Ordinary Time

[dedalus_1947]

You unlock this door

with the key of imagination.

Beyond it

is another dimension;

a dimension of sound,

a dimension of sight,

a dimension of mind.

You’re moving into a land

of both shadow and substance,

of things and ideas.

You’ve just crossed over

into the Twilight Zone.

(Preface to each episode of The Twilight Zone, by Rod Serling)

 

I wrote a poem last week and called it First Thoughts. The original title was “Orthotics”; but that exotic word did not convey the feelings I was trying to express. The word orthotic WAS the first thought I had while jogging that day, and it became my theme. Instead of using prose, I wanted to describe the mental images that went through my head in another way. It was an exercise in “right-brain thinking”. Once I started, and stopped worrying about the logic of my words and phrases, it was quite liberating. This makes the third poem I’ve written. I wrote one for my birthday (Birthday Boy), and another one about my memories of Mexico (Calle Chopo). I once tried composing a lament when I learned of a fellow principal’s death. He had a heart attack and died the day before his school was to be evaluated by the District’s Red Team. I only finished one stanza before my anger at the District consumed me and the words turned to ash. Poetry is a new way of writing for me; an abstract and symbolic means of communicating that’s solid and transcendent at the same time. Poems are metaphorical images that crack the code of the Unconscious, and allow one to describe feelings and emotions that are otherwise, inexpressible. It is the language of the Japanese haiku, and the Zen koan. On this occasion, the time I invested in First Thoughts, helped distract me from a crisis in my writing.
 

 

I had been on a writing streak since the New Year; averaging one essay a week. Topics would pop into my head, or suggest themselves by the activities and events that surrounded me. However, after posting V for Vandalism , an essay which explored new journalistic territory for me, I lost my desire to write. Despite a huge backlog of ideas, nothing prompted me to act. I just didn’t care to start a new writing project. This ennui even crept into my rituals of morning journaling and afternoon jogging. I’d stopped running for periods of time before, but I had never experienced such a disinterest in writing. I felt “becalmed”, like a sailboat brought unexpectedly motionless by the sudden drop in the wind. This stillness was a new sensation; it was like being adrift and directionless, but it wasn’t writer’s block or depression. Since the listlessness seemed benign, I didn’t panic. Instead, I tried to address the little things that were troubling me. I struggled to go jogging when I could, and complete Morning Pages when I was able. The afternoon I did go running, I had my “First Thought” about Orthotics. Another morning, while agonizing over what to write, the image of the Sunday Missalette materialized in my mind. When attending mass the day before, I noticed we were celebrating the 29^th Sunday in Ordinary Time. The thought of those two words reached across my memory and grabbed me by the neck. Ordinary Time - what delicious words, and they seemed so fitting, given my current state and frame of mind. I held to this slender thread of inspiration and developed the following ideas about this ubiquitous season.

 

According to Wikipedia, Ordinary Time is one of the five “seasons” of the Catholic liturgical calendar. The name corresponds to the Latin term Tempus per annum, which means, literally, “time through the year”. Ordinary Time actually comprises two periods of the liturgical year – one following Epiphany (12 days after Christmas), and the other after Pentecost (49 days after Easter). The four other seasons are Advent, Christmas, Lent, and Easter. In other words, Ordinary Time occurs before and after the two most active phases in the Church’s annual cycle. I always considered it a “breather” in the life of a parish after the frenetic and emotional rituals and ceremonies of Christmas and Easter. It was an opportunity for the pastor, ministers, and congregation to catch their breath and rest. The season signaled the end game - the cessation of rites and celebrations, and a time to recover and renew. Ordinary Time was also the anticipatory prelude to Advent, and it fits perfectly with autumn. I felt that fall signified the procession of annual events that ended with Christmas: school, the World Series, football games, cold weather, Halloween, elections, and Thanksgiving. These perennials are so predictable and comfortable, that they seemed ORDINARY. However, the liturgical term Ordinary does not mean “common, conventional or plain”. In fact, the word is derived from the term ordinal or "numbered." The 33 or 34 weeks in Ordinary Time are simply “numbered” periods of astronomical notation. It did strike me as odd, that this liturgical season corresponded to a current period, which I saw as truly remarkable. Since the Feast of the Epiphany we have been living in the most EXTRAORDINARY of political and historical times.

  

  

This season witnessed the most improbable political events in American history. A white woman and an African-American man were the two leading contenders in the Democratic primaries. With the surprise emergence of Barack Obama as a frontrunner in the Iowa Caucuses (A Whisper of Hope), the campaign became a drawn out, knock-down, drag-out fight, with Hilary Clinton. She never gave an inch or conceded any set-back or defeat until every conceivable political, electoral, and legal tactic had been tried and exhausted. Despite efforts to minimize it significance, race and gender dominated private thoughts and public discussions. Could a black man win the presidential election? Would Americans vote for a woman president? As Obama’s superior organization, fundraising, and strategy continued winning primaries and increasing their delegate count, the Clinton camp dropped their message of experience and sanctioned negative excursions into emotional territory. Barack’s association with Reverend Jeremiah Wright and former Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers were used to imply that he was somehow un-American, “not one of us”, and not to be trusted. Despite these attacks, Obama continued winning key primaries, and by June 3, had won enough delegates to officially become the Democratic nominee. Clinton conceded 2 days later. Then in late August through October, with the Presidential race in full swing, we moved “into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas”. We entered the Twilight Zone when media-driven momentum swings, the credit and financial meltdown, and last ditch, mudslinging efforts took over the campaigns.

  

 

Although I was decided on my choice for president, I was still curious about watching the presidential debates and seeing how events unfolded. At the outset, both candidates claimed to be avatars, or embodiments, of CHANGE: Barack Obama, because he was a Democrat with a new philosophical agenda, and John McCain, because he was a maverick, constantly at odds with his own party. The Democratic game plan was to paint McCain with the George W. Bush-Republican brush of failed economic and military policies, and color him as an out-of-touch, outdated inheritor and promoter of 4 more years of the same policies. The Republican game plan was to paint Obama with the tax-raising, big-spending Democrat brush, and color him as too Ivy League, too liberal, and too inexperienced to lead a nation in difficult and dangerous times. In August, the early advantage went to Obama. His triumphant tour of Europe and the Middle East, followed by the spectacularly staged nominating convention, shot him into the early lead. He was new, eloquent, and different; and he offered a fresh change from the Republican economic and foreign relation policies that were stalemated in Iraq, deteriorating in Afghanistan, and in denial of the ticking financial time-bomb. Faced with Obama’s seemingly overwhelming popularity, McCain was able to change the political momentum in September, regain the public’s attention, and generate media excitement with a new, wide-open, game plan. While Barack “kept the ball on the ground” with his grinding and methodical message, John came out throwing. The inspired selection of Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska, as his vice-presidential running mate galvanized the Republican convention and captured the nation’s imagination. The media couldn’t get enough of her – especially since they were not allowed direct access without carefully established ground rules and controlled formats. Palin and McCain appearances were the hottest tickets in town, and speculation of a Ronald Reagan Republican Renaissance filled the radio airways and television talk shows. Overnight, they were the winning combination: McCain had the desired experience and conservative credentials, and Palin was in touch with the common American man and woman, Joe Six-pack and Hockey mom. Obama now appeared distant and cerebral, and his message sounded dull and alarmist. On this wave of popularity, in the middle of what seemed an exhilarating, downhill Republican ski race to November 4^th, there was a slight rumble on the financial mountain of Wall Street. On September 5, the U.S. Government, fearing the bankruptcy of the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac), seized control of these two mortgage giants. It would be the first of many moves to nationalize troubled financial institutions. As the foreclosure and banking tremors continued, Barack kept criticizing the Republican deregulation policies, while John recited the administration mantra that “the fundamentals of our economy are strong”.  By September 24^th, even President Bush was ready to concede that a subprime mortgage crisis existed, and the federal government needed to nationalize private institutions to save our financial system. Throughout October, the mortgage, credit and stock market avalanche built up overwhelming force and cascaded down to what will eventually be a millennial crash. During this period, the worst since 1929, the electoral momentum had again swung to Obama and the Democrats, where it has remained.

 

 

The economic situation in the United States and the world has dictated the ebb and flow of this presidential campaign. So far, it seems to work in favor of Obama’s methodical approach and consistent message. The worsening financial picture has framed his calm and steady demeanor, and his unhurried and measured approach to problem-solving and decision-making in a very favorable light. McCain, on the other hand, continued with his “run-and-gun” style of campaigning, throwing one ‘Hail Mary pass” after another, in the hopes of regaining the lead. He suspended his campaigning appearances to rush back to Washington D.C. and tried to direct the fiscal rescue plan; he threatened to ignore the 1^st debate to concentrate on the crisis; and he insisted on firing the chairman of the Federal Securities and Exchange Commission, Christopher Cox. During the first debate, an aggressive McCain appeared disdainful, and dismissive of Obama, claiming he was naïve, inexperienced, and “dangerous”, while Obama came across as careful, reflective, and precise in his answers and explanations. These impressions of the two candidates were sustained in the 2^nd and 3^rd debates, even as the banking, credit, and stock market situations became worse.

 

 

The latest offensive barrage by the McCain-Palin duo has been a variation on the wedding tradition for luck, of using “something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue”. They hammered at the age-old accusation that Obama and the Democrats would raise taxes and destroy small businesses; they accused Obama of being a socialist who sought to redistribute the wealth and reward welfare mothers; and they resuscitated the mudslinging attacks first launched by Hilary Clinton about his association with 60’s terrorist Bill Ayers. From these three fanciful premises, McCain and Palin tried to characterize Barack Obama as an unreliable, two-faced politician, who was a committed, un-American terrorist, and a subversive socialist planning to overthrow the capitalist system. If these portrayals sought to provoke nationwide fear and panic in the electorate, they do not appear to be getting much traction. The economic situation, with its threats of massive unemployment, evaporating retirement funds, and a world-wide depression, is a lot scarier than a Democrat in the White House. I will say one thing for John McCain; even in his desperation, he has not adopted the Carl Rove-ian terror tactics that were employed in the 2004 Republican primaries against him, and against John Kerry in the general election. There is actually SOME logic behind the negative attacks against Obama, albeit incredibly associative and exaggerated.
  

 

Who will win this election, which took place during Ordinary Time in the liturgical calendar? I honestly don’t know. After the roller coaster ride of the primaries, the radical pendulum swings of the general election, and the disintegration of our leveraged, highly speculative, free market, capitalistic system, I haven’t a clue. I distrust polls and pundits, and financial managers; and I have no confidence in my ability to think like an “average” American. I feel this will be a very close election, and I’m apprehensive about the margin of victory. The nation has grown incredibly polarized over the last eight years, and past presidential elections proved that clear majorities did not exist in our culturally divided and fearful electorate. I have discovered one thing during this extraordinary time: to again have faith and confidence in American Youth.

 

My journey on this election road has been guided by the actions of young people I know, and have come to respect and admire: my daughter, Prisa, working as a precinct volunteer for a year in the Obama For President campaign; my nephew Billy donating the financial maximum to the Obama campaign, and then creating a political action committee to raise more; and my niece Maria standing in the Pennsylvania rain to see and hear a new message about tomorrow from a dripping wet, African-American candidate for president. Silent circumspection and discretion are the watchwords of our family when it comes to politics and political action. The fact that I learned of these three incidents makes me suspect that many, many more actions were performed by my countless nephews and nieces in support of this unique candidate. I can honestly say that I have been led to my current views about this year and this election by the youth of the nation. They never told me who to vote for, but their actions made me see Barack Obama in a different light. These times have seen the rebirth of youthful idealism and hope at a time we need both. We will need the determined action of a new generation to recover from the shambles of this financial catastrophe that was fed by greed, arrogance, and cynicism. These young people bring a willingness to volunteer, commit, and work to overcome the challenges and obstacles before us. Does Barack have the answers? No, but he may be able to frame the problems that need to be addressed and resolved. Our hope will not be in one man, but in the followers he can inspire and support in the years to come. As Wall Street’s Tower of Babel continues cracking and crumbling, the voices of young people seem to rise up. There is a new music in the air, and it is a song of hope, optimism, and determination. The voices belong to the young and they echo the music I once heard at civil rights marches and peace demonstrations in the 60’s and 70’s. Instead of feeling angry and bitter about the criminal actions of greedy Wall Street financiers, bankers, and loan agents, I’d rather look forward to creating something new and better. I think young people might be pointing the way.