Monthly Archives: September 2016

Mooned and Phased

Nope. It’s not what you think.

In case you haven’t noticed, i am not a happy camper when it comes to my choices for the next presidential election.

My sports teams have defined in the tank (except for the Vols: yes, Vandy stalwarts, there remains a warm spot in my heart for what used to be the magnificent orange jersies, white numerals, high-top cleats, and the single-wing  Vols, and when they are not playing the Commodores, i still root for them).

Our traditional annual trip to the “Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival” in Golden Gate Park with our close friends Alan, Maren, and Eleanor Hicks, and now their son Alan Jr. as well, this time with a preceding stop in Concord with Maureen’s wonderful family Stefanie, Eric, Stefan, and Naomi possibly including Ann Minolti, Nikki, Mark, and Markie Knighton, was called off by me, who made a household executive decision because Maureen has not been feeling well. She is on the road to recovery, but i did not wish her to be miserable traveling. i would rather she be miserable with me at home.

So i have been in a dark place.

Since we weren’t in Concord or on our way to San Francisco, i made an oft-made, seldom-carried out effort to get back in my definition of good shape. i woke my usual early and decided to do a run/walk from our house. It was even before first light.

i had climbed the initial hill and was up on the next road of this high desert mesa when i looked skyward to the southeast. Hanging low over the borderlands of Baja California was the waning crescent moon, a sliver of light cradling the darker orb. Directly above it was the morning bright Mercury, named after that wing-footed Greek god.

i would have taken a photo with my iPhone, but i would have had to stop my pitiable jog, and maneuver the phone out of its holster, and most importantly, lose the song i had playing on iTunes, BB King singing “How Blue Can You Get?” So there is no picture of the moon rocking Mars.

But there it was. In the dark before the dawn has not yet considered dawning. This old man in some semblance of himself shuffling toward what? Redemption? He, in his dark place, sure as hell didn’t know. Even BB King didn’t know, even though he had the right idea, and the old man is  staring Mars, the ancient myth, rocking on the legs of the waning crescent moon over Baja, in the face.

And in the quiet of the morning where the worlds collide, there was peace in the heavens.

Stick it in your ear, politicians, money-grabbers, power brokers.

i think the moon, Mars, and i are going to do just fine.

Disenfranchised

i feel…well, i feel poltically disenfranchised.

Johnson’s gaffe yesterday demonstrates to me he is greatly lacking in timely critical thinking, a capability i think is required of our president (and no, i’m not going to be lazy or attempt to be cool and in the know by using the acronym POTUS, yet another dumb aberration of our language).

So now, i am looking at a wasteland. Trust, responsibility, cooperation, good judgement, and concern about others are only facades. Power, money, self-interest, rock throwing,  influence, influence peddling, and lemming-like following are the drivers. Citizens are too interested in their own causes to even read or listen to the other side, except to pick what is said or written to death. Critical thinking is colored by one’s biases and prejudices across the board.

i spent twenty-two years and more avoiding political involvement other than voting. As a member of the military, i understood that was part of my job. Apparently, especially among the higher ranked personnel, this is no longer the case. Now i am old and my pushing for political change sounds hollow and…well, old.

i can only vote for presidential candidates i trust and platforms which make sense.

Although the Libertarian platform is far more logical than the other three, it contains many items with which i do not agree. Except for that platform, all else in this upcoming election is shameful to me.

i would like for us to finally have a woman president, but not this candidate.

i strongly believe we should hold our presidential candidates to higher standards than everyone else, but right now, i don’t see any candidate being held to a higher standard, or any standard that might interfere with a party’s desire to win. Neither do i find any candidate or any party even faking trying to do what’s right.

i was taught in elementary school communists believed the end justified the means, and our country, our government did not believe that and did not utilize unethical or illegal means to win.

That is no longer the case, especially in our political system.

i wish a check box for “i protest any of these candidates being elected” would be included on the ballot, but that will not be an option.

Unless there is some major, major change in the next month, i cannot in good faith vote for any presidential candidate.

i am disenfranchised

 

Encouraging Words

My grandson Sam has an iPhone. If i remember correctly, he is close to the age we gave Sarah hers, although it was a long time before iPhones. i will not be a curmudgeon (for a moment) and make some dumbshit observation about walking to school in the snow without a cell phone when i was young. In fact, i think it’s a good thing he has one: it has a security aspect in that he can get in touch with his mother or father when he might be confronted with a problem. It also is giving him what has become an essential life skill, the capability to use a phone and electronics, the world of the cloud.

It also gives me the ability to communicate with him at any time. We have “Facetimed” together once, on which i commented here several weeks ago. i have been trying to figure out what i could do when and what i shouldn’t do when when Blythe, my daughter, Sam’s mother, clued me in — i take some substantial “clueing in” a lot according to Blythe, my other daughter Sarah, and Maureen.

So this afternoon, knowing Sam would be at soccer practice, i decided to text him to give him some encouragement about practice. It was then i realized i know no soccer terms except “GOOOAAALLL!!!” And man, i hate that almost as “Going, Going, Gone.”

My terms of encouragement back in my sports days were fairly simple:

Basketball: “Don’t double dribble”/”Keep your hands up” / “Use a bounce pass.”

Football: “Kick ’em long”/”Hit ’em hard”/”Watch his belly button; he can’t fake you out with that.”

Baseball: “Swing level”/”Use your body to block the ball”/Use both hands to catch a fly”

There seems to be little cross over. “Kick ’em long” seems about the only one which might apply to soccer. But is that a good thing?

What a pickle.

102

Today, my father would have been 102.

He was my best friend.

He said little to me in terms of how to live my life. I am pretty sure i only received about four letters from him my entire life. Later, he said very little on the phone, letting my mother do the talking.

Everything he did, everything he said, and everything he wrote had a powerful impact on me.

And boy, did we enjoy laughing together.

Early 1943, about a year after they bought the house on Castle Heights Avenue. The caption was written by my Aunt Bettye Kate, her sister. This is roughly about the time i was conceived. He would enlist in the Seabees in August.
September 1943, about a year after they bought the house on Castle Heights Avenue. The caption was written by my Aunt Bettye Kate, her sister. i was about four months into making my debut. He had enlisted in the Seabees in August and would soon be on his way to boot camp and CB training.. And just look at those hands, even then.

And i must say separating my thoughts about him from those about my mother is just flat impossible.

i am one very lucky man.

i miss him, but i also learned from him life moves on, and our task is to live it well, and do the right thing, regardless of the circumstances. So i will once again repeat one of favorite poems i wrote about him.

Hands, circa 2009

When most folks meet him,
they notice steel blue eyes and agility;
his gaze, gait and movements
belie the ninety-five years;
but
those folks should look at his hands:
those hands could make Durer cry
with their history and the tales they tell.

His strength always was supple
beyond what was suggested from his slight build.
His hands are the delivery point of that strength.
His hands are not slight:
His hands are firm and thick and solid –
a handshake of destruction if he so desired, but
he has used them to repair the cars and our hearts;

His hands are marked by years of labor with
tire irons, jacks, wrenches, sledges, micrometers on
carburetors, axles, brake drums, distributors
(long before mechanics hooked up computers,
deciphering the monitor to replace “units”
for more money in an hour than he made in a month
when he started in ’34 before computers and units).
His hands pitched tents,
made the bulldozers run
in war
in the steaming, screaming sweat of
Bouganville, New Guinea, the Philippines.

His hands have nicks and scratches
turned into scars with
the passage of time:
a map of history, the human kind.

Veins and arteries stand out
on the back of his hands,
pumping life itself into his hands
and beyond;
the tales of grease and oil and grime,
cleaned by gasoline and goop and lava soap
are etched in his hands;

they are hands of labor,
hands of hard times,
hands of hope,
hands of kindness, caring, and love:
oh love, love, love, crazy love.

His hands speak of him with pride.
His hands belong
to the smartest man I know
who has lived life to the maximum,
but in balance, in control, in understanding,
gaining respect and love
far beyond those who claim smartness
for the money they earned
while he and his hands own smartness
like a well-kept plot of land
because he always has understood
what was really important
in the long run:
smarter than any man I know
with hands that tell the story
so well.

Crazy Uncle Jim, aka cuj, Gets a Fix

i can’t think of many things much better than an instant of today.

i drove up to spend some way too infrequent time with Renee Hoskins and her daughter Kinsley. Renee served in the Marines, is now going to school full time with plans to get her masters in gerontology health and wellness (or something like that: Renee straighten me out if this is wrong), working, continually fighting the VA Bureaucracy to obtain her rightful benefits, and taking care of her daughter. She is nothing short of amazing.

After several months of trying to get together again after a long layoff — Renee lives in Carlsbad, in the north, while we are almost to the border; her schedule, our schedule and the distance makes it difficult — we finally connected but even then, Maureen could not join us due to other commitments.

i drove to the Escondido, arriving at the Children’s Discovery Museum a bit late. Renee and Kinsley were waiting at the door. When i got out of the car, Kinsley jumped up and down, waved, and ran toward me yelling, “Uncle Jim, Uncle Jim.” She ran into my arms; i picked her up, and she gave me a hug around the neck.

And folks, it just doesn’t get much better than that: a great feeling of joy flowing into an old man.

We had a wonderful couple of hours at the museum and a quick lunch. Kinsley is a delightful, well-spoken, obedient, and energetic young girl. Her mother is caring, a strict parent who lets Kinsley grow and develop, and the love between those two is a beautiful thing to observe.

In many ways, Renee reminds me of her grandmother, Nancy Orr Schwarze. Being with someone who resembles a cousin who is so close she is more like a sister can also make my day.

It ain’t quite like being with my grandson, but it’s close. Boy, is it close.

Thanks, Renee.

2016-09-26-10-54-36
Being serious.
Good folks.
Good folks.