Learning to Commute

             It’s a most unexpected discovery: commuting as an organizing principle of life.

               I’ve been at it for six weeks now. Two hours each way, four hours per day, getting from home in Hamilton to work in Toronto, and back again. I can still hardly believe that I agreed to this move, knowing that this commute would be a daily requirement, controlling factor and drain on my life. I worried over it, but since everything else about the move appealed to me, I trusted that I could at least tolerate it, if nothing more. And now I find that commuting has brought a level of order to my life that’s been lacking for a long time.

               It’s embarrassing to write, even shameful, but structure is something I’ve needed, but have avoided throughout my adulthood. My nature is to dodge the limitations of set schedules, time lines and due dates. It’s equal parts stubbornness, a warped sense of independence, and a tendency toward indulgence that hold sway. Consequently, I’m always struggling with the management of my life, always feeling there’s not enough time for all the things that are important to me. And unexpectedly, commuting has carved out a partial solution to all of this, and I find myself embracing it.

               I’ve done my share of commuting in the past and it’s always been a burdensome waste of time. Strap-hanging on buses and trains; jostling through crowds of strangers; dirty seats, no seats; not having the right change for the fare, and worst of all, turning a corner to see my bus pulling away - these are all reasons I’ve hated commuting. Even drive commuting is painful, however much it may seem an attractive alternative to strap-hanging. The relative absence of physical discomfort allows for the full impact of the boredom, the restlessness, the mind-numbing inanity of most radio, as one sits in slow-moving traffic as life ebbs slowly away.

               The main worry I had facing my current commute was having to conform to a schedule. I’m a late night person, and a late riser. I’m not very fond of clocks and alarms and, no, I’m not the most punctual person you’ll meet – and I’ve very much enjoyed the freedom of not having to be. A locked-in schedule does not appeal to me.

               However, from where I live in Hamilton, there are two direct, express trains to Toronto every morning, and the latest leaves the station promptly at 6:46. There are other options, but they all involve even longer commutes. 5:30 feels like an un-Godly time to arise in the morning (it’s practically the middle of the night!), but it makes my life work, so I’m making it work.

               But how does one go from a loose waking time, variable according to my next day’s schedule, how late I was up the night before, and how often I choose to hit my alarm’s snooze button – to an early commute schedule that has me dropping into my desk chair at an hour when I was previously lowering my feet to the cold bedroom floor? With surprising ease, it turns out.

I don’t really like admitting this truth, but it all seems to come down to having options taken from me. If I miss a train, it doesn’t cost me just a few minutes, as missing a bus or a traffic light did previously. It costs me at least half an hour, and that time is lost from the relaxing, evening end of my day. There is now an economy of minutes I must take seriously, to keep my life functioning…so I do.

Yet, I can’t get over how easy it’s been. Nor how much good has come out of it. I’m actually becoming more productive at work, as my days are more organized and predictable. I’m loving the feeling of arriving at and leaving the office with the first wave of colleagues instead of the last – makes me feel that I’m leading rather than lagging. And the added quiet, and the quality of light and air in the mornings, it’s all surprisingly refreshing and enlivening. I’m a bit shocked that I haven’t missed a train yet.

               But the greatest bonus has come in an area I had come to feel some despair about: my writing. The morning of my first commute, I whipped out my laptop the moment I was seated, and I wrote for the first forty-five minutes of the seventy-five minute trip. On the way home, I did the same. In no time at all, it became a habit, one I find myself positively looking forward to. In fact, one of the most satisfying moments of my every working day is when I get seated in the near-empty GO train, at the start of its run. The attendant comes over the speaker and announces the one to five minutes remaining before departure. The sky is still dark as I take off my coat, settle myself and turn on the laptop. By the time I tap in the date at the top of my opening page, the train has begun to move, and its slow, rocking motion nudges me along. Where will I begin today? With some idea newly formed in the night? Revising yesterday’s product? Attacking the novel chapter I’ve been revising for submission to my writing group?

               I’m writing with more regularity and consistency than I have in some years. It’s been six weeks now. Strange to say, the only days I haven’t gotten in at least an hour of writing have fallen on the weekends, when, despite all my intentions, a day can so easily fly by, the period of quiet focus that I imagined, never having come. I know this is nonsense, delusion…yet?

               I’m grateful. I’m re-energized. I’m optimistic again, that I can address my writing goals and see myself moving toward them in real time. The discipline of this commute seems to be spreading to other areas. I’m having a somewhat different feeling and approach to time, to the minutes and hours of the day, the weeks and months of the calendar. Never did I imagine that commuting could be so good.

Fade-In to Tomorrow

The workday is over, the day fades, and the long, busy year passes into memory.

And what happens to it there? Does it merely fade? I know that it changes shape as well, as some things fade from importance, and others grow in significance.

I don’t want to even pretend that I know what this past year has been. It feels like it’s been rich and full of contradictions, and being pulled in different directions. This blog has been caught up in the tidal, back and forth pull of priority. For a time, in the Spring, I reconnected to writing here again, and also to producing my jazz Podcast. Then, months ago, this blog fell away again, and I hardly noticed. But the podcast continues. And there was no plan for any of it, except to try and stay engaged.

If something has become clearer in the year it’s the presence of holes. Holes that will not be obscured by ignoring them. Holes in personal relationships, for one. There are relationships I’ve ignored, undervalued and lost. And there are others that have remained and even grown stronger, despite my inattentions, or maybe because not all friends value and need the same thing.

There’s the hole that has emerged in my narrative, in what I write, think about, in what I use to explain myself, to myself as well as to others. This blog has made this gap in particular very vivid. Because, more and more often my writing stops when I come face to face with some aspect of my life that I’m reluctant to share with the friends and with the strangers that may read my blog. I didn’t realize how wide some of these gaps are. They touch on what I think my “purpose” is, on ideas of commitment and loyalty, and they cover huge swaths of what falls under the categories “sex” and “relationship”. Large gaps, some with answers that are within reach, but will require courage to grasp; some for which the answers are faint, others for which they are frightening; and there are those gaps for which there are no answers at all.

Gratitude and gain make themselves known through all this wandering in wondering. And I realize, with some surprise, that I am grateful not only for those simple answers that rise up and are a comfort in my hand or heart. I am also grateful, maybe even more grateful, for realizing that answers are very often incomplete, superficial, and over-valued. One of the beautiful prizes is to find no answer at all. Maybe to discover that some pressing question was not that at all, but more of an ardent affirmation of what had no fixed, accepted place. Because yes, those mis-placed, unrecognized, dismissed urges and knowings and longings do scream, they do. They make themselves known, and we mistakenly think it’s all about our questions, about what we think we need to know, to figure out, to achieve.

But the hero of this brief essay, if there needs to be one beyond you and me, is the Fool. The first card of the Tarot, the innocent in the world, the ultra present one who thinks not a second about anything that isn’t NOW. The Fool is forever stepping over cliffs and into ditches, stumbling open eyed into various manifestations of the unknown. I will walk into 2016 with my arm interlocked with his, an unknowing grin on my face, ready for whatever comes!

The Best Ever

One of my great joys in life is reading a book and, upon finishing it, feeling, with passion, appreciation, and a little sadness, that it’s the best book I’ve ever read. I’ve experienced this joy many, many times. And NO, there is no contradiction in that.

Because, being the best book I’ve ever read is not a relative thing, and it’s not something that will necessarily endure any tests of time. It’s a valuation of a moment – usually a long moment: a few hours or days, sometimes longer – but a moment all the same.

Of course, I’m being very un-literal here. But if you love books, or paintings, or movies, or music, or dance, or sex (and really, there are so, so many different experiences of life that this feeling relates to) I’m sure you know what I'm writing about.

It’s about being so immersed in an experience – in this case, a work of art – that it becomes the world, blots out everything else, re-defines reality…for that long moment. It’s about a creation over-flowing its boundaries and invading your senses, so that, for a time, you live inside of it, and your life is exploded beyond normal you. You learn to think and feel and to BE a different way.

As you might suppose, I’m currently reading the BEST BOOK EVER. (Yes. I admit, I haven’t even finished it, and I already know it’s the best ever!) It’s The Orenda, by Joseph Boyden. I’m not going to try telling you what it’s about, or anything like that. Only that it’s powerful, beautiful, devastating, and that it is re-creating the world I know and live in. And that you should read it.

And, not so very long ago, I read another BEST BOOK EVER. That was Room, by Elizabeth Donoghue. Again: devastating, powerful, beautiful. (What else can you say when an artist creates an entire new world, out of bits of your own world that you thought you knew, but didn’t really.)

Okay. I know I’m writing nonsense here. It just happens to be true nonsense. When you are brought entirely into a world, even an imagined one, even an ugly and brutal one, as each of these happens to be, it becomes real. And when that reality is so sharp and clear that it resonates with all you know, and takes in and somehow makes clear-er, so much that you didn’t know, and even what you didn’t know that you didn’t know, well, relativity flies out the window, and there is only room left for superlatives.

There are movies I could write this about, and sunsets, and songs, and afternoons with the one I love, and…you get the point. Life is full of the Best Ever. This one just happens to be a book.
 

Nudges

Lately, I've been noticing how much I've been influenced - for the better - by acquaintances or complete strangers. Like most people, I think, I have a sense of my own independence and individuality. It's empowering to carry the notion that I'm my own man, with a mind of my own, walking my own path toward my unique, individual destiny. But of course Life has demonstrated to me how packed full of delusion and mythology those notions are.

I can't deny that just about everything I do is substantially influenced - if not determined outright - by a multitude of factors, including my culture, the media, my genetic inheritance and the conditioning powers of advertising and a formal education. It would be absurd of me to think that I dress myself, that I reach my own conclusions about politics or on social issues, or that I had much of anything to say about the foods I like.

Even so, It's empowering to think that I take all that and arrive at something of my own, independent of all these influences. So how do I explain the many ways in which my course has been drastically shifted by the odd conversation, an offhand suggestion, or an idle comment?

Awhile ago, an acquaintance who has lost a lot of weight, attributed his new physique to the hours he spends on his bicycle. The very next day, I was on the bike that had been chained up in my yard for most of the Spring, collecting cobwebs. And a colleague recently moved me to make an effort to get back to meditating regularly, by mentioning that he'd gotten his practice back on track. And a few months ago, a health professional I was consulting on a totally unrelated matter, suggested that I get hooked up with a writing group, advice I followed up on just a couple of weeks later, to great result.

None of these nudges were odd or unique in any way. In fact, all the actions that resulted were things I was thinking about to some degree, or things I knew I should do, but just hadn't gotten around to. They were actually all pretty obvious. I simply hadn't done them. But in all cases, getting the suggestion from a person I liked and respected made all the difference. And I'm intrigued by that.

It occurs to me that the effect of these nudges was much like the effect a deadline often produces. In both instances, there's a sense of immediacy that comes into the equation, and my will is mobilized in a way it wasn't before. But the nudge has a much more personal dimension to it than the deadline.

But this is something I don't really feel a need to break down and analyze until I understand it. I know that I feel grateful for them. I feel like I've been gifted by these acts, which each seems to involve aspects of sensitivity and of sharing. And as I think back, there've been so many!

There's one more nudge I have to mention. This blog was started as a result of an idle conversation with a stranger while standing in front of a bike shop. When she learned I was a writer, she immediately began to share the benefits she'd received from blogging, and she pressed me to start one myself. And I, who'd been very idly considering looking into it, for months if not years, took the plunge a short while later. And the rewards I've gotten from blogging have been transformative. I'll do a post about them someday.

In the meantime, I'm feeling much less caught up in the mythology of my independence. I'm deeply appreciative of these nudges that come, mostly unexpected and casual. I intend to hold myself open for more.
 

A Story to Tell

We all have one, I've been told.
Each of us has a compelling story that relays our experience, our truth, in a way that is unique to us. A story that entertains, engrosses, informs; perhaps one that inspires. A story which, when told, will gain us entry into the hearts and minds of others and plant something there.

But all such sayings have exceptions, don't they.
I've known a few dull souls I wouldn't believe you could wring a good story out of anymore than you could out of a rock. There's this guy I once worked with, selling encyclopedias at the North Carolina State Fair, who was one of them.

This guy - let's call him Larry, I really don't remember his name - he was a real lump of a guy. Big and dough-faced; quiet and stiff, he was the guy we'd all forget to ask along when we went for lunch or a beer. We weren't intentionally excluding him; it's just that we'd forget he was there. It's a wonder he ever sold any books, but every now and then he'd make a sale to one of those people who really wanted a set but just didn't want to have to put up with any sales talk or pressure. And Larry - any one could tell with a glance - was safe that way. There really wasn't any personality there that you'd have to deal with.

Maybe it sounds mean, but I just couldn't imagine that a guy like Larry would ever have anything interesting to say. Even if he did, how'd you ever get it out of him? He seemed so isolated in his stodginess that he wouldn't know or care if another human being was trying to reach out to him.
That's just how much of a lump he was.

Which makes it all the more surprising that we talked that day, and that he said what he said, that did what it did to me, I cannot deny. It's not like I was trying to be friendly, or draw him out. How many ways can I say it: I never believed there was anything in him to draw out. I guess it's that it was the end of a long day of standing on our feet,  trying to draw mooches into the booth, hit the quota that would make the travel and the motel and the greasy fair food worth being on the road for so long.

And maybe it was that - being on the road - that got him started. I really don't remember. But he got started talking somehow, and when he did, the talk became him. It wasn't interesting, really; it wasn't bonding or anything. He talked like the lump he was, no disparagement intended. That's just the truth.
And I listened. To every word. Because he had a story after all.

"I used to be a truck driver, back when I lived in Minnesota, before I come here, because my daughter is here with the grand kids. I drove cause the driving didn't bother me. I don't mind it. Not a bad job. Just long hours. But I don't mind. It's just drivin. And the pay's okay. And it's just you and the road.

"Bonnie got sick and went into hospital. I stayed home at first. We didn't know how bad it was, really. and they kept saying they wanted to keep her awhile longer. So finally, Bonnie says I ought to just go back on the road, because no sense in me just sitting around with her all day in the chair beside her bed, watching the tv, which was tiny and didn't have a good picture, nor good sound, so you really couldn't even hear it. I might as well be sittin in my rig she said. Bills was still gonna need payin. So I says okay and pick up a load, going to Georgia. But I'd come right back, I told her, and I did come right back.

"And when I got back, she was worse. Way worse. Cancer, of course. I stayed, and I thought everything would be just fine. I think she did too. But she kept getting worse. And then they put her on more drugs, but it didn't help. And then she lost consciousness, just like that. I didn't know, and I don't think she knew, that we'd never even get the chance to say goodbye. The last thing I remember her saying was to switch of that television, cause she was ready to try and sleep. And she never came to after that.

"And then she was dead. Just two days later."

Larry didn't say anything for awhile, and I didn't say anything either. It was like his talking, and the quiet of him not talking, were the same sound, just flowing together.

"I got up after awhile. After just sitting there with her. And I went and got my rig and down to the office, and had them sign me out a load. It was for Oregon, and I set right out. A day and a half. When I dropped it, I picked up another load, to Cheyenne, then another one to San Diego. They didn't have the limits then, and they only cared if a haul was too slow, so nobody said anything. I couldn't sleep anyway. From San Diego I caught a load to St. Augustine, then back to Amarillo. Then North again, but I didn't take any loads for Minnesota. Anyplace else.

"I don't remember sleepin. What passed for it wasn't sleepin at all. Wasn't restful. The buzzin in my head would get loud and I'd lay down in back of the rig long enough for it to go away. Then I'd drive.
I'd just drive.

"North Dakota. Down near Dallas, back to Cheyenne, and that same haul to San Diego again. I took a load to Cleveland, then New Hampshire, back to Cleveland, then Seattle and back down to San Diego. I remember it so clear, like I was building something, and each trip added a piece to it, like another strip, another layer. Everytime I dropped a load, I picked another one up. And I'd drive right away, at least an hour or two, before I'd stop to lay my head or for something to eat. And I'd drive again, as soon as I could.

"Two weeks. Two weeks before I started to come out of it. I was in eastern Washington, in the desert there, heading east for Idaho. Early morning, and the sun was coming up. And all these colors started coming up out of that desert. It surprised me. And I thought how Bonnie would've liked that. She would've said something about it, about how pretty it was.

"And then I thought about it, and I figured it was time to go home, to see after Bonnie."

That was it. That was Larry's story. He never changed expressions all the while he spoke. And he never said anything else about his wife. But I never heard grief and loss expressed in such plain words before.

Yes. Everybody's got a story.
 

The Dismissed

I've been distracted and a little depressed about the most recent firing in my work place last week. First, there was the terse email announcement from management that, as of that day, our colleague of the past several years was no longer affiliated with the organization.  A few minutes later, an email was received from the colleague, confirming that he was gone, telling us he'd enjoyed working with us, and wishing us well.

Though our connecting has fallen off quite a lot in the last year, due to the usual demands of life, the dismissed colleague was one of the people in my workplace whom I considered a friend, with whom I socialized away from the job, with whom I discussed some of the bigger questions of life in a deep way. I will miss his presence, his intelligence, his sensitivity.

What has followed me like a cloud these last days is frustration not only at my colleague's treatment, but at the state of "human resource management" in this day and age, and in this culture, that his treatment reflects. I'm saddened by the mechanical and legalistic way of dealing with human beings that has become so commonplace. The workplace has become so liability sensitive that normal, human-to-human communication is constrained or prohibited outright in just those situations where it's most needed.

There are methods of managing firings that have become standard and accepted practice:
- management cannot/will not discuss any aspects of a dismissal or what brought it about, often not even with the dismissed employee.
- the dismissed employee is cut off immediately from the workplace and colleagues. Most often, the individual is never again seen on the premises, and if so, only under the watchful eye of security, to insure that only personal items are removed, and that no unfortunate interactions take place.

I'm not advocating against all dismissals. Employees don't always meet expectations. They may lack the skill, the work ethic, or the motivation to do a job well. Sometimes a bad employment situation comes down to a bad fit, and all parties concerned will benefit from a separation. My grievance is with the manner in which these separations take place. How is it that a person can be a colleague and part of a team one day, and an afterthought the next? The dismissed are treated like worn parts, easily replaced and forgotten, as though their struggles and contributions had no meaning and are not worth mentioning. The way they are dismissed without a backward glance calls to mind the practice of revisionist history under repressive regimes: controversial individuals and events are simply deleted from the text books and aren't to be mentioned, as though they never existed, never occurred?

It's a heartless system, but also something of a mindless system. Because it ignores the possibilities for individual and systemic growth and learning. It ignores (or at least fails to profit from) the reality that all learning and success comes from trial and error, from being aware of what goes wrong and trying to understand why. If a person has been part of an organization's development, has participated in the cycles of trial and error, experimentation and analysis, failure and success, and a time comes when the relationship is no longer working, is simply deleting the relationship really the way to go? Is there no more favorable way to acknowledge and respect the accumulated individual and organizational experience?

Yet, we've all been conditioned to believe that the formalities of this current process are absolutely necessary, the only way. The possibility of appeals and law suits seems to have overridden common sense and basic sensitivity, as well as the desirability of simple, honest talk, good-byes, acknowledgements, well wishes. All of this saddens me.

But it angers me too. Particularly because I work in social services for the city of Toronto. Fundamental to the work of my program is a progressive and compassionate approach to dealing with human beings. We aim to be client-centered, thereby basing our activity on our clients' well-being, on their autonomy and choice, and in full recognition of their strengths, assets, and their inherent value as human beings. This approach stems from an underlying respect for people, and the assumptions that they desire good, can make a contribution, are more and better than their shortcomings, and are good to have around. When we have occasion to end a relationship with a client, we make ourselves accountable for doing so in the least harmful and disruptive manner possible.

But the approach to dealing with the service providers of the enterprise is very different. It's more of a business model. Employees are treated as commodities with uncertain shelf life and usage value - any one of them might go bad at any moment. Therefore, when an employee's level of performance slips to an undesirable level, or when other factors emerge that corrupt the quality of performance, the solution can be abrupt dismissal. It's very true that, short of dismissal, there are many provisions for employee health and support. But, when dismissal occurs, it is generally sudden and brutal. There is little consideration of the employee's life circumstances, their social and psychological issues and needs. It seems that no thought is given to the effect that a sudden (and often unexplained) dismissal can have on an individual's self-esteem, sense of security and health. And what of those left behind, who experience such sudden loss and disruption, and sometimes confusion and stress?

What distresses me most is the drastic difference, conflict even, between the values by which clients are treated, and those by which staff are treated. Can a work environment encompassing such a schism be healthy? Can clients be served optimally, when those delivering the service see the values they operate by undermined within the very workplace? I don't think so.

I don't see this as a problem caused by individual managers. We have a fine group of them in my workplace. The just discharged employee was one of them. They are neither unkind, nor insensitive. But we all operate in an environment in which this way of doing business is accepted as the norm. Not so long ago, discrimination against racial or gender minorities, excluding women from positions of authority, and sexual harassment were all considered workplace norms. While unfortunate, they reflected "human nature" or "the way things are". The burden was on victims to adjust, be tough, go along with the program, in order to survive and get ahead. And, in truth, individuals have rarely if ever been able to change such accepted modes of behavior. Only when it is understood that these systemic patterns have broad repercussions that compromise the integrity of entire organizations and communities do we begin to take note.

I believe that this is such a case. The way that employees are dismissed deeply affects the way that other employees view an organization and their role in it. It affects their sense of trust, and of being trusted and valued. It affects the degree to which they are willing to give of themselves to their work. It affects the precarious balance they maintain between taking chances and playing it safe, between going the extra mile and covering one's own ass.

When I initially applied to work for the city, I was attracted by the slogan, then being displayed on job postings, "Work for the City that you Love". It was a phrase that might have easily been dismissed as, well, propaganda. But it came to life for me because it was true. It concisely expressed an ideal that most of us aspire to: to do work that is personally meaningful, because to do so elevates the activity beyond mere work. But the dispiriting manner in which employees can so suddenly have their service dismissed - as though it were less valuable than mere work - influences one to pay scrupulous attention to the letter of one's job description, and little attention to its spirit.

I know there are some who applaud a straightforward adherence to tasks and technicalities. But ultimately, our work is Service - provided face to face, person to person. I sincerely believe that in our work, the service of "being with" others in their most difficult times - listening, sharing, caring, understanding - is as valuable as linking them to tangible services like housing, counseling and case management. And that work of "being with" requires an ethic to support it. And for such an ethic - in this case, a valuing of human beings - to hold sway, it must be applied with some consistency.

Otherwise, we lose faith, the spirit is diminished and grows cold, our clients - and we ourselves - begin to feel that we are in the grip of programs and processes and policies, and that our value is determined by some bottom line. What we want and need to feel, I believe, in that we are engaged with our fellows in improving lives - all of our lives - and that we are jointly building and sustaining a City that Loves us Back!
 

ISIS, Nat Turner & the War on Evil

Whenever one of my communities rises up in fear, anger and outrage, and seeks to wage a war against EVIL, I try to put a damper on my emotion, to force myself to look beyond the obvious. And I recall Nat Turner.

How many people today remember who Nat Turner was?

ISIS scares the hell out of me, as it apparently intends to do. It is seeking - with apparent succees - to draw the non-Muslim world, and the Shiites, moderates and other non-extremists within the Muslim world into a conflict to bring on the End of Time. I recently had my understanding of ISIS deepened considerably, by reading the article, "What ISIS Really Wants", the feature article by Graeme Wood in the March issue of the Atlantic (http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-wants/384980/). If I was afraid before reading it, this article took me a couple of levels deeper into my fear, because it argues a kind of inevitability to the path that ISIS is marching. I had persuaded myself that the single-minded and merciless warfare of ISIS, offering destruction to anyone or anything that opposed its One Creed worldview, could not possibly stem from the core of Islam, any more than the hyper-racism of Nazis or the KuKluxKlan stem from the core of Christianity, in my view. Wood, in his article, argues otherwise, and with a heavyweight roster of Islamic scholars backing his view.

So what to do? My gut desire is to see every possible step taken to simply wipe ISIS and what it represents from the face of the Earth. And this feeling - generated by fear and the hate that follows - is direct and strong and sure enough that it causes me to support any political effort to send arms, soldiers, planes, money...anything necessary to bring this about.

The success of ISIS will bring about the end of so much - maybe everything - that I value in life. No time or space here for half measures, for diplomacy, compromise, cultural or religious sensitivity and understanding. This is a clear instance of GET THEM BEFORE THEY GET ME!!!

But again, I am compelled, by memory, by history, by the passionate reasoning of a good friend (you know who you are), and by the story of Nat Turner, to slow myself, to get hold of my passions, and to look and think more deeply.

In 1831, the name Nat Turner evoked the same sense of terror, of rampant evil, of immanent death and destruction that ISIS evokes in much of the world today. Nat Turner's actions, on the 21st of May of that year invaded the imaginations of gentle, settled, civilized people, with the spectre of the world turned on its head, of demonic fanatics set lose to inflict their wickedness upon the godly, of Satan ascended from Hell and determined to bring about the apocalype. His act of terrorism lasted all of two days, during which time fifty-five or more white men, women and children were killed. Ironically, Turner claimed he was inspired to his acts by visions from God.

Why did this happen? Does it matter why? Does anything matter beyond stopping such a demon...at any cost, and from preventing anyone from ever again unleashing such evil?

In anger, we want to shout, NO! There is no reason. Because reasons can become justification. And justification can force consideration, and understanding...even compassion. And in the face of terror, who has room for understanding and compassion. Destoy the offenders of Peace. And maybe later, maybe after they've been wiped from the Earth, there will be time and space for a little understanding and compassion. Maybe.

Except that...is it possible to prevent a thing from recurring without understanding how and why it came about?

And...doesn't the fear response to terror override our ability to look honestly into the causes that generated that terror in the first place?

Nat Turner was an African slave in pre Civil War Virginia, in the United States. He was property in a society that denied his humanity. He was caught up in a system that brutally suppressed him and his kind. He had no recourse within his world to address the evil being imposed on him. And so he responded to atrocities, by God's direction, with atrocities of his own.

Naturally the citizens of rural Virginia were terrified at the Nat Turner uprising. And, very naturally, the anger, desperation and fear unleashed by that revolt left them little room for contemplation and reflection about the horrors of their own society that led to the rebellion of anger and hate.

When the uprising was quelled, not only were the conditions that generated it not explored. Slavery was intensified, made even harsher. Scores of slaves were killed, and the controls on slaves throughout the south were tightened. Repression endured, and became one of the factors to generate a brutal Civil War, thirty years later. And though slavery ended, oppression and rebellion did not, but endure to this day. Because, even now, root causes have never been thoroughly explored and rooted out.

Does any of this make ISIS any more benign, any more forgiveable? No, it doesn't.

But it does force me to consider, before I join the cry for "an eye for an eye": How did this threat arise in the first place? Is this really as simple a matter as Good versus Evil? And, considering that ISIS too paints the world in exactly these tones, defending itself as the champion of God, and the rest of us as steeped in evil.... Shouldn't this give me pause?

I'm not interested in defending ISIS, any more than I would expect a white person in 1831 Virginia to defend Nat Turner after experiencing the slaughter of innocent loved ones. But I don't think it's too much to hope that someone at that time understood that, on some level, the dehumanization that their society profited from and depended on, played a role in bringing those atrocities to pass.

And likewise, while my passions are inflamed by the videos of beheadings, and the reports of mass executions, and the calls for peace-loving people in my community to be randomly killed, I have to ask myself: what evil, what dehumanization, is being done in my name? And while I don't know the ins and outs of politics and religion and history in the Middle East, I do know, absolutely, that drones are being sent into residential communities, to kill those deemed our enemies, while the death of innocents is excused as "collateral damage". I know that hundreds of individuals, who have done nothing, have been tortured and imprisoned, without due process, for years at a time. I know that an entire war was launched against Iraq, and many thousands killed, in retaliation for actions it had no part in, and based of manufactured evidence. Are these acts not the epitome of dehumanization, of evil? And do these acts have nothing to do with the advent of ISIS, and with the festering of anger and hate that it feeds on?

ISIS needs to be fought. It needs to be defeated. But if we can only attack and root out the evil in others, while we turn a blind eye to and depend on the evil done on our behalf, how can we claim to be on the side of Good?

I don't claim to have any final answers. I don't know how we, as the communities that we are, go forward from here, defending ourselves and defending the good. But I know that it will take honesty and true courage, self-awareness and a degree of humility. Otherwise, our solutions won't be solutions at all. And evil - both ours and theirs - will prevail.