I'm Calling Fire

TW: Rape, death

I watch a lot of murder dramas. Hannibal primarily. Criminal Minds. Bones. The Vanishing Women on ID (although that's a documentary, technically). The ID Channel is a treasure trove of shows that make it hard for me to sleep at night, with its spectacularly terrible I Am Homicide with the medium-like tagline of “I speak for the dead.”

Who does speak for the dead? Because here in the middle of nowhere, it sure isn’t homicide. We don’t even have a homicide department. When people die in strange circumstances, we’ve got to send the body to Wayne County.

This blog post doesn’t try to speak for the dead. It tries to speak for the living. 

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Like everybody else in Monroe County, my mom and I watched Danny Clay be arraigned. He refused bail, apologized to the news cameras, and asserted that the death of Chelsea Bruck was accidental and caused by—ahem—some 50 Shades of Gray stuff. Please remember, readers, that Bruck’s clothes were found in a cement shack and that her body was moved from that shack and dumped into a ditch. She had decomposed to the point that, according to the papers, we’re not sure what killed her—asphyxiation, blunt force trauma to the head, aliens.

“He looks so nice,” mom marveled as we observed his profile.

“He’s balding,” I pointed out, because he was balding in a most unattractive way. He was also sweating.

My mom tsked at me, because that wasn’t what she meant and she had expected me to know it, but I am cold-hearted and did not think he looked like a nice polite young man. I thought he looked like Paris Hilton when she got out of jail. “I mean,” she clarified, “he doesn’t look like a monster.” 

Just keep your head down, it'll all be over soon.

I didn’t answer, but I was thinking of a quote I had seen on tumblr: Monsters are real, and they look like people.

It surprised my mother that a murderer looked like a person. It surprised me that catching Danny Clay didn’t bring Chelsea Bruck back to life.

In movies and television shows there is always a sense of justice and peace when the police catch the bad guy. In Criminal Minds especially so often the FBI shows up just in the nick of time to save the life of one of the (usually female) characters about to be murdered by one of the (usually male) killers. The world is safe again! Peace reigns on earth.

In real life, nobody rescued Sierah Joughin—a twenty year old who was murdered this past week—at the last minute. In real life, it took two years to find a man living ten minutes from where he stashed Chelsea Bruck’s body. In real life, there is no closure, just the nitty-gritty details of Dale Malone posing for a selfie with Bruck’s family, the blue and gold posters that read RE-ELECT MALONE SHERIFF on every street corner, bumbling reporters, and the familiar scenes of the Monroe courthouse.

I’m probably supposed to feel safe now. Danny Clay no longer lives five minutes from my house.  Bruck’s body is no longer lying a hot second from where my grandmother used to live. Sierah’s killer was caught days after her murder. The bad guys are put away, right?

Except it isn’t over. I saw on Good Morning America another murderer claiming that his victim died accidentally after rough sex, claiming like Clay that she wanted it; it just got out of hand. Oops, sorry. And this afternoon, on the front page of the Monroe Evening News, comes the story that Judge Jack Vitale is allowing Danny Clay to undergo psychiatric testing and see if the 27-year-old is fit to stand trial.

This is their story, and they’re sticking to it. I was just giving her what she wanted. Aren’t girls into Fifty Shades of Grey stuff nowadays? It’s not my fault. I’m on medication.

We have created a system that allows perpetrators to live free for years and, when caught, to escape punishment for their crimes. This is rape culture. Men—white men—are never held punishable for their crimes, be it the murder of a black boy, a white girl, whatever color or gender or creed—white men are protected by the law.

I freely admit that I do not have all of the evidence or any background to this case other than what I see on television and what is printed in the papers. But I understand that Clay has confessed—sort of—and that when the news asked Clay if he wanted to say anything he replied, “I’m sorry” as he was led away to a second trial, this one for not paying child support.

It’s the same story, over and over again. She wanted it. It was an accident. I’m mentally ill. I’m sorry.

Accidents happen, my mother told me when I was little and broke a plate, but killing a twenty-two year old girl in a cement shack and then carting her body away does not seem like an accident to me.

The blame always seems to rest on the victims, and that is the definition of rape culture. 

            

Danny Clay is behind bars. But in the shadows there’s someone else, more monsters who look like people, people who will claim when they are caught that it was an accident—implying that the dead girl asked for it, that if they were in their right mind it never would have happened.

The oldest rule in the book is Thou shalt not kill. Unfortunately it is a new law that states, Thou shalt not rape. This commandment certainly isn’t in the Old Testament. It’s barely on our law books.

The patriarchy is alive and well in Monroe County. And until we do something about it, our girls will continue to disappear, their naked bodies lying in shallow ditches. And I can’t bear to hang any more yellow or purple ribbons on telephone poles.

I never asked for this.

You can exhibit this as evidence if the time ever comes when I’m not here to defend myself:

I never asked to die

and neither did Chelsea Bruck.  

                                    

                             

I'm calling fire. 

We Should All Be Marthas

We have two interesting Bible stories in today’s readings, both of them juxtaposed. In the first, Abraham spots three angelic visitors in the distance and literally begs them to stop by his house, ordering Sarah, his wife, to make bread, and his servants to kill and cook an animal. Abraham himself waits on the guests.

“Where is Sarah?” the angels ask Abraham as they eat, leading me to assume that Abraham is not a traditional silent waiter but has been talking to his guests.

“In the tent,” Abraham says, confused. Where else would Sarah be?

“Next year we will stop this way again,” the angels tell Abraham. “By then, she will have had a son.”

This, of course, is a notoriously tricky issue, because men have been telling Sarah all of her life that, eventually, she will conceive. But does Sarah see a baby? No. Has Sarah seen these angels of the lord? No. At some point in the coming year, she gives up and tells Abraham just to sleep with her maid already, give her a son by proxy. What happens is that Ishmael is born, from whose line Islam descends. Of course, Sarah is a total brat and sends Hagar and Ishmael away because she has (finally) conceived: Isaac is born, as the angels prophesy, just after Ishmael is born.

What is fascinating about this story, though, is that Abraham and Sarah are rewarded for their work and hospitality. Sarah especially is given a promise from these angels whom she may not have even met. As a reward for her hard work and service, she will have a son, and then everybody will stop judging her already.

Taken with today’s Gospel reading—that of Mary and Martha—this story is an interesting choice. It would appear that humanity is rewarded for cooking and serving those who—to paraphrase Catholic doctrine—“come in the name of the Lord.” Yet Jesus seems to say the opposite to Mary and Martha.

The story begins with Jesus visiting some of his best friends, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, who appear quite often in the gospels. Of course, where Jesus goes, his twelve besties come along, and then that one girlfriend of Mary’s who has a crush on Andrew, and then maybe Peter’s wife or mother-in-law show up because dude, Peter, you have responsibilities, why are you following this guy around Galilee? Then that one guy Jesus healed last summer comes around to remind Jesus how grateful he is, and suddenly instead of an intimate get together of fourteen besties, Martha has a rave on her hands.

Now, women rarely get to party. My aunt hosted a retirement party for her husband yesterday, and she’s having a Baptism party today for her most recent granddaughter, and let me tell you: It is all work and no play for my aunt. Yesterday I watched her get out the kid’s toys and put them in the backyard so the wee ones would stop pestering so-and-so, and then check on the grill, and then run into the house and make sure the food inside wasn’t getting cold, and then greet the latest person to arrive, and then console the oldest grandchild because he had become convinced that a cop who dropped by had come to take him to jail. Today she called me up and then she apologized for not spending more time with me, and I was dumbfounded: Who on Earth apologizes for not spending enough time with the niece who lives ten minutes away because there were thirty other people (many of whom live several hours away) to entertain and feed? My aunt, apparently.

The same would have been true for Martha and Mary. They would have had to wash the disciples’ feet, which would have been dusty and muddy from their travels. John, the youngest apostle, would have complained of thirst and hunger, and so Martha would have had bread in the oven and some hamburgers on the grill. And then one of the wee ones that Jesus loved so much (possibly one of Peter’s neglected daughters) would have had to go to the bathroom, and she wouldn’t know where it was, so Martha would have had to leave everything and show her. Then Matthew would have asked something about income, and Thomas, the most annoying disciple, would have said something to Lazarus and picked a fight, and Philip, the stupidest, would have knocked over one of the casks of wine Martha had been saving especially for a prized Jesus visit.

Sometime during all of this, Mary ends up sitting at the feet of Jesus, listening to him teach.

There is nothing more on this planet that Martha wants except to sit at the feet of Jesus and have the noise stop. But all of her life she has been taught to be silent, to serve, not to complain, not to draw attention to herself. This is a woman of great faith. When her brother Lazarus dies later in the Gospels, Martha runs out to meet Jesus on the road when she hears he is coming and she cries to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

At that moment, Martha is acknowledging that Jesus is God. He can raise people from the dead, or save them from death. This is faith, and Martha has it in abundance.

 But in this story, she goes to Jesus and says, “Lord, you see what I am dealing with. I need help. I need Mary’s help.”

But Jesus says, “Martha, wonderful, patient, Martha, you don’t need Mary’s help. You need mine.”

This is a revolutionary moment. Jesus is telling Martha to ignore the tumult of her household, to go against her training from girlhood, her own instincts, and to sit at the feet of Jesus. Jesus is inviting Martha and Mary to follow him, to learn from him, to become enlightened. Just because they are women they need not sit with Sarah in a tent far away from the angelic guests. They have a front-row seat to divinity, and Jesus wants them at his right hand.

Jesus wanted women in his ministry. He wanted them to listen to his words. Jesus never saw any woman as secondary, as a background, as a work animal whose salvation was conditional on her husband’s. When he died, three woman and John were at the foot of his cross. Jesus knew all along that Martha would be there at the foot of his cross. And he wanted her to know that he saw her, saw all that she was doing for him, saw all that she feared and worried about and wanted—and her place was not in the kitchen but sitting beside him.

I will end this week’s lay homily with a few lines from poem I have always loved by Franz Wright, “The Raising of Lazarus:”

here was Martha…

…He knew

she would not stray,

as he knew which would;

he knew that he would always find her

at his right hand,

and beside her

her sister Mary, the one

a whole world of whores

still stood in a vast circle pointing at. Yes,

all were gathered around him. And once again

he began to explain…

If I Ran for President

If I ran for president, I would choose Rand Paul as my Vice-President. That way everything we did in the White House would be, by definition, bipartisan. Rand Paul would handle all of the finances of the United States of America, because I am hopeless with money. I would have him deliver a weekly address to the American people, because his beautiful face would soothe everyone. 

If I ran for president, I would pardon not a turkey on Thanksgiving but a white deer. I would give the doe a sign to hang round her neck that said, “Let no one touch me; it has pleased the president to set me free.” Throughout the ceremony I would cackle and surreptitiously watch my iPhone, because I would have a poll going on Twitter to see how many Americans knew what I was doing. I would take the sign off after the ceremony, though, because deer don’t need collars. 

If I ran for president, I would agitate for more women in sports. I would personally go to each of the U.S. women’s soccer team games until everybody was watching girls in sport and getting more excited about women’s games then men’s games. I would have ESPN change the names of their channels, so when the men played it would say UEFA MEN’S SOCCER, so there was no default “an athlete is male, but a female athlete isn’t.” I would also champion, in the spirit of my bipartisan presidency, a sports team that was co-ed, because the idea that men and women can’t play together in sport is just stupid. I would phrase it that way in the bill I presented, too. “Just stupid.” 

If I ran for president, I would throw around acronyms like “STEM” and “HEART” a lot. “I went to a liberal arts college,” I would say, and pause for loud applause and cheers for liberal arts education. “We cannot have sciences without the humanities; we cannot have the humanities without science. Neither group is better than the other.” Chaucer might tweet me. That would be really cool. 

If I ran for president, I would take the time to speak with YouTube journalists once a week, because I have a high respect for many YouTube journalists. I would tell traditional journalists to get over it if they complained, because I am twenty-three years old here, of course YouTube is more important to me than a newspaper that doesn’t even carry UEFA EURO 2016 scores. 

If I ran for president, I would subtly insert reminders that we should not visit Mars until 2028 into all of my campaign speeches. It would be like Dr. Eyster mocking Newt Gringrich and his moon colonies. Nobody would catch it except Dr. Eyster, who would grin, and Rand Paul, who would threaten to quit. 

If I ran for president, I would get a lot of hate mail. Once a year I would publically burn it and dance around the fire. Okay, I probably wouldn’t dance. But I’d make some s’mores and share them with Rand Paul.

How to Read Jean Rhys's "Wide Sargasso Sea"

1. Wait for a very hot day. No, hotter. Hotter than that. Okay. 

2. Find a place that has no air conditioning. This is now your home for as long as it takes to read a hundred page novel. 

3. You should probably be sick. Brain fever might be best, but anything that affects your head will work. A perforated eardrum, sinus pain and pressure, a headache that affects your vision. 

4. A storm will appear sometime in the night. A proper one, with lightning and thunder. You will half-wake and fall back asleep with forks of lightning still glowing on the back of your eyelids.

5. Everything around you will suddenly become more colorful. But also skewed. Everything is so bright and so hot and sideways. It might be the perforated eardrum messing with your sense of balance. Or the brain fever, giving you hallucinations.

6. Nothing is real. Everything is a dream. 

7. The woman at the dentist’s office calls you Autumn. Your name is not Autumn. They insist that your name is Autumn.

8. Your boyfriend cheated on you, maybe. He’s being super vague about what he did that weekend you visited your best friend, and now he won’t kiss you. 

9. For future reference your best friend’s advice on your love life is super worthless. 

10. There are ghosts living in your not-house. You saw them last night when you were not-sleeping. Also, you think you had a son at one point. That might have been a dream. 

11. You’re going to wake up. You’re going to wake up. 

12. Lightning strikes. A fire starts somewhere. You die, but not literally. It’s a metaphor. 

13. Start praying for a break in the heat wave or another ice age. Doesn’t matter which at this point. You haven’t slept in three days.