Hentoff Layoff Won’t Silence the Man in the Skunk Suit

Nat Hentoff, now formerly a Village Voice writer, never figured as a master of the understatement in my thinking. He is outspoken, direct and forthright in his hard hitting columns.

Hentoff’s five decades with the New York alternative weekly ended with a telephone call from his editor. Two other Voice writers were also let go on December 30.

Reacting to the layoff, he told the New York Times, “I’m 83 and a half. You’d think they’d have let me go silently.”

Understatement!

Let him go silently? How could it have been done?

With other recent grasping (and gasping) strategies in the newspaper industry, I shouldn’t be surprised by the Hentoff Layoff. But you don’t let a journalist of his stature go silently. He has been making noise for 50 years.



And for good causes, not the least of which is First Amendment freedoms. The rights of free speech and religion are foundational. He understands this, writing and speaking of it frequently.

Take a stance, then take what comes -- that’s Hentoff. His pro-life stance in the 1980s encouraged those of us peacefully occupying the sidewalks in front of abortion facility doorways. He didn’t share our theology (he’s a self declared atheist) but saw the rightness of defending life at personal risk.

He expects the free world to use its freedoms to speak out for those less fortunate. His writing makes people uncomfortable – puts on his skunk suit and goes to a garden party, as one of his editor's once said. He makes me uncomfortable – the kind of itch that shouldn’t go away in a world of injustices.

He told the Times “in all due immodesty,” that he will be missed by Village Voice readers. What Immodesty? Of course they will miss him. In the same spirit, Hentoff’s closing column isn’t about himself; he again throws accolades to his mentors: I.F. Stone and George Seldes.

The good news: he’s not retiring. May he live – and fight – til’ he’s 100.

Top photo by permission of N. Hentoff



Liner notes in 1960s long play record "The Golden Flute of Yusef Lateef". Hentoff's book, At the Jazz Band Ball: 60 Years on the Jazz Scene is expected this year.

Autumn to Our Hearts, Not Spring

If you want to enjoy every laugh, you have to cry every tear.

                                         -Kahlil Gibran 

                                                                                            Jan 6,1883 – April 10,1931

For its sunshine, flowers and perfect weather, Quito is known as the land of eternal spring. 

It wasn’t named by a foreigner living here, obviously. There is always a piece of us that is dying. 

We live in a transient community. Somebody is always leaving, and this brings autumn to our hearts, not spring. 

After a while, I’d try to make friends and as soon as I did, sure enough we’d have to move out again.
Finally I decided not to let anyone get close enough to hurt me again . . . I guess I’m still doing that.

                                                                             Major Margeret “Hotlips” Houlihan on the 

                                                                            TV sitcom M*A*S*H

We enjoy the laughter as we watch old episodes of M*A*S*H. And yes, sometimes tears. Theirs is a wartime
setting, a mobile surgical hospital, and different from our situation. But we relate to some of the story lines, the
characters’ struggles,  of this television program. 

A spring several years ago, Kathy lost three friends. An ocean would soon separate her from Ros (it was
pre-Facebook, a veritable lifetime ago). Susan was dying; her journey to Jesus occurred while we were in the
States that summer. 

Her friend/mentor/surrogate mother, Lois, had invested lifetimes in us, which included hosting and nursing
Kathy as she recovered from hepatitis. Lois helped not only Kathy, but our whole family. Lois too was leaving.
How much can one heart endure? 

Greg put it this while preaching awhile back, “Long-term friendships here are unusual. We in Ecuador who are
not Ecuadorians come and go a lot.” 

“In some cases,” he said, “We will never see them again this side of eternity . . . and that’s hard to take.” Just
like Major Houlihan, people find a way not to take it. He’s been told, ‘I don’t make close friends anymore. They
all leave and it hurts too much.’ 

Fortunately, Kathy hasn’t quit or
shut down emotionally.  Today,
he has confidants, casual friends
and a friend list on Facebook.
With the social networking on the
Internet, she is connecting often
with former Quito friends. 

Death . . . then life . . . then
another death. And life again
as friendships are renewed.  

These are the seasons, this
is is the life we choose. 

As we serve the One. 

Who left heaven for us. 

A Favor: Bring Me a Small Drum

Exchange in Sheila's office in Ecuador:

Ralph: Think you could bring me a small drum when you go to Ghana?
Sheila: Sure, I can do that.

E-mail message three weeks later . . .

Ralph: Is Sheila still in Ghana? Could you help her select a djembe drum?
Lee: We're going shopping tomorrow and it's on our list.

A week after that in Sheila's office

Sheila: Lee sent this for you. (Hands me a djembe drum key ring, then reveals it's only a joke.)
Sheila: Show me what you had in mind. Show me how tall.




I hold my hand eight inches above her desk. From behind the desk, he pulls out a drum about three times as tall as what I'd indicated. (See photo. Sheila is at the right with her hand on the drum. Sharon is on the left.)

Sheila: Lee told me 'I know this is what Ralph would want.' (Lee doesn't do anything in a small way.)

Result: A nicer drum than I'd ever imagined.

Consequence: Received an e-mailed favor request from Sheila which ended with "Remember the drum."

Conclusion: Drumtalk (different drum sounds heard over long distances) may work just as well as talking and e-mail messages to get your point across.

Please check out the editorial (Africa, but broader and more significant than above story) by Matthew Parris.

15 Seconds to the Ground

Falling, gathering velocity, cables whistling.

In relative silence the tower fell, its descent punctuated only by onlookers’ comments.

“Cayo mal . . . cayo mal.” (It fell badly . . . it fell down wrong.”)

The transmission lines to a nearby antenna array were ripped down by the tower, but workers quickly repaired those lines for the next day's radio programming.

In 15 seconds it was over as the tower cut through the sky and crashed to the ground. Horizontal, mangled and bent, it belied the hundreds of man-hours invested decades earlier. At 416 feet tall, it had served as HCJB Global Voice’s tallest at the international transmitter site in Ecuador, and also the highest tower supporting the parabolic screen behind the steerable antenna.

Loud was the silence in the Andean pasture in a valley near Quito where the tower now lay on the grass. Loud also had been the signals emanating from its antenna, sending a powerful radio voice that proclaimed refuge, security and strength in Jesus Christ to people in distant locations: the Middle East, Japan, and the former U.S.S.R to name a few.

(Please see the full story at this blog site.)

Christmas Party at a City Dump

More info at this site:

Conversation, Invitation, Integration, Congregation

Cradling the bass on my lap, I peer across the top of the music stand to watch Analizbeth tuck her violin under her chin. Sliding across the strings, her bow releases from the instrument the strains of a beautiful melody.

Her sister, Jessica, is at the piano. On guitar, Beth leads the worship band, and with Gabriel also at guitar, the team consists of more than half Ecuadorians.

Pastor Len has publicly credited Spotlight Listeners´ Club with flinging open the English-speaking church’s doors to the Quito community. The face of the congregation has changed with regular English-conversation evenings at church.

Analizbeth, Jessica and Gabriel (also Jonathan and Juan Pablo, violinist and drummer respectively) all are under 30. Just like much of Ecuador and much of Latin America is under age 30. Is it any wonder then, that the EFC group, “20-Somethings”, is experiencing burgeoning growth? Gaining a life of its own, the group is changing the church’s body life.





I think of another Ecuadorian, William, and his involvement in the 20´s group, in discipleship and Bible study. I think of his participation in my conversation group many months ago at Spotlight. He has since moved on to other outreaches at the church. This is integration, even as Spotlight Listeners’ Club continues to stand welcoming new people at the church doors on alternate Wednesdays.

Other Spotlight Listeners' Club coordinators say:

We are meeting once per week (just completed our 7th today) and have an average of about 25 women, plus 8-10 conversation partners each week. We also have a childcare program that can accommodate 12+ babies/toddlers. Our population is primarily Japanese with a few Korean and Arabic women. -Michigan, USA

The Spotlight Club is going absolutely GREAT! It is truly amazing. We are going to have our 8th week tonight (we meet once a week. Of course some of the students have asked for more nights but for right now I think I am going to have to try to stay with just one. We have had some wonderful volunteers and each week we have any where from 8 to 16 "students" come to the club. We can see it gradually growing and it is wonderful. -North Carolina, USA

Those that volunteered did a great job. I had stressed speaking slowly and clearly and had two young women for the basic group that were very creative and excited about what they were doing. The one advanced group leader did a fantastic job as did the leaders (husband and wife about our age) in the middle group. We did the program on Thanksgiving celebrations. We had people at this Spotlight that were originally from Peru, Honduras and Mexico. -Georgia, USA

December?

Yes, it is December. But the signs here for the start of the Christmas month are different.

No bundled-up-in-scarf-and-mitten shoppers, no snow predicted in this century. Instead we do listen to the chiva buses making their evening rounds, and we have heard the traditional song "Chulla Quiteno* " a hundred times already!

The bull fights make some city streets unnavigable, and the blue and red flags of Quito are flying. Once the "founding of Quito" holiday is over, things will begin to seem a little more like December for this South Dakota girl.



I should be happy that our backyard has a blooming 7-foot poinsettia tree . . . but I long to walk into my family greenhouse and see my brother bending over his little potted poinsettias instead. I should be glad that our grass in very green and lush and there are blooming impatiens and marigolds 12 months a year, but just for a few hours a good blizzard would be better for me!!

May the month of December be a peaceful and blessed one for you!!

love,
Kathy

*Melodía - Pasacalle: Alfredo Carpio Flores

Letra: Luis Alberto Valencia

Yo soy el chullita quiteño,

la vida me paso encantado,

para mi, todo es un sueño

bajo este mi cielo amado.

Las lindas chiquillas quiteñas

son dueñas de mi corazón,

no hay mujeres en el mundo

como las de mi canción.

La Loma Grande y La Guaragua

son todos barrios tan queridos de mi gran ciudad;

El Panecillo, la Plaza Grande

ponen el sello inconfundible de su majestad.

Chulla quiteño, eres el dueño

de este precioso patrimonio nacional;

Chulla quiteño, tú constituyes

también, la joya de este Quito colonial.

What are they are singing on those open busses with live bands? Here's a
translation --done by Ralph-- that may help tell the story. A "chulla" had one
pair of shoes (nicely polished) and one suit and lived an existential, somewhat
Bohemain lifestyle. Please leave a comment if you have suggestions on improving
the translation.

I am Quito's high class bum
in my happy-go-lucky life
For me, it's all a dream
under this beloved sky.

Ah, the beautiful Quito ladies!
To them my heart belongs
No other women in the world compare
With those I sing of in this song

The Great Hill and the Guaragua
they're great barrios in my wonderful city
Bread Loaf Hill, Independence Plaza
Leave an undeniable seal of their majesty

High class hobo, you are the master
of this precious national treasure
living for the moment bum, you too belong
the jewel in fact, of colonial Quito