sibly concerned about her disability case.rnShe talked about her distress because thernVeterans Administration Hospital is, yetrnagain, releasing her psychotic husband. Irnlistened and made the noises humansrnmake for one another, rather as horsesrnstand head to tail in the summer pasture,rntheir tails whisking away one another’srnflies.rnOn another matter, I billed and gotrn$1,450, also the mark of a good day. Disraelirnsaid of the race horse owner Danebury,rn”He valued the acquisition of moneyrnon the turf, because there it was therntest of success. He counted his thousandsrnafter a great race as a victoriousrngeneral counts his cannon and his prisoners.”rnWe entrepreneurs eat what wernkill. There are no Mondays, but there arernno Fridays, either.rnIn the afternoon I showed a housernwhich is tied up in a receivership to potentialrnrenters. They are black, haverneight children and grandchildren. Sherngets Aid to Dependent Children. Hernstarted to tell me what he earns and doesrnnot report. I said, “Stop.” She said, “Oh,rnthere’s a live-in rule, it’s all right if he’srnnot really my husband.” I said I thoughtrnthat was not the right rule and rentedrnthem the house.rnAt Bve I changed into riding clothesrnand drove to the stable. The fields of soyrnbeans are beginning to ripen; each oakrnhas one branch and one branch only ofrnyellow leaves. At the stable, I walkedrndown to the outdoor jumping arenarndown below the hill and just west of thernlittle creek. I set a course of two and arnhalf to three foot jumps. I walked backrnup the hill to the stable and groomedrnand tacked up Spot Market. By the timernI was up on his back, the sun had gonernbehind the steep hill above the arena,rnbut there was still light to jump.rnWe warmed up, circling the jumps inrneach direction a few times at the walk,rnthen trot, then canter. Then we took thernjumps one at a time, then two at a time,rnthen three at a time. Then we went overrnthem all. Market changing lead betweenrnthree and four. After that we jumpedrnthem in the opposite direction. Horsesrnlike variety, too. It is bad to make themrnjump the same jumps over and over. Irnwas very happy with him.rnWe walked up and down the darkeningrnhills to cool down. A solitary heronrnflew north above the trees lining therncreek. When Market was cool, we wentrnback to the barn. We got there just asrnJayne came down from the dressage arenarnon Whip. As Jayne got off her horse,rnshe saw the feral tomcat lurking in thernthistles down along the pond. He laidrnopen Cleopatra, the young barn cat,rnwith his claws while she was nursing herrnfirst litter. Jayne took Cleo to the vetrnwho sewed her up. Cleo lived but wasrnchanged. She had been a great hunterrnand very friendly. Now she lives in therncobwebby rafters. When I see her sliprndown for kibble or water I think of therndead, risen by miracle in an old Tuscanrnpainting, right yet wrong, back in thernworld but lost in it because of their experience.rnWe took the horses into the barn.rnJayne cross-tied Whip in the aisle andrntold me to cross-tie Spot Market. Whenrnshe saw that both horses were cross-tied,rnshe took the rifle which she had broughtrndown from the house and went outside.rnAfter stalking and waiting a few minutes,rnshe killed the torn. Market jerked slightlyrnwhen he heard the single shot. Whip,rnstanding in the cross-ties and playingrnwith them, whinnied.rnIn the 19th book of the Odyssey, Penelopernuncovers the trick by which she heldrnthe suitors at bay while Odysseus roamedrnthe world having adventures. Each dayrnshe worked weaving a burial shroud forrnLaertes, father of Odysseus. Though sherntold the suitors that she would marry onernof them when she finished her work,rneach night she untied each day’s work,rnand so the work was never finished.rnWhen I look at all my files, and I think ofrnthe clients and of the lives they have, oftenrnunwillingly, touched, I think that wernlawyers reverse Penelope’s trick. By dayrnwe attempt to untangle the evil tapestryrnspun each night by the flock of welfarernrecipients, a tapestry planned byrnCongress and, of course, by the hirelingrnshepherds at the apex of the various socialrnprograms.rnWe pay people we should pay not tornhave children to have children. Many ofrnthe people we pay to have children arernchildren. We pay them with money werntax away from people who should havernchildren. Each payday for working familiesrnmoney is taken away; each month thernMother’s Day checks go out into thernpoor communities. The gain and lossrnflows like water over a plowed field, carryingrnaway, at first, imperceptibly, therntopsoil, then cutting a little ditch, andrnthen a creek, and then a river.rnSomeday, it is finished. The desert retakesrnNorth Africa, and 1,800 years later,rna man writes a book on the decline andrnfall of an empire.rnI am inside the system. I read theirrnpresentence investigation reports. I seernthe inside of their homes. The mother,rnwhite or black, is always on welfare.rnThere is always money for cigarettes, alwaysrnmoney for cable television, alwaysrnmoney for drugs. The kids are alwaysrnbeaten—or worse.rnI, too, am like the risen dead in the oldrnpaintings. When I tell what I have seen,rnmy friends with both feet, both eyes,rnboth ears, safely in the middle-classrnworld, turn away. And why not? If I amrnwrong, I am lying to my friends, and, if Irnam right, the tapestry is a burial shroud.rnThus, I am becoming like most peoplerninside the system, in that my friends are,rnincreasingly, inside the system.rnDavid D. Butler is a lawyer in DesrnMoines, Iowa.rnU I C IVMJVrnl l X k J ± W i v lrnThe Shooting ofrnGeorge Wallacernby William E. Thompson, Jr.rnOn May 15, 1972,1 was a nine-yearoldrnLittle Leaguer determined tornbecome the next Johnny Bench. As Irnheaded home from the playground afterrnbaseball practice, our neighbor, WilliernKines, waved me over to his car. I rememberrnthinking it odd that he wouldrnbe picking me up, given that I lived onlyrnthree blocks away. As I got in the firstrnthing he said to me was, “Don’t worry,rnyour mother is going to be all right.”rnWell, of course she was; I mean, whyrnshouldn’t she be?rnThen, he told me why. My mother,rnDora, had been shot that afternoon andrnwas now in Holy Cross Hospital in SilverrnSpring, Maryland. Fear and confusionrnseized me until several hours later whenrnI was taken to her room, where she personallyrnreassured me that despite havingrna broken leg—which required her tornspend 29 weeks in a cast—she would bernfine.rnEvents that day, 25 years ago, occurredrnwhile I was at school and later at baseballrnpractice. My mother, who was a cam-rn44/CHRONICLESrnrnrn