-lookingicecubeswouldntcrossmyminduntil thefollowing morning. Caregiving seems sosimple fromafar, but whenits 2:00a.m. and youreactuallydoingit,simpledoesntenter the equation.Afterawhile,shetoldmeshewasfeelingbetter. You cant just sit here watching me for the rest of thenight, she said.But I have to, I wanted to say. Dont youunderstand? Ill neverlet youdie.Her handfoundthe backof my neck. As if I were the one whowas sick. As if I were the one who needed comforting. The tears gathered at the end of my nose. I held my hands open but in thedarknessIcouldntcatchanything.Darling,shesaid,youneedto rest. Youhave your ownlife, too.Forsomanyyears,somanyjobs,somanydeadlines,and so many excuses, thats what I thought I wantedmy own life.Space. Independence. Freedom. All the big words. But fuck thebig words. What I wantedwas the courage tosay a wordI hadntsaidindecades.ONT HE O T HE R S I DE OF T HE C L E A R I NG , T HE pathbendsaroundthelakeandintotheforest. Whenwegot hereyesterday, I made it maybe a quarter of the way around beforeturning back, convinced that there was poison oak all over theplace. This time, at least Imwearing layers. Every fty steps or soI pass apinkribbon. Theribbons aretiedtotheundergrowth,probablytheworkof aconcernedsherman. Theresnoquestionthat Id lose the trail without them, but Imtoo angry about therain to think about the symbolism. Stupidly I take a swipe atone of the giant ferns, and it shakes itself off on my feet, soak-ing my shoes. Stupid, stupid, I say. No matter howdeepI go, howmany ribbons I pass, I cant seemto get underneath anything.The undergrowth thickens, the path narrows, but above me its just wet air andbare trunks. I blunder on and arrive at a fork. To my right, the path hugs the lake. To my left, it goes up. I dont remember this fromyes-terday, upbeinganoption. MaybeI didnt makeit thisfar. MaybeI didnt want to.Tonight,though,Ihaveachoice.AndIchooseup.Thats where I ndher. The one withthe branches.Ive never hugged a tree before. Never gottenpast the clich,never dugmynoseintonine-hundred-year-oldbark, never kneltonnine-hundred-year-oldroots, never allowedmyself tofeel all thoseslow, quiet centuries. Its sodrybeneathher, thepinenee-dles under my toes are crinkling like crepe paper. But soon all I canhear is myowngrief. Its awful andelemental andunhinged and ecstatic. I havent let myself go like this since the momentshe died. I didnt realize howhard I was looking, or that it was evenpossible, but forty-ve days later, here she is.NOTLONGBEFORESHEDI ED, IMANAGEDTOSAYI T. We had just nished reading The Polar Express. It was spring,but all week long wed been on a Christmas-story kick. Some-thing about the fresh, expensive smell of Chris Van Allsburgs illustrations,combinedwiththesmoothnessofthepages,reminded me of how it felt, as a child, to stretch out in front ofthere,restingmychinonmyhands.Idbarelybeenabletoget through the last page, the part about the bell, the bell thatalmost everyone stops being able to hear.WhenI saidit, her eyes snappedopen. Was she blushing?I saidit again, luxuriating inevery part of the word.What are you doing? she said, ghting back a smile. Whyare yousaying that?I kept saying it andsaying it. I didnt expect anything tohap-pen, I just wantedher to hear it.Somehow, shefoundthestrengthtolift her arms andpull mein. Weweresofar past thepoint whereshecouldprotect me, butshe was never going to stop trying. These were still her arms. I was still her baby. This was still our bell.TONIGHT, I MRINGINGITAGAIN.Mommy, I foldyouinto the soil.Mommy, I breathe youinto the bark.Mommy, I mix youinwiththe sap.Mommy, I sendyouacross the lake.When she is everywhere, I fall silent. HowlonghaveIbeenouthere?Thedayisnearlygone, but its still raining. I wonder if theothers have stuck it out at the re. I wonder if theres any whiskey left. I wonder if the dogs will wantto come.Imrunning throughthe woods. Imfollow-ing the ribbons. Soon, I can smell the smoke. I can hear the voices. Its time to get my friends out of the rain. Michael Heald is the author of Goodbye to the Nervous Apprehension, a col-lection of essays. A writer at large for Runners World magazine, he is also the publisher of Perfect Day Publishing. He lives in Portland.We were so far past the point where she could protect me, but she was never going to stop trying. These were still her arms. I was still her baby. This was still our hell.MIA NOLTING37 Summer 2015S