Strix varia

Monday, November 5 was the day before Election Day. I was anxious as the last hours of the campaign ticked away. After spending part of the afternoon calling voters in North Carolina, I went out to the Jewel Moore Nature Reserve to run.

Thirty minutes of my usual slow jog, and I was exhausted. My iPhone app told me I was done, so I slowed to a walk and went a few more steps down the trail, out of the restored prairie and into the bordering wood. A circle of benches beckoned; I flopped down on my back, the Decemberists ringing in my ears, and let my arms dangle. Blood roared through my head, and I felt gravity tugging at my face like I was in a centrifuge. I lay there for a few minutes, utterly immobile, as the evening began to fall around me.

When I decided to get up, I did so slowly. Upright at last, I raised my head and took a step forward -- then froze. A gigantic owl was sitting in a tree not eight feet in front of me, maybe another eight feet above my head. Staring at me.



I didn't want to move, lest I break the spell. But the owl couldn't have been less rattled. It gazed at me, then swiveled its swivelly head to look out toward the prairie. Its sudden presence felt like a portent. I moved carefully around it for twenty full minutes, watching and periodically trying to get a cell phone picture -- nearly impossible in the gathering dark, against a silhouetting sky. This is the best I could do:



Until it left me of its own accord, I didn't feel I could leave the owl. It was the one who had the right to declare the encounter finished. And finally it spread its wings and flew a bit deeper into the trees, and I went home with my head spinning. To have such an experience on such a day. Surely it must mean something.

When I got home I told Cady Gray, my budding birder, all about it, and we went looking for pictures of Arkansas owls. A barred owl -- that's what it was, I realized. The owl commonly called a hoot owl.

I was thinking about that barred owl while walking through the nature reserve this past Friday, almost four weeks after that experience. "It was just about here," I recalled idly, and then -- I saw it again. This time on a low branch, fifteen feet down the trail, below my eyeline. Staring right at me again. And once again, I froze with my heart beating faster in my chest.

Was it the same one? From this angle, it looked a bit smaller than the almost two-foot length of my election eve owl. Maybe the coloring was a bit different, not quite as white around the face? I wasn't even certain it was another barred owl. While I was still wondering, it gathered itself, spread its wings, and flew right past me on its way to a higher branch overlooking the prairie. Involuntarily, I spoke aloud: "It's you!"

My walk abandoned, I followed the owl when it moved, in a completely unrushed fashion, to another tree after ten minutes or so. Then it seemed settled. Finally my time was up; dinner would be waiting for me at home. I had to back away from the owl's lead. I left it perched against the disappearing sundown in the western sky.

In the reflective, contemplative, self-assessing mood I've been occupying for the last month, the owl looms large. Birds represent freedom, owls in particular wisdom. I've thought about Athena and Harry Potter. I've turned over the long stretches of time I spent with this owl, searching for clues to its significance. The way it transcends its environment, refusing to be startled or spooked, moving its its own good time. The way it observes, turning its gaze on everything in all directions as it chooses. The fact that the barred owl is the only eastern U.S. owl with brown eyes rather than yellow ones.

I don't know if the owl has anything to teach me. But after two encounters in the past month, both up close and unbidden, it certainly has my attention.

Apologia pro se voto

For almost all of my thirteen years as a educator, I've tried to stay outwardly apolitical. I felt that students might prejudge me as a teacher if I were open and free about my political leanings. So my only political activities, by and large, were voting and hoping. No bumper stickers, no volunteering, no social media posts. We felt strongly enough about the 2004 election to put a Kerry sign in our front yard, but I remember being slightly terrified that some student would see me going to the mailbox and know. I'm sure they all had their suspicions, but there's a difference between being thought to be liberal in this blood-red state, and declaring yourself openly. After Obama was elected in 2008, I got a "Yes We Did" sticker in the mail and took it to work, thinking I might be brave enough to put it on my bulletin board; it's still buried in a stack of papers, where I run across it occasionally and wish I had the courage to display it.

In the last couple of weeks, whatever fear has kept me in that attitude for more than a decade has quietly dissipated. I started retweeting political messages, commenting on the campaign news of the day. I slapped an Obama 2012 magnet on my car.

But that "coming out" wasn't the start of the change. It started back in the summer, when for the first time in my life I donated to a political campaign. I felt deeply attached to the Democratic cause, and to the president's re-election. And for the first time, I didn't want simply to vote and hope -- hope that other people were willing to contribute the time and resources to craft a victory.  If Obama lost, I told myself, it wouldn't be because I didn't do all I could.

I've donated regularly since then. The total is a bit staggering for modest-living folks like ourselves, to be honest. This week I've made calls to get out the early vote in battleground states. My vote is already registered. But if there's something more I can do to affect the outcome, I'm not going to leave it undone.

Some of my conservative friends surely believe that such a transformation from timid voter to active campaigner could only be motivated by hatred of my candidate's opponent. I've see some Twitter conversations about how apoplectic Obama supporters would be if Romney won because they find him so despicable. Maybe that's true for some, but not for me. I don't hate Romney. I don't even think he'd be an awful president. He's clearly not an ideologue on most issues -- just witness the way his positions on them have shifted over the past couple of decades, from universal health care to abortion rights. He's a politician who believes in the political process as a way to get things accomplished (again, Romneycare is the prime example). That lack of ideological rigidity, coupled with political facility, means that he's likely to govern much closer to the center than our last Republican president (who did not share those two qualities).

I object to three aspects of the Romney campaign, and three aspects only. They are important enough to  help bring me out of the closet, but they are not the basis of any hatred or revulsion.

First, I object not to what Romney himself believes or would do, but to the agendas of those to whom his candidacy and possible election would be beholden. Any honest observer will surely admit that many of these most prominent and influential supporters are dismissive of the poor in favor of the continued enrichment of the monied class, in favor of war as a preemptive solution in world affairs, and desirous of a return to times when women and people of color stayed in their place and didn't seek power over their own lives and destinies, leaving that instead up to the people who knew best. Those people will expect their agenda to be enacted if Romney is elected, and some of it no doubt would be.

Second, I object to the premise that Romney himself seems to have brought to this campaign -- the single most important principle, in my observation, that motivates him to run. That premise and principle is: It's my turn. I've paid my dues, I've worked my way up through the establishment, I've gotten the right people to pull the strings for me, I've kept my nose clean, and now I am owed.  As an argument to the electorate, even a Republican electorate desperate to end the Obama presidency, this smacks of presumption and fails to inspire.

And third, the only reason in my list that is rooted in one of Romney's personal positions that would doubtless affect the way he would govern: Mitt Romney has no interest in understanding or sympathizing with gay people. Of all the stories of his record as governor of Massachusetts that have been passed around, the only ones that sickened and alarmed me were the ones about his animosity toward homosexuals. He dismissed, in the most callous and cavalier terms, the human appeal of a mother in his office who happened to be seeking marriage to her lesbian partner. He vindictively blocked legally married citizens from obtaining accurate birth certificates for their children except through court order. He seems flummoxed by the very existence of gay people with ordinary human needs and desires, evincing a powerful urge to flee from their presence rather than have his cognitive circuits overloaded by the dissonance they represent.

I'm distressed that, whatever his religious convictions, a man who does not believe in the full humanity of a large swath of the American citizenry believes he should serve as their chief executive.

And I'm relieved that the candidate who has my vote, the president whose accomplishments I celebrate, represents the opposite of these objections. Look at the financing of his campaign. 34% of his campaign funds have come from small donors, those giving less than $200. That's not 34% of contributors, or of donation instances -- that's 34% of the total funds. More than $214 million from people who gave less than $200. At a minimum (if they had all given nearly $200), that's a million people who own a piece of the campaign. I don't even count as one of these, and I'm certainly not the kind of fat cat one thinks of as a "large donor." (The comparable statistic from the Romney campaign: 18% of his total individual contributions come from small donors, adding up to $70 million -- less than one-third of Obama's total in terms of both numbers of donors and money contributed.)

By contrast to Romney's "I've paid my dues, now give me the goodies" political career, Obama of course emerged as a political upstart, a surprise, even a distressing line-jumper for the establishment. The premise of his 2008 candidacy was anything but "You owe me this"; instead, whatever you think of the principles and ideals of that campaign, it was clearly based in what he would do, not what he deserved to be handed.

And in terms of being the president of all of America -- including people who don't pay individual income taxes (like the elderly, service members, and the working poor) and people who love someone of the same sex -- well, there's really no doubt.

I don't write this in order to impose my political views on you. I write it to explain why I've changed from vote-and-hope to vote, speak, act, and give.  And to insure that my vote can't be mischaracterized as a expression of class hatred or demonization of the other party. However you vote and whatever your political actions, I think they should come from love rather than hate, determination rather than fear. I write simply to say that for the first time, I'm trying to live that out in public and not just in private.

Thanks for reading. Most of you probably know me in real life, and the general thrust of the opinions here can't be much of a surprise -- but maybe the package surrounding them isn't quite what you expected. I don't expect to change any minds. I only make an explanation (an apology, in that antique sense) for myself. I appreciate the indulgence of my friends and family, especially those who disagree with me politically and on any of the specific points above, in tolerating a more divisive and partisan version of myself than is normally on display in this space.

Go vote, and if your circumstances and conscience permit, also speak, act, and give. Here is a scientific pumpkin made by my daughter; I hope that brings us back to the Union, Trueheart and Courtesy status quo.

Aftermath

Arkansas is a battleground state in the mid-term elections this year. Our primaries were hotly contested, especially on the Democratic side. And that meant a landscape littered with election signs.

Now that the election and runoffs are over, I still see plenty of election signs on roadsides and medians. Homeowners who placed them in their yards have whisked them away, although some for the winning candidates remain in anticipation of the November general election. But every day I pass lonely signs, sometimes in reduced clusters, touting candidates who lost their bids.

Occasionally we hear about localities with regulations about cleaning up signs after elections. I couldn't find any evidence of such laws in Arkansas. But the impression left by orphaned signs of losing candidates left littering the roadsides is that the campaign staff and volunteers gave no thought to the consequences of their publicity blitz except their hope that it would pay off. Every sign that's still there is a testament to the dilution of responsibility and the narrowness inherent in short-term thinking.

Maybe on the weekend after an election, civic-minded folks regardless of party or campaign affiliation should get together and drive around town collecting the signs that no longer serve any purpose. Get enough people with enough pickup-truck beds and trunks, and you could make a dent. Take 'em to the recycling collection center, and return the wire frames to party headquarters, make them available to school and church groups that do sign-based publicity, or sell them back to sign companies.

Mark your calendar for the morning of November 6 -- what do you say? Who's in?

Your last chance

Tuesday is primary day, and we have some hotly contested seats here in Arkansas. The biggest race is the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Blanche Lincoln. She has a fierce challenger in the Democratic primary: Bill Halter, currently the Lieutenant Governor.

I definitely need some help in this race. I'm registered Democratic and intend to vote in the primary, as does Noel. I'm disinclined to vote strategically -- that is, to vote for the candidate I think has the best shot to win the general election in November -- because I think the situation could be entirely different by then, and the mood of the electorate unpredictable.

So I'm choosing between these two candidates based on their merits. I'd like nothing better than to vote for a genuine progressive. National interest groups are trying position Bill Halter as that candidate. But the man has no voting record, having been a bureaucrat up until winning the Lieutenant Governor position in 2008. And he won that based solely on his pro-lottery platform -- a platform I deplore with a white-hot hatred. There's no way to tell what his positions will be once elected, as far as I can tell. There is an easy way to see what he's foisted on this state almost single-handedly: a state-sponsored crapshoot to fund scholarships for which there is no political will as an honest entitlement, spawning a bloated and overpaid bureaucracy that holds the legislature hostage by clucking its tongues over the poor students who will go without their $5000 a year unless the lawmakers give them everything they want, resulting in a depressingly few years (I confidently predict) in a plateau of revenue and corresponding hysterical pro-gambling propaganda lest the scholarships be reduced.

Lincoln, on the other hand, has a wishy-washy record in support of the Obama agenda, and played an annoyingly obstructionist role in the health care reform process over the last year. But she's a veteran, has seniority and the corresponding committee power, and has been endorsed by both Obama and Bill Clinton here in the waning days of the race.

The debates and the ad campaigns have been ugly on both sides. Lincoln came out in favor of massive exemptions to the estate tax in the latest debate (ugh), but Halter has consistently portraying her as a tool of health insurance interests (almost certainly untrue).

So I'm asking for help from my Democratic buddies, especially those of you in Arkansas. (If you have no recommendations for this race except "Go GOP in November!", I will take your comments as read.) Is there any good reason to choose Halter? Are there merits I have overlooked that don't have to do with predicting the race six months from now? Or is the anti-Lincoln case so strong that it doesn't matter whether Halter has anything going for him at all -- is "anyone but Lincoln" really a defensible position?

My vote hangs in the balance. I await your arguments.

Come on, 2009

In the dead days between Christmas and New Year's, a person's fancy turns lightly to consideration of the past year. There are a lot of folks out there who are thrilled to see the end of 2008, and although the economy has not affected us and we've been spared health problems or natural disasters, I can't help but look forward to the new year with as much anticipation as I can ever remember.

My university went through a traumatic scandal involving the president and the board of trustees just as the fall semester began. Although our interim president and new provost are steadfast in urging us to look forward, not back, the pain isn't over yet, since suspicion naturally swirls around the search process for a new president. Financial woes have hit the institution that, sadly, have nothing to do with the recession -- they're entirely the fault of lack of discipline and transparency, leaving us in a multi-million dollar hole.

The anxiety of the presidential race took its toll on me for most of the summer and fall. I refused to watch debates or other coverage, having made up my mind beyond the slightest doubt sometime last year, and dreading what felt like inevitable mistakes, gaffes, pandering, and boneheaded strategizing.

Yet like much of the country, I'm sure, it felt to me like 2009 actually began at about 10 pm Central time November 4, when the stars (many of them negative, it must be said) aligned to produce the election of Barack Obama. And like much of the country, probably, I still shock myself with the realization that it actually happened -- that a black man with a foreign name could be accepted by a majority of the electorate.

Nobody expects the world to change instantly on January 20, 2009. It's going to be a long road to good times, and the presidency in this election cycle seems like something of a booby prize. But something did change instantly on November 4 -- the world's perception and our own realization of what America could choose to do and be -- and what we look forward to in 2009 is the culmination of that story. And if others are anything like me, we're also looking forward to bold action, shared sacrifice, and getting down to work at last.