The two best, smartest, funniest, sweetest kids on the planet — kids who were unfailingly polite at the hairdresser’s today as they they got their hair cut, and reduced each other to helpless laughter tonight as we all played a board game. The boy and the girl are my sun, my moon and my stars, and with the husband as terra firma, we’re just as we should be.

But I would be lying if I said this Pampers commerical doesn’t make me sort of long — a little wee bit — to hold a baby again.

h/t The Hairpin — which you should mos def check out, for it is an ab-fab blog.

I was young, of course, but, for a variety of reasons, not as young as many of my peers, and there is much about the then-me that’s very much still in evidence today.

Upon meeting someone new, I still want to ask them what music they like (though I no longer do). My support for the ERA (remember the ERA?) and opposition to Ronald Reagan were clearly reflective of a consistent if then-nascent political philosophy. And though married, I still go my by own last name — as I knew I would, at age 15 — preceded by my middle initial.

L.

For “Lynn,” since you’ve asked, and I share it with both my mother and my daughter (a brand-new tradition that I hope my daughter will choose to carry on).

Emily L. Hauser.

It sounds nice, I think, has a nice ring and balance to it, and I seem to recall that in high school, it sounded like a writer. My name at the top of papers, at the bottom of letters, wherever it had to appear: There was the L. At the time I intended to become a writer of fiction, and though that changed, the L has remained.

Dammit.

I think that by now, it’s mostly a barrier. In this age of Google searches and instant access, an extra letter not only trips up anyone who might be looking for me, it adds a key stroke (or two, if you include the period) — not to mention adding a character on Twitter (believe me: One character is sometimes all that stands between you and making sense on Twitter). It slows people down, and in this day and age, you really don’t want anyone slowed down if they’re looking for you. I’ve even had one publication refuse to put it in my by-line (to which I wanted to say “You do not pay me enough to change my name,” but you know — I didn’t).

This comes up for me tonight because tomorrow morning I’m going to a TV studio in Chicago in order to speak via satellite with the host of an English-language Russian news program about Israel/Palestine (say that three times fast!). I know I’ll be asked how my name should appear, and there I’ll be, the little pisher blogger who insists on the extraneous letter in her name. Who do I think I am? I’m not Edward R. Murrow! (“Who was that woman on that show today?” “I don’t know, Emily Something Something. Her named sounded like she thinks she’s Edward R. Murrow.”)

So once again, I find myself thinking of dropping it.

Emily Hauser is nice, right? I’m sure that Emily Hauser the student at Ithaca College, and Emily Hauser the Patient Account Rep at DaVita dialysis services, and Emily Hauser the owner of IT placement firm Willow Quest (and this is just from checking LinkedIn) are all happy with their names and don’t regret for one single minute the lack of a middle initial. (And I haven’t even gotten into the various Emilys Houser).

“Emily Hauser” is a nice name. And it’s how I introduce myself, after all. I don’t walk up to people at parties or professional events and go all middle initial on everybody. That would just be silly.

Yet somehow, “Emily L. Hauser” is also my name. More my name, in a way. Just writing this down has made that clear to me. I may drop the L someday. But not tonight.

And right now I have to go get ready for that TV-thinga-ma-hoozie. Having settled on my name, I think I’d better settle on what I want to say.

The girl had her school talent show today, and it was an exercise in wonderful. She did a dance routine with her whole class to “Dynamite” (the song is much more kid-appropriate that the video would have you think…!), as well as a comedy-dancing routine with one of her best buddies to the delightful Sandra Boynton tune”Fifteen Animals” (otherwise known in these parts as “Bob, Bob, and Bob”).

And it was, in a word: Awesome.

Were some of the kids entirely devoid of any and all talent? Yes. Were there sizeable technical flubs? Indeed there were.

And despite all that — or, in fact, in part because of all that — it was adorable and sweet and a little nest of fun and human warmth at the end of week that has been filled with a lot of Big and Worrying things.

Our school is filled to the brim with love and support, for all the kids, whoever’s they may be, wherever they may be from, whatever they may do. When the sound didn’t work for those two little girls who “sang” and “danced” (and believe me, the quotes are very appropriate here) to “Firework,” what happened? They got it working and let them do it again. From the top. And we applauded all the louder. It was awesome.

Thankfully, my girl’s two acts went off smoothly, and were so universally enjoyed that both were given encore performances in the afternoon (K-2 did their thing in the morning, 3rd to 5th grade in the afternoon — she tells me that the second performance was actually a little unnerving: “All the big kids were there!”), and that’s always better than having your props fall over (…) or your dance partner hit you because you’re doing the wrong thing (……) (Not that I’m thinking of anyone in particular. Or anything), I’m sure we can all agree!

And honestly, any event which allows you to watch kids jump up and down, multiple times, to “Firework” (it’s a popular song among the elementary school set, what can I say) is a very good event indeed.

You just gotta ignite the light
And let it shine
Just own the night
Like the Fourth of July

Cause baby you’re a firework
Come on show ‘em what you’re worth
Make ‘em go “Oh, oh, oh!”
As you shoot across the sky-y-y

They were all fireworks this morning. And it was awesome.

*I did also post this OUTSTANDING clip of Sir Ian McKellen on the old Ricky Gervais show Extras this week. So it hasn’t been all muck and mire, at least.

In the meantime, the World Have Your Say page is here; you can down-load the first hour of the program and listen to it here (you’ll start hearing me at the 5 min, 57 second mark, and then there’s a lot of back and forth). I kind of got a bit long-winded at a couple of points (a thing which should surprise exactly no one who knows me, and/or knows the level of my passion for the issue), but I think I mostly sounded sane, which, under the circumstances is a victory in its own right!

Watch this space for video from me on Russian TV…!

President Obama speaks on the Middle East & North Africa at the State Department, White House Photo, Pete Souza, 5/19/11

UPDATE: I’ve been contacted by the BBC and will be taking part in their World Have Your Say program today – not once, but twice! Whoot! Here’s the website – the BBC streams all their shows live at this link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/worldhaveyoursay/ I’ll be on two programs, during the 12:00-1:00 pm hour and during the 1:00-2:00 pm hour (Chicago time).

I’m not going to try to address all of the many and multitudinous aspects of President Obama’s Middle East speech. As an inveterate MidEast geek, I will say there were parts I really liked (likening Mohammed Bouazizi to Rosa Parks, for one; saying that America “must proceed with a sense of humility,” for two), and parts I liked less (I do so wish we could call the Saudis out for the tyrannical, misogynistic extremists they are… Just once?), but there was so much packed into the speech, that I think it’s best that I really focus on the thing that I know a thing or two about: Israel/Palestine.

I’m going to blockquote that whole section here, and register a few responses, below. Feel free to skip past the source material — it’ll still be there if you want to scroll up and look for something!

Let me conclude by talking about another cornerstone of our approach to the region, and that relates to the pursuit of peace.

For decades, the conflict between Israelis and Arabs has cast a shadow over the region. For Israelis, it has meant living with the fear that their children could get blown up on a bus or by rockets fired at their homes, as well as the pain of knowing that other children in the region are taught to hate them. For Palestinians, it has meant suffering the humiliation of occupation, and never living in a nation of their own. Moreover, this conflict has come with a larger cost the Middle East, as it impedes partnerships that could bring greater security, prosperity, and empowerment to ordinary people.

My Administration has worked with the parties and the international community for over two years to end this conflict, yet expectations have gone unmet. Israeli settlement activity continues. Palestinians have walked away from talks. The world looks at a conflict that has grinded on for decades, and sees a stalemate. Indeed, there are those who argue that with all the change and uncertainty in the region, it is simply not possible to move forward.

I disagree. At a time when the people of the Middle East and North Africa are casting off the burdens of the past, the drive for a lasting peace that ends the conflict and resolves all claims is more urgent than ever.

For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure. Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won’t create an independent state. Palestinian leaders will not achieve peace or prosperity if Hamas insists on a path of terror and rejection. And Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist.

As for Israel, our friendship is rooted deeply in a shared history and shared values. Our commitment to Israel’s security is unshakeable. And we will stand against attempts to single it out for criticism in international forums. But precisely because of our friendship, it is important that we tell the truth: the status quo is unsustainable, and Israel too must act boldly to advance a lasting peace.

The fact is, a growing number of Palestinians live west of the Jordan River. Technology will make it harder for Israel to defend itself. A region undergoing profound change will lead to populism in which millions of people – not just a few leaders – must believe peace is possible. The international community is tired of an endless process that never produces an outcome. The dream of a Jewish and democratic state cannot be fulfilled with permanent occupation.

Ultimately, it is up to Israelis and Palestinians to take action. No peace can be imposed upon them, nor can endless delay make the problem go away. But what America and the international community can do is state frankly what everyone knows: a lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples. Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people, and the state of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people; each state enjoying self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.

So while the core issues of the conflict must be negotiated, the basis of those negotiations is clear: a viable Palestine, and a secure Israel. The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

As for security, every state has the right to self-defense, and Israel must be able to defend itself – by itself – against any threat. Provisions must also be robust enough to prevent a resurgence of terrorism; to stop the infiltration of weapons; and to provide effective border security. The full and phased withdrawal of Israeli military forces should be coordinated with the assumption of Palestinian security responsibility in a sovereign, non-militarized state. The duration of this transition period must be agreed, and the effectiveness of security arrangements must be demonstrated.

These principles provide a foundation for negotiations. Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state; Israelis should know that their basic security concerns will be met. I know that these steps alone will not resolve this conflict. Two wrenching and emotional issues remain: the future of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees. But moving forward now on the basis of territory and security provides a foundation to resolve those two issues in a way that is just and fair, and that respects the rights and aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians.

Recognizing that negotiations need to begin with the issues of territory and security does not mean that it will be easy to come back to the table. In particular, the recent announcement of an agreement between Fatah and Hamas raises profound and legitimate questions for Israel – how can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist. In the weeks and months to come, Palestinian leaders will have to provide a credible answer to that question. Meanwhile, the United States, our Quartet partners, and the Arab states will need to continue every effort to get beyond the current impasse.

I recognize how hard this will be. Suspicion and hostility has been passed on for generations, and at times it has hardened. But I’m convinced that the majority of Israelis and Palestinians would rather look to the future than be trapped in the past. We see that spirit in the Israeli father whose son was killed by Hamas, who helped start an organization that brought together Israelis and Palestinians who had lost loved ones. He said, “I gradually realized that the only hope for progress was to recognize the face of the conflict.” And we see it in the actions of a Palestinian who lost three daughters to Israeli shells in Gaza. “I have the right to feel angry,” he said. “So many people were expecting me to hate. My answer to them is I shall not hate…Let us hope,” he said, “for tomorrow.”

That is the choice that must be made – not simply in this conflict, but across the entire region – a choice between hate and hope; between the shackles of the past, and the promise of the future. It’s a choice that must be made by leaders and by people, and it’s a choice that will define the future of a region that served as the cradle of civilization and a crucible of strife.

Ok, a handful of quick points:

1. The President of the United States has to walk a very fine line no matter what he’s talking about, and even if the above doesn’t represent my hopes and dreams or the hopes and dreams of anyone else deeply invested in Israel/Palestine — that doesn’t make it a bad speech. And in fact — it does not reflect my hopes and dreams. By, let’s call it, a long shot. But given the constraints of international diplomacy and the actual facts as they actually exist in actual-factual reality (as opposed to the fevered imaginings of many), I found this to be a perfectly reasonable, even pretty good speech.
2. Having said that, I really do wish he had mentioned Palestinian children, too. A lot more of them have died than Israeli kids, and they deserved at least a nod.
3. When a President references America’s “commitment to Israel’s security” early in a speech — it’s because he’s going to say something Israel doesn’t like later on.
4. A whole lot of people might not like the fact that this: “Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won’t create an independent state” is true — but it’s true. I stand entirely behind the Palestinian decision to take that symbolic action (or, frankly, what is more likely going on here, the decision to threaten to take that action), but if we are wise, we will recognize it for what it is: a symbol. A powerful symbol, no doubt, a potent symbol, but you cannot build a state with a symbol. You might create some momentum toward the establishment of that state, but then again, the whole thing could wind like those other two times Palestinians announced their statehood.
5. A lot of this echoes or flat-out lifts from the talking points of Americans for Peace Now, Brit Tzedek, and J Street. If the President is getting his talking points on Israel from left-of-center peacenik-y Jews, that’s a good thing. IMHO.
6. This: “permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine” is a much bigger deal than I think people realize. Israel has managed to evade setting permanent borders since 1967, all the while calling the West Bank a “disputed” territory — in talking about “permanent” borders, for two sovereign states, Obama was sending a message: Time for borders, Israel. Real, non-squishy, defined borders.
7. Ditto this (nearly ditto, anyway): “The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state. As for security, every state has the right to self-defense…” Every state. I know he then went on to make Israel feel better by saying that Palestine will be “demilitarized,” but that’s still there. Palestinians have a right to a sovereign state, and every state has the right to self-defense.
8. This: “moving forward now on the basis of territory and security” is precisely what J Street has been calling for. See #5.
9. Re: The Hamas-Fatah agreement, the language is subtle, and leaves the door open for negotiation and future developments (“Palestinian leaders will have to provide a credible answer… Meanwhile, the United States, our Quartet partners, and the Arab states will need to continue every effort to get beyond the current impasse“) — and I don’t know if you remember the last President? But “leaving the door open” has not always been a diplomatic method employed by the President of the United States. Personally, I think we should just sit down with Hamas — but the President of the United States can’t say that. This President has, at the very least, left the door open.
10. The Israeli and Palestinian parents that he mentioned toward the end are both people I have met and written about: Robi Damelin (actually the mother of the lost Israeli son in question – her name confuses many) and Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish. Damelin is one of the founding members of the Israeli-Palestinian Bereaved Families Forum (skip ahead to the 50 second mark to get past the Dutch [I think!] introduction); I reviewed Abuelaish’s book for the Dallas Morning News.

And now that all that’s out of the way, let me get to the single most important thing.

This:

The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states. The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

is not, by any stretch of the imagination, new. This has been part of every single proposed resolution of the conflict since Oslo. Obama may have sharpened it a little bit — using the still-somewhat-verbotten word “Palestine,” for instance (OMG! Can you imagine!) and saying “sovereign and contiguous,” all bold n’ brassy. But bottom line: There’s not a damn thing there that hasn’t been said and written a million-gajillion times.

And yet.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has been doing the “I totes want a two-state peace, golly if only the Palestinians would play nice!” dance for a very long time. He knows exactly and precisely what everyone on earth means when they say “a two-state peace,” and that involves permanent borders along the 1967 lines, with mutually agreeable land swaps. I repeat: This is what the world means when they say “two-state peace,” and Bibi knows it.

So then, in response to Obama’s speech, Bibi calls the 1967 borders “indefensible.”

BOOM.

All the President did was throw down the facts — the facts, not any new plan, not any new demand, just something simple that everyone with two brain cells knows is part and parcel of the thing Bibi says he’s been trying to negotiate for years now — and he got Netanyahu to out himself. Bibi has just said, publicly and one very slim day before he’s to meet with Obama, that he is not, in fact, on board the two-state train, and never has been.

And that, my friends, is huge.

Now, if it will ultimately mean anything? Is anyone’s guess. I have written in the past that this Administration has set an important new tone — and whether or not the tone was new, it wound up being pretty meaningless. So, you know, I am not going to try to foresee what might happen tomorrow, or when Obama speaks to AIPAC, or next week, or next month. It might in fact all wind up dust and fury, all over again.

But after a quarter century of watching the same political theater play out over and over and over, again and again and again — I can tell you: This is new.

And only something genuinely new has any chance of changing the sad, sorry reality that we see today.

I’m on tenterhooks to see what happens at the meeting. Aside from anything else, if we have learned nothing else from the Trump and bin Laden affairs, we have learned this:

Don’t piss POTUS off.

Here’s hoping that Bibi continues to do just that.

This is where I part with the Constitution.

Normally, I am pretty much a die-hard proponent of America’s Founding Documents, and something of a fangirl of the Founders themselves. I know it’s a civil religion, but hey — I’m cool with that. The Documents are brilliant, and Founders apparently were, too.

But, you know. They weren’t God (Gods). The Declaration and the Constitution are not, say, the very tablets on which God’s own finger writ (which were then smashed by Moses, but I digress). Mistakes were made — look no further, for instance, than the “three-fifths” clause (ok, that’s actually the first station at which I get off the Constitution train, but bear with me).

And then look no further than the jury system.

Now, interesting side note: Nowhere does the Constitution actually employ the phrase “jury of his peers” — a fact I just learned, while writing the above. Nowhere.

Juries are mentioned, however, three times — in Articles V, VI and VII:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury… In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state… In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved…

A) twenty dollars – heh! and B) like I said, I am generally a big fan of the Constitution.

But come on, Founders! People are stupid! Like, as a rule!

And I know you knew that, because you built all KINDS of safeguards into this fabulous system inherited by me and mine, in order to protect us from the stupid of people! Who knows: Maybe this is why you did not, in fact, employ the phrase “jury of his peers” — because you knew it would be a disaster? Hmmm?

People are stupid. They are swayed by political and cultural considerations that should have no bearing on the application of the law. They are in a rush to get home. They are hungry. They are — and this is really the most important point — unschooled in the justice system. And in the jury system as currently constituted, there exists ample anecdotal evidence that lawyers make a point of disqualifying jury candidates with higher educations — which is to say that in selecting a jury, lawyers actively seek the ill-informed.

Every day, all across this great land, we leave matters of literal life and death in the hands of groups of 12 people who are very likely morons. Or, you know: Certainly could be.

It’s madness.

If juries were composed of people trained and paid to be experts in the life-altering work that they conduct, I would be all for them. Panels of one, or three, or five judges (while preferable, in my mind, to the American jury system) would still be given to pressures and corruptions and inappropriate considerations — spreading that risk among 12 people not actually on the bench would spread that risk a lot thinner.

But that’s not what juries look like. So I’m not all for them. I’m all against them. Because they’re stupid. Because people (as I’ve mentioned) are stupid.

Now, all of the above may or may not have something to do with the fact that I have received a summons for standby jury service, which summons I will be obeying tomorrow morning, at the RJ Daley Center in downtown Chicago (where, my summons informs me, I will have to park at my own expense). It may or may not have something to do with the fact that I’m kind of banking on the fact that my Master’s Degree will probably get me sent home earlier rather than later.

But even if I hadn’t received a summons, and even if America’s lawyers didn’t knowingly and with malice aforethought prefer to work with the ignorant — I would still think juries are stupid.

The Founders were, after all, only human. As genius as I believe them to have been, they were not infallible. The three-fifths clause is a moral abomination.

And trial by jury sucks.

Every year (for 12 years running), I launch my Passover cleaning with a combined loathing of cleaning, a general-all-purpose laziness, and an overwhelming longing for home — and anger at the Israeli policies that inspired my husband and me to choose the Diaspora over home. This invariably crests on the day of the Seder, as I get weepy over boxes of matza and the recipes of beloved Tel Aviv friends, and then it passes, more or less, as the trial of the cleaning fades in our celebrations, and my little family revels in our own little Pesach traditions. I engage with the Divine, I feel a special joy.

A week later it’s back to bread, to the everyday — and I think (every year) that the roller coaster is behind me.

Then another weeks passes, and suddenly it’s Holocaust Day. Almost without noticing, I sink into a kind of numb horror, a boundless grief, listening to Israeli radio and reading the memories of the millions lost, weeping off and on all day it seems, slowly emerging as the sun sets and our yahrzeit candle burns low. Again, I long to be with my people, and internally rage at the reasons that I find myself a stranger in a strange land.

And then I think it’s passed.

And then a week later — today, in fact — it’s the eve of Israeli Memorial Day, Yom HaZikaron, which is, in turn, the lead-in to Israeli Independence Day, Yom HaAtzmaut. And as much as I don’t know how to process the emotions of Passover and Holocaust Day, Yom HaZikaron and Yom HaAtzmaut bring with them an entirely different degree of difficulty.

I refuse to disallow my people their right to their pain, or to their joy. Children, husbands, sisters, mothers killed in war and in terrorist actions are losses as enormous as they are incomprehensible, and all over the world, people celebrate their national days. When (please God) Palestine is officially formed, the Palestinians, too, will celebrate — and I know that among the heroes celebrated that day will be people responsible for great suffering among Israelis. This is the way of peoples. Heroes are very rarely shared.

And that is, I suppose, the source of the maelstrom of emotion that overcomes me every year, as Yom HaZikaron begins and my candle is lit. I refuse to disallow the Palestinians the right to their pain or their narrative, either. I cannot simply mourn and celebrate with my people — indeed, on a personal level, I cannot celebrate at all.

I’ve said it before, many times, and my fear, frankly, is that I’ll never get to not say it on this day, but: Our joy came at the expense of someone else’s bottomless pain, and we have yet to acknowledge, much less deal with, that fact. Our anthem sticks in my throat, our stories of heroism echo with all they fail to reveal. I can’t be happy.

I remember the last Independence Day we spent in Israel, in 1998. All around us, Israel was giddily celebrating its 60th anniversary, but the husband and I gathered with friends of similar political stripe on our back porch, baking potatoes in this cool potato-baking device that produced potatoes that tasted as if they’d just emerged from a bonfire, and complained. Complained and complained and complained, with real, palpable pain and longing for a country in which we could believe. I remember saying that Israel was like a really smart, really attractive 13 year old — knowing its charms and thinking itself fully matured, the country was behaving like an overgrown, spoiled child.

When Palestine exists, on maps and in the UN, when Israel has made a just peace with its neighbors and attempted to address the tremendous, nearly incalculable damage it has caused the Palestinian people over the years — then I will be able to genuinely celebrate.

Until then, I will continue to mournfully hang two flags from my front porch, no doubt to the sheer befuddlement of my American neighbors — two flags on Yom HaZikaron/Yom HaAtzmaut (which follow the Hebrew calendar) and two flags on May 15, when Palestinians commemorate the UN declaration of the partition of Palestine with Yawm al-Nakba, Day of the Catastrophe. I will deny the experiences of neither people — so every year, both flags fly.

It’s not much. But it feels honest. And some days that can be its own achievement.

************************************

Please listen to the following, a lovely song in English, Hebrew and Arabic by Palestinian singer Mira Awad and Israeli singer Achinoam Nini (also known as Noa) — in loose translation, the first, Hebrew verse reads “Your eyes, my sister, are all that my heart asks to see. We’ve come a long way so far, down a difficult path, hand in hand. And the tears tumble and flow in vain, a nameless pain. We’re waiting for the day after.”

I first saw it performed last November when we were in Israel and Nini and Awad took part in a benefit for Combatants for Peace; just today I learned that it was Israel’s 2009 entry in the Eurovision song contest (this is what happens when you move away: You get to never pay attention to the Eurovision again) — which means it probably scans differently for Israelis-still-in-Israel, if only because the schmaltz of the Eurovision tends to slop over everything it touches, if only by association.

Be that as it may, I tear up every time I hear it, because it speaks so powerfully to my sense of hopelessness and impotence, as well as my continuing desperate hope for another, a better, way.

Yeah.... You look just that dopey.

It comes over me every spring, a rant that builds up inside my head until it comes flying out of my mouth. My sainted husband, patient friends, occasional strangers have gotten a real earful. Every spring.

There I sit, in my car, humming a ditty or having a friendly chat, when bam! Into my line of vision hoves the biggest moron on two wheels: the helmetless motorcyclist.

Now, you may say your Uncle Mike is actually the world’s biggest moron, but I won’t believe you, unless your Uncle Mike also likes to get on bright, shiny objects going upward of 70 m.p.h. with nothing but bone between his brains and the pavement. Oh, I’m sorry — bone and possibly a jauntily knotted bandanna.

I’ll go even further: If you shoot heroin and wind up at the county hospital, I won’t begrudge you the tax dollars that go to your care. I believe society has to be responsible for its weakest links, even if the weakness is deplorable. If we can’t figure out a way to keep kids off smack, then we had better be willing to clean up the mess — and moreover, it’s not my life that’s devastated.

But the helmetless? They might as well get up of a morning, look in the mirror and shout: “Looks like a great day to die! And hey — maybe I’ll ruin a stranger’s life too!”

Because here’s the thing: When you insist that helmet laws infringe on your God-given right to have wind in your hair; when you deny the research that says helmets don’t (actually) limit vision or hearing; when you ignore the fact that 38 percent fewer riders die in accidents if their heads are protected; when you, I don’t know, are too embarrassed to look like a dork, you’re not just choosing your own messy, God-awful death (or catastrophic brain injury) — you are consigning me to a life of misery.

If my car and your bike meet — even if it’s your fault, even if it’s no one’s fault — I will never sleep again. I will see your blood, your broken face, your weeping children, your shattered parents every day and every night for the rest of my life. Because I was behind the wheel, because my car happened to get all messed up in your search for some kind of freedom in which the needs of no one else (least of all your parents or children) were a factor.

Sure, the roads are filled with abysmal drivers, and oil gets spilled, and rain can get the best of anyone. But drivers control what is, or is not, on their heads.

If you want to try to cheat death, I have no doubt that that is truly up to you. But please, don’t risk my peace of mind to do it. I have kids too.

A version of this piece ran a few years back in the Chicago Tribune, and then a year later in the Hartford Courant (the Hartford version isn’t online anymore — you’ll have to trust me!), and my i.d. at the bottom of the piece (at least in Hartford) went like this: “Emily L. Hauser is a cranky freelance writer who lives in Illinois, where there are no helmet laws whatsoever.”

And it’s all still true.

Crossposted at Angry Black Lady Chronicles.

I’ve been meaning to write ever since the weekend, but, well, events overcame me. Given the blow-out affair of last Friday, I’m sure you needed a day or two to recover anyway! And so finally, here we are, tete-a-tete.

I’m sure this isn’t usually done, but I want to open this missive with a little snippet from the American Heritage Dictionary, unabridged – to wit:

nude adj. – Having no clothing; naked.

Now, I bring this to your attention, Fashion Industry, because I have begun to suspect that you don’t possess this important linguistic nugget of information. “Nude” means “no clothes on” — and evidence suggests that either you don’t know that, or you don’t know that people of all colors take their clothes off now and then.

No, it’s true! All over the globe, at any given time, black people, brown people, amber people (“yellow” sounds rather garish, doesn’t it?), red people, tawny people, cafe-au-lait people, cinnamon people — all manner of people who are not pasty, pink, or beige in shade are taking off their clothes. Wandering about in the nude. Even if only between pairs of underwear.

I mention this because in the course of reading about last Friday’s big event, I discovered that you, the Fashion Industry, still use the word “nude” incorrectly. You still use it to mean “approximately the color of a white lady’s bum.”

Let me demonstrate.

This pair of $620 shoes?

In spite of the designer’s insistence: Not nude.

This mini-hat, aka: “fascinator” (note to non-Fashion Industry readers: Yes, that really is a thing)?

In spite of the website copy: Not nude.

This ensemble (the little number on the right)?

While so daring as to be charming in my books (though, I understand, not necessarily in yours): Also not nude.

I happen to be of Caucasian extraction, and thus have some experience with the color of a white lady’s bum, and let me first note that, in fact, none of the above actually resembles the skin of any white lady I know. Just, you know, for starters.

Next: To the extent that “nude” could conceivably be a color, it would (by inference) be “the color of the person wearing it.” Thus, if you’d like to call all of the above “Caucasian nude,” I’d be willing to roll with it, though, as I say, I don’t know any Caucasians the color of that hat (except my mother, after an afternoon of vigorous gardening, and really, should we base an entire color scheme on one white lady’s tendency to overheat?).

I understand: The Fashion Industry is an industry. It was constructed and conceived to make people money, and there is a tendency to market industries to the broadest possible swath of humans with money, and the understanding of nearly everyone in positions of power in all of the image-heavy industries has long been that this can only mean using white people to do the marketing.

Models are white. Designers are white. Magazine editors are white. That’s the way it goes, I suppose, until someone figures out that white people are, in fact, just smart enough to be sold things worn, designed, and/or described by non-white people. That day will come. I appreciate the occasional spasmodic efforts to bring more models of color to catwalks, but I don’t expect real integration until the rest of society has gotten rather more integrated itself.

But we could make a small start with “nude.”

As a lady, I can tell you: Ladies will buy any freakishly-named color under the sun. You don’t need to make us feel that we’re buying something that is white-lady-skin-colored to get us to buy it. We’ll buy ecru, toasted coconut, buff, chamois, palest rose, taupe, beige, palest pink, biscuit, mushroom, fawn (ooh, I particularly like fawn), oatmeal, sand, on and on.

Really. I promise.

But, on the other hand, every time you define nude as “Caucasian,” you’re telling a whole lot of people that their naked skin is mistaken. Is wrong.

And not only does that suck, it’s probably costing you some dollars, son. If you don’t want to consider social advancement, you could at least consider your own bottom line.

Anyhoo, thanks for all the details on the frocks and hats at William’s and Kate’s big day! Man, that satellite thing on that one lady’s head — whew! Something else.

Hugs and kisses,

Emily

A whole lot of folks in America have been scratching their heads since Sunday night, a slow realization dawning that as little as we know about Iraq, as little as we know about Afghanistan — we know even less about Pakistan.

And it turns out Pakistan is really rather the point!

Truth be told, I don’t know a hell of a lot about Pakistan either, though I will say that over years of reading about other places (like Iraq and Afghanistan), I’d at least begun to get a sense that I was missing a very big piece of the story. Recognizing one’s ignorance — that’s the first step.

What I do know is how to recognize a good source when it falls into my hands — in this case a terrific book, one which had me feeling the expansion of my brain’s Pakistan Knowledge Node with each turning page: Pakistan: A Hard Country, the result of 20 years of reporting from the country by British journalist and author Anatol Lieven. The title is a nod to something Lieven has heard time and time again from Pakistanis themselves — they live in a hard country, and they know it.

If you’re pressed for time — or if foreign relations isn’t enough your bag that you want to commit to 480 pages — you would be very well served by reading just the book’s 38-page introduction, where Lieven carefully lays out the parameters of his subject and the outlines of his conclusions — but if you do have the time, I highly recommend diving in.

And, hey now! It turns out we probably should have been paying more attention all along. Pakistan’s population (170 million) is close to six times larger than Afghanistan’s, and its army is one of Asia’s biggest, best armed (don’t forget the nuclear weapons!), and most experienced — as Leiven writes: “Pakistan is quite simply far more important to the region, the West and the world than is Afghanistan: a statement which is a matter not of sentiment but of mathematics.”

We’ve known for some time that Pakistani intelligence plays a key role in Western anti-terrorism efforts, and have likewise wondered for some time if they were really helping us as much as we might want, but (in keeping with Western tradition), there’s been a tendency to focus on the extent to which their society mirrors our own.

We talk about the President of Pakistan, for instance, as if real power is found in that (nominally) democratically elected office, when in fact, Pakistan’s real power base is its enormous military (particularly the Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI), created and maintained out of a deeply felt and powerfully held animosity toward India — a country so much bigger than Pakistan that the latter can’t hope to genuinely keep up, relying instead on a kind of bristling deterrence, fed by a very mutual and deep-running distrust and loathing. (All of which is to say, by the way, that when we deal with India, we’re also dealing with Pakistan. Just, you know: BTW and whatnot).

Lieven grapples successfully with a truly gobsmacking amount of information, transforming it into a lucid — and not incidentally, fascinating — whole, parsing the social and cultural tapestry woven from Islam, kinship ties, the military, and global expectations and pressures (indeed, a sort of patchwork tapestry, as each small section of the tapestry is overlaid with, and butts up against, unexpected intricacies), pointing to issues that few on this side of the ocean appear to have even begun to consider (such as population growth and the climate: “In the long run,” Lieven writes, “the greatest threat to Pakistan’s existence is not insurgency but ecological change”).

His policy recommendations come with a depth of perspective, both historic and geographic — this last particularly important in a country about which people are forever going on about “lawless, semi-autonomous tribal regions” — and Leiven’s writing is excellent (though occasionally a bit paternal), an especially crucial fact in a book taking on a topic with which many readers will be entirely unfamiliar.

Moreover, he clearly loves the place and its people. Pakistan: A Hard Country is the work of one of those rare nonfiction writers who is able to get close enough to their subject to see its complexity, without either turning away, or becoming a partisan of one view or the other.

So, in short, if you’re thinking “Pakistan! What’s up with that?” – this book would be a tremendous starting point.

Even, as I say, just the introduction.