Author: Bruce VanWyngarden

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At Large Opinion

Big Chill in Bluff City

photo: Bruce VanWyngarden Signs of spring are blossoming.

Two weekends ago, I walked out into the Saturday morning sun. It was 65 glorious degrees and headed into the mid-70s by afternoon. March had just arrived and March means spring in Memphis. And spring in Memphis means it’s time for Yard Man to get after it.

So I rolled the electric mower out of the garage and ran it over the front yard to mulch last October’s standing leaf harvest. Very satisfying. Very mulchy. I could hear the grass giving thanks.

Then I crawled around the flower beds that make up most of our backyard and clipped and snipped the dead stems, marveling at the annual miracle of perennial shoots emerging from the soil, ready for another season of life. I made a large pile of brown vegetation. Also quite satisfying.

Next, I was drawn like a salmon returning to its home waters, to the Midtown Home Depot, where (as one does) I picked up a mega-package of paper towels, some birdseed for the feeder, six light bulbs, some floor cleaner, two bags of potting soil, and a partridge in a pear tree. And lots of plastic pots of blooming annuals to brighten up the deck — petunias, anemone, lobelia.

There is a clear and simple joy in sitting in the sun and putting fresh plants into old clay pots, digging out last year’s roots and putting the fresh square bundles of soil into their new homes. The smell of loamy earth, the dirty fingernails, the stained trouser knees — all the rituals of spring, of rebirth. 

I liberated the faithful hose from its winter abode and filled it with purpose. The new plants were watered and it was good. Yard Man was content. And there was beer. 

All was well in the kingdom for a couple of days. I took inordinate pleasure from the new flora each time I walked out the back door — the blues, whites, purples, and yellows. I noticed the buds emerging on the fig tree, the white blossoms on the plums, and the big oaks turning green at their tips. Spring was well and truly sprung. 

And then we began to hear rumblings of trouble from the West. A cold front was coming, they said, a real one, with ice and snow and frigid temperatures. They were calling the storm a “cyclone bomb” and saying it would hit Memphis Friday night. We’d be lucky to survive, it appeared. The ensuing weekend would be a frozen, snowy, icy mess. In a city that is still littered with piles of limbs from a February ice storm that left 150,000 people without power, this was not good news.

Alas, the storm did arrive Friday night, right on schedule, and it was a doozy, with sleet, lightning, strong winds, freezing rain, four inches of snow, and temperatures in the mid-20s. I built a fire in the fireplace but there was no joy in it. Feeling fatalistic, I decided to just let my new flowers tough it out. Snow would protect them from freezing, I’d heard. Whatever, spring. You bastard. 

The next morning, just one week after I’d welcomed spring to my yard, the city awoke to a coat of thick wet snow. The social-media photos were lovely, folks. Thanks. But there was also sun on this new morning, and lots of it, and before long, rivulets of meltwater were everywhere. Heavy clumps of snow were falling from the trees and rooftops. There were no broken limbs, no power outages. Huzzah.

At midday, I got out in it and walked around the neighborhood, taking in the snowmelt, the wet streets, the bright sun reflecting it all, the warming air. It put me in mind of a John Updike quote that I return to on occasion: “I am now in my amazed, insistent appreciation of the physical world, of this planet with its scenery and weather … that every day and season has its beauty and its uses, that even a walk to the mailbox is a precious experience, that all species of tree and weed have their signature and style and the day is a pageant of clouds.” 

When I returned home I was happy to see that the petunias, anemones, and lobelia were blooming bright in their snow-crusted pots, literally no worse for the weather. And I looked again at the buds emerging on the fig tree, the white blossoms on the plums, the big oaks turning green at their tips. 

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At Large Opinion

Woke Like a Man

“How many sexes are there in Russia, Brad?”

“Two, Steve.”

“Exactly. And Putin’s army ain’t ‘woke.’”

“Huh, huh, huh.”

That exchange came at the end of a discussion on Steve Bannon’s podcast a couple weeks ago about how Vladimir Putin’s Russian army was going to walk all over Ukraine because it was a manly fighting force that didn’t fret about wussy stuff like pronouns and wokeness. Putin was a man’s man and his soldiers would waltz in and kick ass. This would be a good thing, Bannon continued, since Ukraine was a corrupt autocracy run by a crook. (Project much, Stevie?)

Since then, we’ve seen an under-equipped Ukrainian fighting force made up of people of all ages and genders, sometimes using borrowed and homemade weapons, battle overwhelming numbers of Putin’s manly conscripts to a standstill. And now Ukraine is getting resupplied by the U.S. and “woke” countries from all over Europe. Putin’s forces may eventually capture Ukraine, but this isn’t turning out the way he and Bannon hoped it would.

Now let’s switch to Florida and take a listen to Governor Ron DeSantis waxing eloquent on foreign policy last week: “Can you imagine if [Putin] went into France?” he asked, with a sneer. “Would they do anything to put up a fight? Probably not.”

I’m not sure why DeSantis felt it necessary to insult America’s oldest historical ally and disparage the fortitude of a country whose citizens resisted Hitler’s nazis for six years (and a country, I might add, that has 300 nuclear warheads). But, hey, France, amirite? Cheese-eatin’ sissy boys. Huh, huh, huh.

What’s with all these displays of ignorant machismo emanating from the right these days? Why all the pathetic sucking up to bully-boys like Putin by the GOP and its media enablers? And when did “woke” become the official MAGA shorthand for “liberal wussies”?

Maybe it’s because “caravans are coming,” “build the wall,” “liberals will take your guns,” and “gays will force you to marry them” are played out, and the GOP needs a new boogeyman to stir up the rubes. Woke is the handy code word for everything the right hates and fears: considering more than one side of a question, thinking before reacting, acknowledging the existence of gender and sexuality issues, racial justice, scientific analysis — not to mention nuance, kindness, and empathy. It’s so much easier if you can just ignore all that stuff and go straight to painting political opponents with simplistic insults about their manliness — and hating them.

And it’s not just right-wing men. CongressClown Lauren Boebert said last week that Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has to learn to “chest-feed,” because, you know, he’s a gay man who is a father. Huh, huh, huh.

Who are the role models for these fools? Beavis and Butt-Head? Have they even done the math on some of these issues, or is that too complicated? The latest Gallup poll has the American public’s support for gay marriage at 70 percent. Another Gallup poll found that 87 percent of Americans approved of France. And around 75 percent of Americans are at least partially vaccinated, meaning they probably didn’t find having to wear a mask in certain spaces during a pandemic infringed enough on their freedom that they needed to start a truck convoy.

Seriously, how deranged is driving across the country to protest having to wear a mask two weeks after the CDC ended mask mandates? People are dying for freedom in Ukraine and these bozos are wasting thousands of gallons of fuel driving around the outer loop of Washington, D.C. — to demand what? Lower gas prices? The right to drive around in circles? It’s just more stupid macho cosplay.

Because I’m of a certain age, I am reminded of the old Saturday Night Live skit “¿Quién es Más Macho?,” in which game-show host Bill Murray asked contestants to pick which of three male actors was “más macho.” As I recall, Gilda Radner won by picking Lloyd Bridges, who beat out Ricardo Montalbán and Fernando Lamas for the title. It was stupid — and racist by today’s standards — so it may be time to bring that show back for real. Bannon vs. Boebert vs. DeSantis? It would kill on Fox.

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At Large Opinion

A Bridge Too Far

Photo: Curt Rakestraw

People around the world were shocked and horrified when Russian President Vladimir Putin sent troops into Ukraine last week. The idea of an actual old-school land invasion of a settled, sovereign country seemed somehow incomprehensible in 2022. Mercilessly launching missiles, bombs, and cannon fire into cities full of civilians, hospitals, schools, and churches surely could not be happening. But it was. And then the world watched as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky instigated a fierce resistance that has continued into Tuesday morning, as I write this.

There were mass demonstrations against the war across Europe. Cities all over the free world began lighting up buildings, iconic edifices, and bridges in the blue and gold colors of the Ukrainian flag. Except in Memphis.

It wasn’t for lack of interest. Or trying. On Twitter, people began suggesting that Memphis light its bridges in blue and gold as early as last Thursday. It seemed a no-brainer. As someone tweeted on Saturday (possibly a Flyer senior editor): “If Memphis bridges aren’t gold and blue tonight, somebody has got some damn explaining to do.”

But Mighty Lights, the nonprofit organization that runs the light displays on Memphis’ two interstate bridges, was totally unresponsive. Some people filled out the form on their website, which appeared to be the only method to communicate with the group, to no avail. Increasingly caustic comments on the group’s Facebook and Instagram accounts also got no response. Was anyone home? It didn’t appear so.

The tweeting started to get a little snippy: “Is Tucker Carlson running things over there?” “Memphis should be leading instead of following!” “MLGW is still working on the problem [sarcasm].” “I know a lot of people who’ve reached out to them and gotten no response. What is the damn deal with these people?”

What was the damn deal with these people? I still don’t know. I do know that on Sunday afternoon, on a freshly created Twitter account, @MightyLightsMem issued its first tweet, and it went over like a fart in a crowded elevator: “Laissez les bons temps rouler!” it read. “On Tuesday, March 1, the Mighty Lights will glow purple, green, and gold for Mardi Gras!” There was an accompanying photo of the Hernando DeSoto Bridge in Mardi Gras colors.

Mardi Gras? Who was in charge over there? People tagged, texted, and emailed Mayor Strickland and other leaders. They tweeted pictures of the Eiffel Tower, the Christ statue in Rio, the Roman Colosseum, the Empire State building, all lit in blue and gold, next to a screenshot of the Mardi Gras tweet, and wrote: “The rest of the world vs. Memphis.” Tambo38104 spoke for most when he tweeted: “This is the most tone deaf thing I think I have ever seen. What is WRONG with you?”

We’ll never know what finally sparked the change, but I’m guessing somebody with clout probably noticed the growing outrage and made a call. The Mardi Gras tweet came down within the hour and was shortly replaced by one that read: “Tonight, February 27, and on Monday night, February 28, The Mighty Lights will join iconic landmarks around the world to glow in solidarity with Ukraine,” accompanied by a picture of the M bridge lit up in blue and gold. Never mind that it was an old photo from after a Grizzlies game, they seemed to have finally gotten the message. On Sunday and Monday nights, the bridge was a beautiful blue and gold.

Still, I think it’s safe to say some adjustments need to be made. Mighty Lights has been a wonderful addition to Downtown, but after the events of the past week, it appears — how to say this, delicately? — no one is home. At the very least, somebody needs to be monitoring social media, so they aren’t caught looking clueless again. Someone should also be responding to comments and questions on the group’s social media pages. This is sort of Marketing 101.

I get that this is not a big-bucks organization. It’s a nonprofit with little staffing that does nice visual things for Downtown. But those bridges are public highways, and the public needs a way to communicate with whoever’s controlling the switch.

Someone needs to keep a light on.

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At Large Opinion

You’re Not Bob

Photo: Libux77 | Dreamstime.com

Wow, 77 likes! That’s a good Facebook post, right? Seventy-seven people took a moment to click a response to something you put online. They liked it or loved it or laughed or made a sad face. Some of them even made a comment. It’s very satisfying when that happens, isn’t it? When you make a connection to so many people.

And how about those 62 kind souls who wished you a happy birthday a couple weeks ago? That’s also a good thing, right? Knowing that so many people care about you? It’s certainly better than what happened to my friend “Bob,” who only got six comments on his birthday. What a loser. But at least a couple of them were very enthusiastic: “Hope you have a great birthday, Bob!!” “Happiest of birthdays, Bob! Hope all is well!”

The only problem is that Bob died in 2019, so I’m guessing he didn’t see those six birthday wishes. And I’m guessing those folks who wished him a happy birthday were not particularly close to Bob. Or — not to be too cynical here — maybe, while slurping their morning coffee, they got the daily notice from Facebook alerting them to which friends were having birthdays that day. They saw Bob’s name on the list and thought, “Oh, hey, I should wish that guy a happy one. What can it hurt?” There. Done. Back to Wordle.

That cynicism will get you nowhere, pal. Sure, we all get a lot of obligatory “Happy Birthday” messages. It’s part of the deal we make with social media when we give them every morsel of information about our lives. But it’s a bit much to expect that every single one of your 1,147 “friends” will be able to keep up with whether or not you’re actually breathing. Besides, it’s not all just perfunctory cliches. Some people give you an exclamation point! Or two!! Or maybe they post an actual sentiment or mention a moment you’ve shared in years gone by.

Listen, my friend, it’s your birthday, and 62 people noticed. You should enjoy the day, okay? Don’t think about it too much.

Or maybe think about it in a whole new way.

Think about all those social media clicks on your birthday as an entry point into a meditation or even a celebration of who you are. Maybe click on that list of people who reacted and take the time to check out their profiles, take a minute to think about how you know each other. Maybe try to bring up a memory of them, a moment you once shared.

There’s your high school buddy from the track team who drifted into drugs and now runs a homeless shelter; there’s that woman you worked with in Detroit so long ago, the one you kinda had a crush on; there’s the nice lady who used to babysit your children and still remembers their birthdays 30 years later; there’s that guy who is friends with 75 of your friends and friended you and you said yes even though you’ve never met; there’s the neighbor down the street who walks her cat; your boyfriend from 1989; the guy who was in your band, etc.

Most of them don’t know each other. The only thing they have in common is you. You are the hub. They are the spokes on the wheel of your life. You connected with them at some point during your days on this planet. Whether you worked together for years or just met once, you shared a back road.

Maybe you could imagine those 62 people gathered together in a room somewhere, watching you blow out the candles on your cake, cheering as the flames lean away from your sharp exhalation and the smoke rises and the little candle wicks fade and darken and smolder. As you lift your eyes from the imagined cake to the imagined throng of friends and family from all the days of your life, let yourself feel grateful that lots of people care about you — and that you’re not Bob.

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At Large Opinion

The Memory Hole

Marjorie Taylor Greene (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

Memories are ephemeral things. They get stacked like dishes in a cabinet, most never brought out until evoked by happenstance — a story told by a friend, an unexpected phone call, an old family photo. We more easily recall the high moments, the weddings, births, holidays, deaths. The events of an ordinary day from, say, seven years ago, are mostly forgotten.

Unless, that is, you have a device like the Portal that’s in our kitchen. It’s a screen on a stand that will play music or perform other web duties as needed, but we mostly use it for long-distance calls with family, so everyone can see each other at once.

You can also link the Portal to photos from your camera or computer. Portal then cycles through your pictures at random, posting them for 10 seconds at a time, before sliding into the next one. Since we have made hundreds of photos available to Portal, this can be both delightful and disconcerting.

Walk into the kitchen and you might see a photo of a gorgeous sunset from a long-ago boat ride, followed by a shot from that horrible February when your roof had to be replaced, followed by a picture of your beloved old mutt, Trotsky, who died in 2015. Every 10 seconds, it’s a new memory to think about, a new reminder of how much past has really passed and how many of life’s transitory moments we forget.

Yesterday, a picture I took of then-President Donald Trump’s infamous 2017 “covfefe” tweet appeared. It was once a big deal. Was the president delivering a secret message? What did it mean? I hadn’t thought about “covfefe” and the temporary nuttiness that ensued for a long time. I bet you haven’t either. Once, it was the story of the week. Now it’s just another “WTF?” moment from the Donald years.

The photo reminded me of last week’s kerfuffle involving Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who, in a rambling tirade, accused “Nancy Pelosi’s gazpacho police” of spying on her and other members of Congress. The pundits had a field day making sport of MTG. Pelosi was a “soup nazi.” She’s connected to “anti-pho.” Ha ha, etc. Afterward came a tepid debate about whether Taylor Greene was really that stupid (I vote yes) or whether she was playing a clever four-dimensional chess game to get people talking about her.

Who knows? Nobody but Marjorie Taylor Greene. But as the “covfefe” incident demonstrates, none of it will matter in a couple of weeks. Today’s distraction will be yesterday’s soup.

But the distractions can present a real danger, not just fodder for foolishness. While everyone is yukking it up about MTG’s gaffe, GOP-controlled states around the country are continuing to pass laws that restrict voting rights, a woman’s right to choose, and the rights of LGBTQ people. They are redistricting their party into permanent majority status. It’s happening here in Tennessee as we speak. In addition, Governor Bill Lee is proceeding apace with his audacious plan to pay a Michigan-based Christian school to create up to 500 private charter schools in Tennessee, using tax dollars meant to go to public schools. It’s a huge grift and a deep dive into unconstitutional waters. But that won’t stop “Bible Bill” from pushing like hell to make it happen.

All the national talking heads are making dire forecasts about the 2022 midterms for Democrats, saying the GOP is likely to take back the House and Senate. This isn’t a drill, anymore. It’s no longer politics as usual. One of the two major American parties has skied down the slippery slope, has gone all in for establishing a one-party Christian autocracy as our new system of government.

You have but to listen to the tweet-rants of senators Marsha Blackburn, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and others. They don’t speak of policy or lawmaking. It’s all about spreading fear and disinformation. That’s it. That’s the play. You and I can stand up and fight like hell, or we can sit back and enjoy the shit gazpacho we’re all about to be served.

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At Large Opinion

Sick Burn

Neil Young (Photo: Wirestock | Dreamstime.com)

No doubt, many of you are familiar with Ray Bradbury’s 1953 novel Fahrenheit 451. It was on the recommended reading list in one of my high school English classes, and I loved it.

For those not familiar with the book, the title references the autoignition temperature of paper, which is relevant because the novel is set in a future America where books are outlawed. Any that are discovered are taken and burned by the “firemen,” who also burn down the houses of those who possess books.

Bradbury’s tale is weirdly predictive: Everyone in “future” America spends their evenings watching insipid melodramas and sports on their “parlor walls,” i.e. home screens. No one reads because books have been deemed by the nation’s rulers as too dangerous for the people.

Cut to Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, last week, where an evangelical pastor and rabid Trump supporter named Greg Locke held a book-burning — a bonfire of the inanities, so to speak. The blaze targeted Harry Potter books and the Twilight series, but other books were also burned, including a copy of Fahrenheit 451. The irony was lost, obviously. Still, you can’t be too careful. Some sexy wizard vampire freedom stuff might leak out into young impressionable brains.

On the surface, such activity seems scary, but in 2022, burning books to stop someone from reading them is about as useful as trying to stop someone from listening to a particular musician by burning his CDs. Two hundred years ago, torching tomes might have kept the locals in a village from reading a particular book, but that horse is now out of the barn and on Pixar. In 2022, you can listen to anything, read anything, or see anything you want with a few keystrokes. Burning books or records is a purely performative exercise, Kabuki theater for the gullible rubes. Nobody can “ban” anything, least of all from tech-savvy young people.

Speaking of … Do you know what the No. 1 song on the Billboard 100 chart is right now? I’m gonna guess you probably don’t. It’s “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” a Latin show-tune written by Lin-Manuel Miranda (of Hamilton fame) from the Disney film, Encanto. It’s sung by six different, mostly unknown, people and it’s been No. 1 for five weeks and counting.

How is it possible that this is the No. 1 song in America? Sure, it’s sort of catchy, in a classic Broadway musical sense, but according to those who track such things, that’s not why “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” has reached the top. Nope. “WDTAB” is No. 1 because it’s being streamed millions of times a week by elementary school-age kids, who love the film and the song and listen to it repeatedly. Stream counters don’t care who’s listening. Age doesn’t matter. Everyone’s just a number. You and I may not talk about Bruno, but American kids sure do.

Speaking of streaming … A lot of people smirked a couple weeks ago, when septuagenarian rocker Neil Young pulled his music from Spotify in protest of bro-magnon talker Joe Rogan’s podcast. It’s me or Rogan, said Young. Rogan is Spotify’s primary cash cow, so Spotify said, “see ya, Neil.”

Young’s protest was a meaningless, empty gesture, people said. Oops. Turns out Young’s protest spurred other content providers to pull their work from Spotify. Then, oops again, it was discovered that Rogan was not just an ivermectin-clogged dumbass spreading Covid misinformation, he was also a racist who casually used the “n-word” in more than 70 podcast episodes. Spotify quickly pulled the episodes in question, plus others of questionable taste and accuracy, and apologized to its users and to its employees.

Rogan’s supporters immediately began complaining about their hero being a victim of “cancel culture.” Which is different, somehow, from burning books or pulling them from school libraries, I guess.

Anyway, ol’ Neil got the last word. And we should recognize that none of this would have happened if one man hadn’t taken a conscientious stand on principle. Rogan’s racist crap would still be on Spotify. Now it’s not.

You might say that Joe Rogan got burned.

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At Large Opinion

Wink: A Dog’s Tale

Wink (Photo: Bruce VanWyngarden)

A couple weeks ago, on a day when the temperature was in the low 20s, I decided to take my dogs on a walk at Overton Park. They were acting antsy and I figured I could handle the cold for a half-hour or so.

We usually hit the Overton Bark dog enclosure first, so my dogs can get their ya-yas out with other dogs before walking the trails. On this cold day, however, there was only one dog there — a shivering white pup with no collar or tags. She was standing on an icy patch of ground and her eyes were wide and fearful. An older couple walked by in thick parkas and said, “That dog’s been here for a while. Do you think her owner’s taking a walk?”

No, I thought. I think some asshole dumped this innocent pup at a dog park on a freezing winter day, hoping someone would rescue her. I took my dogs for a walk, resolving that if the pup was still there when we got back, it was my karma to save her.

A half-hour later, as I put her in the back of my car, there was a little grumbling from my two, but nothing serious. The pup looked like a pitbull mix, female, and sported one sassy eye that looked like it had been made-up by RuPaul. She was rib-skinny but affectionate and trusting. When we got home, I put food in a bowl for her. She inhaled it like oxygen, then lay down on a dog bed and slept for four hours without moving, recovering from the cold, exhaustion, and whatever she’d been through on the streets of Memphis.

I named her Wink because of that eye, and I called my daughter Mary, who works with Blues City Animal Rescue. She’s a pro at this stuff. We put out some feelers on social media and, after a couple of days, found a foster home for Wink. But it didn’t work out, so I got Wink back a day later. To be honest, I was becoming fond of her. She was gentle, non-aggressive, high-spirited, and didn’t run to the door and bark every time a delivery person came onto the porch — like my two idiots do six times a day. She was also a great TV-cuddler and would sleep through anything once she conked out.

There were a few suitors. One young couple brought their dog, but it didn’t like Wink. Another guy said he’d get back to me. Another had a family emergency. These things take time, Mary said.

My wife and I noticed that Wink was very independent. She’d snuggle, loved to play and fetch, but wouldn’t come when called. She was quirky. Something seemed off.

The next night, it clicked. I was prepping the dog bowls in the kitchen, my two hounds at my feet, excited, waiting for the nightly miracle. Wink was in the next room, snoring in a chair. When the bowls were ready, I hollered at her. No response. I whistled. I walked over to her and clapped my hands over her head. No response.

Wink was deaf as a stone.

Everything suddenly made sense: the deep sleeps (she was basically in a sensory-deprivation tank); the lack of response to sweet-talk or calls to “come” or attempts to give her a name. How this deaf dog survived out on the streets, I have no idea. How she survived and retained such a loving nature toward humans and other dogs is nothing short of a miracle.

In a couple of days, she began to respond to hand signals. I’ve ordered a sub-sonic whistle, in hopes she’ll be able to hear it. Wink is going to make it. She’s going to find her true home. We’re patient, and she’s a survivor. You heard it here first.

Email me if interested: brucev@memphisflyer.com.

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At Large Opinion

The Quiet Part

The Ninth District: Note phallic incursion from 2010 redistricting. (Photo: courtesy Congressman Steve Cohen)

Maybe you saw this quote last week, when Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the quiet part out loud while defending the defeat of the Voting Rights Act in the Senate: “African-American voters,” he warbled, “are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans.”

Never mind that McConnell apparently believes African Americans aren’t actual Americans, like, you know, white people. And never mind that the bills his party is passing in GOP-controlled states around the country are intended to change that pesky situation before the next election rolls around. McConnell is intentionally glossing over the fact that the Voting Rights Act would have outlawed the implementation of these undemocratic new laws, and that every Republican Senator voted against it — as did two hypocrites calling themselves Democrats, Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin.

Since the 2020 election, dozens of restrictive voting laws have been enacted in 19 states, laws that supposedly remedy “voter fraud” (which didn’t happen) but that have the actual purpose of making voting more difficult for poor people and people of color — who just coincidentally tend to vote for Democrats.

You don’t have to look any further than Nashville for a perfect example of how far the GOP is willing to go to establish a permanent and overwhelming majority. Last week, the Tennessee Senate Judiciary and House State Government committees approved three redistricting plans for new state House, state Senate, and Congressional maps, which are drawn every decade after the federal census to reshape state and federal districts, if necessary, to ensure equity at the polls.

The new Republican-created Tennessee maps are a joke at all three levels, a mugging of democracy in plain sight. Newly configured districts in and around Memphis, Nashville, and Knoxville are designed to break up neighborhoods and Democratic voting strongholds in urban areas, especially Black communities. The new maps pit Black and Democratic incumbents against each other in four instances at the state representative level and give Republicans a huge numerical advantage in eight out of nine of Tennessee’s Congressional districts. That’s an 11 percent representation in Congress for Democrats, who made up 41 percent of the vote in the most recent statewide election.

The lone outlier is Tennessee’s Ninth District, represented by Congressman Steve Cohen, but it’s not for lack of trying. After the 2010 census (in what was widely seen as a direct skewering of Cohen), the GOP took a literally phallic-shaped piece out of the Ninth that just so happened to include Cohen’s place of worship in East Memphis and a large surrounding Jewish neighborhood. To balance the population math, the GOP added a large chunk of Tipton County to the Ninth, meaning Cohen now represents a disparate melange of rural, inner-city, and suburban voters. This isn’t just unfair to Cohen (or whoever the Ninth District representative may be in the future); it’s unfair to all the residents of the district, who deserve to be represented by someone who reflects their concerns and values. The Republicans, it appears, would prefer it if Memphis residents found themselves being represented by a Republican turd farmer from Atoka.

But compared to Nashville, Memphis got off easy. The Fifth District — represented by Democratic Congressman Jim Cooper, and which currently encompasses most of Nashville and Davidson County — will now encompass parts of five (count ’em!) counties. The city’s vote will be split and allocated to three rural-majority districts. Meaning Nashville’s urban residents will soon more than likely be represented by three Republican turd farmers.

This isn’t how democracy is supposed to work. Our elected representatives shouldn’t be allowed to create districts specifically designed to keep them — and their party — in office. Geographic political districts — at every level — should be created by bipartisan commissions, not party hacks. And yes, I know gerrymandering has been done by Democrats as well. The point is that it’s wrong, no matter who does it, and that we had in our hands a bill that would have eliminated all this cheating, that would have kept states from arbitrarily reducing the number of polling places in certain districts or shortening voting periods or, for god’s sake, banning the dispensing of water to voters in line.

In our system, unfettered democracy is supposed to be a feature, not a bug. But unfortunately, that’s not how the Republicans see it these days.

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News News Blog News Feature

Staying Up with Anesthesiologist and Author Shira Shiloah

(Courtesy Shira Shiloah)

Shira Shiloah is an anesthesiologist with Medical Anesthesia Group. She’s also a successful writer, whose first novel, a medical thriller published in September 2020 called Emergence, became a best-seller. The plot, we should add, involves a deranged surgeon in a Memphis hospital who is a serial killer. It’s got some tense and scary moments.

So, one could fairly say that Dr. Shiloah puts people to sleep by day and keeps them awake at night, turning pages. Her second novel is set to be published soon. 

We talked with Shiloah about her background, the medical challenges presented by the pandemic, and the dual career roles she has taken on. 

Shiloah has practiced medicine in Memphis since 2004. “I never thought I would be a lifelong Memphian,” she says, “but the city has been really good to me.” Her family emigrated here from Israel when she was three years old and she went to grade school and high school in Memphis. “And I came back here for medical school,” Shiloah adds.

She says the past two years have been stressful and yet transformative. “Early in the pandemic, before I got vaccinated in December 2020 and January 2021, we had to rethink everything,” Shiloah says. “As an anesthesiologist, I was literally managing the airways of Covid patients all day. My greatest fear at that point was bringing the disease home and exposing my family. Things we once took for granted totally changed. I would get home, take off my clothes, and head straight to the shower, before even saying hello.”

Shiloah says the vaccines were — and remain — a game-changer. “It wasn’t until my family was vaccinated,” she says, “that we could relax a little.” She has little patience for those who “spin nonsense” about life-saving drugs. “We should be grateful for these miracle drugs,” she says, adding, “Even though Omicron looks to be less dangerous at this point, we don’t know if it will have long-term effects like memory fog or fatigue, so it’s important to keep taking precautions.” 

Ironically, the pandemic has also served as something of a “sanctuary” for Shiloah’s burgeoning writing career. “I had no idea the first book would do so well, but then it took off. With the pandemic, I had more time at home to write and was able to finish my second book, which is now in the process of being published.”

So how have Shiloah’s colleagues reacted to her writing career? “Sometimes, the nurses and other doctors will bring in a copy of Emergence for me to sign, which is fun. They’ve been very supportive.” She hastens to add that her novel, while set in a hospital in Memphis with a protagonist who is a female anesthesiologist, is fiction, and shouldn’t be taken too literally. 

She says the best writing advice she’s gotten is to “look out the window, not in the mirror.” And she also has some advice for young people with medical careers: “Don’t give up your creative processes while enmeshed in the science. Don’t give up your creative outlets, whether it’s music, art, or writing. You don’t have to become one-dimensional. Never stop nurturing the creative person you are.”

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At Large Opinion

Dead Surfers

So I’m sitting in the dermatologist’s office, waiting to get little pieces of skin removed from my face and shoulders. I’m of a generation that thought iodine and baby oil made a great “sun tan lotion,” a greasy potion that would give you that rosy-brown sheen favored by surfers and lifeguards. Sadly, even though I was a teenage lifeguard and spent hours in the sun every day, I could never achieve the desired bronze glow, just freckles. Now, several decades later, I have to go in once a year to have brown spots frozen off my skin. I like to think of them as little dead surfers.

But I digress. Oh wait, actually, that whole paragraph up there was a digression. See, while I was sitting in the waiting room I’d decided to sneak in a little French lesson on my phone. Except I forgot to turn it to silent mode and before I could do anything, it squawked, “Je bois trois litres d’eau chaque jour.”

A couple of people looked up, no doubt mentally rolling their eyes and thinking, “Why is this idiot broadcasting gibberish in the waiting room?” (If they spoke French, they were probably wondering, “Why does that guy drink three liters of water each day?”) But I digress. Again.

I whispered “Sorry!” to the room and clicked off my phone. Then the receptionist said, “Is that Duolingo?”

“Yes,” I admitted.

“Pretty addictive, isn’t it?”

“Oui.”

And it truly is. Nearly two years ago, I intended to retire as full-time editor of this paper, then Covid hit, and I stuck around for another year or so. But one of my “retirement” resolutions was to learn French, so I went ahead and started back in April of 2020. My wife’s family is French and I wanted to be able to do more than ask where the restrooms were the next time we went over there. Little did I realize that I was creating a monster. I’ve now had a French lesson every day for almost two years. How do you say “OCD” in French? I could tell you, mon ami.

The Duolingo program I’m using has perfected ways to keep you coming back. It rewards you with points for finishing lessons, and for “streaks,” i.e. the number of days in a row you go without missing a lesson. There are “double point” opportunities, which is when you can really score. Also, you are automatically entered into “leagues” with weekly point standings, and you can discuss answers with other Duolinguists in the chatty (and catty) forums.

My current streak is 597 days. I can’t imagine the glory that will be mine in three more days. So many points! My Diamond League competitors are going to be miffed. Tough merde, losers.

It hasn’t been all vin et roses. Some days I spend an hour or more on my lessons. Other days, not so much. There have been times when life has intervened, where I’ve spent the day fishing or camping or working or driving across the country, and not been able to squeeze in a session. But there I am, in the dark, in bed, knocking out a quick silent lesson before midnight to keep the streak alive. You could call me the Lou Gehrig of Duolingo, except there are thousands of us, many of whom have longer streaks than I do. This stuff is addictive.

So, does it work? I would say yes. I’ve learned to read French pretty well, and I can think my way through most things I want to say in French, albeit slower than I’d like. When I hear my wife talking on the phone to her mother, I understand much more than I used to, but I still miss a lot. They talk too fast. I don’t think there’s any substitute for immersion into a culture where you’re forced to use the native language to communicate. So I may have to go to France and stay for a while to check out that theory. Someday, peut-être.

I’m also working under the premise that the more I exercise my aging brain the longer it will keep working well. Learning a language makes me think, makes me have to remember things.

Like wearing sunscreen when I go outside.