In 1999 there were 308 people living in Tanana, Alaska, where the median family income was $29,750 and where they retire on a median income of $10,576. I wonder how many residents from that little tiny town could afford to pay $2,500 for a jacket?

One of my favorite family photos shows my father standing in an open doorway with about four feet of snow piled up behind him. He’s wearing a $50 insulated, fur-trimmed parka that he paid for with his own money while working on the Defense Early Warning system in Tanana, Alaska, during the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Dad worked as an electronics engineer for the military on its DEW line, the enormous radar network that ran along the 69th parallel between Alaska and Greenland. During the Cold War, the DEW line was supposed to give early warning in the event the Soviet Union tried to bomb the United States. Dad loved Alaska, and regaled me throughout my childhood both with stories of his adventures up north and slides showing his life there.

Back then $50 was quite a price tag. But Dad was working outside in the Alaskan wilderness, and he had to have something that would keep him warm. But getting back to the other jacket: who pays $2,500 for the one Governor Sarah Palin wore while being introduced to the American public? Evidently we, the taxpayers, do. The single comment that jumped out at me about ShoppingGate , among many others, in yesterday’s The Washingon Post, was that of Gretta Monahan. She said:

“Everything is relative … Sarah Palin's goal is to be the vice president of the United States and that's a pretty damned big job. The better your image is, the better people will receive you.”

Yes, Greta, everything is relative. So the $150,000 shopping spree Governor Palin and Company went on (hubby Todd also benefited, as did other Palin family members) is relative to the American people’s current plight: they are broke, unemployed and homeless.

Not the homelessness of yesterday that forced one to live in a car or under a bridge; this is the new homelessness, brought on by greed like that from executives of American International Group, Inc. According to Bloomberg, they spent “$440,000 last month at the St. Regis resort in Monarch Beach .” Apparently, they did that about the same time they asked the federal government for a $85 billion bailout … from their greed-induced financial collapse.

What, if anything, can be learned from this? Only that since September 19 some greed remains undiminished. That’s when Wall Street came tumbling down faster than Humpty Dumpty, only to be followed by Wall Streets in foreign countries around the world. What on earth is a woman who calls herself a hockey mom just like any other doing with such exorbitant tastes, when so many citizens aren’t able to make their house payment—let alone go shopping at Neiman Marcus?

And no, I’m not a supporter of Senator Barack Obama. As far as I’m concerned, if he can afford to pay $1,500 for a two-piece suit that’s fine. It’s his money, to use as he sees fit. But paying that price out of your own pocket is far different from what Governor Palin has done, by having the Republican National Convention pick up her shopping tab.

As with many professional journalists, I don’t vote. I remain neutral with regard to politics and politicians because I can do my job better that way. I happen to believe that objectivity is still a cornerstone of journalism, so what better way to remain objective than to not take sides?

But I am an American citizen who lives in a house the bank foreclosed on about two months ago. It was only due to the kindness of a family friend that we are still living there, and the reason why the public auction slated for August 28 was cancelled at the last minute.

I have never been a spendthrift or a clothes horse, so I can honestly say my spending didn’t lead us into this position. Rather, my husband’s first wife died after fighting a 10-year battle with breast cancer, leaving him a mountain of unpaid medical bills. When we married, he continued to run the small business that had been in his family since the 1940s. He gave to the handful of employees who needed his help. If they had an emergency, he gave them an advance on their paycheck; if they needed to borrow his heavy equipment, he loaned it without charging them a penny, and if they did a great day’s work, he bought beer and pizza for them at the end of a long hard week. And we helped our respective six children financially, when they were in a pinch.

In the meantime, his son, a boilermaker, was tragically killed when he fell from a power plant. That was a year ago. Since then, my husband has had to have a quadruple bypass and I needed back surgery so I could continue to work, earning less than $27,000 a year. Together, our medical bills are out of sight.

So Gretta, who works as a fashion advisor to Rachel Ray, will just have to forgive me when I say I have no sympathy for people who equate price tags with character.

Posted by Daleen at 04:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

I think Alaska Governor Sarah Palin said it best, during the vice-presidential debate. “Say it ain’t so, Joe,” Palin told her opponent, Senator Joe Biden.

But I would direct those words to another Joe: Governor Joe Manchin, who is demanding a Hollywood apology for discrediting the state and its residents by inserting a racially-charged scene between WVU fans and the Syracuse team in the movie, “The Express.” In particular, a hateful audience portrayed as WVU fans in the movie called the black Orangemen “coons” and that other word, the “N” word, which I personally find outrageous and offensive.

Governor Manchin told Universal Studios it was “an unfair portrayal of West Virginians.” I like the governor but with all due respect, I think he’s wrong. That’s because I’ve done some informal polling since I learned about Manchin’s protests. Plus, I’ve seen racism here firsthand.

The Dominion Post story quoting Manchin appeared in the Saturday, Oct. 11, 2008 issue. That night, I attended a live music show in Kingwood, W.Va., where I met another white woman who takes exception to the Governor’s claims. Basically, this woman said it doesn’t help our state to ignore the racism that’s part of our history—and which still exists. In essence, she said Governor Manchin would be doing everyone a favor if he would admit there’s a problem and then take steps to fight it.

Because I’ve seen and heard racism throughout my life, I’d have to agree. My father was prejudiced, but my mother wasn’t. He was born and bred in Jackson County, W.Va., while she was a California girl. Maybe that’s the difference; maybe not. And even with all his prejudicial flaws, Dad did like and respect some blacks, including the family friends of my mother’s, who visited us in the late 1970s. They stayed with us for a weekend when they were considering moving here.

However, after touring our small town, they decided our part of the Mountain State wasn’t right for them. (They lived in Berkeley County, which, being next door to Washington, D.C., had a large black population.) Maybe that’s because they sensed the racism all around us—Preston County had very few blacks, and most of them then lived in one small neighborhood, on the other side of the tracks. (I kid you not.)

This was the same family who opened up their home to me when my parents moved to Amman, Jordan, so I could finish summer school. Their two sons were close to my own age, and treated me with nothing less than dignity and respect, as if I was a sister to them. I can’t imagine them treating me like the white “family” treated Megan Williams, a young black woman who in 2007 had the misfortune of moving into that family’s West Virginia home.

Williams, for anyone living under a rock, is the young black woman who was kidnapped, raped, tortured and otherwise assaulted by six West Virginians. Police discovered her at a Logan County mobile home Sept. 8, 2007. In addition to being confined under a sink during part of her ordeal, Williams “was sodomized with a stick and a noose was tied around her neck for lengthy periods.”

My black friends later came to visit my children and me sometime during 1994. The younger son married a white girl, and I’ve never forgotten what happened while we were standing in line at a local grocery store. A white man and his wife were watching us when he directed some blatant and rude racial comment at my friends. I wanted to smack him, but doing so would have only brought me down to his level. My friends, by comparison, weren’t righteously indignant; they took it in stride and refused to allow his ignorance to spoil what was an otherwise beautiful day.

I’m not sure if that was before or after the cross burning that took place in Newburg, a mile from where I grew up. It was set aflame on the front lawn of a local couple. I grew up with the girl; her "crime" was in marrying a black man. Until that moment, I largely believed such things were the stuff of Hollywood movies. Later, I heard about other crosses being burned in our rural county. And recently, someone told me the Ku Klux Klan still holds meetings up in the neighboring mountains not far from here.

Even more alarming, several months ago a high-powered executive told me she was supporting Senator Hillary Clinton for president, because there was no way West Virginia men would elect a black man. She said this after hearing a group of men talking about their decision to support Clinton. More recently, one of my daughters heard people in our region say Senator Barak Obama will be assassinated if he becomes president.

As disturbing as that is, it’s even more so when I realize the people my daughter speaks of aren’t alone: Other people have said the same thing. If that’s not racism, I don’t know what is.

More recently, while acting in the capacity of a paid journalist, a man said the “N” word, speaking derogatorily of blacks in general. I was offended not only that such attitudes still exist, but also because people still voice them. Which goes to show these racial attitudes are strongly entrenched.

So my apologies to Governor Manchin and Dick Easterly, the Syracuse quarterback who played with Heisman winner Ernie Davis. In an interview with West Virginia Public Radio, Easterly said, “there’s no question in the 50s and 60s throughout the country there was racial tension … all over.”

Racism is not a thing of the past; it’s still alive and well, as the above experiences reveal. That being said, it might be good to remember that no Hollywood movie is based totally in fact. Sometimes scenes are fabricated to show the flavor of a person, a locale, or an idea. I’d have to say that the fictional scene depicting West Virginia as a racist state may have come from what happened to Megan Williams.

The violence she experienced has been called “one of the worst hate crimes in United States history.” In comparison, the fictional WVU fans make our state look far better than what Megan endured. (Her experience led not just to a march in Charleston-the state Human Rights Commission also traveled to Logan County to hear other residents complain about what they believe to be prejudicial treatment in that area of the state.)

Now back to my informal poll: I went to see “The Express,” and questioned a few blacks along the way. I asked a group of college guys I passed if they had experienced racism in West Virginia. “No, not like that (as portrayed in the movie),” they said. Then they said, “It’s a lot worse in Virginia, or the Carolinas.”

I guess I should be happy that the Mountain State is somewhat better than our sister state, but I’m not. And just what does “not like that” mean? I think a black woman working for a security firm got it right. “It’s not obvious, it’s more subtle. But it’s here. You can see it by the way people act when you pass by them,” she said.

Apparently, the farther south you go, the worse it gets, and the more blatant it becomes. But here in West Virginia, it’s a little different. Here, racism isn’t usually about cross burnings or raping black women. Instead it’s subtle. The truth is that few people here will come right out and call a black person the “N” word to their face, but they sure will talk about it with their white friends and family.

I love West Virginia; it's a beautiful state with a rich history and strong, tenacious people who can be as tender as they are tough. Yet denying that racism happens here does nothing. Not for our state, or for anybody who has been its victim. And it's about as effective as saying sexual abuse and domestic violence (two other components in Megan's experience ) don't happen here in Almost Heaven.

Sadly, the state is steeped in denial. It's one of the things we do best.

Posted by Daleen at 09:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

One of the most poignant pieces of history I recall learning is how people were affected by the1929 stock market crash: Many of them committed suicide.

While it was undeniably tragic to learn about the California family who died last weekend, as a result of job loss and related economic problems, it wasn’t unexpected. What troubles me even more, though, is the knowledge that with more than 150,000 jobs lost in September alone, more murder-suicides will follow.

Ever since September 19, I’ve been watching the world scene wondering when such reports would begin flowing in: mothers killing children, fathers killing families, or people killing themselves. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I know I can’t be the only person in America who’s noticed a subtle shift in society’s stress level.

I think it began several years ago—or maybe I just started looking for it then—when customers began buying their fast food on credit. Places like McDonald’s or Wendy’s didn’t always take credit cards; that’s a fairly recent change in this country. And I’ve worried that paying later for food you eat now was the tipping point for the credit crisis we now find ourselves in. After all, credit cards have typically been used for people’s wants, not their needs.

So when the credit trend added food, a basic necessity and most definitely not a want, to its list of “must haves,” I became concerned. (Yes, the argument could be made that people who buy their meals, and those of their families, in the drive-through lane, are paying for a “want,” instead of a “need.” And I’d be the first to agree. But at the same time, how many people find themselves at the mercy of a schedule that leaves them little time to sleep, much less eat—or cook—a family meal? I’ve never paid for fast food with a credit card, but I have faced days where the amount of money in my purse is larger than the amount of time left in my day.)

Maybe that’s why I began watching people I passed in the supermarket aisle, at the cash register, or while pumping their fuel. That’s when I noticed something different: They weren’t talking, they weren’t smiling, and they seemed distracted. In fact, where I once found myself talking to other shoppers, more and more as of late, I’ve found myself wondering why everyone was so stressed and introspective.

This failure to connect with other people isn’t a new trend that began with the recent financial meltdown; I’ve been seeing it for the last few years, if not longer. And it’s not just the absence of friendly, even curious, interchange that bothers me; it is knowing that introspection leads to isolation, which leads to … suicide, filicide and stories like the one coming out of Los Angeles.

Psychologists are speaking out now, telling us to help keep each other safe, by being involved with each other; by reaching out to help family and friends in crisis; by intervening when necessary. I feel this is so important that I address it on two levels in my book, Sister Of Silence. First, from the personal perspective, and second, from the “here’s what we can do to help” perspective. So I add my voice to those mental health experts, and implore anyone—neighbor, teacher, coworker, family member or friend—who can help, to do so. And do so now! Don’t think about it, don’t second-guess yourself, and don’t wonder if you’ll look stupid, or risk losing a good relationship. Because all of those things might happen. But they might not, too. And I can promise you that even if they do, at some point, somewhere down the road, the person or people you helped will thank you. If you don’t help them first, though, they may never get that chance.

If you want to learn why men who lose their jobs are more likely to turn to violence, see my article about unemployment and domestic violence. With no sign of improvement in sight, the current economic climate makes it imperative we all keep our eyes open, alert to the chance to help someone else—before it’s too late for another family.

Posted by Daleen at 02:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)