Sara

Sara, oh Sara
Glamorous nymph with an arrow and bow

Bob Dylan (by way of Dan Dutton)

She was one of those people who, when they enter your life, do not do so politely or with a nice “how do you do.” She was one of those people whose entrance smacked you up side the head as if to say, “Hey! Pay attention! I'm here.” Whenever you happened to encounter her on the street or in a store she always greeted you with ebullience and you knew she was genuinely glad to see you. I always loved those encounters because they were peppered with witty stories and laughter. Her ancestry was instantly betrayed by her accent and brash charm prompting the inevitable challenge “you 're not from around here are you?” The New Jersey manner of speech and the Italian appearance indeed marked her as someone worthy of closer inspection. Her husband was just as reserved and quiet of speech as any opposite could possibly be and I wondered just how in the world two people so different could have found happiness together. But they did and the intervening years have revealed to me that it happens more often than one would suppose.

I have always had an attraction for people who were not cast from the same mold as are the most of us. She and her husband came to live in Pulaski County in the late '70s and bought an old overgrown farm out towards Colo. My memory often plays tricks on me but, as I recall it, the only structure that provided shelter was an old barn which they hastily converted part of for human habitation. That tickled my fancy so much that I was just enthralled.

The group of friends took to the Carrs much as I did and they began to attend the musical gatherings that often were held at one or another's house so often. That girl seriously loved music and, to say the least, loved to dance.

If you are curious about why I chose to write this I have only this answer. Sometimes topics or people or some such thing come to me and just demand to be written. When certain times of year or events come near I become pensive and reminded of instances of the past that hold some special meaning. In this case it was the red shoes. Sara loved to wear the red shoes and they shouted of her demeanor in the way that I mentioned at the beginning of this column. She would wear the red shoes to parties or musical events and they would dance uninhibited in a way that would leave one with the realization that he or she had left quite a lot on the table. But most of us were never able to release that energy the way Sara did.

We are a couple of months away from the 2015 edition of the Master Musician's Festival and I always recall Sara up near the stage dancing, dancing, dancing. I suppose that memory is forever lodged in my mind (at least I hope it is). Sara was taken from us quickly, too quickly to say goodbye and maybe that is OK. I now have enough years to have seen several friends that shared my life be plucked out, some quickly, some not. I am left pondering how it works that they are gone and I am not? Is it by design or is it by some great plan and will I ever know?

There are a few things that I do know. One is the necessity of living each day with vitality and joy. I am so often guilty of allowing things that don't matter to deprive my life of those qualities. Probably Sara had those days too but I didn't know of them and so I don't have to acknowledge them.

There are lessons to be taken from lives lived and, beyond the friendship, Sara left a few for me. I think the most important one is to keep dancing. As the saying goes, “dance like no one is watching.”

Lest We Forget

May 4, 1970 dawned in Lexington, Kentucky just like so many others. It was a turbulent time with the nation at war but the military draft brought the consequences of war closer to home. The campus at the University of Kentucky had never quite bought in to the wholesale protests of the war in Vietnam and campus activities ambled along much as always. Efforts by some activists to engage the students in the protests that had gone on nationally had not met with much success.

Then in a place only a few hundred miles from the UK campus at a small university in Kent, Ohio a campus demonstration had caused the governor to call out the National Guard to quell the protests. The protests were due to a decision and announcement by President Richard Nixon to escalate the war in Vietnam to bombing in neighboring Cambodia after running on a platform to end the war. It was a pretty virulent protest as those things went with some stones thrown and epithets hurled. Then a small group of the Guard knelt down and began to fire into the crowd killing four students and injuring nine more. By nightfall the rumblings of insurrection were being felt around the 

By the next day even the staid UK campus was ablaze with anger at the killings and the mere idea that an arm of the United States government would actually kill students who were protesting what they perceived to be an egregious escalation of the conflict. At first a small group were present at the protest but it steadily grew as sentiment rose to a fever pitch. President Otis Singletary brought the campus police to control the crowd but it soon was evident that more would be needed. City police were brought in to assist and finally Governor Nunn was requested to activate National Guard to help and that just fanned the flames bringing to mind the actions in Ohio the day before.

I had already been called up for my draft physical in December of 1968 and had failed the physical exam. At this time I was living with a friend who was avoiding active service by serving in the National Guard. It was more than ironic to find the two of us on campus in the evening, each one of us on a different side of a hastily erected barrier. The fact is that in Lexington, at least from my perspective, the National Guard did not represent the opposing side any more than the soldiers who were drafted did. Most of them were of a similar sentiment as the rest of us but they had a duty to perform.

The intervening years have erased some of the details but I do recall that someone torched the Air Force ROTC building which was made of wood and it went up like a box of tinder. The culprit was never identified. President Singletary and Governor Nunn were frantic to avoid any further escalation and were apparently open to anything to do so. The University called off classes for the remainder of the semester and ordered students off the campus and that did the trick.

The killings at Kent State had sparked off a national debate over the war in Vietnam and it seemed to polarize sentiment and raise public awareness. People who up until then had managed to avoid taking a position on the war finally came down one way or the other. The event convinced some that change was not going to come peacefully and led to the creation of some underground groups that advocated violence to press the point if necessary. They were few but very vocal and effective.

I think that what one can take from that episode in our history, especially in this turbulent moment, is that there are times when peaceful protest falls on deaf ears and violence causes people to wake up and ask what is going on. We shouldn't be surprised since our country has a long history of violent uprisings. Indeed, we were founded out of one. If we as a people were patriotic enough to consider the well being of all citizens as much as we do ourselves violence would never be necessary. It is regrettable but sometimes it is.