"I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn't steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose. These are not just American ideas; they are human rights. And that is why we will support them everywhere." Barack Obama, Cairo, Egypt, June 2009
And that is why I know that the Obama Administration is working night and day behind the scenes to convince Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to step aside. His day has passed. Because Obama certainly knows that Mubarak does not govern with the consent of the governed, because he knows that it has now become impossible for Mubarak to hold onto power without brutal suppression of his opponents, it is now time to stand on the right side of history in the bright light of the sun. By continuing to appear neutral, we appear to support Mubarak, and that brings more problems than its alternative. When will we ever learn that when we support or appear to support dictators, their victims hate us and seek revenge when they become free? But when we stand with the oppressed and support their efforts to be free, we have a chance at having a relationship with the succeeding regime, maybe even influence.
There is little doubt how this protest will end. There are only two possible endings. There will be either a Velvet Revolution or a Tiananmen Square massacre. If there is a Velvet Revolution, Mubarak will be gone from power and replaced hopefully by an elected democratic government. If there is a massacre, we must withdraw all support from Mubarak immediately, we must shun him and do everything in our power to see that he does not profit from such an action. Either way, our relationship with Mubarak is over.
It is time to move on to the next questions. What happens to the Egypt-Israel peace agreement brokered by the United States? And, as American University Professor Mustafa Aksakal says, "Egypt has been at the center of U.S. strategy to maintain stable relations between Israel and its neighbors." He adds that a more democratic Egypt will mean that the U.S. will have to deal with a much wider range of views, including those that argue we should more quickly make life better for the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. And Egypt controls the Suez Canal, where oil destined for Europe and the United States must pass, and I've read that the situation has already caused oil prices to rise. Although most experts whom I have read do not believe that we lose Egypt as an ally, things will certainly be different.
Samer Shehata of Georgetown University points out that there are many factions behind the demonstrations, that it's not driven by radical religious group. The Muslim Brotherhood is part of, but not all of, the crowd of protesters. Tomorrow is the March of Millions. I want us to stand with those who love democracy, but I do not want to see another radical Islamist state take its place. This moment in human history is an exciting, if scary, moment. This is Egypt's moment.
The whole country knows that nine-year-old Christina Green was killed, allegedly by Jason Loughner, in the January 8 massacre in Tuscon, Arizona. She was killed at the same public meeting at which Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Arizona) was shot in the head at point blank range. That remembrance is as it should be. But why doesn't everyone know another nine-year-old girl who was also the victim of gun violence in Arizona? Why doesn't everyone know Brisenia Flores?
Brisenia Flores was brutally murdered - shot twice in the face - in the early morning hours of May 30, 2009, in the living room of her home in Arivaca, Arizona. But she has received precious little mainstream media attention. Her alleged killers are now on trial. Why has there not been more attention paid to the killing of this precious child, this innocent child, who happens to be of Mexican descent? Or is the question the answer?
On the night of May 29, 2009, Brisenia chose to sleep on the living room sofa to be near her new puppy, who was not allowed in her room. She had just finished third grade, and she and her family had spent the day shopping for new summer shoes for Brisenia in her hometown about 60 miles from Tucson. Sometime after midnight, several people knocked on the door of the family's trailer, shouting that they were law enforcement officers and that the family was suspected of harboring fugitives. That was a lie. Believing they were the authorities, Brisenia's father Raul opened the door and four camouflage-clad intruders, one woman and three men, burst in. After taking over the house, they shot Raul several times in the stomach and in the chest, and they shot Brisenia's mother Gina Gonzales in the leg. Gina fell to the floor and played dead. That saved her life.
Gina heard her daughter say, "Please don't shoot me," just before one of the gunmen fired two bullets into Brisenia's head there on the sofa in the living room. She was killed in order to leave no witnesses. The four intruders stole some jewelry and other items and left. When they were gone, Gina Gonzales stood up and went to get Raul's gun. Then she made her way to the telephone and called 911. While Brisenia's mother Gina was on the phone with 911, the intruders came back, realizing that they had left a live witness. This time, Gina fired at them, wounding one of them, and they left again.
But this was not an ordinary home invasion. This was a hate crime. The woman who entered the Flores and Gonzales home that morning has been identified as Shawna Forde, an anti-immigrant vigilante. She was a member of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps until that group dismissed her for unstable behavior. She then formed the group Minutemen American Defense, and she and the group patrol the US-Mexican border armed with weapons. It has been alleged that she thought they would find drugs and cash in Brisenia's parents' home. The jewelry stolen from the home was found in her possession, and blood from the scene is part of the evidence against her. She could get the death penalty.
I did not even hear of this crime at the time that it took place. I only learned of it recently. Of that I am ashamed, but I am also angry at the mainstream media for the victims they choose to cover. White middle class victims. But look at this innocent face, this shy face. This beautiful blessed child. We should have grieved Brisenia as a nation. Her funeral should have been broadcast on TV. And it should have served as the motivation for fair and realistic immigration reform and realistic handling of border control and the horrific problems therein.
ADDENDUM: A jury convicted Shawn Ford of murder in the deaths of Brisenia and her father Raul, and on February 22 she was sentenced to death. The jury's sentence is binding.
Charles Dickens knew a little about hard times and harsh conditions. This is what he said about solitary confinement:
I believe that very few men are capable of estimating the immense amount of torture and agony which this dreadful punishment, prolonged for years, inflicts upon the sufferers...I hold this slow and daily tampering with the mysteries of the brain, to be immeasurably worse than any torture of the body: and because its ghastly signs and tokens are not so palpable to the eye and sense of touch as scars upon the flesh; because its wounds are not upon the surface, and it extorts few cries that human ears can hear; therefore I the more denounce it, as a secret punishment which slumbering humanity is not roused up to stay.
Solitary confinement is "rigid, strict, and hopeless...cruel and wrong," said Dickens.
Why is PFC Bradley Manning being held in solitary confinement, being tortured, at Quantico Marine Base in Virginia, USA? He has been held in solitary at Quantico since July, 2010, on charges of a crime of which he has not been convicted, nor even tried. Is he not innocent until proved guilty? Can solitary confinement be made worse? Yes, you can be a Maximum Custody Detainee, on Prevention of Injury (POI) watch, and suicide watch. You can't get any more restrictive than that.
PFC Bradley Manning
Manning has been held in solitary confinement with Maximum Custody and a POI order since his arrival at Quantico. He spends twenty-three hours a day in a 6 by 12 foot cell that has no window and has only a bare bed, a sink, and a toilet. He leaves that cell for one hour in an exercise room, where he walks figure eights for up to an hour if he can stand the monotony. If he attempts to exercise in his cell, he is forced to stop. No sit-ups, no push-ups are allowed. Manning may receive approved visitors on some weekends and holidays. Jane Hamsher of the progressive FireDogLake could not see him. As a Maximum Custody prisoner, he must go to all visits, even those with his attorney, with hands and legs in shackles. There is no practical or legal reason for him to be a Maximum Custody Prisoner. And he is the only one present at Quantico now. It's harrassment.
Bradley's POI is similarly unmotivated. Prison psychologists and psychiatrists have certified that there is no need to protect Manning from himself, yet the watch order remains in place, in my opinion, because of the added restrictions, repression, and torture it makes possible for his keepers. Manning's POI order means that he is denied a pillow or sheets for his bed and that he must sleep in boxer shorts and surrender his clothes to guards each night. But at least he can wear clothes during the day. He is allowed to wear his glasses most of the time and to watch TV part of each day. In the evening, he is given pen and paper to write letters, and he is permitted an evening shower. He is allowed to have only one approved book or magazine in his cell at a time, which must be returned to his guards at bedtime. He is alone. Totally alone with a bed with no sheets or pillow. He receives all of his meals alone in his cell, and there are no other inmates near his cell. He seldom if ever comes in contact with other prisoners. His guards do not engage in conversation with him.
Manning's POI status requires his guards to check on him every five minutes, even throughout the night, and he must be visible at all times. If he is not, if he is sleeping curled up and can't be clearly seen, he must be awakened with lights and noise, thus POI inevitably results in sleep deprivation. And now he is being forcibly given antidepressant in an attempt to keep his mind from completely snapping. He is in a situation that can kill men's souls.
He is given a blanket, but Bradley's blanket is of a weight similar to the lead aprons you wear at the dentist's office for x-rays, and it is of the texture of a piece of carpet, according to David House of MIT, who was able to visit Manning for a time. He has carpet burns from moving under his blanket in his sleep. Can it be worse? Yes, he can be on suicide watch, too.
The Quantico brig commander illegally imposed a suicide watch on Manning; only medical personnel can legally instigate these orders. Under suicide watch, Manning was in his cell twenty-four hours a day. He lost his one hour out per day for exercise. He was stripped of his clothing around the clock and forced to sit in only his underwear all day. There is no chair. There is nothing to sit on but the bed, the floor, the toilet. His glasses were taken from him, leaving him effectively blind. Even the coarse, heavy blanket was gone. There was no medical or psychiatric reason for a suicide watch; it simply allowed the maximum restriction of freedom and the maximum punishment. After two and a half days, the illegal order was lifted.
Why is all this being done to Manning? Why is he being punished even before his trial? Why is he the only prisoner at Quantico under Maximum Security and POI even though he has been convicted of nothing and has broken no rules or caused no trouble? Why was an illegal suicide watch placed on man who was not suicidal?
It is because of the crime with which he is charged. Manning is suspected of passing secrets to Julian Assange of Wikileaks. Never mind that the government has been able to find no link between the two men, no link at all. Never mind that they have nothing on Manning or Assange. They appear to be trying to break Manning, to get him to testify against Assange, even if the testimony is false, because as yet they have found no legal ways to get Assange. They are willing to drive this poor, 23-year-old private insane, a young man who may or may not be guilty, before he ever goes to trial.
This is not the Bush-Cheney Administration. This is the Democratic Obama-Biden Administration. The is torture. And it is pre-trial torture on a young man who is innocent until proven guilty. One of our service members. This is America. I think I am going to be sick.
When asked about Manning during a press briefing, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs claimed to know little about the situation. Apparently the White House needs to be told a few things.
Thursday, February 4, is National White House Call-In Day for Bradley Manning. If you thing PFC Manning should be treated humanely and not punished unless and until he is found guilty of something, please call the White House Comments Line on Thursday at 202-456-1111.
Even if you think Manning leaked documents to Wikileaks, even if you think that deserves punishment, severe punishment, if you are an American, you know that punishment comes AFTER a trial and conviction and not before. Where is our much beloved presumption of innocence? Moreover, all of us should be alarmed at the abuse of medicine for political motives. It was the Soviets who abused psychiatry, consigning dissidents to mental institutions, saying they were insane when they merely disagreed with the party line. Let's not sell our souls like we did after 9/11 in the heat of emotion. The rule of law must prevail, or we all lose.
You'll find a link to Amnesty International's letter to Defense Sec. Robert Gates here.
Event: National Call-in Day in Support of US Army Pfc Bradley Manning
Call 202-456-1111
Date: Tuesday - February 1, 2011 - All Day
Details: A day has been set aside for every American citizen who believes in democracy to call President Obama and press the point that Pfc Manning be treated fairly and not punished with harsh conditions. He stood up for America, now we can stand up for him. Specifically, please remind President Obama:
that Bradley Manning is An American Citizen who has not been found guilty of any offense,
that he is an American Fighting Man who did what he thought was best to serve his country, and
that regardless of what the outcome of his trial may be, he deserves to be treated with decency and respect in the meantime.
Number to Call: The White House public line is 202-456-1111.
Further Action => Please help get the word out - Daily repostings in your status message - Let's Get Busy Doing Democracy!!!
Maybe it's the movies, maybe it's the books
Maybe it's the bullets, maybe it's the real crooks
Maybe it's the drugs, maybe it's the parents
Maybe it's the colors everybody's wearin
Maybe it's the President, maybe it's the last one
Maybe it's the one before that, what he done
Maybe it's the high schools, maybe it's the teachers
Maybe it's the tattooed children in the bleachers
Maybe it's the Bible, maybe it's the lack
Maybe it's the music, maybe it's the crack
Maybe it's the hairdos, maybe it's the TV
Maybe it's the cigarettes, maybe it's the family
Maybe it's the fast food, maybe it's the news
Maybe it's divorce, maybe it's abuse
Maybe it's the lawyers, maybe it's the prisons
Maybe it's the Senators, maybe it's the system
Maybe it's the fathers, maybe it's the sons
Maybe it's the sisters, maybe it's the moms
Maybe it's the radio, maybe it's road rage
Maybe El Nino, or UV rays
Maybe it's the army, maybe it's the liquor
Maybe it's the papers, maybe the militia
Maybe it's the athletes, maybe it's the ads
Maybe it's the sports fans, maybe it's a fad
Maybe it's the magazines, maybe it's the internet
Maybe it's the lottery, maybe it's the immigrants
Maybe it's taxes, big business
Maybe it's the KKK and the skinheads
Maybe it's the communists, maybe it's the Catholics
Maybe it's the hippies, maybe it's the addicts
Maybe it's the art, maybe it's the sex
Maybe it's the homeless, maybe it's the banks
Maybe it's the clearcut, maybe it's the ozone
Maybe it's the chemicals, maybe it's the car phones
Maybe it's the fertilizer, maybe it's the nose rings
Maybe it's the end, but I know one thing.
If it were up to me, I'd take away the guns.
In the fall of 2006, my German Shepherd Gretta and I were living in a beautiful home in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Northwest North Carolina about three miles from a little village called Boone. There you'll find Appalachian State University, a small regional state university where I was a Linguistics professor in the English Department. ASU is very popular among young folks in North Carolina who love winter sports because there are so many ski resorts within just a few miles, and there's every other winter sport around there, too, except maybe ice fishing. Winters are rugged; most people need 4-wheel drive vehicles. It is a town of motivated Subarus and Jeeps.
Springs are long, gradual and lingering, just heavenly to see unfold; the daffodils, dogwoods, azaleas and wildflowers take their time. Summers are mild; the rhododendrons bloom, and the temperatures are so moderate that no air conditioning is needed. And fall. Fall in the mountains. God's creation puts on a display of color and beauty that is beyond my ability to describe. Every shade of gold and red can be found mixed among the evergreens in perfect proportions. The trees stand in tiers on the mountainsides, gradually blending into the blue ridges of the more distant mountains.
I interviewed for my job during a blizzard back in early 2001, and I fell in love with the place. I can remember the wind howling and whistling around the window of room in the hotel where I stayed for the three long days of the typical academic interview. I stood at that drafty window and shivered as I watched the snow fall. I thought of Dr. Zhivago making his way home. Home.
ASU campus
Faculty volunteers took me for my meals. I remember Steve and Nikken and their just-barely-a-toddler Ryan picking me up in their Subaru at 7:30 am, taking me to The Mountain House for breakfast at the height of the snow storm. Life goes on in a snow storm in Boone, and the university hasn't closed down since the blizzard of '98. The Mountain House has southern home cooking on its menu, and they do it well. I had eggs, bacon, toast, grits, juice, and coffee. Ryan was a precocious child, learning the names of things. We were all thrilled when he pointed out "chimney" at the restaurant's fireplace and said it so clearly. Steve and Nikken remained one of my two favorite couples when I moved there. Nikken was from Indonesia, and she was finishing up her dissertation for a Ph.D. in Linguistics from Cornell. We became friends immediately.
ASU campus
There were other characters on the faculty, like Bill the professor, the folklorist, who used to sing with the Diamonds, the 1950s Doo Wop group who recorded the classic " Little Darlin' ." Cece studied how the banjo was brought to America by African slaves, then picked up by the white man and is now almost exclusively played by white folks. Susan and Joe were fiction writers, Kathryn was a published poet. Our department chair and his wife were a bluegrass team that played all over the area. In years past, Dave and his brother had performed widely in Europe.
ASU campus
Boone is charming. It is home to Mast General Store, an old time general store, plus a clothing store, a shoe store, and an outdoor clothing store for the outdoor sportsman. It even sells the most perfect porch rocking chairs made by the Amish. The original Mast General Store is in Valle Crucis, a few miles outside of Boone. And in downtown Boone, there are antique malls and good restaurants and bars and a quaint old mountain stone Post Office. I love antiquing and visited the largest antique mall while I was there for my interview. I found an 1862 Pennsylvania Dutch dower chest that I loved, and I promised myself that if I got the job, I'd give myself the chest. I did and I did.
My 1862 dower chest
US Post Office Boone, NC 28607
My housing search was more than successful. I found the perfect two-storied cedar mountain house on a large, partially wooded, partially landscaped lot. There was a crescent driveway lined with large, old, mature rhododendrons and a split rail fence. The house had a covered porch that ran across its entire front, and there was a mountain view. I got myself some of those Amish rockers, some end tables, lanterns, and plants. I had a swing and and a dining table on my back deck, and I fenced in the back yard for my two German Shepherds, Duke and Gretta. It was the first time I had ever had a garage, and I filled it up with shop vacs and tools and equipment in no time, but still left room for my Jeep.
Home
This home was to be my last stop. I would retire to the mountains. I can remember sitting on the front porch, where I had my daily yogurt, and picturing myself puttering in the flowers in my yard in my later years. And my bird feeders. I had birdfeeders and birds everywhere. Deer frequently came into the back yard to set Duke to barking. There was a high ridge behind my house, and I will never forget seeing the silhouettes of the deer against the sky at the top of the ridge at dusk. In the winter, I had a fire in the fireplace every day, every day, and it was needed occasionally in spring and fall. And I can still hear the wind chimes on my front porch making music in the surprisingly strong mountain winds. And the wind itself would sometimes howl like a spaceship landing in my yard.
The Blue Ridge Parkway
Boone is right at the Blue Ridge Parkway, and I loved to take long drives there, often with a picnic, usually with the dogs, or go to the village of Blowing Rock, a charmer just eight miles away, where my cousin Rene lives. Blowing Rock is a village of boutique shopping and expensive homes, but it is absolutely beautiful. Grandfather Mountain is close by as well, with the gathering of the Scottish clans each summer there at MacRae Meadows and Singing on the Mountain. And every spring, there is Merlefest, which is the best Americana and traditional and roots music festival in the country, in Wilkesboro, just 30 miles away.
The house was big enough for my parents, independently, to come and visit all they wanted to, and they could have all the room and privacy they required. Mom would come and sometimes stay a month. She loved it there. She loved to work in the yard, to sweep the front porch, even when it didn't need it. And I love waiting on her, fixing her meals, taking her out, or just sitting on the porch looking at the mountain across the way and talking. Mom loved the view from the window in her bedroom, and she loved the dogs. Dad would come and sometimes bring his dog, Gabby. He always wanted to work, and it was a constant struggle keeping that elderly fellow off the roof, out of the gutters, and with me. The kitchen and breakfast room were re-wallpapered with yellow and white gingham, and I painted my kitchen cabinets blue myself. The vanity in the master bath I painted white, and I painted most of the rooms a neutral yellow, even adding a stencil design around the walls in the powder room. Every corner of that house was exactly as I wanted it. I scoured area antique shops for just the right piece for every spot. In my back entry over an antique table hung a framed print of a water color by a fellow professor, Bob, who is now retired and painting in Paris.
My job. Oh. There is nothing in the world I love more than teaching grammar and linguistics. I love them both so much, I couldn't tell you which I love more. And I love students. Students like language, they really do if you hit them right, and linguistics is so exciting that many days most of class would be on the edge of their seats, learning forward, gripping their desks, waiting for my next words. But what English major wouldn't love animal languages, bee dance communication, language and the human brain and Phinneas Gage with that spike through his brain? What English major doesn't love Greek and Latin roots and affixes in word formation, sentence infinity, child language acquisition, accents, dialects, and so much more? I always said I could rise up out of a coma a talk about linguistics, and I really thought I could. Ask me to tell you about the two kinds of verbs. Well, maybe you'd better not.
But then I got very sick and found I could not rise up and teach. I had to take a leave of absence. The problems were many. I won't list them all. They had been coming on gradually for several years. I had already had to give up the annual UVA football weekend, Merlefest, Wolftrap concerts, and long trips to visit old friends because of my health. I've seen emergency rooms in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina. And then my dog Duke died during my leave of absence. When my leave was over, I really wasn't able to return to work, but I didn't realize this. Somehow I made it with the support of my chairman, a few colleagues, and the many dear students who expressed concern until the Fall of 2006, and then I could go no further.
I became very ill, seriously ill, and was forced to stop working in my sixth year at ASU and take an early retirement. I lost teaching. I lost being a linguist. I lost my students. I lost my colleagues. I lost Boone. I lost my house, not to foreclosure but I thought I had to sell. I lost rooms full of treasured antiques. I lost the new puppy I had recently gotten. I lost my career. I lost my security. I lost myself. I prayed that the house would not sell, that Gretta and I would have to stay by default. In the meantime, Dad's dog died, Dad had a breakdown, and had to go into an assisted living facility, and Mom lost her sight in one eye to macular degeneration. Steve and Nikken moved to California. Gretta passed away, and I was all alone.
Greensboro
Then the house sold. A cute newlywed couple bought it. The wife had a red BMW convertible that made me see green. I sold about half of my furniture and placed the other half in storage. I camped at my Mom's in Reidsville for a full year, finding all new doctors in Greensboro, doctors who so outshone the ones I had in Boone that it made me wonder what if. Finally, after a year, I was strong enough to get a place of my own. I found a smaller place, a townhouse in an older neighborhood in Greensboro, a place where the outdoor upkeep is not my responsibility. There's no yard, just a little courtyard that is mine, but there's pretty landscaping and mature trees in the common areas, and the community is adjacent to two parks. But it's not the mountains, it's not Boone, the dogs are gone, the students are gone, I am not a linguist, I am not a teacher, not a professor. Being a linguistics professor with German Shepherds was my whole identity. I am bereft without them. And Greensboro is okay; it's just not special. I've never seen so many strip malls in my life as there are in this city.
I am not now well enough to be my parents' keeper to the degree I want to be. I was just re-evaluated by my doctors last month to see if I could return to work and was told that I could not. Not yet. What my primary doctor wants for me is just medical stability, and a nice little life: church, a few good friends, good books, movies, good music, and pets. Ah, pets. On Christmas Eve, Kia the dog came to my house. She's a beautiful five-year-old Great Pyrenees who seems to be perfect. I cannot understand how she ended up homeless at age five, she is such a gem. So, I have a dog again. She's helping me build my strength by getting me out walking in the park several times a day, and she's giving me that unconditional love that only dogs can give. And I adopted a cat who has turned out to be the sweetest cat I've ever had, and that is saying something.
Sometimes I have to shake my head to realize that this is me. That I am here. That I am not teaching. That I am not a linguist. "I remember every face of every man who put me here," wrote Bob Dylan. Other times I thank God that this is me, that I am here, that I have a home, that I am able to take care of myself. That I am getting stronger every day. All in all, despite the losses I am blessed, and I am going to be fine. I am starting over. Again.
My dog Gretta was a very special girl, a beautiful sable and black German Shepherd. She came to me as a rescue dog when she was around five years old. She'd been found wandering in traffic, lost in downtown Durham, NC, with a wounded hip and leg. A nervous wreck is what she was. When her stress was high, she started spinning, just running in a tiny circle until she was exhausted, as though she were chasing something invisible. It upset Duke, my other Shepherd, and he would sometimes step into the circle to stop her. She had problems when she first met people, and had been in foster care for a year, not easy to place, but when she met me, she ran right to me as if to say, "Hey, where have you been?" We hit it off immediately. I was even able to open her mouth and give her her vitamins and nutrients that very first day.
Gretta loved to go places. When she realized she was going with me when I was leaving the house, she'd get so excited that she'd dance on top of Duke, literally leaving the house on his back. Into the garage we'd go, and Gretta would jump into the Jeep and head straight for the driver's seat. I have always loved to see dogs sitting at the steering wheel of cars - as long as the cars are parked - and Gretta got that seat whenever she was in the car without me. When I would come out of the grocery store and approach my car, there she'd be, sitting at the wheel, waiting patiently, looking as if she really could drive.
But Gretta had serious problems. Whenever people came over, I'd put her outside first, then seat everyone and give each person several dog treats. Then I would let Gretta back inside. She would investigate each person and if she accepted the dog treat from you, you were in forever. She almost always accepted. We did it this way because if you rang my door bell or knocked on my door, Gretta began barking hysterically and her hair would stand on end. I would go to the door, but very few people had the courage to come in with Gretta in full guard dog mode. And she never obeyed me when I told her someone was ok and to stop barking. So I devised a plan that worked perfectly.
No plan worked at the drive-through at the bank. As much as Gretta loved to go for rides in the car, there were few places she was happy when we got there, and the bank was at the bottom of her list. The teller and I could barely hear one another for Gretta's furious barking, while Duke stood in the back with that calm he always exuded. The teller would always send out 2 dog biscuits, one for each dog, but Gretta would be so agitated that she'd take her biscuit, then let it fall from her mouth as she continued barking. I stopped taking her to the bank.
The sound of my voice was calming to Gretta. If I could catch her eye when she was spinning, I could speak to her and begin to tell her stories. They all started the same way: Once upon a time there was a crazy little girl named Gretta. I'd have her going to the day spa, in the sauna with a towel on her head to protect her perm, taking trips to the Outer Banks, running on the beach, whatever popped into my mind. Her eyes looked so troubled and seemed to say, "Help me." As I talked, she would begin to calm down and stop spinning, I could go to her and get her to lie down and then I would massage her, stroking her firmly with long, long strokes. She loved this. I always promised her I would never give up on her. We were made for each other.
Miss G came with a grocery bag of stuffed toys. She loved her stuffed Jack Rock, her rabbit, her squirrel, her unicorn. My mom and Mom's best friend gave her more stuffed animals. She never destroyed them, just played with them, carried them around, hovered over them, chased them when I threw them. She slept with me on my bed every night starting the very first night I had her until her bad hips and legs made it too hard for her to jump onto the bed. Then she joined Duke on the pallet I had laid for him beside the bed on the floor. She always slept partially under the bed. When my mom came to visit, Gretta would let me know that she wanted her Grandma to get up in the morning, but she would not bother my mom. When I gave the ok signal, Gretta would jump onto the bed and begin kissing Mother's face to wake her up and then she'd lie beside her until Mom was ready to get up. Mom would sit up and caress her and talk to her before leaving the bed.
Gretta came to love me very much. She loved my mother, too. And she loved Luke, the college student who worked as my handyman. She loved everybody once she got to know them. She wanted and needed love so much and yet she would push it away. I sometimes felt she was me in fur. Gretta Looney became Grettalulu and my alter ego. She was a handful and could be hard to handle if you didn't know how, but the rewards far outweighed the struggle. She is gone now, and I feel her absence so greatly. I always will.
I saw him on the local Humane Society's website two weeks before Christmas, a beautiful black and tan German Shepherd called Duke, available for adoption, and I hurried there to get him before he could get away. When I drove up, the sound of barking was unlike anything I had ever heard. Scores of dogs all barking at the same time. The din was almost unbearable. I walked over to the fenced-in area for adult dogs where the barking, playing, fighting dogs were romping, and there sat one dog in the midst of all that chaos as serene as could be. My first thought was that if anyone could get along with Gretta, my nervous Shepherd at home, he could. When I called his name, he stood up and came to me at the fence. I caressed his head through the chain links. He licked my fingers and looked into my eyes.
He had the most beautiful face I have ever seen. There was one scar on his nose, suggesting hard times, but he had the biggest, deepest, brownest eyes in that noble head that there could be. I immediately went inside and completed the paperwork to adopt him. It turned out that he had been abandoned when his owners pulled out their mobile home in the middle of the night, absconding, leaving behind Duke and a horse. We rode home with Duke standing in the back of the Jeep right behind me sniffing my hair. So beautiful in appearance and disposition was he that I had him for almost a week before I realized that his legs were somewhat bent and crooked. Most likely the result of malnutrition in his puppyhood, the vet said.
Duke acted like a guest in my house for two weeks. He didn't seem to realize that this was his home, his house, his yard, his car. But after two weeks, he began to settle in and take possession of the place and of me and Gretta. He became our protector and guardian. Once Gretta slipped out the front door and ran down to the road. I looked at Duke and said, "Go get Gretta," and he took off running to her and herded her back to the house. He clearly loved her and wanted to protect her. He even tried to talk to her, making a sound that sounded like nothing so much as a donkey braying. As he realized that this was home, his delight became apparent. He loved his house. His Jeep. The back yard. Dog biscuits. He loved everything. I have never seen a person or animal as happy with his world as Duke was.
Except thunder. Duke did not love thunder. Whenever there was a storm, he wanted the whole family to go upstairs to the master bedroom to join him so that he could ride out the storm on his bed. He would not go alone. He would come to me, then turn and run to the foyer to the foot of the stairs and wait, and then come back and do it again, like Lassie trying to lead Timmie somewhere. I usually gave in and gave him his wish and we would all trudge upstairs to wait out the thunder and lightning. Gretta of course barked at each thunderclap, but in time even she learned to be peaceful upstairs in the bedroom all together.
Duke loved my mother, and she loved him. When she visited, she loved to work in my yard, and he always sat nearby watching the work proceed. In the evenings he lay at her feet while she read. My front porch ran the whole width of the house and Mom would try to exercise Duke by going onto the porch with him and saying, "Run, run, run!" And believe it or not, that dog would run back and forth from one end of the porch to the other for her.
Duke and my mom
Duke had separation anxiety. I learned this the hard way. After the holidays, when classes started again, I left Duke and Gretta together free in the house. That first day when I got home, I pulled the car into the garage and entered the house through the kitchen. There was sofa stuffing on the kitchen floor. All over the kitchen floor! I walked into the breakfast room, where there was even more sofa stuffing. I braced myself and continued on into the living room. The devastation was complete. The sofa was dead. Gretta had never touched anything when left at home alone. It had to be Duke. I took him back to the Humane Society to give him back. I simply couldn't afford this dog. But when I got there I just drove past and came home with him still in the back of the Jeep. Three times I left the house to go and give him back, and three times I couldn't turn into the Humane Society's parking lot. So Duke and Gretta had to be separated when they were home alone, and Duke had to spend his days in the garage, which was a very nice heated room with a window, or go to work with me. In the garage, I'd give him cardboard boxes to tear up and he would, so I'd give him the pieces to tear up some more. He would, and he was happy.
One night four years later, a sound awakened me at around 1:30 am. I sat up and turned on the light. Duke was on his bed in convulsions, having a seizure. His toenails were hitting a chest of drawers and that was the sound that woke me. "Duke," I cried and jumped out of bed and put my body over his to protect him from hurting himself as he thrashed about. Finally, the seizure ended and for a few moments, Duke lay still. Then he got up and ran from the room, running into the door jamb on his way out. I called his name and though he came back to me, something was very strange about him. It took me a while to realize that he had lost part of his vision. I called our vet's emergency number and told her all that had happened, but she said only to bring him in first thing in the morning.
No one in our town knew what to make of it when seizures had effects that lingered after the seizures were over. Each time Duke had a seizure, he lost more of himself, so I arranged to take him to the Veterinary School at North Carolina State University at Raleigh. I boarded Gretta, and Duke and I set out on I-40 for a six-hour trip. We got as far as the Guilford College exit at Greensboro when Duke began to have another seizure in the back of the Jeep. I'll spare you all the details, but thank God for cell phones. There turned out to be a specialty vet hospital at that very exit that had a board certified neurologist. It was clear that Duke wasn't going to make it to Raleigh so that is where we went. We called ahead so the wonderful staff was expecting him. They came out with a gurney, for now his back legs were paralyzed, and carried him quickly inside. His care began immediately with a phenobarbitol drip to prevent any further seizures.
Well, you probably already know what happened. I was told that the testing had shown that no matter what was done for Duke, he would never regain his sight or the use of his legs. We never learned the cause of the seizures. I had to let him go. I sat with him and talked him out of this world saying all of his favorite sayings, telling him he was a good boy, that we were going home. I only had him four years and he was very young. I cried so much my mom considered slapping me. Well, the only thing to do was to go home, get Gretta out of boarding and bury my face in her fur.
"Stella!," screamed Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire. And "Keeeeeiiiiiiith," screams grettalulu at hearing Keith Olbermann announce that tonight's edition of Countdown on MSNBC would be the last. Countdown is easily my favorite show; Keith my favorite host. I have a weakness for know-it-all men who talk too much and he and Chris Matthews are hard to beat. But Keith was special. His bleeding heart always showed. And it was beautiful. I am in mourning.
I just hung up the telephone with my mom. She was in tears. Her dearest friend has been sent to a geriatric psychiatric hospital. For the fourth time in twelve months. The Jenny we knew seems to be gone, and Mother's heart is broken.
Jenny, a widow who always needed someone to take care of her, a gentle flower, has been in an assisted living center for several years now. But she was doing fine living at home on her own, with a lot of help from her adult children, until an incident that occurred about four years ago when she was around 79 years old. Jenny was expecting family from the Deep South to come visit her, and she was engaged in major house and yard cleaning in preparation. Her son and grandchildren came over to "help" her get her yard work done before the guests arrived.
What a lovely yard she had. Jenny grew magnificent heliopsis, or false sunflowers, among the many beautiful flowers planted in her yard. These are gorgeous tall, bushy plants with scores of lovely yellow blossoms, much smaller and softer than real sunflowers. They are perennials and had grown in her garden for years. She loved them and tended then with care, as she did all her plantings. Her small sunflowers were among the flowers that lined her front walk.
While Jenny was working inside, her son and grandchildren pulled up by the roots all the golden heliopsis and put them in garbage cans. When Jenny came outside and saw that years of flowers, hard work, memories were destroyed, she became hysterical. She just lost it. Her son and daughter-in-law told her that if she did not calm down, the authorities would be called. They told her that they had thought the flowers were weeds. They thought they were helping. Weeds?
Jenny was never the same after this, and the periodic trips to the psychiatric hospital began. She stopped looking people in the eye. I heard her say that she knew what was coming: they were going to try to put her somewhere, she said. Soon she entered assisted living, but she was allowed to keep her car and have driving privileges, and so she could go home to her house whenever she wanted. But she wasn't herself. She stopped answering her phone and returning phone calls, but she would call you when you least expected it. She had her good days, many of them. But she had many bad days, too.
Let me tell you what she was like before the incident with the heliopsis.
After her husband died, Jenny never got over it. She needed her children's help in keeping her affairs in order and in anything major or important. But she was fine in day-to-day living and was one of the kindest, most loving, generous souls I have ever known. She adored bargain-hunting and gift-giving. I have so many tops and nightgowns that Jenny found for me at resale shops. They looked like new and sometimes still had their tags on them.
The hostess role was made for Jenny. She loved to entertain. She would make placecards and treats for each guest's place setting. For Jenny, Christmas shopping started for next year as soon as this year was over; she began picking up things all year with each individual's likes in mind. She never went out of the house without all her friends and loved ones in her thoughts. She filled large beautiful gift bags for everyone she knew with her finds old and new. And every holiday, birthday, anniversary, and special occasion was a reason for a gift bag.
And Jenny loved my mom. She was so good to her. They shopped, went out to eat, came back, took naps, then sat and talked til time for one of them to go home.
When I was trying to get from Boone, NC, to Raleigh with my sick dog Duke, I found he could not make it and I had to stop in Greensboro to hospitalize him there. Greensboro is only 25 miles from my home town, so I went to stay at my mother's. Jenny was there when I arrived after dark. She cried with Mom and me over Duke's predicament. And then she took charge. She told us to sit still in the living room and rest and try to relax while she handled things in the kitchen.
In a short while, Jenny had been through Mother's cupboards and through the fridge and had decided on omelets and fruit salad. She pulled out a leaf in the dining table, dressed the table, made the fruit salad, and then made the omelets with peppers and mushrooms and cheese. And she served it all with good Southern sweet iced tea.
I didn't think I could eat, I was so upset, but the table looked so beautiful and the food so inviting that I was able to come out of myself and have a good dinner with the two wonderful elderly ladies that I so dearly loved.
But recently Jenny fell asleep driving. She was sitting at a stop light, thank goodness she wasn't in motion, and she just fell asleep there at the red light. She slept through several cycles of light changes. Traffic backed up behind her. This time they took her car and her keys away from her. There would be no more driving for Jenny. Well, she didn't take it well. She broke. Not being able to get back to her house when she wanted to was more than she could bear. She reached a point at which she didn't recognize her children. Her agitation and depression were too much for the assisted living center, and so right now she's back in the geriatric psychiatric hospital.
It's a nice place. My dad's been there. After his German Shepherd dog died five years ago, he became very depressed. He even told his doctor that he was thinking about hurting himself. "How would you do that?" asked the doctor.
"Oh, I would shoot myself," answered Dad.
"Do you have a gun?" asked the doctor.
"Oh, yes," said Dad. "I have lots of them."
And then the doctor informed my father that he could not let him go home because of what he had said. Dad was escorted by the county sheriff to the same hospital where Jenny is now, where he stayed until his depression lifted enough so that he was no longer considered a danger to himself. He was released with the provision that he move into an assisted living center and never again be left alone. He spoke very well of the hospital, and they seem to have helped him a great deal.
That is my prayer for our dear Jenny: that she be helped a great deal and become able to return to assisted living. The center's not home, but home isn't either.
On December 29, 2010, Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour suspended the double life sentences of each of the two Scott Sisters of Forest, MS. Jamie and Gladys Scott had by then served sixteen years for their conviction for their roles in an armed robbery in which $11.00 was stolen and no one was hurt. They have always maintained their innocence. Activists have worked on their behalf for years, for Jamie's proper health care and for them to receive pardons. Jamie and Gladys Scott were released into freedom from prison on Friday, January 7, 2011, on the condition that Gladys, the younger of the two, donate one of her kidneys to Jamie, who is in Stage 5 renal failure and requires daily dialysis. Jamie's health care, while substandard in prison, still cost the state of Mississippi more than $200,000 a year. I leave it to others to decide the ethics of the conditions Barbour has imposed. I have my thoughts, which I may share someday, but right now I am just overjoyed that Jamie and Gladys are free!
The Scott Sisters celebrate their freedom with Ben Jealous of the NAACP
For years activists, including me, have worked for their release by calling and writing the Governor's office and the office of many prison and parole officials. But who are the Scott sisters? I include below a note I wrote for Facebook on August 31, 2010 explaining their case.
Who are the Scott Sisters?
On the morning of Christmas Eve, 1993, sisters Jamie and Gladys Scott of Forest, Mississippi, drove to a mini-mart near their home. Jamie was 22 and Gladys was 19. On their way back, their car broke down, and they were given a ride by two young men, one of whom they knew. It was not a peaceful ride home. Jamie and Gladys asked the men, Johnny Ray Hayes and Mitchell Duckworth, to stop the car to let them go to the bathroom. Another car came upon them with three young male occupants, the Patrick cousins, who robbed Hayes and Duckworth of a total of $11.00. The police accused Jamie and Gladys Scott of being accomplices of the robbers rather than friends of the victims. They said the the women had set up Hayes and Duckworth for the Patricks.
Jamie and Gladys Scott
So in October, 1994, both Jamie Scott and Gladys Scott were found guilty of armed robbery and given two consecutive life sentences for an $11.00 robbery they didn’t commit. The women had never been in any trouble before, and this conviction was based on very thin and contradictory evidence. The Prosecution argued that the sisters had arranged in advance to set the men up to be robbed by the young men. There was much conflicting testimony for the prosecution, and the sisters’ defense attorney called but one witness. Most witnesses against the sisters later claimed to have been coerced. The trial lasted 2 days and the jury deliberated 30 minutes.
The three young men who had committed the robbery were offered a plea bargain and each received a sentence of 10 months. One of these was a 14-year-old who was later told that if he signed a statement stating that the Scott sisters helped in the robbery, a statement he says he never read, he could go home the next morning. He was told that if he did not sign the statement, he would instead go to prison where he would be raped and made “into a woman.” He signed. The sisters were not offered a plea bargain.
The two victims did not implicate the Scott sisters at the time of the crime or the trial, but they changed their story one year later to charge the young women. All three of the convicted robbers testified against the sisters at trial but later recanted their testimony. Their testimony was thin, shaky, and contradictory.
The sisters appealed their convictions on grounds of insufficient evidence, but they lost. Their appeal was denied. There were other appeals. All were denied.
Jamie and Gladys Scott’s mother, Mrs. Evelyn Rascoe, who now lives in Florida and is raising their children, thinks she knows why this has happened. A member of the family had previously turned State’s evidence against Scott County Sheriff Glenn Warren in a bootlegging case in that dry county. The corruption may even have spread to the court system. Payback had been promised.
In 1998, one of the three young men convicted for the robbery signed an affidavit stating that the Scotts were not involved. There are now at least 3 such affidavits. But they remain in prison. It’s been 16 years. And they have consecutive life.
Both young women were healthy when they went to prison, but Jamie now suffers from extremely poor health, including Stage 5 renal failure. She requires weekly kidney dialysis, and she has other life threatening illnesses that she has developed in the years since 1993. The dialysis port on her arm required surgery last week and it was scheduled one morning for 8:30; however, officials at Central Mississippi Correctional Center did nothing toward getting her to the hospital. “Free the Scott Sisters,” which has a Facebook page, sprang into action, notifying all its members, asking them to call and email certain prison officials. The prison was overwhelmed with calls and emails, and Jamie got her surgery at 11:00 am. But that was one day. Her health care is irregular and undependable, and her condition is dire. All this for $11.
And there are ripples. This month Jamie’s son Terrance was arrested for car-jacking and robbery. All his life he has said that if his mother had to die in prison, he thought he should die in prison, too. What a waste of another young life.
Never doubt what one person can do. Jamie’s day of surgery proves what a difference individuals can make. Jamie needs public pressure to receive the health care she requires to stay alive. And of course, both Jamie and Gladys need legal help. The Mississippi Attorney General has recently appointed an investigator for this case, a major victory for the sisters and everyone who cares about them.
I was on Facebook, trying to be social on the social media website, when out of the corner of my eye I saw an ad for Zappos.com low on the right side of the page. Animal print high heels with the toe out. They looked so 2011 and so 1940s at the same time. So feminine and so sexy. So womanly and so girlish. I wanted them desperately.
But I had already exceeded my budget for shoes, and last year I got a pair of animal print clogs, which I love and have no regrets about. I'd promised my mom my shopping spree would be over. I had to be a good girl. So I copied the photo and posted it on Facebook with the message, "Somebody please help me."
Susan B. was the first to respond. She thought I should buy them. "Go on," she said, adding "He, he, he, he." She repeated her urgings several times, and when I admonished her, telling her I had asked for help, she said, "I am helping you."
W., one of my gay friends posted, "I know I play for the other team, but something wonderful happens to a woman's leg when she puts on a shoe like that." He, too, thought I should by them. A couple of straight guys who obviously aren't leg men checked in and said nobody cares what kind of shoes you wear. Men don't look at that. I begged to differ. All the men I've known well have been leg men with a great appreciation for the shape of the female leg. They would agree with W. My niece A. said her husband would love it if she wore shoes like that all the time.
Readmore and my new red shoe
Elizabeth said they would be bad for my back. I had to say, I know, because I already have a red pair just like them, black heels, toe out and all. (And a brown pair.) Here's my cat Readmore and one of my red shoes the day they arrived. He loves shoes as much as I do.
All in all I got almost 50 comments and about 10 "likes," the most I have ever gotten for anything I have ever posted on Facebook. Men and women, straight and gay, spenders and savers, pro and con, all joined in to voice their opinions as to what I should do and why. I had a blast.
I went to the Zappos website and keyed in animal prints and not very many pairs of shoes came up. There they were, so easy to find, so cute, so pretty. And not very expensive at all. The next day, a friend came back and posted that she had ordered a pair for herself. She could hardly wait to wear them with jeans, a cream sweater, and a wide black belt. Sounds good. But in the end, I decided not to get them. Yet.
The Lincoln Memorial Washington, DC August 28, 1963
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.
We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.
We cannot turn back.
There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream."
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.
Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends.
And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today!
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today!
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."
This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.
With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:
My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,
From every mountainside, let freedom ring!
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.
And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that:
Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:
