The Claw Magazine: Volume 3, Issue 2 by The Claw Magazine

THE CLAW MAGAZINE Volume 3, Issue 2

EDITORS-IN-CHIEF Max Allan McClure ’11 Alice Haelyun Nam ’11

SENIOR ART EDITORS Mari Christine Amend ’13 Emily Suzanne Mitchell ’13

SENIOR DESIGN EDITOR Justin Eli Calles ’13

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Alex Michael Mayyasi ’11 Kaitlin Jolie Olson ’13 Rutger Ansley Rosenborg ’12 Megan Mackenzie Winkelman ’13 theclawmagazine.com

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“The Claw” by Jenny Marie Tiskus ‘11

FROM THE EDITORS An original spam message: To: theclawmagazine@gmail.com March 8, 2011 <html> <body> My Dearest one, Hi, My name is Sofia Justin Yak, 23years old originated from Sudan. I decide to contact you after my prayers, I really want to have a good relationship with you. My father Dr. Justin Yak was the former Minister for SPLA Affairs and Special Adviser to President Salva Kiir of South Sudan for Decentralization. My father Dr.Justin Yak and my mother including other top Military officers and top govaernment officials had been on board when the plane crashed on Friday May 02, 2008. You can read more about the crash through the below site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7380412.stm After the burial of my father, my uncle conspired and sold my father’s properties to a Chinease Expatriate and live nothing for me. On a faithful morning, I opened my father’s briefcase and found out the documents which he have deposited huge amount of money in one bank in Burkina Faso with my name as the next of kin. I traveled to Burkina Faso to withdraw the money so that I can start a better life and take care of myself. On my arrival, the Branch manager of the Bank whom I met in person told me that my father’s instruction to the bank was the money be release to me only when I am married or present a trustee who will help me and invest the money overseas. I ha</iv>ve chosen to contact you after my prayers and I believe that you will not betray my trust. But rather take me as your own sister. Though you may wonder why I am so soon revealing myself to you without knowing you, well, I will say that my mind convinced me that you are the true person to help me. More so, I will like to disclose much to you if you can help me to relocate to your country because my uncle have threaten to assassinate me. The amount is $5.6 Million and I have confirmed from the bank in Burkina Faso. You will also help me to place the money in a more profitable business venture in your Country. However, you will help by recommending a nice University in your country so that I can complete my studies. It is my intention to compensate you with 30% of the total money for your services and the balance shall be my capital in your establishment. As soon as I receive your interest in helping me, I will put things into action immediately. In the light of the above, I shall appreciate an urgent message indicating your ability and willingness to handle this transaction sincerely. Please do keep this only to your self. I beg you not to disclose it till i come over because I am affraid of my wicked uncle who has threatened to kill me. Sincerely yours, Miss Sofia Justin Yak </body> </html>

— Max McClure and Alice Nam 3

TABLE OF CONTENTS 3 Editorial Statement 6 6

FRONT MATTER Wo Jiao Wen Peiru Peri Unver Lost in Translation Selections from the Arabic, Italian, Russian, Spanish, and Swahili

10 12

TALK OF THE QUAD The Perfect Omelette Caroline Ferguson On the Negative Power of Love Rutger Rosenborg

FEATURES 20 The Tree Party Max McClure 14 19 25

FICTION AND POETRY Bird Boy Sadie Zapata Reading About Cairo Rachel Hamburg The Truck Made Entirely of Glass Austin Zumbro

ESSAYS 28 Adrift in America Emilie Dannenberg PRIMARY SOURCES 36 Harvard of The West 38 About The Claw

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VOLUME 3 ISSUE 2 ART & PHOTOGRAPHY Mari Amend The Madonna on the Fox 16 Gabriel Benarros Facce di Fumo

Justin Blair Sex, Darwin, Death

Trip Leavitt Metamorphosis of Rodin Sculpture 39 Yanran Lu Untitled (Nude Man) Untitled (Nude Woman) Untitled (Nude Woman Reclining) Untitled (Man, Chair)

4 5 18 26

Lucas Manfield Zeke 23 Janina Motter Dance and Environment

Larissa Muramoto Kaleidoscope

Carla Carrillo Paredes Untitled (Man) Untitled (Woman) Untitled (Band)

8 9 36

Emma Webster Winter 24

Yanran Lu ‘11

DOODLES Jane Reynolds Doctors and Borders

Lindsey Toiaivao Like, Dislike

Emma Webster Cafe Au Lait

Front and Back Covers of Auguste Rodin’s “Right Hand” and “The Age of Bronze” by Justin Calles and Mari Amend {table of contents} 5

FRONT MATTER Wo Jiao Wen Peiru Peri Handan Unver ’13 I have no ear for languages. I took Spanish in high school only to embarrass myself during the tango (“Move your hips; why are they so stiff ?”) and to say, “Grass-ee-ass” in class one day without remembering to round my vowels. Why I chose

to take Chinese, then, makes no sense whatsoever. I remember David Sedaris sadly trying to learn French in Me Talk Pretty One Day. In Chinese class, the teacher asks us to repeat after her, and we all sort of mumble away to ourselves. All except for that one student who I am convinced has taken Chinese before. I pray not to be called on, and of course, inevitably I always am. This gave way to surprise when I realized my accent was not the worst in the class. After a brutal diagnosis by our teacher (who went, one by one, around the room to hear our pronunciation) two men were

told that they would need to come to her office hours. Translation: “You need help, badly. Please do not embarrass yourself any further.” I felt guilty as I silently rejoiced. I must confess, I have these fantasies of going to China. I can see myself there, attempting to use my tiny bit of Chinese. I can ask how you are, how your father’s health is, what country you are from, and what your family name is. In short, I am ready for small talk. Hopefully, soon I will learn to ask for today’s date and also what you like to do. Until then, I’ll have to be satisfied with: “Wo Chang Kalaok.”

In first-year language classes across Stanford University, undergraduate students must write personal essays that discuss separate yet equally important subjects: their personal lives, involving friends and family, and their opinions on everyday matters. These are their stories.

Oklahoma vs. Moscow Jean Margaret Lam ’12 Composed for First-Year Russian; translated into English by the author

a grandmother, Loobov. In my apartment in Moscow, there are three rooms. In my house in America, there is one floor. My home in Moscow is far from the university and left of Metro Voikovskaya. I think living is difficult without friends and family. I think living is not difficult with sugar. Yesterday, I was in a cafe, Coffee Beans, and I saw my friend. I usually go to a cafe or bar with friends. I want to live in America in a warm place far from the big city.

I am a female student at Stanford University. My university is very pretty! It is very green! I love Stanford because my friends live here. Avery, Shannon, and Jenny are my favorite friends. Avery likes to listen to music. Jenny likes to read books about math. Shannon likes to watch television. I am from Pauls Valley, Oklahoma. I love Pauls Valley very much. Pauls ValDana Anne Feeny ’12 ley is a very small city but very beautiful. My town has five good restaurants. I lived Composed for First-Year Swahili; translated on a farm. My farm is very green and very into English by the author beautiful. I have two dogs and many cows. Pauls Valley is in the south of the state. I I love all of the seasons. I like do not have family in Moscow. I live with fall because of the cool air, the frequent

Spring Awakening

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sunshine, and the start of a new school year. I love the summer when it is hot every day. There is no school, and I get to travel and earn money. I even like the winter when the rain falls every day turning the brown grass green. My favorite of all is spring. It is the freshest time of the year. The winter rain has brought all the plants back to life and flowers begin to bloom. The daytime is longer, and the sun doesn’t set until seven. The trees and flowers bloom, and the air smells like lavender. The birds chirp from the trees every morning. People wear shorts and sandals and bright colored clothing. The sun is warm and it rarely rains. I spend so much time outside in the nice weather, get a tan, get more exercise, and am so happy! Spring also comes with a lot of great holidays to celebrate! It starts with spring break, which is always fun. Sometimes I go visit my grandparents in Montana with my family for spring

LOST IN TRANSLATION Art for Art’s Sake

break. Montana is beautiful and I love seeing my family. Sometimes I go visit friends, or if I am really lucky, go on a nice vacation. I always return rested, tan, and ready for a fresh start in spring quarter. Mother’s Day and Easter are great family holidays where I get to see everyone; we have a nice brunch and enjoy each other’s company. The spring festivities continue with the May Day celebration and Cinco de Mayo. Spring is a great time of the year with happy colors, great weather, and new beginnings.

Mari Christine Amend ’13 Composed for First-Year Spanish; translated into English by the author

Going Camping Layne Alexandra Novak ’13 Composed for First-Year Italian; translated into English by the author Dear Diary, I hate camping with my family. It’s a disaster! It’s always stressful and never any fun. I went with my parents and my brother. We were angry at each other the entire trip. (Unfortunately, it also rained for the entire trip.) On the second day, my mother declared, “I can’t take it anymore!” because my father had broken the tent. But we didn’t go home. No, we stayed in the woods because my father would not admit defeat. We were there for a week. When we left, we hated each other. On my next vacation, I am not going camping. I want to go to the ocean or to a historic, interesting city, and stay in a hotel, not in the woods. I will visit the beach, or the art galleries downtown, and go shopping. The vacation will be relaxing and fun. Maybe I’ll go with my family, but I’ll probably go with my friends instead.

The Brother of My Friend John Visits Stanford University Alex Michael Mayyasi ’11 Composed for First-Year Arabic; translated into English by the author This week, I do not study much on account of the brother of my classmate. He travels in Stanford University. The name of my classmate is John, and the name of the brother of John is Alex too. I and John are students in fourth year, and his brother is a student in second year at Harvard University. Now, I and Alex are friends.

My name is Mari Amend. I am from California, from Los Angeles. I am 19 years old and in my second year at Stanford University. I like to read and to talk about books; I do not like physics and math. For those reasons, I am a student of French, English, and Spanish literature. I am very sociable and I like to talk with my friends. With my friends, I like to go to San Francisco, to go to concerts, and to go to parties. We eat Japanese food, like sushi, together. Also, with my friends from Los Angeles, I like to go to the movies. My favorite movies are Amélie, You’ve Got Mail, and other comedies and romances. I don’t like horror movies. I am also very artistic. I like art and going to museums a lot. At Stanford, I work at the Cantor museum where I hang paintings because I am an assistant to a preparator. My favorite paintings are those of Pablo Picasso, and my favorite sculptures are those of Rodin and Robert Arneson. In my free time, I draw and paint. I make drawings for my friends and family. I like to sing also. I have had 10 years in a choir and sing alone with a professor of singing. Sometimes, I play the ukulele and sing. I like all of the arts. Finally, I like to write and read. My favorite books are Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf and East of Eden by John Steinbeck because they describe reality. I don’t like the books of John Locke and political philosophy because they are boring. I like to study and to have fun, and at Stanford, I can do both of those things. {front matter} 7

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Carla Maria Li Carrillo Paredes â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;12 9

TALK OF THE QUAD The Perfect Omelette: A Scientific Approach Caroline Ferguson ’14 Deep Blue Sea always made me laugh as a kid. Morbid, I know. But there was something about a genetically engineered shark breaching out of the water to chomp down on Samuel L. Jackson that tickled me. For those who aren’t lucky enough to have experienced the cinematic brilliance that is Deep Blue Sea, a brief recap: Dr. Susan McCallister believes she has found the cure to Alzheimer’s disease in enzymes naturally occurring in shark brains, but in order to harvest them, she must – you guessed it – increase the mass of the brain, thereby making the already massive and aggressive sharks “Bigger. Smarter. Faster. Meaner.,” as the tagline reads. Manhunt and bounteous CGI ensue. One comparatively unremarkable scene I often recall depicted Def Jam rapper L.L. Cool J (I’m serious, you need to see this movie) filming what he believed would be his last moments. He looks straight into the camera in desperation, “We will start with the perfect omelette, which is made with two eggs, not three. Amateurs often add milk for density; this is a mistake.” His speech is interrupted by vengeful shark geniuses, leaving the audience wondering, how do you make the perfect omelette?! At least, it left me wondering. And I’m finally going to find out. Search “the perfect omelette” on Google and you come up with some 10 the claw

800,000 web results, mostly recipes, as well as several instructional videos. Highlights include Alton Brown, Jamie Oliver, and an adorable twelve year old named Grace!, exclamation point included. I intend to take these chefs into consideration and apply the scientific method to determine what really makes the perfect omelette. Define the Question: What factors contribute to the perfect omelette? Does milk improve an omelette or detract from it? Who makes the best omelette? How can it be duplicated in my kitchen? Form Hypothesis: I hypothesize that if milk is used in omelette-making, then the eggs will be fluffier and thus contribute to a superior tasting omelette. Perform Experiment and Collect Data: Let’s start with Jamie Oliver, largely because he’s search result number one and has a sexy British accent. First, Jamie stipulates the use of “free range organic eggs,”and while I’m all for eco-friendliness, I’m also a broke college student. Hence, we’ll be relying on grade A large eggs.

Jamie, like LL Cool J, takes a decided stance against the use of milk. 7” pan. Medium heat. Pinch of salt. Whisk in the bowl (that’s whisk). This is all fairly standard procedure. He uses both extra virgin olive oil and “a knob of butter” in the pan; and recommends “giving it a chivvy about,” which I assume from his gesture means rotating the pan until the butter is melted. Jamie turns down the heat after 30 seconds to add grated cheddar cheese. He uses tantalizing words to describe the eggs like “silky” and “softness” for the next 40 seconds, before detailing his preferred omelette-removal technique. He leaves us with a solid introduction to omelette-making and the conviction to pack-up and move to London once and for all. However, the recipe falls far short of taste perfection. Next. Despite her difficulty reaching the stove, I’m impressed with Grace!’s omelette technique. I’m slightly less impressed with her little brother’s filming, which more closely resembles the Blair Witch Project than anything you’d see on Food Network. Grace! is clearly the star of this family, and little Billy (sans exclamation point) should probably stay in school. After whisking the eggs, salt, and pepper, Grace! adds ham and green onions, which she observes “don’t really look like onions.” Grace! then moves to turn on the stove, but no flame appears when she twists the knob, and after a few seconds she exclaims, “Ooo, stinky!” The camera cuts away and when we return, it looks like mom has taken over filming. Grace! uses only butter but adds grated cheddar cheese after 30 seconds, just like Jamie. At this point, I think we can call that par for the course, and I’m going to assume LL would have shared this tip too, had vicious man-eaters not distracted him. After numerous attempts at omelette removal, Grace!’s mother insists with increasing fervor, “Perfect. Perfect. Perfect! Perfect!!” and as she pretends to take the first bite, Grace!

{talk of the quad} 11

signs off with clenched teeth, “Press the middle button.” Perfect is a gross overstatement. But I think we’re getting somewhere. Oh, Alton Brown. Any Food Network nerd can attest to his brilliance. (There are others of us, right?) Surely he can bring some clarity to this issue. • 3 eggs, warmed in hot water for five minutes • Pinch salt • 1 teaspoon room temperature butter, plus ½ teaspoon for finishing omelet • ½ teaspoon fresh chopped chives

Except for temperature specification, Alton follows pretty much the same cooking process as Jamie and Grace!. He insists, however, on applying butter directly to the surface of the plated egg, 1) because more butter always means happier taste buds, and 2) “because it provides a suitable substrate for herbage.” But here’s the real kicker: Alton serves his “perfect omelette” with a side salad and a glass of wine, and calls it dinner. Mind. Blown. Wonder if that’s what LL had up his sleeve this whole time… Analyze Data:

I knew I could count on Alton to bring the critical element into this whole matter: temperature. My mom swears by room temperature eggs. Apparently, “they coagulate differently.”

I’m most impressed with how quickly each chef was able to execute “the perfect omelette.” Ask any dining hall employee and the process takes approximately the amount of time your quadmates need to finish their continental breakfast, i.e. somewhere

between 10 minutes and eternity. Speed aside, each chef had definite advantages. Jamie’s irresistible Posh twang was almost overshadowed by Grace!’s oversized apron and gapped teeth. However, Alton took a clear lead when he introduced alcohol into the equation. Jamie, I hope we can still be friends. Interpret Data and Draw Conclusions: Because none of the chefs recommended the use of milk in their recipes, I must conclude that my grandmother’s omelettes, while delicious (really Mawmaw, I swear), are inferior in texture and taste to those without added liquid. Grated cheddar cheese should be sprinkled after 30 seconds. Don’t forget to whisk in some salt. Always, always serve your omelettes with wine. And most importantly, avoid man-eating sharks.

On the Negative Power of Love Rutger Ansley Rosenborg ’12

The Couple, at first, is playful. It smiles constantly: one large, maniacal smile. It kisses itself once the waiter turns around. It reaches for its own hands under the table, groping in the dark until its fingertips connect, sending shivers through its own flesh. The toe of one half of The Couple slides up the leg of the other half from the back of its shin to its calf. It talks to itself. It tells itself jokes. It says things that are trite and superficial, but they are nonetheless things that make it happy. It is fascinating to observe it in its natural environment. 12 the claw

Its communication and interaction with itself consist of an expression of the things that it loves about itself. The waiter comes back and The Couple continues to order more food. Lobster and Chardonnay. Filet Mignon and Cabernet. Dessert. Appetizers. Its appetite is enormous. It rifles through the whole menu, exhausting the range of foods and drinks, frantically searching for something else to try. But soon it finds itself repeating orders. It has been coming to this restaurant for too long. A year passes and it sits at the same table, but soon it realizes that it

is grasping for superficialities because it has run out. One of its hands gropes in the dark and struggles to find the other hand under the table. It admits something to itself: some grievance or sorrow. It tells itself that this is good; this is healthy. It thinks it is finally understanding itself. It cries for what it now knows, and it refuses to order anything more. Separating the halves of The Couple means murdering this creature. But the very act of hybridization, love, also means murder of the halves as distinct entities. Love is both

inherently selfish and inherently “selfless” – in the very literal sense of not having a self. In contemporary society, love suggests necessity: “I cannot live without the object that I love. It is necessary for my happiness, and perhaps my survival – without the love-object I am fundamentally and permanently impoverished as a human being.” We claim to love someone by negating that person, by imagining her absence. So when we ask, “Do you love me?” and when we say, “Yes, I love you,” we mean, “Can you negate me?” and “Yes, I am negating you.” We are thinking not of the person, but of ourselves. We kill the person we love, but we are the martyrs. And then we simultaneously do the opposite: as we negate the other, we negate ourselves, disappearing into the union. This is not the Marxist Collective. For in a Collective, the individual still exists, though she works for the greater good. The Collective works toward some common goal outside of itself. In a union of love, the union works toward itself. It has no goal other than perpetuating itself: it is autotelic, and the individual disappears in its abstraction. The secrets, emotions, and actions of one

half become the secrets, emotions, and actions of the other, and vice versa. It becomes some sick hybrid, a monster: an absurd spherical creature wheeling around like a cartwheeling clown (as Aristophanes envisioned it). Each half ends in the other and not in itself. There is still a final negation. If the union elevates itself above all else, those outside the union are bound for removal as well. This is why Slavoj Zizek declares that, “Love is evil.” Love is an entirely anti-egalitarian phenomenon. Love is also, according to Kant, “pathological,” because it is out of our control. This is what makes it so dangerous. We are defenseless against it as it slowly drags us on our backs across the graveled floor to the edge of the abyss. We must therefore warn The Couple about the negative power of love. We must wave our arms and yell as loud as we can, jumping as high as we can, until it notices us at the restaurant window. We must make it known that love is a death drive. When Jacques Derrida was asked by an interviewer with poor French to speak about love, he asked for a clarification: “La mort ou l’amour?” Death or love?

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FICTION & POETRY

Bird Boy by Sadie Ann Lucia Zapata ’11

“Dance and Environment” by Janina Pearl Motter ’12 14 the claw

As I live to tell it, this story is ongoing. In reality, it goes on without me. See, this is a story about my stupid sister Sadie. One December, age seven, she said I wouldn’t care if you were dead or alive! all because I refused to dance to a televised version of the Nutcracker Ballet without first taking off my socks. I happened to be age seven at the time, too. It’s been over a decade since then, and she still hasn’t taken it back (even after I said take that back!), so it seems reasonable to say that she would go on just fine without me. More importantly, this story is not about me, so I will get myself out of the way before I begin. I was born sometime in the spring of 1989, possibly late winter. This approximation is based on my head size, weight, and tuft of crow’s hair on the morning I was dumped in the birdbath outside of an orphanage in Piura, Peru. Perhaps in a fairytale about my birth, my mother was a blue jay named Maria Llena de Gracia. Mistaking the birdbath for a baptismal bowl, my mother used it to give me magical powers of invincibility and wingless flight. But then something either awesome or awful happened. The babypound lady swooped me from my birdbath nest and dried me with a dishtowel. As she rubbed my featherless back, she wiped away my magical powers so I could never fly to my blue jay mother. Ever. After, my adoptive mom would happily name me John, and some would come to call me Jay. The morning I appeared in the birdbath, they say, my lips were raw-ripened-berry-cold blue. Even this resemblance would be wiped away with that dishtowel. The Spanish word for birdbath is pila para pájaros, but that is just a madeup name, like Sadie or Jay or John or

mom or Phoebe, or Sadie. Names are all made-up, but some names are even more made-up, like Maria Llena de Gracia. I made that one up myself. In reality, no birds took baths in the pilas para pájaros in Piura, Peru. The birdbath was for baby boys with bloated bellies stretched so tight and shot through with so many longitudinal veins and oceanic bruises that they looked like little Third World globes. Or else their bodies had already collapsed into their brown skinfolds like leather-bound atlases. Then again, I did not see any of this. I did not even know that I came from Peru until I was seven. This was about the time I refused to let my stupid sister nutcrack me. When I was seven, the name Peru! was the time-out corner for bad boys who were too bad for the normal time-out corner. The normal time-out corner was on top of the washing machine, either because it was cold and hard and uncomfortable, or because it was conveniently located where my dad could go about the housework without letting me out of his sight. In reality, I was a good boy. I sat quietly, but my dad never noticed because he was always too busy shutting up my stupid sister. Sitting on top of the washing machine was for bad things like putting dead wasps in Sadie’s mouth, or throwing tapioca pudding in Sadie’s eyes. The Peru! time-out corner was for very bad boys. That was when my dad said You better estop it, estupid, before I send you back to Peru! with his Spanish lisp. I was never quite bad enough to be shipped back to Peru!. Maybe if the wasps had been alive, or the tapioca hot at the time. Sadie did not have a time-out corner; she had a space-out corner. My dad did not think she was a bad girl, but sometimes she went crazy and he needed to calm her down. Down, Sadie. Her space-out corner was usually a feather-down pillow in the middle of the carpet in the parlor, conveniently located out of earshot so my dad could

go about the housework without losing his mind to her wildness noises, or worrying about her hurting herself. I told him not to worry, that it was nothing to worry about. Sadie, Sadie, Sadie. Just a made-up name. Sadie this and Sadie that. Sadie curled up on my mom’s tongue like a cat. Sadie wagging on dad’s tongue like a lapdog. I wish I were making this up. Let’s pretend these things don’t matter and that nobody minds. This is the part of the fairytale before anything really happens, before the evil stepsister comes and messes up everything for the sake of a stupid story plot They say my adoptive mom noticed me first because I was the quietest baby at the orphanage. I bet they say that so I stay quiet. Knowing American women, I bet it was really because I was the latest thing they carried at the orphanage. By both magic and coincidence, I was dumped the very same morning my adoptive mom arrived with her stroller-shaped shopping cart. Magic and coincidence, it was the very same morning the baby girl died of AIDS so I could go the United States instead of getting roped to a tree in the backyard or muzzling a hole under the fence. On that day, a big, fat white lady with sky bullets for eyes was going to adopt that baby girl. Phoebe, her name would have been. Phoebe, the name crocheted on the sweater worn by the teddy bear in my closet. That teddy bear has one missing button eye, and the stitching in the nose is frayed like a snot rocket. The sweater is okay. Pastel yellow with pastel blue letters P-H-O-E-B-E. I owe my life to the AIDS virus, sounds sarcastic. I owe my life to the baby girl, sounds stupid. I am not stupid. That baby Phoebe girl had no more choice in the matter than I did. Maybe I should say that I owe my life to the death of another, or I should say tough {fiction and poetry} 15

“The Madonna on the Fox” by Mari Christine Amend ‘13

caca, there just wasn’t enough life for the two of us. They tell me and they tell me and tell me again that it is not my fault, as if I have the choice to feel grateful rather than guilty for being the one left alive. Phoebe was half German, half Peruvian. Phoebe was half like the big, fat, white lady; half like her big, fat husband Hector, who immigrated the hell out of Peru in the 1950s. Half like him and half like her, Phoebe was perfect. Then Phoebe died, and that makes her even more perfect. The most perfect thing of all was that my sky bullet mom was imperfect. Her tubes – or was it her tunnels? Something you hold your breath through. My adoption worked out and everything else did too because something inside her wasn’t working 16 the claw

at all. Even though her sky bullet eyes chose mine, she wouldn’t have chosen to adopt otherwise. Unless it was Sadie. Of course, the big, fat, white lady was sad about the baby Phoebe who died, but sadness is complicated. She was also probably sad about the AIDS epidemic in South America, and probably about the one in Africa and everywhere else in the world. She was also probably sad about death as a concept. That’s not uncommon. She was sad like, how the sun is sad when its beams leak through a clammy skin that cannot contain them. People so alive they don’t know whether to burst or pass gas. Or she was sad like the reds and purples splitting into sunset that you do not really understand. You do not really understand because you are used to seeing blue sky during the day. It’s like blood, how it’s blue

on the inside but it comes out red. Bruises are purple, mixed blood and sometimes painful. In life, the mixed blood has something to do with injury or unwanted pregnancy. In the sky, the mix-up has something to do with pollution. She was also probably sad about pollution. It’s complicated. She was sad about things big and small that day. Of course, she was sad, but let’s pretend this was the happiest day of her whole life, a life made whole by this day, a life that couldn’t be made more whole by any other day. I was the smallest thing in her life, and also the biggest, and also the happiest. Let’s make-believe anything I want, since this is still about me and not my stupid sister. Let’s pretend my mom didn’t only want a baby girl. Let’s pretend she would

“Darwin, Sex, Death” by Justin Thomas Blair ’13

{fiction and poetry} 17 17

have flown all the way to Peru just for me, not for stupid teddy bear sweaterwearer Phoebe. Let’s pretend my mom didn’t notice I was too dark-skinned for anyone to believe I was her baby boy from the very, very beginning. A woman once accused my sky bullet mom of stealing me out of my baby carriage. That morning there was a veil of fog. Another gaggle of women wondered what a woman so old was doing babysitting such an ethnic child, giggles. That morning the moon looked like a pale prostitute behind its veil. My mom had sky bullets for eyes, and they locked with mine so steadily that she did not get a chance to read the tag on my collar. This is what my identification tag might have said. Mother: Peruvian, 13 Father: Japanese, age unknown Extenuating circumstance: Mother, 12, raped by soldier, age unknown. Mother and grandmother cannot take financial responsibility.

It might have said this, but in Spanish. If not in Spanish, it might have spoken a language for those who live less literate and more literally than the rest of us. Yelp, bark, growl, bite. This profile, which said too much, also couldn’t say enough, including my date of birth. My mom chose Mother’s Day, May 10. Perhaps this really was the happiest day of her whole life, so far. It was the first official day of mine, so perhaps I was happy. Sometimes it’s hard to know how to feel and what to think, especially about how things used to be or how they happened. I like to think of my mother as a blue jay and my father as a tree branch that broke under the weight of her feather belly, but really, I don’t like to think of them at all. And what I don’t think about I do not feel. For example, I do not feel Phoebe; I do not feel the globe-bellied boys who piss in birdbaths a moment after taking a drink. It is better to feel grateful than guilty. I don’t think my stupid sister feels

either. She is a very bad girl, but no one ever seems to notice because she’s a full-time nut job. There is no space-out corner for girls who are too crazy for the normal space-out corner. There’s no Stop, or I’ll send you back to your birthplace! Her dad would never say that to her, the way my dad said that to me. It makes me think we have a different dad. In reality, we do have different dads. We have different birthplaces, too. I guess hers just isn’t as much as a threat as mine, Peru! See, Sadie was adopted too. I was adopted first, but no one ever seems to notice because she’s so busy going crazy. She’s a full-time nut job. If a boy like me goes crazy, and flaps his wings at one school teacher and that fatso bully Carlos, they call him dangerous and clip his wings. If his stupid sister does the same thing, they call her fragile and make her a pipe cleaner halo. Her birthfather didn’t want her- and I don’t blame him! Her birthmother did want her, the way my sky bullet mom wanted to have her own baby girl, but the government said no. So, her birthmother called her cousin, the sky bullet mom, and asked if she would adopt her baby girl. Yes. No! But what did they know? Sadie became my stupid sister five days after I came home to the United States. During those first four days, my blue-andwhite striped walls looked like the blue sky streaked with clouds as if my mom was poking her head in everywhere. Or a picket fence or a bird cage. Nice white things. Phoebe was perfect because she was a

by Yanran Lu ‘11 baby girl, and half-German, and dead. 18 the claw

Sadie was the opposite of perfect because she was a baby girl, and halfGerman, and not dead. Almost immediately, they started calling her by a fairy’s name, as if Sadie were a some kind of real-life fairytale. Bleck. They called her Tinkerbell, and her hair grew in just that way, like pixie dust. She had white people freckles too, like pixie dust. Like mine, her eyes were brown, but for a time it was a pale face that surrounded them. All the same, he treated us differently. He treated me to a shamefaced solidarity: we were both half-Peruvian. We could see it in our shame and in our faces. We both wanted to have sky bullets for eyes; we both wanted to set into our doorstep like westernized, prodigal suns at the end of every day. We wanted to be the last thing her sky bullets saw before she closed her lids, good night. Sadie, he treated better than a paper princess to King Size boxes of Junior Mints that he hid under her pink-andwhite striped pillow. The walls in her room were pink-andwhite striped, like a gift-wrapped box with bows and ribbons in drawers and on vanities and frosted along mirror frames. Her room said Come, open me, see what’s inside! Like I said, my walls were blue-andwhite-striped, only now they were like a cage with things of wartime, games of physical risk, and primitive tools. A boy cage. The birds had gotten the wiser and fled. Full of the things you might need to break out of jail, or poke an eye out, or give yourself a tribal tattoo. The upside of racism: I told my first grade teacher I was from an Indian tribe, and she had to believe me all day until she asked my sky bullet mom. That night I learned the difference between Native American and Indian. Unfortunately, I was neither. A boy cage. My room said what caution tape is supposed to say,

Reading about Cairo’s City of the Dead The tomb pictured is a printing press: Sheaves of curls and dots or scriptures crowd the undistressed dead. The man in the photo stands near the coffin and hawks news. Guarding these graves is easier than lying in them: smoke shesha, heat lungs and head without argument. Inside, the ancestors unwind in other ways, as quietly. Life is hard to come by, devout in harsh colors for eyes used to dirty linen, wasting saffron on dry noses. They drop coins to grandmother’s staid sarcophagal babysitter — a boy who spends them buying ices from the grave two down. This is all on paper far from papyrus, in a rainy Western ranch town. The dog brays in solidarity with some long-dead blues singer, who is no relative of hers. I shiver when she follows me to bed.

Rachel Elizabeth Hamburg ‘10

Stay out, authorized personnel only. Inside, it is dangerous. This is my authoritative personality, and I can keep you outside any parameter I set.

In fact, my personality is so authoritative that my stupid sister can tell her own damn story. I bet she already told it to you anyway, and I bet she used a lot of hand gestures. {fiction and poetry} 19

FEATURES

The Tree Party Why wilderness preservation – and monkeywrenching – just isn’t what it used to be

Max Allan McClure ’11 BERKELEY, California. Up on the La Peña Cultural Center stage, organizer Karen Pickett is listing the things that biocentrism contradicts. “Biocentrism,” she says – the idea that non-human life has inherent value – “contradicts communism. Biocentrism contradicts patriarchy. Biocentrism contradicts capitalism, of course.” Goodnatured laughter and applause. The event is technically organized by Earth First!, a group that is widely regarded as the father of radical environmentalism. Since its founding in 1979, the organization has lived up to its slogan, “No compromise in defense of Mother Earth,” with a series of hardline tactics. Most commonly, these involve blockades of mining or logging sites, thoughthey have notoriously also included “monkeywrenching:” digging up roads, destroying mill saws, sabotaging mining equipment. But this event in Berkeley has a cozy, churchlike feel to it. Speakers spend their time emphasizing the importance of local involvement, of community, of cross-movement solidarity. Old hippies seated up front often interrupt with corrections or encouragement. There are a couple of folksy musical numbers. And in between speeches you can buy a variety of Earth First! merchandise: Tshirts, cassettes, bumper/bike stickers that say “Stop Clearcutting,” or “Equal 20 the claw

Rights for All Species,” or, more radically, the classic pro-ecotage line, “I’d Rather be Monkeywrenching.” Which, all things considered, is a little odd; none of these slogans reflect what the activists on stage are saying. Trees barely come up, not to mention monkeywrenching, which has frequently been disavowed by the modern radicals represented here. The name of this event is “Revolutionary Ecology,” in honor of what you might call Judi Bari Eve: the night before the infamous Oakland car bombing twenty years ago. On May 24th, Bari, a prominent Earth First! activist, was nearly killed by a nail-filled pipe bomb that detonated under the driver’s seat of her Subaru. Her pelvis was shattered, and, when paramedics found her, seat springs were driven deep into her thighs. Remarkably, investigators accused Bari and her partner, Darryl Cherney – also in the car during the explosion – of planting the bomb, despite evidence to the contrary, and Earth First! suddenly found itself at the center of a media frenzy. The following year, Bari and Cherney sued the FBI and Oakland Police for violations of their First and Fourth Amendment rights, and the case stalled in court for over a decade. Bari succumbed to breast cancer in 1997 – five years before a federal court finally ruled in her favor, awarding her estate 4.4 million dollars. Bari’s legacy remains very much

alive within Berkeley’s environmentalist community. A near-martyr to the cause, she became an inspirational figure for radical youth, particularly in the Bay Area. And, as the primary organizer behind “Redwood Summer” – Earth First!’s widely publicized campaign to halt old-growth logging along California’s North Coast – she moved the organization from its initial focus on wilderness preservation toward the comprehensive, left-leaning social vision that most of these young activists share today. Still, in the eyes of the veteran Earth First!ers I spoke with, this new ideology has come at a price. While the younger members of Earth First! may favor Bari’s approach, the old guard believes that it is precisely this shift away from their original vision that has caused the radical environmental movement to reach a state of crisis. The book that hooked me on environmentalism was Edward Abbey’s 1975 novel The Monkey Wrench Gang. It was a story of cowboy figures turning their own lawless misanthropy to a greater moral good – a good that often took the form of blowing up dams. That outlaw image was what the original Earth First!ers, many of whom knew Abbey personally, wanted to recreate. These men, including Mike Roselle, John Davis, Howie Wolke, and Dave Foreman, were part of a small, homogenous group:

“Kaleidoscope” by Larissa Lileana Muramoto ‘13 {features} {features}21 21

they were white, they were male, they had extensive wilderness experience, and they had little patience for politics. On bumper stickers, they called themselves “rednecks for wilderness.” On banners, they called themselves Earth First! And though many debate the actual political impact of EF’s activities, it was arguably their hard-line position that redefined mainstream environmentalism in the ‘80s. Monkeywrenching may never have been as much of a cultural phenomenon as Abbey would have liked, but, for a while, there was hope. Take, for instance, Foreman’s Ecodefense: A Field Guide to Monkeywrenching, which I have in my backpack as I watch the La Peña speeches: Foreman was certainly aware that he was writing a radical tract. The chapter on “Security,” by far the longest in the book, begins, “It is important to not get caught.” Still, the writing betrays a hope that ecotage will become a spontaneous grassroots movement, a selfsustaining, decentralized, and essentially enjoyable pastime among Westerners. Abbey, in his “Forward!” to the guide, says, “No good American should ever go into the woods again without this book and, for example, a hammer and a few pounds of 60-penny nails. Spike a few trees now and then.” And people may well have listened - in 1990, one EF organizer estimated that the lumber industry in Northern California had lost as much as $25 million in profits to tree spiking. Currently, though, you’d be hardpressed to find anyone who advocates the practice. Earth First! co-founder Mike Roselle, whose own autobiography is called Tree Spiker, has tactical concerns about the sorts of things he did in his twenties. “There were aspects of monkeywrenching and other types of violence,” he said in a phone interview, “that made it very difficult to organize in a community, very different to sustain in a long-term campaign, and fostered a security culture that was not conducive to recruiting.” Some go farther: Don Morris, the North Coast Earth First! contact before 22 the claw

Judi Bari, told me that tree spiking never accomplished what it set out to achieve. “The trees got cut down anyways. The lumber companies viewed not cutting down trees just because they were spiked as allowing people to terrorize you, and they weren’t going to allow that.” In recent years, monkeywrenching has become the purview of the extremist fringe of the extremist environmental movement. It was the splinter Earth Liberation Front, not EF, that vandalized SUVs and burned down ski lodges in the late ‘90s and early 00’s. And though the tenor of the FBI crackdown on these activities – what many established radicals term the “Green Scare” – has drawn its fair share of criticism, far more of the old guard reserve their ire for the ELF’s tactics. Roselle, for one, rejects the idea of the “Green Scare” entirely. “What the fuck do they expect?” he asked me. “If they endorse violence, they’re going to get hit like a hammer.” The fact is, within the ranks of the green vanguard, this reticence used to be less common than it is now. Under Judi Bari – one of the first prominent EF organizers to officially disavow tree spiking – the exit of monkeywrenching was tied intimately to a shift in another unifying ideology behind EF: radical biocentrism. Speaking to nearly any EF organizer today, it’s clear that biocentrism is still considered a central pillar of the movement - hence Karen Pickett’s speech at La Peña. But her interest in patriarchy and capitalism are very separate from the early movement’s idea of wilderness for wilderness’ sake. Pickett’s message is one that Bari put forth in her essay “Revolutionary Ecology:” that the ecology movement “must recognize that we are just one front in a long, proud, history of resistance.” When Bari published her 1995 essay – the namesake of the La Peña event – the article was reflective of a debate that had been going on in the Earth First! Journal for nearly a decade. EF’s founders had fought an unpopular and ultimately losing battle to reserve the publication solely for wilderness and

biodiversity-related news – rather than, as John Davis put it, “filling pages with irresolvable debates over anarchy, flags, immigration, diet, or belly dancing.” He would later suggest changing the name of the journal to “All Aboard the Woo Woo Choo Choo” to reflect the “allaboard” approach. By now, Bari’s message is de rigeur for most younger radicals. The journal frequently runs articles on identity politics and anarcho-syndicalism, and the Earth First! national meeting, known as the Round River Rendezvous, regularly features workshops on paganism and trans-sexuality. As the young Earth First! organizer Jared Aldrich puts it, “You could just as easily call ‘Earth First!’ ‘Communities First!’ now.” But there is still a very clear division between this approach and someone like EF co-founder Howie Wolke, who told me, “I’ve always thought one of the problems with the environmental movement was its association with the leftists.” Older activists like Mike Roselle, Don Morris, and Howie Wolke have all expressed dismay at what they perceive to be an investment in lifestyle over environmental results. Roselle, for instance, was head of the Ruckus Society – an activist training group originally staffed by preservationists like himself – “until it was taken over by anarchists and identity politics and gender politics, and there was basically a purging of the older people… who just didn’t fit the mold: they weren’t vegan, they weren’t skinny, they weren’t tattooed.” Still, the old guard has a more fundamental criticism of today’s movement. In Wolke’s words, Earth First! “wasn’t about a political ideology. It was about saving wilderness.” EF has dealt with this sort of urban/suburban-based environmentalism before – one of Dave Foreman’s original recommendations to national environmental organizations was that their boards of directors be required to spend a minimum number of weeks in wilderness areas, to keep them inspired. But the younger generation is already less motivated by traditional biocentrism and more invested in

viewing environmental causes in terms of their effects on society. This worries Wolke. “There are too many people in the movement who don’t have their feet planted in the wilderness,” he told me. “And this makes them more willing to compromise.” Of course, none of these critics are suggesting a return to biocentrism would be accompanied by monkeywrenching. In fact, many of the early Earth First!ers now head grassroots nonprofits dedicated to preservation. They may not be spiking trees or incurring FBI crackdowns, but they remain radical. Roselle said it best: “I go chain myself to yellow machinery. I break injunctions, I cross lines. I get arrested a lot. I run my mouth. But I don’t blow things up and I don’t burn things down. And [the FBI] knows that because they probably do tap my phone, but I could give a fuck if they tap my phone. I don’t have any secrets.” What is true, however, is that the decline of one counterculture ethos –the outlaw thrills of monkeywrenching – was buoyed by the rise of its replacement – Bari’s big tent leftism. This is why the merchandise at La Peña seems strangely out of date. Twenty years after the national press zeroed in on Bari’s tragedy, definitively making her the face of radical environmentalism, it seems unlikely that Earth First! itself will return to the approach favored by its founders. I do eventually buy a sticker, once the speeches are done. It’s a classic EF logo: a circle with a monkey wrench and a primitive stone hammer crossed in the center. “NO DEAL ASSHOLES” is written about the circumference. It’s the sort of vague message any radical environmentalist can get behind, cowboy or hippie. The spirit of no compromise lives. They just haven’t decided what they’re not compromising on. To learn more about radical environmentalism, check out Max McClure’s interview with Mike Roselle published in Volume 3, Issue 1 and available online at theclawmagazine.com.

“Zeke” by Lucas Samuel Manfield ’11

{features} 23

“Winter” by Emma Beatrice Gambier Webster ‘11 24 the claw

FICTION & POETRY

The Truck Made Entirely of Glass by Austin Zumbro ’10 Tom Vlastik was driving a truck made entirely of glass and trying desperately to keep his eyes on the road. He was on Highway 159, about 20 miles outside of Lancaster, Ohio, at 1:30 on a Tuesday morning. There was no one out driving. The weather was calm, warm and dry with a gentle wind. There wasn’t anything to see, but Tom squinted hard out through the windshield, frantically locking his gaze onto any object that appeared. The truck had no headlights due to its lack of any metal wire, so the blackness in front of him was viscous. The combustion of the diesel engine provided the only light, and the surroundings came floating up through a dull, pulsing redness. Tom strained his brow, trying not to trace the light back into its source. The truck’s engine was, like the rest of the vehicle, a miracle of engineering. If Tom hadn’t been petrified by its furious thrashing, he might have admired the majesty of the solid crystal pistons, the intricacy of pumps and pipettes woven through the weighty balance of the cylinder block. Purportedly, the truck was built by Michael Pearson. Tom inferred this from the name etched into the top of the glove box. It was almost impossible to read, but during his first exploration of the cabin, as he ran his hands over the glass seats, the glass gear shifts, the glass display with its glass dials, Tom had been able to feel it. That was all the way back in Cincinnati. It irked

him then, when he’d first realized it was cursive. But now it caused him great psychic pain, a kind of needle-sharp horror at the thought of a human name tattooed onto the insides of this golem. It was as if Oppenheimer had initialed the plutonium with a Sharpie. Seat belts were not included in the design, as Michael Pearson had not seen a need for them. The vehicle was physically unable to travel faster than three miles per hour on flat ground, and in the event of a crash, the kind of safety provided by physical restraints seemed irrelevant - if not detrimental - to the driver’s well-being. Instead, Tom wore a thick kevlar suit, padded helmet, and goggles. He was hot, and his breath fogged up the entirety of the cabin. His sleeve, while bulletproof, had no absorptive qualities, and so instead of wiping the windshield clean, he satisfied himself with smearing the moisture into streaks. Different patterns afforded varying degrees of visibility. The truck was 13 feet tall, 60 feet long, and it weighed more than 40 tons. There were 18 wheels, each one a solid disk 22 inches in diameter. The trailer was full of beets. Crates of beets stacked one on top of the other. Purple juice stained the sides and bottom of the truck. In the mornings, it gave a beautiful accent to the dazzling prismatic glints of early sunlight. Tom never admired this. In the red-dark of the cabin, he had

begun to cry. The tears relaxed him. After the hours of rigid terror, his sobs, the spasms of his diaphragm, shook loose his shoulders and his neck. He squirmed in his seat. He dropped his head and dripped snot into his lap. His throat ached with hoarse moans, but outside of the truck, Tom’s cries were inaudible. The vehicle continued on, rolling slowly, shrieking exalted songs of motion. And then Tom hit someone. Really, it was more like a shove. The man was walking in the middle of the lane, texting someone from his phone. Out of distraction, he had slowed his pace to a near stop so that the truck came up behind him and struck him full force. The man was wearing a large, loaded camping backpack, and the relatively gentle but wholly unexpected blow sent him stumbling forward. The weight of the pack shifted, and he pitched over his feet and onto his face, all the while holding the phone up and away from danger. Tom stopped crying. He went rigid, slamming down on the brakes, so that the truck slowed to a stop about a foot before it rolled over the man’s body. Tom took the truck out of gear, opened the door, and scrambled down to the street. Tom could see the man was moving. And now he was pushing himself up. Tom hurried over and touched the man’s shoulder. Lee Derry, the traveler, whipped his head around. He was young and a lit{fiction and poetry} 25

larger this time, shattered the front bumper. A fourth hit the broad expanse of hood. It cracked. Tom picked up another rock. The glass hood collapsed. The engine exploded.

by Yanran Lu ‘11 tle dirty. He had hit his head when he fell, and a gash on the right side of his forehead was bleeding profusely. Blood filled his right eye, and he could taste it in his mouth. He was a student of environmental sciences out of Champaign, Illinois, and he was hitchhiking across two states. Lee could identify 200 different mushrooms and every single tree native to the region. In his right back pocket he had a half-empty pack of American Spirits, and an infection had left him completely deaf in both ears since the age of six. What Lee saw as he looked up, his vision half-soaked in blood, was a large-goggled helmet of a head, the face streaked with mucus, a body and extended arm gloved in tight black thickness. The figure was bathed in the red glow of a phantom, the heart of which shook and flamed with demonic fury. Lee Derry screamed. And kicked. Lee’s kick caught the instep of Tom’s right foot, pushing his leg out from under him. Tom dropped hard onto his knee. He reached out again toward Lee, offering a proposal of friendship. But Lee had picked himself up with 26 the claw

the speed of prey and was sprinting off through the fields toward the distant safety of trees - twelve species, all native. Tom watched him go. He knelt there for a few minutes, recovering and taking stock of the night around him. He stood up, rubbed his knee, used his sleeve to smear the snot on his face, and climbed back into the truck. He put it back into gear and began again to creep forward, numb to the engine, no longer squinting. Around four o’clock in the morning, having made it another eight or so miles, the throbbing in Tom’s knee spread up into his hands and he found it hard to hold the wheel. He had to pull off the road on account of the shaking. He parked just off the highway in a patch of tall, dry grass, shivering. He swung his legs out of the cabin and climbed down slowly. He turned to look back at the thing in its entirety. Tom leaned down and picked up a rock, his hand steady around it, and lobbed it. It crashed through the windshield and out through the open driver side door. Tom threw another, and it glanced off a wheel. Another,

The fire shot through the glass fuel system, splintering the glass tubes as it moved, until it hit the fuel tank. Tom was knocked onto his back. Big sheets of glass and bits of beet, beets stuck full of bits of glass, flame and purple juice, crystal shards of Michael Pearson’s truck, hurtling over Tom’s face: a hundred tiny cuts. He couldn’t breathe. He was on fire. Tom extinguished the fire that was burning him, but around him the fire was spreading. Dry grass caught and was carried up on the warm, dry wind. The road was lit up for two hundred yards in each direction. He picked himself up, and observed the scene around him. The truck was blown apart, the remaining hulk of its structure crumbled beneath the weight of flaming root. Glass splayed out over the road and into the field. The fire grew. The wind settled on a firm Northeasterly direction, so Tom Vlastik, flameretardant, bleeding, chose to walk Southwest, back through Leistville and on through Meade into Kingston. He got there about at 8:30, had a little breakfast, and slept in a motel. That night, he caught a bus down to Chillicothe just before the evacuation notices were issued. The fire persisted for three weeks, following the dry forest up into Buena Vista before it was contained, causing millions of dollars in damage and leaving hundreds of people homeless. Tom, dressed in pajama bottoms and a stained white shirt, read the paper in his Cincinnati apartment. Sipping coffee, he learned how investigators had traced the fire back to its source: the rudimentary campsite of a hitchhiker who, it appeared, had fallen asleep while furiously chain-smoking the better half of a pack of American Spirits.

“Facce di Fumo” by Gabriel Rabello Benarros ‘11 {fiction and poetry} 27

ESSAYS

Adrift in America by Emilie Mei Shan Dannenberg ’11

Nevada is dark and cold. We prowl the outskirts of the freight yard and scan the fence for holes. We dart furtively in and out of shrubs. Then the quiet gives way to chaos. Horns bellow. Pistons hiss. Metal jars, catches on metal. Hard, blunt drums puncture the ringing of steel. The wheels arc. The rhythms renew. An anguished screech rips from under the wheels, and the train grinds to a stop. “Now we are peering into the yard,” Bo says. “We memorize the cars and take a mental note of the ridables.” I met Bo a year and a half ago at a shamanism conference in Peru. He promised me a freight trip but had to cancel when hepatitis intervened. This is the make-up trip. I’ve ridden freights a few times, but I welcome the opportunity to learn the ropes proper. Bo has been riding freights for decades. He is over 30 years my senior. He has taught a sociology course on hobos and has made a hobby of taking high-flying executives on the rails. It seems I could have no better guide. We walk briskly around the perimeter of the yard. Bo is hypersensitive to every possibility and exudes paranoia. He rambles in a thick, continuous flow. Every hundred yards he conjures a new story to tell police in the event that we are stopped. “Our story is that we hitchhiked in from the Bay with a trucker,” he says as we walk by the highway. “Our story is that we are catching a freight,” he says as we approach the yard. He continues to monologue. I lag behind and try to plug my ears with my fingers. We head down an alleyway that is dark, infested with weeds and disused fragments of track. We enter the yard into a gritty orange light that barely dilutes the darkness. A car rolls up the service road toward us. Its headlights glower at us, searing and clinical. “Hide, hide behind the bush!” Bo yells. We press our backs to the wall of a building. The car bears down on us.

28 the claw

The headlights sweep over our stiffened bodies, and we are illuminated by lights from above, lights from the side. We are blatant, luminous fugitives. But the car swerves past us out to the road. Maybe the rail police don’t trouble themselves with such inept attempts at stealth. We walk briskly to a grain car with a platform. We spend the next hours cowering from cars and yard workers in sleep-deprived paranoia. Bo constricts his hood around his face and retreats inside so that only a white moon of nose and mouth are visible. Our train spasms down the track in frustrated increments. The cold sun rises over the mountain. My senses are warped from exhaustion. Bo climbs into the cubbyhole of the grain car and falls asleep. Finally, the train moves forward, and our grain car jolts in a steady rhythm.

I stir out of a heavy sleep. I watch the desert roll by. What a strange color Nevada is, I think. Pastel pink and green, the sweeping, pointed mountains. In Elko, Nevada, Bo tries to crush coins under the train wheels. “A classic hobo pastime,” he tells me. The train jerks unpredictably and the coins have to be abandoned.

{essays} 29

Our car is afflicted by a nervous tick. Often, it falls out of sync with the car behind, and the couples slam together, the impact creating a mini-explosion. Our car spasms and I am thrown forward. My nerves are shaken. “Next stop – Salt Lake City,” Bo says. Snowcapped mountains rear up in the distance. The light thins into darkness. I fall asleep, but throughout the night our car convulses, and I’m sucked back out into rattling metal, the biting air and the land reeling around me. A fresh turn of the earth. The land has become craggier. Sediment rock stacks up into jutting towers and sheers off into canyons. The color of the land is harder. The sun crests toward the horizon. There is no Salt Lake City in sight. “Slow fucking train,” Bo says. Darkness blankets us again. We pass through a town. This must be Salt Lake City, I think. But we shudder straight through. Bo pries his upper body from the floor, still wrapped in his sleeping bag. “We’re lost,” he says. “Loose adrift across America.” He glances behind him. When he turns back to me, there’s an incredulous look on his face. “Look where we are.” I peer behind him. A large, illuminated sign pulses in a dull yellow light. Welcome to Cheyenne, Wyoming. The sign sweeps behind the train. The train slows and the racket dims, only to be replaced by Bo’s curt, bossy voice. “Memorize the last three restaurants we pass. Every time you see a new one, drop the last on the list,” he says, just one of many orders I tune out. This man is obsessive, but it is a strange pathology. He exhausts himself exerting whatever small control he can in activities that

30 the claw

defy control. “Neurotic hobo:” an uncomfortable oxymoron. The train comes to a stop, and I cast my rucksack from the train with a feeble throw. I have not eaten in 36 hours. My legs are rickety. We step briskly across a wide dark road, toward the big neon sign of the gas station, and a cold wind nips at our faces. In the gas station, we deliberate how to return California-ward. Bo takes charge and grumbles his demands. “Call the information line,” he says. “Call Greyhound.” “Ask for the next three buses,” he says. “Ask for the fare.” He is gruff and impatient. I end the call and he says, “Did you ask if the route was direct? Did you ask for schedules from Salt Lake City?” His voice has an edge of exasperation. For a moment, I feel like a subpar secretary; then irritation springs up inside me. “You ask,” I say. “No.” “Why?” Does he think I like riding freight trains because I enjoy taking orders? “I’ll tell you why,” he says, “because it’s a wilderness out here, and you don’t know what to do.” This does not bend me into submission. “Go on, walk out the fucking door right now,” I say. “Let’s compromise,” he says, not missing a beat, and I hand over the phone. It turns out our best chance is a bus from Salt Lake City that leaves the next day at midday. We will catch a freight back to Salt Lake City tonight. Back outside we march along the tracks in the darkness. Bo pulls far ahead, a solitary, sulking silhouette. I realize Bo offers no security. He is no longer a leader; I must fend for myself. It is not long before a train winds up the track. We jog between stack cars and climb ladders, searching for a crevice. We jam ourselves into a trough. It is too small for two long-legged people. “You take the other platform; there isn’t space for two,” Bo says. He has a smirk on his face because my trough is on the front side of the car. If the train makes an emergency stop, I’ll be the one crushed by the load. “Good call,” I say, and cross over.

{essays} 31

We pass back through western Wyoming. The crusted, gritty landscape yawns out on either side. Grey clouds pile up into storm clouds, then the cloud loosens and disperses, and the sun pries a gap through the clouds and anoints the land in great rectangles of light. I watch the stretched, golden land. I watch the trailers and creaky farm buildings reel by. The sun grazes the horizon. I have forgotten about the bus.

32 the claw

Dark, green vegetation spreads over the coarse desert and takes charge. A crystal river winds amongst the trees. White mountain peaks tower into the sky. The train stops. I ask Bo, seasoned hobo, if he has any idea where we are. “Looks like Idaho,” he says. “What?” I say. This is not the state we were aiming for, but I stare out in wonder as the day fragments into final bursts of white light. The light flashes out from behind black, angry storm clouds. The metal angles of our car grow more severe, as if solidifying or bracing themselves against a sky in turmoil. The wheels spin madly as if trying to flee the vast, apocalyptic beauty of the land. We twist by hillsides cast in dark shadow. I cower from the searing, gaping sky. I can barely look at the mountains because they frighten me. I feel like we are careening toward the edge of the world. But the darkness draws in, and inside my sleeping bag, cradled by the noise and rhythm, I feel strangely content.

The next day we get off in La Grande, Oregon to stock up on food and drink before continuing west. Back in the yard, a string of refrigerator cars pulls in, and the engineer tells us that they are heading for Portland. We climb up a ladder, onto the high, jutting platform. We pick up speed through pine trees stacked up slopes, past rivers edging into banks, more trees. The noise

{essays} 33

is deafening. The freight churns deep, pulsing drumbeats and frantic snare drums. The sound works open the cracks in my head and sweeps the fragments up into sound. Choir voices align from the wheels and friction. They overlay ricocheting drums and sing out into the night in harmony. My senses are inundated by sound and I am left with my thoughts. They merge leisurely into one another. I lie down and hook one end of a bungee cord through the platform, the other around my wrist so that the train doesn’t buck me off. There is no way I’ll sleep, I think. But then the noise fades out and a serene silence veils the chaos. There is no more sound. My vision contracts, and though I can still see the car shuddering about me, it is diluted, almost washed out, and the hard steel angles are pushed further into my periphery. Then a rich golden glitter carpets my vision like magical, white noise. It envelops me and expands into the silence, and my girlfriend materializes from the gold and is running naked toward me in slow motion, her mouth crinkled in a smile. The scene consumes me. Then I am asleep.

all When I wake, our train is backing into a warehouse. The warehouse of alien experimentation or toxic chemical spray draws closer. Meanwhile, Bo is strewn across the platform fast asleep, an inert lump. “Bo,” I point at the luminous mouth of the warehouse entrance gaping wider. 34 the claw

“What?” Bo shakes his limbs from his sleeping bag in a flurry. “What?” We throw our belongings from the platform. Luckily the freight slows enough for us to jump down. Bewildered, we watch car after car roll past only to be consumed by the warehouse. Then they stop. There is no hint of movement or pulse or steady drumbeat, just cold severe metal and wind scratching up inside steel hollows. “I don’t understand,” Bo says, his eyes squinting at the night. “I don’t understand,” he says over and over. The unexpected has won. We stumble through an overgrown field to the highway. We hitchhike downtown, and our ride tells us we are in Pasco, Washington, a few hundred miles off course. We sit on a bench outside a gas station. It is 2:00 AM; the streets are barren and windswept. We snipe insultingly at each other. It is time to bail. The Amtrak at 5:00 AM is our salvation. We navigate the dark streets to the train station. “Should we catch another freight? Go to Canada?” I say. I laugh maniacally. Outside the Amtrak station, I lie on the lawn by the car park and sink into a deep sleep. At five, I stagger like a zombie into the heated, cushion-clad passenger train. I sleep the best sleep of my life. Bo and I part ways at the Sacramento Greyhound station. I see him queuing sternly for the bus; then he is gone. Finally, I walk down Escondido Road. My grime-caked clothes begin to thaw under the warmth of the sun. There is more dirt crusted on my skin than on the pavement beneath my feet. Bikes whirr softly by, too polite to raise their voices, content to disperse their whisper amongst the beige buildings. I walk into the lecture hall. I sit down in the aisle, a disheveled pile. The professor’s words resonate importantly. I try to summon my focus but I cannot hold it. Soon I lie down on the clean-swept floor. I close my eyes. Echoes of steel shudder in my ear.

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PRIMARY SOURCES On March 18, 1963, the brothers of Beta Chi, formerly the Stanford chapter of Sigma Nu, delivered a statement of defeat to Harvard President Nathan Pusey. The sixties were a tumultuous decade for the Greek community at Stanford. Although the Stanford Trustees formally stated in 1957 that the university sought to end discriminatory practices among student groups, the national organizations of many fraternities explicitly barred religious, ethnic, or racial minorities. In 1960, Alpha Tau Omega defied orders from their superiors to depledge four Jewish students, and in November of 1962, Stanford Sigma Nu voted unanimously to withdraw from their national organization in protest of clauses that prohibited “Negro and Oriental” members. Disaffiliation, suspension, or charter revocations were not uncommon events: in total, nearly one-fifth of Stanford’s fraternities challenged the statutes or customs of their national organizations. One of the first actions undertaken by the newly independent Beta Chi chapter was to issue a challenge to Harvard University. The 67 brothers sought to outstrip the total number of Marshall, Rhodes, and Danforth scholarships awarded to Harvard’s 4,500 undergraduates in the 1962-1963 academic year.They fell short by two Rhodes.Thus humiliated, the former Sigma Nu chapter publicly announced that it would no longer seek to become “The Harvard of the West.” The document on the following page is the official press release issued by Stanford News Service.

by Carla Maria Li Carrillo Paredes ’12 36 the claw

HARVARD OF THE WEST

Image courtesy of Stanford Special Collections {primary sources} 37

ABOUT THE CLAW As our former editor-in-chief once said: if The New Yorker and The Atlantic had a bastard child, it would be The Claw. We hope one day this will be true. Until then, we are a student publication that supports and showcases Stanford’s rich culture in politics, humanities, and the arts. In this spirit, we publish investigative reporting, columns, essays, fiction, fine art, doodles, and everything in between. To see all the content in this issue and more, please visit our website: theclawmagazine.com.

I want to contribute to the next issue. How do I get involved or submit a piece for consideration?

Please refer to our website or e-mail us at theclawmagazine@gmail.com. We are currently recruiting for the following positions: Staff Writer Contributes weekly columns or a longer, more ambitious piece each quarter Editor Jack-of-all-trades: writes, edits, and does menial labor to keep the magazine running Design Editor Resident typography nut Finance Editor Keeps us out of bankruptcy Web Editor Our ambassador to the Internet

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Special thanks to the ASSU Publications Board and The Stanford Fund for their continued support.

“Metamorphosis of Rodin Sculpture” by Tripp Edgar Leavitt III ’11

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