On March 1, 1803, Ohio became the 17th state to join the Union. Portsmouth was incorporated in 1815. Johannes Leichner was born in Germany in 1803. He brought his family to America in 1854, settling in Portsmouth where the hills and the Ohio River reminded him of the Rhine Valley. As children in the 1950s, little did we know that we had the honor of coming of age in an All-American city. All of our many shared fond memories tell us that we grew up in a place that, until 1965, led a charmed existence.
My father and his many male friends were small town businessmen and professionals. All were Eisenhower Republicans bringing home the bacon. My mother and the other spouses were homemakers, raising the kids, cleaning the house, doing the laundry, preparing the meals, and occasionally enjoying an afternoon together at the bridge table in the private dining room at their favorite restaurant.
In Portsmouth, Baby Boomers like myself, born between 1946 and 1964, were the beneficiaries of safe streets, clean homes, excellent teachers and the freedom to roam the many neighborhoods on foot or on our bicycles and hike with our dogs in the adjacent hills and forests.
The men had returned from the war and inherited the businesses started by their fathers. The women married the men they had fallen in love with at PHS. For the children and teens in this town of 25,000, there was a consistency in our sense of well-being and an unspoken affection for each other that finally flowed openly at our high school reunions.
Throughout the late 1940s and into the early 1960s, the dream thrived. Then came globalization and big box stores, and by the late 1960s, the fairy-tale American Dream in Portsmouth was over, locally-owned businesses closed, the steel mill closed, and the massive railroad switch yard went quiet. The shock was palpable and heartbreaking.
In the spring, the Ohio and Kentucky farmers plow their fields, turning up spear points, arrowheads and decorated pottery shards. In the glove box of my pickup truck, I carry a flint arrowhead, my talisman, a reminder, a symbol of the hunter, the warrior, the tribe, the first people to inhabit the shore of the river they called Oyo and we call Ohio.
It’s 2018. I’m 71 years old. I live in Seattle now. Yesterday, in front of the drug store there was a homeless man sitting on the sidewalk with his back against a small tree. I nodded his way and he nodded back. I stopped and reached for my wallet. I handed the homeless man a dollar bill and he blessed me.
He said, “My name is Paul,” and he reached up for a handshake. I shook his hand. Paul was not drunk or stoned, but he was not all there. He gripped my hand, looked me in the eye and said, ”The Bible saved me.” He reached into his brown paper grocery bag and pulled out a small book, “New Testament: Psalms & Proverbs.”
In the drug store parking lot, I sat in my pickup truck and stared at the small book in my hand. I have never read the Bible, but I do have my favorite verse: “The fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” There was a dark side to the American Dream.
Bibliomancy is divination by book. Open any book at random and you will find a message designed by the gods just for you. I opened Paul’s gift and my eyes looked down at Psalm 58, verse 8: “May they be like snails that dissolve into slime…” I burst into laughter.
I stepped out of the truck and walked back to Paul. I said, “Do you have a place nearby where you can shower, eat and sleep?” Again Paul looked me in the eye and, even though he wore no insignia, I knew he was a military vet. I handed him a five dollar bill. Paul said, “Proverbs saved me, but there are a lot of people living on the streets who do not want to be saved.”
We Baby Boomers know that we were born at the right time… at the end of the nightmare of the Depression and the bloodbath of World War II. We came of age in the mid-century version of the American Dream… church, home, family, work, friends… then rebelliously we ran smack-dab into the Sixties social and political revolution… civil rights, gay rights, anti-war, women’s lib. And now, once again, we are forehead-deep in the American nightmare… racism, misogyny, insanity, violence.
Taking a cue from Jesus, I learned to protect myself from our government overlords and our capitalist predators by easing into a vow of poverty, playing out my work life as a self-employed nomadic carpenter: pickup truck, tools, clothing, books, computer… the affable minimalist with a very special set of skills.
My generation, the Boomers, have seen social and political upheaval up close and personal. Once again, we are living in interesting times. The Boomers know that interesting times are a gift, a challenge. Perhaps the Chinese curse is not a curse at all, but a call to action, change and evolution. Keep up. Let your voice be heard. Vote for Sanity.