Writing Work Ethic vs. Procrastination--and, of course, Burn Notice!

Okay, I'll finally got it. The Burn Notice obsession, the attempts to clean and organize the house, the decision to take up running--they're all about avoidance. 

This is because I am working on revisions of a novel that I both love and hate. It's got such wonderful parts, and I know what I'm trying to say matters, and yet, I do not want to approach it yet again, trying to fix it. 

Even though, this time, I can not only see it clearly, but I have this fabulous critique group to give me outsider eyes and pinpoint precisely how to fix the issues that have dogged this novel since the beginning. 

Or, I could just blow the damn thing up. 

P.S. This was not a How To post. I'm sure you are just as capable as I of writing avoidance--or any other kind.

Burn Notice Explosions Part 2

Okay, so I'm obsessed with these Burn Notice explosions. Because there are hundreds of them. I know Miami is a big city and must have a lot of crime, but really? Nobody notices these hundreds of explosions? No one from the fire department has begun to clock their much-discussed bomb-maker fingerprints? 

I read the paper. Our local throwaway paper has a crime report, and the fire department report, too. Even I would start being suspicious after awhile if I kept seeing these explosions and fires. 

Oh, and the concussion thing? Like, hospital bed time? Like stage 3 chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Poor Michael, Sam and Fiona, dying young of chronic dementia, their brains rotted away and full of holes. 

In other words, do not try this at home. 

Burn Notice Thoughts--Explosions/Concussions Etc.

More Burn Notice Thoughts

Watching Burn Notice with a concussion provides an odd framework. Nearly every episode, our heroes and heroines blow something up, and we watch them leap--or get blown away--from the blast.

Nobody, however, gets a concussion, or if they do, they don't complain about it for more than a minute.

Your brain is soft, squishy stuff that floats inside the hard bone of your skull. When you are moving, brain and skull move along together. When you stop suddenly, skull stops, but brain keeps moving. This shears away connections at the base of the skull, but it gets worse. Brain hits side of skull, is knocked backwards, hits other side of skull, and winds up bruised all around. It's kind of like what happens to a house in an earthquake. Earth moves, house starts moving. Earth stops, starts going the other way, but house keeps moving in the first direction and either the walls flex like crazy and things fall down inside, or the house simply falls off foundation and everything goes boom.

I can speak about concussion now from experience, and I didn't even get blown up. I was ice-skating on a public rink where kids were breaking the rules and racing. (I had just told them to stop.) A tall teenager, going full speed, lost his balance and slide full speed into the back of my skates. I went up, then down, flat on my back. The helmet could protect some of the back of my head, but still, brain sheared, went front, went back, went up went down, while neck muscles got some pretty bad whiplash, ribs were bruised, elbow black and blue, etc. So, I know, really know, how dangerous being blown off your feet can be.

Of course, your brain isn't the only thing that would get messed up in an explosion. Hearing would be destroyed. Each time. 

But Mike, or Fiona, or Sam, or Jesse, all get up, and run or walk to someone important, who usually says something softly to them--some of the actors in particular have adopted that recent: "if I whisper my lines, I will sound more intense," school of acting. And our recently blown off their feet hero can hear them.

And we're not even talking about the times people slug someone in the head.

My little ones and I have enjoyed watching another show, Chuck, which has a lot of this stuff, too, but my husband doesn't like Chuck, preferring Burn Notice. "Chuck is a fairy tale," says my husband. Huh. Don't get me started.

Some Fascinating Reads From Last Year (Inspired by Literary Agent, Nephele Tempest--and Isn't That The Best Name Ever?

Nephele Tempest wrote a post about her favorite reads from last year. Not those she represents, just ones she read for joy.

She has some fabulous ones. I recommend you taking a gander, over at NepheleTempest.WordPress.com

And of course, I had to take her up on writing about my own favorites. Unfortunately for publishing, many of them are from least year or earlier, but oh, do they smoke!

Some books are comedies, like Nephele's choice of "The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry." I think of these as the perfect books to read when you're going through a divorce, or have a child in the hospital--enough meat and insight to give meaning, but you always know it will end happily. And though, like Nephele, I tend to skew female in authors I read, I'd put the Neil Gaiman/Terry Pratchett "Good Omens" in this category. It is without a doubt one of the funniest books I have ever read. I would also include Toby Barlow's "Babayaga," (another guy) and Christopher Moore's "Sacre Bleu." (Three guys, oy.)

I enjoyed the book "Hild" by Nicola Griffith, an exploration of Saint Hilda and got jealous of Saint Hilda's 7th Century, a world where, believably, women were expected to work, weave, bake, brew, plot and wield power side by side with the men we more often hear about.

Two books older books changed the way I look at the world. Both deal with the overwhelming horrors of the Holocaust--and you have to figure that any . One is called "Conscience and Courage" by Eva Fogelman; the other is "Shielding the Flame," an interview with Warsaw Ghetto uprising leader Marek Edelman, written by Hanna Krall. Fogelman, who participated in the research into bystander behavior, (those infamous--"would you torture someone if you were ordered to" experiments) became fascinated by those few who refused to follow orders, which lead to interviews and analysis of those who saved Jews during the war. Her insights are astounding. Edelman, who survived the Warsaw ghetto and was one of the young leaders of the uprising there--they held out for longer than almost every country in Europe--later became a noted cardiologist. I found his view of God and life to be earthshaking.

Right now, I'm immersed in research on Anna Leonowens and her King of Siam. "You just got another book about Thailand?" my husband asks, while I skip for joy--another book! Both Leonowens and Mongkut, historically, are vastly different from the way they have been presented in American culture via missionary Margaret Landon's "Anna and the King of Siam," and of course, "The King and I." Both straddle multiple cultures in ways we have not historically understood before.

Down the Rabbit Hole of Research pt. 2: Gabrielle Anwar, Burn Notice and Crazy Research

So, to recap. Gabrielle Anwar

married Shareef (nee Mark) Malnik

whose father is Al Malnik (get a load of the plastic surgery on these two)

with the ceremony performed by Tantric Kaballah Rabbi (!) and likely serial sexual assaulter and child predator, Marc Gafni, (nee Marc Winiarz) 

But the story gets both more interesting and crazier. The interesting part to me is that of Gabrielle Anwar's family.

 Grandpa on her father's side was Rafiq Anwar, from India. Rafiq went to England as an engineering student.  In London, he met Edith Reich, an Austrian Jew. (I cannot find a photo of her.)These two married and went back to India, where Rafiq became an actor. They had two children, one, a son, born in 1945. Which means they must have met before '45. Which hints that Edith had fled to England from the Nazis. 

In 1946, Rafiq starred in a film produced by his brother, Rashid, called Neecha Nagar, which won the first ever foreign language film award at Cannes that year. (The music was by a young guy named Private Ravi Shankar, and the dance segments, created by the doyenne of Indian cinema, Zohra Saigal,  were edited out for the Cannes screening.) 

Edith came back to London with her two children, followed by Rafiq, who also worked in Hollywood, in The Spy Who Loved Me and Lord Jim. Edith and Rafiq's story sounds rich and complex, something I would love to learn more about. Give a holler, everybody, if you know more than this bare outline I can find. 

Their son, Tariq, became a very well-known film editor: The Crucible, Oppenheimer, American Beauty, and The King's Speech, which earned him an Oscar nomination and two BAFTA Awards.He is now based in the United States and England. He is the father of actress Gabrielle Anwar. Mother is actress Shireen Anwar, nee Shirley Hills, and this is the only photo I can find. 

That's all the interesting part. The crazy part has to do with Michael Jackson, Al Malnik and Jackson's children:  Michael Jackson, Jr., Paris-Michael, and Prince Michael Jackson II, known as Blanket. More about that later. 

Sometimes, with the Internet, it's just fun to go down that rabbit hole. 

Down The Rabbit Hole: Internet Research About Nothing in Particular, Burn Notice, and Gabrielle Anwar

I'm a little slow on the uptake when it comes to popular culture, which is why I just discovered the TV series Burn Notice (via Netflix.) Of course, I had to look up the writers, producers and actors, and when I did, I fell down the All-Time, Bizarro Rabbit Hole of internet research, all intertwining around the actress Gabrielle Anwar.

I have nothing at all against Ms. Anwar. In fact, I think she is an actress of extraordinary brilliance, so good at expressing complexes emotions that her face seems almost translucent. The rabbit hole, however, began with an article about her recent wedding to a man called Shareef Malnik, the service performed by--as the papers stated--a Tantric Kabballah Rabbi who officiated and read passages from his book to the blissful couple.

Mark Gafni. (The One Not in
Red and Yellow)

"Tantric Kabballah Rabbi. The name, which implies a tantalizingly silly mix of Hindu sexual practices, Medieval Jewish mysticism and the term for a Jewish teacher, set my Hilarious Garbage Antennae twitching. Those antennae were accurate. The tantric Kabballah rabbi in question, one Marc Gafni, (born Marc Winiarz), has a Phd from Oxford, and has been believably accused of sexual assault many many different times, including the grooming and assault of a thirteen-year-old student.

The woman accusing Marc Gafni of grooming
 and then molesting her as a child

(http://forward.com/opinion/329620/i-was-13-when-marc-gafnis-abuse-began/?attribution=author-article-listing-1-headline)

Okay. Not exactly the guy I'd want at my wedding ceremony. Especially given that Anwar has three children by previous marriages and relationships, and her new husband also has a kid.

But if you want to go further down the rabbit hole, remember new hubby named Shareef Malnik? Hilarious Garbage Antennae go a bit haywire over that name. Is he the result of a Moroccan mixed marriage? A Jewish Mama's long-time crush on Omar Shariff?

Nope. Mr. Malnik was born as Mark Malnik in the U.S. in 1958.  In fact, Daddy is an all-American mob associate, Al Malnik, one-time lawyer for gangster, Mayer Lansky. It seems besides being mobbed up and representing Sammy Davis Jr. and some of his Rat Pack pals, Daddy more or less invented off-shore money-laundering in the Bahamas. Somewhere in between having his Rolls blown up (of course it was canary yellow) and the unsolved murder of some of his associates, Al became chief financial advisor--and much, much more--for Saudi Royal member Prince Turki Bin-Aziz. 

Now, Turki Bin-Aziz was one of the many sons of the king of Saudi Arabia. Bin-Aziz came to the U.S. in the 1980's on a crazed spending spree that encompassed several years, billions of dollars, and the kind of insanity that makes interesting news articles ("Saudi Prince hires decorator to paint genitalia of all mansion's statues in glorious, living color") and desperate neighbors. (Saudi family parks multiple Ferraris on your grass, lands their helicopters in your backyard, and shows up in middle of night offering three million for your bungalow as long as you and your family leave within the next half hour.) 

During this blazing craziness, son Mark starts toting a copy of the Koran and winds up married (briefly) to the sister of the Prince's commoner bride. (Look, this is so complicated and bizarre, that I can only hope I'm getting the details right.) I would assume it is at this point that Mark became Shareef, a name which, come to think of it, beats, say, Muffy Malnik for assimilationist silliness. 

The story gets even crazier, but I think I have used up my Rabbit Hole quotient for the day. And the good news is, it seems as if Anwar and Malnik's use of Gafni for their wedding has, hopefully, shown new light down Gafni's rabbit hole. Wouldn't it be wonderful if a costumed, Wild West marriage between an actress and a "restauranteur"/possible mobster, (this being wedding number five for him) would lead to a sexual predator finally having to face some of the consequences of his actions? Let's keep our fingers crossed. 

The Romantic Phase of Research: The King And I, Anna Leonowns and King Mongkut of Siam/Thailand.

I am deep in that phase of research that parallels the romantic part of love: When you just can't get enough of learning about a subject about whom you plan to write, you just want to dive in, you have to order another book about the history of Siam or Anna Leonowens or King Mongkut.

Anna Leonowns in Canada

King Mongkut and Queen Debsirindra, 1856. 

Every other word out of your mouth is "Oh," and "That's amazing," and you bend stranger's ears with the absolute fascination of it: "And as a young monk, the king studied Sanscrit and Palian, plus he learned Laotian, Cambodian, Vienamese, Peguan, (what is Peguan?) Burmese, Malay and Hindustani. And then, later, he learned English, but there was no Siamese-English dictionary in existence, but there was an English/Pali one, so he had to translate words from Siamese into ancient Pali and then search for an equivalent in a "voluminous" Pali-English dictionary. And because he was never sure if the Pali word perfectly lined up with the meaning he wanted, he usually put in two or three choices, hoping he'd gotten at least one right."









Yes, it's true love. Staring deep into the eyes of your subjects, and wanting to learn every single thing there is to know about them.

Yes, I know this is Rudolph Valentino's Falcon's lair, and
not on Ivarene, but it will have to do
until I can do more research. 

Later will come the challenges in my research relationship, when I have to keep my cool even though, as the writing is pouring out, I have to stop, stop, stop, to figure out what kind of car star scenarist (screenwriter) Frances Marion would be driving in 1921, where the controls are in that car, how hard are they to manipulate, what the car sounds like as you drive it, what Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles might have looked like in 1921, and where can I find a photo of twisty Ivarene Avenue from that era? All those tiny, telling details that make something spring to life.

Right now, it's just bliss, just sinking into the cushion of another age--politics, religion, technology, geography, geology, and above all psychology, learning as much as I can about these fascinating other people's stories so when I write them, I will do them the honor of seeing them as clearly as I possibly can.

Desperately Seeking Beta Readers, or How Did Jane Austen Do It?

What Did Jane Austen Do For A Beta Reader? 

I am always, it seems, urgently seeking a fresh beta reader. Writer friends who have not read my first pages are busy. I rewrote the opening chapters, and have an agent eager to read the revision, but do not think it wise to send them until someone intelligent and thoughtful has vetted them for me.

I got to thinking, how did Jane Austen handle this? I know she read her work aloud to a sister.

Rumer Godden describes a similar thing, taking her sister, Jon (also a novelist) out on a boat in Kashmir and reading an entire draft to Jon, whose only response is, "It won't do, Rumer."

Rumer and Jon Godden, Sister-novelists. 

The Bronte sisters were obviously a fan-club/critique group for one another, at least while they were all alive.

What about people who don't have literary siblings? What can we do?

What do you do? How do you find the perfect reader for your sci fi, fantasy, romance, thriller, or--in my case, literary fiction that is, hopefully, accessible? 

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Prayer Poem

Shekhinah,

Please send me a Nice Jewish man, who doesn't have to pretend to a stiff upper lip,
Who can whine like I do when I have a cold, 
Who can--and will--spend the years it takes to grow up with me, 
While I grow beside him. 
Who can find the humor in my flaws just as I laugh while locating for him 
the Peanut butter in the fridge, literally in front of my nose.

And, Shekhinah, if only his mother were alive to be my mother-in-law, 
I would embrace her with love and laugh over any gimlet eye 
Turned in my house-cleaning. 
"Mother-in-law", I would beg her, 
"Teach me how you do it so well, 
For I will never be the balabusta you are." 
In truth, she would soon realize, I will never be a balabusta 
At all. And maybe hire me a cleaning lady.

Oh, Shekhinah, 
Help me above all not to buy into 
Anglo-Saxon Protestant cultural values that say that no one
Should drop by unannounced. 
Remind me, instead, of the richness of my own 
Immigrant culture that values closeness,
And men with real feelings, exposed, 
And that has, for more time than our memories can hold, 
Created both men and women with wits and drive, 
Creativity and comedy, 
And the wisdom to love one another as we are. 

What Do Cats Read About?

Cats, of course. 

I swear, we did not pose this. Just managed to snap it as she, well, studied the cover.

Next up, Puss-In-Boots.

Taming The Green-eyed Monster--When Your Envy is Professional

Envy as a Tool, The Writer's Life

Some time ago when I was an actor, a dear friend got a dream part, that of a strong, successful creature, a woman with a woman's sexuality, not a man's fantasy versions of it. Plus, she got to age 40 years without the benefit of makeup. 

She was brilliant--vivid, funny, alive. The world responded: reviews, her face splashed everywhere, award nominations, everything we had dreamed of when we started out as teenagers. I was happy for my hard-working friend, and also, torn up with envy, the kind of evil, gut-eating ache that you can't ignore, no matter how you wrestle with it. 

That's when I realized that the envy was a signpost, a gift. It was telling me that I needed to get out and do what I cared about most. I started to show people my writing, got extremely positive responses and began to work on learning to write the long-form challenge that is the novel. 

I have since watched this friend's career (and life) rise and fall, but I'm never torn with envy, not for her, not for a fellow writer who gets published. I may feel twinges of wistfulness, but not that gut-wrenching envy. I have my dream and I am actively working towards it, all the time, with as much energy as I can spare. I may have to go slowly, because of limitations on my writing time--I have a special needs child. But I know that Winston Churchill had it right, at least as far I am concerned: never, never, never, never, never give up. Hurray for dreams, and the hard work it takes to achieve them. 

The Married Priest At the Renaissance Fair

So, I saw this priest at the Renaissance Fair, striding along in his medieval monks habit, a shepherd's crook in hand. Next to him walked a woman in ordinary clothing, baby in her arms. It was clear to me that they were, at the very least, in a long-term relationship.

They sat on a stone wall to rest, and I approached them. "I know that clerk in Kentucky is refusing to marry priests," I said, "But I want you to know that I'll stand beside you all the way."

They burst out laughing. The "priest" said, "We're not really into large organizations," and I watched it dawn on him at the same time I said it slowly--"Which is why you're a Catholic priest."

And for a moment, within that circle of laughter, life was grand.

(Please note, this is not the monk guy--this lovely fellow is from a Michigan Renaissance Festival, and I couldn't resist the image.)

Hello, Luke. I Am Your Father, Atticus--First family changes baby's name from Atticus.

Okay. The first one has happened. After the publication of Go Set a Watchman, where the heroic, saintly Atticus Finch, of To Kill A Mockingbird, joins the Klan, (briefly) and foments rebellion against integration or even the NAACP providing legal service to the grandson of his beloved family housekeeper, Calpurnia.

David and Christen Epstein have changed their baby, Atticus' name to Lucas, Luke for short. Big sister, Ayla, is pretty confused, but they're hoping that neither will get a complex about it.

http://www.people.com/article/parents-change-son-atticus-name-go-set-watchman

I get this. I totally do. We adopted a dog once who we thought was named Tonto. That was going to have to change. And when one of my great-grandparents got super sick, her parents changed her name, so as to confuse the angel of death. (Angel flies down, looking for "Mary, Mary, Mary--who's this? Oh, that's Jane. Nope." And flies away.) It worked, so who am I to argue?

And Harpo Marx was born Adolf, but changed his name to Arthur.

Still, really? Because there are two versions of a fictional character? Oh, please.

I always did wonder at all the little Atticus' running around. Had that been my set of mind, I would have named a child Amasa, (after Harper Lee's real father, and the model for both Atticuses.) And then, we would have been fine.

Yes, Go Set A Watchman Really Was Poured on the Page, says Charles Shields.

It's fascinating to dig into Charles L. Shield's unauthorized biography of Harper Lee, published in 2006, when Go Set A Watchman was merely a title implying Atticus standing guard outside Tom Robinson's jail cell and a few notes in Tay Hohoff's files.

What happened was this: in November of 1956, after some years of part-time writing, Nelle Lee felt she had five good short stories, titled: The Land of Sweet Forever, A Roomful of Kibble, Snow-on-the-Mountain, This Is Show Business, and The Viewer and the Viewed. It seems those short stories have disappeared, and we know next to nothing about them, except Snow-on-the-Mountain, a short story about a southern boy who takes revenge on the flowerbed of a nasty old lady in the neighborhood--a story that later appears in To Kill A Mockingbird, as Jem flattens the flowers of vicious old Mrs. Dubois. 

Harper Lee's friend, Broadway composer and lyricist, Mike Brown, connected her with an agent named Maurice Crain, who said he especially liked Snow-on-the-Mountain, but said short stories were hard to sell, and suggested she try a novel. 

December of '56, Mike Brown sold a novelty song about Lizzie Borden--

 ‘Cause you can’t chop your papa up in Massachusetts

   Not even if it’s planned as a surprise
   No, you can’t chop your papa up in Massachusetts
   You know how neighbors love to criticize. 

and he was feeling flush. As a Christmas gift, Mike and his wife gave Harper Lee gift of a year away from work, writing full time. 

That January, Harper returned to Crain's office with a short story, The Cat's Meow, and the first fifty pages of a novel called Go Set A Watchman. A week later, she was back with a hundred more pages. Every week through February, she dropped off about fifty new pages to Crain. 

By early May, after two months of back-and-forth revisions between Crain and Lee, Crain sent the manuscript out, but with a new title. (He felt the old one sounded like the book was about clocks or something.) The new book was sent to publishers under the title, Atticus, which is how it reached the offices of J.B. Lippencott, whose last best-seller was Betty McDonald's charming (but now dated) The Egg And I, fifteen years before. 

Meanwhile, Nelle surprised her agent at the end of May with 111 pages of another novel, The Long Goodbye. Days later, Lippincott requested a meeting with Harper Lee about Atticus. 

Male Lippencott editors filled the room, along with one skinny woman with a tight gray bun. Theresa von Hohoff was getting up there in age, her eyesight failing. She'd be raised a Quaker, so Quaker her family used the archaic intimate form, "thee and thou," to indicate that all people were equal, and no one deserved the honorific of Sir or Madam. She loved working with young authors. Thomas Pynchon was a client of hers, and she was working on a biography of a leader in the settlement house movement for New York Cities poor immigrants. 

The editors spent a lot of time discussing Atticus. The characters "stood on their own two feet; they were three-dimensional." But the manuscript was "more a series of anecdotes than a fully conceived novel." They made suggestions. Nelle Lee nodded and said, "Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am." (Nelle was not Quaker, but Methodist.) 

They wished her luck on her revision and hoped to see her again. 

Okay--so stop a minute here and imagine this happening today. Rough manuscript. Meeting with editors around the table, spending quite a long time discussion how they believe the novel could be approved. Polite author takes notes, pays attention, gets to work on the revision. 

Then, they spend the next two years working together on what turns out to be another To Kill A Mockingbird. 

Sigh of envy. 

Back to reality and our story. 

By the end of the summer, Nelle had resubmitted her manuscript to Hohoff, who had volunteered to work with her. "It was better, but it wasn't right. . ." "There were dangling threads of plot, there was a lack of unity--a beginning, a middle, an end that was inherent in the beginning." 

In October, Lippencott offered Nelle a contract with an advance of a few thousand dollars. If other words, if a few means 3-4, then she was paid somewhere between 25,000 and 34,000 in today's bucks, which would have been plenty of to live in in a Manhattan cold-water flat of the time. 

She worked on the book for two and a half years. She battled to find an overarching plot. She battled to find the right voice, writing first in third person, then in first, and later, in the final draft, choosing to use essentially two narrative voices, one an older Jean Louise looking back, the other Scout's immediacy. 

So, yes, Go Set A Watchman was the first endeavor at long form writing by a novelist who steadily gained strength, skills and wisdom under the tutelage of a fine editor.  

Wouldn't you love to get a look at that other novel, The Long Goodbye?

Goodbye. 

Rachel Dolezal, Dolphus Raymond, Reverse Passing, And The Vagaries of History

Okay, for awhile, I will post blog posts at both sites, until people make the switch. Here's what I just put up at SakkiSelznick123.blogger.com

I would be profoundly surprised if Rachel Dolezal is the first person in history to successfully pass as black. When you live in a world of multiple gradations of color that have been divided in power for centuries into black and white, there will be many people who find those flat boundaries don't fit, and who choose ways to cross them.

Some will do it blindly and with hatred, like Clarence Thomas, some via fairytale, like Rachel Dolezal.

Then, there's Dolphus Raymond from To Kill A Mockingbird, who pretended to be a drunk so that the white people in his community would allow him to live away from their pale hypocrisy, with his colored family. (And who surely must be based on a real, creative problem-solver, a man who was obviously not the only one in the country.)

It's just, we almost never hear about those people, just as, until recently, it was harder than pulling a healthy tooth to find out about people in this country who were able and willing to pass from black to white.

When I was calling academics, looking for contemporaneous oral histories or accounts of people who crossed the color line, I got, "Oh, that never happened. People might pass to ride the bus at the front, or to shop inside a department store, but as soon as they came home, they reverted back to their true selves."

I understand the desire to pretend this is true. When you're working so hard to find pride in that which is considered shameful by the outer world, when you're struggling every day to imbue your children with pride in themselves, in a culture that shames them, it can be deeply painful to consider those who gave up the battle, who painted on the face powder and left their fellows behind. This is something I'm exploring in my novel, "The Color Of Safety."

Still, Walter White, the blue-eyed, blond-haired, fair-skinned president of the NAACP for many years, said in his 1948 biography, "'Every year approximately twelve thousand white-skinned Negroes disappear—people whose absence cannot be explained by death or emigration. Nearly every one of the fourteen million discernible Negroes in the United States knows at least one member of his race who is “passing”—the magic word which means that some Negroes can get by as whites, men and women who have decided that they will be happier and more successful if they flee from the proscription and humiliation which the American color line imposes on them." 

So, back to Dolezal, who was raised under a different kind of oppression, in a Christian cult that believes children are carriers of the virus of original sin, and thus must have the evil beaten out of them. Dolezal was sixteen when her parents adopted four young children of color and would have been older when her parents sent two of they children off to a camp that was even more harsh than their upbringing at home, in an effort to free them from the devil. Those two children have completely rejected their parents, with one even filing for legal emancipation--something that has to be tough in the rural Western state where he lived.

So, somewhat like Dolphus Randolph, Dolezal recreated herself. She studied the culture she had been sideswiped with as a child. She has, it appears, become an expert in black hair, (something a friend of mine who was then starring on a soap opera fought to have but never got.) She has, it appears, become an expert on aspects of black history and politics. She married an African-American man and is raising two African-American boys, and somehow has persuaded herself that color is something you can convert to, like Judaism, or, these days, like gender.

Twenty, thirty, a hundred years ago, that would have been that, she would never have been found out.

But this is now. The world of the Internet makes everything viral. Dill would have blogged about Dolphus Randolph and his secret would have been blown.

The white world ridicules Dolezal. The world of color seems divided, with some saying, 'Welcome aboard," http://time.com/3921404/rachel-dolezal-naacp-race-kareem-abdul-jabbar/ and some saying that she is a deluded example of White Privilege.

Yet, I cannot believe that Rachel Dolezal is historically alone in either her life-masquerade or her choice.

Does anybody have any historical stories of those who passed for black? What do you think about Dolezal's choices? And why?

Hello o o o o. I've been blogging, it's true, but over at SakkiSelznick123.blogspot.com

I know I used to have quite a few followers on this blog. I did not mean to abandon you all. Especially not for two years--more than two years.

The good news is it's not my fault. (Unless you consider that confusion around technology is my fault. I do not. I think it is genetic.) I didn't just get bored with blogging. Instead, I could not figure out how to get back into this blog. I could, like you, read the posts already there, but when I tried to log in to the dashboard, it would kick me back out.

That's why I began blogging at SakkiSelznick123.blogspot.com. I'm having a great time over there: writing about research for my just-completed novel, The Color of Safety; a few film reviews (A very few, as we don't tend to get out to movies much.) I've written about other things, mostly racial and related to bigotry, things that catch my eye. Lately that's Rachel Dolezal's psychological, ethical and racial conundrums and, of course, Harper Lee's new/old novel, Go Set A Watchman. There's a lot more to look at in this rich rough draft of a novel, like reconsidering To Kill A Mockingbird.

It's such a delight to plunge into research on Harper Lee, seeking out her small writings, reading unauthorized but well researched biographies, and approaching her sideways, through research on those she knew or knows.

At any rate, I don't think it makes much sense to haul two comparable blogs side by side. I hope to see you on the other blog. SakkiSelznick123.blogspot.com. I hope life is treating you all well. Take care of yourself. Join me there.

Sakki

Les Miserables Lives On- Part IV

We live in a rare state that not only provides health insurance for low-income parents, but even provides medical assistance for non-parent adults who cannot afford their own health insurance.

Plus, we have mental health parity--we require insurance to pay for mental health services.

Even so, the state makes the annual application process extremely difficult. The waiting time between applying and notification of approval is long. I have met people with bronchitis and walking pneumonia who were waiting for approval and could not afford the doctor.

Now, I have learned of another friend who had to call 911 and an ambulance for mental health hospitalization after two years of gaining and then losing, applying again, gaining, then losing, etc. her medical insurance.

Okay--so rather than provide her with medication for depression and anxiety and provide her with therapy for same, we now have to pay for a week of hospitalization, a month of ongoing outpatient hospitalization and ongoing therapy. The hospital took care of the application for disability and medical insurance and now this friend is back among the mentally living, an active and  valuable parent and participant in society.

But what harm has been done to the elasticity of her brain cells in the meantime? Not to mention those of her children?

Keep in mind: I am a middle-class white person. We own a house. My children go to a fabulous public school. I do not hang out at the local homeless shelter. The people that I am discussing here are friends made from among all classes, races, religions and incomes via this public school.

And yes, I have friends in the arts and writing community, which tends to be less stable than, say, the financial world. Still, those friends have, until recently, been steady wage earners, home owners, apartment renters, teachers, child-care-givers, valuable people to any society for more than their creativity. But after losing job, house, etc., some people find they need mental health assistance including stabilizing mental health meds. How does it makes sense that we are not providing the backup to these people? I do not understand.

I repeat: Our family values MUST include making sure that people can get the medical support they need. 

The Joy of Challenging Questions

Today, I submitted an excerpt from The Color of Safety for a new fellowship given by a foundation  dedicated to secular Judaism. I am not sure, but I think secular Judaism may be following the principals laid out in Jewish teachings without worrying too much if you believe in God.

Whatever it is, this international fellowship has two sections, one for scholars, and the other for fiction writers working on projects with Jewish themes. I figure this includes The Color of Safety, which rides straight into the chasm that was cut between Jewish and African-Americans in the last decades of the 20th century, reminding us (as well as some Japanese-Americans) of how much we share historically and internally. The main character derives wisdom from both traditions and far from riding to the rescue on her lily-white own has to learn to throw herself a community that is already very capably fighting against societies current villains.

I would love to be one of the inaugural fiction fellows for this foundation, but the truth is, whether I wind up winning one or not, the process of applying has benefitted me tremendously. These grant and fellowship people ask fascinating questions: like, what are your career ambitions? Whereas before, I would have no notion of career ambitions, I now know that I would like to use any opportunities for publicity for The Color of Safety to create a new conversation of the many connections that African-Americans and Jews share.

I am also far more clear than before that I am a ridiculously Jewish novelist. However much I wrestle with my faith, with which parts I believe, which I observe and how to act out my ethics in their most powerful form, they are Jewish ethics, it is a Jewish faith, and the fact that I can even consider which parts of my faith to ignore is an inherently Jewish concept born of our traditions long history of not only asking questions, but of recording both sides of an argument and ultimately turning them into holy writ (see The Talmud) vs. other traditions who have historically decided what is holy and what is not, and acted accordingly.

I am sure that we Jews also did that long ago, or else there would not be casual mention of ritual prostitution in the Torah, or hints of goddess worship in both Torah and archeological record, though any goddess worship that remains in Judaism is via the concept of the Sabbath Bride, the Shekhinah. (Side note: I recently met a Christian woman of just-discovered Sephardic Jewish ancestry who told me that in the Charismatic Christian community they refer to the Bride of the Sabbath, but pronounce her ShekInah, (rhymes with vaGIna.) Reminds me of the pre-k teacher who had prepped for the Chanukah story by "reading all about those MacAfees and their hammer.")

In recent years, though, (like most of the last 2000) Jews have had to develop a non-centralized religion that allows for a wide range of beliefs and customs, while still, to my eye, anyway, remaining Jewish. I hope that in my career, should I be blessed with a career, I will be able to explore some of those beliefs and customs interacting with this complex world. Hurrah for fellowships, whether I win them or not. Hurrah for challenging questions without any one right answer, and the discoveries that these questions will leads us to if we are brave enough to struggle with them. 

Les Miserables Lives On, Part III

Great News, Terrific News. My friend, who I am calling Claire, had to be hospitalized. Yes, the chronic genetic illness along with depression combined with the complete cold turkey absence of meds thanks to our medical insurance system, got her in the hospital for a week and all-day outpatient care for a lot longer.

And while there, the hospital took care of her State Insurance application, straightened out the screw-ups on the State's end, and stabilized both condition and depression. For the first time in two months, when I spoke with Claire, she was there. Really there. Her humor, her strength, her joy.

So. Really? We really think it's wiser that the State had to incur her hospitalization costs than that they make sure applications get taken care of in a timely manner? (And of course, let's not forget that we're one of the few fortunate states that provides necessary medical insurance to parents of young children.)

We really want people off their medications rather than considering the dreaded--'gasp" Socialized Medicine? (As in Socialist, as in somewhere on the continuum between Flat-out "Caveat Emptor" Capitolism and "Everything Belongs to the State" Communism.) We really want her three young children to now have to wrestle with the impact of a mother's hospitalization, to deal with the consequences of that for the rest of their lives, rather than provide families with children--whether single parent or couples--with the support that they need?

I suppose we do have one up on Les Miserables, at least in this state. We still have a wonderful hospital system. If this had been one of our major cities that have gutted their public hospitals, my friend would have been really screwed.

And of course, in the 1780's and 90's in France, a hospital was a psych ward where people went to be tortured and die. Progress. . . I suppose. 

Les Miserables Lives on Part II

I have another friend, a couple I'll call Mel and Kari. They are bright, funny, kind, caring people, very hard working, and their whole lives revolve around parenting their four kids under the age of seven. Mel is a scientific genius without a college degree. Kari has an advanced degree and training in a field that is both art, craft and science. Mel works in his field, but the companies around here that hire in his field only hire for a year, and then they fire people.

They used to hire people and work them until it came time for them to qualify for benefits, then fire them (much like retail stores are doing today) until the IRS told them they couldn't do that. Now, they hire people for 1 year, give them no benefits, then fire them. Legally.

Of course, that's only one of his jobs. He started another one last year, another part-time, because, of course, he knows he can't count on the first job for permanent employment. That job, too, does not offer benefits, so he is screwed.

Kari has started a business of her own based on her training field. Her business is flourishing, but she has to keep costs low to get business, there are material's costs and store space rental, plus, it's a craft, based on her own labor, so there's only so much she can work, (particularly with four little ones.) Mel and Kari earn enough between them that they do not qualify for medical assistance or Welfare, but not enough that they can afford things like medicine or even dental care for the children, though in our state, the kids are covered for medical care. Kari and Mel cross their fingers, watch the blotch grow on the front tooth of one of their kids, and keep on keeping on, with a cheerful good will.

Mel comes from a large family with a history of bi-polar disorder and suicide. Working two jobs now, he sleeps very little. They can't afford an anti-depressant that would help him cope, though anybody with four young kids and one and a half jobs would probably be exhausted enough to feel depressed. Kari is endlessly patient and wonderful with her small horde, and so is Mel--when he's rested enough to be present. He's such a gentle man, but what little time he gets to spend with his children finds him grumpy or lumpy. Really, he just wants to sit there and rest.

So, I ask you: where are our family values? Don't talk to me about prayer and church being the answer. This family is deeply religious. He is choir director of his church. She teaches Sunday school classes. Their home is filled with religious photos and I know they pray a lot, because her four-year-old kept  insisting, "Jesus is so the boss of this house, because he's the boss of everything," when I gently explained that since we were Jewish, he wasn't the boss at our house, that God was. This family prays then gets up off their needs and works damned hard. When are the rest of us going to do the same thing--for families like this one? When are we going to get smart enough to this family? Doesn't it make sense that we'd want to keep a father of four with a family history of suicide on his mental health meds? Doesn't it make sense that a mom of four young kids should have the medical care she needs to stay healthy? If we want her to work, shouldn't we make sure those terrific kids have quality childcare?

Let's shout out for real family values, ones that help families with their boots on the ground. Medical care for everyone. Quality childcare or financial aid for families where both parents work. If jobs can't or won't provide medical insurance, why don't we just switch to single payer? Heck, I've torn a calf muscle in Europe, had an orthopedic surgeon come to my hotel, diagnose, go to the pharmacy for the necessary medicines, give me an injection and a massage on the sort spot, and apologetically charge me $35.00--because with any French citizen, this would have been free. Happy doctors working there. Happy people going to them. Call it socialist or not, it works wonderfully. Why not do it here?