Month: February 2025

Captain Larry Chambers was the first African American commander of a Navy aircraft carrier, and the first to hold the rank of admiral. One of his brothers became an Army lieutenant general. Their mother, widowed when her children were young, worked at the War Department to support them. Even with his remarkable achievements, Captain Chambers is known primarily for a decision he made on April 29, 1975, off the coast of what was then South Vietnam.

The evacuation of Americans and South Vietnamese was underway, but one major, Buang-Li, hot-wired a tiny two-seater Cessna, loaded his wife and five children, and took off in hopes of finding safety on a carrier. He encountered artillery fire and had difficulty getting a message to those on the deck when he did find the USS Midway. Although there was an initial plan to have him ditch the plane alongside, it was decided that it would sink before the passengers could be rescued.

There was one problem: The deck of the carrier was covered with helicopters involved in the evacuation. No room for a landing. What did Capt. Chambers decide? He ordered the helicopters be pushed over the edge. After that, more landed, and they were also scuttled. Many tens of millions of American dollars into the sea. The major and his family landed safely, and Capt. Chambers assumed he would be court-martialed. He wasn’t—not one but two brave men that day.

Second story introduces the term “pareidolia,” a psychological condition which allows people to see faces and other figures when they aren’t there. Seeing a camel in the clouds is an easy example. A face on a piece of toast. A rock formation. The man in the moon. When I recently encouraged the local set of grandchildren to play the game Ouisi, the youngest declared, “Oh, these photos have examples of pareidolia.” I didn’t know the word. The game requires players to match images that appear similar between themselves or can look like two things at once. While there is competition, the point is to develop communication skills.

It is an odd paring, but see what you think. On that bridge, a captain with authority and the need to make a life-saving decision heard his mother’s voice in his head as well as his own conscience. There was only one right thing to do: The family had to be saved. In the face of losing his career, Capt. Chambers did what I hope and assume all would do. The helicopters went into the ocean. I hope and assume hearing this story cheered your faith.

Here’s where I worry. Did it occur to you that someone with different views (Right or Left both) would have used different reasoning to have a different outcome? That they would have chosen career over their humanity, the millions of dollars over a risky landing, the possibility that the message (“Please rescue me, Major Buang, wife and 5 child!”) was a trap? That while your side would obviously do the right thing, the other side wouldn’t? I wonder. I hope I never see what only looks like the real thing—but isn’t.

A quotation—unsourced and unfindable—last week: “You are more important than my views.”

For context and full disclosure, the story came from a podcast called Follow Him, their favorite story of the week. And unforgettable…

(This is in two parts. If you read and perhaps go to a book club, you could skip down to the Xs and give me advice.)

In October, I wrote about a literary prize judged by incarcerated persons. The difficulty with the award centered on the lack of Texas participants because there were no libraries in our prisons. Armed with horror, I decided to submit an abstract for my annual college teachers conference about the issue with the title “Victims All: Restricting Books in Texas Prisons.” It was accepted; the event begins on the 27^th, and, no, my paper isn’t written.

I have a good excuse. (“Excuse” is not the same as “reason” so cannot, by definition, be “good.” It just sounds better.) As it happens, I was misinformed. Texas prisons do have libraries, but they do not have any supplied by an organization called Freedom Reads, “a first of its kind organization that inspires and confronts what prison does to the spirit. We bring beautiful, handcrafted bookcases into prisons, transforming cellblocks into Freedom Libraries. The library is a physical intervention into the landscape of plastic and steel and loneliness that characterizes incarceration.” Reginald Dwayne Betts, the founder, has a remarkable story. Incarcerated for 9 years, beginning when he was 16, he spent time in solitary confinement where books were not allowed. Read his account for details, both moving and eloquent.

The news, however, meant that the premise of my unwritten paper was kaput.

Before moving on let’s look at the winner for 2024 and the others on the shortlist: The Rabbit Hutch, This Other Eden, South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon Line to Understand the Soul of a Nation, Best Barbarian, and The Haunting of Haji Hotak and Other Stories. One son and daughter-in-law know Tess Gunty, author of The Rabbit Hutch. I do own it. South to America won; the prize was $4860 based on the amount Betts was paid over 5 years in prison. Or 54 cents an hour. I verified with Lori Feathers that the 2025 contest is happening. The shortlist is here.

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If you’ve skipped here as directed, that’s fine. Everything above explains something that hasn’t happened but must by February 27. Below, I discuss what I’d like to have happen before May 31.

When I met Angelica Zaragosa, I heard only the slightest part of her story. We’ve talked since, and I would recommend her nonprofit, Janie’s Angels. Her group focuses on children whose mothers are incarcerated. Read more about her programs on the website. She told me about the Women’s Storybook Project, based in Austin. This is what I want to help with: “Mothers earn their way into the Storybook program through good behavior. Once a month, for six months, they meet with volunteers on a Saturday or weekday to choose and record a book for each of their children between the ages of 0 and 14. Mothers can reapply for the program as long as they qualify.”

So, my idea is to sponsor a literary book award like the Inside Book Prize. How best to do that?

• Choose one of the women’s prisons in Texas to highlight. Have participants choose from a list of books for a certain age group. Award a prize to the WSP. (Short title: fundraiser)
• Announce a competition for a new book manuscript. Strict guidelines for a particular age/reading level. Writer who wins the prize would visit the prison for a Q&A. Possibly publish on Amazon. (Short title: innovative writing)
• Similar concept for children of incarcerated mothers. Prize to fund Amazon publishing. Or scholarship. (Short title: youth engagement
• Something entirely different, that you could suggest.

I have funded a literary prize before. Twice. But the structure was already there. I just asked to fund a poetry section. For the record, I didn’t judge. All the poets were better poets than I.

Any thoughts you have will be reviewed and considered. Which sounds stuffy. Let me know what you think! And I will write that paper, promise.

The title comes from the concept of six degrees of separation—within 6 levels, all people know all other people in the US, 7 for the world. The movie with Will Smith popularized the phrase in 1993. The term is based on a short story by Frigyes Karinthy called “Chains.” Very short. Here are some people I’ve met and their stories.

It was the summer after my freshman year at Texas Tech. My future husband drove up to get me in San Angelo to take me to visit his mother in Austin. He’d invited me to the Jazz Festival (perhaps that was the name of the event). The jazz flutist Herbie Mann played. Amazing facility and tone. Here is a recording of “Push Push” from 1971. Yes, I asked for his autograph which you can see here.

At a conference in New Orleans, I met a favorite author, Tony Hillerman. No autograph, nothing much to say but “love your novels.” I recommend them still. He writes about the Navajo Tribal Police via his characters Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee. Cultural detail is the main draw, with storylines that are genuine and heartfelt. Caveat: I don’t recommend the series Dark Winds (2022). In fact, I intend to write the producers a letter of complaint. They make Lt. Leaphorn abusive and that’s grossly inaccurate.

Tom Stoppard is a Czech-British playwright and screenwriter. He gave his collected papers to the University of Texas Harry Ransom Center. I met him at a conference when he was honored for that. His first famous play was Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1966). There’s a movie version with Gary Oldman and Tim Roth, 1990. It’s an “absurdist, existential tragicomedy” which I guess explains it as well as anything. Not only did I meet Stoppard, I spoke to him about Hemingway, one of his influences and on whom I was delivering a paper. Probably too long did we speak. I wrote my thesis on his radio plays, and my director told me to send him a copy, which I’d done. I received a lovely thank you note, handwritten. Hence no need for an autograph.

One more—Stephen Covey. He was the featured speaker at a BYU Management Society event in Duncanville a few years before he died. His Seven Habits of Highly Effective People has influenced many people. One of my friends couldn’t attend and asked me to tell him the work was a turning point in her life. Which I did. I asked him in the Q&A what his favorite hymn was. He said “Love at Home” so we did a brief hymnsing. Nice duet, non-traditional here. The Choir is here. Truth be told, I’m not a fan. Sitting in the front row as I went to conduct the singing was a friend who knew this and gave me that sort of smile that’s a HaHa.

This evening, a friend commented that she’d met Seamus Heaney when he was in Dallas. He was an Irish poet who won the Nobel Prize for Literature. He was one of the great poets of our age. Tonight we had a reading of his poem “Digging.” He compares his pen to his father’s and grandfather’s diffing of peat blocks. The last words are a wonderful description of the digging writers do. According to Wikipedia, “His son Michael revealed at the funeral mass that his father texted his final words, ‘Noli timere’ (Latin: “Be not afraid”), to his wife, Marie, minutes before he died.” Imagine texting a few minutes before death. What had he seen? Remarkable.

I knew someone whose father-in-law taught with Einstein. Another met Elvis. My brother and our friend met (and worked with!) Stan Lee. So many more. Oh—last year I met Andrew Davies, the British screenwriter for the best-because-Colin-Firth Pride and Prejudice (1995) and the Bridget Jones movies plus much much more.

I’d love for you to share who you’ve met if you’ve gotten this far.