Thursday (Donnestag?) July 2

I’m on the gondola, on my way up the mountain to Piz Nair for a little hike and photo fest. (Piz Nair = elevation of a tidy 3057 meters, or about 9000 feet — obviously somewhat above the treeline, but still not the highest peak in the area.) At least I think I’m bound for Piz Nair. Signage here is adequate but not crystal clear for foreigners. Therefore I’m just following the group of 30 or so random pairs and singles thru the changes, from one car to another every thousand meters, like its some subway in the sky. Pretty great, even if I am headed to Chantarelle, Diavolezza, or some other higher point than Piz Nair. No better spot to waste an hour than atop an Alpine mountain.

Of course, then I would miss my appointment to meet Sue and Barbara about 2:30 back at the hotel (it’s 11:30 now). But that would be okay, too. They were not feeling up to a higher-altitude hike, so now I get to stumble along solo, both linguistically and physically. Not many Americans in St. Moritz this time of year, from the sound of it. On the plus side, John Hiatt’s great song “Cry Love” was on the loudspeaker in the gondola waiting area… so I MUST be in the right place.

I told Sue if she ever wanted to try on a Versace $2000 dress, today’s her chance. Hey, THEY don’t know she can’t afford it.

Almost to the top now. Las montanas son breathtaking. Can’t look at this tiny screeen anymore, for now.

Constantines S. Niarchos : 23.1.1962 — died 1999

Greek climber who conquered slope of Piz Nair, and also Everest on 13.5.1969

Ich danke mein Gott das ist uber alles.

The Glacier-Maker…

Aber ich bin kalt. And it’s drizzling too.

I’m not sure if I and my $10 Incredible Hulk watch belong in Switzerland, but I sure do like it here. Aber… Don’t get me angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry. Besides, the Swiss probably don’t GET angry. It’s against some unwritten, stiff-upper-lip code. Not like the Italians — will get pissed and create a 30-year vendetta over which side of the fence a beetle chooses to climb down — not even like the Americans, who settle their affairs with a little gunfight or broken-bottle brawl now and then.

Later…

Got down offen the mountain okay, then in the afternoon went to Sils (a neighboring town where Nietzsche used to summer… but I ain’t gonna talk about depressing old Fred… you’re welcome). Walked around the Silsensee (Lake of Sils), popped in some shops, had another of those unconscionably small cups of coffee they serve here (but at least it’s strong), and waited out a bit of rain while drinking it.

Good buffet supper back at the hotel, where Barbara throws a bit of her seniority around and for our suppers here, gets us a semi-private table at the back, in another room in fact, far from the high-volume chatter of the several international tour groups that are here this week. Walked with Sue after supper into town (the “Bad” section, named for the mineral baths they have here). Unfortunately, one other “bad” part of town is that they’re re-doing all the brick cobblestones on the main street, so it ain’t so nice to look at. But it’s a tourism based town that’s been hit sort of hard by the wordlwide recession, so might as well tear up Main Street now, rather than in a busier year.

Tomorrow, on to Lugano, near the Italian border. I’m feeling torn. Don’t wanna leave, but can’t wait to get to Italy either.

Might not get to a computer for several days; so this is a long two-part post.

Wednesday, July 1

Quiet night our last night in Zurich, except for the part when we got lost (though we were only 3-4 blocks from our hotel). And the part when Sue got nervous about the chicken kabab she’d ordered. And the part when Mark went on a fruitless hunt for a simple bottled softdrink in the middle of downtown Zurich, plenty of restaurants and bars, no grocers or 7-11s.

Today (Wed.), took the 11:37 train with Aunt Barbara from Zurich into the Alps, arriving in St. Moritz about 4pm. Like a precise Swiss clock, the train left the station at exactly the time published in the schedule. Now at 4:15 I’m sitting in an aluminum chair on the balcony of Hotel Laudinella (aka “Hotel Lark”), watching pouring rain come down on a 9000 foot mountain just around the corner. It’s also washing down some of the more interesting architecture we’ve seen thus far. Here in one of the classic ski resort towns in all of Europe –host of the 1928 and 1948 Winter Olympics– there’s an eclectic mix of styles: 19th century darkwood and carved Nordic, 17th century French (Provincial?), Early 20th Art Deco and functional, clean-lined modern. Some of the houses and hotels in this region are also known for a special style of painting –part graffiti, part family crest, geometric designs and calligraphy, all writ large, but in subtle beige or earthtones on a white or cream-colored background.

This region is identified most often as The Engadin, but informally as “ibex country”, after the Capra (as in Frank) Ibex, a deerlike animal with long, slightly curved, tubular, studded antlers. The Schweiz-Deutsch word for it is “steinbock”, and this state even has this stag on it’s flag. All of this suggests that the Swiss are regionalists, not unlike Americans, and are proud of their local customs. Also, around here, they hunt them (umm… the ibex, not the customs).

On the balcony in the next stack of the hotel are two Asian women, and below them, an Indian man having a smoke. Saw lots of foreigners, and lots of smokers, when we were in Zurich, but also lots of local people on bicycles, on skateboards, or doing other healthy things. Tons of electric streetcars there, too –and people of all classes, even the bankers, seem to use them.

Speaking of banks, exchange rate from U.S. Dollar to Swiss Franc is about 1 to 1 now, though Barbara says it was at two or even three to one just a few years ago. Our tough luck. But at least we’re here finally.

There’s a German/French/English New Testament in our bedside nightstand, and there’s nary a person in this whole town who speaks just one language. Even the big group of Chinese that came through the lobby with their guide probably speak two dialects of Chinese. And of course everyone can say “Coca Cola”. Ugh. I’ve sworn off all things American for the duration of this trip. Why eat, buy or do what I can get back home? (And cheaper.)

We’re here two nights, then on to Lugano by bus through the Italian (or Romanische-speaking) part of Switzerland. Barbara says this German/Italian hybrid dialect is dying, cuz all the kids want to learn and use English (which itself has overtaken French as the international language, in our aunt’s opinion). On the free shuttle we took here from the train station, a German or Swiss pre-teen boy got on wearing a half-cocked Yankees cap and a full-blown swagger. Ah well, he’s Swiss — he don’t know any better when it comes to baseball.

Looking forward to a hike or two here in the mountains, and around the gorgeous lake (hint: it’s in a gorge). Maybe I’ll enjoy some fondue as well. (Yikes! Can a macho American male say he wants fondue without sounding like a metrosexual? …Oh, who cares?!)

Wed 10:45pm

Ich bin im der hotel bar, mit der name Keller Bar (it’s in the basement, as in cellar, which is also the origin of Sue’s Aunt Barbara’s surname – her ancestors were vineyard owners.) There’s a rapper spitting in German on the stereo here, and I’m drinking Calandra (?) Edelbrau, a local brew. Remember “Edelweis”, the flower and song… well this is the area Austrian Maria escaped to in Sound of Music, and the little edelweis flower is on all kinds of products, and easily found in the valleys. Edelbrau is a lightish lager, not bitter, but not as rich as a Sam Adams or Harp.

After serving me, the bartender and her barback rushed away. They acted like there was a fight, or a big football match they had to see, but when she returned briefly to get some champagne, she said they had broken away for “mangiare” (to eat).

So now I’m here literally alone in this bar, surrounded by liquor from the four corners of the earth. Okay, three… Asia is severely under-represented here. These Swiss are very loose, trusting people. They seldom lock their bikes, they don’t guard their liquor, and they leave 400-year-old carved wooden chests out where any Joe can set their drink or their cigarette on it. Then again, many of the hotel staff here are Italian, so maybe they’re just being more derelict in their duties than a true Swiss would.

Before she left (with the bartender), I asked the well-dressed African-looking woman down the bar, in English, how many languages she spoke. She counted with her fingers, then said “Five” quite matter-of-factly. Clearly, this city is one of the world’s major playgrounds, though judging by the Versace and Pucci stores in its small downtown (or should I say uptown, since it’s up the hill from us our more modest hotel), it’s not for the faint-of-wallet.

Now they’re back, but the barkeep is speaking to a patron, or a local. She addressed me in Swiss-German when she came back, and I managed to grunt out “Ich spreche keine Deutsch”, as my host helped me to remember. She was probably the first person in three days not to know right away that I’m American. Must be the low lighting in here, and the fact that I know just enough German to order a beer (as long as I can also point).

The n-tv news show on the tv to my right is turned down, but I see from the text crawl below that 97-year-old fave actor Karl Malden died today. He of the large nose and even larger heart. Stanley’s more reserved pal in Streetcar. General Bradley to George C. Scott’s Patton. Mentor to Michael Douglas on Streets of San Francisco. So long, Karl. As our Irish compatriots say, may you be in heaven half an hour before the devil knows you’re dead.

11:30 now, and the bar activity is kicking up a notch: five twenty somethings, with the two new hipsters in horn-rims next to me ordering vodka martinis. So now I’m an old fish in new water, but I am not entirely out of my element.

Nevertheless, after I nurse a second beer, I’ll make a quick pass through the small park next to the hotel, then on to bed. Barbara and Sue tease me about not getting tired, but I don’t mind. “I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” as my mentor Warren Zevon once sang.

Speaking of American music and mentors, it’s everywhere around here. Last night The Boss played Zurich. Joe Jackson will be here in a couple weeks (though he’s really a Brit), and I hear the likes of Lenny Kravitz and see posters for the Bonus Bothers tour (thass Jonas Brothers, for you tweens and sober people ou there) wherever the crowds can be found.

Meanwhile down here in the cellar, I recognize just four whiskeys on the shelf: Canadian Club, J&B, Chivas Regal (there are no kings left in America, and Queen Liz is a figurehead in Canada),… And of course, Jack Daniels. (No accounting for taste… Unless you look at great marketing.) There are other whiskeys, just unfamiliar to me. They don’t even have the good Irish brands like they did at the piano bar in Zurich: Glennfiddich, Glenlivet, GlennMiller (kidding…), and my beloved Bushmill’s. Nor Johnnie Walker, nor bourbons of any kind. Somebody needs to teach these polite sons of staid Swiss bankers how to drink! (But not me. I’m driving, er, walking, …or would you accept “crawling up the stairs”? In other words, my anti-depressants fuzz up my buzz considerably.)

On the other hand, I feel okay. Maybe I’ll climb the nearest mountain and howl at the moon. This is the mentoring that *I* have to offer. This is the true gift of Americans upon the world stage: audacity! Any of you pups ready to make some noise?

Though the bar babe just changed the stereo from swaying, easy Jamaican/German dub music to pounding house music, acid jazz and agitated high-voiced pixies singing updates of bad lounge music in English. That’s my cue to check out the bocce courts outside and start my long, low howl.

(But not before the lights go down and the female horn-rimmed hipster gets a tiramisu with a sparkler stuck in it, and a rousing rendition of “Happy Birthday” -in broken English- from the gathered and growing crowd. Nice country you got here, kids.)

WHEW! Finally found a hotel with computer access (but a slightly odd German keyboard). At least for now, I can stop fighting Sue’s Blackberry, which dislikes both WordPress and facebook. Facebook readers will have seen part one of this travelogue, but not the second day.

Started my first day in Europe out right by almost causing an international incident at the airport’s passport gate.

Our plane landed, and we were checking through security/immigration. I had seen a sign over one of the lines with the letters “EU” on it, and I stupidly thought that stood for either Estados Unidos (Spanish) or Etats Unis (French). Bear in mind: I was fuzzy-brained after only one hour’s sleep on the plane ride. Then the gatekeeper told me no, it was European Union (Duh!), but then I went the wrong way around the rope barricade in moving back to Sue’s line. So at that point the security woman at the next gate thought I had been on the Exit side, and was trying to sneak into the line or into the secured airport. She called me to come back, and it took a minute before Gatekeeper #1 –and about half the waiting passengers– helped her understand I had only line-jumped, not passed through from the city side of the gate.

When I got to her window a few minutes later, apologies and explanations tumbled clumsily out of my mouth, and she mercifully said “Now you know for next time.” Though I’m sure next time I’ll do something else to embarrass myself.

On the plus side, Lyle Lovett was singing over the P.A. in the airport terminal, so at least a few nice aspects of American culture have made it over here.

Sue and I gutted it out through most of the day (and a nice restaurant with a mountain overlook) on no sleep. But by the time of our late lunch with Aunt Barbara, Sue was toast. She only nibbled, then napped an hour at Barbara’s nearby condo, while Barbara and I talked about Switzerland, Egypt, food, Toni Morrison, and other points of common interest.

At night we overpaid for a simple meal, searched unsuccessfully for a grocer, and continued our amateur architecture tour (which had begun in the morning at the 1200-year-old Fraumunster church, complete with spirit-filled Mark Chagall windows dated 1971. Awe-inspiring, inside and out.)

After supper, we split up, as Sue needed a bed again but I still wanted to go hear a brass band we’d seen setting up in a public square earlier. Except when I got there, they were done already. So I looked around the “old city” section, took photos, saw a poster saying Springsteen is playing here tomorrow, and eventually landed in an “American” piano bar I’d seen earlier in the day.

Except in this Swiss/American piano bar, the bartender was from Kosovo, and the musician was Bulgarian. We talked American and world music some, after which this Bulgarian Billy Joel proceeded to butcher the lyrics of song after song– good songs, too! Al Jarreau, Fats Domino, Chicago’s Saturday in the Park, John Denver’s Country Roads, Steely Dan’s Do It Again.

Eventually I had to leave to preserve my dignity and sanity. You can’t sing along with a mumbling Bulgarian when he is replacing the words in your favorite songs, and what’s worse is that he’s oblivious to his problem. So what’s a piano bar for, if not sing-alongs?

Tomorrow, a more substantial tour of Lake Zurich, the church with the largest clock face in Europe, and other historic sites. It’s a lovely city, flowers and art everywhere, and it ought to be a great day. But now –FINALLY, at 12:06am –I need eight hours of sleep!

——————————————————————————————————————-

Tuesday

Holy crap, was ist die date? June 30th. Today would have been my late father’s 70th birthday. Happy Geburtstag, Dad! Wish you were here.

Sitting in hotel lobby waiting fur Aunt Barbara. BBC World News channel was chosen over CNN in the hotel room while getting ready fur the day. Train crash in northern Italy. 10 dead. Better now than when we’re on OUR train in northern Italy. On the other hand, reports of superfraud Bernie Medoff’s 150-year prison sentence cheered us considerably.

Another great “cheese and chocolate” free breakfast in the hotel this morning. (The chocolate is that Nutella chocolate and nut spread for bread and fruit. I’ve had it in the U.S only once, but here in the home of fine chocolate, it somehow seems right on target. Kid food, but who cares?)

‘Swonderful. Then I pop over to the Jung bakery for a sesame baguette for later (these €25 veal sausage meals are fine, but pricy). I tried English, and bad German, but the counter girl at Jung apologized, saying “Swedish. Sorry.” But I still remembered just enough college German to get my sesame-seeded bread (so good and crusty here!) and three navel oranges (eins, zwei, drei ! oh, and maybe they are not navels, but true Valencia oranges, from Spain!)

Later Tuesday morning, Barbara takes us around the Old City area, including the spot where a number of Teuters (Mennonites) were intentionally drowned by the followers of Zwingli (a Zuricher and a reformer of a more bloody variety than Bern’s intellectual, John Calvin, in that same era). Then on to the site of the original Roman garrison, near Big Clock St. Peter’s (largest clock face in Europe on its tower). Then ‘cross the Limmat River and up the hill to Zwingli’s Grossmunster kirche (church), the first Swiss Reformed church, with its beautiful pipe organ and its subterranean crypt honoring Charlemagne (and also the martyrs/monastics Felix and Rugalo… or something close to that spelling…) True confessions: knowing what I already knew about that bullyboy Zwingli, I felt justified in opening the heavy brass door of the sacristy next to the altar area, to peek inside. (It was empty, but I still stole its 400 years of secrets and its residual holiness. See, even peaceful Mennonites can still be sneaky and agressive when we want to be… or was that the naughty Catholic schoolboy coming out to make mischief?)

Good light Italian lunch (insalati Caprese) and tiramisu rustica for dessert after that (no peasant cannolis available on the menu at Dialog). Then strolling back to our hotel at a leisurely pace. Barbara only has about three good hours of tour-guiding in her at a time at this age (late-70s), which is fine. So we’ll discover Zurich for ourselves tonight.

“The Bhagavad Gita — that ancient Indian Yogic text — says that it is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else’s life with perfection.”  -Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love, page 95

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons and daughters of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” -Jesus, in Matthew 5:9-10 (NIV)

I leave for my first ever vacation in Europe in about two hours, and yet here I am writing, instead of tying up the half-dozen loose ends that need to be taken care of in the next 24 hours. But that’s okay. I don’t need to control every last nuance of my life, and I would be a fool to try. (Though my nervous wife wishes I would get off the computer and finish packing.)

And maybe I’m a fool either way, whether or not I work to control all that might impact my life. But if so, I’d rather be God’s fool than anyone else’s.

I would be remiss, though, if I didn’t mention that last weekend I popped in on my old church, Reba Place Church in Evanston, IL (Mennonite). It was for the wedding of a friend’s son (and the son has also become a friend). It was also the first time I darkened the door of that sanctuary (though they don’t call it that) since our family left the church last June.

We left on good terms, but I sensed all along that I needed to make a clean break, precisely because I was so bonded and committed to that specific group of people and their way of seeing things, of doing things, for over twenty years. I needed to live a slightly different life, however imperfectly. I am still a fully Mennonized believer, and will remain so forever. But I needed to “leave the nest” in order to grow, and in order to support the needs of my family (who admittedly were not getting as much, or giving as much, in the context of that congregation anymore).

Besides seeing the wonderful father of the groom bawl like an old woman (love ya, Doug!), the other wedding highlight for me personally was sitting at the reception table with Ronn and Julius, who together in 1991 had officiated for my wife and my wedding in that same space (and on a similarly sweltering day, though now there’s air-conditioning there). Julius in particular has been like a second father – a Grand Father (to use a Richard Rohr term) – to me, and to dozens if not hundreds of other men, women and children in his 40+ years at that church. He is the living definition of Christian community and charity, and wise mentoring, more than anyone else I have known (except perhaps for his wife Peggy).

He’s also a fairly odd bird, another reason we get along so well.

So we still have friends at the church – and at it’s sister church Living Water, planted in nearby Chicago – but now we are telling the rest of the world about the good news of peacemaking, and of simple living –those very un-hip, un-American values that Jesus both discussed much and lived out daily. These are values Reba Place has been pretty good at living out for so many years, values that the more recent Emergent Church movement and New Monasticism movements are beginning to rediscover, much to my satisfaction and joy.

Speaking of hip vs. un-hip, I got a little “bump” for this blog by being trendy and writing about Michael Jackson this week. Weird. Even among all the thousands of other blogs, Tweets, columns, and tv specials, I still managed to catch the ear of twice as many people as usual, just by writing about what’s “hot”.

As for my usual fare, I am well aware that 14th century Italian monks and the perils of trying to figure out my son’s stupid Transformer toy for him are definitely not hot topics. Nevertheless, I must live my own destiny imperfectly. I cannot be the next Kurt Vonnegut, Martin Scorcese, Mark Heard or Gordon Quinn (look up those last two, both big heroes of mine). As Old Blue Eyes once sang, “I gotta be me”.

If I’m extremely lucky or blessed, perhaps some significant portion of the population will come to me, instead of me deperately trying to reach them. Or, I will help further the cause of a few thousand war orphans and refugees in Pakistan or Angola, and die unrecognized for that effort, except by a handful of well-informed people.

So be it. Humanitarian work, hard truths, ethics, and pacifism are never going to be hot topics in a fallen world. Jesus himself said it would be so — or something to that effect.

That Jesus was and is a very unhip cat, wasn’t he?

Since I’m still in America for a couple more days, I’ve succumbed to the mass mourning ritual over Michael Jackson somewhat, and am enjoying watching MTV play all of his old music videos back-to-back, while I digitize some CDs and do other computer work.

For my own attitude about Michael’s influence, and his immense psycho/spiritual baggage, see my entry from this past winter in which I explored some of his historical and creative importance on the worldwide scene. [If you click, the Michael stuff is mostly in the second half of the post.] You can also do a search at right, as I’ve cited Michael’s music or personal life a handful of other times here as well. He was nothing if not a fascinating, somewhat iconic or symbolic figure.

Anyone remember the Jackson Five cartoon series on television, probably early 70s? Anyone remember the name of his brother Jermaine’s one and only solo hit?

And does anyone think Paul McCartney’s public statement today, calling Michael a “Boy Man”, sounds more like a mild insult instead of sincere praise? (Michael did, after all, buy the rights to all of Paul’s Beatle songs… which Mac saw as a betrayal.)

On the Mount Rushmore of the 20th century, maybe Jackson even belongs there… maybe moreso than Sir Paul, even. Came up during the civil rights movement, at the center of big changes in entertainment and business, complicated religious/personal identity issues (he was Jehovah’s Witness early on, but morphed into something more mysterious later), weird medical issues, legal and financial messes, married a Presley, caught fire working for Pepsico, hid out in Dubai, tabloid gold, and of course there’s that whole triple threat thing as an entertainer (singer/dancer/actor… though the acting thing is debatable). He had a hand in some of the finest creative projects of the past fifty years. And I’m not just talking about his solo stuff. The Jackson Five hold a special place in my heart, too.

And yet I will not worship Michael, because among other things he often didn’t write the top songs or play instruments on his recordings. Quincy Jones, a musical genius from a prior generation, was one of the main people who allowed Michael to reach the heights he reached. And when they stopped collaborating, Michael’s slow decline (in sales at least, maybe also in musical quality or influence) set in pretty soon after. Still good… just no longer a phenomenon.

As for his personal life, that speaks for itself. Or even if it doesn’t, I can’t compete with the thousands of other news and entertainment reporters weighing in this week. Besides, why drag down a guy who had already been chewed up and spit out by our crass, ungrateful culture hundreds of times in his career?

So I didn’t want the day to pass without sending out my thanks to one of the two great MJ’s who made my teen years a whole lot of fun. (Chicago folks can gues the other…)

So long, Mike. I can’t pretend to have known or understood you. Or even to have loved you the way all these people coming out of the woodwork claim. But I sure enjoyed your tunes and your moves. Even one of the greatest triple threats ever, Fred Astaire, had the good sense to recognize your immense talent.

Every generation needs a king. You ruled the world for a few years there, and you brought us together like few other public figures can.

This is one of the few times I can say “rest in peace”, and actually it means something. So enjoy the rest. “Don’t stop till you get enough.”

 

A few little stacks of heaven, including travel, linguistic, poetical, and devotional books.

 

In Italian, the word for “left”, as in left hand, is sinistro. From which apparently we get the English word sinister. Anyone out there still think language and translation are morally neutral and non-political?

On the plus side, I also learned today that the modern version of Italian is based on master poet (and divine comedian) Dante Alighieri’s beautiful 14th century Florentine dialect. So nice to know that for once, the people with the biggest guns didn’t get to make the rules.

I’ve had my head buried in books this morning, a combination of last year’s big Oprah-assisted hit Eat, Pray, Love (by Elizabeth Gilbert, set partly in Italy, and recommended by Mom… Thanks Mom!), plus various Italian language-learning texts and travel books (that fat one in the photo near the bottom is from Lonely Planet, the Brits’ slightly hipper version of Fodor’s) .

The language books are all from our great friend Donna, who had to cancel a trip there several years ago. (No rush, baby. Before you die will be soon enough.)  Last weekend she asked if we could pack her into one of our larger suitcases. We’re not too good at packing light, and we do really love her, so we were tempted, but we had to say no.

I’m trying my best to firm up in my head some of the trickier differences between Spanish, which I speak at an intermediate level, and Italian, for which I’ve been hearing only expletives, strange idioms and ethnic slurs since I was two years old… as in “Baffa Nabula” (for you non-Sicilians, that’s a bad transliteration of “Go to Naples!” – which was comparable to saying “go to hell” for some strange reason, when shouted by my maternal grandparents). But I know that only 10% of my reading — on both language and history –will stick. Sue and I, senza (without) Graham, will still mostly stumble clumsily through Switzerland and Italy for a couple weeks, like every other cheerfully ignorant American who’s ever been there.

Which is okay. I’m getting over my need to be special, and graceful, and brilliant, and perfect, and the center of attention. Really, I am. No really!

More importantly, I simply trust all these stranieros (foreigners) to be friendly, accept me, even take care of my wife and I, in the warm way that Italian hospitality has been practiced for hundreds of years. These are, after all, MY people. Maybe a little moreso than the smart but bland Danes and creative but depressive Irishmen on my father’s side of the family. (There I go with those ethnic slurs again… sorry, Dad.) I’m half Italian –or Italian-American, more accurately– but the way my sisters and I were raised, it was more like a 75/25 split in terms of what we were exposed to and encouraged in.

Which explains why I’ve always been slightly obese, given the wide and deep Italian palate. As Dad often teased, most people eat to live, but Mark “lives to eat”.

The Swiss front end of our trip will be great, too. A bit more laid  back, and full of surprises, partly because I don’t know much at all about Switzerland. Except –amateur linguist that I am– that they speak practically ALL of the southern European languages (they have a French section, a German section, an Italian section, and a genuinely Swiss section… not to mention speaking English pretty well in many cases).

We’ll be visiting and traveling with Sue’s Swiss godmother, Aunt Barbara, one of the sweetest and most grounded beings on the planet. So we’ll be taken care of there, too. Besides, she’s the one that’s been beating the “come to Europe” drum most consistently, in her infrequent but highly-valued communication with us all through our marriage. We want to see her on her home turf finally, and learn a few travel tips from one of the masters. Plus she thinks I already speak Italian, bless her cosmopolitan heart.

And then there’s the prospect of hiking in the Alps, with someone who can probably even name most of the wildflowers that we’ll see… though only in German, I suspect. Having lived in the U.S. for 10+ years, Barbara’s English is excellent, but not that good.

But alas, there are still some preparations to make before we depart. So I have to resist for now my temptation to blather on, giddily explaining how much I’m loving Eat, Pray, Love already, or telling about the Native American folktale of Raven bringing us the sun (a buried book in the photo above, one that I will re-tell for a men’s spirituality event this Saturday), or discussing the kiddie picture book featuring St. Francis’ Canticle of the Sun (not pictured… neither sun nor book).

No more. For now, basta. This is more than enough. Except to say that any commenters who know me or Sue, and who drop your address in the Comments slot below, will most certainly receive a postcard from faraway lands. Because I wish I could pack you ALL in my suitcase, but I can’t. Ecco e’ basta.

I’ve been watching some of the Iran coverage, and hand-wringing, and grandstanding, and lying.

Among other things, I see a severe lack of “history” reporting and discussion, in my own very ahistorical United States society. It’s not as if we can’t learn something from past mistakes (politicians, newsmedia, and private citizen alike). It’s more like we dig in our heels and won’t look back, in order to understand some of the roots of these present problems. I actually found myself explaining some of the 1979 Iranian/Khomeini revolution to a young (Christian) Iranian woman here in Skokie a few months back!

It’s a little sick, actually, the way families and schools and churches and television don’t ground our young people in a fuller understanding of what happened before they were born, and how it affects the here-and-now.

It’s not just the teachers, politicians or news gathering agencies that are to blame, though. We Americans been in a collective state of holier-than-thou denial for generations. At least since the Eisenhower era. And after all, didn’t we have alot of pain to forget? WWII and the Great Depression, post-WWI disillusionment, the slow rise of existentialist or “every-man-for-himself” thinking… it’s all part of a pattern. But since the wars themselves were not actually fought on U.S. soil, and the majority of the depressive philosophers were German or French, it became that much easier for Americans to sweep history under the rug and keep looking smilingly forward.

Foreigners mostly like Americans for our optimism, from what I’ve heard. But they also are frustrated by our collective ignorance of their cultures, and of their own even more painful history. So Iran is just the latest example of messes that the Americans, Brits, and a handful of others helped create, then left the locals to try cleaning up.

In my opinion, the Reagan era was the apex of that self-involved attitude. There was the concern with image, and politics as marketing, talking about how things LOOK instead of how they are. Plus the “screw you” message of a pro-dictator, anti-democratic foreign policy in relation to the developing world (though to be fair, Ike, Kennedy and others had this attitude also). The rise of “debtor nations” can be traced in many cases to actions in that decade by the International Monetary Fund (a puppet organization essentially controlled by the U.S., as evidenced by their ability to get that turd Paul Wolfowitz appointed to head it up).

Yet now our “we’re the neighborhood bully, get used to it” chickens are coming home to roost. Afghanis know we’re just the latest “empire” messing with their country, that we formerly SUPPORTED the Taliban when they were fighting the Soviets, and that Karzai is just the latest Western puppet. Meanwhile –just a few years after being granted the right to vote — Iraqis have already seemingly given up on the power of the vote, sensing the system is rigged and biased from the outset, or that their bumbling Parliament can barely agree on a lunch order, let alone an effective reconstruction plan.
Back here in the Land of the Free to Be Ignorant, we find we have very few true “friends” left. And bad national and international monetary policy –which has quietly been a huge problem all along – is now the house of cards finally falling down, taking the world with it (except maybe China, which will make a killing –both literally and figuratively — by the end of the current recession).

But in the middle of all that past struggle and present confusion in the Middle East, nobel laureate Jimmy Carter has had the guts for years to continue playing Jeremiah, the Weeping Prophet, unafraid to state the hard but hopeful truth. He made lasting peace between Egypt and Israel, and continues with warnings of the coming storm in his books (if we don’t change our ways). To me, it’s no wonder Smilin’ Ron got elected over Carter. Americans prefer the shiny optimistic lie to the realistic truth about how hard it is to establish and maintain a fair and lasting democracy (even in our own country).

And sloppy policy, poor accountability, and shortsighted thinking have ruled ever since… Clinton included. No surprise we’ve reached this point.
In Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, Palestine, and right here at home, the  ”house built on sand” analogy is a good one. What’s worse: it’s a cheap, pre-fab house, built with half the manpower and brainpower it used to take.

Is any “kingdom of this world” really built to last? I’m beginning to doubt it. But I will pray for peace and justice in Iran, nevertheless.

When I did the CAC’s Men’s Rites of Passage last August, there was a handful of  really important music that was either used in the rituals, or else kept springing to mind from my personal CD collection. As I’m re-doing my private devotional mix-CD (original got scratched) I thought I’d go public and let y’all in on what’s on it.

The centerpiece is a classical work from of one of the earlier rituals at the event, a grief ritual, was Polish composer Henryk Gorecki’s 3rd Symphony (aka Symphony of Sorrowful Songs). Composed in part as a memorial to the many young men who died in WWII, either Polish or otherwise, this evocative work builds to some powerful crescendos.

Second up on the CD, a new addition to the earlier CD that I scratched, is the Finale to Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. Ever since college, this entire work has been my own private version of headbanging music, inspirational, emotional and just downright fun. I put just the Finale on, only because I need room for the rock and folk songs that also have meaning to me as I try to understand how to enter into that “beginner’s mind”, that monkishly prayerful headspace, which came so consistently when I was on the “confront” (the opposite of a retreat).

First on that non-classical list, another one that Father Rohr used to great effect in one of the rituals, is Leonard Cohen’s song Anthem. The most famous line from this song is probably “There is a crack in everything… that’s how the light gets in.” Cohen had been a fave of mine for years, but I had not listened closely to this song until last year. He’s a great writer for contemplatives, with a Buddhist/Jewish angle, but seems to have great respect for Jesus and New Testament imagery also.

Next up, a trio of songs by Bruce Cockburn, my “spiritual director” for the week that I spent in the woods being initiated (btw, that’s two Canadians in a row, for those of you keeping score) . Snippets of his songs are always popping up in my brain as I go through life, but these three took on greater importance when I started the men’s work.

a) Get Up Jonah (from The Charity of Night) – a hard-rockin’ call for the reluctant prophet to get it together and come straighten us all out. Also a call for me to get off my ass and find the courage to speak up about what’s gone wrong in our world.

b) Closer to the Light (from Dart to the Heart) – a grief-induced tribute to Cockburn’s friend and fellow songwriter Mark Heard… who’s right up there on my “old school” list with Cockburn, Cohen, Townshend, Dylan, Springsteen, Van Morrison, James Taylor, Paul Simon, Lennon/McCartney and Peter Gabriel (most of whom I had no room for on this disc. And I haven’t even gotten to the women yet…)

c) Open (from You’ve Never Seen Everything) – a cheerful, honest appraisal by a middle-aged man stating that he’s enjoyed walking (or stumbling) down some pretty odd paths, led by God, and he’s looking forward to finishing the journey in an equally colorful way.

Last on the disc, a dark horse entry by a woman, trying to connect the spiritual sensibilities of the 13th century Sufi poet Hafiz and the mindset of Jesus when he walked the earth. That would be Rickie Lee Jones, on the little-known album The Sermon on Exposition Boulevard, one of the more unique projects of the past decade. The song I chose was Nobody Knows My Name, a mostly improvised, chant-like thing based on Lee Cantelon’s book The Words (as in the words of Jesus) that reaches into some new territory  musically, lyrically, even theologically. I have not picked up the book yet, but her interpretation of some of its themes is a jazzy, folky, very postmodern (and yet sort of orthodox) perspective on what the gospels might mean to people who work at diners and text their friends on a Sidekick or Blackberry.

And that’s it. That’s all I had room for. A first-person narrative sung by Jesus, in the guise of a 21st century woman, gets the last word. If I had room on a standard CD-R, I would put John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme into the mix to wrap things up. Guess I’ll just have to reload to hear that one.

And as a bonus for you dads out there, here’s a link to a slightly silly, mostly great song called Father’s Day by a New York fratboy band called Guyz Nite. To paraphrase Ted (or was it Bill?): Be excellent to yourselves and one one another, gentlemen!

Chicago! View from the backside almost as good as the front!

That is why the Great Ones speak of  / The vital need / To keep Remembering God, / So you will come to know and see Him / As being so Playful /And Wanting. / Just Wanting to help.  – from I Know the Way You Can Get, by Hafiz, circa 1370 A.D.

God really does have a sense of humor. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

Friday was one of the weirder, more exciting days of the past year. I took Graham to his Red Sox fan dentist, saw my psychiatrist, helped a lost Chinese tourist find an art gallery, gave my navel orange to a stoner, and intentionally walked my dog in a torrential downpour. And wrote yesterday’s rather interesting blog about visiting my dad’s gravesite and other ritually significant experiences. And got tipsy in the evening, after a darn fine home-grilled Omaha Steak.

The only missing ingredient left to make the day more colorful was getting arrested, propositioned, or growing a magic beanstalk.

I particularly enjoyed the el ride with Stoner Boy, on my way back from the shrink’s. He was about 22, from Wicker Park (which I found out later, and which means he rode from way Northwest all the way into the Water Tower area, changed trains, only to ride way north and then west again to get to Skokie to visti his friend). I asked him, after I got on the train down in the Loop, if he knew what was the starting time for the Purple Line (formerly called the Evanston Express cuz it skips all the North Side stops in Chicago). He didn’t know, but as we talked a bit, he realized it might be a good choice for him too. So we both decided to get off at Belmont and take our chances (it was about 3:30pm). While we waited for our stop, he rolled his own cigarette, from some papers and tobacky he had in a white business envelope. If nothing else, getting off at Belmont would let him have his smoke, even if he got back on the Howard Red Line ten minutes later cuz the Purple wasn’t running yet.

When we were on the el platform, I didn’t see him for awhile. Then he came back over to me and said somebody had told him the Purple would be here in five minutes or less. Then he glanced down at my plastic grocery bag and asked if I had any snacks. I said I had an orange. He didn’t come right out and ask, but after an awkward pause, I said, “Do you need an orange?”

“Yeah,” he replied. “I had a couple rice cakes earlier, but that was about it.”

So I surrendered the orange to my poor adopted stoner with the munchies. He was on his way to Skokie, same as me, but I stopped short of offering him a car ride to his friend’s.

I also wondered – in that old time “evangelical” sort of way – if I should be witnessing to him about Jesus. But I decided against it. Maybe I just don’t wanna work that hard anymore. I dunno. I was still ministering to him, in my own private way. If I had felt that Jesus Thumb pressing down on me to say something more directly, I would have. But I didn’t sense the timing was right.

So we rode the Purple Line in adjoining seats when it came, and we only spoke momentarily on the Howard Street platform when we arrived at the end of the line (the end for me, anyway.) I told him where he could pick up the Skokie Swift, and then went up the elevator, out of Stoner Boy’s life forever.

Or not. If you’re reading this now, Stoner Boy from Wicker Park, Jesus loves you. He’s even willing to tolerate your pretentious, fake bohemian, roll-your-own smoking habit, since obviously you’re piss poor, sort of lost, and therefore automatically one of His peeps.

Just remember to say “thank you” more enthusiastically the next time a complete stranger offers you his orange and gives directions unsolicited.

Sometimes, any old gravestone will do.

Visited my father’s and grandparents’ grave site yesterday. Amazingly, four of my eight great-grandparents (all four on Mom’s side) are in the same cemetery. The elder Stellas are just thirty yards from Grandma & Papa Stella (and Dad, the token Irishman/in-law… waiting for Mom to slip in beside him eventually). The Fillicaro ancestors are way across the huge Mt. Carmel Cemetery, in one of its oldest sections, where most of the gravestones are written up in Italian instead of English.

This activity and grieving was sparked partly by my great aunt Geri seeking some support while arranging for her own mausoleum crypt. Aunt Geri’s single – and as she puts it “doesn’t like dirt” – so instead of being interred next to her mother and father, she’ll be cremated and dropped into a marble box alongside dozens of other marble boxes, her unknown but eternal neighbors.

It’s pretty there, though. I’m not saying anything negative here about cremation or mausoleums, or whatever these condo-like, open-air crypt complexes are technically called. Just one of many fine alternatives.

As for me, I want to be in the ground, with at least a footstone. But a headstone would be nice, so I can fit some cryptic “last words” on it at the bottom. We’ll see. Suggestions below in the comment section regarding what should be inscribed on my tombstone are welcome, especially from those of you who know me well. (”Died with his sandals on…”; “Beloved Nobel Prize Winner”, you know what I mean…)

My mom is Aunt Geri’s practical support person for stuff like this, so she was there too. Thus Sue, Graham and I were mostly just along for the ride, and to show Graham where his Grandpa is buried. But with Dad’s 70th birthday happening next week, I suppose I was also there to pay my respects, and move along in my own journey of grief (as if seeing a shrink –which I just started last week– wasn’t enough).

Only one problem: I wasn’t “feeling” respectful. Wasn’t feeling anything really, except extreme gratitude for gorgeous weather and a deep appreciation for all the  beautiful old, gnarled trees in the graveyard. But I guess that was okay too: my spirit still sent up prayers when my brain was looking the other way.

[Cool but totally irrelevant link: I'm sort of a fan of the influential American painter Frank Stella, even though I don't think he's related to our family. Check out some of his modernist work over here.]

I actually have a long history of hanging around graveyards. My first web-published story was a creative nonfiction riff on a walk through an Irish Catholic graveyard, with a consideration of my own immigrant heritage. That was in 1999 in a small-but-mighty webzine called Tweak, and it was the last piece of my creative writing Dad got to read before he passed. He read a paper version while in his hospital bed, enjoying my references to his mother (an O’Brien), though perhaps he didn’t connect much with my admittedly odd style and voice. Then Dad limped off to meet his mother in heaven in March of that year, just three months shy of sixty.

Meanwhile, back on this topside of the turf, I am preparing a different sort of ritual experience for my male spirituality group. The day before I leave for Europe (which is itself a sort of pilgrimage), I’ll lead about a half-dozen middle aged white men (and a part-time Latino or two) through a Pacific Northwest Indian creation myth (”Raven Brings Light to the People”). We’ll also do a faux fireside blessing/empowerment ritual. I say “faux” because we’ll be gathered around candles indoors, in a great old convent chapel, instead of outside around a bonfire, where such transformative stories should be told.

Fire in any form is an important ritual element, so candles will work fine. But nothing beats the enveloping experience of a campfire. Crickets, orange glow on faces, the scent of burning hickory… nothing like it in the known universe.

So where’s all this talk of ritual leading? I don’t know. I am just trusting it. That’s the main purpose of ritual: it opens up a different door, offers a glimpse of the mystery, a peek at whatever our heart or our God have to show us this day, if we listen.

Knock  knock…