The Sacred Beasts (38 page)

“My last outburst at the loss of her poems instantly quieted her.
She sat me down at the kitchen table and rocked me in her arms, soothing me as
we recovered from our hysteria. She caressed and kissed me and silently
comforted me. At last she said, ‘Mother of God, what an imaginative child I
have! I might have known there would be one like this. Whatever will become of
you, my child who dreams such incredible things?’”

“There was an enormous change in our lives the very next day. My
mother enrolled in one of the free People’s Universities that were available at
that time. They taught reading, writing and simple math, which she didn’t need,
but also such useful skills as how to repair a toilet and how to be a scavenger
of garbage so as to find all the possible nutrients. At that time, too, public
schools became mandatory and free, so I became a student who had to travel long
distances by bus to school. My mother became a plumber. She joked that, as one
who removed clogged waste, she was in the same line of work as before, though I
was still too young to appreciate her irony. We loved to teach one another what
we had learned in our new lives. As a result, I can fix any toilet and pick
over garbage as well as any alley-cat.

“In old age, my mother died of Alzheimer’s disease, and there was
no one to tend her but me and my sister. I tried to refresh her memory about
all the things she had ever told me. I asked her how to repair toilets, fish
through garbage, and finally I told her all the folkloric tales and legends she
had given to me so long ago as bedtime stories. I told her all the lovely
images of arcadia that had once filled her poetry. Her eyes grew as large and
round as a child’s, and the stories and fantasies became all the more
astounding and beautiful to her as her mind shrank and then disappeared. I
would love to believe that the last thing she imagined was her fanciful arcadia
of long ago. Of all the questions I asked her, I didn’t ask the one for which I
wanted an answer: Do you remember those secret places, those shadows, mother;
and how we went out at night in search of the unknown in corners, in pools of
darkness and neon, in starry skies, and discovered only the sordidness of human
life? Ah, but you don’t ask such questions, even to one whose mind is leaving,
because the answer is too sad.”

There was again a soft, appreciative murmuring in the room. Every
woman knew that this was one of the great evenings at Monserrat’s house. They
found these mothers as unforgettable as their daughters did. The next woman to
tell her story was from the healthcare professionals group, a hospital director
who had university degrees in medicine and nursing.

“I was born in a women’s prison, and both my mother and
grandmother were imprisoned for political agitation against the fascists. My
father was also a resistance fighter, but he was killed in battle early in the
war.

“My mother told me that when first placed on a prison blanket, I
cried, and she found out why—there were forty bedbugs underneath me. It’s
probably fortunate that I don’t remember it. My mother was falsely imprisoned;
she had no desire to be a clandestine agent after my father’s death, but she
was still under surveillance by the fascists. She was a fisherwoman in our
small village of Santana and had four children to feed with her work. So, she
went out fishing every night with my brother. One night, however, she stayed
home because two of my sisters were sick. Since she therefore had no fish to
sell on the Santana village market the following day, the fascists assumed that
she had given her catch to a charismatic guerrilla leader named Cardoso, who was
known to have fighters in the area.

“She was immediately imprisoned at Santander, and her children
were given to my aunt and uncle. Born later, I stayed in prison with her until
I was no longer nursing, so I was a part of this much Civil War history without
remembering a single event. I do remember when my mother was released and came
for us, however. She told me so many stories about women prisoners like the
ones we’ve heard already—the women who were tortured, the terrible conditions
of the prisons, the sympathetic bonding between women and their unselfishness.
She was particularly struck by the powerful mountain women from Asturias; they
were the most courageous.

“She also told me other stories about the women she had known, and
some of these were unforgettable. There were women who went mad because of the
arbitrary nature of their imprisonment and the poor living conditions. She
described a woman named Rosa who was imprisoned for the sole reason that her
son was a resistance fighter. When she and her husband had no information about
his whereabouts, the fascists beat her husband to death in front of her and she
was dragged away to the nearest prison, which was Santander. A year later, she
received a postcard from her son, who had left the country after the war effort
failed; but still, the fascists would not release Rosa. My mother was her
closest friend, and one day she began to hallucinate and grabbed my mother by
the throat in a powerful grip. When her sanity returned and she realized what
she had done, she tried to hang herself. All the prisoners begged to have Rosa
transferred to a mental hospital where a doctor could treat her, but this was
never done. She ended up muttering in a corner, with no sense of the outside
world. This was her fate, all for a son who was no longer a soldier or even
living in Spain, Yes, I will always remember Rosa.

“My mother also told me about a woman lawyer named Elena who came
to the prisons in an attempt to free innocent women and get better living
conditions for all. She was from a wealthy doctor’s family and had a very sharp
intellect as well as great self-confidence. The men running the prison were
afraid of her for many reasons, according to my mother. Her criticisms were
valid; because, in fact, the prison decisions and procedures were capricious,
illegal, and probably had the status of war crimes. In addition, Elena was a
class above them, clearly more intelligent and truly fearless. For a time, they
didn’t interfere with her work, though it was apparently difficult for them to
tolerate a woman so obviously superior to them. My mother was always fascinated
with her forceful voice and manner.

“One day, the prisoners were told that she had committed suicide
in the warden’s office by leaping out the open window and falling six stories
below onto a concrete surface. No one believed it, of course, but everyone
wanted to know what really happened to her. Eventually, they pieced together
these facts: She was in the director’s office presenting her arguments against
illegal detention and poor living conditions, and a shouting match occurred.
Her body then landed on its back on the concrete, so it was obvious that she
had been thrust out the window by the warden and whoever else might have been
there. If she had actually tried to kill herself, her body would at least have
been found face down.

“It was an incredible situation, my mother and the other prisoners
all thought. The fascists could apparently not tolerate the simple presence of
a woman this superior to them. At any time, they could easily have imprisoned
her falsely and stopped her activities. But, they were overwhelmed by the very
fact of her presence there. It was ultimately, in other words, a crime of
passion; but one engendered by hate, guilt and inferiority rather than love. We
are very fortunate that we no longer live in such a world. Today, this woman
would be a great lawyer and judge, possibly a powerful force in politics or
even a Prime Minister, with a family following in her footsteps. Yet, for all
her courage and brilliance, the fascists gave her a fate worse than that of the
prisoners. I was most struck by this story and this woman of all I heard from
my mother. Oh yes, I will always remember Elena; and as terrible as her story
is, it belongs here, in this house, a truth to be told to other women. Even
now, no man has ever been punished for her death.

“As you can imagine, my mother, my siblings and I had enough of
the resistance after what we had seen and heard. This was never the case with
my grandparents and particularly my grandmother, Tomasita, who was very short
and often called Pequeña, though she was small only in body. In spirit and
courage, they didn’t come any bigger than Pequeña. Since she remained in the
resistance until Franco’s death, I met her for the first time when we were both
relatively old. I always knew her story, however, and it is inseparable from my
mother’s story and my own, so I must tell you about her, too.

“Tomasita was born in Guadalajara as the middle child of six. Her
family was as poor as they come. Her father had been disabled by a fall from a
horse, and her mother was constantly ill from stomach and intestinal problems.
Grandma virtually supported the whole family single-handedly as a child, so you
can see that I do not exaggerate her stamina. As a young child, she was briefly
put into a school run by nuns but, when she had to work full-time in a knitting
factory as well as care for her own mother, she could not attend every day, and
the nuns refused to let her continue her education.

At the knitting factory, she quickly learned the price at which
the goods were sold, which was substantial, and asked for a higher wage.
Immediately, she was fired and threatened by the factory owners. They said they
would see to it that she never got another job, but that never stopped her. She
then worked full-time in a pasta factory and mended clothing for people at
night. There was only one light in her tiny house, and it was too high up to
illuminate Pequeña’s night work. So, she put a chair on top of the tallest
table below this light and worked a good part of the night. She faced another
crisis when her mother was told that she must drink milk every two hours or die
from hemorrhaging of the stomach. The cost was far beyond what the family could
pay, so my grandma just took a full-time job at a dairy and provided her mother
with all the free milk needed.

“Grandma Tomasita could not be defeated, in other words, yet her
family was so poor that she never knew toys existed and only was given candy
once. The lack of a childhood, the harshness of her life and the injustice of
the nuns and factory owners made her ardently wish for a better future for all
mankind, and she joined the Communist Party at the age of eleven. She was
arrested one night when she stopped a policeman who was beating a child by
threatening to curse his mother. When her father came to the police station to
get her, the officers told him that she was deeply involved in radical politics
that would hurt her and that he must beat it out of her. But, he had always
been very close to her; and, after they had returned home, he only asked,
‘Pequeña, is it true?’ She said it was and showed him her card. When he
half-heartedly picked up a belt to beat her, she said that she would never stop
her political activities. If he forbade them, she would live elsewhere and
support herself alone, as they knew very well she could. ‘I love you and
mother,’ she said, ‘but I must do this for my ideals and a better world. This
life is not worth living.’ He said to her, ‘OK, Pequeña, stand up for your self
and for all of us. It’s true that I’ve never been able to do it myself.’

“She was arrested and imprisoned when she was only fourteen years
old and faced the same torture we’ve already heard about and the resulting
damage to the spine and the kidneys. Her father died when he heard the length
of her sentence, thirty-five years. She escaped at one point, however, and
lived in the mountains with the guerrilla fighters. She married my grandfather
and had my mother as her only child. My grandparents could not live safely
outside the mountains until the death of Franco.

“When I went to the university, I had a long spirited talk with
her, though she was on her deathbed. I told her that I wanted only to heal the
sick and would prepare myself for a long career in healthcare. She said to me,
‘I’ve fought all my life for a cause, and only now do I see that I was fighting
for you, though I didn’t know whether you would ever exist or not. Your mother
and I were poor and uneducated, and now here you are, going to the university
to live in a world without fascism, where Spain is free, and you can choose to
heal with medicine rather than firearms and resistance. My nickname has always
been Pequeña, the Little One, so I want you to give yourself a nickname. Call
yourself Big One. Be whatever you want—a doctor, a nurse, a lawyer, a matador
for all I care. Whatever you become, always remember that if I were still alive
(and I won’t be), I would welcome you home with a big, big hug and call you my
Big One, for all the pride I felt because of you. You are worth what the
fascists did to my spine and kidneys in torture when I was so much younger than
you, just a child, and that is a very big thing, remember!’ She was right, and
how could I ever forget it? I want you to remember, too, because her story also
belongs in this house, to be told to the women who come here. We are the lucky
ones.”

ALEX WAS UP early, since she had not been able to find Ruth during
the previous evening. She walked around the house’s ground floor and then went
into the kitchen, where she was relieved to find Ruth making coffee. Ruth
politely invited her to have coffee, and they went into the living room with
two cups and a pot.

Alex could find no subtle way to begin talking to Ruth about
grief. She finally settled on an observation that was the reverse of what she
wanted to know. “You seem very happy with Monserrat,” Alex began, and her
statement ended with a slight question mark.

“Oh, yes, very much so,” Ruth answered and thought, Sylvie has
sent her. There’s no other explanation as to why she would be up so early,
asking me such intimate questions. It’s still not resolved with Sylvie, and the
situation is chaotic enough that both of them are disturbed. I must relieve
them, but how?

“If you don’t mind a casual observation, I thought you might also
be a bit upset over something, probably related to your book, not about Sylvie,
of course,” Alex said and thought this is awful. I will never be an ambassador.

“Don’t let Sylvie hear that, ‘of course.’” They both laughed.
Good, she’s getting right to it, Ruth thought.

Both felt a uniquely queasy sensation in knowing that they had
both been so recently involved with the same woman, one whom they both knew to
be very difficult, attractive, magnetic, and explosive. “It’s really nothing
you don’t already know from our lunch, when we first met,” Ruth said. “This
time is very disturbing for the planet and the future of our civilization.
We’re more vulnerable than most countries seem to realize. The animals I have
studied all my life are in danger of extinction, and that is only small part of
what’s at stake. Human pollution and habitat destruction are causing the sixth
mass extinction on the entire planet, and people will pay the price along with
other animals. Global warming is a big part of it, but there is much more. I am
increasingly convinced that there will be a global catastrophe before humans
are serious about stopping it, and it could be enough to send us back to the middle
ages.”

“I’m very worried about this, too, but I’m sure you know the
situation in much greater detail. What do you foresee?”

“In a nutshell, computer simulations say that ocean levels will
rise by about three feet by 2100. But, they are always revised upward when
actual measuring is done to determine whether the simulation is correct. A much
more accurate figure would be a rise by fifteen feet. The beautiful cities on
water that I have always loved—San Francisco, Rio, Hong Kong, Barcelona,
too—will all either be underwater or behind sea walls by then. All the coastal
areas will be behind sea walls, too. There will be no more swimming in the
ocean, feeling at one with the universe, you can be sure. If our infrastructure
doesn’t produce those walls, which will be very expensive and complex to keep
functioning, the foundation of La Sagrada Familia will be under water. There
will be tremendous loss of human life as well as animals. By 2015, the world’s
population will number some nine billion people, many living on coastlines. The
first global catastrophe is most likely to occur on the coasts or the island
nations. There’s always a chance that people will take up alternative energy
and methods of conservation in time, but it looks less and less likely as time passes
and the situation becomes more dangerous. There is a new science of
geoengineering that might come up with solutions, but its work will always be
based on computer simulations, which can always be wrong. One idea that has
been offered, the creation of gigantic mirrors placed between the earth and the
sun, is a good example. If the calculations of the earth’s resulting
temperature are off by the smallest margin, we could be plunged into a
thousand-year winter. Conservation and shifting to other energy sources are the
only safe methods, and that’s where people start becoming stubborn and
resistant to change. The rise in sea level may not even be the worst part of
the change. The first stage is increased precipitation, which causes chaotic
weather—hurricanes, tornadoes, twisters. In winter, there are more snowstorms,
paradoxically, in addition to warmer weather. Hurricanes and winter storms that
are so powerful as to occur only twice century in the past, will happen every
couple of years. We have no infrastructure for that. All countries need
powerful central governments, much more intelligent leaders and a united,
knowledgeable and motivated population for that. You know where the U.S. stands
there; we both left in disgust. Northern and Western Europe are in a better
position, Canada and New Zealand, too. They’ve had a long tradition of liberal
government. But, the biggest nations—the U.S., India, and China—do not. In
time, India and China will probably move in that direction, but the U.S. is
moving farther and farther right. That’s why there has been so little job
growth under Bush. I am sorry to speak at such length. I taught college
students for so many years that it has permanently turned my language into that
of an old professor.”

“But I really want to know about this!” Alex said. “I’m beginning
to realize that we need a political commitment to this issue here, in the
house. It should be on the web site and Facebook page, and there should be a
group meeting. There are plenty of scientists in the university professors
group. I honestly don’t understand why Americans have so little commitment to
this issue. They only talk about future generations when the Republicans want
to cut the entitlements again. Otherwise, they could care less. It disgusted me
enough to leave, but my Internet protests aren’t changing the situation at all.
I’m sure they’ll elect a Democrat in 2008, but I doubt that government will
really be able to change anything, either. Why are people so damned dumb?”

“I’m happy to answer, but you’ll only hear a longer version of the
old professor’s essay.”

“So go ahead. I would like to feel something other than disgust
for my country. And, you’ve heard what people around here have to say about
it.”

“To begin with, you’ve been part of an intellectual elite,
probably since grade school. You may not have known enough people who are truly
defeated by the American economy, but I teach all types at the university, and
I’ve been thinking and reading about these issues for decades. You can’t
imagine how economically besieged the middle class is now and how poorly
educated. The public schools are so badly in need of funding as to be a
disaster. Their graduates, if they can find work at all, are most often working
two jobs. They have no time for the future when the present is so oppressive.
They clearly haven’t the time to read and think enough to understand what’s
happening to them and what their options are. That’s why they’re so easily
swayed by the money and mendacity of the far-right Republican Party. It truly
only acts in favor of the wealthy—the rest is pure deceit, which they engage in
shamelessly. It reminds me so much of chimp behavior: if chimps meet another
colony of chimps, they attack immediately. Of course, bonobos don’t do this.
Chimps are intolerant of any divergence from the group they form. Equally, the
Republicans represent the wealthy, and everyone else is not a human being, only
a fool to be manipulated by lies.

“Religion, which they also manipulate shamelessly, only
exacerbates the situation by providing another justification for oppression of
others. This is a complete violation not only of the New Testament but also of
the social compact itself, through which humans are nurtured to adulthood and
live lawfully in groups as adults. Wealth cannot be won without it, and the
wealthy can’t then refuse to support the system that allowed them to acquire
their wealth. But, this observation is a matter of thought and reason, and
there’s no reason in the far right. Living in the U.S., you feel how powerful,
vicious, ignorant and unreasoning the conservative predisposition is; it comes
as no surprise to me that it’s biological. If their wealth has been acquired
legally, unethically, or criminally but it has not been detected, the wealthy
believe they have every right to deny a life of human decency to everyone else.

“The other system of justice, typified by the Democrats with its
biological basis in bonobo behavior, is that we must function and make
decisions in diverse groups, help one another, protect the environment, and
provide a strong safety net for the old and disabled. Clearly these are two
different forms of justice, but only the latter is moral, and only the latter
has ever resulted in economic prosperity and political maturity.”

“Wasn’t there an economic expansion under Reagan?”

“Yes, but also a big budget deficit. The Republicans always
deliberately create one, like Bush did, so that they can argue against the
entitlements. They create their own problems and then try to get themselves
re-elected to solve them. It never happens, of course. Clinton had to clean up
after both Reagan and Bush, balancing the budget while expanding the economy.
He was the most effective president in modern memory, as they say.”

“But, why don’t Americans
feel
the danger they’re in? I do,
but I always feel that I’m alone outside of Moveon.org.”

“There are polls showing that nearly half of Americans don’t
believe that global warming exists. This statistic alone shows how besieged the
middle class, how unable to read and study they are, how vulnerable to the
mendacity of Republicans. The concept behind global warming is very simple: the
heat of the planet causes more ocean water to evaporate into the air. What goes
up must come down, so the first stage is increased precipitation, more water
coming down, and hence the increased presence and strength of hurricanes,
tornadoes, typhoons, floods, landslides and mudslides, huge snowfalls in
winter, etc. There can be no question but what we’re in the first phase. Our
infrastructure is crumbling under the stress now, to say nothing of the future.

“Meteorology is a very complex field, however, and so is the
application of this simple concept. When we factor in all the effects of wind
and sun, water and air, millions of other variables show a picture consistent
only in predicting extreme and destructive weather. Spain, for example, will
undoubtedly experience extremes of drought in the future as well as floods. The
jet stream over the US, which carries precipitation and normally runs east-west,
can suddenly—for the first time—run north-south for brief periods, releasing
much greater precipitation than usual, and this can prevent water from reaching
areas in the south and west that hence experience more drought than ever
before.

“Too, the public may not always understand what computer modeling
is, the methodology of climate scientists which, as a huge database of perhaps
millions of variables, can describe the present and allow us to understand the
future. A good example of computer modeling that everyone has seen is the
images we have of our solar system from the various space probes we’ve sent to
study it. When the public sees the final data, it looks as though they’re
viewing the planets from the deck of the Starship Enterprise as it moves
throughout the solar system. The raw data, however, is nothing but streams of
binary numbers, 0 and 1. The computer system, using programmed rules or
algorithms, enable us to see images that conceptualize the data and answer
questions we address to it. There are now computer simulations so complex as to
recreate the formation of the universe using all the astronomical data we have
assembled. They can actually display the time just after the big bang, with the
irregularities in radiation becoming stars and galaxies and thus the conditions
for our own life and evolution.

“These two basic ideas—increased precipitation and computer
modeling—are not understood by so many Americans because they are poorly
educated and beleaguered economically to the degree that they no longer form
clear and accurate opinions about their time. In the period after World War II
until the 1970s, there was a much narrower gap between rich and poor and
greater general prosperity and economic competitiveness. The tax on the wealthy
went from seventy percent to thirty percent today, plus plenty of loopholes to
reduce that thirty percent far below the percentage the middle class pays. All
of our real national needs—effective public schools, competitive industries,
and stable infrastructure—have weakened to an amazing degree in this period.
Ultimately, even the wealthy will fall prey to environmental catastrophes and
their inevitable economic consequences. It could send us back to the Middle
Ages.”

“Why are intellectuals so weak in alerting the public, in saying
this? I’m reading it all the time, but nothing seems to affect an election.”

“The U.S. does very poorly by its intellectuals; they are hardly
used in industry at all. My analysis of America’s economy is liberal orthodoxy.
Liberal journalists and academics have been saying it for years. My synthesis
is original, however, so far as I know. Fewer liberals know that the tendency
to be liberal or conservative is genetic, though some surely do; it has been
discussed in the media. I know of no one who has related it to primatology. I
am probably alone there, and the reaction to my ideas could be very hostile.”

“But what
is
better? What exactly are you advocating?”

“The problems of combating global warming can only be solved
through an alliance between science and industry. This can’t even begin before
there is more economic prosperity. Germany is a good example of a resilient
economy. It has a strong emphasis on excellent public education and empowered
labor, resulting in a skilled and talented work force in industries that fare
well in global competition. You do not see the great disparity between rich and
poor there; positions at the top of industry don’t have the huge salaries you
see in the US. Germany also has a powerful middle class and a strong safety net
for the old and disabled. Historically, it seems to be without some of the US’s
most misguided ideas, like salvation from a free market economy and the value
of self-reliance over well-functioning groups and governance. The reverse of this
is the dying, third-world economy that the U.S. has begun to resemble—poor
public education, weakness in the position of labor, fewer jobs, corrupt and
non-competitive industry, crumbling infrastructure, and the rise of far-right
politicians who do nothing but obscure this reality. It leads to catastrophe
for all.”