The Great Hits and Albums of 1971

 You know how you envy people, especially when you're young? I'm well over that now.  I used to wish I could be as handsome as David Cassidy and as talented a musician as Karen Carpenter, both close to my age. They both died after years of unhappiness, Carpenter at 32 and Cassidy at 67. I'm still here, and despite the pandemic, the usual problems of being over 70, and not being rich or adequately famous, I have a good life. The last six weeks, I've taught a class called "The Great Hits and Albums of 1971," as a volunteer at Osher Life-Long Learning, through West Virginia University's School of Public Health. David Cassidy, as part of The Partridge Family, and Karen Carpenter, who formed Carpenters with her brother Richard, have been  featured in this class. 

I've gained an appreciation of the hard work and commitment of people in music who were also politically involved, people like Aretha Franklin, Isaac Hayes, Curtis Mayfield and Gladys Knight. I have more  respect for David Bowie and Elton John, and "Lola" by the Kinks, breaking  barriers around masculinity. While many people were blaming John or Paul for the breakup of The Beatles, videos from 1971 show Paul and Linda and John and Yoko in love. I have memories of young women I knew who swooned over Carole King's Tapestry  Joni Mitchell's Blue, and "Best New Artist" at the Grammys, Carly Simon. I still think of "So Far Away" from Carole King when I think of friends I miss in California. I played a video of Joni Mitchell accompanying herself on dulcimer, singing her song "California" that knocked me out. 

I was too old for The Partridge Family and The Osmonds, but I am still in awe of The Jackson Five, especially little Michael, who had a brilliant career as an adult, but an early and sad end to his life.

I look at The Bee Gees, three brothers, the younger two twins my age. Someone in class noted that their syrupy ballads, moving syrupy ballads, but still,  were nothing like Saturday Night Fever. Barry Gibb, the oldest brother, is still with us, but the twins died a few years apart some time ago. 

The Beach Boys also were three brothers, where the younger two have died, and the eldest is still here. This was a time of a lull in their career, but their albums from 1970, 71 and 72, Sunflower, Surf's Up  and Holland, have always been among my favorites. I played "Until I Die" from Surf's Up in class, and fifty years later, I still cried when I heard that song. 

I'm ending my class tomorrow with two songs from Gonna Take A Miracle by Laura Nyro, a songwriter who decided to do an album of covers of songs by other writers, and recruited Patti Labelle's new group, Labelle, to sing backup. Although the album never cracked the Top 40, had no singles, and was not on recommended lists from Rolling Stone or Spin, it is my favorite album from 1971. The Word magazine listed it as one of "The 60 Best Underrated Albums." There's a cult of Laura Nyro fans, and I'm in it, and it centers especially around this album. I could earn a PhD. from explicating it. The album is on YouTube. Check it out.

I don't know if I'll teach another OLLI class. I do a lot of research and these classes take way too much of my time. I've been doing this for more than eight years, and I've done a class for every year from 1960 to 1971. Still, I enjoy it, and I think people in my class do, too. I would like to do some other writing, maybe a book, and clean up the piles of trash in my office space left over from my time on Morgantown's City Council.

But just yesterday, I had a thought about classes I might teach. 1972 would bring us Jackson Browne, Bruce Springsteen and Steely Dan, and a new era for Stevie Wonder and Paul Simon. Or maybe six weeks of R&B heroes: Isaac Hayes and David Porter, Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye, Smokey Robinson, Nikolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson and Holland, Dozier and Holland. Or six weeks of women artists: Aretha Franklin, Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Carly Simon, Janis Joplin, and Gladys Knight. How about women in country music from Patsy Cline to Loretta Lynn, June Carter, Dolly Parton, Lynn Anderson and Sammi Smith? Make me stop! I don't want to work this hard. But maybe I will. 

71

 It's Saturday morning and Joe is about to start Torah study from home on Zoom with people from our temple. This is the week of Breishit, "In the beginning," as the annual cycle of reading the five Books of Moses begins anew. My birthday on the Jewish calendar was yesterday, as it was on Friday, October 26, 1962, the day before my bar mitzvah. That was after  my "regular" calendar birthday; this year, it's before. 

There was an article last Sunday in TheWashington Post, a review of a book about the times we were close to a nuclear war. The review started "October 27, 1962, was the most dangerous day in history." I remember reading about the Cuban missile crisis, which was happening that week. It was my first "bargaining with God" moment, where I asked God to put off the nuclear war until after my bar  mitzvah. My wish was granted, or maybe the diplomats worked everything out- it's hard to say. 

Once again, life on Earth is at a turning point. There is an election in a short space of time, and there is a lot riding on it. The current President won't commit to stepping down if he loses. He has been infected with the coronavirus (as his current wife and youngest son have been) yet he continues to hold big rallies, appearing maskless, despite the best public health advice. He and his toadies are pushing through a Supreme Court nominee who might vote with others to invalidate the election, cut off healthcare for millions of Americans, ban legal abortions or attempt to invalidate my twelve-year marriage. As I've pointed out, my marriage was with clergy in our denomination, a vow made in front of family, friends and God, so it can't really be invalidated. No court has that power.

In West Virginia, the pandemic is getting worse. And today, October 17, 2020, West Virginia University's football team  is playing Kansas University at home, with the stadium at  twenty-five percent capacity and the bars in town open. Our City Council has retained the ban on large house parties in student-centric neighborhoods, with my approval, but  there is still lots that could go wrong. Joe said, and I agree, that even if we don't contract  this virus, we may not survive the pandemic.

I finished my project to find a new city, with sixty-eight possibilities. I now fully realize that it's completely a fantasy. I don't see Joe and I going anywhere, even as many of our friends in Morgantown go south for the winter. I don't see us splitting up, although renting an apartment for myself for a month in the winter in Los Angeles or Fort Lauderdale is tempting. At least this year, I'm still on City Council, so I guess not. 

Effective Wednesday, I will no longer be seventy, but past seventy. As Werner Erhard said "THIS is  how your life  worked out." 

Delaware County, Ohio

Delaware County is north of Columbus, twenty-seven miles downtown to downtown Delaware, the town that serves as the county seat. Parts of Columbus, Westerville and Dublin are in Delaware County, it being easier for cities to annex in Ohio than it is in West Virginia. I was set to go Wednesday to Friday, but woke up late after a grueling and annoying City Council meeting Tuesday. Then I checked the internet and read the paper.

Tuesday there were no reported cases of  covid19 in West Virginia or Ohio, so I figured I could go. I would be alone in the car and in a motel, and not in crowds. By Wednesday morning, there were three cases in Cleveland (not close) but Ohio University in Columbus was closing for the duration. There were no cases in West Virginia, but very few people had been tested, less than ten at that point. Maybe this was more serious. So I didn't go.

Friday, the President seemed to take someone's advice and declare a national emergency. He has been exposed to the virus, but continues to shake hands with people. Democrats in Congress finally bullied the Centers For Disease Control to offer testing for free. In Morgantown, West Virginia University went on spring break Friday, extended it to two weeks instead of one, and students were told not to return to campus. An undergraduate friend spending the semester in Australia was ordered to come back, although no one can see what the point is of that. Public schools closed early Friday and are not coming back. The students have "snow-day" assignments they can do at home.

West Virginia University's basketball team won its first round of "March Madness," but now the rest of the games are canceled. Professional sports are off, the high school basketball tournaments won't happen. Major League Baseball canceled spring training and the season will be "delayed."

We've seen the potential failure of the whole American enterprise. I don't mean just the ups-and-downs of the stock market. Many, many students receive free breakfast and lunch, feminine hygiene supplies and even take-home food at school. People have no health insurance coverage or high deductibles. Coronavirus is not a big deal for young healthy people, but for older people it is life-threatening. Those with mild forms of the disease need to be isolated, with pay. We have no mechanism for that, no way to make sure people have medical care, infected people have a place to go, poor children have food to eat and someone to care for them when schools are closed. No one has said what will happen to college students with part-time jobs, paid-for meal plans or scholarships.

If anything, all of this proves that Bernie Sanders was right all along, and Elizabeth Warren, too. The United States has been coasting along with some thinking everything was great because the stock market was up and unemployment was down. On the ground, though, we knew that people didn't have health insurance or sick leave, couldn't afford to feed their families. We have been absolutely unprepared for a catastrophe, and yet things happen all the time all over the world.

Rabbi Joe (full disclosure: my husband) went ahead with services Friday night. As usual, most of the congregants were older. He spoke about the plagues that were God's wrath, like when Moses found the people worshipping the golden calf, and many people died. We don't believe that now, that God controls those things. Still, there are consequences for our actions. Electing someone incompetent and uncaring to be President, and for Republicans in Congress and the Senate, going along with whatever he wants, has left us all vulnerable.

The Friday when President Kennedy was killed was warm and sunny in Baltimore, where I was fourteen and a ninth grader. The next day, it rained heavily all day and by Monday it was bitter cold. We've had seventy-degree highs this week, about twenty degrees above average, but this afternoon, it turned cold and it's snowing. Sometimes I think the weather does somehow follow world events.

The City of Morgantown sent out an overloaded agenda for Tuesday's meeting: interviewing people for city boards, dinging a landlord for nuisance properties, passing a budget and a five-year capital improvement plan, then meeting after the regular meeting about potential lawsuits. I suggested yesterday by email that we table as much as we could and talk about the emergency in our city, which even if no one gets sick, will be devastating economically. I also sent a message to my doctor asking if I should even go this meeting, being high risk for this illness. I've been offline last night and today for the Jewish sabbath (I still wrote this on Saturday, but will post it after dark), so I only saw a post from one Councilor, who agreed with me.

I hope we can all get through this. I saw Readers Vent comments in The Charleston Gazette-Mail, where people said they think it's all a hoax because they don't know anyone with corona virus. I am reminded of 1982, when friends said that about AIDS. Many of those people died of the disease. We need to be vigilant and demand that our governments at all levels do what is needed.

High Holidays 5780: How Terribly Strange To be Seventy

"How terribly strange to be seventy" is a lyric from Paul Simon, who turned seventy-eight last week. I wonder what he thinks about that now. I can tell you, it's not strange at all. It's just what happens when you just get up every morning, as I did this morning, on your seventieth birthday. I didn't just sit on a park bench, with nothing left but my memories. I ran/walked (ran downhill, walked uphill) through my neighborhood in beautiful, slightly-warmer-than-average fall weather.

The past month of Jewish holidays has taken a toll on both me and Joe. I chanted haftarah (prophets) the first day of Rosh Hashana, and Torah the second day, and Torah the morning and afternoon of Yom Kippur. In the Reform movement, today is Atzeret-Simchat Torah, the last day of the holiday period. In between everything else, Joe and I are teaching classes at Osher Life-Long Learning through West Virginia University. He is teaching "Old Testament Rituals-Don't Try These At Home," and I'm teaching "The Great Hits and Albums of 1967," fun for me, but a lot of work. We attended a wedding on the Saturday between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur in Alpine Lake, 40 miles east of here, near the Maryland line, and a bat mitzvah in Pittsburgh two days ago. Yesterday, we combined Simchat Torah with the Sunday school, then Joe had an unveiling near Uniontown, Pennsylvania, and spoke on a  panel later in the afternoon, followed by a dinner, through Greater Morgantown Interfaith Association. I spoke on a panel at WVU for counseling students Thursday morning, with a priest, a Dakota elder and our local Imam, then grabbed lunch before my own class. We attended a mourning prayer service Thursday night, for the mother and grandmother of congregants. This is in addition to Joe's regular services and my City Council responsibilities. I didn't expect to be so busy in retirement, and I'm sure it's not what Paul Simon envisioned oldness would be.

The kids at WVU asked about my history, and how I came to be religious and believe in God. I told them my story of coincidences in my favor piling up over time, and how I thought Someone had a plan for me of which I was not aware. I got kind of emotional about it all. At the evening service for Rosh Hashana, my attention wandered, and I saw myself as a child with my parents and at Passover seders with my grandparents, aunts and uncles, in Hebrew School and at high school dances, with my first boyfriend in New Orleans, and that time there was snow on the palm trees. I thought about how my grandmother loved me and worried about me when I lived in Miami, and the times I was sick there, about how I came to Los Angeles, my job issues and many career changes. I remembered again all the friends I helped bury during the worst years of the AIDS crisis: Fred and Art, Hal and the others whose names I can't bring up now, all these years later. I remembered how I wanted to meet someone and leave Los Angeles after I suffered a heart attack and my mother died a few weeks later. And then I saw Joe on the bimah leading services and said a quiet "Thank you, God." No one could have predicted fifty years ago that my life would be what it is now.

I still worry plenty about the climate, refugees, Israel, the United States, Morgantown, how long I'm going to live. I don't have any big, immediate worries. Physically, I'm as healthy as can be expected. I've started running, slowly and not far, after thirty-five years of not running. It's  a testament to the heart and asthma medication I'm on every day. Still, there are times when I am just exhausted, and no matter the time of day, I need to stop and go to bed. That happened Saturday, when we came back from the bat mitzvah in Pittsburgh, with a stop at Apple Butter Day at friends' farm in Mt. Morris, near here in Pennsylvania. 

When the kids asked me Thursday about my spiritual practice I told them the main thing is to say "Thank you, God." I do that when I wake up and when I start a meal, and at random times during the day. I extend that practice to being kind and compassionate to people around me (still working on that), charitable and generous in spirit. 

Joe bought me two t-shirts with funny things about cats for my birthday, and we'll have dinner out tonight. I'm speaking to another panel Thursday morning and my class continues in the afternoon.  At seventy, having lived longer than my father, grandfather and great-grandfather in my paternal line, I give thanks for my life today.

This is what 70 looks like

Art Appreciation

"Art Appreciation" is what it said on the purple rubber bracelets distributed to friends of Art Jacknowitz. Art took up being a docent at West Virginia University's new art museum after his retirement. He and his wife Linda renewed their vows on their fiftieth anniversary in September. He looked fine then, but after a dire cancer diagnosis, died April 18, the night before the first Passover seder.

Tree of Life always has a seder the first night of Passover, held this year at the temple, with a good turnout. Linda and Art often invited us for the second night, and my sister attended also sometimes. By Jewish tradition, the funeral could have been Friday before the holiday, but in modern America, people have to fly in for the funeral, and the funeral homes are not prepared to do funerals on short notice. The rules are that you can't have a funeral the first two days of Passover, and you can't observe shiva, the week of mourning, until the holiday is over. This happened in my family when my father's sister died on the first seder night in 1955. They had to have the funeral a few days later, but could not start mourning until after Passover ended. My mother recalled it as one of the worst two weeks in the lives of everyone involved.

Art's funeral was on Tuesday, the fourth day of Passover, with a "meal of consolation" at Tree of Life.  The funeral was in downtown Morgantown; the burial was a few blocks away, just down the street from the synagogue and Linda and Art's house. We observed three nights of prayer services for shiva at the Jacknowitz home, as the Reform movement allows more flexibility than more traditional Judaism. Our friend Donna, who is not Jewish but has a Jewish husband, put together, with some help from others, meals that were kosher and kosher for Passover.

Art and Linda are beloved in Morgantown. Art taught at the WVU School of Pharmacy for many years, mentored and advised students, and wrote papers on obscure topics, despite being low-key and down-to-earth. He and Linda were raised in Brooklyn and retain the charm and folkiness of Brooklyn in the fifties. At synagogue, Linda is the one who goes up to strangers and introduces herself, making them feel welcome.

There was a visitation at the funeral home for two hours before the service. Jewish funerals are closed casket. As the rabbi's spouse, I greeted people as they came in, and ended up standing in the back of the packed room. It was hot and stuffy there, and, fearing I would pass out, I moved into an adjacent room with a couch, where I could hear Rabbi Joe and the other speakers, but sit in a much cooler and air-filled room. Linda told me that five hundred people signed the guest book at the funeral home. At least thirty people came to house for services each of the three nights.

At the cemetery, I spoke with a young woman who told me she had been one of Art's students ten years ago, and that his career advice to her was spot-on. I thanked her for coming and told her (as I've learned from Rabbi Joe) that going to a funeral is rewarded in this world and the world to come, because the person whose funeral you attended won't be able to return the favor. She told me she is a religious Christian and asked what "the world to come' means in a Jewish context. I referred her to the rabbi. I met another woman one of the nights we were at Linda's house. She was also not Jewish, and didn't understand the service.  Art  told her when she got her undergrad degree and go out and work before going to grad school. She did that, and left for grad school at forty, coming back to Morgantown with a PH.D. and a teaching position at WVU. She was also grateful for Art's advice.

Most of the people at the services were in their seventies, long-time friends from the synagogue or from WVU, or just neighbors who knew Art and Linda. Art's brother, who came from Long Island to be with Linda, spoke at one of the evening services. He said he had no idea there was such a wonderful community of people here in Morgantown, so kind and so loving.

What I saw at the funeral and the house of mourning was grief over Art's death, and sympathy for Linda. But I also saw fear. People have had brushes with cancer and heart disease, wear hearing aids or have had cataract surgery. In one's seventies (five months away for me) death becomes a part of  life. It's east to think "Am I next?" We all looked at each other as Art's brother praised our community. It is a great group of people. Joe and I came late, only seven years ago, but we have been made to feel at home. I looked around the room and thought  "Who of us will be here in ten years?" I had to push that thought back and think about being kinder, more modest, helpful to others. I want to live up to the standards of the community at Art's funeral, and to continue to live by those standards, for as long as I can.

Charlottesville

I was in Canada the weekend of the Fascist marches and demonstration in Charlottesville.We didn't watch most of it, and didn't see what a big deal it turned out to be.

We came home, and I watched the HBO video, read the comments from the president of the Jewish congregation in downtown Charlottesville, and read as much as I could.

At the Morgantown City Council meeting on August 15, and previously on Facebook, I had asked for a meeting with members of City Council, the Monongalia County Commission and West Virginia University, and their respective police departments to firm up plans in case there was a similar march here in Morgantown.

I was out last Thursday downtown for an event at WVU, the Human Relations Commission and a social gathering. I took the PRT, WVU's ingenious driverless mass transit system, to get downtown and walked between the venues. I didn't stay long at any of them. Joe had a meeting, and I thought I would catch up with him at temple to get a ride home. Our signals were crossed on that, and the PRT had an emergency shut down. I got home much later than I expected, and way tired. That's when I lost it.

There was an op-ed piece in our local paper that day from Michelle Malkin, a truly horrible person, IMHO. Her response to criticism of the President over Charlottesville was "What about Black Lives Matter?" I also got a response from Morgantown's mayor, someone I like and consider a friend, who brushed off my concerns by saying he was sure the Morgantown police could take care of anything that might come up.

I get Black Lives Matter now, and "intersectionality." I will admit to (generally) being white and "passing" for straight, at least when I'm alone and not with Joe. My parents made choices for me in housing and schools that were not available to African-Americans. I had financial help from my family that a vast majority of Americans of any race could not imagine. I expect to be taken seriously. That's how I was brought up, as a White Male in the South.

And yet, when I was concerned about heavily armed young men with Nazi flags standing outside a Reform synagogue in a liberal college town, I was told to worry about African-Americans instead, or to not worry, it wasn't a big deal. That hurt, not so much the former from Malkin. I wrote a scathing letter to the editor about her, which was published this past Saturday. I was more hurt by the Mayor's response. I accused him in my response of not being worried because he is "straight, white and Christian." "Clueless" might have been a better adjective. My husband is the rabbi at the Reform synagogue in a college town 235 miles from Charlottesville, according to Google maps. And my family had relatives in Poland in 1939, who were murdered by the Nazis. That Nazis marching in America did not upset the Mayor, or the President for that matter, meant to me that my life doesn't matter. And Black lives matter even less.

This past Sunday, there was an article in Morgantown's Dominion-Post about preparations for events like those in Charlottesville. The reporter, Alex Lang, quoted me, but also sought out the local police and WVU officials. Apparently, they have thought about this issue, and there are plans in place.

Tonight, I attended a panel discussion about Charlottesville put on by the History Department at WVU. The speakers were good about putting events into perspective. They explained that many of the monuments to Robert E. Lee and others were placed in the early part of the twentieth century, to emphasize white supremacy, and that schools named for Confederate heroes were often built in the 1950s and '60s during the battles over school integration.

Ultimately, the issue is not about statues. It's about white people, almost always young white men, feeling threatened by Blacks, Jews, gays and women, and feeling left behind, like it's someone else's fault. I asked the panel tonight where the hatred of Jews comes from, and the embrace of Nazi flags and admiration of Hitler. The panelists said that young people have no knowledge of what Nazism really meant, no idea about Jim Crow or the Civil Rights Era.

Some of this is prejudice handed down. I know what Baltimore, where I grew up, was like in the 1950s and 1960s. People don't believe me when I say it was totally segregated, not just by race, but also by religion, and not just between Jews and Christians, but socially between Catholics and Protestants, between German Jews and Russian Jews. The Civil War was still an issue in Maryland 100 years after it was over, and to an extent, still today.

It's late and I'm rambling. The talk tonight put things into a historical perspective, and the failing Trump regime, which encouraged outbursts from Nazis and Ku Klux Klan people, will not last. As to racism, anti-Semitism, and our fear-based culture, our only hope is to be open with everyone about who we are, present everyone with a friendly face, and demand much better from our politicians. I'm working on being a good politician, writing letters to the editor (another went out today) and being open, in our city at least, about who I am.

Manifesto: Morgantown City Council

I opened my campaign for City Council here in Morgantown yesterday. During my campaign for a seat in the House of Delegates last year, I made lots of friends, old and young, in the progressive community. Many people told me I would do better in the city than in the larger delegate district.

The Council has had some accomplishments in the last two years. With a decline in funding from the state, the city has raised money through levies for schools, transit and the library. There is now a three dollar weekly tax on people who work in Morgantown, not the best idea, but absent other funding methods, necessary. That tax and the levies have helped maintain our standard of living. Many of our notoriously bad streets have been repaved, the library (where I am on the Board of Directors) has increased hours and given employees a much-needed raise. The Council negotiated a deal with West Virginia University to get some tax money from the University's public-private partnerships.

Within the Council there have been two factions, one of which tried to have the other removed from office. That was a waste of time, and may have caused our last City Manager to leave. The Council voted unanimously for a new city manager, a good sign that the factions are able to work together.

I want to continue the good things in Morgantown. It would be great if we could get more money from WVU, from corporations and the state, and then be able to get rid of the weekly tax on workers. That will be difficult. I have friends in both Council factions, and I would hope to serve as a bridge between them, if the factionalism continues.

Morgantown, as home to an internationally acclaimed university, is not like other towns in West Virginia. We have a large Muslim population, including students and doctors. My dermatologist and allergist both have Arabic names. The University now has an LGBT Center, and has worked to make LGBT students safe and accepted on campus. I served on WVU's LGBT Equity Commission for more than two years.

In the West Virginia Legislature last year, and now with the new administration in Washington, our acceptance of diversity is under threat. I attend meetings of an interfaith group in town, and with my spouse, Rabbi Joe Hample, of Tree of Life Congregation, have attended meetings, along with many others from a variety of religious organizations, to support the resettlement of refugees. I spoke before the Council, with the full support of the Morgantown Library Board of Directors, in favor of a City Council bill to ban firearms in municipal buildings.

Morgantown is the progressive capital of West Virginia. In today's world, we have to compete with other college towns like Ann Arbor, Michigan, Charlottesville, Virginia and Athens, Ohio, for the best students and teachers, artists and tech firms from all over the world.  I want to make sure we are able to do that.

Contact me at rebnermwv@gmail.com or on Twitter @BarryLeeWendell.

Open letter to John Raese

John Raese owns Greer Industries, a major industry in Morgantown. His companies also own the Dominion-Post, the only daily newspaper in town, and most of the local radio stations. He wrote a full-page letter in the newspaper to E. Gordon Gee, the president of West Virginia University, decrying the Morgantown City Council's failed attempt to block big trucks (typically working with Greer's gravel mining operations) from the city's streets. He also blames the council for banning (or trying to ban) fracking in the city limits. Apparently a WVU law professor helped with the lawsuits.

Here's my response to John Raese:

Dear Mr. Raese:

I read your letter in The Dominion-Post July 19. You raise some interesting points about Morgantown's City Council, the use of WVU employees as outside counsel, and the nature of freedom, capitalism and liberty.

No one is denying the contribution of your companies and your family to the economy and life of this city. Where I differ with you is the idea that capitalism is the only thing that matters, and that corporations have a final say in how things go.

People want their city to be clean and healthful. Yes, the truck ban was heavy-handed, and the courts ruled it illegal. Still, pollution levels from diesel trucks are too high along Beechurst Avenue and in the center city. The noise along Brockway Avenue from trucks makes it difficult to live there. Driving out Earl Core Rd. is harrowing in a car on a narrow road with giant trucks coming at you or behind you.

This is not the Morgantown of fifty years ago, or even ten years ago. We are now a bustling small metropolis, and people want to live in a clean and safe environment in their city. No one is attacking your liberty or the capitalist system. We, because I include myself, want to live in a more people-friendly environment. Perhaps we could come to a compromise. Trucks could be retrofitted to produce less toxic fumes. There are proposals to upgrade Greenbag Road as a bypass around the center city for trucks. I know weight limits are an issue, especially when carrying stone, but perhaps smaller trucks or less loaded trucks could be used that would be acceptable on the Interstates. Maybe new U.S. routes 19, 119 and State Road 7 routes could be built around the city, and the local streets could revert to the City of Morgantown.

As to fracking, in the Dominion-Post  on the same day your full-page letter appeared, there was an article on the front page from the Associated Press about a study in JAMA Internal Medicine, showing that people living near fracking sites were four times as likely as those living farther away to have asthma. Noise and light pollution are a problem with fracking sites, and water wells are at risk. Acceptable ways to dispose of waste from fracking are not in place. We in Morgantown have a right to worry about pollution and our health and that of our children. Our liberty and our freedom are at stake.

My point is that capitalism in our society does not have the final say. Of course it is important, the basis of our economy, but people everywhere generally, including in Morgantown, have a right to regulate capitalism, to make sure our physical environment and quality of life are not sacrificed so some can make money.

Barry Wendell
1319 Heritage Pl.
Morgantown, WV 26505-2426

Depression

On my chart at Kaiser in L.A., it said I had chronic moderate depression. I don't really take it seriously. I think of it as part of life. Yesterday I saw my cardiologist for a second followup to my new stents from the end of September. The numbers looked good, but the doctor asked about doing a new echocardiogram. If the echo isn't better than the one before the stents went in, he may want to put in a defibrillator. Monday, I had a basal cell carcinoma removed on my face. Medical issues could be a lot worse. I don't like to be reminded that I am no longer young.

The doctor asked how I felt and I said "Lousy." Part of that was that my face was still swollen from Monday, but what I said was "I'm a sixty-six year old gay man. How could I not be depressed?" The doctor thought that things are better than they were, but at thirty-eight, and not gay (as far as I know) he hasn't been through what those of us who are older have dealt with.

And of course, in West Virginia, we have our elected officials, who just today (February 11) are scheduled to vote on "The Religious Freedom Restoration Act." This bill would allow people to object to the state for making them do something they object to because of their religion. Rupie Phillips, a delegate from a rural place in southern West Virginia, and a Democrat, admitted that this bill, which he supports, is a response to the Supreme Court making same-gender marriage legal in all states. The bill would allow denial of public accommodations to gays, particularly in couples, because of religious principle. It will probably pass, despite opposition from Chambers of Commerce in Charleston and Morgantown, West Virginia University Faculty and Student Senates, and many national hotel chains.

It was reported in the Charleston Gazette-Mail today that two women applied for a  marriage license in Gilmer County yesterday and were screamed at by Deputy County Clerk Debbie Allen. "Abomination!" she said. I'm waiting to hear if this clerk is fired, but I doubt it. There's lots of hand-wringing about why young people leave this state in droves, but who wants to live in a place like this? Gilmer County has a state college and a population of less than 10,000 people. It is about eighty-five miles from Morgantown to Glenville, the town in Gilmer County.

Our four Republican delegates in our district pretty much think like this. We have one liberal Democrat, much beloved. Had she lost in the last election, I would have insisted to Joe that we move to Pennsylvania, only ten miles from downtown Morgantown. Her reelection, and all the people we have met from temple who hired Joe in the first place, and have been kind to us, give me some hope that there is an element of really good people here. That's who I wish to represent as delegate.

The election campaign is going slowly for me. I have not raised much money. I answered questionnaires from the teachers' union, the statewide AFL-CIO and the local carpenters' union , and also a state-wide anti-abortion group. I didn't agree with the anti-abortion group's agenda, but I sent them a note with their form suggesting that "pro-life" should mean restricting guns, making maternity and parental leave mandatory, increasing SNAP benefits, favoring comprehensive sex ed including birth control, and talking about th responsibility of men in causing a pregnancy. I've been to a number of Democratic Party events and Bernie Sanders events as well. Tonight, I'll be at the watch party for the Democratic debate sponsored by Morgantown for Bernie Sanders. There will be time for people to ask questions of the eight candidates running for five slots in the Democratic primary May 10.

We are headed to Israel at the end of the month for the CCAR (Reform rabbis) convention in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. When I was last in Israel, in 2007, I was with a congregational tour from our temple in L.A. I wished that I could have been with Joe on the tour, as he spent a year in Jerusalem as part of his rabbinic training. I worry some about terrorism, but more about my health, the logistics of getting there and back, and my role, since I won't be attending the conference.

I've been reading opinion pieces from Israeli Jews, stating that the West Bank occupation has turned into an annexation, and an apartheid state. There is not even a pretense that there might be an Arab state in the West Bank, or that Arabs in that area, who are not citizens, have any rights at all. Arabs in Israel proper have citizenship, but there is no official acknowledgement that they are part of Israeli society, not  even an "Arab History Month." Yes, I understand that they could have had a state in 1948, 1990, and 2000, but wouldn't accept peace, that Gaza was given back, and Hamas has created a terrorist state. I understand Israel shares a border with Syria, where a Holocaust of sorts is going on. Still, it's hard for me to defend everything Israel does. Of course, I shouldn't have to. I've always loved the United States, even if the George W.Bush administration embarrassed me. I stii love Israel, just not the current government. I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of being in Israel at this moment.

Meanwhile, we've had more snow most of this week, and temperatures in the teens the last few days. The sun came out today for the first time in a long time, even as the temperature dropped. I am a sun-lover, even as a ne skin cancer survivor.

The Omer period is one of semi-mourning in Judaism. I have my own Omer period, February 6- to March 27. It commemorates that period in 2003, when I was living in Los Angeles. I flew to Baltimore February 6 for my mother's seventy-fifth birthday. I suffered a heart attack on the 9th and stayed with my mother after five days in the hospital, for a week. I came back to L.A. on the 22nd and went to work on the 24th. I came back to Baltimore March 16th. My mother was in hospice care. She died March 18th and the funeral was the 20th. I returned to L.A. after observing shiva, the week of mourning, on March 28.

It helped me to get this off my chest. I will feel better. I always do. I have to remember to look at how far I have come, continue to struggle with today, and be hopeful about the future.

 I wrote this Thursday (it's Monday now). I do feel less depressed, although the weather has been worse. Other delegates have said even more bigoted things than Delegate Phillips, but it has only made me more determined to win this election. I've been inspired by the one Jewish delegate in our legislature, Mike Pushkin, from Charleston, who pointed out that baking a cake for someone you don't like is an inconvenience. I won't share the rest of his thought. And Steven Skinner, our only openly gay delegate, from Jefferson County in the Eastern Panhandle, having to tell the troglodyte legislators that he didn't choose to be gay.

I feel better about going to Israel, although both Joe and I are concerned about stamina and logistics. We will be active voices for change in Israel, as we are here.

Manifesto

I'm working on technical issues for my campaign for Delegate to the West Virginia State Legislature. This manifesto outlines my ideas for the state. I hope you who read this will join in my campaign.


My issues are basically economic. For an economy to work, people must have money to spend. Tax cuts for corporations and the very rich will not accomplish this. West Virginia University is the basis for economic growth in Monongalia County. And yet, the budget has been cut the last few years. To cope, the University has cut classified positions and raised tuition. We need to fully fund the University so that in-state students can afford to go to the state's flagship school. Classified people need jobs to maintain the economic growth of this area.

University employees, school teachers and public employees are being hit with cuts in PEIA, the Public Employees Insurance Agency. Employees will pay more for less coverage, taking money out of the local economy, and potentially causing valuable employees and teachers to leave West Virginia.

The same is true of "right-to-work" laws, which serve to lower wages for corporate profit or executive pay. Skilled workers in the state need to be able to maintain a high standard of living for everyone's sake.

Charter schools seem to be unworkable in a (mostly) non-urban state like West Virginia. More importantly, they remove union protections from teachers, and divert public money to private corporations at the expense of teachers and students. One of our local Republicans proposed charter schools for West Virginia in the last legislative session.

It's no secret that the coal industry in this area is not doing well. We must make sure, however, that miners and retirees don't lose hard-fought for health and pension benefits. Companies declaring bankruptcy should not be able to divest themselves of these costs while paying out million-dollar bonuses to CEOs for cutting labor costs. I have to wonder if these people have any conscience at all. Last year, some safety regulations in the mines were repealed or relaxed in a bill introduced by one of our local Republican legislators. These former standards need to be reinstated to make sure our miners are as safe as they can possibly be. Cost should not be a factor when lives are at stake.

Global climate change is real and affects West Virginia. We must work with the United States Environmental Protection Agency to maintain our health and the health of our mountains and forests. Our university can work on creating jobs to make coal burning cleaner and find alternative energy sources.

I know social issues will be part of this campaign. Sectarian prayer in schools has been outlawed since the 1960s, abortion has been legal since 1973, and same-gender marriage is now legal in all states. Attempts to overturn these laws are futile and a waste of time and money. We all must recognize that there are many different religious beliefs, even in West Virginia, and especially in Morgantown. One of our Republican delegates proposed a resolution to ask for a United States Constitutional Convention to ban any recognition of same-gender relationships. Another Republican delegate supported this resolution. I can only describe this as mean-spirited, exclusionary and colossally useless.

I propose raising money for the state in several ways. First, we should restore the tax money that has been cut from corporate taxes in the last few years. That was supposed to make the state more competitive; instead it has meant that the state cannot cover basic services. We should raise the gasoline tax to cover desperately-needed road repairs. And Mon County needs to demand a fair share of gas tax money. People in other parts of the state have told me that the roads here are worse than in their counties.

In many places there are fees on developers. Homes can't be built until the developer widens and repairs the road where the new development will be. We see development all over Mon County where roads are not upgraded. Could we not implement a plan to make new developments contingent on better roads?

Our economy will grow if we can make sure that the people who work here are making a decent wage, if good jobs are available at our West Virginia University, if teachers have competitive pay and benefits, and if Social Security, Medicare, and the new Medicaid expansion are protected.

I ask for your vote to help me make West Virginia a vibrant economic engine for all our people.

Barry Lee Wendell
November 12, 2015