Category Archives: My Opinion of Something

May10

The End Draweth Nigh

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Okay, forget the craziness surrounding 2012 and the Mayan calendar. Don’t pay any attention to all the folks blathering on about Nostradamus’ final predictions and such. Ignore the prophetic signs abundant in the Middle East. Don’t even worry about the guy on the corner with the sandwich board proclaiming “The End of the World is Near.” These petty predictors pale in comparison to the omen I received yesterday morning that our days on this planet are truly drawing to a close.

Before you ask, I didn’t receive a divine visitation or some ESP related premonition. My source is much more reliable than either of those . . . well, depending on WHO the divine visitation is. I mean, I would consider Angelina Jolie or Scarlett Johansson dropping by unannounced as a divine visitation, but I wouldn’t give much credence to any prophetical statements either might make (even though Angie does have that whole “weirdness” thing going on sometimes.)

No, my wake up call, literally, came from the radio beside my bed. I know that the end of the world is coming because NPR — that’s National Public Radio for the Dittoheads out there, you know who you are — aired a full segment interview with (cue ominous music) . . . THE BEASTIE BOYS!

No worries, mates. The show won't last that long!"

Yep, Ad-Rock and Mike-D chatted up a new project they have coming out with one of the erudite and hyper-literate NPR hosts. MCA was sadly absent because of his ongoing fight with cancer. Let me run that one by you again in case you missed it the first time The Beastie Boys — yes, THOSE Beastie Boys — were being interviewed on N.P.R. As Bugs Bunny once remarked in his Bronx accent, “Now I’ve seen everyting!”

I could understand when Pearl Jam started appearing on my local Classic Rock station. It was hard at first because I was like, “Pearl Jam?! What gives? Vedder rocks forever! They just had a HUGE tour in 2000! Oh, yeah, um, 2000 . . . that was like  eleven ye-. . . *heavy sigh*.” So yeah, that was harsh, but I could deal. I deluded myself into thinking some things are just “instant classics”, you know?

I was even able to handle the crushing blow of seeing one of my other favorite bands — Foreigner — have their Greatest Hits cd on sale — not at somewhere like Record Bar (if you don’t know what Record Bar is, PLEASE, don’t ask. I feel bad enough already) or even Target or Walmart. Foreigner, the whole “Hot Blooded” bunch of them was on sale at HALLMARK. Right between the stationery with puppies and kittens and the new Vera Bradley releases sat one of the iconic rock bands. HALLMARK. I could just barely hold my composure until I got to the Element where I could give full vent to my sorrow. Budge was extremely worried and asked me what was the matter. I sobbed out, “Foreigner is on sale at Hallmark!” and erupted into another bout of misery.

She just looked at me with that look of “Someone tell me again why I hitched my wagon to this horse?” I have a picture of that look. I really want to put it up in a post on here but I’ve been promised grievous bodily harm should that ever happen.

"I'm givin' 'er all she's got cap'n! She cannae ta' much more!"

I managed to survive the revelation that Steve Tyler — the rock god frontman of Aerosmith (and father of Arwen Evenstar) — was going to be a judge on American freaking Idol. When I read that news on MSN, I couldn’t help but start quoting from Shelley’s “Ozymandias”. I didn’t realize I was speaking aloud until Budge asked my why I was quoting

Romantics and I told her that Steven Tyler was to judge American Idol.

I got The Look again for my trouble.

The Beastie Boys on NPR though? That’s it. I am officially PAST old and well on my way to ancient. When one of the first groups you ever headbanged to trade in “Brass Monkey” for Perrier, the Apocalypse cannot be too far away. All that is left is for The Rolling Stones to finally disintegrate and fall into dust right in the middle of a live performance of “Satisfaction” for me to know that it’s all over but the crying. After all, once The Beastie Boys do NPR, what’s left? I guess I could hear Def Leppard playing as elevator Muzak. Of course, once that happens, I’m just taking that elevator on up to the ceiling and jumping off. I don’t want to be around for the earth-rending events that are sure to follow!

Love y’all! Keep those feet clean and if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go read my Easton Press copy of W.B. Yeats’ poems. I think I’ll start with “The Second Coming.”

Apr24

Habeas Corpus

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Today is Easter Sunday.

Today, Christians the world over celebrate the most important event in the history of the world — Jesus Christ’s rising from the dead. The Resurrection is not only the most important event in history, but also the most ridiculed event in history as well. To adherents of other religions, including atheism and its current priestly triumvirate of Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens, the idea that a man can — and did — rise from the dead is mythology akin to Prometheus being bound in the Caucasus Mountains or Odin and his offspring riding down the Rainbow Bridge from Asgard to fight Ragnarok.

From time to time I have wrestled with doubts over the veracity of the Resurrection accounts, but one compelling and unanswerable detail has nailed me to my faith in Christ as surely as He was nailed to a Roman cross. If Jesus of Nazareth did not raise from the dead, where is His body?

The founders of other religions of the world are accounted for. Gautama the Buddha was cremated and containers of his ashes given as relics to shrines. Confucius is interred in Qufu, China, his hometown. The Mohammad lies beneath  the Mosque of the Prophet in Medina.

But wither the Carpenter of Nazareth? Where are the remains of He whom Pilate, a Roman provincial governor not prone to flights of superstition, named “REX IVDAEORVM” ? Where is the body of The Christ, the Holy One of God?

First, Jesus of Nazareth was a real person who died on a real cross at a real point in time in the very real and verifiable Roman province of Judea in or about 33 AD. Forget about “the search for Jesus” or “the historical Jesus”. We have the Gospels and they say He lived. We have Josephus and Philo and they say He lived. Still people want to dispute Jesus’ existence. To them I say, was Julius Caesar real? Prove it. Less contemporary material exists mentioning the would-be Roman emperor than mentions Christ by a magnitude of ten yet no one doubts Caesar’s life and deeds. Why must Christ’s life be called a myth? If we are going to play these reindeer games, let’s all play by the same rules for all historical persons.

So, where is His body?

The Resurrection DESTROYED the Roman Empire. It made Jews, sadly, a cast out and hunted people. Logic dictates that if either the Romans or the Jews had knowledge or possession of Jesus’ body, as soon as Christians like Peter started preaching in the streets, these men would have gone to a tomb, carted out Jesus’ body, unwrapped it and said, “Here is your ‘Savior'”.

Christianity would have come to a swift end.

But it didn’t.

Through reading I have settled on two unassailable facets of Roman life. First, the Romans were excellent record keepers. Second, the Romans were excellent killers. The Romans in Palestine who crucified Jesus didn’t “misplace” the body and they didn’t take Jesus down “alive” from the cross so that He “got better” then showed up later on. I don’t have the time or space to shoot those two arguments against the Resurrection as full of holes as they deserve to be, but luckily others have done that yeoman’s work in my place. My suggestion is to start with the thin book by Josh McDowell titled More than a Carpenter if you want to start exploring the arguments over the centuries around Jesus’ death and resurrection.

I must warn you, though, before you undertake such a journey. Many extremely passionate and intelligent men have set out to debunk Christianity’s claim that Jesus rose from the dead. None have succeeded and many have become believers and followers of Christ in the process.

Will you?

Love y’all and Happy Easter.

Why are you seeking the living among the dead? He is Risen, just as He said He would.

Apr20

Of Birds, Bees, and Frogs

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Amsterdam, Paris, Vegas . . . they got nothing on the Country Walk Lane Froggy Bordello.

I am a pimp. Not in the “how I dress flamboyantly” sense of the word (but with all my purple, who knows?), but in the “male who handles prostitutes” term. I am running a brothel for frogs. My backyard and pool have become a red-light district for amphibians.

Even as I am typing this, outside my living room window, the sounds of illicit frog romance is filling the night. If I were to gently pad to the back door, ease out onto my deck, pick up my spotlight, then flip it on and point the beam at the pool’s surface, I would witness a veritable tsunami as forty or fifty froggy “johns” dive into the green water to escape the penetrating light of “the authorities.”

I did not intend to be the owner of such a den of amphibian iniquity and vice. Unfortunately, I failed to buy a cover for my above ground pool and its new liner at the end of the last swimming season. I wasn’t overly worried about debris because I don’t have many trees in the back and none of them overhang the pool. All winter, the pool weathered the weather like a champ. Once or twice I took some GI Joes I found in the front yard (courtesy of the hellions next door) and sent them ice skating on the coldest days. (Okay, I’m from a small town in the sticks, it doesn’t take much to entertain me)

Another satisfied customer waiting for the party to crank back up.

Then came the spring. As the weather warmed, the pool greened. Since my deck doesn’t circumnavigate the pool, I cannot clean it with the vacuum until the water warms enough to get in it. Unfortunately, it’s plenty warm enough for the diatoms, euglenas, and algaes long before I feel comfortable subjecting my mammalian nether regions to the water. As a result, I don’t have a pool so much as I have a wonderfully symmetrical pond — probably for the next month or so. Then the fun part starts.

Not only do I have to get the pool chemically balanced, vacuumed, and cleaned out, but I also have to find a way to clean up the Times Square of the anura order. Maybe I can get Rudy Gulliani to come down and “clean up” around here?

Anyway, if you know how to encourage these wonderfully cacaphonic bufoae and anurae to look for love in some other places, please let me know! Otherwise, I’m afraid that the chlorine from the pool cleaning in a few weeks is going to cause a massive infanticide among the nascent tadpole population. Ah, such is life. The parents do all the loose living and the children bear the brunt of the punishment.

Circle of life, indeed!

Love y’all and keep those feet clean!

Mar18

Are You Talkin’ To Me?!

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Most of us have watched a young Robert De Niro playing cab driver Travis Bickle posing in the mirror with a gun and an attitude while repeating over and over, “You talkin’ to me?” It’s a great scene but it’s just one more way in which we realize dear Travis is a bean or two short of a full bowl of chili.

Now, yesterday, I was walking around in the Garden Tools section of Lowes — or as I like to describe it, Toy R Us for males — when this guy down the aisle a bit from me starts flailing his arms around and screaming and he’s looking dead at me. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, this was not my first rodeo with babbling lunatics involved. I taught high school and middle school — I’m ready for anything. So, I stopped and adopted a good defensive posture to let dude know I wasn’t backing down from his craziness. Oh, and I also reached over and picked up a nice double-faced axe just in case I had to get all Gimli from Lord of the Rings on Rainman here. Luckily (for both of us since nothing adds pounds like “jumpsuit orange”) before I could yell out a cool dwarven war cry and get in touch with my Viko-Celtic roots, the guy turned and I saw it — he had a freaking BLUETOOTH MICROPHONE IN HIS EAR.

This idiotic phenomenon has become a pox, nay a plague, a veritable pestilence on the good graces of our public spaces these days. One can hardly walk around a mall or even a park without coming upon someone babbling incoherently to himself about picking up the milk and cat food or laughing maniacally to herself while continually repeating, “I KNOW, right?” Just about the time we get ready to pull our wives and children close and sprint to the other side of the aisle / sidewalk / track, etc, the goober turns around to reveal the blue blinking light practically embedded in his or her ear.

They have been assimilated.

No, really, watch somebody sporting a Jawbone and tell me she doesn’t look like she forgot to take off some makeup props before she left the Star Trek set where she was trying out for the part of Seven of Nine in the upcoming Broadway release “Star Trek: The Musical”. (They aren’t really making that play . . . at least I don’t think they are but with this Spiderman fiasco, who knows. But I digress). All over the highways and supermarkets of America, people are turning into Borg. I refuse to believe resistance is futile!

Now I admit, I hate cell phones on general principle. I am of the ilk who believe if someone isn’t home when you call, he or she doesn’t want to talk to you right then. Were it not for Budge and Mama’s dual insistence, I wouldn’t have one of the wretched, brain rotting devices. Cell phones are the final straw that is going to usher the barbarians through the gates.

 

Come ON now, Dude! Seriously? Two words: Voice Mail.

When the day has arrived that I cannot rid myself of the dregs of a two bean burritos lunch in Target without hearing a tinny version of MC Hammer’s “Can’t Touch This” coming from the next stall — followed by some fool saying “Hello?”, we are truly on the downhill slide of the slippery slope. You are pooping you fool, you need to concentrate and so do the rest of us!! Besides, do you really want to consider the environment you are placing near your hands, mouth, and ears?

 

Um, EWW!

Then we have the drivers barreling down the road yakking away into their “hands free device.” Apparently, hands free has become a euphemism for “wreckage inducing contraption.” You are theoretically controlling a huge hunk of steel, aluminum, glass and rubber down a stretch of autobahn at well over the posted speed limits, so you need to be concentrating on the predicament at hand, not arguing with your mother over a stupid bunch of bananas she wanted to leave you but you had no need for! For the love of all that’s holy, just TAKE THE BANANAS and HANG UP THE PHONE!

Yes, Brethren and Sistren, the ubiquitous Bluetooth in the ear is the ultimate sign the apocalypse is upon us. Not long ago, if you sat animatedly jabbering to yourself complete with hand waving and hair tugging, the nice kind men in the white coats would come and gently take you to a softly lit comfortable room with lots of padding on the walls where you could wait while being fitted for your cute jacket with the sleeves that tie in the back.

Not anymore. The rabid Bluetooth invasion has made it impossible to tell the disturbed from the merely obnoxious. Just last week, I was having a date night with Budge and watched a man and woman sit two tables across from us, both carrying on extremely animated conversations — just not with each other. All the while, that cute little blue light kept pulsing around both their temples.

Really? You can’t take that ear funk coated spit stained hunk of Bakelite out of your face long enough to talk over a meal to the person IN FRONT OF YOU?

Why, YES, as a matter of fact I AM a raging douchebag!

We are all doomed.

If I owned a restaurant, I’d have a Faraday Cage built into the walls of the building. It’s not that I’m a Luddite or something. I love technology. I just hate that rules of decent behavior and civility haven’t kept pace with the times!

So, in closing, I love y’all, but if you are walking or driving around talking to yourself because of a little chip in your ear, I’m going to make fun of you, laugh at you, and think you are a goober — especially if you cut me off in traffic because you aren’t paying attention!

Til then, keep those feet clean and those Blueteeth put away!

Feb28

Flanders Field is Empty

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A very hale and hearty Mr. Buckles at the ripe old age of 106 at a veteran's function in Washington, DC.

For the United States of America, the guns of the Western Front have been silenced at last and an important period of US History passed from the realm of living memory yesterday evening. With the death of Mr. Frank Buckles at his home near Charles Towne, West Virginia, everyone who remembers the blood and the mud of the Western Front has left the battlefield. For our country, World War I — The Great War — that they said would “end all wars” now resides only on grainy film and yellowing newspaper pages.

 

I will leave Mr. Buckle’s obituary and eulogy to better writers than I can hope to be. The New York Times has an excellent write up about his life posted now. Instead, I want to speak to the passing, not of a wonderful and beloved old  warrior, but of history itself. Up until yesterday, if a thorny or ambiguous question about life in the trenches arose, a car ride to Charles Towne, West Virginia could straighten the mess out quickly once Mr. Buckles spoke five powerful words: “I know. I was there.”

Now, we only have the history books. World War I has joined the Spanish American War, the War Between the States, the Mexican War, the War of 1812, and The American Revolution as a historian’s bailiwick. The next great event in American History will most likely be the death of the last World War II veteran and at the rate those men and women — all in their 80s now — are leaving the world stage, it might not be as long.

A handsome 16 year old Cpl. Frank Buckles just before his shipping out to France.

The loss of the last living figure of an event like World War I is a huge tragedy in two ways. First is the human loss. Mr. Buckles had become quite famous in his later years (and he had PLENTY of later years) and our nation is diminished by his passing. Secondly though, is the loss of the eyewitness. Now historians can “interpret” and “reinterpret” America’s involvement in that long ago global event with impunity. No one is left who can speak for the multiplied thousands who lie beneath the white crosses in Belgium’s Flanders Field.

For now, Holocaust deniers have one insurmountable obstacle to the free spread of their cancerous message and that obstacle is the every shrinking handful of men and women with numbers tattooed on their arms and horror engraved upon their souls. For now, at least, those who would say “It never happened” must answer to the likes of my beloved friend Mrs. Marion Blumenthal-Lazan who spend years of her childhood in Bergen Belsen.

For now, those who would seek to cover up the grave tragedy that was the Cambodian Killing Fields have the survivors to answer to. The aging veterans of the Japanese army must still confront the living, breathing presence of the “comfort women” whom they abused so many years ago. War Hawks who would rush to hurl nuclear weapons at one another must still look into eyes that saw a bright flash above their two cities in 1945. Some are still among us who were there to hear Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr tell a million people on the Washington, DC Mall that he had a dream.

In time, however, these memories, too, will fall silent — as silent as the grave.

What then? How will those events, so important to the world, our nation, and even to us, be remembered? It is said that history is written by the victors. That is not a true statement. History is written by the survivors and when they are gone, what is left is but hearsay and conjecture.

In Pace Resquiescat, Corporal Buckles. May you find your rest at long last.

Love to all of you as well.

Sincerely, G.S. Feet.

Feb24

Yes, As A Matter Of Fact, It IS Mine!

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The wallet I carry every day. Why, yes it is a Vera Bradley.

Hello, my name is Shannon and I carry a Vera Bradley Zip-Around Wallet in the “Simply Violet” pattern given to me by my plural wives.

WANNA FIGHT ABOUT IT!?

Apparently, I am single-handedly bringing about the demise of Western culture and the downfall of our civilization because I carry a “woman’s” wallet. Well, I’ve checked both eyes for tears and, finding none, have to assume that the care bears that live in my tear ducts have decided to stay mute on this fashion point.

My favorite pair of Croc Caymans. Color: Grape.

At least once a week, when I take my Vera Bradley out of my left leg cargo pocket of my favorite brown cargo pants to pay for something at a restaurant or store, I get an incredulous look and some smarmy, snarky comment from a salesman or a waiter like “Cute wallet? Does it match your shoes?”  Of course, if I’m wearing my favorite pair of shoes, I point down and say — with as much scorn and vinegar-laced honey as possible — “Only when I’m wearing these, Sugar.”

Budge hates it when I do that.

Now if we are being served by a waitress or checked out by a lady, the comments aren’t nearly as vilely undertoned. It is more of a “That’s a nice wallet there. Is it yours or your wife’s?” I seldom go out in public without Budge or another of my handlers like Mama or Deuce, so one of them is usually close enough to warrant the comment. The sweetness usually turns to apology laced surprise when I unzip my wallet and show her my oft-washed and well-worn wedding dress picture of Budge. Then I’ll usually smile and say, “Do I look like I’d marry someone so vain they would carry around a picture of herself in her own wallet?”

The odd part is, if this same pattern of wallet had a metal zipper and was cast in cowhide or some dull colored canvas instead of cutely stitched cotton, I wouldn’t have this constant questioning. Well, what can I say? I like a little color along with my functionality. Of all the evils foisted upon our collective American psyche by our overly dour and legalistic Puritan forbears, the abhorrence of brightly colored clothing — particularly MALE clothing, is possibly the worst.

The story behind my decision to carry this particular stripe (or paisley as the case may be) of accessory is very practical and simple. I was tired of carrying a regular guy’s billfold in my back pocket. With the ton of loyalty cards, a debit card, a driver’s license, and one or two other sundries, the billfold my wallet replaced was three inches or more thick. Sitting on that monstrosity not only made my right butt cheek sweat too much, but it was also like sitting on a boulder. Added to the fact that my chiropractor warned that sitting on a billfold is a leading cause of spinal misalignment and associated back problems and my choice was clear. I needed a better system.

Unfortunately, the aforementioned cowhide or fine leather “manly looking” wallets cost more than the cow from whence they originated. I fail to see the logic, humor, or even irony in paying so much for a wallet that one has no money left to place therein. Enter Budge.

Budge was changing out her old “Simply Black” Vera Bradley zip around for her new monogrammed clutch. I saw what all she took out of the old wallet and realized I had found my solution. I asked her if I could have her old wallet and she handed it to me with that usual look that says, “You’re going to do something that will embarrass me, aren’t you?” I ignored the look, took the wallet, found it carried all my “stuff” in a much more orderly fashion, and so carried it until it almost fell apart. So for Christmas, Budge and Deuce bought me my new purple wallet. End of story. It’s what I carry.

So I like purple?!

WANNA FIGHT ABOUT IT!

Love y’all and keep those feet clean!

Feb1

Being a Bad Parent — continued

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People don't always notice signs.

I’ve had some people ask me about my last post. They want to know what set me off. Was it something specific or was I just railing against the general inability of some people to parent. Well, my post about poor parents actually DOES have its roots in a specific local family dynamic. Now I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings by naming names, so let’s call them, oh, I don’t know — my next door neighbors. The ones on the right hand side as one looks at our home. The ones with the blue car with the duct tape and plastic tarp side window. And the pile of trash on the back porch. And the yard strewn with debris. You get the idea.

These people do not look after their kids! Gentle readers, I don’t live in DisneyWorld. This is a lower middle class / upper working class “mobile home subdivision”, basically a trailer park but we have to take the tongues and wheels off the trailers and we don’t rent the spaces. Kids NEED to be watched after around here.

What makes matters worse is this is a particularly FERTILE couple. Is it just me or has anyone else noticed how the lower down on the intellectual level one goes in the animal kingdom the more offspring a given pair of animals produces? For instance, dolphins are super smart. Dolphins have ONE pup at a time. Two is a rarity. Frogs, though? Frogs will NEVER top anyone’s list of Einsteinesque fauna and they have THOUSANDS of offspring at once. The reason is obvious — the dumber the animal, the more offspring that are needed to ensure the species survives.

They are working on that principle right next door.

Happens WAY too much.

This woman has FOUR kids. The oldest two are both in the FIRST GRADE. They are only 10 months apart in age, and get this — they have different daddies! Let THAT math keep you up at night. These kids are 6 almost 7, barely 6, four, and two years old. The oldest is a girl and the rest are carbon copy boys.

Do these people not know what a TELEVISION is?

Anyway, they have this slew of kids. The dad lost his job in the downturn two years ago so he’s been working about six part-time jobs. I’m not sure if he works so much for the money or if he just wants to stay away from home. I know which one I’D pick. The mom stays at home with the brood until dad gets home at which point she takes the car to her job at McDonalds. I’d be worried about them financially, but when she was big as a barrel with the two-year-old she told Budge and me they were in good shape because of WIC, food stamps, and about six other government programs.

Now up to this point, you might think I’m just cracking on some poor white trash in an attempt to get blog hits. You couldn’t be more wrong. First of all, I hesitate to call anyone white trash. Too many members of my family have been branded with that particular moniker over the years for me to toss such a label around lightly. More than that though is the fact that I’ve seen other families in similar states be adoring and careful parents and raise some amazing kids.

No, I’m cracking on this bunch because of the UPS truck.

I was straightening up the house about a week ago when I heard a LARGE vehicle LOCK DOWN on the brakes. I looked up to see the four-year old staring at the grille of the Big Brown Truck. I know this UPS driver and he’s not an excessive speed demon. If he’d been traveling two miles an hour faster, that kid would have been road kill.

Just a matter of time?

If that was a one time deal, I wouldn’t be going to the trouble of writing this, but that kind of thing is the RULE in their house, not the exception. The three oldest kids stay outside from the time school lets out until dark. They have NO IDEA what it means to look before crossing a road. To date, besides the UPS truck, two school buses, the Charter guy, the water meter guy, and at least six cars that I have seen have nearly wrung the brake pads off the front of their cars trying to keep from turning one of these chaps into a human speed bump. They NEVER look where they are going. I’ve told Budge that it is just a matter of time before someone can’t make a last second stop and that’s going to be terrible.

I used to never lock my gates. Now I do because these kids have no concept of “that’s not yours.” It’s nothing for them to go across my yard — which I really DON’T mind — and get out toys belonging to my OTHER neighbors’ GOOD child and start playing with them even if no one there is home! I can’t imagine how long I’d have been stuck inside if my mama had caught me doing such!

Let me be clear though — it’s NOT THE KIDS’ FAULT.

Too late to watch over them now.

If a six, five, or four-year old child doesn’t know how to behave, it is not his fault. It is the PARENTS’ fault. Children are just that — children. By definition they are ignorant of most dangers, evils, and pitfalls and thank God they are. The horrible state of the world will catch up to them soon enough. Until then, though, it is up to MAMA and DADDY to RAISE them and that requires a little something called WORK.

Now I’ve seen a child run out in front of a car before, but every other time it was because he wasn’t listening to THE ADULT STANDING RIGHT NEXT TO HIM. The adult is attempting to provide a safe transit from store to car and the child isn’t listening. Most of the times I’ve seen this happen, Mama or Daddy will reinforce the lesson of the near tragedy by a vigorous application of the Board of Education to the Seat of Understanding just as soon as everyone reaches the car.

Not this family.

No one is watching these kids. We live on the busiest street in our neighborhood and Mom is nowhere to be found unless she happens out onto the porch to smoke. Granny wouldn’t let me play in the FRONT YARD of her and Papa’s house and they lived on a street full of nothing but old people in the quietest neighborhood in Fountain Inn. If I GOT ran over it would be due to Mrs. Johnson losing control of her power scooter and tearing through the wisteria bordering the back yard. Otherwise, I was safer than the gold in Fort Knox. Plus, this was in the pre-Adam Walsh days when we kids didn’t know strangers would kill us. Someone in a van could pull up, offer these kids next door candy, snatch them into the vehicle and be gone and it would be suppertime before Mom even noticed they were gone. That’s insane!

I don't want this scene in front of my home. Children deserve better caretakers.

If anyone is looking out for these kids, it’s ONE little girl who is about ten and seems to be the natural “mothering type”.

You haven’t seen irony until you see a ten-year-old berating a four-year old at top volume like R. Lee Ermey on crack because the kid didn’t look before crossing the street. If it wasn’t for though, these kids would be as rudderless as a capsized canoe in a whitewater whirlpool. I for one think the child deserves a medal.

BUT IT’S NOT. HER. PLACE. TO. WATCH. THESE. KIDS.

I am at a loss to know what to do. As a final thought, if one of the kids DOES get hurt, I’LL have to call 911 because THEY don’t have a phone. Correction, they have a cell phone, but instead of leaving it at home in case — I don’t know — the two-year old swallowed something and needed an ambulance, Daddy takes it with him on his “rounds.”

Talk about priorities?!

Any thoughts on this comedy of errors? I’m open to suggestions!

Take care, y’all and keep those feet clean.

Jan31

Perils of Playing House

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Consider yourself warned.

In this country, anyone wanting to operate a car, truck or motorcycle must pass a test and be licensed. If you don’t have a license, you are not legally allowed to drive. You may spend years in schools obtaining a medical or legal degree, but if you don’t pass the tests for the bar or for the medical specialty of your choice, you cannot call yourself a doctor or a lawyer and if you are caught trying to deceive people into believing you ARE a doctor or a lawyer, you will go directly to jail neither passing GO nor collecting $200.

BUT, any one man and one woman can pair up and, as long as they possess the correct anatomical and God-supplied equipment, make a baby and bring that baby into the world. In doing so, they often deceive people into believing they are, in fact, PARENTS. They are not. They are a sperm donor and a very sophisticated incubator. Making and / or birthing a baby doesn’t make you a parent any more than putting on a lab coat or a powdered wig (in England at least) makes you a doctor or a lawyer.

Therein lies the source of a huge amount of the problems facing the country today. Too many people are running around PRETENDING to be parents when all they are really doing is playing a cruel version of “house” just like kindergartners.

Why yes, I would like to get her started in her mama's footsteps as soon as possible!

If you want to know whether or not I am talking to you or if you should be giving me multiple loud “amen, preach it, my brother” outbursts is simple for me to ascertain with ONE question. Have you ever worried that you were not being a good parent or actually thought you were being a poor parent? If you have dwelt at any length on those statements, you are NOT a bad parent or — at the very least — you are trying. Just the fact that you CARE if you are a good parent or not says volumes.

Two of my favorite former students married, in due time, produced a gorgeous little tow-headed, blue-eyed girl just as pretty as her mama and as much of a smartass as her daddy. Her daddy has gone from being a favorite student to being a dear friend and he has said to me on more than one occasion, usually with tears in his voice, “Coach, I just don’t know if I’m being a good daddy to Lisa.” I tell him every time what I just told y’all, “Mike, the fact that you CARE whether or not you are a good daddy means you are trying really hard to be a good daddy and that is all any man can do.”

Entirely too many incubators and sperm donors today seem –by their actions at least — to view their offspring as accessories like a watch or a chihuahua, or maybe the next logical step in some middle class fantasy plan. Others actually see their children as INCOME producers and keep having them until the government says they won’t pay for any more. Worst of all, however, are those poor fools who see their children as “friends” and not “children.”

Here is a story I have told often and it still flabbergasts me more than ten years later. It illustrates the perils of poor parenting.

My second year as a teacher, I was in on a meeting with a 16-year-old tee-tiny white girl, her mama, the AP, the guidance counselor, and a few other assorted teachers. We were trying to explain to mama that baby-doll wasn’t doing so hot in the academic realm. When it came time for the mama to respond, she didn’t get three sentences out before her daughter spun around and unleashed a torrent at her that turned the air of the conference room a Smurfy shade of blue. This 16-year-old slip of a girl called her mama every name in the book and actually worked herself into such a rage that she had to be restrained and taken from the room.

Mama’s reaction? She put her head in her hands and started moaning about, “I just don’t know what to do with her. I’ve tried so hard to be her friend and get her to like me.”

Even then I was not known for having either volumes of tact or great reserves of self-control so while everyone else in the room (the older, more experienced ones) sat staring at the table, I got up and sat next to the poor woman. I put my hand on her shoulder and she looked up at me with red-rimmed eyes and I told her, “Ma’am, my mama is my best friend in this world. I love her like I love no other. She is 5’2 and weighs 110 pounds in a full winter suit of clothes, heavy boots, and soaked in a swimming pool. She has bad lungs from smoking for years and working in cotton mills. She is a bit past her physical prime. I am 5’10, 250 pounds (I was then anyway) have wrestled, coached wrestling, and fought in full contact karate tournaments. I’m in the prime of my life, but if I — TODAY — let alone when I was 16, said HALF of the words your daughter just said to you to MY MAMA, I know EXACTLY what she would do. She would walk over, pick up that nice heavy metal stool and proceed to disfigure the metal of the stool seat with the bone of my head. Once she had beat me unconscious, she would call Bull Street in Columbia and tell them to come get her son because he had OBVIOUSLY lost his mind. Ma’am, your daughter doesn’t need another FRIEND. She needs a MAMA.”

Well, she got all pissed off and I got another letter in my file, but I stand by what I said to this day. My mama has said many things to and about me and we’ve had our disagreements over the years but at NO TIME has my mama EVER uttered the phrases “I can’t do anything with him” or “I just want him to like me.” Mama never gave one tiny tinker’s damn if I LIKED her or if she was my FRIEND or not, but let me assure you she ALWAYS knew SOMETHING to do with me and it was the thoughts of what she COULD do that kept me on the straight and narrow most of the time.

This doesn't REALLY say "Juicy." It REALLY says "Mom and Dad don't care that perverted old men are going to stare at my butt."

Remember this — You are a PARENT. You RAISE the child. Teachers, pastors, day care centers, and TV stars don’t RAISE your kids. It’s not their job; it’s YOUR job and if you didn’t want it, you should have given little Johnny or Jill or LaKwisha or Jaquan up for adoption to one of the thousands of infertile couples like me and Budge who would love to have a child to raise but can’t. EVEN BETTER, if you didn’t WANT the responsibility of being a parent because it might CRAMP your style, you should have stayed off your back or out of that hotel room or out of the back seat of that car. As I have told more than one young person over the years when they were facing choices about sex, drugs, or rock ‘n roll, “If you don’t want to go to Atlanta, don’t get on I-85 South!” Stay on that interstate long enough and eventually you WILL end up in Fulton County, Georgia. Guaranteed.

Hope I didn’t terribly offend anyone, but I’ve just seen some stuff this weekend that has made me question how our species has made it this far! Unfortunately, the ones who need to read this the most will never see it! ***sigh***

Love y’all anyway and keep those feet clean!

Jan29

“The Fighter” isn’t about Boxing

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Well, it is, but that’s not the real story. The REAL story is the story of a family and this bunch takes ALL the “fun” out of “dysfunctional.”

Mark Wahlberg stars in this touching and realistic homage to his real life friend, boxer and fellow Bay Stater “Irish” Micky Ward. Both Ward and Wahlberg hail from HUGE Catholic families and both have advanced degrees from the prestigious University of Hard Knocks — Real Life Campus.

The film is very good and the boxing alone makes it worth seeing, but the real story is a once-promising older brother trapped in the haze of drugs and eternally reliving his one glorious moment in the spotlight AND a still promising baby brother of the family emotionally ripped in two by a childlike adoration for his older brother and an earnest desire to “make it” as a boxer in the way the older sibling never could. This movie is an Oscar vehicle and rightly so. Wahlberg turn in a terrific performance as Micky Ward, but Christian Bale is remarkable as the drug addicted, past his prime, Dickie Ecklund.

The best fights in the movie are not in the ring. They are in the living room and kitchen of the Ecklund family home, on the porch of Micky’s girlfriend’s apartment building, and, at one point, in the middle of a Lowell street. Micky is caught in the trap so many young men are when they genuine love their sprawling and brawling families but have come to realize the toxicity of that atmosphere is killing any chance at a real future. As I’ve stated on this blog before, love can smother, wound, and even kill with all the best of intentions.

The women of the film put in fantastic performances, from Micky and Dickie’s mother Alice, who has no idea just how much she favors Dickie over Micky, as well as seven of the raunchiest, ugliest, and most brutal sisters to ever grace the silver screen. Growing up in this household, it’s no wonder Micky Ward eventually won a boxing world title — he had to root hog or die just to get a place at the dining room table and sparring partners abounded, even if they were mostly female.

I was leery of dropping $20 for two tickets on this flick at first, but I can honestly say it was extremely well acted, well scripted and enjoyable. See it. You won’t be disappointed.

Jan24

Being Unemployed Isn’t for the Fainthearted

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It’s just twenty minutes until tomorrow so I’ll start calling Monday yesterday, as in — yesterday, I spent a little over four HOURS at the unemployment office. I filed my paperwork for the final extended benefits plan. If I get approved, I’ll have fourteen more weeks of unemployment insurance checks then I’ll become a “Ninety-niner” that some people are talking about. Ninety-nine weeks unemployed.

It’s hard to believe just how clueless some people are about being unemployed. I was reading the comment section of an article in the local newspaper on the stagnant job market and some of the commentators were HORRIBLE. I didn’t know I was such a lazy, useless bum who is attempting to be a parasite on the backsides of hardworking people.

I’ll tell them what they can do as far as backsides are concerned.

The unemployment office was packed today and I saw all shapes and kinds of misery AND con-artists. I know out of the room of about 500 people, more than one really has no intention of ever finding a job for longer than it takes to accrue more unemployment. Any system is going to have people who take advantage of it. Mostly what I saw today though was people hurting. One lady broke my heart. Her company abruptly shut down last week and when I say abrupt I’m talking “note on the door” style. She was about my age and she was just in tears because she had no idea what came next.

I’ve seen that several times when I’ve gone to file this or that paperwork. Mixed in with the lip ring wearing, saggy pants, hats on backwards crowd who’ve never worked an honest day in their lives are seriously decent folks who have ALWAYS worked and now they find themselves in their fifties and, in too many cases, sixties with no job, no insurance, and — increasingly — no hope.

You get to talk A LOT to a great many people in four hours of sitting and standing in line. I heard several common refrains like “overqualified,” “no experience in X field,” and the ubiquitous “it just looks like no jobs are out there.” In the comments I mentioned earlier, one self-righteous gentleman said with great pride that he’d “NEVER been out of work and if he ever found himself unemployed he DAMN SURE wouldn’t take 99 weeks to find another job.”

Oh really? My mama taught me a long time ago, NEVER say what you’ll NEVER do. You just might be surprised.

People not in the situation LOVE to say things like, “Go get a job at McDonalds or WalMart — they are always hiring.” Um, no, their not. It is an employer’s market right now. Businesses can pick and chose because they know how desperate people have become. The worst thing is, education used to be a bulwark against unemployment, but now, it’s a hindrance to finding another job. For example, I have a Masters Degreee AND all my recent work experience is in education. Someone takes one look at my resume’ and realizes I’m a teacher. Well, they aren’t stupid; they know that I’ll be looking for another teaching job and as soon as I find one — hasta la vista, Baby.

I’ve actually had an HR interviewer tell me that I’m almost unemployable outside of my field because no one wants to invest time or effort training someone who has an established career. I could LIE and say I have no intention of looking for another job in the schools, but I’ve found lying is a pretty low percentage game most of the time. The fact is, yes, if I’m a sales clerk at Target and a principal calls me and says, “come be our librarian,” I am GONE. As Lynyrd Skynyrd put it so eloquently, “Call me the breeze.”\

Unfortunately, the longer I’m out of the library, the rustier and rustier my skills get. I’d love to still be able to look through VOYA and SLJ, but my budget didn’t have room for $120 subscriptions. I sat down the other day and pulled up some the YA section on Amazon. I didn’t recognize much. When you aren’t talking with other librarians and students and teachers about books and computers and research and stuff . . . well, the edge starts to go.

So. What’s the answer? No clue. I’ve got a final fourteen weeks to figure it out before I become one of those people who help artificially inflate the “unemployment recovery rate” by falling off the job seeking roles. If you aren’t getting money anymore, you aren’t counted as unemployed. Go figure.

In any event, keep me in your thoughts and prayers. I’m not panicking because that won’t do anyone any good — especially me. Sorry about the short rambling post — it’s been a trying day and I wanted to vent a bit.

Love y’all and keep those feet clean!