The Terror of the Unforeseen, the Angel of History, and Or

June 11, 2006

“…the unfolding of the unforeseen was everything. Turned wrong way round, the relentless unforeseen was what we schoolchildren studied as ‘History,’ harmless history, where everything unexpected in its own time is chronicled on the page as inevitable. The terror of the unforeseen is what the science of history hides, turning a disaster into an epic.”
Philip Roth, The Plot Against America, 113-114

"IX

Mein Flügel ist zum Schwung bereit,
ich kehrte gern zurück,
denn blieb ich auch lebendige Zeit,
ich hätte wenig Glück.

My wing is ready for flight,
I would like to turn back. If I stayed timeless time,
I would have little luck.

Gerherd Scholem,
‘Gruss vom Angelus’


A Klee painting named ‘Angelus Novus’ [owned by Benjamin, pictured with this entry] shows an angel looking as though he is about to move away from something he is fixedly contemplating. His eyes are staring, his mouth is open, his wings are spread. This is how one pictures the angel of history. His face is turned toward the past. Where we perceive a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet. The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing in from Paradise; it has got caught in his wings with such a violence that the angel can no longer close them. The storm irresistibly propels him into the future to which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows skyward. This storm is what we call progress." From Walter Benjamin, Theses on the Philosophy of History www.tasc.ac.uk/depart/med...NCEPT2.html

“The blossoms…entered the world that is coming.” Zohar 1:1b (Matt translation 4)
“This concept [the world that is coming] is often understood as referring to the hereafter and is usually translated as ‘the world to come.’ From another point of view, however, ‘the world that is coming’ already exists, occupying another dimension.” Matt 4

June 14, 2006 (a little after noon)

History contains our breath, is breathed in and out, our breath marking a movement we call time. Change, cause and effect, breath, all words attempt to capture and control what we call the past (that which causes now), the present (that which is), in order to apprehend and perhaps to feel comfort in the unknown we call the future (the world that is coming always). All of this is present in Or, light supernal, an understanding beyond our words, beyond our lives, beyond time. Yet we try to use words and measure with rules, rulers, calculators, time pieces, the transformations that we call history. Why? Again, so that we might control what Roth calls “the terror of the unforeseen,” by explaining how it might have been foreseen.

And sometimes science and the science of history provide a predictive power that attracts us, calms us, and lulls us. Yet, even within science we have only models, paradigms, whose use is measured by their ability to predict, but whose truth is not known so much as assumed. At the theoretical boundaries of physics, as I understand it (here I reference Thomas Kuhn and Arthur Zajonc, among other writers who know more than I about science), there are only the same questions raised by the mystics. A direct experience of Creation, of the world, is impossible.

All observation, understanding, and expression is mediated, the philosophers tell us—from cultural critics to literary theorists to theoretical science, there is understanding that the fact of observing changes the observed, that inscribing the unknown with measurement and language analogizes, that representation is not the same as “to be.” Always, the inscription is marked by the moment and context of the inscribing, by the inscriber.

This is not to deny history or truth. It is simply to say, we don’t know. We wish to know, we work to know, we pretend to know. We do it well enough to predict some things, some parts of reality, very effectively. Yet, so much remains beyond our ken. Ken, the English word, meaning to know. And Ken, the Hebrew word, meaning yes. Our yes is limited, as is our knowledge, to what we can say yes to. We can only know what is known, to extend slowly into what is unknown using what is know, so changing what is unknown into something social, cultural, human, and not something only of the essence of Creation. The Light of Creation.

Light, supernal, spiritual, not literal, the Light of Creation, caused all of creation. Before, that is, at the cause, all reality is filled with light. Light fills all reality. Which is to say that everything that unfolds in time exists outside of time, whole, perfect, complete, within the supernal light. We are already complete. We have already solved the questions and problems and accomplished our purpose, in this no-time supernal light for which, here, I will use the Hebrew word for light, Or. Even as we sense time unfolding around us, the world that is coming has come. This is how I understand the first sentence of Lurianic Kaballah as explained by Rabbi Yehudah Lev Ashlag in the text that Yedidah Cohen and I studied yesterday. This strikes me as Oneness, Ein Sof containing all outside of time that is everything and nothing at once. I am sure there is much more to learn here.

This means that our struggles in this world are over, resolved. This means that all is light, goodness, whatever inadequate word we choose for Ein Sof, for Or. We are already surrounded by the blessing of the world that is coming. All we need do, perhaps, is to learn to see the world as it could be, which is as it is. Of course, that is a huge task beyond a simple phrase written easily. Learn to see the blessings of the world that is coming as they are, now. Always. I’m not sure my own human frailness is up to that, but I would like to try.

These are my thoughts today, as I think about those quotes above, about the kedusha falling outside of Gaza, of the US President visiting Iraq, of the many conflicts and battles over truth in this world today. Let us find common ground in questions, rather than battle over answers. Let us agree that we cannot know what is true, perhaps not even what is right, but that we can act in this world according to certain values—of human dignity, of a shared desire to fulfill our own needs, of the need to help others fulfill their needs in order for us to fulfill ours. These are simple things.

B’shalom from Israel, to whomever might read this. Comments, as always, welcome.

Layers of history...

June 10, 2006

The sun lowers on Mount Meron, marking the end of my first Shabbat in Tzfat. Yesterday my refrigerator arrived while I went to Omrit—a second-hand and rather large one that will be perfectly serviceable while I am here. As stores, restaurants, and cafes all close for Shabbat, I have been doing my own cooking and am happy to have had the refrigerator in time to stock up on some perishables.

The visit to Omrit intrigued me. Apparently in 1998 a fire swept through the area, and Andy Overman, the Macalester professor who runs the site, and some friends surveyed the area. They found the indicators of the site and started digging—to find the remains of a Byzantine Church that had been built on top of several layers of Roman Temples and other sites. Apparently, a temple was there and over time the architectural material was filled in, re-used, other materials added, etc., in several building cycles. The students and staff have dug down to foundation stones laid on bedrock, but apparently, to hear the students talk about it, there are more questions than not about what is what and exactly how many cycles of building there are. My timing worked out, as Friday the students went to the various areas of the dig to hear a report updating them on the workings and recent discoveries at the separate areas of the dig.

This is a reminder of the age of human activity in the area, which of course goes back to pre-Roman times and beyond. The site itself is located in the Upper Galilee, high up on a hill overlooking the Jordan valley. From the site Lebanon is visible, and Syria is not far, either. Military helicopters flew over a couple of times, once low enough that I am sure they wanted to make certain that we were indeed people working at a dig and not about some other, less desirable, activity. Another vivid reminder of the tensions in the area is the sign on one of the gates near the site: Danger Mines!

In some ways, the layers of building and the current tensions must inform each other. At once, the history in rock of change and turn over, perhaps with or without conflict, also demonstrates survival and continuity of human activity. The fact that the same site has had some sort of holy significance at least since the Roman Temple, through the Byzantine Church, also seems interesting. There is evidence of a cemetery, of a possible market, and while I was there some early work in a new trench suggests that at some point people were making use of the rubble for a lime pit to burn down the limestone and make plaster or cement. All of this suggests that the conflicts and the tensions and the changes of our time might be, in history, forgotten or known by a few. But every day life and work and worship might yet continue, in different forms, now in limestone, now in basalt, now re-using older materials, now bringing in new.

Making do, getting by, coincidence and splendid possibilities

Today is the first day since my arrival when I have moved beyond most of the day spent settling in, running around to find things I need for the apartment here, and just getting acclimated. I only did that for a little bit. The day has been wonderful, relaxed in its way, totally without specific agenda or that sort of conscious effort I had been expending trying to get everything together. Yet it turned out to be quite rewarding, including providing some opportunities unexpected to help me with what I need.

As I started writing this I sat in my kitchen, the computer on the counter top, me sitting on a little stool. That is to say, I don’t have much furniture in my apartment yet and this is one of the things I do need. But as can happen when one relaxes the search, I find that I am now sitting on a useable, if wobbly, desk chair at a little wooden table complete with tablecloth. How did this happen in the space of a short time?

I went looking for the trash container for the building when I noticed a table and chair under the stairs of the apartment building, in a public area. So I asked some of the neighbors about it. Another Michael, downstairs and across the hall who speaks some English, was very helpful. He asked someone else, but that neighbor didn’t know whose was the table. He said his father-in-law would be back soon and might be able to help me get some furniture. While I was starting to write this, there was a knock on the door and a young man told me I could have the table and offered to help carry it upstairs. It was Michael’s brother-in-law. The table was Michael’s father-in-law’s table as it turns out.

The father-in-law invited me in to visit for a bit and have some Israeli cola; I met most of the rest of the family—Michael’s father-in-law of course, his mother-in-law, brother-in-law, and one sister-in-law. Michael’s expecting wife and their two children. They seem to live in the apartment all together. They offered to help with other things I might need, and called someone who might know about a motor scooter for the summer when I asked about how to lease or rent one long term. Meanwhile, they said I could use the table and chair for the summer.

As I carried first the table and then the chair upstairs, I was thinking I’d buy something to cover the table, which must have been a school table of some sort, judging by the pen drawings on it. Just then a young woman came in the building carrying something and went down to the apartment where the other Michael lives. Shortly after, they presented me with what she had brought (apparently at their behest), a tablecloth for the table.

These are good neighbors.

This is making do, finding I can get by, and by coincidence discovering the splendid possibilities of connection and friendship and even better than making do. The chair is not great, but it will do. The table has character, for a desk. And it will double well for a meal, until the table that is supposed to be coming arrives. Along with the refrigerator that is pending—maybe tomorrow morning, last I heard.

Earlier today, another splendid coincidence that is perhaps not surprising for such a small town, but still remarkable. The coincidence in some ways perhaps orchestrated by sources of information and observations, too. The woman I am renting from, Shoshanna, who lives in New York, told me that her son knew about the Cappuccino Café that has free wireless internet, which I had finally found. I was there checking my email around midday. Several Americans came and went.

A Chabad man tied Tefillin on my arm and helped me read the Hebrew prayer. He told me I was “licensed” now to wear them every day, that I “passed the test.” Whatever that means. But it was fun. I was talking to some of the Americans, including two young men with whom I exchanged a few words. On my way out, one of them saw my computer and got excited about it’s being a Macintosh PowerBook.

We talked about it a bit, and he wanted help with his Mac and to see mine working (the battery was drained, so I couldn’t show him there). I asked him his name. Avi. Avichai, he said. Well, that is the name of Shoshana’s son. So I asked him his last name, and he told me. It was he. So I told him I was the one renting the apartment from his mother. He was supposed to give me the key when I arrived, but went instead on a hike with his yeshiva, so the handy man ended up letting me in.

I thought it amusing that I happened to be speaking with Shoshanna’s son. She insisted I should call him today, when he was supposed to be back from the hike, so I guess this will do for the call. Another good coincidence.

Today I have begun to feel as though this trip, this adventure, might work out. Having had a minor flood the first time I tried to use the bathtub, having lost (and then found) the house key in Tiberias, having just to adjust to the time shift and the language shift and all of that which comes with traveling, I was tired this morning and not sure what my day would be like, or the week, or the trip. Last night I broke a beautiful glass wind chime that I had bought during the day to hang in the apartment. And this morning, my first fix of the flood problem almost worked, but still left a little water on the floor (the hardware store today furnished me with a needed o-ring to seal the trap that is at the heart of this simple but frustrating issue).

I did manage to cook my first meal last night, even without the refrigerator here. I just had to portion so that I could eat it—no storage for leftovers. I have bought some food, tea, a water filter, some decorations, and am using a few of the things left here by Shoshanna. The kitchen is nearly complete enough for the summer, and the buffet in the living room (one of the two pieces of real furniture that came with the apartment) is nicely set up now with some pottery vases I picked up (and flowers), a runner, my books, and a set of Shabbat candle sticks left by Shoshanna.

For a touch of home today, and also just to do something other than work on the apartment, I drove up to Kfar Szold, east of Qiryat Shemona. There I met up with Macalester Professor Andy Overman, where he is working on a dig with a group of students (www.macalester.edu/whatshap.../omrit/). I met another colleague of ours from the Classics Department and Andy’s daughter, as well as a couple of the staff who work on the dig. Many of the students had actually driven to Tzfat today, ironically enough. However, I saw briefly one, Joanna, who has worked for me at Macalester all of her four years (she graduated this past May). I will return tomorrow morning to see the actual dig, Omrit. They start at 4:30, but I will join them around 8. I am thinking that I will also join them in Jerusalem later in June, where they will spend two days with some lectures and a tour before the end of their stay. Perhaps I will go stay at Kibbutz Szolda where they are staying and go on the dig at 4:30 before they leave, too. Or maybe not… that’s very early in the morning.

So, the adventure really seems to have begun today. Most of all, having the ability to sit at a table to write seems to signal this for me.

--written June 8, 2006

Now in Tzfat

I arrived at the airport in Tel Aviv Monday evening, June 5, spending the night at a hotel in view of the Mediterranean. Tuesday morning I arranged a pre-paid cell phone and rented a car for the week, then drove up to Tzfat. I have been settling into my apartment since then. I will post pictures in my photo album. Mostly I have been doing the usual things of settling into an apartment--wiping away the dust of disuse, figuring out where to put things, what I need. There is not much of interest in reporting this.

The views from my apartment are great, though. Mount Meron from the bedroom window and the window of the bedroom that will be my writing room / study. The picture with this post is as the sun began to set behind Meron last night.

I have just this morning found the cafe with free wireless internet. It is run by South Africans, and peopled by a lot of Americans. A few moments ago as I write this, a rabbi came to me, tied on Tefillin, and helped me read through a Hebrew prayer. He says I am now "licensed" to wear them every day. He is, of course, Chabad. Still, an interesting experience while drinking capacino and typing email.

There will be more to say, probably already is. Right now on the TV above my head, Zarqawi is reported killed by a U.S. air raid. I wonder what will happen in Iraq in the next few days, or beyond, as a result.

One week to go through the door

One week from today, on Sunday, June 4th, at about 5 p.m. my time the plane will take off carrying me to Atlanta. After not quite two hours in Atlanta, I will leave for Tel Aviv, Israel. I will arrive in Tel Aviv around 5:30 p.m. local time on Monday, June 5th. From Tel Aviv, I will go to Tzfat (Tezfat, Safed, etc.), where I am renting an apartment for June, July, and August. All of the arrangements are pretty much made, except for some that I will make on the ground in israel. This is my third trip to Israel.

In each of the two prior trips I visited Tzfat as well. The first time, in 1998, for a few hours and lunch. In 2004, I went for a couple of days and stayed nearly a week. This time, I am going to live in Tzfat as my base in Israel for nearly three months (I return on August 24-25). Here is some of what I wrote in my journal in 2004.

Tzfat. How to describe this incredible city on top of a mountain? From one corner, a view of Mount Hermon, beyond which lies Lebanon. This is the more distant corner, the newer Tzfat. From another corner, where I stayed for three of my nights here, this being my fifth, the Kineret, or the Galilee, reveals a hazy blue shadow under Tiberias. From the center of the city, Mount Meron looms to the west, behind which the sun set to begin Shabbat for the Ari (Rabbi Luria) and his disciples, a key figure in Jewish mysticism (Kabbalah).

The city has existed here for centuries, perhaps longer than two thousand years. It was here for certain in the second century, during the Roman period. Roads, some little more than stone alleys, some wide stone steps, wind and wend around the mountain top. Steep steps join circling paths of roads and alleys in sometimes obvious, wide lanes, and other times narrow and articulated paths; compared to here, San Francisco seems relatively flat (though much larger--Tzfat has around 20,000 residents). ...

I have a theory about Tzfat, Israel and Jewish mysticism: one could not arise without the other, perhaps. The circling roads, the maze of alleys, the great variance in height (one street runs along the roofs of the street below it, the next up along its roofs), provide glimpses of one’s desired goal. However, go down the road that would seem to take one there, and it curves, taking you to some other place. Each road circles around, and the path to your destination never is straight. However, if you know the connections, which stairs to ascend or descend, you might move from one circle to another quickly. Light constantly plays a role here, at least in this July. The sun and its heat, its setting over Meron, its rising on the other side of the mountain somewhat over the Galilee and the Golan Heights. Shadow and light play through the corridors, the alleys, the courtyards, the grape arbors, arches, synagogues. Stained glass decorates doors, windows, signs. This is Kabbalah.

Tzfat has an ancient history, and much of it lies buried beneath the town. In the 19th century, an earthquake shattered the city and most of its buildings. Thousands died. The survivors simply built on top of the rubble, filling in empty spaces of remaining buildings with rubble and dirt, rocks and refuse. When World War I came, many left the city due to lack of food and water. They had built the roofs with rocks held together with compacted dirt, re-compacting it every year. As people left, the roofs washed out and caved in and left ruins. Then the Arab-Jewish riots and destruction of the Jewish quarter just before and after the British left the area. And the 1948 war. Tzfat has been re-built, largely in the style of ancient Tzfat, in many cases pain-stakingly archaelogically restored under the supervision of the department of antiquities. So, while there are synagogues attributed to the Ari, these are mostly restorations, as I understand it, of the synagogues in the places where they were in the 16th century.

That's what i wrote then (with some minor editing). Back to the present. Tzfat is an artists center and a center of mysticism. It is near areas of natrual beauty, national parks with rivers and water falls, the Galilea, canyons. I plan to hike, to take photos, to read and write, to study. I will post some of my photos here, as well as entries from my journal, during the next few months. I welcome my friends to read them.

Thirty-one days and counting

All confused and excited and with a little trepidation, I look forward to traveling to Israel in 31 days. I leave Minneapolis June 4, to arrive in Tel Aviv via Atlanta on June 5. I will stay there until August 24, writing poetry, studying Kaballah, hiking, and just living life. I have a 3-bedroom apartment, site unseen, which I will rent. It will be the adventure of a life time as my friend, Kathilyn, says. I intend to update this blog a little more frequently, including some photos, while I am gone.

In the meantime, spring is busting out here, the early tulips ending, the next ones opening up in bright splendor. The bleeding heart open wide their love lost and tender. The rhododendron has dropped its petals, but the azalea is begginning to bloom. A jack-in-the-pulpit has emerged from its slumber, and the blueberry bushes' white bell-shaped flowers open a bit more each day. As May progresses it will seem like summer soon enough, and then I'll be gone for the three months to Israel. An amazing thought!

Of blessed memory

This is about the whole tragedy of the West Virginia miners. Just to note it, I guess: The explosion, the two days of searches on and off due to conditions, the families all waiting, not knowing, hoping, despairing. Then the news, one found dead. Then the news, 12 found alive. Front page of the Star Tribune, Minneapolis’ newspaper, said so. The West Virginia governor apparently said so. News reports, bells ringing, photos in the paper of people embracing each other, tears, joy, all calling out the miracle.

And it’s a lie.

One alive, in critical condition (maybe not even alive anymore?), eleven more found dead by searchers. Too late for the Star Tribune’s press run, the truth comes out. The story will likely be about the media, the frenzy, how the wrong story got out. Already this is what I heard in interviews on public radio.
The real horror, though, is the tragic, cruel, brutal fucking trick on those loving people who waited for two shitty, lousy days, hoping and praying and wishing and thinking a miracle had happened, thinking all would be as alright as it could ever be. Only to find out that their beloved brothers, fathers, children, lovers were not alive.

They are dead. That is the story. Sad and tragic, suffocating and horrifying. Let us say Kaddish for them all. Let us celebrate their lives and loves and sorrows and joys. Let us be grateful to have had them in the world. Let us let them go, with love and dignity. Let us not pretend that they are alive any more.

Maybe I can’t end with that. I don’t want to end this entry with such a note, although these notes add depth to our lives. I want to sing another chant another song.

But I can’t. Those poor miners weigh on the world. We must lift them up and sing them into the next world. We must release the mourning of the living who loved them. God, take them gently unto you. God, hold their loved ones close.

If you google my name, you will find many Michael Dickels. Some will hits will be about me. Some are Germans who don’t have English web sites. Some are Americans, a linguist, a musician. One lived over a hundred years ago and climbed down into a mine shaft after a fire:

June 20, 1874

FATAL OCCURRENCE: At the underground works of the Fire Brick Company, at Mt. Savage, Tuesday last, it became necessary, in order to open communication between the shaft and gallery, to blast with a large charge of powder. This was done when Mr. Michael Dickel descended the shaft to inspect the result. The smoke not having risen as quickly as expected, this gentleman was overcome by bad air and fell to the bottom. The bucket was immediately drown up, when Mr. John Hoskin went down to the assistance of Mr. Dickel. He also became suffocated and fell from the bucket. After some delay both men were brought to the surface, and strenuous efforts made to resuscitate them. These endeavors were successful with Mr. Dickel, who is now recovering, but Mr. Hoskin died a few hours later. He was a good citizen, and his sudden and melancholy death is a subject of profound regret to all who knew him, and a deep distress to his wife and three children. (ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgen...homas.txt)

Even though that is not this Michael Dickel, perhaps what I have written came from him. Poor Mr. Hoskin, I grieve for his family. I grieve for the families of the 12 dead. I wonder what Mr. Dickel did next in his life, back in 1874? How did he live and die? Who was this other who had my name?

Memories

I took my mother for a drive after her doctor appointment today. Usually we go to lunch at some place like Baker's Square on the way back to her assisted living. But it was a nice, clear, sunny (but cool) day, and I wanted to begin my vacation. So I took her on a drive south and east of here, to Red Wing, a town on the Mississippi River where it borders Minnesota and Wisconsin that is famous for pottery and steel-toed work boot brands of the same name.

We had lunch in a little sandwich - ice cream shop in the old pottery factory, which has been converted to a sort of mall of antique, candy, and gift stores. Then we headed across the river into Wisconsin and drove up the valley a while before crossing back to Minnesota and heading to her jail... er, assisted living facility... It was a nice time.

The trees are just past the peak, but still held enough leaves and color to provide stunning views on occasion and fall beauty all along. The rolling hills on the way into the river valleys between here and the border soothed my eyes and soul. The lime stone bluffs of the Mississippi valley itself reminded me of trips to NW Illinois as a child.

My mother's memories go further back, of course. While I played some CDs quietly, she rambled on about where we were in her mind. One time we were heading toward Wilmington, Delaware, another time she had been in the buildings we passed as a child, while visiting Williamsport, Pennsylvania. We were going to the red woods for a time, and must have been approaching the Canadian border, by the look of things (and yes, it did look a bit like a Canadian border crossing north of here... a few hundred miles), and who knows where else.

She's really more coherent, in general, than that list implies. But I think she is so starved for stimulation at times, that a trip like this (I took her on a leaf ride a couple of weeks ago, going north this time) sparks memories-- there was none of the dementia resistance or argument if I laughed and said something like, "similar view, wrong state." She immediately knew where she was, laughed or smiled, and didn't get angry about my tricking her or lying to her or anything like that. But the memories flowed, most of them muttered and hard to hear.

I used to get frustrated--wanted her to make "sense" to me and my perceptions. But I am learning to let go, let her play out her memories. After all, I was in NW Illinois for a while, myself. And when I couldn't understand of I felt the frustration, the desire to have an earlier version of her with me, I listened to the music. When I could, I joined with her a bit in the memory or talk--not often, for many were from her own childhood, I think. Or I'd point out a nice view, she'd notice some trees and nod to them. We both got to relax and get away from things for a couple of hours, or perhaps to relax and get into what matters. A form of metta?

Just behind the front lines of winter at Rosh Hashana

Yesterday began the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashana.

It's October and most of North America is enjoying fall. In fact, most of our leaves are still green here with trees just beginning to show some color. Two-hundred miles north of here, not far in weather terms and even closer as climate goes, the trees are at peak color. Bright yellows of birch and poplar punctuated by orange and red maples and the deep red to brown of the occasional oaks. Dark evergreens provide caesura to the color.

And just beyond that, a winter storm warning for Northwestern Minnesota; five to ten inches of snow for Eastern North Dakota and the upper Red River Valley of Minnesota (that corner with North Dakota and Manitoba). So, 200 miles north, pure fall joy; another 100 miles or so north and west, winter crosses the border. Here? The temperatures are still a very mild high 60s.

Last night it rained. And rained. And rained. Five inches fell in the area overnight; three more may fall today. A significant part of the moisture arrives via Tropical Storm Otis from the Pacific and over the Rocky Mountains. Lightening flashed and thunder boomed through the night. In the early hours of the morning, one clap of thunder sounded like a bomb going off next door-- the close sound of thunder rips more than it rumbles, shaking the universe within its grasp.

Today the sky hovers dark, gray, dripping. Heavy rains will no doubt fall, and more thunder, as summer, fall, and winter contest this limited geography, battling in storms that even the national weather service folk call "freaky." Winter to the northwest, tropical rains in the southeast, fall color somewhere in between.

It's not the snow that's unusual here, now. October is the month when snow usually falls here; it is not unusual to have at least some stick on the ground here in Minneapolis before Halloween (although, just as common for the snow to melt right away or to have simply some light flurries). So the forward charge of winter does not take one by surprise, even this early in October, so long as it's up there by Canada.

What's unusual is the warm weather. While temperatures in the 60s for early October are just plain nice and not so unusual, this past weekend the temperatures where in the 80s. Monday morning the dew point hoverd in the high 60s, a pretty darn tropical humidity. Monday night, it was still 80 at midnight, a record. That's summer. Pleasant enough to have summer in October, but summer this close to winter? Freaky.

And the contrast, from snow to tropical storm remains, makes it seem as though, somehow, we are at or just behind the front lines of a monumental battle between summer and winter-- a seasonal war fought over and over again in winds, rain, snow, lightening, thunder.

But why so sharp a contrast? Why has Otis, following on the heels of Katrina and Rita, landed in these United States? Perhaps our Christian leaders would fall back on apocalyptic comforts and blame it on the coming end times, the gearing up for the ultimate battle of good versus evil, the second coming of a mesiah some of us don't believe arrived the first time.

Did I say comforts? Yes, certainly. It allows us to avoid responsibility, ignore the human impact on climate, continue to use and use up resources willy-nilly without considering the consequences or our part in bringing those consequences on. All we need to do, as I understand it, is let ourselves be "born again" and ask God to forgive us before all the "good" people get to leave earth in God's special chariot... so it's comforting to think this is the end times, the apocalypse beginning to show its signs to those who would heed them and stop being greedy just in time to repent...

For me this doesn't work. Pardon the bumper sticker philosophy, but I think the phrase "God's coming, and boy is she pissed" comes closer to any end-time reality their might be out there. I think stewardship of the resources of this planet is a responsibility. One of the rabbis said: "It is not for us to finish the work; nor are we free from doing it." Well, something like that. The work is Tikkun Olam, healing of creation.

So, here I am behind the front lines of this monumental climatological battle between winter and summer, normal seasons and global warming. I won't be able to accomplish the task of solving the problem. But I must do something to contribute to the solution. I must turn, make a turning. In Hebrew, T'shuva. It is the word for repentance-- repentance is not saying "sorry about that." It is turning from one path toward another. Turning toward God. It is not enough to say "I'm sorry," although that, too, is required. One must say it, mean it, and act differently.

So, to the earth, I am sorry for my part in hurting you. I begin to turn-- composting, recycling, driving a hybrid, walking more. I have not turned all the way yet, so don't let me off the hook, either. I still use electricity excessively (witness this computer-gernerated text posted on the internet). I still use fossil fuels.

So, in this new year I look forward to learning more about solar electric panels to at least cut back on my fossil fuel consumption. I want to work on riding my bicycle more, walking even more. I want to buy locally grown food (to support my neighbors, but also to reduce transportation associated fuel consumption). And I will work to have a government that understands that the benefits of conservation and renewable resources far outweigh increasing production of fossil fuels, that the cost savings of preserving natural settings to offset human impact on the environment is greater than the so-called losses to the economy, and that war and lying are wrong.

L'shana tova to all who might read this: a good and fruitful new year.

Be afraid... be very afraid

In 2002 the Federal Government arrested Joseph Padilla, a U.S. Citizen, but also a "former Chicago gang member" (I think that's code for, "he sure ain't a white guy"), at O'Hare Airport in Chicago as he returned to the U.S. The military has held him since, without trial, on a presidential order declaring him an enemy combatant. While a lower court ruled that this was unconstitutional (ever heard of habeus corpus, or the right to a speedy trial, or the right to face your accusers?), the 4th Circuit Court (including one judge reportedly being considered for a supreme court nomination) ruled yesterday, unanimously, that even in the absence of criminal charges "the president can indefinitely detain a U.S. citizen captured on U.S. soil...holding that such authority is vital to protect the nation from terrorist attack" (Minneapolis Star Tribune, Saturday, September 10, 2005, p. A4). (fuller story online: www.startribune.com/stories/...519.html)

Warning, my friends: don't do anything or offend anybody that might lead to an accusation that you could be a terrorist or involved with terrorists or thinking about terrorism or sympathetic with terrorists or anything other than one-hundred and ten percent with the President of these United States. We all know that "you're either with us or against us," so if you criticize George W. and his royal we, "us," you must be against us.

Beware, abandoned citizens of New Orleans: your actions might be deemed terroristic unless you stand firmly with the government that served you so well. Did you break a store window to find diapers, food, water? Damn, that's a terrorist attack against capitalism, the foundation of the "us" that you're supposed to stand with, not against. You must be against "us." The president might decide to declare you enemy combatants and hold you against your will without charges, indefinitely, on some military base(s).

Caution, non-Christian critics of the president: clearly if you're not Christian, as determined by narrow conservative fundamentalist definitions, you're suspect and definitely not with "us." So you must be against "us." Don't speak up too loudly or call attention to yourselves, or the president might declare you an enemy combatant, arrest you on U.S. soil, and hold you with no charges indefinitely.

Look out, voters who vote against the president and his party. If you're not with us, you're against us. If you don't support the president and his party, you're not with us. You, too, must be enemy combatants.

Not white? Don't even think about doing anything but what you're told by those in power. Certainly, if you're not white, you're not with this "us."

Supporter of the president? Wait... did you just say he looks a little tired... hold on... you're not with "us"?

Hello? Anybody home?

Welcome to Germany, early 1930s.