letters
TO THE EDITOR
number). They seem obsessed with strange
and ineffective privacy concerns at the
customer service desk — yet the meter
inspector in the fi eld freely gossiped to my
barn help about my account! I fi nally got
my question answered when I demanded to
speak to a supervisor. Then and only then
was customer service willing, hurriedly
so, to disclose my actual billing dates. I’ve
dealt with public utilities for the last 40
of my 60 years — IMO, their “customer
service” is at best clueless — and abusive at
worst. I do plan to fi le a complaint with the
Oregon Public Utility Commission.
Jan B. Baldwin
Coburg
RECKLESS WORDS
A philosopher at the UO has alerted me
to the fact that you have falsely reported
(Slant, 8/11) that I “posted rumors as facts
in this case, mistaking confi dentiality for
cover-up.” This mischaracterizes the post
in question, which did not report “rumors
as facts” but reported allegations from a
graduate student at Oregon, and reported
that two faculty members confi rmed those
allegations. The posts in question are at
http://wkly.ws/13h and http://wkly.ws/13i
I can only assume you got the reckless
language from Bonnie Mann, who has
used similarly reckless language.
As a lawyer, I choose my words
carefully in matters like this. I trust you
will print a prompt correction.
Brian Leiter
Professor of Jurisprudence
University of Chicago
EDITOR’S NOTE: Leiter blogged that two faculty
members confi rmed the allegations of sexual harassment
and also confi rmed a “member of the faculty urged quiet
about this incident,” but the UO says the harassment has
not been substantiated, and Bonnie Mann says the implied
cover-up was nothing more than respecting confi dentiality.
But there may be more to the story.
NOT ALL MASOCHISTS
The writer (“Intelligent Provocation,”
8/4) who suggested that nonviolent
protesters should do more to encourage
violence against them, made plenty of good
living out
points about the way violence has swayed
public opinion — in the past. While you may
not see it every day on the news, nonviolent
protesters in this country are met with
considerable violence on a regular basis,
it just doesn’t mean the same thing to the
general public any longer. The tree-sitters
in the in the Elliott State Forest were fully
attacked by a piece of heavy machinery, and
then had their lives threatened by armed
offi cers who come equipped with Tasers,
guns and chemical weapons that they use
against people on a regular basis.
I invite the previous writer to consider
the difference between a water cannon or
baton at ground level, and an untrained
hand and knife at 130 feet or higher. The
reason this type of activity isn’t heavily
covered or considered in mainstream
media is clear, it just isn’t very exciting to
people any more, no one is getting blown
up, guns aren’t used when the media is
there, and thankfully, there usually isn’t a
resulting death.
To this modern society, a lack of these
components means a lack of violence, and
to them, also a lack of excitement. If people
want to see the violence committed against
peaceful activists in this country every day,
they should contact their favorite media
outlets and demand coverage of it, not
make the ludicrous suggestion that peaceful
activists aren’t experiencing enough of it.
After all, we are activists, not (all) masochists.
Jason Gonzales
Cascadia Forest Defender
Walton
WHAT ABOUT WINK?
I have just fi nished reading the Aug. 4
edition. A comparison of the “People for
Sale” and the Wink personal ad section in
the back of the paper leads me to wonder:
Do you do anything to screen the Wink ads
before publishing them? Sure looks to me
like a great way for trapping unsuspecting
innocents by sex traffi ckers.
Gil Campbell
Eugene
EDITOR’S NOTE: As an alternative newspaper we tend
to do minimal censoring of our content, but we never
knowingly advertise illegal activities.
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BY SALLY SHEKLOW
Sumpin’s Not Right
No time to question spousal duties
W
ifey was convalescing from surgery, and I was busy
loving, honoring and cherishing her pretty much
around the clock. On one of my trips to the kitchen
to fetch a fresh ice pack, I noticed an odd quiet from our
basement where backlogged laundry had been cheerfully
chugging along. This could mean only one thing: Our sump
pump wasn’t working.
When the system’s functioning, the washing machine
overfl ow raises the pump’s fl oat which trips a switch that
starts the motor that draws the sump water up a drain hose,
out the basement window and into the rhododendron bed.
Dry basement, happy shrubs
This day, however, silence.
Already on post-op home-care overload, I needed another
project like a funeral needs Fred Phelps. Please. As it was, we
hadn’t opened mail since our fi ve days in the hospital, kitchen
compost needed dumping and the answering machine fl ashed
FULL, also descriptive of the cats’ litter box.
I consulted Wifey, our resident basement butch, who’d have
zipped downstairs had she not been lying in bed, leg elevated and under ice.
“Could you please go look?” she slurred through her medicated fog.
How could I deny her? I had to rise — or in this case descend — to the occasion.
The wooden stairs creaked. I ducked the cobwebbed beams, traversed the dingy
expanse of concrete and beheld the sump. Dim basement light cast an eerie glow on
the stagnant water in the sump, an oval-shaped catchment pit the size of a chamber
pot.
The sump pump, a thin pedestal model with a motor on top and water-sucking
intake at the bottom, lay tilted against the sump wall, lifeless. This is really Wifey’s
territory, but no way could she even get down here on that newly replaced knee, let
alone squat sumpside. It was up to me.
I mustered my resolve, held my breath and plunged my hands into the murky
pool. These are the things one does for a spouse, I thought as I groped around in the
thick, tepid water, whether or not they fi le taxes jointly, enjoy Social Security rights of
survivorship or any of legal marriage’s myriad other federal benefi ts.
I fi shed out the old sump bricks that were supposed to keep the pump upright. They
were slimy and coated in black shmutz. Elbow deep now, I wrangled the pump creature
from its black lagoon. No matter the thousand-some rights I’m denied because
the U.S. still discriminates against couples like us, this was no time to question my
responsibility to spouse, home or humble sump pump.
I cleaned that sucker, found the irreparable problem, dashed to the hardware store,
assembled the new pump and anchored it in place. With schmutz-blackened hands
(nice contrast to my gold wedding band, by the way) I fl ipped the switch. The fetid
water slurped into the hose and out the window to the appreciative rhody.
I scrubbed up and returned to Wifey who lay in a drugged stupor, knee aloft on a
pile of pillows. I applied fresh ice, re-wrapped her leg and prepped her next dose of
meds. The sump pump whirred softly in the basement.
How is it again that our marriage isn’t real?
Award-winning writer Sally Sheklow lives in Eugene where she does what needs to be done.
JANE GIBBONS
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EUGENE WEEKLY AUGUST 18, 2011
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