More from Sylvia Luppert - Bless Her

From Sylvia:

"Both politics and Linge are very much on my mind these past weeks. We were together at some momentous times in American politics. I think that over the years we were not together, politics was nearly always one of the subjects of our conversations. I was very interested in her viewpoints, which were nearly always identical to min in our conclusions. She, however, frequently had a supporting analysis that I had not thought of. I don’t know whether my analyses were new to her. Although I agree with you that she was pretty disdainful of the American political process, I think she would have been keenly interested in the present political scene. And, I’m quite sure she would have been enthusiastic about Barack Obama, and articulated her reasons better than I can mine."

I agree that mom was always very good at articulating opinions and analyzing political events. I disagree that she would have been enthusiastic about Barack Obama, because she explicitly said that she thought he was "too slick."

"I remembered today that she and I were together at Antioch when John Kennedy was assassinated. The day I moved to Chicago, Martin Luther King was assassinated. We didn’t know about it until a taxi driver picked us up on an unusually deserted street and told us. Later that summer, Robert Kennedy was assassinated, too. She and I were devastated by all three. I had to go back to Washington at the time of the Democratic National Convention that summer, and watched in horror the police riot. Linge was there. When I returned, I went to a meeting with her of some Roosevelt students who had organized in reaction to these appalling events. Someone raised the subject of bombing the student union. There had been other student bombings elsewhere, and thus, I suppose, the idea was not as repugnant as we might imagine today. Linge reacted exactly as you would expect. Her moral compass was right on the mark, and she promptly and firmly rebuked the suggestion. There were a few people who argued with her. Although she was not an organizer of the group, she was very persuasive and the idea died in the birthing. She later claimed that it would have anyway, but I have always thought her unequivocal reaction may have averted a calamity begun with understandable but foolhardy intentions."

Perhaps she really did avert a disaster. It might also be true that she affected the would-be perpetrators so much that they became pacifists. It is also typical of her to understate and underestimate her impact on person and groups and their ideas. For somebody who was as big a show-off as mom was, she was downright humble!

"That fall, the Republican precinct captain called on us. In Chicago in those days, persons of good conscience could not support local Democrats who were all slaves to the Daley Machine. But national elections were another matter. Initially, Linge was very cordial to the Republican, until he said something to the effect, “All the hippies” are voting for Republicans this year, which included Richard Nixon. Linge replied, “All the hippies?” and then went off like a bomb. Poor man. She resented equally the suggestion that she was a hippie as that she would vote Republican!"

Oho! I actually cringed when I read that the Republican precinct captain said "'All the hippies' are voting for republicans this year." Poor guy. I hope she scared the Nixon out of him.

"I hadn’t registered to vote, but Linge had. When she went to the polling place, she asked how to split the ticket. (I don’t know whether this was commonplace throughout the country, but in Chicago, all you had to do was pull one big lever – on the left side - to vote a straight ticket.) The poll worker replied that it couldn’t be done. Linge said that this was too bad, because she wanted to vote for quite a few Democrats, but she would have to pull the Republican lever if she couldn’t split the ticket. The poll worker, suddenly remembered that it could be done and showed her how. "

You hadn't registered to vote? How did she ever forgive you? The type of logic mom used against the poll worker is all her. She pulled stuff like that off all the time, getting her way with a minimum of fuss. I try to emulate her, but it is not easy.

Sylvia Luppert and Missing a Post on the Blog

I missed last night's post. My excuse is that I was extremely tired. Strange that I should do so on the day that Sylvia sent me such a wonderful email. Oh, well. It was bound to happen some day, right? I will endeavor to make sure that I will never miss another again.

I will have more for you this evening. For now, just a little something about mom: I looked in the mirror at my bald and graying head, and thought about the fact that mom, at age 63, had less than 50 gray hairs on her head.

She was too young, dammit.

Catching Ladybugs

Ragia, my wife, tells me that while I was away in Baghdad, mom visited her and the kids quite often. Ragia would make mom her lahma mhammara, which mom always said was the best she ever ate. They would go outside and eat in front of our old apartment in Carrboro.

One such time, when Ali was about to turn two, a ladybug caught his attention and interest, so mom caught it for him. When he was afraid to touch it, mom put it on his little push car. Soon there were two. Mom kept the two in place by repeatedly catching them for him until he lost interest.

Sigh.

Rooty-Toot-Toot

Rooty-Toot-Toot was mom's dog around the time when she was pregnant with me. Mom had found her as an infant puppy lying by the side of the road, emaciated and shivering. Mom adopted her on the spot, and gave her the name "Dana."

When mom took Dana to the veterinarian, the vet told her that she was very ill. So ill, in fact, that the medicines required to save her life might kill her, she was so weak. Mom took Dana home and force fed her with an eye dropper, every few minutes (she could not hold down more than a few droplets at a time). After a few sleepless nights, Dana fattened up nicely and regained her health enough to be treated.

Dana, in her newfound health, developed into a powerful dog and a vivacious, energetic person, earning her the nickname "Rooty-Toot-Toot." She also developed a strong, unquestioning and unconditional loyalty to my mother (mom seemed to have that same effect on almost all the people in her life, with the exception of those men in her life whom I know, more's the pity). When I was born a few months later, Rooty became my first friend and a guardian. I have some vague memories of Rooty, but I am sure I was a cross to bear! Mom told me that Rooty was smart enough to pull me away from electrical sockets and other dangers. She also, allegedly, kept me from going AWOL when she could, and accompanied me herself when she could not.

Rooti had one odd habit; she would chase her tail until she caught it, then she would worry at it until it bled. Other than that, she was a most stable, sand, and intelligent canine being.

Rooti had a litter of puppies when I was five with a German shepherd owned by mom's friend Skip Lance. I remember helping to find the puppies homes. We kept Harry, who was my dog first and then Carla's after we left for Egypt in 1976 (I vaguely remember something about Rooty being Carla's at one point also, but that memory is quite vague and shadowy. Carla: What is the fact of the matter?). When I returned to Chapel Hill in 1990, I got to meet Harry again as an old, debilitated, and utterly wonderful dog.


The photo is of mom and Rooty-Toot-Toot in 1970, a few months before I was born.

All of this reminds me that I asked Sarah a while ago how mom's last dog, Molli, is doing. Perhaps she will get around to answering me soon.

Traces of Her Online

When Googling mom online, I came across a post she had made on AfroNets.org. According to the website, "the African Networks for Health Research & Development (AFRO-NETS) was established in 1997 to facilitate exchange of information among different networks active in Health Research for Development in Anglophone Africa, and to facilitate collaboration in the fields of capacity building, planning, and research."

Mom's post:

Information Technology and Third World
Countries

In none of the developing countries where I work is it true that only the rich and/or educated have access to internet and e-mail. It may be true that for people of middle and old age, only the rich and/or educated have access, but not for the younger people, at least in urban areas, but in many fairly isolated rural areas as well. Wherever there are computers being used at work, or in universities or schools, there are gangs of teenagers and young adults at those computers after office hours, teaching each other to use the technology and communicating with the world. Someone who is officially there has to be present to unlock the door, but most of these people are not connected with the workplaces where the computers are, just dropping in to visit.

There are many cases of people clubbing up to buy a shared computer and pay for access too, or sharing the cost of sessions at urban cybercafes, which are popping up everywhere around the world. And once there are a few computers in offices, suddenly people who know how to use them begin to give training to others on a moonlighting basis -even in tiny villages. And, of course, the fact is that those who do not use computers are already marginalised in the United States, and also that the counties which pay less taxes and therefore have fewer or no computers in the school, are not giving their children an even break. Do we suggest taking computers out of the primary schools of America?

And we must not overestimate our potency - it is not within our power to marginalise or not third world countries. They are already marginalised by poverty, lack of access to many resources, often very bad government, and so on. In any event, one of the hardest things about living in many third world countries is the lack of access to accurate information on what is going on around the world, a state of affairs which has enormous political implications domestically.

One simply has to take a look at any of the Sudan discussion groups, which are participated in by people in and out of Sudan, to see how much this access contributes to [an] understanding of what is actually going on. Or Iran, for that matter, or Egypt, or many other places.

And, in fact, we pour money into these countries for the most incredible projects, often with no demand for such activities at all, but here is an area in which there is a very high level of demand, and in fact computers and internet don't cost much relative to these [other] things.

Perhaps what we should be doing rather than arguing against email and internet in the third world is to work to increase the relevance of what is on the internet to the needs of people working for constructive change within third world countries. It is extraordinarily difficult in most third world countries to know what is going on in one's field elsewhere, and the internet is still very far from sup-porting change in this area. Much more can be done to report to colleagues everywhere things such as what projects were tried, with what inputs, toward what ends, with what results, with what lessons learned, for instance. What is on now has a distinctly commercial flavor, alas, and we would do much better to be more analytic and more collegial.

In sum, I think trying, even unconsciously, to limit the information available to people is not a good recipe for development, nor for growing autonomy, nor anything. I do wish the internet had more to offer.

Linda Oldham

Linda's Cars

Mom had a procession of cars through the years, from the old Saab we crashed in in the 1970s to the antique DKW she bought in Alexandria (pictures to come later). She later had the Erda, a shared Volvo (with Nadir), a Mercedes Benz, and a Honda. Her very last car was a light blue 1992 (?) Geo Prism bought for $2,000 from the wife of Chapel Hill mayor Kevin Foy.

Idris

Mom not only loved her children, she also loved having children. Because of both the former and the latter, she continued to have children until she no longer could (she was 42 when she had Sarah). If she had been able to, she would have had many more.

She believed that she had control over the sex of the babies she carried, and that she decided to have a boy-girl-boy-girl order. So, it was hardly surprising what my mother-in-law, Zakia, told me today. She told me that mom once told her that, had she been able to have another boy, his name would have been Idris (Ed-rees).

Here's to Idris, my imaginary brother.