But why not give Jacob an opportunity for what she was pleased to call a Judeo-Négro concordat? He was, after all, her paternal grandfather. They shared misfortune. Perhaps, in these circumstances, he would greet his granddaughter as a zayde should, with love and affection. If he did, she might give him the vials as a present. It was no skin off her skin. If, on the other hand, Jacob’s greeting was not all that she felt a grandfather’s should be, well, then… She would have to think about how best to impress upon Jacob the full import of her actions, how make him appreciate her fleeting possession of divine caprice as she poured the last of his strain down the drain. It was all up to Jacob, of course. The way he acted would in large part determine the way she acted. She would allow for his still fresh grief, his shock when she told him who she was and how she got there. Yes, she would cut him some slack. But, for all that, she would not forget herself completely.
Oreo put her package down at the intersection, resting one sandaled foot lightly on top of it as she waited for the light to change. She idly twirled her walking stick, smiled her cookie smile, and whispered slowly and contentedly to herself, “Nemo me impune lacessit.”
A Key for Speed Readers, Nonclassicists, Etc
Pandion and Pylia beget Aegeus. Pittheus and wife (let’s call her Neglectedea) beget Aethra. Aegeus visits old friend Pittheus. On the same night, both Aegeus and randy sea-god Poseidon sleep with Aethra. Aethra conceives. Who’s the father? Generous Poseidon to Aegeus: “I’ve got enough kids — he’s yours.” Aegeus to Aethra: “Well, I’ll have to be getting back to Athens now. Send the kid to me when he can lift this rock and recover the sword and sandals I’m leaving under it.”
Aethra names her son Theseus (“tokens deposited”). “Boy, it’s hot in here,” says visiting relative Heracles (Hercules), flinging off the skin of the Nemean lion he’s slain. Young Theseus and playmates enter, see lion. Playmates panic. Theseus attacks lion. “Brave lad.” Later, he invents wrestling.
When Theseus is sixteen, Aethra says, “I’ve got something to tell you.” Theseus lifts rock, retrieves sword and sandals, and sets out to see his father. He decides to take the overland route because it’s dangerous. He wants to be another Heracles.
Epidauris: Theseus kills the lame bandit Periphetes, who’d been dispatching tourists with a club of brass (or iron). Theseus confiscates the club (Heracles has one like it).
Isthmus of Corinth: Sinis likes to play games with people and trees. You bend this tree, see; then you tie… Theseus does unto Sinis what Sinis, etc.
Crommyon: Thesus kills a wild sow.
The Cliffs of Megaris: “Wash my feet,” the bandit Sciron (“parasol”) would say to passing strangers, and then he would punt them into the sea. Theseus does unto Sciron…
Eleusis: Cercyon likes to wrestle wayfarers to the death. Theseus invented wrestling, remember?
Corydallus: Procrustes has a long bed and a short bed (or one bed). He fits overnight guests to his bed(s) by racking or lopping. Theseus does unto Procrustes…
Cephissus River, Attica: Theseus has done unto so many that he takes time out for purification.
Temple of Apollo Delphinius (the Dolphin), Athens: Hard-hats building the temple make unseemly comments to Theseus, believing that our hero (in braids and white robe) is either a girl or gay. Theseus tosses their oxcart (or ox) over the temple.
The Palace, Athens: Aegeus has married Medea. She knows that Theseus is not just another stranger. If he’s who she thinks he is her child(ren) won’t get to sit on the throne. Medea to Aegeus about the Stranger: “He’s dangerous, poison him.” But Aegeus recognizes his token sword, knocks the poisoned cup to the ground. “My son!” General rejoicing. Medea and child(ren) take flight (she has a dragon-drawn chariot).
Months Later: Ambassadors from Crete come to Athens. “Well, here it is that time again. Where are the seven youths and seven maidens we need for the Minotaur’s dinner, in tribute for [another story] the murder of Androgeus?” (Cretan king Minos’ wife Pasiphaë and a white bull were the proud progenitors of a fine half-bull, half-human with a taste for all-human flesh.) Theseus says, “I’ll go with the gang and kill the Minotaur, Dad.” “Son, be careful. And for Zeus’ sake, change the black sails on this death ship to white ones if you’re successfull.” “Black sails to white — okay, Dad.”
Crete: Theseus boasts, “I’m a son of Poseidon.” “Who isn’t?” says Minos. “But prove it.” Minos tosses his ring into the sea. Theseus dives in and, with the help of Amphitrite and/or lesser Nereids, retrieves it, along with a golden (or jeweled) crown (“You have to lay it on thick with these Cretans”). Ariadne, Minos’ daughter, ever a softy for a showboat, gives Theseus a sword and a ball of string so that he can find his way through the Minotaur’s Labyrinth (built by Daedalus), kill it/him, and find his way out again.
All the baddies are killed; all the youths and maidens get away. Theseus abandons Ariadne on the island of Naxos. “I just can’t stand to be in anyone’s debt. Besides, Athena or Minerva or whatever her name is came to me in a dream and told me to do it. Now, was I supposed to change the sail if I was successful or unsuccessful?”
Athens: Aegeus, seeing the black-sailed ship, flings himself into the sea — hence its name, Aegean.
White is the talismanic color in the Theseus legend, eight the magic number.
Further Adventures of the Hero: Theseus and the Amazons; Theseus and Phaedra and Hippolytus; Theseus and Pereithous and Helen and Hades.
Aegeus — Samuel Schwartz
Aethra — Helen Clark
Apollo Delphinius, Temple of — Apollo Theater
Ariadne — Adriana Minotti
Cephissus — Jordan Rivers’ sauna
Cercyon — Kirk
Heracles — Uncle Herbert
Medea — Mildred Schwartz
Minos — Minotti
Minotaur — Toro the dog
Pandion — Jacob Schwartz
Pasiphaé — Bovina Minotti
Periphetes — Perry the gonif
Phaea — Pig killed by taxi
Pittheus — James Clark
Procrustes — Manager of Kropotkin’s Shoe Store
Sciron — Parnell the pimp
Sinis — Joe Doe
Theseus — Oreo
AFTERWORD
Under the banner of the Black Arts movement that emerged as the cultural component of Black Power politics of the 1960s and 1970s, African American writers and artists struggled to define and practice a distinctive black aesthetic that departed from traditions based in the history and values of European cultures. The Black Arts movement was fueled by the desire to use art to recover — or, if necessary, to create or reinvent — an authentic black culture based in the particular historical experience of Americans of African descent.
Like the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s, the Black Arts movement resulted in an outpouring of music, art, and literature, and inspired many educated and middle-class African Americans to re-evaluate and to identify themselves more closely with the vernacular culture associated with the black proletariat. At its best, the Black Arts movement stimulated a creative exploration of the folk, popular, and fine art traditions of a community in which diversity and unity, innovation and preservation are interactive forces. At its worst, in their eagerness to purge black identity of all traces of Europe, some critics and theorists proposed narrow prescriptions for black art that resulted in formulaic expression from some artists. Even this served to provoke others to question and transgress the limits, while the thorough exploration of blackness not only contributed to the collective self-knowledge of African Americans, but also helped to redefine the culture of the United States as a hybrid multicultural gumbo rather than a white monocultural melting pot.