Where Is This Place

Friday night. In the dark, in the city, the lights glow, and voices drift in the air. "Allahoakbar," people are shouting and pleading from their windows and rooftops under the stars.

An amateur camera captures the scene, looking out into the darkness, revealing only a few lights of the neighborhood. In the background, you can hear the night voices, some nearby, some far away.

A woman speaks, her pleading voice wondering about her country.

The video is remarkable and is here. It includes quickly translated subtitles in English.

Her voice is haunting, but the subtitles capture only a fraction of its power. Below, I have written down my version of her words, a rewriting only of the English subtitles, because the number of Farsi words I know could easily be counted on my two hands.

Tomorrow, Saturday is a very important day -- the day of our destiny. And tonite, the Allahoakbars shouted from the rooftops are louder than they have been before.

Where is this place? Where is this place where every path is closed? Where is this place where everything has been blocked?

Where is this place where people just call out the name of God? Where is this place where every night the calls get louder?

Every day I wait to see if that night the Allahoakbars will be louder. I shiver, and I wonder whether God shivers too. Or not.

Where is this place where the innocent are imprisoned? Where is this place where no one comes to help? And where is this place where our voices are best heard thru the silence?

Where is this place where young people are killed, and people stand in the streets to pray? They pray on the blood of the fallen. Where is this place where innocent people are called trouble makers and thugs?

Where is this place? Do you want me to say? This is Iran. This is my land and yours.

--- rewriting of the subtitles on a youtube video of a narration of calls in the night in Tehran.

h/t: The Belgravia Dispatch

1:07:39 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Have You Seen The Women?

Have you seen the women there, in the streets at the vanguard of the thousands, with scarfs on their heads and green ribbons on their fingers, with heads and defiant hands held high, marching, chanting, some dying with the men and the boys and the girls.

I can't imagine the courage it takes for them to march in a place like that at a time like this. I can't begin to imagine.

6:41:19 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Then She Named The Cities

"So do you have travel plans?"

We ask them that, because they always do no matter when we ask, no matter how recently they've only just returned.

He smiled and looked to her.

"Khadija?"

She looked up with that half-smile that we've learned to interpret as yes.

"You do!?"

Yes, she had plans. So she smiled that half-smile and began to explain. Except this time, there was a brighter sparkle in her eyes as she said where they are going.

She has always wanted to go, she said. And you could see it from her eyes. You could hear it in the way she spoke, the tremor in her voice, the anticipation of something long desired.

And then she named the cities.

Bokhara. Tashkent. Samarkand.

6:21:23 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

A Telecommuter's Lament

Sitting on a teleconference.

This dang new phone doesn't have a speaker mode. This dang new phone evidently doesn't have mute. This dang new phone didn't come with a manual. Why did I have to fall off my bike and break my old phone? This dang one might just make the hoohah of an iPhone and the $hoohah$ of AT&T worth it. I'm so close to switching.

Sitting on a teleconference.

BOOM behind me. Orange flash fills the room and reflects off my laptop screen. Smell of electrical fire. I can't find any evidence of what happened.

My laptop is still working. The fan on the floor runs fine. The electric recliner still goes up and down. The fountain pump is still running. The outside ground fault device that it plugs into looks ok. The floor lamp CF light bulb looks ok.

And all this while I'm on this teleconference, although I'm not sitting anymore but rather walking around the room trying to be quiet (because I'm not muted) with the dang cell phone pasted to my ear (because it doesn't have a speaker mode) looking desperately for the source of the flash and the smell. I walk around and walk around, checking and rechecking things I've already checked once, already checked twice.

Then I walk towards the bedroom. As I'm walking, I see a big black smear on the floor coming out from under the recliner. I looks like maybe a tiny comet came streaking in at an angle and smashed into the laminate floor, splaying black char in a fan shape.

Clearly something exploded under there. Move the chair. It's coming from the floor lamp cord. The cord is kinked and damaged exactly where the spot was. I guess the recliner was sitting on it.

Walking to the kitchen still on the teleconference. Phone to my ear so I can hear what they're saying, because it doesn't have a speak... well I guess I already told you that.

Grab paper towel and run it under a very slow drip from the faucet so I don't make any noise, because it doesn't have a mute... and I guess I already told you that.

Wipe up the black splotch with the barely damp paper towel. Most of impact crater is just black ash. Wipes up fine. Not all of it, though. We've got a black spot burned into the flooring. Fortunately, it's about the size of a knot in a piece of wood, so it actually could make the flooring look a little more natural that it looked just about an hour ago.

Off the phone now. Teleconference over. Gotta go release the hound. I had him in his crate to stay quiet while I was on the phone, because ... well I told you all that already.

5:17:15 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

A Sea of Green

Ribbons and signs. Two fingers in the air. Sparkling dark eyes. Frightened eyes. Hundreds of thousands in the streets. One day and then another. Word twitters out. Discontent grows.

Police with batons. Marauders on motorcycles. Gun shots from broken windows. Thugs looking for something to break, someone to kick.

Flames and smoke. Chants of protest. Shouts from the roof tops and windows of the city. Silence from the masses mourning for their dead. Candles at dusk for their fallen.

A Sea of Green.

12:29:43 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Graduation Week

My father came from far away where the temperatures were barely above freezing the morning they left. My mother came too, breaking her "No Texas After April" rule. And a Chachi whose joyful laugh I can still hear. And my ever-faithful brother who has always been there for his nephew.

They came for his high school graduation -- to watch Ben walk across the stage in flowing robes with honors draped around his neck. They came to cheer as his full name was read aloud. They came to congratulate him. They came to toast him as we ate enchiladas and chalupas. And they came to see the last of "the boy", because as he showed us all, striding out of the crowd, he certainly isn't a boy anymore.

I was happy. I was sad. My cheeks got sore from smiling. My eyes got filled with tears as that man came down from the other side of the stage, beaming, waving to his friends in the band.

It lasted forever. It passed in a flash. And at the end, I sat on the corner of a bed and looked up with tears in my eyes and said, "This has been one of the best times of my life."

Oh for heaven's sake, what a wonderful week it was.

11:11:48 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Just A Few More Fatherly Comments

"Dad," he said to me over the phone, "have you eaten, yet?"

I know how I get when I get hungry. Tone gets serious. Volume goes up. Words start coming out faster. And I start to get aggressive. So yes, I knew what he was talking about. But I wasn't hungry.

The going to college in the fall thing is working on me in ways I hadn't expected. The years we've had don't seem like quite enough, now. There are just a few more things I need to share. Just a few more fatherly comments...

He sits at the computer all afternoon as the phone calls he needs to make go unmade. Just a few more fatherly comments.

He goes passive-aggressively silent when I ask if he's getting a graduation card for a friend who's inviting him to a party on the beach. Just a few more fatherly comments.

It will be past mid-June before he begins to make progress on volunteer work we talked about in lieu of a summer job. Just a few more fatherly comments.

He... I... It... They... We... Why... You... Just a few more fatherly comments.

"No, I'm not hungry, Ben. I just have so many things I want to say to you, and this last summer is already slipping away."

11:20:44 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Congratulations To The Man

The radio went off a little after 6:00 this morning. Trudy rolled over against me and lay quietly for a while and then got up and took her shower and ate breakfast and went out to water the garden. The dog lay next to my stomach as I dozed. After a half hour, I got up to take my late, telecommuter's shower.

The morning routine had started out as usual ... except for one thing.

"Is the boy riding with you to school this morning?" I asked Trudy, making a face of mock sadness. Because of course there is no more "school", and he isn't "the boy" anymore.

After the ceremony Thursday evening, as Ben emerged from the crowd of Austin High graduates in their streaming maroon gowns with friends and family offering congratulations, my brother held out his hand to my son and said, "Congratulations to THE MAN!"

And let's be honest: that face of mock sadness of mine hid (not so well) something real.

8:23:13 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Commencement

The band played as the Class Of 2009 filed out onto the floor in their gowns and mortar boards. Speakers spoke from the podium. Names were announced one by one. The graduates walked across the stage all smiles, greeted by a principal who gave each of them a hug.

And when they had all been called, they moved their tassels from one side to the other, and they threw their mortar boards into the air, creating a swarm of maroon trapezoids. And there was cheering from the floor. And there was cheering from the seats. And the band played as they filed off the floor and out into the hot Texas sun.

We waited for Ben at the appointed place. We waited and waited, and then we called. There were happy sounding voices in the background when he answered, and I heard him say, "I need to find my parents." Trudy was the first to reach him as he emerged from the throng, his diploma under his arm, his maroon gown streaming behind him, his graduation medal and honors cords hanging about his neck as he took long steps toward us with a smile on his face that spoke volumes.

12:38:03 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Celebrating The Rain

The lightning that was flashing in the distance when we went to bed... That lightning that I poo-poo'd, thinking that nothing up near Burnet would come our way... It came, and it brought thunder with it.

Some time late in the night it woke us up -- a couple tell-tale rumbles and a breeze beginning to blow and the first few drops of rain with a sound that makes you think there's plenty more to come.

I sat upright in bed with images of the boats down at the waterfront blowing loose. I pictured myself running down the sandy steps and picking up the toys and towels that were left behind.

But were are no boats. There were no stairs. There is no waterfront outside our door. The habit of a long-ago childhood is just wired into my brain, which began running thru the things that might need tending before the storm arrived. And the thunder was getting louder.

I ran into the back yard in my underwear and let down the patio umbrella. And I ran into the front yard and made sure the car windows were up. In my underwear I did this, which made Trudy laugh hard when I told her later. And big drops of cold rain started to fall.

I went inside, and from behind the storm door I watched the rain come down. I saw the leaves start to blow. And I saw a toad hopping along on the sidewalk, which was quite sufficient for me. There was nothing more to do. Nothing more to tend to. And a toad was out out celebrating the rain.

I went back to bed and fell fast asleep.

12:31:43 AM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []