It’s dark in Oregon. Sunrise was at 7.40 this morning
supposedly. I have a cold and hit the couch with a blanket and a book after
bringing Lily to school. The good thing about having a cold is I can do this
rainy day couch time without guilt. I drifted in and out of a few chapters, a
few dreams and woke thinking about guns, my current passion. The sun did not rise.
When we moved to America this summer I wanted to live in a
mixed neighbourhood. Our lilac tree and the weeping birch are eerily naked. The
view from the couch has widened. Our across- the-street neighbours’ house is
painted pale mustard yellow with white trim. They have a small motor boat and a
trampoline in the back. Hilda, the mother over there, is from Nicaragua. Her
husband is from Mexico. They have three beautiful young girls who bounce and
ballet down the sidewalk each morning to the elementary school a block up the
street. The littlest girl has a purple umbrella. I doubt they have a gun.
Our back garden neighbors seem sweet. They are young. I
would guess that they live a bit on the edge. They have a Billie Jean and a
Granddad in their house. Hey you, new
lady. Look at the fence! It’s me, Billie. I’m small enough to climb through
your fence. And she did. She just wanted to look at my glass chair. She sat
on the plastic chair from IKEA and made it bounce. We got a dog. It nipped me. Now we have another dog. I tell my mother
everything. Then she disappeared back through the fence. My hunch is they
don’t have a gun.
Our neighbour to the left is originally from the Ukraine. He
came to America when he was a child. He has a few small, battered American
flags in his empty flowerbeds. He was in Vietnam and later worked as a
bartender. He likes women and is a charmer. He was probably a bit dangerous
before the stroke. Now he is sweet and doddery. If he has a gun it is most
likely locked up somewhere, I think he knows his limitations.
Next door to him is a couple with two teenage daughters who
found us fascinating when we first moved in, but we haven’t seen them in a
while. The dad is a welder. He made a potbellied stove out of a barrel; it has
a long thin neck of a chimney and two pig-like ears on top of it. He and the Ukrainian
neighbor sit outside by the stove each night. They drink beer and smoke
cigarettes and have a laugh together. It’s sweet. But the welder is an Oregon
redneck, and my hunch is that he has a gun or more than one. His wife works at
the cafeteria at the High School and tends bar at a Chinese restaurant a few
nights a week. When they argue in the back garden I hear her stand up for
herself.
An elderly couple lives on the corner. They have dozens of
bird houses, metal daisies, gnomes. And two yappy dogs who look a bit elderly
themselves. I doubt they have a gun, but they might.
It’s a good mixed neighbourhood. It’s a slice of America. It’s
the aptly named Forest Grove. We are now Grovers. Newbie citizens finding our
way.
We helped with the book sale at the Forest Grove library in
October. In November we went to a Presbyterian church and helped pack boxes of
food for the Western Farm Workers Association. Many workers lost two or more
months of work because of last year’s drought. When we loaded boxes of food,
frozen turkeys and bags of apples into our car to deliver them, I thought about
guns. Was I crazy to have Lily at my side as I knocked on the doors of
strangers? A gorgeous woman opened the door at our first delivery. She smiled
and showered us with Spanish words and guns became the last thing on my mind.
We carried the stuff into her shiny house. A dozen chairs lined the walls and I
was sorry that we would be missing the party that was sure to follow. We got
hugs at each house thereafter. This is America and I like it.
And then I stupidly get on Facebook and see comments written
by people I used to know in Alaska, old high school people. Some that I really
liked and still do; and some who are just part of the gang. Other people, too.
Guns don’t kill people, people do…as if I’m some dumb-shit who doesn’t get the
connection! Poor baby-soft guns. It is there, on the screen, that I wonder what
happened to America in my two decade absence. There must have been a hardening.
Gun-loving, politician-hating, flag-waving people who wrap themselves in
bizarre religiosity spouting off about their rights and my ignorance. This is
America and I don’t like it. I know Sarah Palin happened. She is now,
thankfully, off the radar pretty much, but the damage she caused with her hate
speeches lives on. Angst and hate about having a president who is black also happened. The hardening, what is it?
I think of my Irish
friends who give so freely to the world. My neighbors in Ballinderren who are helping
refugees. My neighbour Joe who slept outside with the homeless to raise money.
Ireland is not perfect, there are plenty of jerks there too. I’ve been heckled
there more than once. They know about guns in Ireland, and they live just fine
without them. Gangland criminals have guns, ordinary people do not. They know
about terrorism, decommissioning; they know how hard it is to change and how
awkward and clumsy peace can be when it comes. But even the biggest Irish jerk
will wonder why America tolerates guns
and all the racist drivel from Donald Trump. Ok, Mr. Trump did get a red carpet
laid out for him when he bought a castle in Ireland a year or so ago…all hallowed commerce won in that
instance.
My friend Debbie tells me not to compare and she is correct. It's the hardening that concerns me. And the quietness of good people.
I will not be quiet.
Helen Mirren, in honor of her 70th birthday, said
that there were two words she wished she had used more frequently in life: fuck
off.
We need someone like George Mitchell and Mo Molan, God rest her, (Ireland
gets to keep Bertie Ahern and Gerry Adams) to help us
reach a peace agreement. I have hope. We need to stop focusing on religions and
focus on our own humanity and fix what ails us. The purple umbrella-ed girl
gives me hope, as do two facebook “friends” who just today suggested that
although they are pro-gun perhaps, erm, perhaps we could do without assault
weapons. It's such a ridiculously tiny statement; and in this dark week in America, so huge.
