I am leaning toward the position that Keb’ Mo’ has got it right, but five decades after Shirley he may be too late. Let me explain. By 1968, Americans had experienced six years of turmoil starting with the assassination of a president, the murders of a prominent civil rights leader and leading presidential contender, an escalation of an unpopular war that brought anti-war protests, some that would in time lead to violence and death. The younger generation at that time was shedding itself of the old Eisenhower era norms and were flooding the nation with music, art and a message of make love, not war; but many soon found disillusion in an unchanging system and fell by the wayside in a swirl of drugs.
It was in that tumultuous year that a Brooklyn born, Barbados raised lady was chosen to represent New York’s 12th congressional district, a position she held until 1983. She was the first Black woman to be elected to the U.S. Congress; she was Shirley Anita St. Hill Chisholm. In 1972, she sought the nomination of the Democratic Party for President of the United States. And that is where we may have missed the boat as a country, a sentiment echoed today by Keb’ Mo’.
Kevin Roosevelt Moore, known universally as Keb’ Mo’, is a 73-year-old Black musician steeped in Delta Blues whose career goes way back to his early days playing with Papa John Creach. One of Keb’ Mo’s songs is “Put a Woman in Charge,” where in the first stanza he cites man’s influences on the earth, and its consequences. Here is the second stanza, in prose form: “The time has come, we’ve got to turn this world around. Call the mothers, call the daughters, we need the sisters of mercy now. She’ll be a hero, not a fool, she’s got the power to change the rules. She’s got something that men don’t have; she is kind and she understands.”
Where would America be today if we had chosen Shirley as our president back in ’72 instead of a man who would disgrace the office and be forced to abdicate or face removal? And Congressmember Chisholm was the fruit of seeds planted by women who fought for the vote, who fought for racial rights, who fought against the corporate glass ceiling. With sheer determination for over a hundred years, women in American society have shown the world what they can do as well as men and what they can do better than men. In the past decade alone, both Democrats and Republicans had the chance to see what not one but two strong women could do as leader of our country but both opted out; and look what happened.
I’ll cut this short now and move on but not before I cite some personal examples. Born before women even had the vote, my mother wore a Marine staff sergeant’s uniform in wartime and later was head of a department within the California correctional system. For some years now, I have been a volunteer at the local museum, where in my time the place has been greatly improved from its beginnings due once to Jessica and Sharon and now to Teri and Fiona, plus a host of female interns along the way. The present administration has a handful of women with authority and power; and no one can argue they haven’t had an impact. I leave it to personal choice as to whether those impacts will be beneficial or deleterious to our future.
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Some ill feelings have arisen twixt a neighbor and myself over my attitude and actions toward cats; especially my contention that when a mammal eats food one day, on the next day that food is expelled from said mammal. Ergo, if the food goes into a cat from your property and ends up coming out in my yard then I will return it to your yard. And I did so, with a shovel, repeatedly. This resulted in a showdown on the front porch where the only argument the neighbor had was that the cats did not belong to her, and that I have no manners nor respect. Fine. Nonetheless, the upshot of the discussion was if she persisted, so would I. She relented and has taken the food and water bowls from her yard. Now, if any cat foils the yard it goes into the street.
Why, do you ask, do I appear intolerant of cats? It is because they possess the same instincts and traits of their ancient ancestors, the Big Cats. I once worked around some 35 tigers at a rescue in Colton in Southern California and they are fascinating in their power and grace; just to watch one walk across the compound was exciting. And the little versions have all the same independent hunter’s ability as do the big ones. And that is the problem with cats in an urban setting; they are way out of place.
I had relatives in the Midwest, agrarian folks, who always had cats for barns, corrals, feed storage buildings and garden patches. They are superb hunters of everything from field mice and rats to squirrels and snakes. These hunters are of great benefit to farmers, ranchers and warehousemen in ridding pests harmful to produce and products. My relatives did not feed their cats and no cat ever stepped inside the house. The dogs did not bother them; more a case of toleration than acceptance.
Cats are not work animals; they do not herd cattle, sheep, horses nor do they take any hunting commands other than from their own instincts, which are fine tuned to kill. To keep such an animal cooped up in a domicile, when food, water and sandbox near a cage and scratching post is their whole world is a waste, a travesty of human making. And to let them roam free throughout neighborhoods is irresponsible.
Take care. Peace.
