Haiku – I will write a book -Judge Hylden – Lusitania by Eric Larson – wrestling with my conscience – Tom Agnew’s example -“They was just Niggers” – where my home is – How my blog is a very big part of everything that is wrong with the Duluth Schools – Cosmetics – My parent’s example – Sophie’s Choice…….
Since waking up at 5 this morning these are a few of the things that have run through my mind to blog about…..a few of them. I am a writer, a half-ass writer probably but a writer nonetheless. When I was younger I considered politics to be my future thus setting off on a career leading to my achieving mediocrity as a Duluth school board member. That seemed to be seconded by my [“Buddy”] who emailed me yesterday that he really enjoys reading this blog that I frequently link to – that described me as mediocre. Of course, my Buddy would say this. I emailed my Buddy back and wrote that if I could stand his calling me a “bigot” I could handle being described as “mediocre.”
Currently my writing career is even less stellar than my political career. I do, however, make nice snow sculptures. That’s to my credit. I think! There is one thing I do believe about myself and have since getting elected to the Mankato State Student Senate as Vietnam roiled my college campus along with marijuana smoke, Earth Day, a-riot-a-year that burned down whole (usually black) neighborhoods across the nation. What I believe about myself is that I am the most reasonable man. I know that is a tall claim for a man of such demonstrably limited accomplishment but I believe it – to this day. I work very hard to put myself in the other fella’s shoes; to see things as he sees them……and yes, of course, I’m using one gender in this sentence when I mean both, although really…I’d have a hell of a time standing in, let alone walking in, high heels.
Long time readers of my blog (poor benighted souls they) will probably recognize hints from the partial list at the beginning of this post of things I’m alluding to. If they are long time residents of Duluth they will recognize even more. I’ve got a lot of things on my mind. The writer in me, in every good writer, must choose to tell their welter of thoughts one word at a time, one idea at a time, one sentence, paragraph, chapter and book at a time until Cat’s Cradle or War and Peace emerge apparently fully formed.
The book Ulysses by the author James Joyce is famous for being the best mostly unread book in English literature. It’s a quarter million words long and it’s all about a single day in Dublin back in 1904. I’ve never read it although I’m suddenly tempted to add it to my list of about a thousand must reads. The Wikipedia entry offers one of its many delicious sentences which I would alter thusly: “History [Our school board] is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.”
A quarter million words about a single day in Dublin! Imagine that! Now imagine a novel of similar detail dedicated to a year’s worth of days or a lifetime’s. Its amazing to think that each of us could live a novel’s worth every day of our lives. My lousy little blog only manages a few posts of miscellaneous length on about two of every three days. Even so, in its own way, it’s a little Joycian especially the “mostly unread” part of it.
My greatest preoccupation is not the school board. It’s me, as the viewer of my life. Too often it is written without the benefit of being able to put on other people’s shoes because they’ve been hidden in a closet to hide the scuff marks. If Ullysses is a quarter million pages long it’s got nothing on Lincolndemocrat.org. Years ago I calculated that I had written a couple million words just on the “Red Plan.” All of it has been hurled over Niagara one word at a time.
I’m not poet. I could never be satisfied with haiku although that might make for an easier summary of the Duluth School Board. To wit:
Good People for kids
Learning to hate each other
Wrecking their own schools
If I wasn’t impelled to keep writing I could stop there. Actually my haiku could be altered slightly to cover just about every news story I’ve ever read.
So, I’m reading a fantastic book out loud to Claudia. Its “Dead Wake” by Eric Larson. It’s the nonfiction story of the Lusitania’s sinking. It was an event that my Congressional Medal of Honor winning Grandfather didn’t think merited America’s entry to World War I – which he blamed on causing World War II. I know already that we will finish the book (unlike the last two novels that I only managed to get two thirds of the way through before our interest in them petered out).
That’s the kind of book I would like to write only in my case I’ve got much smaller stories to tell: my Mom’s determination to become an abstract artist; the Duluth School Board through the years I’ve haunted it; Minnesota’s biggest, but now forgotten, political scandal that had Duluth as its point of origin; my Grandfather Robb’s experiences that, while extraordinary, didn’t quite elevate him to the level of heroism that the flawed little man, Martin Luther King, managed to take on.
I will write a book – barring my getting hit by a car. That’s an echo of my childhood mantra: “I’ll live to be 100 barring my getting hit by a car.” Or in my book’s case getting stopped by being hit by a lawsuit. Ex Senator Ralph Doty begged the corporate behemoth Johnson Controls to do that to me in the Duluth Budgeteer five years ago. That would have been a mismatched fight. Even Art Johnston is only facing five clumsy school board members trying to push him off the School Board with a couple hundred grand of taxpayer dollars. By comparison, Johnson Controls employs twice as many people as live in the whole City of Duluth. They also have better lawyers than those at the disposal of the Duluth School Superintendent. Trust me. I keep lawsuits in mind every day I blog.
My conscience is wrestling with the problem outlined in yesterday’s Tribune. Do I defend Art Johnston by telling his side of the story even if it prolongs the trauma of the Duluth Schools? Well, I would drop the story like a brick (even stop blogging about it and the school board) if the five nice people in the majority paid the extortionate forty thousand bucks they forced Art to pony up when they attempted to do to Art what Johnson Controls had the good sense NOT to do – persecute and prosecute an honest man.
I assume that the majority will risk my further scrutiny despite a year’s worth of warnings from me not to go where they seem determined to head. If they go ahead and exact that small minded revenge against Art Johnston I will feel duty bound to help him pay those expenses. I believe I can find 2000 people who will donate $20 bucks each ($40,000) to Art on the off chance that I might actually do what I promised but failed to do five years ago – write a book about the School Board’s misadventures.
Like Michael Fedo’s unsavory book about Duluth in 1920 with its first unsavory book Title it’s a story worth telling although I’d really prefer to write it ten years from now so I could write it with a little more perspective. That would also let me get on with my other preferred writing projects.
Here’s the deal:
1. I may or may not complete this book. If you spend your money on it it’s for Art’s legal bills not for my guarantee of completing this project. (In my defense I did refund everybody that last time. In fact, I got a call from one of the buyers yesterday who told me that he kind of wished I hadn’t returned his $100 donation back then.)
2. Should I get it written I’ll see to it that everyone who helps pay Art Johnston’s legal bills ($20 dollar minimum donation) gets a copy.
3. If it is completed it will not be available until after the general election this November. And again with my record it may never be written in full.
4. It will probably borrow heavily from my blog……which will make it easier for me and will finally give folks who have never found their way to the Internet – good reliable senior voters – a chance to see why Ralph Doty wanted Johnson Controls to sue me.
5. If Art is not compensated I will continue to harp on our school board on my blog book or no book. I’m a lousy politician. I’m a lousy writer. I do, however, still consider myself a reasonable man. I believe a reasonable man has an obligation to stand by the truth at least in most circumstances. I hold on to the hope that a different school board will put our children on a higher level of priority than the seven of us on it now currently do. That alone justifies my faith, that “honesty is the best policy.”
We will learn on Tuesday whether this book project will commence that being the day the Board considers my proposal to pay off Art’s bills for the sake of putting the last eleven months behind us. By the way, I understand that my threat is a compelling reason for the Board not to do what I ask of them. I don’t respond to threats well either. They make me stubborn too. Therefore, if you see any of my colleagues (because they won’t be reading my blog) point out that their vote shouldn’t be in response to my threat. They really should vote for it to insure the peace and calm of the Duluth Schools and for our children’s sake. For that, $40,000 is a pittance.
