Ben McKeown

Long time no blog.

Life seems tense these days.  It’s a combination of things, I think.  Much of my stress comes I believe from the general undertone of worry being felt in this country these days.  Just as economic troubles seem to propagate themselves, so does the bad mood that accompanies them.  I’m feeling it.  Additionally, my chosen field - media - issuffereing a doubly intense period.  For the media business, the paradigm is mid-shift.  And it’s painful.  I’ve been anticipating this shift for several years now just like many, many others.  The problem these days, I believe, is that so many of the folks who actually run things in this business didn’t anticipate this inevitability.  As a result, things are pretty much chaotic.  Of course, the debate on why the media business (especially print media) is suffering so much is well documented and ample, so I won’t dive too much into detail.  As it stands now, I am certainly feeling the pressure.

I wholeheartedly believe that this business - the business of storytelling, truth-searching, accountability - will survive and flourish once again.  It will be different in form, but essentially, the purpose will be the same.  The need for journalists, be them writers, photographers, radio anchors, has not diminished at all.  In fact, we need them more than ever in this country.  And I think that we’re beginning to see the resurgance in the demand for our leaders to be held accountable, as well as the demand for the telling of stories.  It’s apparent to me in the way that President Obama has been thoroughly criticized (though not necessarily maliciously) even at a time when many people believe beyond doubt that he is perfect for this country at this time.  Perhaps it’s a result of years of inaccountability and social complacency, but whatever the impetus, it’s undeniable that there are people out there who want to keep a close watch on what’s happening.  This is a good thing.  Though empty criticism and sensational outbursts of thoughtless malice (see: Fox News) is totally unneeded, real, true, pure journalism is absolutely needed.

At this point, there is no shortage of folks who want this pure journalism.  The problem is that the new pool of concerned citizens aren’t particularly schooled in the art of non-biased investigation (see: Huffington Post, Daily Kos, CrooksAndLiars, etc.).  I do believe these types of media have a place, but they should not take the place once held by newspapers.  Admittedly, I subscribe to some of these blogs and read them quite regularly.  Though unfortunately as the demise of newpapers continues to progress, I am more and more discouraged by the fact that some of these outlets, particularly Huffington, claim to fill newspaper’s slots.  It is utterly impossible for a company like Huffington Post to produce pure journalism while continuing to embrace a voice of purely non-journalistic timbre.  In a case like this, every “journalistic” piece is tainted by the residue of bias and agenda, thus stripping it of its legitimacy.  Subsequently, Huffington Post, et al. and Fox News really are hardly different in journalsitic legitimacy, they simply appeal to different demographics.  This is why we need what we used to have with newspapers.

Like I said, the debate on how to revive this function is copious.  Nobody really knows exactly how to proceed.  But I am confindent that one day in the not too distant future, we’ll see it again, revived, more mature, and as vital as ever.  The simple fact that this conversation is now very audible is encouraging to me.

So, me….

In the meantime, I’m struggling just like anyone else with how to make it through the shift.  I’ve seen a substantial decrease in work and compensation.  Finances are as tight as ever.  And like everyone else, I’m not only struggling with how to keep my wallet stocked, I’m also struggling with how to maintain positivity in my attitude, my mood, and my spirit.  And it’s not terribly easy.  I am susceptible to despondency.  The energy I require to keep myself up is great.  That said, it is absolutely worth the work.  I’ve returned recently to a few truths, a few constants, a few eternal verities.

Recently I learned that a friend of mine who also works in the media business (television) had lost her job as a result of company-wide layoffs.  Though I’ve gotten used to hearing about broad layoffs like these in this industry, I was frankly surprised to hear that someone like her - young, passionate, dedicated, and immensely talented - had been laid off.  I sent her a message in hopes of offering some sympathy and encouragement.  In the course of writing my message, I stumbled across something that I realized I should personally be fighting each day to implement:

“I believe that now is a great time to take stock of our blessings, invest heavily in our friends, and get a return on something beautiful like a summer evening or a springtime sunrise.”

These sorts of things happen when I write.  Even in the form of a brief facebook message, writing for me isn’t so much about creating as it is about finding.  (More about that here.)  So when I found this little nugget, it marked somewhat of a revelation for me.  I’ve consequently reconnected with a part of myself I’d more or less abandoned in the past few months.  Namely, I’ve done things like hike, enjoy the sunset, listen to the wind, sit on the edge of the river alone and write.  I’ve turned on some music that I’d let lie dormant for a while.  Acoustic stuff, soulful stuff, the kind of music that is born of those organic, eternal verities.  Right now, I’m listening to “Driftless” by one of my favorites, Greg Brown.  The ethos of this rediscovered philosophy is perhaps best encapsulated in this haiku I wrote while meandering around the river yesterday:

Touch things.  Walk on things.
Experience the sunset.
It doesn’t last long.

So, for what it’s worth, that’s that.  I actually intended to write something today about what projects I’ve been working on, what work I’ve done recently and such.  I’ll do that soon.  For now, though, I guess that it’s appropriate that my writing is about this deeper, more prevalent project - that of figuring out how to live.  I’ll finish with an excerpt from another poem.

Life
its decay, its perpetual forgetfulness,
its breath, so pure, so fleeting
moves timelessly
for time is only ours
and meaningless to god.

Come
beside me fly a moment
North, up, away from moments
stuck, forth, we’re only listening to
rules that whisper and grin,
flicker and then recede.
Be a breaking force against the
course followed, straightening for
the souls swallowed, distilled, in
stillness perpetual, inevitably
still uninspired.
Be apparent, live alive
or lie and die -
a corpse with blood and breath.
Come and with me
move, exist persistent,
restraint-free
You, me, your coffee, our dreams.

“It sure isn’t the same not having you to cry with,” she said in a text message.

It was around 1:00 AM on a Wednesday night.  I was in Boone, North Carolina, she in Washington D.C.  I assumed she was lying on a bed in a hotel somewhere near the Capitol, but it was equally possible that she was at a bar with her father and sister, or perhaps standing outside a restaurant on a cold D.C. street.  My body tightened when I read it.  Suddenly, and with absolutely no forewarning, I felt a deep sense of sympathy, perhaps the way a mother feels when her daughter wakes her after a nightmare.  I wanted to be there for her now.

I wanted to hold her.  And wipe away her tears and reassure her like I know only I can.  I wanted to be there.  “I’m so sorry darling.  How can I help you?” I responded.

She was sad.  Nothing bad, she said.  Just sad.  I felt infinitely too far away.  I couldn’t help.

“Love you,” she said.
I responded.  “Love you too.  I miss you.”
“Miss you too.” she said.

I had nothing else.  If I were close, I would have put my hand on her arm and squeezed gently, perhaps stroked her forehead with the palm of my hand, just held her.

I wasn’t close.

——

I sent her a text an hour later.  “Asleep?”

She responded affirmatively by saying nothing.  I closed my eyes and hoped for her.

As I was leaving I told her, “I really am happy that we ended up next to each other for a while, tonight and at this point in everything…”  I leaned down towards her, heavy, it seemed, like my whole body was a sponge that had been soaking up a dense and watery affection for these last six months.  I kissed her forehead gently.  I loved her, I was sure.

She lay still, slowly breathing, by all measurable means asleep.  I left quietly.

——–

Later, I wondered if I should’ve stayed.  On my phone, I typed out a text.  “Can I come back?  I won’t keep you awake.  I wish I hadn’t come home.”  I didn’t send it right away.  I couldn’t decide whether I should.

I stared.  Into my computer screen.  Into my future, hazy, bright, somewhat noisy, but a bit more alluring than ever before.  My mind weighed the alternatives.  All at once, a battle raged within my brain between what I wanted, what she wanted, what I needed, what she needed, and what would satisfy us both.  None was much stronger than another.  My thumb fixed itself atop the “send” button on my phone, its pressure increasing, decreasing, increasing; the tiniest intensification in pressure would easily forward my message.  I waited.  My thumb grew sore.  Then in an instant, the pressure, by no deciding of my own, perhaps simply as a result of my expanding anxiety, became too heavy for the button’s resistance.  The message sent.

I set the phone down on my desk.  No response.  I hadn’t considered this scenario, actually.  She was asleep.  The text, as the case most often is, did not wake her up.

She’d see it in the morning, I realized.  And with that, I relegated my night to a more dispassionate level and retired from the bother of too much thought.

A couple
a man, a woman
Alive today, strolling smiling
through the corridor of the prism of
history
I see Today becoming
Forever
I see Washington, Jefferson,
Lincoln, Roosevelt, Kennedy -
Obama.

Hand in hand and slowly
in my mind they walk
and wave not fading so much as
transcending,
the warm and brilliant light of
eternity
casting their hopeful image on the
photographic paper of benevolent
immortality.

Change awakens.

—————

Yesterday for me was in a word, intense.  In a way that I don’t believe I have ever experienced, the events of yesterday made me feel proud.  Intensely proud.  I felt good, deeply good, stirred somehow.  The feeling was so intense, in fact, that I have yet to completely emerge from the moment.  Each wonderful photo I find online brings me again close to wonderfully joyful tears.  It’s truly as if the energy of the millions on Washington’s National Mall somehow reached me; I finally feel it: We.

We.  My country, my community, my neighbors, the strangers I see each day, my world… We.  Yesterday brought beautiful expansion to a far too empty concept.  We.

We did something amazing.  Really, amazing.  We crossed a bridge.  Built one, in fact!  We grew, we learned.  We - we - proved that humanity, as it happens, does have the ability to progress, to never be satisfied with injustice, to truly flourish.  It is this collective energy, this human ability that embodies for me what I feel is truly divine.  We.

Still now words seem pitifully insufficient.  I don’t feel remotely close to able to articulate the deep and raw elation I feel.  I do feel strongly compelled, however, to document these raw feelings, even if only for my own future recollection.  There were a series of glowing moments yesterday that truly resonated with me.

As the inauguration ceremonies began, I felt that my feelings came too quickly to rely on memory for recording.  I decided to write, moment by moment, what I was experiencing:

It’s the second time in a few months when I am simply overwhelmed with the gravity of the moment.  I want to write about it, I want to record it for posterity, but I am simply too full.  I am lost in enormity of this morsel of time, which I believe will forever glow as purely monumental.

There are over a million people standing on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.  I am seated comfortably on my couch watching the events on TV.  It’s snowing outside.  It feels good.
11:00 AM
I feel like we are seeing a regular citizen move into the White House.  It’s a wonderful, American feeling.
11:12 AM
Just saw Al Gore walk through the Capitol Building.  Amazing that 8 years ago, he should have actually been the president.  What, I wonder, would have happened if the supreme court hadn’t decided in favor of Bush?
11:15 AM
Bill and Hillary walking through the Capitol Building.  They were preceded by George H.W. Bush, Walter Mondale, Al Gore, Dan Quayle, Jimmy Carter, among others.  This is a venerable parade of modern American history.  Simply phenomenal.
11:19 AM
The wide shot of the National Mall really makes me realize how monumental this event is.  Words simply cannot describe it.  Bryan is there.  We are all a part of something simply incredible.
11:22 AM
Bill and HIllary just introduced to the crowd.  Big ovation.  I just asked Philip what will happen when George W. Comes through.  This is incredible.  History books are literally being written.
11:25 AM
They showed a shot of the movers at the White House.  Cardboard boxes being unloaded from white moving trucks.  I thought for a moment about how it must be terrible to not be able to watch the inauguration ceremonies for those movers, then I quickly realized what an absolute honor it must be for those workers.  They are as much a part of anything as anyone.
The Obama girls and their grandmother just walked through the capital building.  I hardly have words to describe my feeling.  I gasped.  So proud.  I will vote for one of them for president in several years.
11:30
Malia just pulled a digital camera out of her pocket.  Again, I feel like we have elected a real, authentic, and humble family.  We can absolutely relate to these folks.  We can relate.
11:32 AM
George Bush and Dick Cheney walking through the capital.  Cheney in a wheelchair.  He was rolled to the side, Bush left alone to walk at the back of the line.  No one speaking.   We have been waiting a long, long time to see this.  They are leaving.  They are being asked to leave.  It is peaceful, it is based on the consensus of the majority.  History is being made as he walks, and to the undeniable vindication of many, it is absolutely not redeeming him.
11:35 AM
Cheney now being wheeled through to the platform.  He looks old and quite honestly decrepit in his wheelchair.
Bush and Cheney just introduced to the crowd.  See my above thought for reaction.
11:36 AM
A purely beaming Joe Biden is now walking through the Capital.  Again, I am proud.
11:38 AM
The first shot of Barack Obama as he walks through the capitol building.  He is solitary.  He looks pensive.
The camera pans across the enormous crowd on the Mall.  I am breathless.  Just breathless.  My heart is beating faster… he will be introduced in just a moment.  I am not sure I’ll be able to write it…
11:42 AM
A woman in the crowd is holding a sign that simply says “Wow”.  Perfect.
11:44 AM
He is introduced.
The crowd.  They represent him.  He represents them.  This election is not about those gathered at the Capitol Building.  This election is about what Lester Hold described as the “roar” that just echoed across the entire country.
11:46 AM
Got a text message from my mom that says “Really proud to be an American.”  I respond, “Me too.”  I am near tears.
11:50 AM
Rick Warren delivers the invocation.  It is passionate, it is humble.  “May we have a new birth of clarity in our aims.”  Today is a day of acceptance, of understanding, of humility, of progress.
11:54 AM
Aretha sings My Country Tis of Thee.  Chills.  I say Amen.
“Let Freedom Ring.”  Again, Amen.
11:51 AM
Joe Biden is sworn in.  Cheney, I realize, will never again be Vice President.  Wow.
11:59 AM
I am truly thankful for the ritual, for the ceremony.
12:01 PM
Yo Yo Ma (and others) play an original John Williams composition.  It is beyond beautiful.  I hear myself think “God Bless America.”
12:04 PM
The music made me truthfully breathless.  I am breathing heavily.
Dianne Feinstein introduces Barack Obama.  I am completely transfixed.

I watched the speech enraptured.  Later, I wrote this…

I remember these moments from the speech:
- holding back tears in the presence of Philip (my roommate)
- Dad texts me “Really proud to be an American.”; I respond “Amen, amen, amen!”
- The image of a helpless George Bush watching with an expression that looked reflective, small, and a bit frightened.
- From the perspective of the Capitol, the throngs upon throngs of admirers and American pilgrims are a part of an image of history in composition.
- Joseph Lowery’s benediction left me spiritually overflowing.

Finally, while I was sitting in the quiet press room at Cameron Indoor Stadium, I wrote the above poem.  It’s obviously too soon to truly recount in any organized fashion, as indicated by my formless sputterings here, but I feel I should at least try.  As the moment drifts into the past, perhaps my analysis will become more astute, more describable, more concrete.  Now though, I still feel elated.

And I am hopeful.