Story

For the few who tune into this blogspot from time to time, an apology for not being as faithful in writing these epistles as I should have been. I've been diverted by a story.

A couple of months ago, I had inspiration on a story line which holds some promise. So far I am about 51,000 words into it. I know where the story starts, where it ends, and quite a bit about the middle. For the most part, though, I have put off several other activities I usually indulge myself in on the internet in favor of something I do for myself. This blog is one such casualty as is my geocaching.

For instance, I've effectively started deleting e-mails from people who send me e-mails telling me of the evils of the current administration. If they want to support nut-jobs who go waving guns and/or threats at protest rallys, it's their right. If they think that I'm a "Moran" (actual spelling on an actual protest sign) for not agreeing with them or Fox News, so be it.

Actually, the main character in this story I am writing takes a pragmatic view of the world, billing himself as "The last bastion of freedom in an otherwise bleak and hopeless land." Yes, I have cast part of myself as the main character in this little melodrama I am writing. I really don't put too much faith in the radical right or the radical left who are rattling their cages looking for radical change. Both sides have some valid arguements about their positions, but neither side is completely sinless.

The heroine in this story I'm writing is based a lot on the Lovely Miss Carol... a red-headed nurse who has been on a parallel path with the hero in the story... it just took her a while to figure it out. In her defense, the hero of the story was also on a parallel path and it took him a while to figure it out. Fair is fair, don't you see?

I have incorporated elements of my prior life in the broadcasting industry into the story, as well as some of the people/personalities who had been involved. There are a couple of incidents which I would like to incorporate into the story which have not found a place in the narrative. There was the time that the owner of a radio station I worked for came in from Chicago and left his hat, a Homborg (sp?), in the studio where I was working. He called me directly when he got to the airport in Columbus asking if I had seen the hat and requesting that I mail it back to him in Chicago. There was also the "Who's Norm Shor?" episode which was played out a couple of times... Norm is a dear friend who is now in the clutches of the dreaded Alzheimer's disease. I do plan to pay homage to him somehow in the story (as I have with a couple of other friends who are now on the other side of the grass).

I am having fun with this story, really, I am. I hope to be able to complete it at some point in the next couple of months. During the meanwhilst, I hope that you will not be put off by the lack of verbiage in this particular little corner.

Be Seeing You!

Jackpot

The lovely Miss Carol and I have a secret vice. We like to play the lottery.



We don't invest our life savings into the State Lottery, nor do we play it consistantly. We will spend $2, sometimes as much as $3 a week playing the Super Lotto or some such creation if we remember to buy the ticket. The stepson tells me that we'll never win because of the odds and he's probably right.



I stand a better chance of being hit by lightning in a thunderstorm than I do winning the lottery. My brother who is practically a CPA and has dabbled in Law told me at one time the best time to spend a dollar on the lottery was when the prize was over something like $15million... statistically, at that point you can get your dollar back.

As if I'll live that long.



One of the reasons I keep buying the tickets, though, is that it's a cheap way to dream for a day or two before the drawing. I have this vision of going and purchasing a motor home and a something to tow behind it, then taking the teenagers out of school to take a lap of the country. There are lots of places I'd like to visit, like forts and historical sites which would educate me and my charges, presuming of course that they will take advantage of the opportunity. I could delay that trip, on the other hand, and wait until the kids are out of the house so that Carol and I can take that trip by ourselves.



When we finally finish that trip, there would be others.



In between trips, we'd be living in a much bigger house with our own private windmill to keep us off the grid, and I'd build a really private swimming pool... one so private that I don't have to wear a swim suit if I don't want to.



Nice dreams, to be certain, but we won't win due to the fact that we lack a certain something in our personalities which prevents us from winning.



We have good sense and humility.



For instance, our plan starts with what we will give away and to whom before we even think of choosing an RV dealer. The Church, the Salvation Army, the local food bank... we would arrange to give some gifts to the worthy before jumping naked into our swimming pool.



I have seen too many times when someone wins the lottery and goes on a bender or comes to some sort of grief after their winning moment. It's not just the lottery, but there are other games, or moments of luck which seem to fall on the wrong people. For instance, there's this fellow I know of who just won a truck at the place where he works. He's already squawking that it's the wrong make of truck and that it's way too small for him.



Fer cryin' out loud, it's a free truck! I'd drive it even if I didn't like it!



This same fellow has been known to have more than his share of his beverage of choice... I wonder what will happen when this fellow damages his free truck after having imbibed. A guy I went to High School with parked his car into a tree at his parents' house at some point before he was 21 (drinking was legal in Ohio at the time for those between 18 and 21) and his father left the car right where it was for a number of years as a reminder of the son's carelessness.

Anyhoo, we are beyond that sort of nonsense at this point in our lives. We have good sense and a set of scruples which prevent us from most of our foiables - and are therefore ineligible to win the lottery.

How much is the jackpot the next time around?

Be Seeing You!

Relativity

Almost everything is relative to how one thinks.

That's not too hard a concept to grasp... it's a lot like the self-fulfilling prophecy we hear about time and again. If you think it, it will happen. The mind, you see, is a powerful force.

A few years back, I was asked to leave my home and my family against my will. I had some choices to make and I had to make them relatively quickly. My first thought was that I was not going to sit around on my arse and feel too sorry for myself. She who has yet to be named in these chronicles had seemingly set herself the task of making me feel miserable.

It didn't work.

The day I moved out of the house, I had arranged a "date" with a young woman who I had met while looking for a suitable place to live. I took her to lunch at a nice little Thai place and we had an awesome conversation. She, too, had been seperated from her spouse and she had a way of coping with her situation which I thought quite novel and decided to copy. She made a list of things she should do and posted that list on her refrigerator. Among the items on her list was to try some new foods. She got to try Thai, I got a good suggestion.

For the most part, I made the most of what I had thought was a bad situation. I thrived and eventually found happiness and all that other stuff just by being the person I knew I could be. I didn't even have to find Jesus... for that matter, I wasn't aware that he was lost.

(Sorry, that joke was rattling around in my head too long not to have used it.)

After about a year of the nonsense of being 'seperated', then finally divorced, I got a letter from a former co-worker and good friend of mine who related the story of another acquaintance who had been on the same road as I was but with very different results. To make a long story short, he too found someone who had introduced him to the world of some happy white powder - at last report, he was broke, out of a job, and headed quite far north to become a ward of his parents.

Darn shame.

After getting back from the service for the Lovely Miss Carol's grandmother, we spent the week fretting about her father. Dave McGee was in San Angelo, Texas in poor health and by most reports was quite depressed about himself and his position. Carol and the Lovely Miss Shelly (Sister-in-law extrodinaire) were working on a plan to move Dave McGee from San Angelo to College Station where he would be closer to what little family he had. A great plan it was.

Unfortunately, it will never come about. David McGee was found dead in his apartment in San Angelo on Friday.

Somewhere in his mind, he had ceased to have the will to live. I was quite saddened because he was on the brink of something better for his sunset years, the brink of being closer to family which, for any faults he may have had, loved him for what he was. The mind is a powerful thing, you see, and eventually it will win if put to the test.

From what I had been led to understand, he had been the victim of the demons which posess the minds of some of us willing or unwilling. What may have transpired will remain between those who loved him and those of us who have not had a chance to even know him.

Carol, her brothers and I will be spending the next couple of days attempting to disburse what little Dave McGee had in this world. He had already given of himself by requesting his body be donated to Texas Tech University for research. Good for him.

I'm sorry that I never got to meet him as he had some of the same background that I had in radio. I'm sure that he had some great stories left in him.

The mind is a powerful force. Harnessed correctly, it can accomplish great things. Sometimes, it can lead to self-destruction... even to one's demise.

Rest in Peace, David McGee.


Be Seeing You.

Funerals

I find that I am getting to the point in life when I am attending more and more funerals. It wasn't totally unexpected, seeing how I am on the downslide between 55 and 60... my turn is coming, but hopefully not next.

A few years back I recall my mother commenting on her realization that all of the older people were passing away and how she was now one of the older people herself. And so the passage of time evolves and the responsibility of being a mourner at someone's funeral is handed from one generation to the next.

For the most part, I find that attending funerals can be an educational experience as well as a great place to meet people. For instance, last weekend the Lovely Miss Carol and I drove down to Belton, Texas for the funeral of her 101 year old grandmother, Elta Mints. I had met the woman several times in the past three years that I have been associating with the Lovely Miss Carol and came to several conclusions about her based in large part about stories told about her.

For one, the woman had a wicked sense of humor. Think what you will about people born in the first decade or so of the last century, more than one had a wicked sense of humor. My Aunt Sara had that same gift. My understanding was that Sara had various 'phases'... if something caught her fancy, she would involve everyone surrounding her with whatever the phase of the moment was. Her love of involvement was something I learned about at her funeral. Sara's 'castinet' phase came up for some reason and I found myself vaguely recalling my sisters recieving castinets one Christmas from my Aunt Sara.

The other fact I learned about the grandmother was that she had apparently eloped(!) with her husband of over 50 years. What an impetuous thing to do! Given a few more years I might have found out about the elopement, but alas, time had caught up with the grand old woman.

She must have been something in her day - a fact further confirmed by the leaflet handed out at the service by the funeral director featuring the late Mrs. Mints in a sepia tone photograph in what could only be described these days as a "Glamor Shot".

I learned a lot about the newly departed at this funeral and about the dearly departed at other funerals I have attended over the years. While the last few months or years may not have been so pleasant for the the guest of honor, they had lives and loves, good times and bad times of their own which helped to bouy their spirits when they were attending funerals as mourners themselves.

It's one of those 'triumphs of the human spirit' things which tie us all together.

In our mourning, we find ways of binding which help us out of the valley of despair and into a new understanding of our friends and families. When my Aunt Sara passed, I got re-acquainted with cousins, first and second, whom I had not seen for years. This time out, I was introduced to a new brother-in-law, his lovely wife and their two children... and had opened a window into my own wife's soul which had not been previously opened (one of those tricks played by a younger brother things which seemed ghastly at the time, but when retold becomes funny).

I have come to the point where I tolerate funerals, and perhaps even enjoy some because of what I can learn about families and the person who has just shuffled off this mortal coil. When my time comes, I hope that those in attendance will find out something about me which will make them smile or meet someone who they may have heard about but never had the pleasure to have met. It will have made the whole show worthwhile.

By the way, use the photo of me with my head in the dinosaur's mouth. I would love it if even just one person has a laugh at my expense...

Be Seeing You!

Naked

There were a couple of stories which caught my eye in the past week which I believe to be interrelated.

One has to do with the broughaha over a young woman who made a video in downtown Dallas where she stripped naked and fell down on the spot where JFK was assasinated.

The other has to do with a group of High School students in California who "Sang Down" a group from the Westboro Baptist Church who were protesting the High School from across the street.

The young woman in Dallas was making a music video... or so it was claimed. Personally, I've never heard the song nor have I ever heard of the young woman who made the video. Judging from the uproar and the extended coverage on the 10 O'Clock news (We're Central Time, here), you would have thought that the woman had pulled a pistol and started shooting.

"OH MY GAWD, SHE DID THIS IN FRONT OF CHILDREN!!!"

I've noted that we are a people of what could only be described as "Victorian Sensibilities" despite the fact that Queen Victoria has been dead for over 100 years and the fact that we have been out from under the thumb of the English monarchy for over 230 years. We view nakedness as a sin, perhaps because there is the common belief that nakedness can only lead to shameless acts of sex. Even a mother discreetly breast feeding her infant is seen by some as being nothing but a shameless harlot.

Having dealt with my wife's bout with breast cancer and the subsequent reconstruction of her womanhood (See "Registered Guns"), I tend to see nakedness just a bit differently than I once did. We have dealt with and have discussed how we feel about our bodies and we feel comfortable about them. We're not going to go out and walk the dog in the alltogether, nor are we going to publish pictures on the internet in the manner that John Lennon and Yoko Ono did for an album cover some years back. But at the same time, there may be periods of time when we might not bother dressing right away after taking a shower.

Now, the young woman in question making the video may have done so in questionable taste, but at the same time, she was using artistic license to demonstrate vulnerability (as we are all vulnerable without our clothes on). While we have no compunction about seeing naked people as statues, we seem to see actual nakedness on a living, breathing human being as being something dirty. "It must be kept from the children, you see."

Children, though, can see nakedness from an entirely different perspective. I recall hearing a joke about a mother and her child driving along on a beautiful spring day behind a convertible. The passenger in the convertible, a well-endowed young woman, totally naked, gets up out of her seat and faces the woman in the car behind her. The woman in the following car was horrified - her young passenger looked and exclaimed, "Mommy! That woman isn't wearing a seat belt!!"

The real problem with the "video shoot" in Dallas was more in the eye of the parents than it was in the eyes of the children. Most children can figure things out and decide for themselves what is right and wrong.

Which brings up the story about the High School in California.

Most of us are familiar with or have heard about the Westboro Baptist Church. It's the creation of Fred Phelps who could only be described as human garbage at best. He's the "GOD HATES FAGS!" guy. You know him, you loathe him. And his supporters decided to picket a High School in California because they accepted human beings as individuals instead of as groups with certain labels attached.

The students launched a counter-protest (with the approval of their teachers) and quite literally shut down the Westboro people by singing to them.

The students had figured it out.

They didn't need someone to point out to them what was right and wrong, they figured it out all by themselves and acted on a set of principals which, oddly enough, are much the same as those preached by a Rabbi about 2000 years ago. He was a liberal Jew named Jesus.

Because of that protest and because of the remarkable feats of intelligence I have witnessed in a number of younger people (including second cousins, nieces and nephews), I am very encouraged by today's youth. They don't need to be preached at or told what's right and wrong. Given proper encouragement they can figure it out for themselves.


Be Seeing You!