Knuckleballers, Vice Presidents, Great Souls Like Eleanor Roosevelt

Friday, November 7th, 2003

Aye, and 'tis indeed a great day to be alive this beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful one is crisp and calm Dakota. I'm snug before the fireplace, no chills or shakes, and ready for rosy-fingered dawn and a productive day before my lovin' spouse wends us eastward for a Roto-rooter job on my bile duct and more tests this Monday and Tuesday next - and then possibly further treatment in an effort to shirk this insidious invader. 'Twill be something of a hardship on spouse, Leslie - traveling on a weekend without conservative talk radio to listen to and become outraged about. She's been mighty lonesome without Rush - 'tis talk radio that gets her on down the road. 'Tis easy for me, sitting there in the passenger seat - I can listen to music on my earphones, sleep, read - 'tis the easiest of passages.

There's wondrously brilliant light that continues to shine from the faces of some who completed their journeys here in the middle world on this day - including the great Russian novelist Tolstoy (1910), Eleanor Roosevelt (1962), John Nance Gardner (1967), and English writer Lawrence Durrell (1990). And this is the day in 1972 that Senator George McGovern and his running mate, R. Sergeant Shriver, father of yesterday's birthday girl, Maria, lovin' wife of Arnold Swarzenegger, were whupped soundly so President Richard Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew - the Nixon-Agnew team got just the weest bit more than 30 percent of the vote garnered by the McGovern-Shriver team. Within short years, both would leave office in utter disgrace. Such is the nature, atimes, of great victories. John Nance Gardner was Franklin Roosevelt's first running mate - he found nothing that great in the job he won. Also known as Cactus Jack Gardner, the man who helped FDR get into the White House lived to be almost ninety-nine - and he quite a career before his stint as Vice President, which he dismissed as not being "worth a pitcher of warm piss." I like fellows like Gardner, who aren't afraid to say what they really think of where they find themselves. He had served for thirty years in House as a U.S. Representative from Texas, including being the Speaker when he was tapped to help get FDR elected. Gardner was a rather conservative sort who had supported a graduated income tax and had opposed with considerable vigor the Klu Klux Klan. But there were aspects of the New Deal he found to be too much government - and he was most upset with FDR's running for a third term - in fact, he ran against him after serving eight years as his vice president. FDR triumphed, of course - and triumphed again on this day in 1944 when he won a fourth term as president.

FDR's wife, who completed her passage in the middle world at age seventy-six and outlived her husband by nearly two decades, did more in a spectacularly quiet and effective way to reach out to Americans suffering during the Great Depression than anyone else. Always smiling, she dignified the lives of all those she met. What a great gift - 'twas what Democratic candidate Howard Dean hoped to do rhetorically by saying he wanted to embrace those driving pickups with the Confederate flag on the back, Eleanor Roosevelt always did in fact, without fanfare. She worked tirelessly for programs to help youth, hard-pressed farmers, African Americans - go here for a summary of how great her contribution was to greater human dignity and recognition of all Americans as worth of respect and equal access to opportunity in our social compact. One of FDR's Brain Trust members, Rexford Tugwell, gave an indication of the power of this remarkable woman - "No one who ever saw Eleanor Roosevelt sit down facing her husband, and, holding his eye firmly, say to him, 'Franklin, I think you should . . .' or, 'Franklin, surely you will not . . .' will ever forget the experience. . . . It would be impossible to say how often and to what extent American governmental processes have been turned in new directions because of her determination."

There are many great souls, women and men would like to have known, born on this day - November 7 must be among the best of days to be born or to die. Among those I would toast this morning with a swig of grape juice is Joe Niekro, knuckle-balling brother of Phil, who also played for years in the Majors. Joe turns fifty-nine today - he played with seven teams, including a stint with the loathsome New York Yankees before playing with my beloved Minnesota Twins - he was with them when they won the World Series in 1987. Happy Birthday, Joe! And a happy birthday to seventy-seven-year old opera singer Joan Sutherland - what a great legacy and what a gift to her generations and dozens of those who will follow, a voice that brings chills of the best possible kind.

Can't tell you how great it is to be alive and feeling in pretty fine fettle, all things considered. I'm not quite sure whether the long life and legacy of Billy Graham should be celebrated by folks of my ilk - he turns seventy-five today. As you know, I have the weest bit of a problem with those who believe they have cornered truth - and Graham's either the Jesus way I'm preaching or hell, take your choice - bothered me even as a youngster. But it's more than that - I don't remember ever seeing Billy Graham laugh in all those television programs, have you? One has to be the weest bit suspicious of folks who can't laugh, but then, I have no experience in the kind of burden folks like Billy Graham take on . . . saving the world. Better, perhaps, to be a Vice President. Or worry about getting one's knuckleball over the plate - or enjoying a great piece of pie. Take care of yourselves, kola - but don't take yourself too seriously, for therein lies misery - and it doesn't help at all in doing what is the best of what we humans do, treat each other with the dignity and respect we would receive from our fellow travelers here in the middle world.

Ev Albers