My Sunday Feeling

I was saddened to learn of the passing of Arkansas writer Charles Portis.  I, of course, had read "True Grit" and watched both of the movie adaptations of it.  But I also knew Charlie a little bit.  

It was back in the eighties.  I had just returned to Little Rock and had begun my illustrious and distinguished career with the government.  My friends and I used to hang out in bars in those days.  This was primarily because there was absolutely nothing to do in Little Rock back then.  There was no River Market.  No Argenta.  No Chenal Valley.  Hell, there probably wasn't an I-630 back then.  It was not unusual to see Bill Clinton jogging by himself downtown.  Or to see Hillary walking alongside little Chelsea on her trike.  

It was a different time.

Charlie and I lived in the same apartment complex.  And we both hung out at a steak joint where the Sonic on Cantrell is now located.  It was maybe a half mile from where we lived.  I hung out there because my brother Bob tended the bar.  Charlie told me he hung out there because he knew he could always make it home.

It's not like we were close friends or anything.  He was a solitary sort although he resisted being referred to as a recluse.  Anyway, I respected his space and always let him initiate the conversation.  We tended to talk about the stuff guys talk about.  Namely sports and politics although we never talked about women.  Not that I can recall in any event.  He was interested in the law and we talked about that.  Or mainly, I talked and he listened.  And he was a deep and active listener.  I would imagine this trait helped inform his voice.

As did perhaps one of his earliest journalism gigs.  I read in one of the numerous excellent obituaries written about Charlie that back when he was at the University he was hired by the Northwest Arkansas Times to edit the dispatches that came in from the communities around Fayetteville.  I remember this type of homespun journalism well.

My grandfather Bivens subscribed to the Cleburne County Times (I think it was called).  There was always a section in every edition where folks would report the goings on in the towns around Heber.  They would typically begin with a Bible verse.  Births and deaths were noted.  Revival meetings were announced.  If a particular preacher gave an inspiring "message" it was duly recounted. And "visits" from out-of-town guests were always dutifully recorded on history's immortal scroll.  Or at least history as it obtained in Pearson, Quitman and Drasco.  

I made the Quitman report at least twice that I know of.  The first time was when I got accepted to law school.  The other time was when I passed the bar.  I can assume that Grandmother Bivens was the source for these reports.  I can't imagine Granpa having any use for such foolishness.  I also made the Heber Springs section, along with a female college classmate who grew up there,  when some sharp eyed correspondent saw us strolling down Main Street.  

They wouldn't print it if it wasn't true.

The obituary said that it was Charlie's job to turn these dispatches from the hinterlands into english.  This evidently was not a high priority for the Cleburne County Times.  Anyway, I have absolutely no evidence for this.  But I would like to think that somewhere in the process of defanging the language contained in these missives he found the voice of Rooster Cogburn or any of the other eccentrics and cranks that he brought to life in his writing.  

Grandpa read the Arkansas Gazette and the Arkansas Democrat.  They merged into the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.  His Cleburne County paper is no more.  There is now the Heber Springs Sun-Times.  And as far as I can tell from my recent examination of the same, the rural dispatches from the amateur correspondents are no more.

It was a different time.

I had heard a couple of years ago that Charlie had slipped into dementia.  I had lost track of him after moving from the apartment into my first house.  The notion of that sharp quirky mind being lost in the fog grieved me not a little.  

I remember my last conversation with him.  He used to eat breakfast in the diner by the Federal Building.  One morning some 20 years ago he was coming out as I was heading to work.  We stopped and exchanged greetings.

"Mind if I ask you something?," he said. 

"Not all I all,"I replied.

" I just read where they are calling United States Magistrates United States Magistrate Judges  now.  Why did they change that?"

"I have no idea."

"OK. Thanks.  Good to see you."

And away he went.

It was a different time.  

AWOL

Call it post-Valentine’s Day depression. Call it would rather play golf.

Call it what you will.

But I’m outta here.

Enjoy your Sunday.

My Sunday Feeling

I attended the visitation for the mother of an old friend the other day.  S's mom was in her eighties when she passed away.  

Reminiscence comes naturally and easily at moments such as these. 

"You know I was thinking about your dad the other day,"S said.  

"Really? How so?" I replied.

"Well, he died so young."

"52"

"Wow. That's younger than I thought."

"Yeah.  Pretty much dropped dead in the backyard."

" Mother lived what some people would describe as a long full life.  But it wasn't.  The last 20 years she had no quality of life at all."

I didn't know his mother.  Or I have no recollection of her.  Southwest Little Rock was a long time ago.

"I didn't know that," I said. "I'm sorry." 

S is a pensive man.  He was pensive at 16.  

"You know," he said after a pause. "There ought to be a happy medium between what happened to your dad and how it ended for Mother.  It's just....well, it's just not right."

"You know? I try not to think about stuff like that," I said. "It does no good and nothing changes anyway.  I just try to remember that every day is a miracle and one that we are not promised.  I have no complaints.  I am upright and mobile.  I have gas in the car, food in the fridge and clothes on my back.  And I don't any of it for granted."

"Isn't that the truth?" he said." Look at us.  We both turned out OK I think. You and me both got to retire.  Your poor dad didn't. We're not wealthy men by any stretch of the imagination but we're OK. We live down the road from each other a million miles from where we came." 

S had crossed over from pensive to downright voluble.  A rare event.

Then again, the death of any loved one but particularly the death of a parent tends to concentrate the mind as my buddy Phil would say.  

By then the line of folks waiting to greet him had grown.  This was neither the time nor the place for a couple of old crackers from 72209 to discuss the Meaning of Life.

I lost Mother in 2009.  I have fresher experience in dealing with this than S does.

"When things settle down, let's get together and compare notes," S said.

"Would love to," I replied. " You call me when you are ready."

And with that I took my leave.  My next stop was a Theology Club meeting at school.  I've really enjoyed watching the boys grapple with challenging concepts like Christology, empiricism, ontology and church history.  And it occurred to me after the visitation that pretty much all we do during T  Club is compare notes with each other there to.

And if you are lucky to live long enough you figure out that this process never ends.  You never really come up with an answer.  But that's OK too.

S and I know we're lucky.  Really lucky.  

Because you know what?  There is no happy medium.  The universe is not configured for our happiness. There is only luck or not luck to paraphrase Yoda.  

But that notion opens the door to considerations of theodicy.  The T Club boys aren't quite ready for that yet.  

Comparing notes among friends is sufficient for the day.  And is the best we can do besides.

  

My Sunday Feeling

We think we know them.  

We think we know the men and women that play (or coach) the games we watch in our living rooms.   Or maybe it's something else.  Maybe something more akin to the Freudian concept of "transference" in which the patient recognizes something comfortable in the therapist which causes him to open up to him or her.  

Whatever it is, Madison Avenue counts on it as a thing because they know that an athlete's endorsement for a product can often translate into serious money for them and their clients.

And perhaps because we thought we knew him, the passing of Kobe Bryant in a helicopter crash in the fog, along with his daughter and 7 other souls was a shock to the nation and to the world of sports.

After all, there's only a handful of athletes that are recognizable by their first names: Rafa, Roger, Serena, Tiger, Shaq, Kareem, Aaron, Derek, OJ.  You get the idea.

But we don't know these people.  We can't.  Even though thanks to the Internet we can sure learn about their foibles and failures at the speed of lightning. Just like we learned about Tiger's in 2009.  And Kobe's in 2003.  

But shock is an appropriate response when one so young, one who was a dominant force in his chosen profession, exits the stage in such a tragic (which is appropriate) and needless (which is also appropriate) fashion.  

I know that the FAA has just begun its investigation.  And by all accounts the pilot on board was experienced and instrument rated.  But the fog was sufficiently dense that morning to cause the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department to ground its helicopters.  And other helicopter pilots interviewed expressed the view that it was too dangerous to be flying that morning.  At least by visual flight rules.

So why didn't the pilot proceed by instruments?  One theory that I have read is that flying by instruments would have made them late to the basketball tournament his daughter was scheduled to play in.  

All great players do risk calculation.  The great ones take them and they largely succeed. But not all risks are worth it.  Any lawyer can tell you that.  

Today is Super Bowl Sunday.  The Chiefs and the 49ers.  There will be a tribute to Kobe before the game and to the others that perished that day.  Players will bear his number on their shoes.  Perhaps his number will be sewed upon the jerseys.  

Meanwhile, those left behind must grieve the loss of their loved ones. Their children.  

So who failed the risk calculations here?  The pilot? Kobe?  We don't know.  We weren't there.

And we only think we know them.