All posts by Jim

79

A Pocket of Resistance

Today, i am somewhere between not grown up and ancient.

79 years old or young, however you look at it.

I am faced with three facts:

  • I was born and i will die.
  • I’m going to live until i die.
  • Only i can determine how i deal with the above two facts and all of the craziness that living brings.

I’m okay with that.

I celebrate my birth date with some pretty well-known folks:

Dolly Parton is two years younger (and looks much younger). I have never met Dolly, but i was not amused when she took Jeannie Seely’s place on the Porter Wagoner television show in 1967, and I hadn’t been all that thrilled when Jeannie Seely replaced Norma Jean (Busler) in 1965. I had watched Norma Jean since she debuted on the show in 1961. If she hadn’t been on the show, I probably wouldn’t have watched Porter at all and only turned on WSM-TV, channel 7, when Flatt and Scruggs followed that show at 5:00 on Saturday. Now, I have the greatest respect for Ms Parton even if her “Dollywood” turned a nice country two-lane road with single-lane hump-backed bridges leading to our mountain cabin for many years.
*     *     *
Edgar Allan Poe is/was 145 years older than me. Edgar captured me with his short stories, especially “The Pit and the Pendulum.” However, his love poems impacted me deeply: “To Helen,” “Annabel Lee,” and “Lenore.” And if someone does not like “The Raven,” they are a bit touched in my mind. My cousin Jamie Jacobs, one of the dearest, caring ladies of all time now lives in the house in Monroe, Virginia dedicated to Poe because of his service in the Army at Fort Monroe.
*     *     *
Janice Joplin is/was one year older than me. Even though i prefer Irma Franklin’s version of “Piece of My Heart,” her “Me and Bobby McGee,” written by Kris Kristofferson, and her own “Me and Bobby McGee,” remain two of my favorites.
*     *     *
Robert E. Lee is/was 143 years older than me. i think he was a noble, well-intended man, who had some hard decisions to make in a time and place that i cannot imagine. There are many who malign the man, rather the existence of slavery, the most horrible of institutions which existed in many forms in most cultures. I cannot judge the man for i did not know him nor cannot fathom what such an awful time was like. We moved forward and upward from that horrible time, but we seem destined to wallow in it for revenge. When i think of Lee, i just feel sad.
*     *     *
Paula Dean is 3 years younger than me. i would not even know who she is if it had not been for Maureen. When i think of her, i think of butter, lots of butter. Perhaps i am attributing butter to the wrong cooking show hostess. But i don’t think so.
*     *     *
In a website list of folks born on this date, there are 43 other, younger people. I do not know any of them. That is, quite possibly, those folks came after my time.

I don’t feel old but sometimes feel like time has passed me by. Time can seem like a relative thing, but it, the lucky old sun, and this lucky old son, just keep rolling along. Oh, i have a long list of medical problems that can kill me…sometime. Yes, i creak and moan and find a number of movements more difficult than they were before. And i recognize i have to adjust from my-devil-may-care, let’s-go-for-it, system for attacking life. But i feel young.

Perhaps my greatest concern is living with friends who have stopped living, good people, people i enjoyed being with.

And so it is; and so it shall be. But that last fact of the three listed at this opening of this rambling keeps whacking me in the head. “Only i can determine i how deal with the above two facts and all of the craziness that living brings about.

And by golly, i’m gonna stick with it.

79: here we go. Whoo hoo!

SW Corner, column 2: Finalities

Notes from the Southwest Corner

This column, my second weekly for The Lebanon Democrat, published October 22, 2007, was not what was planned. Perhaps my thoughts, not from the events surrounding the column, i.e. the wildfires, are as appropriate today.

SAN DIEGO, CA – This second weekly column has been tough to write.

In a rare exception from my usual pell-mell, last minute throw-it-together mode of operation, I followed the tenets of making any worthy task a success. I determined the desired outcome as I started; I outlined the important steps and created a timeline for completing those steps; I gathered notes and resources and researched needed missing pieces.

Then came the fires.

I tried to stick to my plan and to my regimen. The fire had a different plan, however. It preoccupied my every sense for three days, even though I only briefly felt true concern for my family or my home. Even if I could have eliminated the overbearing presence from heat, smell, smoke, ash, news reports, incoming phone calls checking on us, or outgoing ones checking on others, the fires pervaded every sensible thought I tried to have on other topics.

This is my sixth start on this column. I wanted to write about connections and memories and good stuff. I am compelled to write about the fires.

The devastation and the impact here is mind boggling. Fortunately, the only thing to keep this past week in Southern California from being worse than Katrina is the number of deaths. Only seven deaths have been reported so far.

The fires desolated over 750 square miles. More than half a million people were evacuated. In San Diego alone, over 1400 homes were destroyed. On a local news program, it was revealed we were literally seconds away from cutting power to large numbers of residents during the middle of the crisis.

Returning from our evacuation, we must sort what we packed willy-nilly and place them back from whence they came. We must clean ash on and in the home without the benefit of water, blowers, or vacuums (from a call to conserve water and energy). The fires have put us behind in our usual tasks and added significantly to the list.

As I started on those five other columns, I attempted to escape the fires. Early this morning, I realized I needed some closure.

Of all of the horrible statistics of devastation and costs and of all of the reports of bravery, kindness, futility, anger, meanness, selfishness, and the other aspects of human nature, I have been most intrigued with a whole bunch of people, including me, dealing with finality.

Many people dealt with the prospect of finality in many different ways.

There’s an old adage about living every day as if it were going to be your last. Yet most of the three million people in San Diego County refused to believe it was their last day.

Many ignored the evacuation orders and stayed behind. Some decided they did not trust the government to do its job. Some thought their presence would protect their homes. Some refused to leave their pets and livestock. Some valued their possessions more than life itself.

Learning from the 2003 fires, the ordered evacuations were more successful this time. One of the reasons was most of the evacuation centers in 2003 did not allow pets. With no where to go without their pets, people refused to evacuate. This time, the evacuation centers allowed pets as much as possible and had pet care built into the evacuation plans.

Of the half million who chose to put more days between them and finality, there were also many diverse reasons for doing so, and many different ways of going about it.

Some panicked and simply left seeking shelter somewhere. Some had planned thoroughly beforehand and methodically carried their plan out. Some like our family had pieces of the plan in place and tried to stay ahead of the curve, tried to make wise choices based on the information at hand and assessing the risks and benefits.

I experienced dealing with finality as I chose what to take and not take with us on our departure. It put some different priorities on what is important when we returned home.

I suspect the thoughts of finality will fade quickly for those who escaped home loss like us. We are already re-prioritizing without consideration of this possibly being our final day.

Most of us who have gone through this twice take a little bit more learning away this time. Finality is closer to home.

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