anitabrenner

La Canada Valley Sun
March 9, 2006

by Anita Susan Brenner

Last Thursday was a great day.

In the morning, the Valley Sun was distributed. My friends at the La Canada Thursday Club immediately read my column and learned that I borrow my daughter’s make up.

They quickly arranged for a beauty "make over".

Kim from Merle Norman had also read the column. She arrived at the Thursday Club with two satchels of make up and her sister, Kris. They suggested that I discontinue products such as "Lip Venom" and "Hard Candy," because these products dry out elderly lips.

Kim treated me to a session with "Bare Sheer Defense," "Nectar Creamy Concealer," "Nutty & Nice Blush" and "Glam Jam Vinyl Lip Color." This happened on a stage in front of eighty of my closest friends.

The Thursday Club motto is "nothing great is accomplished without enthusiasm."

Afterwards, lots of people took photos. Then we went in to have tea.
Armed with my "new look," Len and I met with Drs. William Opel, William Corey, Mike Harrington and James Riggins for a promising update on a cancer research project. The project is in memory of our son, who died two years ago.

A few years ago, I could not have imagined the need for such a meeting. In a short span of time, our son, 2nd Lt. Andrew Torres, USMC, died of cancer, and his classmates, 1st Lt. Todd Bryant, US Army, and 2nd Lt. J.P. Blecksmith, USMC, were killed in Iraq.

None of us ever imagined that anything like this would ever happen. We certainly could not conceive of it back in 1998, a happy but poignant year when Andrew left for the Naval Academy, Todd entered West Point, and J.P. began a stellar senior season as quarterback for Prep.

We could not conceive of it in 2001, those happy months before September 11th.

A few hours before his death, Andrew asked us to support cancer research. We did not realize this at the time, but it was a blessing that we were with him.

Andrew’s classmates from Prep and Palmcrest Elementary are the primary organizers of the annual golf tournament, dinner and auction, in Andrew's memory. The event raises money for strategic cancer research at Huntington Medical Research Institutes in Pasadena.

And now, there is an annual scholarship in Todd’s memory at LCHS. There is also a scholarship fund at Prep and leadership foundation in memory of J.P Blecksmith.

These are all good ways to remember a friend.


===
You can call Anita at (626) 792-3175 for dinner tickets to the Second Annual 2nd Lt. Andrew Torres Memorial Golf Classic, to be held on April 3rd at the La Canada Flintridge Country Club, or see www.andrewtorres.org.

(c) Anita Susan Brenner, Los Angeles Times, Valley Sun March 9, 2006

By Anita Susan Brenner





Our daughter's college invited us to their annual "parents' weekend."

Parents' weekends are wonderful events, designed to introduce moms and dads to fine educational institutions, complete with receptions, lectures, athletics, tours and discount coupons to the student store.

"What a lovely idea," I said.

My husband remained silent.

He has a right to remain silent. I think it's in the United States Constitution.

Last year, we spent the entire parents' weekend shopping. Rachel needed running shoes, a hair cut and a new shirt. She needed shelves for her dorm room. She needed new clothes hangers and bleach. Then she and her dad went to a reception while I took her car to Costco for new tires.


By golly, this year would be different. I would sign up for all the lectures. I would purchase graduation announcements at the student store. I would visit the art exhibit.

There was only one hitch. Our daughter had left a few months earlier for South America. She was on a quarter away "to study Spanish."

I still don't understand why she had to go to South America to study Spanish. I speak Spanish. My husband speaks Spanish. Grandmama Torres speaks Spanish. In fact, even Rachel speaks Spanish.

I called Rachel (via the Internet) to tell her the news.

"Guess what!" I said. "We're going to parents' weekend without you."

"Mom, that's creepy," said Rachel.

"I'll tell you what's creepy," I said. "Why are you in South America? Plus, we're going to take all your friends to dinner."

Rachel laughed and immediately sent the following e-mail to her friends:

"Re: Who Wants To Be Stalked By My Parents?

"Hey kids, I may have told some of you last quarter that my absence from campus this quarter would be no barrier to my parents' coming for parents' weekend. My parents are indeed coming next weekend and, per tradition, would like to take all you guys out to dinner … Have fun with my parents, and don't let them keep you out all night .

"Love, Rachel

"PS. Feel free to order the lobster."

At the last minute, we decided to take the dog with us. The dog's name is Audrey Hepburn. A lot of people know our dog. I think people like her because of her name.

When we got to the college, the hotel gave us a doggie bed and the name of a groomer. We took the dog on walks. We used the student store discount coupon for an exciting new dog leash.

We ran into a lot of friends. Some of them were on the way to Costco. We told the other parents that our daughter was in South America, but that this was our dog. We missed all the lectures and only went to one of the receptions.

We took various girls and boys to dinner. Like Rachel, they will all graduate in June.

The girls were very nice. They told us about their plans for grad school, their fellowships for AIDS research and their applications to law school. I opened my purse and showed everyone the three new lipsticks that I borrowed from Rachel's room.

I demonstrated the count down clock on my cell phone. It now says, "29 days until Rachel comes home."

The boys were nice, too. My husband was happy. No one ordered lobster.




Copyright March 2, 2006, Anita Brenner, Los Angeles Times La Canada Valley Sun

La Canada Valley Sun


Our daughter Rachel called, via the Internet, to talk about her college friends.

Last quarter, she lived in a cooperative residence hall where fifty students, all undergraduates, cooked for one another. The rules were simple. The meals were "vegetarian with a vegan alternative." In plain English, this means that some of the food was made of vegetables, grains, pasta, eggs or cheese. The rest of the menu had neither eggs nor dairy and was known as the "vegan alternative".

Rachel came home last December with new recipes, mostly for lentils and garbonzo beans. One night, she used all of our martini olives to make "Garlic Olive Humus." It tasted pretty good, until I noticed that she had also depleted our supply of olive oil. Then she left for South America.

College is a good lifestyle choice.

The vegetarian cooperative residence hall is governed by "consensus." They do not vote. There is no majority rule. Before a decision is made, everyone has to agree.

There are decisions about how many avocados they need and which kind of ice cream to order. As a result, the meetings often last hours.

The Quakers use a similar method, described in a book called Beyond Majority Rule: Voteless Decisions in the Religious Society of Friends. The idea is that everyone shares in the experience. Concerns and information are shared until the sense of the group is clear. This builds a sense of community and allows everyone to be part of the decision-making process.

I was reminded of this, recently, on a day when snow dusted our foothills. Under the mountain named for Gabriel near the crest of angels, my friends and I continued, bit-by-bit, to read an ancient text.

The text was a small but important part of the Book of Exodus. It was called "Yitro", which means "Jethro" in English.

The scene: Moses and his people are on the other side of the Red Sea. It is after the Exodus from Egypt.

In the first half of the text, Jethro, the father-in-law, gives advice to Moses. Jethro notices that people are waiting in long lines to see Moses because Moses is doing it all. He decides every inquiry and every disputed case. The people wait for hours at a time for their audience with Moses.

Jethro suggests that Moses establish a system of lower courts to settle community and religious disputes. He instructs Moses to delegate his authority to judicial officers, but to save the few important decisions for himself.

At first, Moses is not sure that this is a good idea. Moses does not want to interact vicariously with his people. And, he wants to make all the decisions. But soon, Moses recognizes that the communal model does not always work with large groups.

In the second part of Yitro, we read of a true communal experience, where nothing is delegated.

In the second part, the people are at Sinai. God speaks the Ten Commandments. The experience is not vicarious. Everyone hears God. Everyone "hears" the lightning and "sees" the thunder. They are all witnesses.

Sinai is a true communal experience. There are no delegated representatives. There are no judicial officers. The event is witnessed by all. What they witness will resonate down through the generations.

The juxtaposition of these two events is jarring. The first part of Yitro describes a vicarious system, where activities are delegated. There is a hierarchy. Not everyone gets to participate. The second part of Yitro records a communal experience, an important event where everyone is a witness and nothing is vicarious.

It is interesting that the two experiences, the vicarious and the communal, are recorded together in Yitro.

Perhaps we need both.

(c) 2006

It had been a long day. I flew to Phoenix on the early flight, attended a deposition, then boarded the evening flight back to the Bob Hope Airport in Burbank.

I put my folio under the seat and opened my new book. I was reading "Sabbath," by Abraham Joshua Heschel.

I barely looked up when the young lady stopped at my row. She appeared to be in her twenties, slightly older than our daughter. What caught my eye were the three strands of diamonds. When she stretched to put her bag in the overhead, her T-shirt rode up, exposing thin chains hooked to her belly-button.

She sat next to me.

I nodded and went back to my new book. I like Heschel. He once told a story about a long ago town that had "all the necessary municipal institutions" -- a law court, cemetery, a hospital, a bathhouse and many types of craftsmen. There were tailors, bakers, shoemakers, carpenters and bricklayers. But the town lacked a watchmaker.

Over the years, most of the town's clocks became what Heschel called "annoyingly inaccurate." All the clocks in the town showed different times. Some people stopped winding their clocks. They thought, why bother? Their clocks ran down. Others continued to wind their clocks, day-after-day, year-after-year, even though the clocks did not keep accurate time.

The years passed. One day, a watchmaker moved to the town. Everybody was happy. People brought their clocks to the new watchmaker to be fixed. But the only clocks he could repair were those that had been wound, those that had been kept running. The clocks that had not been wound, daily, these "abandoned clocks had grown too rusty" to be fixed.

Heschel's message was that prayer is important, even on days when prayers don't seem to work, even when our hearts are not into it. Some day the watchmaker will show up and we'll be happy we didn't get rusty.

I looked out the window.

The plane lifted off and I noticed that the young lady was also reading a book. I peeked over at it. It was clearly not by Heschel, most certainly not about prayer. Her book had something to do with "a Muslim girl's sexual awakening."

I went back to Heschel.

The turbulence began 30 minutes away from Burbank. Pilots call it "chop." Sometimes I am afraid of turbulence. This time I was not. It is hard to be afraid when you are reading a book by Heschel on the power of prayer.

We hit a big bump and the young lady spoke. She told me she was nervous. She said she did not like to fly.

Don't worry, I told her, we'll be OK.

We began to talk. She asked my occupation and I told her. I asked about her work. She said she was a marketing director for a Phoenix-based magazine. She was headed to Los Angeles to meet with clients.

The seat belt sign went on. We kept talking. The young lady mentioned meetings, seminars and an existing circulation of 60,000. She sounded impressive. I began to wonder where she got her MBA.

The plane hit another bump, but I hardly noticed. This was a golden opportunity. Lots of my friends are writers, real writers without day jobs, who believe that it is nice to connect in a positive way with management.

I put my book on the tray table and we continued to talk.

What kind of magazine? I asked.

The plane lurched. People gasped. My book fell.

The young lady gripped both hand rests and paused before she replied, "I am the marketing director for an adult magazine with an on-line component." She looked at me expectantly, as if waiting for approval.

Suddenly, everything became clear. The watchmaker was in the building, I mean plane. I searched for an appropriate comment.

Are you a member of the Phoenix Rotary? I asked.

The plane wobbled, but she began to laugh. That's when I knew that we would land safely. Life is full of wonders and tragedies, but the God would never let my plane go down with me reading "Sabbath," seated next to a young marketing director reading a different sort of book.

It just doesn't happen that way.

(c) Anita Brenner 2006

The pain is unending, impossible to heal. These were the words of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Sharon was commenting on the death, 34 years earlier, of his 11-year-old son.

The loss of his firstborn, in 1967, was one of several tragedies in Sharon's life; it was preceded by the death of the boy's mother, Margalit, in an automobile accident.

With each bereavement, Ariel Sharon, the warrior, was faced with a choice. It was the same choice faced by every grief-stricken individual. Would he go on with life? Or would he give up?

It is the same choice for all of us. In Tel Aviv or in La Cañada. After the Twin Towers. At a mine disaster.

Last month, I met a 95-year-old man. When I learned that he was a Holocaust survivor, I asked him, "How do you manage to live in the world?" The gentleman tapped his finger on the table, I think he did it for emphasis, and shouted, "Faith!"

Everyone finds their own answers, but when a public figure, like Ariel Sharon, faces bereavement, I always want to know, "Where does he get his strength?"

Ariel Sharon made the choice to live fully. He remarried. He fathered children. He became the doting grandfather.

He was known to be tough. Tough on the enemy. A strong opponent at home. "Even the sheep are afraid of me," he once said.

He was also a charismatic leader. For years, Sharon opposed the formation of a Palestinian state and supported the expansion of Jewish settlements in the former Palestinian territories.

Not everyone agreed with him.

In 1999, the third tragedy struck. Sharon's second wife, Lily, came down with cancer. Through the short months of her treatment, she encouraged her husband to continue with his work. When her condition worsened, he stayed with her in the hospital. Just like folks in cancer wards all over the country. All over the world.

At night, he slept a chair by her bed. In the morning, he would go to work, like she wanted. No different than other patients' wives or husbands, at Norris, at City of Hope, at UCLA.

One night, while they were at the hospital, Lily and Ariel's house burned down.

When Lily Sharon died on March 25, 2000, Ariel Sharon was again faced with the impossible pain of bereavement.

The bereaved live differently in the world. There are more choices. The choice to live or not to live. Choices about how to live. It is not surprising that Ariel Sharon began to envision another solution.

In 2001, a year after Lily's death, Sharon was elected prime minister of Israel. He was 73 years old. The warrior was reborn as a statesman.

And then, the magic happened.

This warrior came up with a plan for peace. He wanted to keep all of Israel's children, including his grandchildren, safe.

Sharon reversed his opposition to the Palestinian state. He reversed his insistence on maintaining the settlements. The new plan for peace provided for the formation of a Palestinian state, withdrawal of settlers from the Gaza and the construction of a security perimeter between Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Not everyone agreed with him. Last summer, after nearly four decades in the Gaza, amid riots and violence, the settlers were withdrawn from their settlements by Sharon's government.

Not everyone agreed with Sharon, but many of us had hope. If anyone could pull off a compromise, it would be Ariel Sharon. The warrior-turned-statesman, the warrior-turned-peacemaker.

Israeli journalist, Allison Kaplan Sommers, explained, "Left-wing or right-wing, even if you felt like Ariel Sharon [was] wonderful, or if you felt that [he was] completely wrong, you never doubted for a minute that [his] absolute top priority was the security and well-being of the State of Israel and its citizens."

To effect his plan for peace, Sharon left his political party, the Likud, and formed a new coalition party, Kadima.

And now, despite a strong will to live, Sharon is gravely ill. A new generation of young Israelis is at a crossroads.

May we see peace in the Middle East, in our lifetimes, and may Ariel ben Vera, the warrior-turned-peacemaker, be restored to full health and vigor.

(Anita Susan Brenner practices law in Pasadena with her husband, Len Torres. You may contact her at www.anitabrenner.com

The large Mediterranean-style house still stands, high above Foothill Boulevard. The original owners were Walter and Beulah Overell.

In the 1930s and 1940s, Walter Overell was one of the wealthiest men in Flintridge. He made his first fortune in the furniture business. This was followed by other successful investments.

Walter doted on his wife, Beulah Jungquist Overell. Walter loved Beulah so much that liked to name things after her. Given the opportunity, he christened Beulah Drive. And when the Overells were finally blessed (or so they thought) with their only child, Walter named the baby girl Beulah Louise.

Whenever I write a column on local history, I get phone calls. People call to add new facts, to share their recollections and to correct my assumptions. After I first wrote about the Overells, in July 2000, a lot of people called to talk about the Overells. Many people knew the them, followed the murder trial and attended the estate sale after the trial.

They say that Beulah Louise was spoiled. That she was the only child of wealthy parents.That whatever Beulah Louise wanted, Beulah Louise got.

At the age of 17, Beulah Louise Overell wanted a boyfriend. What she got was a 21-year-old World War II veteran named George "Bud" Gollum.

In the context of the post-war years, Bud Gollum was primo, a good catch, at least in the eyes of Beulah Louise. After the war, young veterans flocked back to local colleges. It was tough potatoes for the younger males, those too young to have served in the War. There was no way they could compete -- the young ladies were attracted to those devil-may-care war veterans. Ergo: many happy marriages and the baby boom.

Mr. and Mrs. Overell, however, did not approve of the relationship between Bud and their Louise.

Many facts about the Overell case are in dispute, but this much is certain: On March 15, 1947, 17-year-old Beulah Louise Overell and 21-year-old Bud Gollum watched from the shore as the Overell family yacht, a 47-foot cruiser named the Mary E., exploded in Newport Harbor.

The bodies of Walter and Beulah Overell were found on the boat. Walter was 63 years old. Beulah was 57.

Remnants of a bomb were found in the ruins of the Mary E. More than 30 sticks of dynamite had been wired to a clock attached to the Mary E.'s battery. The police searched Bud Gollum's car. Machine screws were found in the car. The machine screws matched the screws on a clock used to set off the bomb.

And then, the police looked in the trunk of Bud's car -- there was more dynamite.

A witness was found. The witness said that he had sold dynamite to Bud Gollum on March 14, 1947, the day before the explosion.

The police theorized that Mr. and Mrs. Overell had been beaten to death, and that a bomb was detonated, blowing up the boat, to cover up the murder. The motive was twofold: Mr. and Mrs. Overell's dislike of Bud Gollum, and Beulah Louise Overell's expected substantial inheritance.

Beulah Louise Overell and Bud Gollum were arrested.

While they were in jail, Beulah Louise and Bud wrote "lurid" letters to one another. These letters were leaked to the press, most likely by the prosecution, and considered to be proof of the motive.

By the time Beulah Louise Overell and her boyfriend, Bud Gollum, went on trial for the murder of Walter and Beulah Overell, the case was a nation-wide sensation, equivalent to the cases of O.J. Simpson.

The trial began in 1948 before the Honorable Kenneth Morrison, judge of the Orange County Superior Court. It was an interesting cast of characters. The prosecutor, Eugene Williams, was a charismatic trial attorney with political aspirations. The lead defense attorney was Otto Jacobs; he had over 80 criminal trials under his belt and he was not camera-shy.

One of Judge Morrison's first acts was to issue an order allowing radio microphones in the courtroom, with one caveat. The order permitted only "hometown" radio stations to broadcast the trial. In 1948, there was only one hometown radio station, KVOE, based in Santa Ana. The station contracted with the Mutual Broadcasting System to re-broadcast the trial all over the United States.

Soon, everyone in the country was listening to the trial testimony. All four months of testimony.

There were other microphones as well. During the trial, the local police bugged the law offices of the defense attorneys. Years later, Jacobs' son, Robert Jacobs, explained, "One day during the trial, I noticed Dad's diploma wasn't straight. I saw a microphone inside. We went to Gollum's attorneys and found another. We traced the wires to a room around the corner. We found a man with earphones on and made a citizens' arrest. The police captain came out and said, 'You guys arrested one of my lieutenants!' The episode was quickly forgotten."

These shenanigans did not dissuade defense attorney Otto Jacobs. Step-by-step, Jacobs began to demolish the prosecution's case.

The prosecution argued that the machine screws found on the floor of Bud Gollum's car were unique and hard-to-find. These machine screws matched the clock used to set off the bomb. Defense attorney Jacobs went to a local hardware store and found identical screws. He brought a box of them to the trial.

The prosecution pointed to the leftover dynamite found in the trunk of Bud Gollum's car. Bud took the stand and testified that he bought the dynamite at Walter Overell's request, for the removal of tree stumps.

At the end, the jury found Bud Gollum and Beulah Louise Overell not guilty of all charges. They were released from jail, but they did not get married.

They say that there was little to inherit from the Overells' estate after all, that Beulah died of alcoholism and that George "Bud" Gollum is still alive, somewhere in Northern California.

Walter and Beulah are buried at Forest Lawn Glendale, on Sunrise Slope, beneath a white marble statue of a young man and woman -- they are dancing.

All's well that ends well.

La Canada Valley Sun

By Anita Brenner


Anita Susan Brenner
Joshua Sparling is a 24-year-old soldier from Port Huron, Michigan, who was wounded six weeks ago in Iraq.

Pfc. Sparling has been undergoing multiple surgeries at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, in Washington, D.C. He was in the news this month when he received a Christmas card addressed to "any soldier" at Walter Reed. The card did not contain good tidings. Instead, the writer expressed the desire that the recipient die from his wounds.

This was Pfc. Sparling's first card for Christmas 2005, so he taped the card to the wall, right where he could see it. He did it for "motivation." Pfc. Sparling reckoned that every time he looked at the card, he would be motivated to get well.

Unfortunately, the card was not the first such incident.

Last summer, an anti-war group called "Code Pink Women for Peace" began to target wounded soldiers and their families at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Code Pink applied for and obtained protest permits from the District of Columbia police department.

Week after week, always on Fridays, the demonstrators positioned themselves directly in front of the main entrance to the hospital grounds. They focused on Friday afternoons and evenings because this was the time when out-of-town families were most likely to visit their wounded soldiers, sailors and marines. The demonstrators brought mock caskets. They carried signs that said, "Maimed for a lie" and "Wounded for Halliburton."


Imagine your son or daughter enlists after September 11th. Maybe you are happy about it. Maybe not. Then, your child is deployed. You put a blue star in your living room window. Few other families in your town have a blue star. People ask you what it means and you explain that the blue star is for a family member on active duty, deployed to the war zone.

You pray a lot. You send care packages. You put three television sets in the family room, each tuned to a different cable news station. One night, you get the phone call. You are one of the lucky ones. Your son or daughter did not die, they were merely wounded.

At Bethesda, I met a family from Georgia. On Thursday nights, the mom baked pies. Every other Friday, just after dawn, the whole family piled into the van. They took turns driving. Ten hours each way. Ten hours to Bethesda from Georgia to visit their wounded son.

Some folks can take a leave of absence from work. They catch Jet Blue to Dulles. They try to stay for the long haul. Then the bills begin to mount.

Imagine that one Friday afternoon you arrive at the hospital. You turn into the main entrance, in your airport rental car, or in the family van filled to the brim with stuffed animals and snacks. You are tired from the journey.

You wait in a line of cars to go through the check point. That's when you see them. Flag-draped coffins. Demonstrators. Signs that say, "Enlist here to die for oil."

Inside the hospital, it is a different world. One often hears the phrase "Marine Corps family," "Army family," or "Navy family," which does not refer to any individual family, but to this new world inside the hospital, where people treat your family like part of one extended family.

The nurses and orderlies, all young people on active duty, greet you each day. Without fail, they greet you by name.

When you get lost on the way to the cafeteria, the staff, including officers, stop to escort you to your destination.

Surgeons tell you, "Last night, I prayed for your son."

And then, after the second or third surgery, the first card arrives. It is addressed to "any soldier" in a child-like script. It is a pretty card, but the message is despicable.

The card tells your son or your daughter to die.

The First Amendment guarantees all of us the right to express our opinions, particularly on important issues like wars and taxes. We can pick and choose what opinions to express. We can pick and choose where to demonstrate. But our soldiers, sailors and Marines do not have the freedom to pick and choose their battles. They go where the commander-in-chief sends them. They fight where our elected representatives tell them to fight. They serve.

Real get well cards can be addressed to Joshua Sparling or "any serviceman or woman", c/o Walter Reed Army Medical Center, 6900 Georgia Avenue N.W., Washington, D.C. 20307-5001.

(Anita Susan Brenner practices law with her husband, Len Torres.) See www.anitabrenner.com

(c) Anita Susan Brenner, La Canada Valley Sun December 29, 2005

Holiday Boutique

By Anita Brenner


Anita Susan Brenner
Like many, I read an ancient text, bit-by-bit, week-by-week. I always start with good intentions and am invariably side tracked. This time, I put down the text and decided to go shopping.

I had been invited to a private "holiday boutique" in Chinatown. On Chung King Road.

The easiest way to get to Chung King Road is to drive to Pasadena. Take the Metro Gold Line to the Chinatown Station. Descend the stairs and walk due west about six blocks.

I was late, so I drove the whole way and parked behind a gas station.

Chung King Road is a pedestrian street in downtown Los Angeles, a few blocks west of Hill. Unlike the more commercial Chinatown to the east, Chung King Road is mixture of avant-garde and kitsch. There are storefronts, gift and souvenir shops, restaurants and mahjong parlors. Recent additions include several art galleries and studios. Above the walkway, for its entire length, there are red lanterns. High above the storefronts are private apartments, their entrances hidden.

I walked past Mr. Fong's store, opened a small door and went up the concrete stairs. The stairway opened onto an airy apartment.


When I arrived, the party, I mean the holiday boutique, was in full swing. There was wine. There were young people. There were chips and dip.

I took a cup of cider and made the rounds. This was much better than the malls, more fun than the gym and obviously more au courant than the Book of Genesis. It felt cool to be in the same room with this crowd.

Several young artists and designers had card tables with their wares. At the first table, a musician named Miles gave me a free CD by a group called "Ill Again." At the next table, I purchased a black "Robot Sushi" T-shirt for Rachel. I also found colorful handmade note cards that said "Tofu gives me gas." The cards came packed with assorted stickers, including "Happy Birthday, "Thank you," "Congratulations" and "Get Well Soon."

After I shopped, I noticed a few other people my age. They sat in the corner. The highlight was an 8-week-old baby boy. I noticed the following:

This baby was stunning.

This baby was beautiful.

This baby was intelligent.

Baby clothes are a lot cooler nowadays than when my kids were little.

Watching the baby made me feel both young and old at the same time. The baby reminded me of the text I had been struggling with. I had been reading the story of Tamar, the twice-widowed daughter-in-law, who risked execution as a harlot to trick old Judah into impregnating her. The modernist in me always rebels at the story. I always wonder why, back in the day, why couldn't widows get a career? Or go to law school?

I looked down at the gorgeous little baby. Suddenly, it made sense. Babies are wonderful. Babies are perfect. Maybe Tamar just wanted to have a baby?

Or two.

After the boutique, I met up with Len. We went to the movies, with friends. We got a bite to eat. Later, Rachel drove down from college, bringing life back into our home.

And a little laundry, but not too much.

La Canada Valley Sun
December 15, 2005


Anita Susan Brenner




Our family, like many others in America, is multi cultural. We are also interfaith, with the emphasis on "faith." When our kids were little, we constantly made choices. Nothing was a given. Nothing was assumed. Extended family members often gave unsolicited advice and our parents fretted. Not an easy path, by any means.

I often wondered where we fit in. Saying grace at Thanksgiving required great diplomatic skill. Would the "holidays" bring us closer together or move us apart? How would our kids fit in? There were not a whole lot of Chicano-Catholic-Jewish-Marine Corps veteran families living in La Cañada.

We blundered along. Somehow, our kids turned out to be nice people, a quality that we consider to be more important than grades, SATs or wealth.

Like they say, mission accomplished.

But there were still days when we felt ...well ...a little different.

It all came together one rainy week at the Navy hospital in Bethesda, where we began to encounter chaplains of several different faiths. The on duty chaplain would go room-to-room, bed-to-bed. He or she would ask, "Would you like to pray?" And we did. It was always meaningful. It always gave us strength.


It is a given that military chaplains will render pastoral care to servicemen and women from many different faith backgrounds. On deployment, in battle, or at a hospital, there may not be a chaplain from the serviceman or woman's own faith. So it is important that all the chaplains be able to pray with and respect people of different faith backgrounds.

Army Chaplain Abdul Rasheed-Mohammed once explained, "Most people will initially accept a chaplain of any faith, particularly when the chaplain projects sincerity and a willingness to meet patients on their own sacred ground. My personal belief has always been, with faith in God, all things are possible."

After several weeks at Bethesda, praying with various chaplains, one day we ran into all of them at once. We were walking back from the cafeteria, down a long hallway. Outside, it was raining. There they were, a rabbi, a Catholic priest, an Episcopalian priest and a Protestant minister. At one point or another, each of the chaplains had met with us, prayed with us, and counseled us. But we had never been together, all of us, in one place.

The priest tried to introduce us to the others, but stopped mid-sentence and asked the rabbi, "Do you know them?" They began to joke about which chaplain we "belonged" to. Who had the right to claim our family as one of theirs?

It's nice to be wanted.

The rabbi and priest obviously had strong claims. The Episcopalian just smiled. But then the Protestant minister pointed out that his own wife was an Israeli and that their children spoke Hebrew at home. Perhaps he had the stronger claim?

One of us, I forget who, said "We need all of you." The chaplains seemed to like that idea.

"Wow," I thought, "we really fit in."

This week, I was reminded of that rainy day at Bethesda when I read about Jacob's dream. When he woke from his dream in the wilderness, Jacob said, "I did not know that God was here, here in this place."

Bethesda. La Cañada. The United States Marine Corps.

We each belong. Our faiths sustain us. "Here, here in this place."

(Anita Susan Brenner is the current president of the La Cañada Thursday Club. She practices law in Pasadena with her husband, Len Torres.)


(c) December 15, 2005 Anita Brenner, Valley Sun, LA Times

La Canada Valley Sun
December 8, 2005

Our Dog, Audrey Hepburn

By Anita Susan Brenner


Winston Churchill once said, "Dogs look up to you. Cats look down on you. Give me a pig. He just looks you in the eye and treats you like an equal."

Our dog, Audrey Hepburn, came to live with us in March of 2004. Actually, our son got her. Andrew was home on medical leave, having just started a new round of experimental chemo. Andrew figured that if treatment worked, he would move back to his place with a dog. And if it did not, then his parents would have someone to take care of.

None of us knew that Andrew had only two more weeks.

It was a busy time, but also a time of hope. Naval Academy classmates visited on the weekends. Friends from Prep stopped by nearly every night. Random Marines, mostly Majors, showed up for dinner. The Thursday Club ladies kept us supplied with good food.

Time stood still those last days. There were moments of great peace, joy and good fortune.

So when our daughter, Rachel, came home the next weekend, she steered Andrew toward the Pasadena Humane Society website www.phsspca.org/view_pets.htm. They decided upon a female Black Lab-Chow mix, allegedly 3 years old.


The Humane Society interviewed us. Their staff spoke with Andrew by telephone, but the rest of us trooped down to Pasadena to be evaluated. Their many questions about fences should have alerted us, if we had any brains.

Andrew wanted to name her Dogzilla, but I was stuck on Elizabeth Taylor, the dog from Sex and the City. Somewhere along the way, Andrew suggested Audrey Hepburn, and we compromised.

Two days later, Andrew was unexpectedly hospitalized. For the next 10 days, the Naval Academy classmates, the high school friends and some Thursday Club ladies came to our house. They took care of the cats. They watered the plants. And they tried to take care of Miss Audrey Hepburn. We later learned that Audrey repeatedly jumped the fence, growled at all the men and had several potty accidents on top of our kitchen counter.

In the months that followed, Andrew's friends began to find dogs, or perhaps the dogs began to find them. One young lady, whose parents live in Pasadena, found a stray brown puppy. She put up posters but no one came forward. She checked with various humane societies, but there were no takers. There was some discussion with her landlord, so, she brought the dog to our house, where he immediately used his nose to dig a large hole. "Andrew sent us this dog," she said. "What about your parents?" I suggested politely. Her parents have never forgiven me -- their garden is toast, but the brown dog lives the good life in the Crown City. They named him Dogzilla.

And then our second daughter, Ana, found Dune, an energetic mutt who has kept veterinarians busy from Pennsacola to Whidbey Island, and many points in between.

What all these dogs have in common is that they get us up in the morning, even on the bad days. They drag us back into the world, even when we are not sure if we want to go. They follow us around and wag their tails, especially when we are sad.

Which is why, even though I call her Audrey Hepburn, Len still calls her Andrew's dog.

Anita Brenner lives with her husband, Len Torres, Miss Audrey Hepburn and a cat.


(c) December 8, 2005 LA Times, Anita Susan Brenner