MOVIES THAT MOVE US

Last week I was in Frostproof, Florida, enjoying the sun and a sojourn on Silver Lake where sunsets are rightfully billed as the most glorious in the U.S. I spent a lot of time “taking my leisure,” but ventured out to a Rotary Club meeting with Vickie Sullivan’s sister on one occasion, and another day we visited a plant nursery where research is being done on citrus. However, a customary Sunday afternoon at the movies proved to be the most cogent day of the visit. We saw the movie “The Soloist,” and if you haven’t viewed it, I’d strongly recommend that you take time to see it at your local theatre or rent it.

The movie is a true story about an L.A. columnist (played by Robert Downey Jr.) who meets a homeless schizophrenic musician (played by Jamie Fox), a former student at Juilliard Music Academy. The homeless man sits on the streets of L.A. playing Beethoven on a two stringed violin. The columnist and the musician become friends, the story unfolding in a stark, unsentimental way that gives it poignant authenticity. This simple story suggests to viewers that much is asked of us when we encounter the mentally ill who live on the streets in major cities everywhere in the U.S. since the time that legislation was passed regarding institutionalization of the insane. The result of that legislation has been that the mentally ill now reside in shelters or in jail cells, rather than in institutions dedicated to care and medical help for them.

Perhaps there are many of us who have at least one relative who is like the character, Nathaniel Ayers, in “The Soloist,” a person with whom we can’t connect and who’s unwilling to be helped so that his humanity isn’t so difficult to accept, but this story provides some hope for victims who are poor in mind and spirit. I won’t reveal the plot but I do suggest that you see it even if you aren’t an advocate of social reform and haven’t joined any campaign against unemployment, poverty, and the homeless. It poses some relevant questions about the disenfranchised and our response to them –some of those “what would Jesus do?” type questions. One question could be if we really believe the words in Ephesians, “… [they are] no longer strangers and aliens, but…members of the household of God.”

“The Soloist” sent me to my bookshelf where I re-read Archbishop William Temple’s vision of a fairer society which could be built only on moral foundations with all individuals recognizing their duty to help others. He was deeply interested in a view of morality that wasn’t preoccupied with sexuality but which was relevant to the numerous social problems facing us. Temple espoused in “Citizen and Churchman” that the vocation of a Christian was to dedicate himself in the power of love to the establishment of justice. “The Soloist” also brought to mind a theology emphasized by Harold T. Lewis in “Christian Social Witness,” in which he explains that we must have grounding in an incarnational understanding of the universe.

I hasten to add the caveat that for many families, as in my own, the willingness to help these homeless relatives is not enough and, like Nathaniel Ayers, medical help is more than often refused by the victims, and the street becomes home as a matter of choice – they don’t want to be treated or helped and abhor the confinement and restrictions of a saner life. It’s truly a Catch 22 situation, and the movie provides an answer only in the musician’s willingness to accept a friend and his help so that he can explore the meaning of his life and break out of the narcissistic pattern of living, finally connecting with another human being.

Last year in early Spring, I received an e-mail from a Religious whose friend is director of a homeless shelter in Chattanooga. The e-mail detailed a hard day at this shelter, a story about dangers that beset the homeless. The report from this friend provoked the following poem:

E-MAIL FROM A HOMELESS SHELTER

Snow falls while we live in warmth,
outside, the dense silence of a cold Spring,

inside, the complacency of blessings.

A message arrives in the silence,
pleas to offer up prayers for Dana,

Dana who visited a homeless shelter Saturday,
wearing a white dress,

soft like a confirmation gown.

Brother Ron, admiring her unusual finery,
received a hug, her self-esteem restored,

and when he left his work,
she lingered in front,

embracing the shelter’s welcome she knew so well.

He asked about afternoon plans,
the beautiful Spring day of her white dress,

A picnic, she said, and maybe she’d call her daddy
to see if she could go home again.

Sunday morning they found her,
the white dress stained with blood,

murdered in Chattanooga’s incautious Spring.
Brother Ron says, “no one knows at sunrise

how this day’s going to end,
so pray for Dana in her blood-stained dress”…

And, I might add,
for those who live in indoor complacency.

MATT THE MOODY HERMIT CRAB

Sometimes when we” start out for town,” as my Grandmother Nell used to say, we end up miles away from Sewanee, searching for serendipity instead of running errands. Yesterday, when we had driven as far as Cowan, TN, we discovered a new bookstore, “The Book Brake,” that specializes in used and rare books,and we came to an abrupt halt before the small shop across the street from the old Cowan train station.

Inside, we found shelves of mysteries, classics, children’s books, and the rare ones that were out of our pocketbook range, settling for several $2 and $3 volumes, one of which was an old Graham Greene novel. However, the brand-new book with which I left the shop was a children’s book actually written by the proprietor, entitled MATT THE MOODY HERMIT CRAB. I bought the volume after a long chat with Caroline C. McGee, an M.D. who now lives in Cowan and who formerly practiced family medicine and specialized in care for patients with depression and bipolar disorder.

MATT THE MOODY HERMIT CRAB is the story of an imaginary creature, a hermit crab afflicted with bipolar disorder, which provides insight into the thinking and behavior of a young boy crab who has become convinced that aliens have taken over the world and he must stop them. Readers also experience life within the family constellation in which Matt, the hermit crab, learns to function without disrupting all the members with his irrational rages associated with bipolar disorder.

Caroline’s husband, a former publisher in Nashville, TN, published MATT THE MOODY HERMIT CRAB during the time he owned the publishing house, McGee and Woods. Caroline, who no longer practices medicine, is a living “profile in courage,” as she suffered a near-death experience resulting from a bicycle accident, and the experience left her with brain damage that affects her speech and limits use of one of her arms. The bookstore is her new terrain, but she has a formidable work history, having practiced family medicine for 16 years, along with the care she provided for those with bipolar disorders. She also worked with a Juvenile Detention Center, caring for behaviorally troubled youths, and was a founding board member of Tennessee Women in Medicine. She served on the board of Siloam Family Health Center, a clinic for indigents where she was a volunteer physician.

MATT THE MOODY HERMIT CRAB was illustrated by Nancy C. Hall, a renowned artist who lives in Nashville Tennessee. Her whimsical drawings of crustaceans remind me of the Clovis Crawfish series written by Cajun Country author Mary Alice Fontenot (now deceased). The illustration above is the cover for MATT THE MOODY HERMIT CRAB, an informative story that can be read at one sitting as it is little over 100 pages. For those of us who have at least one hermit crab of this variety in the family, the book is a “must read.” The hopeful take home message is that a person suffering from bipolar disease, when treated with appropriate medication in early childhood (and coupled with behavioral training) can become successful in any work he undertakes in adulthood. Caroline emphasized that early diagnosis and treatment of this disease results in enhanced functionality.

As I said, a trip to town isn’t always an occasion for errands! It’s nice to have another outlet for books in the area, particularly when you can find second-hand treasures for reasonable prices. Of course if you’re a book buff, the bargain prices will only encourage you to take home an armload!

A DAY FOR BIRDS

When a blanket of gray envelops Sewanee on certain Spring days, I refer to this mountaintop idyll as “Grayburg.” Yesterday was one of those days but it was brightened by talk about, and the appearance of, several birds, one small fat one which I had never seen before and which hovered at my front door on the welcome mat. When I went to Monteagle for my usual overdue haircut yesterday morning, my hairdresser revealed to me that she’s a bird lover and that on her days off, she goes fishing and takes along a bird identification book. Recently, she sighted two bald eagles near St. Mary’s Convent where she lives and reported that hawks abound in the area. When she had finished cutting my hair, she accompanied me out on the porch of the “Mane Attraction” and showed me a mother cardinal sitting on her nest in the bushes near the doorway. I was as enthralled with the overwhelming interest Lydia showed in bird care (she has been feeding the mother) as I was with the sight of the cardinal placidly sitting there, unperturbed by customers walking in and out of the shop.

At noon, I went to the French doors overlooking the woods in the front yard and found a fat nuthatch perched on the doormat. She was unmoved by my peering at her intently for ten minutes or so before she finally lifted off and left me scurrying to find a bird identification book. I think it was a red-breasted nuthatch which is a bird that winters in southern climes. I surmise that she has been nesting in an old woodpecker hole in an oak of the front yard, a place where a pileated woodpecker has been drilling. This bird imitates a pygmy owl hooting and if I knew how to make the sound, I could call her back for a visit as I understand the nuthatch often cozies up to human watchers. She certainly didn’t seem disturbed when I observed her, and I would have provided her a peanut butter dish if she had tarried as this is something nuthatches enjoy eating.

So many birds migrate this way, and the thought of their migrations provoked another search for explanations of where birds go during the winter months. I discovered some information by Rosemary Drisdelle who offered folklore tales about bird migrations. In the Middle Ages, people thought bar-headed geese, crossing the Himalayas, went to the moon for the winter. Others believed that Piping Plovers simply changed into another kind of bird when the icy winds of winter began to blow. Ancient Egyptians thought that small birds were carried away on the backs of larger birds when winter approached, and Corn Crakes were thought to bury themselves in mud when cold weather threatened their survival.

In any case, I’m glad birds migrate South during winter and provide color on overcast days here in “Grayburg.” Here’s a snippet about birds written during a visit to the desert of west Texas near Big Bend entitled “Santiago Peak, Terlingua,” from my chapbook, COUNTERPOINT:

SANTIAGO PEAK, TERLINGUA
Unwavering desert,
sotol, cacti, and creosote
root in yellow pebbled sand,
yuccas strike at the post vigil of vultures,
remind us of life’s struggle with aridity;
narrow trails lead upward
to buttes, mesas,
all with tender blue crowns,
ribbed altars,
where hawks pause…
to raise the Host.