For Love of Mother's Milk

Watching the dead and dying, moments of brief heroics, seeing normally stoic men weep at the devastation, I've tried not to break out in tears over the fate of the Haitians. I was mostly successful until today. The story that mothers of young babies here had donated their breast milk for the hurt little ones in Haiti made smile and cry at the same time. When you think humanity pretty much sucks (ok, I live and work in Hollywood) then such things as this happen. 140 small but powerful bottles of relief arrived Thursday afternoon: breast milk donated by American mothers.The bottles are tiny, but full of life saving nutrients for babies suffering from injuries and illness or born prematurely in a disaster area. But after surviving a commercial plane flight, a charter ride, a helicopter trip and two days on dry ice, the milk ran headlong into red tape. Some stupid Navy pinhead complained about the idea of distributing donated breast milk and issued a statement calling it an "unfeasible and unsafe intervention." Mother of God, can it be more unsafe than dying of starvation..or catching some disease because the little bodies have no immunity system developed yet? Does he think junkies are running in off the street gripping their breasts and offering milk? There had to have been some oversight in the collection of these bottles, wouldn't you think? Part of the recovery operation that sits and does nothing while food, medical supplies, shelter and other aid piles up on docks is the kind of bureaucratic atrocity that is often worse than the disaster. It certainly fuels anarchy. And it makes people like Ruth Lavida Adkins Robinson furious. What can we do?

My Brainiac Friend Slapped My Emotional Wrist

One of my smarter friends who lives in Norway, but is an American, wrote: "If I can offer one word of advice, you have to stop loving (or hating) politicians, or judging them based on their personalities. Politicians should be judged by what they do and what they achieve, and whom they serve, not by their personal histories, or their like-ability, or skill at mesmerizing us with dazzling speeches. If American politics is reduced to Republicans fawning over people like themselves, Bush and Palin, for example, while Democrats become ecstatic over "you get 'em girl" Clinton or the inspirational African-American Obama, then the vast majority of this country is going to experience a very bleak future. All of these politicians are personally driven by their own will to power, putting their own political futures above any considerations of what is right for Americans. (Well, Bush may have actually believed in what he was doing as deluded as it was.) In particular, Clinton and Obama, as with so many of their fellow elected Democrats, are complete tools of the powers-that-be, especially what Eisenhower quaintly called "the military-industrial complex" and corporate America in general. The current administration has only continued America's slide into plutocracy (and even worse, the police state).
I am wrong? It is my fault that you are struggling to keep your household afloat, while Wall Street bankers are earning larger bonuses than ever after they just brought the global economy to its knees. Just look at Obama's appointees - Geithner, Summers, Bernanke. Why not appoint Cheney as a good-will ambassador? Oh my, dear Bruce, you've just made Ruth Lavida Adkins-Robinson's head hurt.

Nobody's Following Me

I'm puzzled. I keep getting emails saying they love my blog, but where are the 'followers?' I've done more than 138 posts. I'm told they are well written, wide in scope and interesting. If you are reading this, sign up as as follower and you will get a thank you from Ruth Lavida Adkins Robinson.

Woman's Brains vs Men's Brawn

I was reading today all the hurrah over Kelly Kulik winning the PBA Tour, the first woman to do so and the comments gushed and crowed...now doesn't that prove that women can do anything as well as a man?? No, it actually only proves that a woman bowler can beat the pants off of men bowlers. Make no mistake, Kelly won by 70 pins and if you've ever bowled, you know how many pins that really is!!! But in a championship competition it's just bowler vs bowler, and game strategy , composure and smarts win. There is the eternal argument that finesse can beat out brute strength every time. I believe that wholeheartedly and will say it to anyone, any time. I remember having a conversation at a gathering at Brock and DiDi Peters house back in the 70s with Muhammad Ali and a bunch of other people. Now, readers here know I am a superfan of the Champ. He's my homie, and I always say 'Yeah, I'm from Louisville, me and Ali.' Now that makes what happened that night even a little more outrageous to some and really typical Ruth. We were still a little edgy over the recent bad earthquake here and the conversation had gone to what we all would do if one hit right at that moment. Somebody said we'd be glad the Champ was there because he was strong enough to lift the house up off of us so we could get out. Of course I said, well what if the way out does not depend on who is the strongest, but who is the smartest? Talk about heads swiveling in my direction, complete with real glares. Not Ali though, he just grinned and asked what I meant. I said, what if the house had fallen in on us and you could lift the roof off of us, but I knew where there was an exit door and we could get off without any heavy lifting. Ali graciously said, he hoped that I was around when the next earthquake hits and we all laughed. I understand the realiance on muscles thoughts. I was the number one tomboy in Louisville KY and could be counted on to throw a ball harder, take any dardevil dare, climb a tree higher and jump into anything that required some physical challenge, even when my brain cautioned. That I never listened of course is the reason, I broke my left arm, ran a spike through my right leg, split my head open several times and sailed ass over elbows off my bike half a dozen times to bruises, bumps, cuts and scars. Then I got sidelined by polio and had to rely solely on my brains. I'm happy I did or I might have been a woman's sports champion (not bowling, though)....who knows what the fate of the sidetracked Ruth Lavida Adkins Robinson would have been?

Betrayal Is An Ugly Word

Today I found out in a casual phone conversation that someone I had trusted for a long time had betrayed me. Say the world out loud and it sounds ugly--Betrayal. Roll it around on your tongue Betrayal... it makes your tonsils and teeth hurt. As I heard this friend of mine recount a story that happened a couple of years ago, I got quieter and quieter, my breath was shallow and from the other end of the phone came the query, 'you still there?' Parts of me were, other parts were shattered, beneath me on the floor in fragments. He wanted to know what was wrong and was surprised at my anger over what she had done. After all, what she did was directed at him, not me. Perhaps she didn't think it would hurt me, more likely she didn't think of me at all--collateral damage is all I was. Betrayal is an ugly word. Revenge is a beautiful word and Ruth Lavida Adkins Robinson will have hers.

What Weather?

I watch the BBC's "Cash in the Attic" every time it's on and recently watched a woman who was selling off her stuff in London so she could return home to Australia after 20 or 30 years. The reason she was leaving was given as some kind of disorder caused by the winter weather. She fell into a funk from lack of sun and just couldn't stand it as she got older. My first reaction was how silly that seemed, but then I realized where I've lived my entire life has been regulated by the weather. When you are young and fearless, you ordinarily don't give much thought to the weather, but when I was deciding which direction to head in when I ran away from Kentucky, Southern California was very appealing for what it didn't have --Kentucky weather. It's dead in the center of the Ohio River Valley and has one of the highest pollen counts in the world. So imagine trying to breath in the stinking humidity and having to suck up pollen too. I wanted to get out of that weather and came here. I love this weather. Every time I think I could live somewhere else--which is frequently, I realize the weather holds me here. I did move to St. Thomas on the Fortuna end of the Island. That was one of my stupidest impulses ever. There I got to try to manage the heat, humidity, bugs and hurricanes. So I moved to San Juan living on the ocean front in a high rise on Avenida Ashford. The humidity followed me there and combined with the robbers who stole everything including the frozen food in the fridge drove me back to Los Angeles, where the sun was shining and I wasn't sweating. Then the weather in LA betrayed us all this week. Today I found myself weepy and depressed because of the endless rain, storms, hail, thunder and lightening. I'm weather-spoiled Ruth Lavida Adkins Robinson

Ruth Lavida Burns

Who was she? I never knew. She has always been a stick figure. Just a girl whose face I wear. I spent many years in the search for Ruth Lavida Burns. I wonder who she was, this young girl who was 17 years old when I was born, who died in Baltimore when she was not yet 40. There are nights I run the past like an old ricky ticky movie in my head. So add this January night as another sleepless night to the list. I'm the daughter of Ruth Lavida.

What A Year

This time last year, Suzanne de Passe, Suzanne Coston and I were happily freezing our buns off in Washington DC as the harried and hurried women working on the Commander-In-Chief's Inaugural Ball. It seems such a short year. I'm sure the man who became President of the United States on that fateful day has wondered "what was I thinking" when he determined to be President. I love him even more today than I did on that historic day. The challenges dumped on him by those exiting republican fools would have brought a lesser man to his knees. But he keeps moving forward. It's interesting that people rarely speak of temperament when talking about what it takes to be the most powerful man in the world. But it's worth noting that it takes a resolute and calm character to remain in charge and devoted to executing intentions in spite of all the garbage thrown in his direction. Ever more often I wonder at what point in his life that he decided to be a Black man. He didn't have to embrace the African father's name. Raised by his white grandparents, he could have been Barry and taken their last name and moved in some different circles. But he chose Barack. Charismatic, handsome over-achiever he is, he could have picked a glamor blond, but he didn't. He chose a woman of dark color to stand beside him, not behind him. And she ain't doing so badly either. She is clearly who she is and will leave a deep imprint on history. How either of them deals with the horrible hatred hurled at them makes me want to lift them up even more. I'm proud I lived long enough to see them in the White House and one of the most glorious times of my life was standing under the Presidential Seal at the end of the night and grinning at being part of history. I'm still the smiling Ruth Adkins Robinson

History, History Who's Got the History

How did I get labeled the historian? Somehow long ago, I started correcting assertions based on "somebody said." I became editor-in-chief at BRE simply because I hated the fact that one writer didn't know the history of what he was writing about and did not know who Albert Ammons was or Meade Lux Lewis. I no longer have any connection whatsoever with BRE, but the knowledge that got me labeled the Historian still is stuck in my head. If you want to see something funny, sit in the room with me and Wren Brown as we struggle to out-history trivia each other!! Truth is, Wren has me beat, but he does have the advantage. After all his entire family as far back as Grandfather Troy forward has been making entertainment history. Troy Brown was in that first group of five Black actors who signed up with the Screen Actors Guild! I can recall the exact emotions I felt when I first got my Writers Guild Membership card, thinking it was an monumental achievement. Imagine how Troy Brown felt holding that SAG card in segregated Hollywood. Wonder what Grandfather Troy had to endure?? Back to sitting in the room with Wren. We are talking about the project "Blacks In Entertainment" with Blair Underwood, his producing partner Tommy Morgan and director Naisa Wong. On the history tip--Blair was actually the first Black leading man (read Hunk)in primetime TV with his role in "L.A. Law." There's a deep story with Blair and if what we are working on comes true, we'll get to tell these stories in a series in works. I am in fine company and this is a fine project. Let's see what history unfolds now for Ruth Adkins Robinson.