Being Marginal

John Jankowski

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Wendell Berry

“I’m a Christian in a sense I’m uneasy to talk about. From a sectarian point of view I’m a marginal Christian. But then I’m a marginal person, I’m a marginal writer.” — Wendell Berry

Marginality is something I’ve been forced to think about for most of my life. Like it or not. Whether I was growing up in Logan Square, having to be one of the tougher kids on my block, while simultaneously (unconsciously) propping up my image as my class’s biggest nerd, complete with thick glasses, goofy wardrobe and unkempt hair. Or making my way through high school, working part-time jobs to pay my way, staying on the honor roll, while also being punk rock. Or finally, moreover, as I am today: a traditionalist Catholic with a divorce (and worse) under my belt, and all but devoid of what’s come to be termed “conservative” politics as most commonly regarded.

In a word, I’m a mess. Not easy to pigeonhole, classify or stereotype. Not easy to befriend, ally or date. And since I don’t come with a label, I’m the type that’s easy to ignore. To underestimate. To regard less seriously. To marginalize.

This ain’t no pity party nor an attempt to claim bragging rights. Just part of an attempt to use this blog for what I hope it’s for; i.e., a medium for self-expression. I don’t wear my marginality as a badge of honor; nor do I wallow in the misery it might present. At fifty, I’m not changing. My life on the margins is firmly established.

It’s been a life of adaptation via reflection. And rejection. Despite looking like a freak during my punk days, I never did drugs. Straight-edge all the way. Even though I fell away from the Church in my twenties, I still honored its teachings. Or still respected them. I mostly remained monogamous. Never been to a strip club. Never watched porn. Always respected women, which my “feminist males” on the left merely gave lip service to, rarely practicing what they preached.

The whole “macho” thing never appealed to me. I remember nearly being seriously injured while working at the Chicago Board of Education for daring to challenge a couple of Hispanic guys I worked with to treat their wives/girlfriends as they’d want to be treated. That meant allowing “their women” to have affairs, just as they were. One morning I arrived at work to find my lift stacked on top of a pile of pallets. Another day I was nearly crushed by the two of them via their lifts, ala the Malachi brothers from “Happy Days.” Just for asking them to be a little less hypocritical and a lot more honest.

Same place but a different situation.

Just by chance, I discovered that a janitor who had once worked for the Board was on leave for health reasons. Asbestosis, to be precise. I happened to be getting coffee when I noticed a woman half-crying at a table in the vending area. No one else was around, so I tried to console her by using a little humor, trying to cheer her up. As it turned out, her husband had been an employee at the Board and had worked the freight elevator when asbestos was being removed there some years prior. He was currently dying of cancer, mesothelioma, from what she believed was a shoddy attempt at abatement in the building. She claimed that her husband was exposed to asbestos fibers as workers carelessly and recklessly transported the material on the freight elevator he was operating at the time. None of the OSHA/EPA-mandated procedures were followed, she told me, leading to an inevitable inhalation of the cancer-causing fibers. And now, in addition to dealing with a dying spouse, she was meeting hard resistance from Board directors and had barely the money to afford a lawyer to fight back.

Knowledge can be a dangerous thing. My conversation with this woman had me wondering about my own health and safety as I continued to work there. I ended up doing a bunch of poking around, and via a little research, I noticed quite a bit of asbestos still wrapped around pipes. Much of it was in bad shape, cracked in some locations and fractured in others. Made me a little concerned about all of the sweeping we did in the summer when things slowed in the schools. Was I breathing in this shit?

I brought it to the attention of my direct supervisor and his boss, which went nowhere. They told me that there was nothing to worry about and that I was imagining things. But I couldn’t get the conversation I’d had with that woman out of my mind. I felt that something needed to be done. So during the slow days we had, I went around the building and taped up hand-made signs, pointing out where I believed fractured asbestos was located. That eventually got the attention of both of my bosses; and if I had not been a member of the union, probably fired.

Marginality

Wendell Berry

Bridgeheads: Direct Action at the Rock Island Arsenal

Bridgeheads

John Jankowski

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The Rock Island Arsenal

Not so long ago, more of us gave a shit. Even young people, who seem much more content with i-phone activism these days than street theater or walking picket lines. I’m not trying to be hippie-nostalgic, nor am I wagging a proverbial finger at today’s “apathetic youth.” We had our reasons for doing what we did back in the ’80s. Remember Reagan’s “Star Wars” and “first-strike nukes?” Iran-Contra and the criminal activities of Ollie North, et.al.? How about nuns murdered and even archbishops assassinated in Central America? Or C.I.A.-trained death squads, the “disappearing” of thousands of so-called “communists,” and covert action?

The evils still lurk. And maybe because a presumed-liberal black man with a “progressive”-sounding name occupies the Oval Office, some of the state-sponsored criminal activity is hidden a little better. And maybe, for the same reason, some isn’t. It doesn’t take much effort, however, to find a reason to get off one’s ass and take to the streets. You just need to decide that it’s worth it.

Did you ever consider that perhaps Big Brother would like us all to think he’s much bigger, much more omniscient and omnipresent than he truly is? After all, doesn’t it serve his interests for us to presume so? That way, we self-censor, we self-check any potential thought crimes that might lead to lifting a picket sign, hoisting a banner, or — God forbid — participating in a form of direct action that challenges the walking dead around us to think, to recalibrate what Thoreau referred to as their “lives of quiet desperation?”

The Machine still stands, still clicking along full-throttle. The raging has been reduced to a whimper. Even punks seem content with being heard and not seen.

But it need not be so; and it wasn’t so. Even here in the Midwest. I was a witness. I was a participant. I risked arrest, losing my job, and being alienated from my family. Mistakes were made but regrets were not. It was a matter of not letting history “make” me. It was a matter of choosing to make history myself. With others. Out of love. For others.

Here’s a piece of history being made. I’ll blog more on the subject in the future.

https://www.upi.com/Archives/1984/06/04/About-75-people-were-arrested-today-during-a-demonstration/3197455169600/

Civil Disobedience

Quad Cities

Rock Island Arsenal

Catholic Worker

Anti War Movement

Gay Parrots

John Jankowski

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Peredia

I’ve got nine birds. A couple of budgies, four cockatiels, and a few others. They all share a former bedroom in my house. I’ve also got a chicken. I’m boarding her in my basement until some new digs are move-in ready at a friend’s farm, just outside of town. All but the chicken are rescues. All have issues that have led them to living complicated lives, not all of them injury-related. Most of them can’t fly very well. One is missing most of one leg. Three were confined to hellish conditions for God knows how long, courtesy of a bird hoarder. (http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=9330387) Two were almost meals for feral cats. Despite being messy and at times expensive to maintain, I love each and every one of them dearly, and honestly feel blessed to have them in my life.

One of my cockatiels was a former boarder at a local pet store. She is missing about half of her feathers, blind, and probably about twenty-five years old. Friends managed to talk her former owner into letting me adopt her, following a few guilt-tripping sessions based on the extended stays at the shop, where she was stuck in her cage for weeks at a time and clearly felt miserable.

I guess because of this adoption, these same friends started dropping hints about a pair of handsome Amazon parrots, also being boarded there. But while the cockatiel’s “vacations” often lasted weeks, the Amazon pairs’ stays typically lasted months. And they also seldom ventured out of their cages, which, as you can imagine, is pure torture for such clever birds, accustomed, as they are, to spending their days in a large aviary.

I soon discovered that the owners of the parrots have a lot of money, travel a lot, and also have a macaw, which is boarded elsewhere and for not nearly as long as his aviary-mates. As it turns out, and is often the case, one of the owners of the birds isn’t nearly as fond of the Amazons as he is the macaw. So the macaw gets preferential treatment.

Another discovery: the birds’ owners are two gay men. And under ordinary circumstances, this wouldn’t matter. Nor should it. But it does here because Amazon parrots, like most of their species, are incredible mimics. My neighbor once had one for years, and when it “vocalized,” it sounded just like him. Well, these two Amazons also sound just like their owners, whom — as I said — are two gay guys. Two rather flamboyantly gay guys, I hasten to add. So the parrots sound like, well…. Get the picture? And not only do the two birds sound gay (imagine almost lispy stereotypes here) but they have also latched onto the couples’ musical tastes, which include their renditions of — and I’m not kidding — opera parts and Broadway show tunes.

All of which presents me with a potential dilemma, if and when the Amazons are offered to me for adoption. In addition, that is, to space and cost concerns, which are also very real. Okay. Here goes:

I’m a divorced man, living alone, in a house that I own. I’m not dating now, but I haven’t ruled it out in the future yet completely. I’m clean, in decent shape, sort of groomed. If I were to adopt these two gay-themed Amazons, what would a prospective girlfriend think? If I were to introduce them to her, would she find it all amusing? Once I told her their back story, would she believe me? Or would she think I’m covering something up?

Sure, I admit: Odds are, the birds won’t end up here; but the chick pickings in rural America are slim because most are heavy, and I need to do all I can to increase my market share out there in the dating world. I don’t need a couple of “gay parrots” creating misgivings in the minds of potential future Mrs. Jankowskis. No sir!

Too bad their owners aren’t lesbians instead.

Animal Rescue

Animal Adoptions

Bird Rescue