The Eye of the Storm

The Eye of the Storm

Thundering gray waves explode on the shore.

An endless army advances, retreats,

Explodes, Furious. 

The roars of the warriors deafen,

Spending themselves on the dark cold beach.

Snarling ashen clouds spew 

Wind and rain battalions 

Against all that stands.

Sand for bullets

Shrieking hordes descend 

Lightning.

Crack. The spine of a tree shatters.

Splinters.

Ghostly outline of the Chapel Bell

Motionless in the din.

Ancient, rusted, frozen clapper.

Forever joined and silent 

Firm amidst the fury and violence.

In the warm afternoon sun the boy and girl kneel in the sand

Building a sandcastle beyond the reach

Of gentle rolling waves caressing the golden shore.

Peals of laughter rise on the summer breeze.

Beyond, the sapphire bay shimmers

Under the warm tropical sun.

Suddenly a wave, larger, more powerful,

Rolls out of the sea and up the beach. 

The boy and girl run, squealing.

The yellow plastic pail, caught in the water is

Drawn away, unseen into the sea.

The boy and girl return to their work.

Looking.
A tear forms.

Then dries in the gathering breeze.

Rain beats down. 

Thunder on the rooftop.

Sheets of wind-driven water

Like nails into the sodden ground

Advance in ranks along the boulevard.

Relentlessly. The water rises.

Swallows the bank.

Over the roadway into the yard.

Deeper and deeper.

A tree limb captured, a lawn chair

Swept toward the bay.

Screech.

The ancient oak sways.

Dancing in the storm.

Water rises up, cold, dark

Above the stone steps 

Worn smooth from years of foot treads,

Immovable under the scourge

Of the advancing flood.

Splash.

Two kids land in the sparkling blue water

Shrieking joyfully as they play.

The inflated ball bounces high out of the pool

Off the tiled deck and out of sight,

Then fetched back and put into play again.

Splashing and squealing the children go.

With a sudden scream one is pulled under.

In all the noise no one notices

Until he explodes back out of the water

Exacting his revenge as

The golden sun drops behind the oak trees.

With a sigh

I turn from the window.

Crack.

Lightning strikes

Rending tree limbs 

Exploding. Burning shrapnel splinters

Through the broken glass.

Sheer curtains ignite. Fire spreads.

Through the kitchen

Up the stairs. Flames devouring

Consuming all that was there, is there.

Memories, history turns to ash.

Through the flames the chimney stands.

All else falls aside.

Stone piled up one on one

Reaching toward the sky.

Stubbornly standing still in the battle’s din.

The log pops in an explosion of sparks

Lifted up, dancing on the fall breeze, 

into the night sky.

The sun has set on the autumn leaves.

The children snuggle under blankets

Around the campfire grandpa made.

There to sing songs and toast treats

Warm. Cozy in each others arms.

With a snap another log breaks 

Sending burning cinders toward their feet

But quickly swept aside. 

Then another song is sung, a story told

Around the campfire grandpa made.

Eyes closed, silently, I sigh

As I put down the album.

Older, tired, bruised and broken.

Still standing.

I never knew

We live in the eye of the storm.

Poem: A Mother Cries

A Mother Cries

 By Rob Hesler

Hot dusty breeze.

Nestles Crunch wrapper flits by, carried away.

Brown puddles from the early evening rain fill the potholes.

Light poles all askew, dark. Dead.

One light blinks on. 

Off. 

On. 

Off.

Somewhere a mother cries.

Red and blue lights strobe.

A neon light blinks

Lotter  Tick ts He e.

Another says More than a billion served.

The windows all are dark. The sign says Hiring.

Somewhere a mother cries. 

A cowboy on his horse. Full stride. 

Marlboro man making money.

High above the dark gray street in living color

the billboard says

Even Me? Get tested.

And somewhere, a mother cries.

There is another sign

Behind the eight foot high chain-link fence.

Elementary School it says.

Sirens wail. Horns blare.

Another sign. See a crime, call.

Somewhere, a mother still cries.

In the dark alley two eyes peer out.

Experienced eyes. Been here before.

Cautious eyes. Expecting the worst.

Weary eyes from all the other times.

Head lights pass. Twelve-year-old boy.

Somewhere a mother keeps crying. 

Finger twitches. Up.

Down.

Up.

Down.

Then still. Forever.

Dark red stain across the cold gray pavement

Still wet from the early evening rain.

Somewhere a mother starts crying.

...

Next Week

Another raindrop. Plunk. On top of her box.

The angry gray clouds swirl overhead
so low.
They reach down to engulf him.
The breeze off the lake is cold. So cold.
Blink.
He pulls the blanket tighter around Joey and Anne Marie.
He holds them. Brave troopers.
He feels nothing.
He blinks once. Again.
But the scene in front of him shatters. Someone spun the kaleidoscope.
Blink. Blink.
Then clear. Her box comes back into focus.
Dark shapes circle around.
The priest. Words but no sound.
Raindrops on the wood. Plunk.
Plunk, Plunk.
It began long ago. It happened so fast. An unusual disease.
Very bad the doctor said. But there was one hope.
The insurance lady said they'd call back. Next week.

They tried to explain to Joey and Anne Marie. But words can’t explain.
It’s an unusual disease. Very rare they say.
And she said they would call back. Next week.
Rain beats down against the top of her box.
Blink. Blink.
The days dragged on. They flew by so fast.
She was always so brave.
She maintained her belief.
She was better than him.
Blink.
Blink.
The insurance lady said, “Maybe next week.”
The rain slowed.
Plunk. Plunk. Plunk.
She kept going to work. She couldn’t work anymore.
Doctors gave her new pills. They waited for more.
She grew smaller and smaller.
Then faded to black.



Blink.
The lady said they would call back. One more week.
Plunk.
Another raindrop on top of her box.

What is Success?

Have you ever felt like a complete failure? Ridiculed by your friends, laughed at by your family, scorned by your dog! Perhaps the key to ensuring this never happens again is by revisiting how you define failure, and therefore, how you define success. Do your definitions empower you or do they weaken you? Most of us employ disastrous definitions of success and failure which make the accomplishment of success impossible from our own perspective. Over time our repeated perception of failure leads us to eventually give up on our dreams and settle for far less than our potential because we don't want to fail anymore. We'll take even self-destructive actions if it means we can avoid what we have come to identify as failure.

I know what you're thinking. "But Rob, surely it can't be that easy, can it? If I just revise my definition of failure, then BAM!, I'm instantly a success? After all, in the end isn't it just results that count? Either we win or we lose. Success or failure. I can't just declare winners losers and losers winners without totally deluding myself, can I?"

One of my favorite coaches on leadership and success is the late John Wooden. Coach Wooden led the UCLA men's basketball team to 10 national championships in 12 years, including, at one stretch, 7 in a row. This was an unprecedented accomplishment at the time and, may be equaled, but never exceeded. He probably knows a thing or two about success. He developed his own definition and rules about success that, at first, seemed ridiculous to me. One rule that his father taught him home on the farm was "never try to be better than somebody else." Can you imagine that? Here is a man who made history coaching his teams to beat others more consistently than any other ever, and one of his fundamental life-rules was - "never try to be better than the other guy."

Another rule from Dad was to always learn from others, and a third, never cease trying to be the best you can be. These are all rules that are in your own control. Coach Wooden says that if we spend to much time on things we can't control we will lose control of the things we can.

From these simple rules Coach came up with his definition of success and here it is:

Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable.

That bears repeating. Success is peace of mind (and internal state to you) which is a direct result of self-satisfaction (another internal state) in knowing you made the effort (you and no one else made the effort) to become the best of which you are capable. Nowhere in that definition does it mention others or does it mention outcomes or results. There is no winning or losing. When asked about the most successful players he ever coached, one would have thought Wooden would answer with players whose names everyone knows, like Kareem Abdul Jabaar, or Bill Walton. But instead he mentioned two virtual unknowns who never found NBA success. He said that when he first saw them practice as college freshmen he thought, "If we ever need these two as starters then the program will have fallen on hard times indeed." However, by the time both finished their UCLA careers they were starters on national championship teams. What made them great successes was not their level of talent or the number of victories, but rather, they took the talent they did have and became absolutely the best they could be.

If you adopted Coach Wooden's definition of success would it change how you feel about experiences in your life? Would you enjoy life's journey just a little more if this was your definition of success rather than one requiring "victory?"

I once coached an optimist baseball team of twelve year-olds my son Andrew played on. The league was set up so that all the new kids ended up on the same team. I had to play a child at second base who couldn't throw to first because it was too far. Yet we started off with thirteen kids who showed up all season, practice and games. They gave it their all. When the season started they couldn't make an out or score a run. The first inning would go on for a while until the opposing coach would declare 3 outs so my kids would get a chance to bat. But gradually as the season went on those players got better and better. I can still hear their cheers the first time they got three outs in one inning. By the end of the season they were actually competitive with the other teams. They didn't win a game that season but I was so proud of every one of those kids. They did their best at every practice and every game. And I know, looking back on that season, every one of them felt like a success.

Coach Wooden liked this poem and I will end with it:

At God's footstool to confess

A poor soul knelt and bowed his head.

"I failed!" he cried. The Master said

Thou didst thy best. That is success.

Man was it a hot time inthe Florida Keys!

Would I die for Osama bin Laden?

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.” (Mt 5:38-48)

Do I love the terrorists who piloted those three planes 10 years ago? Do I pray for them and those who would be like them?

Do I love the radical suicide bombers in Afghanistan and Iraq? In Israel or London? Have I ever prayed for them?

Do I love the abortion doctor or the mother who used his or her services and do I pray for them?

Have I ever prayed for the politician who makes decisions I see as ruinous or anti-American? Do I love him or her?

These were hard words for me when I heard them this morning and set me to some serious reflection about my own hypocrisy. Angry demonstrators are screaming at each other in Madison. TV personalities are calling their political adversaries evil. Political discourse in this country is dominated by hyperbole and lies instead of honest debate. And the anger grows and grows. It makes me wonder what the atmosphere in the country felt like in 1860 leading up to the Civil War?

Before today I can’t say that I ever prayed for Osama Bin Laden, or Mohammed Attah. I haven’t prayed for Sarah Palin or John Boehner or Florida Governor Rick Scott. Can I honestly say I love them? And, what does that mean? Should I compromise on my closest held values because I love my adversary? If I love Osama Bin Laden does that mean I don’t want him hunted down and brought to justice? If I love the mother who just terminated her pregnancy does that mean I think her abortion was right? Does it mean I think the doctor acted morally? What does it really mean to say I love my enemy?

I, for one, don’t know the answers to these deeply personal questions. And as I look around at friends and family I don’t see too many people even asking these questions. We all seem to be too busy feeling angry and shouting. I know I have been. That’s why this reading from Matthew struck me so strongly this morning. Though I don’t know the answers, I don’t think it means that we all become pacifists or surrender to our adversaries and enemies. Also in Matthew Jesus was quoted as saying "Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth. I have come to bring not peace but the sword.” But when his time of death came he didn’t summon legions of angels to wipe the high priests and Pharisees from the face of the earth as he easily could have. He walked humbly to his death carrying his own cross in order to save many of the very same people who shouted “crucify him” the night before. Would I likewise die for Osama bin Laden? Would I die to save an abortion doctor? Could I actually do that?

I know it’s human to be angry and hate. But it’s not divine.

Image by Narayan Mahon for The New York Times

I'm a Liberal, I'm an American, and I'm not Stupid!

It was a telling moment as Marco Rubio, a photogenic tea party favorite and newly elected US Senator from Florida took the podium with his wife and small children in formation behind him and delivered his victory speech last Tuesday night. He provided a crystal clear presentation on just what the teapublican party has now come to represent. And he provided crystal clear evidence that the chickens have come home to roost after several decades of allowing the right to define what is an American liberal. In fact, over those decades many liberals, me included, ran from the label (I tried to go with progressive for a while). Now the very idea of liberal for a significant percent of the population has come to be equated with a slew of anti-American actions and philosophies. The truth is that we, liberals, must shoulder part of the blame. And we, liberals, have to take the mantle back by clearly defining what the our philosophy really is and proudly shouting it from the rooftops, from our blogs and twitters and status updates over and over again until it penetrates the lies and misrepresentations that have been left unchallenged for so long.

In talking about the political views of President Obama, Bill O’Reilly defined something called “progressivism” earlier this year as: “Progressivism wants to take your stuff. That’s it. That’s what it is. They want to take your stuff.” In the same broadcast Glenn Beck added: “I will go a step further. They don’t just want to take your stuff. They want to control every element of your life.” It seems like that’s pretty scary stuff to be associated with, very Un-American. And, speaking of scary, I wish I had a nickel for every time liberals have been equated with marxists, communists, socialists and even fascists. Because we want to take everybody’s stuff and control everyone’s life we, therefore, must have a big federal government. By extension then, government is evil and anything done by government is evil. And the liberal’s favorite tool, a massive federal government is also totally incompetent at anything it tries, ever. Evil and incompetent. There is another entire vein of thought that liberals must be stupid or we would all become conservatives. Of course that argument might run into a little turbulence from those accusing liberals of being an east coast group of over-educated elitists. For the liberal, welfare has apparently become the opiate of the masses. And so the litany continues. Liberals are both evil and masterful manipulators of the American people bent on taking everybody’s stuff and controlling everybody’s everything, and, simultaneously naïve fools not smart enough to understand how the real world works and thus leading the country to ruin. Got it?

So in the face of this overwhelming “evidence” against the merits of modern American liberalism, I’m forced to ask myself, “Why am I a liberal? Is it in fact a character defect? And, if so, is there a cure?

The answer to these questions for me is really pretty easy. By training I am an economist and, as such, I have a deep and abiding respect for “the market.” Theoretically I accept that there is no better way to allocate resources and distribute wealth than through the operation of the market. Practically, the twentieth century is full of examples of countries trying to operate some other form of economic system only to lead to economic catastrophe. But, (you probably figured there would be a ‘but’) as any economist will tell you, the market only results in the most efficient allocation of resources and wealth based on the initial allocation of resources and wealth. If you change the initial allocation then the market will find a new “most efficient allocation of resources and wealth” different than the one that resulted before. If you change the initial allocation again, you will again get a different final allocation. In fact, for every initial allocation, there is a different final allocation. Therefore, the question I had to ask myself was, “What is the most just initial allocation?” (I’m always asking myself a lot of questions.) Is it just and equitable for whole segments of the population to be trapped in poverty and lack while another tiny segment continues to amass ever more and more wealth? This is, in fact, the central question that separates teapublicans from liberals in America today. This is the question of “social justice.” And the concept of social justice is as American a concept as “free speech” and “separation of church and state.”

One of the many myths (aka lies) perpetuated by the right in America is that a group of long dead men commonly known as “The Founding Fathers” we conservative/libertarian types who created a constitution in order to prevent liberals 200 years in the future from being able to interfere with corporations’ ability to make profits. In fact, the founding fathers actually fought bitterly over many of the exact same issues about the role of government in a capitalist society we fight over today. In fact, one father, Thomas Paine, wrote an essay entitled “Agrarian Justice” written in 1796 in which he lays out his argument on the need for redistribution of wealth to promote what he called agrarian justice and we call Social Justice.

In this fascinating essay Paine explains that prior to cultivation of land (what he calls civilization) extremes of wealth and poverty didn’t exist.

“To understand what the state of society ought to be, it is necessary to have some idea of the natural and primitive state of man; such as it is at this day among the Indians of North America. There is not, in that state, any of those spectacles of human misery which poverty and want present to our eyes in all the towns and streets in Europe.

Poverty, therefore, is a thing created by that which is called civilized life. It exists not in the natural state. On the other hand, the natural state is without those advantages which flow from agriculture, arts, science and manufactures.”

Paine isn’t arguing against progress, but only looking to redress the great inequality created by economic progress. Because of agricultural progress populations in many cities exploded. This made it impossible for society to revert to subsistence living (the natural state) because there were now too many people and too little land in the cities for this. Therefore the masses became dependent on those who owned the land (and eventually he adds personal capital as well; “Personal property is the effect of society; and it is as impossible for an individual to acquire personal property without the aid of society, as it is for him to make land originally.”) Those who owned the land and improved it to provide food for the masses became wealthy from the land. And Paine defended their right to become wealthy because of the service they provided. The problem arises, according Paine, because in the natural state God had created the land to serve all the people. The wealthy land owners only deserved the wealth coming from the improvements they made to the land, and not from the land itself which naturally belongs to all. Therefore the wealthy owe something to the community which he calls ground rent. In a natural state “every man would have been born to property.” And, “every person born into the world after a state of civilization commences, ought not to be worse than if he had been born before that period.” This is what Paine refers to as Agrarian Justice.

Paine further explains that this transfer payment to the “dispossessed” is a right, not a charity.

“But it is justice, and not charity, that is the principle of the plan. In all great cases it is necessary to have a principle more universally active than charity, and with respect to justice, it ought not to be left to the choice of detached individuals whether they will do justice or not.”

What was required was a redistribution of income managed by the government. Paine then laid out a proposal to provide a stipend to all individuals upon reaching 21 years of age, as well as an annual stipend for the elderly and disabled (social security). All laid out in 1796. I heard a rumor that Paine’s essay on health care reform was lost in a fire. Just a rumor. But it would just seem like common sense.

So when someone tells us that we need to return to the values of the founding fathers our answer needs to be yes. Just like at least one founding father we believe in social justice and need to retake America from the corporate elitists and apologists.

God Bless America, founded on Liberal Principals.