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The Chicken Chronicles
Chapter Nineteen
©2010 by Alice Walker
That you offered
your light
while you were
too young
to comprehend
our darkness:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That you were
injured in spirit
while still
a child
& that you
presented your
joy
regardless
of hurt:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That you knew
you were love
loving itself
in those you
adored:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That exhausted
from over-giving
you lost
the energy
to protect
your gift:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That your arrows
were scalpels
turned against
blameless
flesh:
We promise, St. Michael
To learn from you.
That your heart
refused
work
no slave
on the plantation
of fame
could accomplish
in fifty
venues:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That you loved
the simple
vulnerable beings
of this earth:
the trees
the children
& the animals:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That in your unique
loneliness
you thought
it best
to
erase
yourself:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That in your reading
of us
in our bondage
you sought
to
offer what
we seemed
to desire:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That the Self
is
already
perfect
with no need
to be
redefined:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn
from you.
That to be wealthy
in everything
but freedom
& joy
is to be poor
beyond
bearing:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you.
That we are
as we are
splendid
to all who
love us
including
ourselves:
We promise, St. Michael
to learn from you:
&
we thank you.
That you left us
abruptly
to ponder
these things:
We promise St. Michael
to learn from you.
& by
our learning
of so much truth
that we have avoided
for so long
& to our
decline
may we repay you
- a very small offering-
for your indescribable
even unimaginable
suffering
from which
we may
awakening
to our
beauty
benefit.
We promise, St. Michael
To learn from you.
And we thank you.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
St. Michael
The Chicken Chronicles
Chapter Eighteen
©2010 by Alice Walker
Dear Girls,
The week that Michael Jackson died, Mommy was in a state of shock. She could do nothing, really, but come sit with you. Or with her human sweetheart, or with the other “children;” the dog, Miles, and the cat, Surprise. Spending time with you was especially comforting, and she sat some part of each day with one or the other of you on her lap. She also became even more obsessed with your freedom. How to protect you from predators and how to keep you safe if indeed you wandered beyond the enclosed confines of your house and yard. What pained her so much about the loss of Michael was the loss of his own innocence, seeing it offered to adoring fans that did not have a clue, many of them, how precious was the gift they were consuming. Because to Mommy, looking at a photo of the young Michael, when he was bursting with love of life and the joy of giving himself to others in song, he was a special being, sent to us for a special reason. It seemed to her almost everyone forgot to keep wanting to know: What was that reason?
Mommy could not bring herself to watch the memorial for Michael, live. She waited for a rerun, and that was still almost too painful to bear. She couldn’t absorb the reality that Michael could fit into so small a casket, even if it was made of silver, or whatever the shining metal was. She could not believe his memorial was so large and that it was so public. And that people bought tickets to attend. These things seemed to be about the Other Michael that Young Michael had become, but not about the little boy who loved to sing and dance for the offering of it. So many times over the years, watching Michael as he flashed by on screen or marquee Mommy had wanted to tell him to take his chimp and a backpack and go camping for two or three years. It had all seemed too big, too demanding, too draining, even though everyone in his company seemed to agree he was very good at it. The Entertainer.
And then there were a couple of questions that really hounded Mommy: How could Michael not know how beautiful he was, as he was? And, didn’t anyone ever kiss his nose and tell him they loved it? Or his hair or his chin? Or his color, even with spots?*
Mommy looks at all of you, so different in coloration, beak and comb size and length of feather, and she can’t imagine wanting to change a single thing. You poop all over the place and never even notice; but this too seems the way you are made. Sometimes if you perch on Mommy’s shoulder or head she has a moment of concern, but it passes; she smoothly redirects you closer to the ground.
Mommy met Michael Jackson only once. It was in Steven Spielberg’s wonderful Navajo rug decorated New Mexico adobe style studio in Burbank when he was shooting Mommy’s novel The Color Purple. (What would you do with a copy of this book, Mommy wonders? If I sprinkled it with mash gravy you would probably eat it). Anyway, Michael’s mentor and friend, Quincy Jones introduced us. (Mommy loves Q, irrespective of diet). I smiled and said hello. Michael, his eyes wide and startled, looking curiously like a deer (Mommy loves deer), but dressed in a dark blue uniform with big silver buttons (you would have enjoyed pecking at), said nothing. Quincy had told Mommy that Michael loved the story of The Color Purple and thought of himself as a Celie, the abused step-daughter of her “father” and the brutalized wife of “Mister.” Mommy thought it odd that Michael did not speak, but she had heard of his shyness with strangers. She blessed him in her heart ( she could still clearly see the little boy who had loved to sing no matter who was listening) and moved on.
When Michael was being accused of things she could not believe he would do, Mommy wrote to him and sent the letter by Quincy. Seeing his suffering, she invited him to come for a Master Class she intended to call “The Insufficiently Charted Territory of Perilous Smiles.” A seminar about who some people are, and who he might, trusting them, become. In his innocence, Michael often seemed to Mommy not to inhabit the same Americas she did. This is a huge pitfall for many of our young humans who are taught nothing of how to protect themselves from a machine of malice and envy and greed that, with a big smile, runs some of our best people over, year after year, decade after decade, even century after century. (It is still almost impossible for Mommy to believe, for instance, that Toussaint L’Ouverture (b. 1743) the liberator of Haiti who defeated the French in battle and banned slavery (taking away their human “property”) was still enticed to go to Paris; from there he was taken to the frigid mountains of France,imprisoned, and left to freeze to death. Some serious smiling there!) Though the letter was apparently delivered to Michael, there was no response. Mommy wondered if this was because she asked him to come as himself, not as his persona, and to “leave all long cars at home.”
What is lovely about meditation is that looking back on this comment Mommy made in her letter, she can see how judgmental and insensitive it was. No wonder he didn’t answer it. This almost sarcastic bluntness, which her Sagittarian rising sign gives her, is not always helpful. By befriending rather than cursing it, however, Mommy can help it mellow out, become more skillful; and instead of hating others who also say annoying things, she can see they’re just like her, mostly unaware at the time.
Sometime in the midst of grieving, Mommy figured out that she could let you out into the vegetable garden, if not all the way underneath the grape arbor that unfortunately circles into the woods where the big gray predator that steals chickens seems to lurk. She would have to sit with you while you scratched and ate. This is what she did.
Mommy’s Jewish curandera who lives on the coast also raises chickens. Once when she was about to stick an acupuncture needle in Mommy’s third eye Mommy told her of her dream to have chickens running about the vegetable garden ridding it of bugs. Her friend laughed. I don’t advise it, she said. Then she told Mommy of her experience of letting her chickens run free in her garden. They ate, shredded, scratched up everything, she said. By the time they were through, there was very little left for us to eat that wasn’t pecked. So Mommy had waited. But now, her own love of liberty kept her awake at night, imagining chickens felt the same way about freedom she did. How could she give them freedom and keep them safe?
So there Mommy sat, having opened your gate - through which you poured like a fluffy tide - surrounded by a flock of liberated chickens. You were acting just as my friend said: messing up everything. But by then I didn’t care. Go ahead, I thought, mess it up. I will eat the plants with the holes in them. Why not? And in fact, the more I let go of caring about the damage, the more I relaxed, even exulted in the freedom you seemed to feel. And then up walked Glorious, who looked me kind of in the eye or maybe she was looking into one of my buttons, and hopped into my lap.
Glorious, of all of you, was the most sensuous; and I know you don’t hear that said much about chickens. But she was. Once in a lap she could nestle in and stay as long as possible, until the lap stood up. Then she would lie where she fell, seemingly in a swoon of ecstasy. She would remain in that state for several minutes, until Rufus or Agnes came over and started to peck at imaginary insects underneath her. I named her Glorious for the shining straw colored grasses of mid summer, when Northern California puts on such a show of opulence and ease. Everything golden and still. Warm. Everything growing. Or dying. But quietly.
I had dragged my meditation camping chair that folds out of storage and we were sitting in it together underneath the windmill. I think this was the day of Michael’s memorial or perhaps the day after it. What can one do at such times? I think: Hold something that is alive. Breathe with it. Feel its heart. Offer yours. What else is there?
However, I remembered I had left a burner on up the hill in the kitchen and decided to put Glorious down and go up to turn it off. I did this. When I returned, she was gone.
Just like that.
I looked everywhere. The garden fence wasn’t too tall for a determined predator to scale, but it was unlikely one had done so during the fifteen minutes I had been gone. Of course I thought maybe some hungry human had slipped in and stuck Glorious under his arm. But we are miles from anywhere and there’re not that many hungry humans passing our place. And then I remembered my love of hawks, the way they look when they’ve spotted prey and how they stop just above it in the air and seem to be standing still, though their wings are flapping. Then they drop. This had always excited me before, even though I felt sorry for the mouse, rat, rabbit, snake or whatever animal was being grabbed and then borne away. It had not occurred to me that this same fate could befall one of my chickens!
And not just any one of you, but Glorious.
And then, in my sadness to lose Michael and Glorious in the same week, I realized there is no reliable protection we can guarantee for another being, as much as we would like to do so. Freedom is a big risk, as is loving. Michael and Glorious are perhaps showing us by their lives and deaths what they came onto the planet to let us know: that each day is to be cherished, each moment of closeness with another deeply appreciated, each memory of innocence treasured, valued, and passed on.
Mommies can’t be everywhere. Only Nature can be everywhere.
It has its ways.
____________________________________
*Shortly after Michael Jackson stated he had bleached his skin to camouflage a case of vitiligo, which turns skin white in patches, Mommy was in Cuba visiting hospitals and delivering medicines to the Cuban Red Cross. This was during what was called The Special Period. The US embargo against Cuba had been tightened drastically and people were visibly losing weight from scarcity of food. Medicine was hard to come by. There was no soap or detergent. At a children’s hospital, Mommy noticed that the doctors’ uniforms though washed, were dingy. But they were completely committed to what they were doing: treating children from Russia who had lost hair and skin and skin coloration as a result of the nuclear meltdown in Chernobyl. One of the doctors said to Mommy: Please tell Michael Jackson we can cure vitiligo; we have been working on it with these children from Russia. Really? Mommy asked, delighted. Sure, the doctor said. Send him to us! En Español, of course.
Mommy did not know how to send Michael Jackson anywhere, or, at that time, how to even send him a letter. But she asked around until she found someone who might deliver such a message, and sent it. But then she thought: Michael probably thinks Cubans are demons, from the way they are portrayed in the media. It was painful to think he might never be cared for by physicians who would prefer to heal his affliction( whether physical or psychic) rather than hide it.
Mommy and friends in Havana during "The Special Period." Mommy is holding the hand of Dennis Banks, whose people have always appreciated feathers(mostly of Eagles) and behind her is grandfather Fidel Castro. Behind him Grandfather Ramsey Clark. Mommy doesn't remember the names of everybody else, alas. But she does remember that the Japanese American man and his compañera, both opthamologists, came to Cuba to find out why so many young people at the time were going blind.
Chapter Eighteen
©2010 by Alice Walker
Dear Girls,
The week that Michael Jackson died, Mommy was in a state of shock. She could do nothing, really, but come sit with you. Or with her human sweetheart, or with the other “children;” the dog, Miles, and the cat, Surprise. Spending time with you was especially comforting, and she sat some part of each day with one or the other of you on her lap. She also became even more obsessed with your freedom. How to protect you from predators and how to keep you safe if indeed you wandered beyond the enclosed confines of your house and yard. What pained her so much about the loss of Michael was the loss of his own innocence, seeing it offered to adoring fans that did not have a clue, many of them, how precious was the gift they were consuming. Because to Mommy, looking at a photo of the young Michael, when he was bursting with love of life and the joy of giving himself to others in song, he was a special being, sent to us for a special reason. It seemed to her almost everyone forgot to keep wanting to know: What was that reason?
Mommy could not bring herself to watch the memorial for Michael, live. She waited for a rerun, and that was still almost too painful to bear. She couldn’t absorb the reality that Michael could fit into so small a casket, even if it was made of silver, or whatever the shining metal was. She could not believe his memorial was so large and that it was so public. And that people bought tickets to attend. These things seemed to be about the Other Michael that Young Michael had become, but not about the little boy who loved to sing and dance for the offering of it. So many times over the years, watching Michael as he flashed by on screen or marquee Mommy had wanted to tell him to take his chimp and a backpack and go camping for two or three years. It had all seemed too big, too demanding, too draining, even though everyone in his company seemed to agree he was very good at it. The Entertainer.
And then there were a couple of questions that really hounded Mommy: How could Michael not know how beautiful he was, as he was? And, didn’t anyone ever kiss his nose and tell him they loved it? Or his hair or his chin? Or his color, even with spots?*
Mommy looks at all of you, so different in coloration, beak and comb size and length of feather, and she can’t imagine wanting to change a single thing. You poop all over the place and never even notice; but this too seems the way you are made. Sometimes if you perch on Mommy’s shoulder or head she has a moment of concern, but it passes; she smoothly redirects you closer to the ground.
Mommy met Michael Jackson only once. It was in Steven Spielberg’s wonderful Navajo rug decorated New Mexico adobe style studio in Burbank when he was shooting Mommy’s novel The Color Purple. (What would you do with a copy of this book, Mommy wonders? If I sprinkled it with mash gravy you would probably eat it). Anyway, Michael’s mentor and friend, Quincy Jones introduced us. (Mommy loves Q, irrespective of diet). I smiled and said hello. Michael, his eyes wide and startled, looking curiously like a deer (Mommy loves deer), but dressed in a dark blue uniform with big silver buttons (you would have enjoyed pecking at), said nothing. Quincy had told Mommy that Michael loved the story of The Color Purple and thought of himself as a Celie, the abused step-daughter of her “father” and the brutalized wife of “Mister.” Mommy thought it odd that Michael did not speak, but she had heard of his shyness with strangers. She blessed him in her heart ( she could still clearly see the little boy who had loved to sing no matter who was listening) and moved on.
When Michael was being accused of things she could not believe he would do, Mommy wrote to him and sent the letter by Quincy. Seeing his suffering, she invited him to come for a Master Class she intended to call “The Insufficiently Charted Territory of Perilous Smiles.” A seminar about who some people are, and who he might, trusting them, become. In his innocence, Michael often seemed to Mommy not to inhabit the same Americas she did. This is a huge pitfall for many of our young humans who are taught nothing of how to protect themselves from a machine of malice and envy and greed that, with a big smile, runs some of our best people over, year after year, decade after decade, even century after century. (It is still almost impossible for Mommy to believe, for instance, that Toussaint L’Ouverture (b. 1743) the liberator of Haiti who defeated the French in battle and banned slavery (taking away their human “property”) was still enticed to go to Paris; from there he was taken to the frigid mountains of France,imprisoned, and left to freeze to death. Some serious smiling there!) Though the letter was apparently delivered to Michael, there was no response. Mommy wondered if this was because she asked him to come as himself, not as his persona, and to “leave all long cars at home.”
What is lovely about meditation is that looking back on this comment Mommy made in her letter, she can see how judgmental and insensitive it was. No wonder he didn’t answer it. This almost sarcastic bluntness, which her Sagittarian rising sign gives her, is not always helpful. By befriending rather than cursing it, however, Mommy can help it mellow out, become more skillful; and instead of hating others who also say annoying things, she can see they’re just like her, mostly unaware at the time.
Sometime in the midst of grieving, Mommy figured out that she could let you out into the vegetable garden, if not all the way underneath the grape arbor that unfortunately circles into the woods where the big gray predator that steals chickens seems to lurk. She would have to sit with you while you scratched and ate. This is what she did.
Mommy’s Jewish curandera who lives on the coast also raises chickens. Once when she was about to stick an acupuncture needle in Mommy’s third eye Mommy told her of her dream to have chickens running about the vegetable garden ridding it of bugs. Her friend laughed. I don’t advise it, she said. Then she told Mommy of her experience of letting her chickens run free in her garden. They ate, shredded, scratched up everything, she said. By the time they were through, there was very little left for us to eat that wasn’t pecked. So Mommy had waited. But now, her own love of liberty kept her awake at night, imagining chickens felt the same way about freedom she did. How could she give them freedom and keep them safe?
So there Mommy sat, having opened your gate - through which you poured like a fluffy tide - surrounded by a flock of liberated chickens. You were acting just as my friend said: messing up everything. But by then I didn’t care. Go ahead, I thought, mess it up. I will eat the plants with the holes in them. Why not? And in fact, the more I let go of caring about the damage, the more I relaxed, even exulted in the freedom you seemed to feel. And then up walked Glorious, who looked me kind of in the eye or maybe she was looking into one of my buttons, and hopped into my lap.
Glorious, of all of you, was the most sensuous; and I know you don’t hear that said much about chickens. But she was. Once in a lap she could nestle in and stay as long as possible, until the lap stood up. Then she would lie where she fell, seemingly in a swoon of ecstasy. She would remain in that state for several minutes, until Rufus or Agnes came over and started to peck at imaginary insects underneath her. I named her Glorious for the shining straw colored grasses of mid summer, when Northern California puts on such a show of opulence and ease. Everything golden and still. Warm. Everything growing. Or dying. But quietly.
I had dragged my meditation camping chair that folds out of storage and we were sitting in it together underneath the windmill. I think this was the day of Michael’s memorial or perhaps the day after it. What can one do at such times? I think: Hold something that is alive. Breathe with it. Feel its heart. Offer yours. What else is there?
However, I remembered I had left a burner on up the hill in the kitchen and decided to put Glorious down and go up to turn it off. I did this. When I returned, she was gone.
Just like that.
I looked everywhere. The garden fence wasn’t too tall for a determined predator to scale, but it was unlikely one had done so during the fifteen minutes I had been gone. Of course I thought maybe some hungry human had slipped in and stuck Glorious under his arm. But we are miles from anywhere and there’re not that many hungry humans passing our place. And then I remembered my love of hawks, the way they look when they’ve spotted prey and how they stop just above it in the air and seem to be standing still, though their wings are flapping. Then they drop. This had always excited me before, even though I felt sorry for the mouse, rat, rabbit, snake or whatever animal was being grabbed and then borne away. It had not occurred to me that this same fate could befall one of my chickens!
And not just any one of you, but Glorious.
And then, in my sadness to lose Michael and Glorious in the same week, I realized there is no reliable protection we can guarantee for another being, as much as we would like to do so. Freedom is a big risk, as is loving. Michael and Glorious are perhaps showing us by their lives and deaths what they came onto the planet to let us know: that each day is to be cherished, each moment of closeness with another deeply appreciated, each memory of innocence treasured, valued, and passed on.
Mommies can’t be everywhere. Only Nature can be everywhere.
It has its ways.
____________________________________
*Shortly after Michael Jackson stated he had bleached his skin to camouflage a case of vitiligo, which turns skin white in patches, Mommy was in Cuba visiting hospitals and delivering medicines to the Cuban Red Cross. This was during what was called The Special Period. The US embargo against Cuba had been tightened drastically and people were visibly losing weight from scarcity of food. Medicine was hard to come by. There was no soap or detergent. At a children’s hospital, Mommy noticed that the doctors’ uniforms though washed, were dingy. But they were completely committed to what they were doing: treating children from Russia who had lost hair and skin and skin coloration as a result of the nuclear meltdown in Chernobyl. One of the doctors said to Mommy: Please tell Michael Jackson we can cure vitiligo; we have been working on it with these children from Russia. Really? Mommy asked, delighted. Sure, the doctor said. Send him to us! En Español, of course.
Mommy did not know how to send Michael Jackson anywhere, or, at that time, how to even send him a letter. But she asked around until she found someone who might deliver such a message, and sent it. But then she thought: Michael probably thinks Cubans are demons, from the way they are portrayed in the media. It was painful to think he might never be cared for by physicians who would prefer to heal his affliction( whether physical or psychic) rather than hide it.
Mommy and friends in Havana during "The Special Period." Mommy is holding the hand of Dennis Banks, whose people have always appreciated feathers(mostly of Eagles) and behind her is grandfather Fidel Castro. Behind him Grandfather Ramsey Clark. Mommy doesn't remember the names of everybody else, alas. But she does remember that the Japanese American man and his compañera, both opthamologists, came to Cuba to find out why so many young people at the time were going blind.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Leaving You
Chapter Seventeen
The Chicken Chronicles
©2010 by Alice Walker
Leaving you that first day after my travel and illness, I was stopped at the gate to the chicken house by a strong sense that you wanted me to stay. Mommy stood for a few seconds with one foot raised in the air. What to do? Some of Mommy’s feelings became a bit scrambled (no pun!) when she was a little girl; members of her family were always leaving home and she did not understand why they wanted to go anywhere, especially if they loved her, as they seemed to. Nobody talked about “loving” anybody in those times. But you could still tell because love is that kind of emotion; where it exists, it’s all over the place. Where it doesn’t exist humans claim they don’t think about it; usually they’re untruthful. So Mommy was stoic. They went. She stayed. They waved goodbye, she waved goodbye. They might be gone for a third of a decade, coming back looking and smelling and behaving entirely differently. She learned to let her heart shrug. Or maybe she put it to sleep. Because in reality, losing all her sisters and brothers in this way hurt a lot. But when you’re really little, or even not so little, what do you do with this feeling that nobody names?
So in a way, Mommy, with you, is just waking up. Isn’t that funny? And this was one of those times. She stopped, with one foot raised outside the gate to your yard, one foot inside. Hummm, she thought. I feel really odd. Even a little dizzy. If her heart had been an egg she would have heard it start to crack.
Mommy noticed Gertrude Stein in particular. Gertrude Stein, unlike her namesake, was always the smallest of the chickens. That is probably why Mommy’s young friends, K and J, became accustomed to holding her in their arms, even before Mommy started doing this. There stood Gertrude Stein just by Mommy’s foot. She had the look she’d had after losing Bobby to the Predator Inhaler. Mommy brought her foot back inside the gate to the chicken house and picked her up. Oh, she felt in her heart, this is what I wish my sisters and brothers had done! Brought that foot back up on the porch, back inside the house. I wish they had picked me up! And not only that, I wish they had stayed home! Or taken me with them! Though how could I have left school? Left our parents? My mother, especially?
Now, after half a century, of course Mommy understood why they had to go away. Why they too had to be stoic. They had to travel far away from home to find work. And sometimes to avoid encounters with people who were dangerous.
With one hand Mommy reached down her stool from the rafters and sat on it, Gertrude Stein nestled contentedly in her lap. Because she was slightly chilled and Gertrude Stein very warm (chickens are super warm blooded) Mommy placed one hand under a wing, the other under Gertrude’s body, covering Gertrude’s gray, scaly, entirely precious feet. She looked down into the orange colored feathers with their Aubrey Beardsley like designs. How extraordinary you are, she murmured. And, stretching out the wing her hand was under: How beautiful you are, too! She thought of all the children in the world who eat chickens, but do not realize this about them: that they are beautiful. This made her sad. It wasn’t that she felt no children anywhere should eat chickens; she was a fervent supporter of Heifer International and sometimes sent, through them, chickens and other animals to poor families whose survival meant having the occasional animal to eat. And she also, on occasion, ate chicken herself. No, she grieved knowing what children missed when they had no opportunity to learn to appreciate what they were eating. How marvelous it was. Not just its taste in their mouth, but in its very Being.
In fact, she could have boo-hooed right there. She had this thought: Maybe after this lifetime some of us do come back as crocodiles. And, previously human, we have learned about the beauty of what we are eating; but as crocodiles, we have to eat flesh to live. Maybe that is why crocodiles cry when they’re having lunch; they remember. Mommy thought: and maybe that is why humans cry “crocodile” tears even before they become crocodiles. There was a part of her that did cry when she was eating something that once was beautiful in its own feathers or scales, darting about eating gecko eggs or krill.
Gertrude Stein did that wonderful thing chickens do when they’re cradled and warm: she dropped into a swoon and nodded off with her eyes still open. Then they started to close. Mommy too was very comfortable, though still a bit chilled; next time, she thought, I’ll wear a warmer coat. She also hoped she wouldn’t start again to cough. That would be such a disturbance of the moment! Sitting with Gertrude Stein made Mommy think of Glorious, and how she was lost. And the loss of Glorious would always be connected to the loss of Michael Jackson, whom Mommy always called in her mind: St. Michael.
The Chicken Chronicles
©2010 by Alice Walker
Leaving you that first day after my travel and illness, I was stopped at the gate to the chicken house by a strong sense that you wanted me to stay. Mommy stood for a few seconds with one foot raised in the air. What to do? Some of Mommy’s feelings became a bit scrambled (no pun!) when she was a little girl; members of her family were always leaving home and she did not understand why they wanted to go anywhere, especially if they loved her, as they seemed to. Nobody talked about “loving” anybody in those times. But you could still tell because love is that kind of emotion; where it exists, it’s all over the place. Where it doesn’t exist humans claim they don’t think about it; usually they’re untruthful. So Mommy was stoic. They went. She stayed. They waved goodbye, she waved goodbye. They might be gone for a third of a decade, coming back looking and smelling and behaving entirely differently. She learned to let her heart shrug. Or maybe she put it to sleep. Because in reality, losing all her sisters and brothers in this way hurt a lot. But when you’re really little, or even not so little, what do you do with this feeling that nobody names?
So in a way, Mommy, with you, is just waking up. Isn’t that funny? And this was one of those times. She stopped, with one foot raised outside the gate to your yard, one foot inside. Hummm, she thought. I feel really odd. Even a little dizzy. If her heart had been an egg she would have heard it start to crack.
Mommy noticed Gertrude Stein in particular. Gertrude Stein, unlike her namesake, was always the smallest of the chickens. That is probably why Mommy’s young friends, K and J, became accustomed to holding her in their arms, even before Mommy started doing this. There stood Gertrude Stein just by Mommy’s foot. She had the look she’d had after losing Bobby to the Predator Inhaler. Mommy brought her foot back inside the gate to the chicken house and picked her up. Oh, she felt in her heart, this is what I wish my sisters and brothers had done! Brought that foot back up on the porch, back inside the house. I wish they had picked me up! And not only that, I wish they had stayed home! Or taken me with them! Though how could I have left school? Left our parents? My mother, especially?
Now, after half a century, of course Mommy understood why they had to go away. Why they too had to be stoic. They had to travel far away from home to find work. And sometimes to avoid encounters with people who were dangerous.
With one hand Mommy reached down her stool from the rafters and sat on it, Gertrude Stein nestled contentedly in her lap. Because she was slightly chilled and Gertrude Stein very warm (chickens are super warm blooded) Mommy placed one hand under a wing, the other under Gertrude’s body, covering Gertrude’s gray, scaly, entirely precious feet. She looked down into the orange colored feathers with their Aubrey Beardsley like designs. How extraordinary you are, she murmured. And, stretching out the wing her hand was under: How beautiful you are, too! She thought of all the children in the world who eat chickens, but do not realize this about them: that they are beautiful. This made her sad. It wasn’t that she felt no children anywhere should eat chickens; she was a fervent supporter of Heifer International and sometimes sent, through them, chickens and other animals to poor families whose survival meant having the occasional animal to eat. And she also, on occasion, ate chicken herself. No, she grieved knowing what children missed when they had no opportunity to learn to appreciate what they were eating. How marvelous it was. Not just its taste in their mouth, but in its very Being.
In fact, she could have boo-hooed right there. She had this thought: Maybe after this lifetime some of us do come back as crocodiles. And, previously human, we have learned about the beauty of what we are eating; but as crocodiles, we have to eat flesh to live. Maybe that is why crocodiles cry when they’re having lunch; they remember. Mommy thought: and maybe that is why humans cry “crocodile” tears even before they become crocodiles. There was a part of her that did cry when she was eating something that once was beautiful in its own feathers or scales, darting about eating gecko eggs or krill.
Gertrude Stein did that wonderful thing chickens do when they’re cradled and warm: she dropped into a swoon and nodded off with her eyes still open. Then they started to close. Mommy too was very comfortable, though still a bit chilled; next time, she thought, I’ll wear a warmer coat. She also hoped she wouldn’t start again to cough. That would be such a disturbance of the moment! Sitting with Gertrude Stein made Mommy think of Glorious, and how she was lost. And the loss of Glorious would always be connected to the loss of Michael Jackson, whom Mommy always called in her mind: St. Michael.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Enough Mother
The Chicken Chronicles
Chapter Sixteen
©2010 by Alice Walker
My darling girls,
It has been too long! Mommy has so many things to tell you she doesn’t know where to begin. Well! After two weeks of coughing with that nasty flu, named for pigs as innocent as you are, she finally staggered down the hill to see how you are. Of course you are the same as you always are, if nobody’s gone missing. You are eager to see who’s coming; glad to encourage them to bring you good things to eat; you’re interested in their shoelaces, tasteless though they are. You’re prepared to chat, which in your case is more of a cluck. Mommy was so happy to be alive to see you that just seeing you waiting by the gate of the garden made her whole day. What a miracle you are, she thought. She got a little teary thinking of her good fortune to have you in her life, but we needn’t go there.
What is always so energizing about being with you is your curiosity: what’s that shiny thing hanging from Mommy’s ear? An earring. What’s that shiny thing sliding down her nose? Her glasses. What’s that shiny thing….oh, many of them, going down the front of her blouse. Buttons! What a funny sound they make between the beak. Beaks? Bills? Being still a little weak, Mommy retrieved her green stool from the rafters and sat down on it. But she hopped up in less than a minute because she forgot the first thing she wanted to do was see if there were fresh eggs. So, Mommy opened the People door and went inside. She went from nest to nest. Many were empty. But the nests with the chiropractor’s balls were swimming in eggs, the bigger chiropractor ball like a white boulder in the middle of an egg ocean. She was too thrilled.
My goodness, she cried. All these eggs. Everyone must be laying now. Because, when Mommy left to go abroad (she likes saying “abroad” because it is so old fashioned) only a few of the girls were laying. And that reminds Mommy of one of the things she wanted to write about: how to tell when a hen is laying. Mommy did not know how you knew this, and she would every day collect the eggs and look at them for any resemblance to their parent. Yes, she did that, and Mommy is probably old enough to know better. Whoever heard of an egg looking like the chicken who layed it. But then again, Mommy is a poet. Anyway, she would look at the light green egg and know it was from one of the Ameracaunas; look at the light brown eggs… and then it got tricky. It could be the Barred Rocks, Rufus and Agnes of God, or it could be, maybe, one of the Red Gang of Six. Mommy was wondering also whether and what to name the gang. It didn’t seem quite right to give them a group moniker. Mommy herself is a strict individualist, except when she’s prejudiced.
So what happened? Her next knoll over neighbor, Sue Hoya Sellars, the great painter, goat raiser, cheese maker, the best roaster of goat and chicken in the world, came to visit. She and Mommy took a stroll about the garden, picking collards and kale and digging out a few potatoes and onions. Mommy of course wanted to brag about her girls. Oh, she said, they are laying. At least some of them are.
Do you know which ones? Asked Sue, her head cocked and her bright blue eyes giving her an adorable chicken like countenance.
I don’t, said Mommy, somewhat wistfully. She didn’t really care, and still it would have been nice to know.
Well, said Sue, here’s how you tell. Mommy has learned so much from Sue! She waited with joy.
Sue reached down and picked up Rufus. See her red comb? She said. Then she put Rufus down and picked up Hortensia. Mommy never writes about Hortensia. But there she was. A striking vision of black and gold, with less orange and more yellow in her neck ruffle.
This one, said Sue. Hortensia, said Mommy.
This one isn’t laying. See how pale her comb is?
Mommy looked closely. It was true. Rufus’s comb was fiery red; Hortensia’s merely pink.
When they start to lay, said Sue, putting Hortensia back on the ground, their combs turn. Isn’t that the coolest?
Mommy agreed. It sure was. She was wondering all kinds of things. For instance, in humans, what was the equivalent of the comb? Had hers, whatever it was, turned?
But then she thought of something else: she thought of her friend Jean Shinoda Bolen who had taught her something just as wonderful as what Sue was teaching her. Mommy didn’t recall how it happened but somehow she had been in a circle of women who had lost their mothers, hated their mothers, didn’t know their mothers, or were estranged from their mothers. Motherless women! And they were all mad because nobody should be without their mother! This was their feeling, even though in truth they might not have liked her at all.
And Jean said: Now, here’s the magical thing about Mother. There’s always enough.
The women looked skeptical and someone snorted and said: usually enough is too much.
But Jean continued because she is a wise woman and relentless teacher: Here’s how it goes, she said. We all know the world is full of women who feel motherless, and that is not their fault. However, what most women don’t know is this: that if you collect seven women and form a circle together, enough Mother will automatically be created. Ample Mother will appear.
Well! The women were all over this gift. It meant nobody need ever be motherless.
And so girls, that is what I hope for you. When Mommy’s away, and Mommy’s away a lot because Mommy is a nomad, you yourselves, being twelve strong females, can create me in my absence. You can create the Mother you need. It is only Mommy, out flying about the earth, who cannot create you, except in her thoughts of your sweet, mostly cuddle and food interested ways, and the wonder of you which she carries in the nest of her heart.
Chapter Sixteen
©2010 by Alice Walker
My darling girls,
It has been too long! Mommy has so many things to tell you she doesn’t know where to begin. Well! After two weeks of coughing with that nasty flu, named for pigs as innocent as you are, she finally staggered down the hill to see how you are. Of course you are the same as you always are, if nobody’s gone missing. You are eager to see who’s coming; glad to encourage them to bring you good things to eat; you’re interested in their shoelaces, tasteless though they are. You’re prepared to chat, which in your case is more of a cluck. Mommy was so happy to be alive to see you that just seeing you waiting by the gate of the garden made her whole day. What a miracle you are, she thought. She got a little teary thinking of her good fortune to have you in her life, but we needn’t go there.
What is always so energizing about being with you is your curiosity: what’s that shiny thing hanging from Mommy’s ear? An earring. What’s that shiny thing sliding down her nose? Her glasses. What’s that shiny thing….oh, many of them, going down the front of her blouse. Buttons! What a funny sound they make between the beak. Beaks? Bills? Being still a little weak, Mommy retrieved her green stool from the rafters and sat down on it. But she hopped up in less than a minute because she forgot the first thing she wanted to do was see if there were fresh eggs. So, Mommy opened the People door and went inside. She went from nest to nest. Many were empty. But the nests with the chiropractor’s balls were swimming in eggs, the bigger chiropractor ball like a white boulder in the middle of an egg ocean. She was too thrilled.
My goodness, she cried. All these eggs. Everyone must be laying now. Because, when Mommy left to go abroad (she likes saying “abroad” because it is so old fashioned) only a few of the girls were laying. And that reminds Mommy of one of the things she wanted to write about: how to tell when a hen is laying. Mommy did not know how you knew this, and she would every day collect the eggs and look at them for any resemblance to their parent. Yes, she did that, and Mommy is probably old enough to know better. Whoever heard of an egg looking like the chicken who layed it. But then again, Mommy is a poet. Anyway, she would look at the light green egg and know it was from one of the Ameracaunas; look at the light brown eggs… and then it got tricky. It could be the Barred Rocks, Rufus and Agnes of God, or it could be, maybe, one of the Red Gang of Six. Mommy was wondering also whether and what to name the gang. It didn’t seem quite right to give them a group moniker. Mommy herself is a strict individualist, except when she’s prejudiced.
So what happened? Her next knoll over neighbor, Sue Hoya Sellars, the great painter, goat raiser, cheese maker, the best roaster of goat and chicken in the world, came to visit. She and Mommy took a stroll about the garden, picking collards and kale and digging out a few potatoes and onions. Mommy of course wanted to brag about her girls. Oh, she said, they are laying. At least some of them are.
Do you know which ones? Asked Sue, her head cocked and her bright blue eyes giving her an adorable chicken like countenance.
I don’t, said Mommy, somewhat wistfully. She didn’t really care, and still it would have been nice to know.
Well, said Sue, here’s how you tell. Mommy has learned so much from Sue! She waited with joy.
Sue reached down and picked up Rufus. See her red comb? She said. Then she put Rufus down and picked up Hortensia. Mommy never writes about Hortensia. But there she was. A striking vision of black and gold, with less orange and more yellow in her neck ruffle.
This one, said Sue. Hortensia, said Mommy.
This one isn’t laying. See how pale her comb is?
Mommy looked closely. It was true. Rufus’s comb was fiery red; Hortensia’s merely pink.
When they start to lay, said Sue, putting Hortensia back on the ground, their combs turn. Isn’t that the coolest?
Mommy agreed. It sure was. She was wondering all kinds of things. For instance, in humans, what was the equivalent of the comb? Had hers, whatever it was, turned?
But then she thought of something else: she thought of her friend Jean Shinoda Bolen who had taught her something just as wonderful as what Sue was teaching her. Mommy didn’t recall how it happened but somehow she had been in a circle of women who had lost their mothers, hated their mothers, didn’t know their mothers, or were estranged from their mothers. Motherless women! And they were all mad because nobody should be without their mother! This was their feeling, even though in truth they might not have liked her at all.
And Jean said: Now, here’s the magical thing about Mother. There’s always enough.
The women looked skeptical and someone snorted and said: usually enough is too much.
But Jean continued because she is a wise woman and relentless teacher: Here’s how it goes, she said. We all know the world is full of women who feel motherless, and that is not their fault. However, what most women don’t know is this: that if you collect seven women and form a circle together, enough Mother will automatically be created. Ample Mother will appear.
Well! The women were all over this gift. It meant nobody need ever be motherless.
And so girls, that is what I hope for you. When Mommy’s away, and Mommy’s away a lot because Mommy is a nomad, you yourselves, being twelve strong females, can create me in my absence. You can create the Mother you need. It is only Mommy, out flying about the earth, who cannot create you, except in her thoughts of your sweet, mostly cuddle and food interested ways, and the wonder of you which she carries in the nest of her heart.
Monday, February 1, 2010
The Triangle of Life
I woke this morning thinking of Howard Zinn (see remembrance below) and of how much he loved us! Us, you know, humanity. And someone sent this piece about earthquakes from a person who reminds me of this caring. Caring is what will see us through. And yes, take a few moments to say, as we almost always do: What, even about this, earthquake survival, they lied? So they did. (Maybe they didn't know). But one of us found out, and told the others! That is the joy, and hope, of our age.
AW
DOUG COPP'S ARTICLE ON THE: 'TRIANGLE OF LIFE'
My name is Doug Copp. I am the Rescue Chief and Disaster Manager the American Rescue Team International (ARTI), the world's most experienced rescue team. The information in this article can save lives in an earthquake.
I have crawled inside 875 collapsed buildings, worked with rescue teams from 60 countries, founded rescue teams in several countries, and I am a member of many rescue teams from many countries. I was the United Nations expert in Disaster Mitigation for two years. I have worked at every major disaster in the world since 1985, except for simultaneous disasters.
The first building I ever crawled inside of was a school in Mexico City during the 1985 earthquake. Every child was under its desk. Every child was crushed to the thickness of their bones. They could have survived by lying down next to their desks in the aisles. It was obscene, unnecessary and I wondered why the children were not in the aisles. I didn't at the time know that the children were told to hide under something. I am amazed that even today schools are still using the Duck and Cover instructions- telling the children to squat under their desks with their heads bowed and covered with their hands. This was the technique used in the Mexico City school.
Simply stated, when buildings collapse, the weight of the ceilings falling upon the objects or furniture inside crushes these objects, leaving a space or void next to them. This space is what I call the 'triangle of life'. The larger the object, the stronger, the less it will compact. The less the object compacts, the larger the void, the greater the probability that the person who is using this void for safety will not be injured. The next time you watch collapsed buildings, on television, count the 'triangles' you see formed. They are everywhere. It is the most common shape, you will see, in a collapsed building.
TIPS FOR EARTHQUAKE SAFETY
1) Almost everyone who simply 'ducks and covers' when buildings collapse ARE CRUSHED TO DEATH. People who get under objects, like desks or cars, are crushed.
2) Cats, dogs and babies often naturally curl up in the fetal position. You should too in an earthquake. It is a natural safety/survival instinct. That position helps you survive in a smaller void. Get next to an object, next to a sofa, next to a large bulky object that will compress slightly but leave a void next to it.
3) Wooden buildings are the safest type of construction to be in during an earthquake. Wood is flexible and moves with the force of the earthquake. If the wooden building does collapse, large survival voids are created. Also, the wooden building has less concentrated, crushing weight. Brick buildings will break into individual bricks. Bricks will cause many injuries but less squashed bodies than concrete slabs. Concrete slab buildings are the most dangerous during an earthquake.
4) If you are in bed during the night and an earthquake occurs, simply roll off the bed. A safe void will exist around the bed. Hotels can achieve a much greater survival rate in earthquakes, simply by posting a sign on the back of the door of every room telling occupants to lie down on the floor, next to the bottom of the bed during an earthquake.
5) If an earthquake happens and you cannot easily escape by getting out the door or window, then lie down and curl up in the fetal position next to a sofa, or large chair.
6) Almost everyone who gets under a doorway when buildings collapse is killed. How? If you stand under a doorway and the doorjamb falls forward or backward you will be crushed by the ceiling above. If the door jam falls sideways you will be cut in half by the doorway. In either case, you will be killed!
7) Never go to the stairs. The stairs have a different 'moment of frequency' (they swing separately from the main part of the building). The stairs and remainder of the building continuously bump into each other until structural failure of the stairs takes place. The people who get on stairs before they fail are chopped up by the stair treads and horribly mutilated. Even if the building doesn't collapse, stay away from the stairs. The stairs are a likely part of the building to be damaged. Even if the stairs are not collapsed by the earthquake, they may collapse later when overloaded by fleeing people. They should always be checked for safety, even when the rest of the building is not damaged.
8) Get Near the Outer Walls Of Buildings Or Outside Of Them If Possible - It is much better to be near the outside of the building rather than the interior. The farther inside you are from the outside perimeter of the building the greater the probability that your escape route will be blocked.
9) People inside of their vehicles are crushed when the road above falls in an earthquake and crushes their vehicles; which is exactly what happened with the slabs between the decks of the Nimitz Freeway. The victims of the San Francisco earthquake all stayed inside of their vehicles. They were all killed. They could have easily survived by getting out and lying in the fetal position next to their vehicles. Everyone killed likely would have survived if they had been able to get out of their cars and sit or lie next to them. All the crushed cars had voids 3 feet high next to them, except for the cars that had columns fall directly across them.
10) I discovered, while crawling inside of collapsed newspaper offices and other offices with a lot of paper, that paper does not compact. Large voids are found surrounding stacks of paper.
In 1996 we made a film, which proved my survival methodology to be correct. The Turkish Federal Government, City of Istanbul, University of Istanbul Case Productions and ARTI cooperated to film this practical, scientific test. We collapsed a school and a home with 20 mannequins inside. Ten mannequins did 'duck and cover,' and ten mannequins I used in my 'triangle of life' survival method. After the simulated earthquake collapse we crawled through the rubble and entered the building to film and document the results.
The film, in which I practiced my survival techniques under directly observable, scientific conditions, relevant to building collapse, showed there would have been zero percent survival for those doing duck and cover. There would likely have been 100 percent survivability for people using my method of the 'triangle of life.' This film has been seen by millions of viewers on television in Turkey and the rest of Europe, and it was seen in the USA, Canada and Latin America on the TV program Real TV.
Spread the word and save someone's life... The entire world is experiencing natural calamities so be prepared!
Take Care
Thank you, Doug Copp. Wherever you are, know we are grateful for this teaching.
There are those who disagree completely with Doug Copp's advice; many have a great deal of anger that he has even offered it. It made sense to me, much more than the old "duck and cover" instruction. I do tend to expect the best of people and to believe they are, often, simply trying to help. However, be advised to consider this approach and all other approaches to earthquake survival with care. We are now in a period when earthquakes are becoming more frequent and more deadly: recent examples are Haiti and Chile. A good debate on what is the best protection during earthquakes could be a useful thing.
AW
DOUG COPP'S ARTICLE ON THE: 'TRIANGLE OF LIFE'
My name is Doug Copp. I am the Rescue Chief and Disaster Manager the American Rescue Team International (ARTI), the world's most experienced rescue team. The information in this article can save lives in an earthquake.
I have crawled inside 875 collapsed buildings, worked with rescue teams from 60 countries, founded rescue teams in several countries, and I am a member of many rescue teams from many countries. I was the United Nations expert in Disaster Mitigation for two years. I have worked at every major disaster in the world since 1985, except for simultaneous disasters.
The first building I ever crawled inside of was a school in Mexico City during the 1985 earthquake. Every child was under its desk. Every child was crushed to the thickness of their bones. They could have survived by lying down next to their desks in the aisles. It was obscene, unnecessary and I wondered why the children were not in the aisles. I didn't at the time know that the children were told to hide under something. I am amazed that even today schools are still using the Duck and Cover instructions- telling the children to squat under their desks with their heads bowed and covered with their hands. This was the technique used in the Mexico City school.
Simply stated, when buildings collapse, the weight of the ceilings falling upon the objects or furniture inside crushes these objects, leaving a space or void next to them. This space is what I call the 'triangle of life'. The larger the object, the stronger, the less it will compact. The less the object compacts, the larger the void, the greater the probability that the person who is using this void for safety will not be injured. The next time you watch collapsed buildings, on television, count the 'triangles' you see formed. They are everywhere. It is the most common shape, you will see, in a collapsed building.
TIPS FOR EARTHQUAKE SAFETY
1) Almost everyone who simply 'ducks and covers' when buildings collapse ARE CRUSHED TO DEATH. People who get under objects, like desks or cars, are crushed.
2) Cats, dogs and babies often naturally curl up in the fetal position. You should too in an earthquake. It is a natural safety/survival instinct. That position helps you survive in a smaller void. Get next to an object, next to a sofa, next to a large bulky object that will compress slightly but leave a void next to it.
3) Wooden buildings are the safest type of construction to be in during an earthquake. Wood is flexible and moves with the force of the earthquake. If the wooden building does collapse, large survival voids are created. Also, the wooden building has less concentrated, crushing weight. Brick buildings will break into individual bricks. Bricks will cause many injuries but less squashed bodies than concrete slabs. Concrete slab buildings are the most dangerous during an earthquake.
4) If you are in bed during the night and an earthquake occurs, simply roll off the bed. A safe void will exist around the bed. Hotels can achieve a much greater survival rate in earthquakes, simply by posting a sign on the back of the door of every room telling occupants to lie down on the floor, next to the bottom of the bed during an earthquake.
5) If an earthquake happens and you cannot easily escape by getting out the door or window, then lie down and curl up in the fetal position next to a sofa, or large chair.
6) Almost everyone who gets under a doorway when buildings collapse is killed. How? If you stand under a doorway and the doorjamb falls forward or backward you will be crushed by the ceiling above. If the door jam falls sideways you will be cut in half by the doorway. In either case, you will be killed!
7) Never go to the stairs. The stairs have a different 'moment of frequency' (they swing separately from the main part of the building). The stairs and remainder of the building continuously bump into each other until structural failure of the stairs takes place. The people who get on stairs before they fail are chopped up by the stair treads and horribly mutilated. Even if the building doesn't collapse, stay away from the stairs. The stairs are a likely part of the building to be damaged. Even if the stairs are not collapsed by the earthquake, they may collapse later when overloaded by fleeing people. They should always be checked for safety, even when the rest of the building is not damaged.
8) Get Near the Outer Walls Of Buildings Or Outside Of Them If Possible - It is much better to be near the outside of the building rather than the interior. The farther inside you are from the outside perimeter of the building the greater the probability that your escape route will be blocked.
9) People inside of their vehicles are crushed when the road above falls in an earthquake and crushes their vehicles; which is exactly what happened with the slabs between the decks of the Nimitz Freeway. The victims of the San Francisco earthquake all stayed inside of their vehicles. They were all killed. They could have easily survived by getting out and lying in the fetal position next to their vehicles. Everyone killed likely would have survived if they had been able to get out of their cars and sit or lie next to them. All the crushed cars had voids 3 feet high next to them, except for the cars that had columns fall directly across them.
10) I discovered, while crawling inside of collapsed newspaper offices and other offices with a lot of paper, that paper does not compact. Large voids are found surrounding stacks of paper.
In 1996 we made a film, which proved my survival methodology to be correct. The Turkish Federal Government, City of Istanbul, University of Istanbul Case Productions and ARTI cooperated to film this practical, scientific test. We collapsed a school and a home with 20 mannequins inside. Ten mannequins did 'duck and cover,' and ten mannequins I used in my 'triangle of life' survival method. After the simulated earthquake collapse we crawled through the rubble and entered the building to film and document the results.
The film, in which I practiced my survival techniques under directly observable, scientific conditions, relevant to building collapse, showed there would have been zero percent survival for those doing duck and cover. There would likely have been 100 percent survivability for people using my method of the 'triangle of life.' This film has been seen by millions of viewers on television in Turkey and the rest of Europe, and it was seen in the USA, Canada and Latin America on the TV program Real TV.
Spread the word and save someone's life... The entire world is experiencing natural calamities so be prepared!
Take Care
Thank you, Doug Copp. Wherever you are, know we are grateful for this teaching.
There are those who disagree completely with Doug Copp's advice; many have a great deal of anger that he has even offered it. It made sense to me, much more than the old "duck and cover" instruction. I do tend to expect the best of people and to believe they are, often, simply trying to help. However, be advised to consider this approach and all other approaches to earthquake survival with care. We are now in a period when earthquakes are becoming more frequent and more deadly: recent examples are Haiti and Chile. A good debate on what is the best protection during earthquakes could be a useful thing.
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