culchiewoman's Open Salon Blog

Yes, Girls Can Play with Electronics: Ode to Smokin' Joe

Fri, 10 Jun 2011 23:06:48 -0400

He was mine through adoption, but somehow we developed a bond closer than most related by blood. Maybe it was because I retained some dim memories of my birthmother, having been with her in the mother-baby home for nearly two years. So relations with my adoptive mother were rather restrained. Yet with my dad, I had no early-memory dad, hence no handicap.

He was one of those never-endingly patient people. Phillies blunt propped in the corner of his mouth (some people claimed they didn't recognize him without the stogie), he'd calmly watch me deconstruct the Emerson stereo I received at age 12 for Christmas (at his request) , then put it back together. It was a passion we shared, playing with electronics and gizmos. And he was a giving and equal-opportunity tutor at a time when girls weren't supposed to be interested in gadgets or computers. My brother never showed such interest, and my dad had a willing and apt pupil in me. So he figured, what's the difference? Fair due to my mom as well, as she never thought it was unsuitable nor would she suggest I'd be better suited for nursing, teaching or any of the other 'acceptable' occupations for women.

So I went into the fledgling electronic banking industry and continued to nurture a love for computers, computer science and engineering.

My dad was a master plumber and HVAC guy; his family business, so it was an expected career path for him. And he was a genius at his work, not to mention adored by his customers. No panicked call about a burst pipe was too late at night. And he always wiped out bills for customers he knew couldn't afford it.

But his real love was electronics, electricity and anything that was cutting-edge. As a high school senior, he built his own LP recording system and would record hilarious, sodden family parties on 78s. In 1948 he built his own 10" TV with cabinet, followed in the late 1950's by a full stereo and tape recording system with built-in cabinet that lasted until his death. He owned the "latest" 16mm movie camera (and those old home movies are still far superior, even now converted digitally, to 8mm or Super8) and spent countless hours capturing my brother and I -- summers at the NJ shore, religious milestones, birthdays, mock rock bands, and the sun setting over the sunken concrete ship off Cape May Point. Always with the ubiquitous stogie in his mouth. I look at photos of him as a young man, in his somehow chic surf jams (circa 1958), Ray Bans perched on his nose and still think he was the coolest guy in the world.

He was a reluctant disciplinarian, leaving the yelling and punishment to my mom. I recall one night, I had committed some infraction that I don't even remember and my mom finally put her foot down, saying, "Joe, you have to give her the belt!"

So my dad marched me into my room, took off his belt and put his finger to his lips. He made an "S" of the belt and whispered, "When I snap this, cry 'ouch'." I obeyed as he snapped it twice, adding a little Sarah Bernhardt for good measure.

He also had a passion for theatrical technical directing. When I was a little girl, he'd take me backstage at a local Catholic girls high school where he volunteered, place me under the watchful eye of the nuns there, and then produce the most amazing special effects, direct the lighting crew and engineer LP recordings of the performances, which I still treasure today.

No small wonder that under this tutelage (along with a dose of nature, not nurture -- both my birthparents were singers who gave me the ability to sing and dance without kicking out chaser lights), I threw myself into high school theatre when I came of age. And as serendipity would have it, my freshman year I learned that the teacher who'd been managing the stage crew was retiring and they were desperate for a replacement. Of course, I went straight home and asked my dad. Of course, he said he'd do it. And of course, my mom was furious because now she'd have many a night of missing father AND daughter. But it was our special time together.

Long after I graduated, he continued working at my alma mater, becoming fast friends with the priest who directed our productions, Father Sabatini. Sab and my dad were inseparable. My mom stopped calling herself "the plumbing widow" and now referred to herself as "the theater widow."

When I entered the working world, my dad used to drive me in his copper pipe-smelling station wagon (he preferred it over his work trucks) to the train, then meet me when I came home, the two of us stopping at the local for a quick shot and a beer. We always caught hell from mom, but the relaxed conversation and 'special time' was worth it. Two peas in a pod.

Life moved on and I moved to Florida to advance my career. I was married, by Father Sab, of course; danced with dad (who stepped on my train as we walked up the aisle, but no matter) and delighted in the attention he showered on his small grandchildren when we'd come north to visit. One of my favorite photos shows my dad and my then 2 yr-old daughter (in her little summer watermelon dress), bent at the waist watering flowers together. It makes me cry every time I look at it.

In October 1989, I received "the" call from a hospital in Philadelphia. My dad had suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage and it didn't look good. They were keeping him on life support until my brother and I could organize flights up from Florida. When we arrived, my mom was panicked...she didn't want to make the decision to remove my dad from life support. But my brother and I knew...we knew the sallow, puffy man lying connected to tubes was just a husk. There was no need for tubes and oxygen. The true spirit of the man hovered somewhere near, and I swear I could smell cigar smoke.

My brother and I went out in the hallway to discuss the best way to bring my mom around and as we chatted, I could see a small figure clad in black bustling up the hallway. I thought I was hallucinating. Having not seen him since my wedding 5 years prior, unbelievably, Father Sabatani was moving towards us. When he realized who we were, there were a few confused moments where I thought he'd been called by my mom, and he couldn't figure out what the hell my brother and I were doing there. As it turned out, Sab happened to be at the hospital attending a weight management seminar. He'd no idea what had happened to my dad. Serendipity strikes again. So now we had the best person possible available to help ease my mother into letting go of her husband, our father.

His end was fitting. He died with his 'boots on,' working on a furnace in the basement of an art gallery. When his sister, who worked in their office, called the gallery after my dad hadn't checked in for hours, they learned he had suffered his hemorrhage there. He and my mom were to spend their 32nd wedding anniversary visiting us in Florida that month...my mother had just picked up the plane tickets from the travel agency that morning. And it was the first full vacation he'd taken in nearly 10 years. The nearest to "time off" he'd taken since we were little kids, was an occasional weekend at my aunt and uncle's Pocono retreat, and he was usually working on their sump pump or some other plumbing issue.

We said our goodbyes, observed all the usual Catholic rituals of grief and mourning, led by the grief-stricken-himself Father Sab. I remember being astounded as more than 1,000 mourners poured through the viewing. Many were young people, girls and boys, who told me, "Your dad got me a job working on broadway...", "Your dad inspired me to become an electrician...". Some were older fellows, grizzled Irishmen who whispered, "Your dad gave me a job when I first came over..." Endless paeans to his patient mentoring and his generosity of spirit.

He's with me still. On two occasions, I've smelled that distinctive Phillies blunt cigar smoke. The first was innocuous: I was sitting with a co-worker up in the light booth of the auditorium at the university where I worked, chatting about theater. Suddenly, there it was. And my co-worker noticed it before I did. "Who the hell's smoking a cigar up here?" We looked about for the perp, but I knew deep down that the perp was hovering just over my shoulder, enjoying the conversation and the milieu.

A few years later, I caught the second whiff under much more dire circumstances. I was at the bitter end of a horrible, abusive marriage and my late, estranged and deranged husband had broken into my home, pointing a .357 in my face. I suffered through a 6-hour siege of craziness with him ranting and threatening everything from murder to suicide to both. After the initial extreme shock, the attempts to calm him and reason with him, I suddenly felt an enormous wave of peace come over me and there it was...the unmistakable aroma of cigar smoke. Throughout the ordeal of being held hostage by my husband, we had long gone through whatever supply of cigarettes we each had. So I knew it wasn't any lingering smoke from us. My husband knew it, too. "Why do I smell cigar smoke" he asked agitatedly. I just smiled serenely, knowing whatever the outcome, I would survive and my kids would be unharmed. Dad was there.

An hour later, my husband shot himself sitting next to me on the couch. I caught the exiting end of the bullet in my jaw. Some messy surgery and weeks of recuperation ensued, but I survived. The scar I bear and missing teeth are testimony to the gentle spirit who watched over me and let me know he was there.

Dad, I owe you everything I am. The genetics I carry may not be yours, but the life force within me is. "Smokin' Joe" is always hovering just over my shoulder, the aroma of cigars always gently wafting around me.

Happy father's day, Dad. I'm smokin' one for you tonight.

The Little NGO That Could

Fri, 10 Jun 2011 22:06:31 -0400

I just could not be more proud of the little NGO, Justice for Magdalenes, I co-founded back in 2003 with two other colleagues, no funding (a €26 account balance as we speak) and with less than a David-sized slingshot against a Goliath made of the Irish State and the Catholic Church. But on Sunday, June 5, the United Nations made that slingshot and ammunition bigger. Tons of international press followed. A tepid statement of "cooperation" was released by CORI (the Conference of Religious in Ireland, representing the four religious orders who operated Magdalene Laundries)...holy rhetoric, Batman! But's it a start. And it proves justice is possible for the most marginalised of Irish society. The press release we issued June 6 says it all:

The UN Committee Against Torture (UNCAT) issued its “Concluding Observations” following the first examination of the Irish State under the UN Convention Against Torture. The Committee reiterated its calls for an independent investigation into the Magdalene Laundries abuse and redress for the women who suffered.

It also recommended that the State “prosecute and punish the perpetrators with penalties commensurate with the gravity of the offences committed.” Justice for Magdalenes (JFM), the survivor advocacy group, is now calling on the Irish State to act immediately on foot of UNCAT’s recommendations and issue a formal apology to all survivors of the Magdalene Laundries and immediately establish a statutory inquiry into these abuses.

JFM’s submission to UNCAT, written by Maeve O’Rourke (Harvard Law School 2010 Global Human Rights Fellow), and which includes testimonies from four women who spent time in the Laundries, highlights the continuing degrading treatment that survivors are suffering today because of the government's ongoing failure to apologise, investigate and compensate for the abuse. At the examination in Geneva on 24^th May 2011, acting UNCAT Chairperson Felice Gaer, questioned the government's statement that "the vast majority of women who went to these institutions went there voluntarily, or if they were minors, with the consent of their parents or guardians".

She said, "We had testimony about locked doors and people being captured by the police and returned to the institutions - so there’s State involvement as well." She added, "There were physical barriers and there seems to have been an intent to confine people" and she stated "I think 'voluntary' means that one makes a choice; I think that 'voluntary' means that one is informed; I think that 'voluntary' means that one is then free to leave. I think it means that there is nothing coercive in this context." She asked, “Can you identify any examples of efforts by State authorities to inspect or regulate these facilities? Were they exempt from standards? And can you tell us what means were taken to ensure that there were no acts or omissions that amount to torture”?

James Smith, Associate Professor at Boston College and a member of JFM's Advisory Committee, said, "Today's UN recommendation undermines the government's argument that this abuse happened 'a considerable time ago in private institutions'. It rebuts the State’s assertion that the 'vast majority' of women entered the Laundries 'voluntarily'. And, it underscores that the State’s own definition of torture includes the crime of omission with respect to ensuring due diligence to prevent torture. The State failed the women and young girls in the Laundries, and now the UN is saying not only that Ireland can, but that it must, make right its own history in this regard."

Maeve O’Rourke, who presented JFM’s submission to the Committee, said: ”The UN torture committee has added its voice to the Irish Human Rights Commission’s to remind the Irish government that the women who spent time in Magdalene Laundries have human rights which demand respect today. Having suffered torture or ill-treatment, in which the state directly participated and which it knowingly failed to prevent, the women have the ongoing right to an investigation, an apology, redress and treatment with dignity. I am hopeful that, before it is too late, the government will honour its obligations to these women who suffered such injustice in the past.”

JFM Co-ordinating Committee Director Mari Steed said “Magdalene laundry survivors currently receive no pension reflecting the years they worked for no wages. Many of the women suffer long term physical effects from years of hard labour in the Laundries. All of the women speak of the psychological trauma of their experiences in the Laundries, in many cases the trauma of arriving in a laundry as young girls has stayed with them throughout their lives. We call on the Minister for Justice to implement a scheme in line with the ‘Restorative Justice and Reparations Scheme’ submitted to Mr. Shatter in March by JFM. UNCAT committee member Nora Sveaass commended JFM for this scheme, saying that the State should look at it more closely.”

A Modest Proposal

Thu, 3 Mar 2011 11:03:43 -0500

TO: The Adoption Authority of Ireland

Shelbourne House, Shelbourne Road

Dublin 4

Republic of Ireland

RE: A Modest Proposal

Dear Chairman Shannon and Board Members,

It has come to my attention that the Adoption Authority of Ireland recently met with the U.S. Department of State with a view toward establishing a bilateral adoption agreement that would allow for the export of available U.S. citizens to Ireland for purposes of adoption, particularly from Florida. I understand this is in response to continued insatiable demand by prospective adopting couples in Ireland, who have been thwarted by now closed-off avenues such as Vietnam, Russia and other ‘sending’ countries.

I am aware that these avenues were cut off because of mounting cases of fraud, illegal and gray-market practice and inability to comply with the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption. And that’s as it should be. I am pleased that the Authority took such action to insure that adoption practice is always carried out for the right reasons and in the best interests of the child involved. Adoption should always be about finding homes for children who desperately need them; not about finding children for homes that desperately want them.

But now Ireland turns to the U.S. as a sending source. And while on the surface, one would imagine this to be an idyllic situation – after all, America is a developed nation, one of the ‘greatest’ in the world – unfortunately, as an adopted adult living in the U.S., I sadly know it is far from idyllic. Many U.S. states continue to abrogate the rights of adopted adults. Original birth certificates in all but six U.S. states remain retroactively sealed. And of those six states with some measure of openness, only three offer complete, unfettered access to the original birth certificate (Kansas, Alaska and Oregon). Moreover, adoption agencies in many U.S. states continue to violate the Hague, dealing in gray-market placements, coerced relinquishment practice, infant stealing and trafficking, and shoddy post-adoption services.

In looking to Florida as a potential sending ‘source’, one cannot find a more abhorrent situation. As a ‘border’ (water) state, Florida is a gateway to thousands of illegals entering the U.S., largely from Latin America. And a good part of that illegal flow is equally illegally trafficked children, often outright stolen from parents with little resources or understanding, from countries like Haiti, Guatemala, Brazil, Chile and elsewhere. Florida also has an abysmal placement record even among its own citizens and many agencies operating out of the state continue to use practices such as falsifying birth certificate, allow private, ‘sub rosa’ unregulated adoptions (c.f. Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman), improper vetting of prospective parents (resulting in poor placements which often leave children at risk for abuse and neglect) and, of course, sealing the original birth certificates of adopted adults in the state.

It is ironic, too, that Ireland would look to the U.S. as a sending source now, considering it has hardly dealt with the aftermath of its own export of children to the U.S. from the 1940s through the 1960s. The Adoption Authority recently reaccredited St. Patrick’s Guild, an agency notoriously involved in the past child export scheme and still currently involved in investigations concerning fraud (c.f. Tressa Reeves and other pending cases). St. Patrick’s, along with the Sacred Heart Adoption Society, St. Patrick’s Home (Navan Road) and others, sent thousands of Irish children to the U.S., often illegally (particularly those sent prior to the 1952 Adoption Act). Informed consent and signed relinquishments were given little thought in that time, and mothers were often cruelly unaware of where their children were being sent, or that they were giving permanent relinquishment. Concrete evidence exists that many of those children were used in unethical vaccine trials conducted by Burroughs Wellcome (now GlaxoSmithKline); this investigation is still ongoing, despite recent attempts by the Oireachtas Health Committee to once again sweep it under the carpet.

I was one of Ireland’s original ‘Banished Babies.’ And I have a modest proposal for the Irish Adoption Authority. Rather than risk the potential for fraud, corruption and violations of the Hague Convention and take a chance on ‘unknown’ U.S. children, why not choose a ‘known quantity’?

I would like to offer myself for placement with any Irish parents seeking to adopt from the U.S.

I already possess Irish citizenship rights; am toilet-trained and easily adaptable; speak English well (albeit with an American accent); I get along well with others; and most importantly, I come unfettered as my mother long ago gave up rights to me, is more than likely dead, and even if still alive, because of the shabby, post-adoption trace assistance offered me by my original placing agency in Ireland, I am unlikely to ever find members of my family of origin. I could even pay my own way over. I can cook and clean, drive my new family around and be quite useful.

I promise not to be ‘ungrateful,’ whinge over my circumstances or create a nuisance for my new family. I’ve already been broken of those ‘bad habits’ by my former adoptive family, agencies and the general public. All I seek is repatriation to the land of my birth and I can be whatever my new family wants me to be. I understand that being at least 50 years of age, I may be a bit ‘older’ than what my new family expects. But I am truly in need of a good home – a home in the land where I was born, before being cruelly ripped away from my first mother and shipped more than 3,000 miles away to a strange, new country at an age where I was already walking, talking and had a close, prolonged bonding experience with my first mother for nearly two years. But don’t worry – I’m over all that now, which is one of the benefits of advanced age. In another few years, I likely won’t remember it all. And the good news is, my new family won’t have to deal with me for long, or at least no more than 30-40 years, which is far less than what they’d have to contend with in procuring a newborn.

Most importantly, this proposal is quite a ‘green’ option: recycling citizens (particularly trained, working, tax-paying ones), rather than bringing in new ones to add to the already overburdened Irish economy just makes sense.

I do hope you’ll consider my proposal with all due seriousness. And if not, at least consider cleaning up the mess left by Ireland’s previous ‘export’ business before repeating history, only in reverse.

Sincerely yours,

Mari Steed

nee Mary Therese Fitzpatrick

or whatever new name you'd like to assign me...hell, I'm easy.

Lamentation, Feet-Washing: Why Paddy Doyle is a Great Man

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 12:02:57 -0500

Despite spending most of his adult life bound to a wheelchair, Paddy Doyle is a formidable man. Formidable in many ways. After years of neglect and abuse in the Cappoquin, Wexford, industrial school in Ireland (including continued misdiagnosis and medical experimentation which resulted in his ongoing health battles), Paddy was one of the early voices exposing the extraordinary horrors many Irish children were subjected to under the "watchful" eye of Church and State. His book The God Squad (1989, Raven Arts Press/Transworld UK) serves as the definitive survivor's testimony. It is an unapologetic, unflinching, and often humorous account of his battle with dystonia (which he pithily maintains, "It might well sound like a breakaway Russian Republic but it isn’t") and a life punctuated by abuse and loss. I cannot recommend this book enough – it is so completely opposite the typical mis-lit treatise that it stands apart. You will not pity Paddy – you will applaud this man's iron will and wry outlook on life, despite what that life has hurled at him.

When he was four years old, Paddy's mother died of cancer, and he witnessed his father’s subsequent suicide by hanging.

Incarceration followed in a series of institutions, in which he was not just used with harshness, ignorance and insensitivity, but was also subject to physical and sexual abuse, culminating in brain surgery. He is now permanently crippled in body though not in spirit.

He has used his experience well and is now recognized as one of Ireland’s leading disability activists and has served as member of the government-appointed Commission on the Status of People with Disabilities. Paddy was also recently been appointed by the Government as a member of the Memorial Committee to Survivors of Child Abuse.

I've been privileged to know Paddy through his Internet circle of friends and fellow campaigners for some years now. I've enjoyed many an amusing and enlightening e-mail exchange with Mr. Doyle, and my life is enriched knowing him.

When the child abuse scandal first broke in Ireland, Paddy was one of a very few voices of reason advocating that no deals be cut, no decisions made, without the input of every survivor. "Nothing about us without us" has long been his motto, and with good reason. Many 'representatives of' survivors and survivor groups played loose and fast, dealing sub rosa with the Irish State and the Catholic Church and in the process, sadly rendering survivors' rights impotent. Some have even further perpetuated the abuse upon their own by misusing funds paid out by Church and State meant for survivors' needs.

Paddy saw all of this coming, warned against it and continues to expose it. He suffers no fool lightly. Last week, he sent an alert to his wide circle of friends to let us know a ceremony was being planned for Sunday, February 20 at Dublin's Pro Cathedral – a "Liturgy of Lament and Repentance." Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley of Boston and Dublin's Archbishop Diarmuid Martin were on hand to perform a symbolic "foot-washing" for selected abuse survivors, among them prominent survivor spokeswoman Christine Buckley. Read the full text of the service at the Boston Globe.

The irony of this dog-and-pony-show is not lost among those of us who continue to campaign for justice for survivors whose voices have not yet been heard; particularly survivors of Ireland's Magdalene Laundries and the Protestant-run Bethany Home, who were omitted from the 2002 Redress Act. 'Twas Mary Magdalene herself made most famous for the whole foot-washing thing, now equally infamous for her connection to the Church 'penitent' model, notably as applied to the Magdalene Laundries and their 'penitent' slaves.

Sunday's particular show was organised between the Church and abuse survivors Father Paddy McCafferty, Catholic activist Paddy Monaghan and survivor Marie Collins, who allegedly set about preparing a liturgy in consultation with survivor groups. Unfortunately, this consultation did not include voices like Paddy's, mine and many other good people. Had we been consulted, we would've advised against such a theatrical spectacle, as it does nothing for the very real needs of an aging population coping with the results of a lifetime of abuse, denied education and life skills and struggling with daily needs such as housing and medical care. Not to mention those still left without even a public apology.

I think any of us in Paddy's circle could agree that this exercise scheduled for Sunday was a slap in the face to so many who seek justice as more than a foot bath. And today's press would indicate it backfired in a mighty way. But the slap didn't end there. Paddy made the trip up to Dublin on the day from his home south of Dublin, accompanied by Mary Smith, a woman whose mother had been sent to a Laundry after falling pregnant with Mary. Mary herself ended up shunted off to an industrial school and Laundry. She had a letter for Cardinal O'Malley with her and wanted to attend the ceremony and deliver it to him.

But Paddy and Mary were denied admittance at the door. A phalanx of Irish gardai and Church officials would not allow them in. Amid a group of survivors protesting the event, Paddy told The Irish Times it was "getting to the stage where apologies are becoming cliches."

In the wake of the 2009 Ryan Report and then the collapse of the Irish economy and call for new government, this theater of the absurd foot-washing episode seems a desperate cry by Church (and State) to be done with it all...more of a symbolic hand-washing rather than foot-washing. As my colleague in Justice for Magdalenes, Professor James Smith put it: "It is as if now that the national finances are in the toilet, the notion of justice, ethics, [and] morality is suddenly contingent on the national coffers." And Sunday's service was an expedient and desperate attempt to put close to it all. Many of us are still dealing with, as James put it, "closed ranks and silence" on serious human rights issues: the abuse and unpaid labour of the Laundries; vaccine trials perpetrated on babies marked for adoption, without mothers' consent; survivors of the Bethany Home; and more.

And yet somehow this morning, the ever-pragmatic Paddy was able to put his infamous humourous spin on it all: "The cops couldn’t arrest me because they hadn’t got a van to put the wheelchair in!"

Paddy is the keeper of the fire that burns in those of us still denied justice. An ailing economy and Church urgency to get their house in order (which involves further sweeping of elephants under the carpet) will not silence or stop our voices. And certainly not with the formidable Mr. Doyle leading the charge. Long may he reign.

No, I'm Not Oprah's Sister.

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 21:01:56 -0500

Nor do I wish I were, really. Shit, would THAT get complex. But I wish her and her sister and their extended families all the best. And of course, adoption activist that I am, I had to submit an online congratulatory note via Oprah's OWN website along with the advice that Oprah use her not inconsiderable clout to help other families separated by their circumstances of birth, and raise awareness of America's extremely arcane and punitive sealed records laws. Only six states in the U.S. allow access to an adopted adult's original birth certificate (and under varying conditions; some with contact vetos, preference systems, grandfather clauses — only two who have always had complete, unfettered access — Kansas and Alaska).

I suffered the same loss, of both my mother and daughter, and am happy to say that we also all reconnected, and in a very positive way. It is not always so, and I often caution people to approach tracing family with the "11th Beatitude" approach: blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall not be disappointed. It isn't always a wondrous and healing rebinding of family like mine, or a delightful mid-afternoon surprise on national television like Oprah's. But we all deserve the answers...whatever they may be.

In lieu of a full-on OS rant on the topic, I'll simply post up a link to the recent documentary I filmed with RTÉ Ireland here http://www.rte.ie/player/#v=1089797. I spent a hectic week in Dublin, Cork and Swindon UK (with my natural mum, Josie) last October filming the piece, part of RTÉ's Would You Believe? series. It was initially to air in late November. But with sudden and prolonged preemption by the insufferable face of Irish PM Brian Cowen and the antics of his Fianna Fáil cronies along with a financial flogging from NAMA and a crumbling Tiger economy, the programme didn't air until this past Monday.

It ain't OWN...but it's my own. And I have to say RTÉ has some pretty classy production values.