Drawing from the Long-Term Memory

to make sense of the present

I have to write this. I am retiring after 26 years of teaching (yes, comparable to running a marathon). My first years were at La Roche College (now University). My first class was a group of students newly arrived from Africa, mostly Rwanda, some whose families had fled to Uganda (let that sink in, as the memes say).

They were bright, they were enthusiastic, and they loved learning about American ways.

We invited them for Thanksgiving dinner. We took them downtown Pittsburgh to see the Christmas decorations and then back home to help trim the tree. They neither liked nor understood the tossed salad we served that night.

They saw their first snow. Local students taught them how to make snowmen, have a snow fight, sled down the campus hills on cafeteria trays. Then they saw their second snow, then their third. Soon they were asking, when does it stop?

It was a presidential election year – 2000. I went to bed thinking Al Gore would be president and woke up to, as the song says, “bad news on the doorstep” – The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette with a blazing headline, “Bush wins Florida.” Or something like that. I vowed I would never go to bed again before a presidential election was called.[1]

But wait! There’s more!

Florida wasn’t decided at all. Gore conceded, then retracted his concession. They kept counting. There were “hanging chads” and “pregnant chads” and no one in the country has named a son “Chad” since.

I made that up.

But there were back and forth lawsuits and appeals. Jeb Bush, the future president’s brother,[2] was governor, but I’m sure he had nothing to do with the final results[3]. His Secretary of State set a deadline for counting. The state Supreme Court got involved. Counting stopped, restarted, stopped again. Palm Beach County was the source of most of the confusion – the “butterfly” ballot design confused the elderly population[4], and analysts suggested that many accidentally voted for Pat Buchanon instead of Al Gore. Trust me, there was no one on the fence trying to decide between Buchanon and Gore.

So Gore sued to keep the counting going, Bush sued to stop the counting, lather, rinse repeat. Eventually the United Supreme Court called a halt to the counting because they believed it would be impossible to conduct a fair counting before the deadline for certification, December 18.

Is this just another rambling story that I’m trying to capture before it disappears into that Great Grey Fog?

Not at all. It has great relevance. Those 15[5] African students were angry, disillusioned, and heartbroken all at once. They believed that in the United States, one person got one vote, that the people chose their leaders. They saw, up close and personal, that that was not true.

Imagine how international students are feeling about our country today. They came here expecting the freedoms we have taken for granted, especially free speech. They have discovered that that is a privilege for citizens, but not for them.

And it won’t be long before silencing of citizens commences, or, frankly, continues as President Trump considers deporting “home grown criminals” – American citizens of whom he disapproves.

The right to due process? Piffle. The right to council? Bah.

My students were knowledgeable about politics. They could see corruption, and in fact they had seen it. They had stories about having to step over bodies on their way to school during the genocide. They had such high hopes for America.

And so did I. It was alarming but enlightening to see their reactions. Too many US citizens shrugged it off – that’s the way the ball bounces. Or reacted from partisan positions – my guy won! Or just went on about their daily lives.

Since then, many of my college students have insisted that elections and politics don’t affect them. Their education in history and politics has been sadly neglected, as my aunt used to say. As a rebel raised in the 1960s and 1970s, I can’t understand their apathy. I want them to be screaming about the state of West Virginia’s economy, education system, health care, drug addiction. I want them at the state capital or the governor’s mansion with signs. I want them calling university administrators to task when there is injustice on the campus.

And yet, I am hanging up my teaching hat (a gorgeous black velvet tam with a gold tassel that cost about $90) and hoping to find some way, through my writing or art or any other way that appears, to find that hope for our country, and to spread it around liberally. And, yes, a very conscious choice of words.

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[1] A vow I have since broken simply for my own peace of mind.

[2] And the former president’s son.

[3] Word has pointed out that “final results” is redundant. It does not have the context to make that call – there were many many sets of “final results” in that election. Perhaps I should have said “final final results.”

[4] Which is most of the population, except my dear friends who are only 10 years older than I am. Not elderly.

[5] Approximately. I wish I had kept better records, and I wish I had kept in touch

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