I Do! I Do! Not You. Yet.

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for May 10, 2012

            On the same day President Obama went on TV to affirm that he has finally “evolved” to believe that gays have the right to marry, just like straight couples, 61% of North Carolina voters went to the polls and voted to not only outlaw same-sex marriage but to outlaw previously legal “common-law” civil unions and domestic partnerships, even for straight couples. It takes a powerful fear for people to want to take away rights already granted to fellow straight citizens.  No “common law marriage,” no domestic partnerships for them, because those forms of making a legal family unit might be used by gay people and that cannot be tolerated.  So everything must be cut out, sterilized, cleansed, sanitized, protected. If it isn’t, those gays might get a toehold and infect the whole “married” community, which would be intolerable.

            As I said, it takes a powerful fear to do something like that. Fear of change, fear of the dreaded “other,” the false conviction that the Golden Rule is a zero-sum game and if you gain, I lose.  And good old-fashioned bigotry, too.  Can’t ever forget that because it’s always sadly present in so many hearts as We the People struggle to perfect our more perfect union and ourselves.

            And it’s all so sadly deja vu. Same fears, same hatreds.  That dreadful darkness was there during the long, terrible struggles to gain civil rights for all black Americans. It seems that human nature decrees that so many people will always fight so fiercely and for so long to keep rights for themselves they would deny to their neighbors.  Which is why I keep wondering how North Carolina voters can square this circle?  What does it feel like to be on the wrong side of history?  Again?  Because that, too, is deja vu.  

            The whole direction of our history has been one of inclusion, of expanding rights, of transforming the “other” into “one of us,” all guided by an extraordinary document: A Constitution that translates a religious Golden Rule into a secular Equal Justice Under Law.

            It was the power of that document that transformed a slave into 3/5ths of a person into the N-word into a Negro into a Black into an African-American into an American into an American President.

            It was the same document that transformed women from chattel into voters into CEO’s into Secretaries of State.  And changed gay soldiers into soldier soldiers.  And struck down segregated schools and housing and all manner of discriminatory laws of all kinds that diminished and demeaned our fellow citizens. It was that document that held that in America, there are no second-class citizens. Not under law in a nation of laws, the primacy of which is “equal rights.”  

            Plus, the blood, tears and strength of good men and women who held the golden rule in their hearts instead of fear and were willing to do battle to see that our union, our shining city on the hill, kept its promise to all its citizens.

            And thus it will be for gay citizens.  It’s simply a matter of time.  The clock is ticking, the legal cases are making their way to the courts for what can either be one final ruling from the Supremes or a series of rulings that will make the logically obvious the legally obvious. In the meantime, the legal patchwork tangle that fear hath wrought in so many states will have to be untangled by the courts.  The law of unintended consequences will claim its share of victims until the inexorable push of history straightens out the road ahead. For the old and the fearful, this world is passing away. Their grasping effort to keep gay people excluded by neo-Jim Crow laws is futile. After all, the future now belongs to the young.  And for the young, the issue is interestingly moot. To the majority of them, gay people and black people aren’t the scary other – they’re classmates and friends.  And the idea that friends and classmates should be treated as second class citizens can’t be so easily squared away. 

            Which is why I keep thinking about the North Carolina voters.  And all the other voters in other states that have enacted similarly fearful bans.  In ten years, how will they square that circle to themselves? How do they do it now? 

Lotusland

Moon Pool.  The abalone shells edging the pool are arranged to resemble lotus flowers.

 Bless the ladies, those who marry well.  And often.  Case in point, Madame Walska, a well married Polish Opera singer and socialite.  Her opera career didn't go so well, but her luck marrying wealthy men did.

Mexican barrel cactus

As a result, in 1941 she had the cash to buy a big chunk of property in Santa Barbara (Montecito) and unlimited funds to start creating an extraordinary series of gardens, filled with a dizzying array of amazing plants.  As the L.A. Times put it, "For Walska, plants were more than plants; they were colors to paint with, a family to nurture, characters to direct."

Newly created cactus garden

And direct she did, for 43 years until her death in 1984, creating dramatic tableauxs of plants, a huge Lotus pool (hence the name), whole swaths of jungle-like groves filled with massed bromeliads and a huge variety of succulents.  She even made a pact with a fellow plant collector, who had created a huge, spectacular cactus garden, that when he died, he would will his cache of prickly flora to her.  Alas, she died before he did, but he worked with the estate and was finally convinced to move his treasures before he died.  So the Lotusland staff created a new, beautifully laid out section and all the cacti, some of them toweringly huge, were transported from San Diego to their new home. Almost all the plants survived the perilous trip and our collector, by this time, a very, very old man, was able to attend the opening ceremonies.


 It must have been a culminating moment for him, to see this new, beautiful and cunningly designed "cactus world" filled with his "babies," an eye-popping variety of cactus, all thriving happily, even in Santa Barbara's cool coastal weather. Several weeks after the installation ceremonies, the gentleman collector passed away.  I'm sure he had a smile on his face.  His lifetime's work had been achieved.

Ethiopian papyrus

Since the great lotus pool doesn't start blooming until June, the beautiful lotus blooms weren't yet open.
But there was plenty of other amazing plants to see, including a whole section given over to the ancient endangered cycads, plants that were here before the dinosaurs.

Female cycad

Male cycad

Cycads, aloes, ferns, succulents, lotuses, waterlilies, bromeliads, blue gardens, japanese gardens, butterfly gardens, topiary gardens, olive groves, the whole of Lotusland is one series of astonishments after another. A perfect example of the interesting conjunction of a creative passion and money well spent, all now available for the public to enjoy.  Quite a legacy. 

Main house with cactus garden

Since parking is very limited, reservations are a must.  Regular tours and family tours are offered at 10:AM and 1:30 PM, Wed through Saturday, Feb 15 - Nov 15.  There is an admission charge.  For further information or to schedule a tour, go to http://www.lotusland.org or call (805) 969-3767.

Trellised lemon trees

Rose gardens

Your Sunday Poem

Did you see the moon last night?  And early this morning?  Huge.  Gorgeous.  So near to earth, as if to peek down to say hello. Yesterday morning the air was like spring champagne.  This morning the smell of the sea has returned. It is still except for the faint sound of a rooster waking up the neighborhood a few blocks away.   This poem is by Billy Collins from his book, "Nine Horses."

Today

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze

that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary's cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.

Dressed to Shine

Before restoration.

 The Piedras Blancas Light Station is all dressed up and ready visitors.  Last year when we went out there, volunteers and others were in the process of removing all the old lead-based paint and doing other repairs to this amazing years-long restoration.

After the new paint job

Looking up the spiral staircase

 

The ground-cover yarrow isn't in bloom yet (that happens later in June-July) but the sand poppies are out, the sea lions are on the rocks and the whales and their babies are skating very close to shore on their migration north to the cold feeding grounds. The weather should be perfect this weekend for a visit.

     Tours are an easy 1 1/2 mile ramble, last about 2 hours and from now until June 15th, are offered on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturdays.  Starting June 15th, they're held 6 days a week, Monday through Saturday.  Cost is $10, which goes to help with restoration costs.

Meet at the former Piedras Blancas Motel, which is located 1.5 miles north of the light station at 9:45 a.m.  The groups then caravan in your own car to the lighthouse.  Piedras Blancas is located north of Cambria, north of the elephant seal rookery.  (Plenty of young elephant seals are still there lolling around in the coves so that's also worth a visit. And remember to stop by at Sebastian's Cafe in old historic San Simeon (opposite the Hearst Castle entrance) for one of their killer sandwiches for lunch.)

Be on the lookout for whales heading north.

 For further information,go to http://www.piedrasblancas.org   or http://www.piedrasblancas.gov.

It Wuz Ayn

Calhoun’s Can(n)ons for May 3, 2012

            It could only have been her. Who else in the world could have talked a whole country into collectively committing suicide?  Turn it into a heedless fiddle-playing grasshopper who had no responsibility for its future because winter would never come?  Who could make a whole nation believe that it was so exceptional, so special, so wonderful, so King-of-the-Worldish that it didn’t need to undertake those annoying chores like taking out the garbage, washing the windows, mowing the lawn and paying the mortgage, all of which are part of the adult responsibility required to maintain a civil society?  Who could feed the adolescent ego to such a degree that a whole generation of boomers would grow up to become right-wing Randian Republicans, all convinced that they were John Galt and it was time to shrug?          

            Ayn Rand, that’s who. And why not?  Hers was the irresistible siren song for every 18 year-old brooding in his room in the basement, picking at pimples and daydreaming about the cool, blond Dagny Taggart, while Mom keeps hollering down the stairs that he needs to do his homework, clean up his room, take a shower and come take the garbage out. Terrible. Take the garbage out. That’s for mooks, for losers, for leeches and takers, not for job-creating Masters of the Universe!

            And so John Galt was secretly born in the hearts of millions of average Americans – the belief that the benefits they received by living in a civil society, the schools they attended, the roads they drove on, the public health measures that helped keep them healthy, the regulations and subsidies that kept their food safe and affordable, everything in the social compact that surrounded them, all paid for by taxes by their hard-working fellow citizens  – all of that should be eliminated, de-regulated, privatized, profitized and paid for by The Other Guy, while they alone would be exempt, would be the special ones, answerable only to themselves.  Not for them the taking out of garbage.  Or paying the taxes that kept the schools and roads open so others could also benefit.  No.  Once he’s gotten his, John Galt doesn’t do The Commons for anybody else. That is for the moochers, the leeches.

            Did I say “siren song?”  Crack cocaine is more like it.  It was irresistible to the self-centered sociopathic 18-year old mind.  Fortunately, most people were able to outgrow Randian sociopathy when they grew up, got a job, had a family.  That’s when a world-wiser adult realizes that paying for a civil society actually brings benefits, secures a better future for their kids, and offers vital protections against the brutal way capitalism often operates in the real world.

            But a few people never grew out of that mind set. Alan Greenspan, the former Chairman of the Fed, was one of those life-long fanboys of Ayn.  He was also one of the most powerful financial advisers to all the Masters of the Universe for years, which gave his Randian world view extraordinary legitimacy. The Koch  Brothers are fanboy beneficiaries extraordinare, as is Congressman Paul Ryan.  He’s a Super Fanboy who requires that his staffers read her interminable Atlas Shrugged.  His proposed federal budget is Ayn at her chilling best.

            Which is all well and good.  In a capitalist, consumer society, sociopathy has its special charms and pay-offs for a certain few.  But here was the most amazing part of  Ayn’s mind-trick:  Her few fanboys managed to convince a huge majority of normal adults --who knew better-- that they should repeatedly vote for Master of the Universe policies that would benefit a handful of real John Galts, while hurting all those useless, contemptible moochers and leeches  -- themselves. 

             It was a brilliant piece of political ju-jitsu, all blind self-destructive noses, scissors, and fearful, misdirected spite on the part of the voters.  While the manipulative, sociopathic Randers smiled. Ayn would have been so proud.   

            So, how did it all work out?  Look around you at what happens when Atlas shrugs: For the moochers, an underwater mortgage, a looted national treasury, record unemployment, outsourced jobs, busted unions, voter suppression, a crumbling, bankrupt Commons, a failing health system, a failing school system.  In short, a system in collapse, a country without a future.

            And for the Masters of the Universe? The happy continued massive transfer of the nation’s wealth upline, with the booming Wall Street casino once again open for business-as-usual.   

            And why not?  Johnny Galt needs a new pair of shoes.