Archive for July, 2011

We got none…clear enough? We got POLITICIANS…who really only want to get re-elected, and that puzzled me for a long time. I mean, when they’re stumping around begging for money and votes, they always talk about the country and what they want to do for it, but when they finally crawl into the marble halls of power, they kind of get hypnotized. I think it takes only a couple of ritzy cocktail parties cocooned in all the priviledge they enjoy to convince them that somehow they’re SPECIAL, stratospherically above the rest of us proles.
And they LIKE it; who wouldn’t? It’s all wrapped up in the power corrupts thing. After they get to the Nirvana of democracy, they grow fingernails and imbed themselves into the nearest marble column. Got a flash for you dreamers. After they slide their asses into those soft, cushioned seats of power, they don’t give a damn about what WE want, but they give a BIG DAMN about what they want. Napoleon started it…reach and grab…reach and grab, but where does it leave the rest of us?
Frustrated, mostly. We work hard, balance our budgets, make sacrifices, and live within our means…we have to…but they DON’T. They promise EVERYTHING to EVERYBODY, and usually make those promises good when they can, even if they have to do it with borrowed money, TRILLIONS of dollars of it. A dollar is 6.12 inches long. I tried to calculate how long a train of a trillion dollars would be, but my calculator maxed out. IT’S A BIG NUMBER, probably enough to go to the moon and back a couple of times, and that’s just one trillion. We’re working on FOURTEEN TRILLION!
I keep wondering about it. Don’t those guys pay their bills? Don’t they KNOW you have to? What the hell is going on over there? I’ve decided most of those guys are fueled by fantasy, or illusion, or maybe alcohol. It sure as hell isn’t reality. Take Social Security, for example. People PAID into that system…all their lives. They sort of saw it as a contract, and now they’re being told the government may not give them what they’ve earned…and in most cases what they NEED to survive.
And what about people working now? Why should they pay through the nose for a program they’ll NEVER benefit from? I’m a writer. I live from day to day, but if I was working, I’d think twice about paying stuff to the government I knew I’d never get back. It would be like pissing in the wind. Of course, those marble-hall people only see it as reliable income they can splurge with, waste, and NEVER be held accountable for.
I heard a really great quote from Margaret Thatcher the other day. She said, “Socialism is great…until you run out of OTHER people’s money,” and that’s where we seem to be…out of other people’s money…your money, my money, your cousin’s money, your yard man’s money, your checkout lady’s money, your parent’s money, EVERYBODY’S money…except for those idiots clinging to the marble halls on the Potomac.
Lincoln bucked a lot of people, but he had a VISION…and it proved to be the right one. He went on until John Wilkes stopped him, but when I look around these days, I can’t find anyone like him who seems to be able to look beyond the immediate present and plan for the indefinite future. I find it funny how they ALL keep quoting Reagan over there. I liked Reagan, liked Clinton, too, because they TOOK CHARGE and did good things for our country.
And as I see it, that’s a big part of the problem. The people in charge these days seem to be the pollsters. Before making any move, every damned one of them seems to check it out first to see how it might impact them in the next election. I know their lives are cushy and will be secure forever, but why do they do it? To STAY there…they like that life and those cocktail parties, that exposure on TV, and they LOVE enhancing their cherished concept that they’re better than the rest of us. They’re modern-day gods while we’re DIRT.
Nowadays, that’s all they seem to think about…getting re-elected, and it looks like they’re willing to sacrifice the country to do it. I got tired of phone calls from political parties begging for money…and my vote, so I changed my registration to INDEPENDENT. After all, I’m about as independent as you can be, and now when they call, I tell them proudly. After a few stutters, they always hang up, which is exactly what I had in mind, and I gotta tell you. It makes suppertime a lot more pleasant.
That’ll work for me as long as I can AFFORD supper. The way things are going these days, it may not be long before I’ll be fondly remembering those times before the great fall, those times when I could still grill a steak or bake a chicken to give my family something nourishing to eat. When our dollars can’t buy piss, when we are hunkering down in abject poverty, when we’re all wondering where it all went, those guys will be living a live of luxury. They’re like that.
They’re POLITICIANS…lapping up whatever dregs they can in a world CRYING for people who can rise above temptation and the seduction of power, crying for STATESMEN. Give up, America because they ain’t there, and the way things are going, I don’t think they’ll ever be. Face it; we’re screwed.

Like most of the people I know, I watched the trial of Casey Anthony with a mixture of horror and fascination. Of course, she was acquitted of all the major charges, based…as I understand it…on the lack of cold, hard evidence, and I tend to agree. The prosecution failed to prove a crime had been committed, but I haven’t been able to shed the raw, empty feeling that somehow, something went WRONG here.
People are quickly making signs and pouring into Orlando to voice their objection, and when interviewed, they always say, “We want JUSTICE for Caylee.” I think we all do, just like I sometimes think the prosecution may have been so blinded by their desire to punish Casey they tended to overlook the fact that they were also our only hope of justice for a sweet little dead child. Maybe they DID reach too far. Maybe less than Murder 1 would have found more success.
Now, they’re celebrities, the attorneys…on BOTH SIDES, racing from one TV show to another…which I see as inevitable…part of the messy aftermath built into high-profile, media-enhanced trials like this, but somehow like a lot of people, I still feel like something TERRIBLE has gone unaddressed, something evil or possibly even insane. It’s that WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED part I find so slippery, so hard to keep a grip on…or to wrap my mind around.
A child died, and we don’t know why, or how, or even whether it was intentional or accidental…I’m pretty sure it wasn’t suicide…but instead of treating her with love and respect, her little body was thrown into a swamp as food for scavengers. We do know WHEN she died…a month before ANYBODY brought in the authorities, and that point causes me the most discomfort. That “Bella Vita” lady was computer-savvy, and it wouldn’t be too hard to Google the internet and find out how long it might take for a decomposing body to lose ANY traceable path…particularly back to her.
And that’s another point I find confusing. I know on TV they keep saying CSI is fantasy…no REAL case is that neat or conclusive, but archaeologists were able to pinpoint the EXACT circumstances and nature of Tutankhamun’s death…THREE THOUSAND YEARS AGO. And they’re saying thirty days erased EVERYTHING? EVERYTHING? I find that a little hard to swallow. Maybe they should have had an archaeologist on their forensic staff, but they didn’t…so we have to examine the BEHAVIOR of those closest to the little girl when she died.
Who the hell sits on a dead child for a month…and WHY? Who the hell wraps it in plastic and dumps it into a swamp instead of notifying the authorities and calling a funeral home…and WHY? What the hell was going on? That WHY thing keeps getting in the way because it sure looks to me like SOMEBODY was working like hell on some sort of plan, and sure as hell, like that same somebody was trying to COVER something up. Notice how many times I used the word HELL? It’s my clumsy attempt at subliminal imprinting…because I believe that’s where this twisted sort of behavior oozes from. It sounds SO like him, God’s eternal adversary.
Satan be damned; let us crawl toward truth. To deny the validity of the verdict is also to deny the rule of law, our only REAL protection. We can’t jettison the best we have simply because we don’t agree with it, even though THIS TIME it left us with that awful feeling. That should be…and has been made stridently clear. We don’t like the way it all went down, but we ACCEPT it because we’re civilized and live in a country governed by law rather than morality, evil’s edge. Morality has given us the Spanish Inquisition, innocents at the stake, and the Salem witch trials; personally, I’ll take LAW anyday.
Face it; we’ll NEVER know what really happened. Who’s going to tell us? The mother who was convicted on four counts of lying? The parents who are either as much in the dark as we, or torn between the tragic choice of siding with their daughter or their granddaughter? No, this one’s going to remain a mystery, but don’t worry; there’ll be lots of theories…and even more conspiracy-buff and tell-all books to keep it alive in our collective memory forever.
The way I see it, civilization is layered. Up top, things are bright, clean, and shiny…and any minute a cartoon bluebird wrapped in melody might land on your shoulder. A delightful illusion, but moving deeper, things get darker…and murkier…and far harder to understand, and at the bottom, the darkest part where civilization’s underbelly rips apart over nothingness, we find the least comfort and reassurance…because there be demons…and insanity…and evil…and death…oh, yes, and lawers. Lawyers seem to THRIVE in that void, take to it like ducks to water, even though it’s COMPLETELY alien to the rest of us. I’ve never understood that difference.
The little girl didn’t just get up one morning and decide to die. Something or somebody killed her, and whoever knows what went down isn’t ABOUT to tell us, which leaves the rest of us tormented, confused, outraged, powerless…and increasingly ANGRY. I understand that anger because I feel it, too, and HATE the thought that I can do nothing to change what happened, what’s going on, or what’s likely to happen from here. We bluebird people, it turns out, while good, noble, and loving, aren’t really up to the challenge of facing true evil, DEMONIC evil. We live happily and quietly most of the time and when we confront it, haven’t the slightest idea what we should ACTUALLY do.
It’s incredibly frustrating, but to tell the truth, I don’t believe we can do ANYTHING. It’s gone much too far beyond our capacity to modify. I don’t know what the rest of you are thinking, but I’ve decided the only course I have left is to leave it to God. He’s good at this sort of thing, and I trust Him, always have…my Rock when my back is up against the wall. Who knows what else might be in that blackness? Evil, certainly…and insanity, and peversion, and manipulative court procedure, and lawyers, and sociopathic thinking, and irresponsible press, and all the rest of Pandora’s foul escapees.
It’s dangerous down there where the belly meets the void, no place for normal human beings with feelings…and fears, and personally, I believe God is the only one who can really deal with it, far better at battling demons than I could EVER be. So, I’ve decided to leave it to Him. He’ll know what to do…and while He’s working all this out, I’m planning to get on with the rest of my life. As a Christian, that thought gives me comfort, but I feel sorry for the athiests out there. I guess they’ll just have to stay pissed…and make signs…and yell forever. I think my way’s better.

I’m sure you know it; I’ve told you before. I grew up in St. Martinville, an incredibly tiny South Louisiana town…a dot…on any map anywhere…including GPS and other high-tech stuff, but I’m glad I did. For me at least, that little dot was crammed to overflowing with wonders and life-changing experiences. I tend to feel sorry for kids growing up in cities…when I see them in movies or when we’re traveling. Life seens so terribly complicated for them…and not nearly as peaceful as our tree-lined streets, our quaint old homes, our history, and our quiet sidewalks where everybody knew everybody else.
Of course, when I was growing up, sometimes that was a problem. If you were misbehaving ANYWHERE in town, the nearest adult corrected you, and when you got home, there was hell to pay. And then, there was the “children should be seen and not heard” philosophy, to which every mother and father devoutly adhered. Well familiar with it, when visitors came, we said hello then VANISHED, but it became an insurmountable problem whenever we went to visit as a family because we had no place to escape to.
Not only that, if it was winter, mom always chose to put us boys in WOOL suits, itchy, scratchy, HORRIBLE wool suits, complete with white shirts and ties. The girls always had soft, pretty, non-itchy stuff, but not us. We didn’t mind the shirts and ties all that much, but the wool was UNBEARABLE! Of course, the people we went to visit always had the temperature set at broiling, which sort of slowly cooked us. We weren’t ALLOWED to sweat, but I got to tell you; it wasn’t easy. For a long time I chose to believe it was a form of torture my parents had devised…particularly when I noticed dad didn’t have one wool suit to his name.
When I left home, I swore I would NEVER wear wool again. I had outgrown my old horror and bought a spiffy tan linen suit for summer, but one Christmas mom and dad gave my brother and me very special presents…more WOOL SUITS…mine was dark green…GREEN…would you believe? My plan had been to wear my light suit for summer stuff, and jeans, thick shirts, boots, and jackets in the winter. I knew I wasn’t going to be invited anywhere fussy, so people could either take me the way I was…or never invite me again. I was resolute.
But it turned out I had to wear it one time…ONE TIME! Forced to attend a university function in the middle of winter…and wear a suit, I had no other option, and it was exactly as I remembered: itchy, scratchy, miserable, and suffocating once I came in from the cold. Somehow, my parents never acknowledged the existance of central heating…EVER…even though they had it at home, and I began to rethink the TORTURE scenario. I have no idea where that green suit is today…lost somewhere along the line, I guess…but TOTALLY unmourned.

Another memory of my life in St. Martinville has to be the Boy Scouts. I made friends in that organization I’ve cherished ever since and had some truly spectacular adventures. Ours was one of the most gung-ho scoutmasters in the universe, and I can’t help remembering one PARTICULAR weekend campout. It started out well enough…even though the weather seemed a bit iffy. By that point, we devoutly trusted our dominant leader…if he said everything was going to be OK, we gleefully accepted it. We were BOYS…what else can I say?
Anyway, we set our campsite up in perfect little squares…four tents each, just like he wanted, but when I started digging our fire pit, it began to rain. My tentmate, Richard, and I retreated into our tent, but then it also began to blow…REALLY HARD. Pretty soon, it became a pattern…a hard blow, then yells as tents came flying up off the ground. Richard and I laughed and watched the tumult…until OUR tent began to rise up around our knees and tent-pegs began to pop.
Ignoring our tent flying up into the treetops and points beyond, we retreated to our scoutmaster’s INCREDIBLY reinforced area, a tarp tightly hung between four trees with a campstove, a lantern, a cot, and a flapping sleeping bag desperately trying to join the tents above. “Don’t worry, Boys, it’ll blow over,” he said. BLOW OVER? WHEN? By now we could see the trees bending into at least sixty-degree arcs. “Want some cocoa?” he asked. “It’ll blow over.”
We said no and huddled together in the wind and sideways rain until frantic parents roared in to rescue us. “IT’S A HURRICANE,” they yelled. “It’s been on TV for three days! What the hell are you doing out here?” A good question, I must admit. As boys, of course, we NEVER watched weather stuff on TV, and I began to realize our scoutmaster didn’t either. We gathered up whatever belongings hadn’t blown off and rode back to town in comfort and safety, but seven tents were never recovered. The way I figure it, they wound up somewhere around Alexandria and are probably now part of a different scout troop.
I was mad at the scoutmaster for a long time after that, and WHENEVER we went camping, I watched the weather news for days before…but that was our one and only hurricane. I DO remember camping in Catahoula near the levee defining the Atchafalaya Basin. Usually late at night before we went to sleep, he always INSISTED we take a hike along the levee…but never on the road at the top…instead through grass near the water. Sometimes we sang, striding along OBLIVIOUS to the danger surrounding us.
Today, not for love or money would I walk down there during the day, much less at night. How none of us were ever bitten by a cottonmouth is a mystery I will contemplate for the rest of my life, but I gotta admit. It was FUN! God protects fools and drunks, I guess. In time, I grew up…by then a Star Scout. When I quit, they kept telling me I should go on and make Eagle, but to tell the truth, I saw it all as a BOY’S thing…and I was on the threshold of manhood…so I said no.
When I left home for good, I didn’t realize I was leaving so much behind; it took me maybe ten years to understand, but by then I lived in New Orleans, with its charm, history, excitement, and the allure of sophistocated and beautiful women. One Mardi Gras at an uncharactistically horrid party I met my lady. Bored as I was, as any NORMAL human being would have been, I saw her standing there…also bored…but GORGEOUS and sophistocated as hell, and I knew God had decided to smile on me that evening. I can still remember how easily she snatched a dubloon out of the air one night at a parade…while deep down she could also be comfortable in so tiny a place as St. Martinville…when we visited…which, to tell the truth, wasn’t all that often.
I know a lot of people consider growing up in a town like St. Martinville stultifying, but in reality it was LIBERATING, in an unexpected, frustrating, sometimes frightening kind of way. When things happened in those days, they felt more like ADVENTURES…and became experiences I’ve treasured ever since. Never actually harmed, never truly left vulnerable, I was STIMULATED and prodded to new and more glorious adventures. When my lady and I had lunch with Richard a few months ago, we all laughed about those days and understood how good they were…unbelievably unorthodox, but good.
He died recently, our old scoutmaster. Of course, I went to his wake to honor him, just like I’ve been to a lot of wakes and funerals for people who meant something special to me when I was growning up, but like dad, our scoutmaster always stands out. Neither EVER stopped pushing me on or seemed to care the tiniest bit how difficult what they were suggesting might be, and I thank them for it. It wound up wonderful. I KNOW dad loved me and was always trying to make my life better, but I have NO IDEA what my scoutmaster thought.
Maybe he was just a crazy son-of-a bitch…or possibly only a rare, joyful spirit who didn’t give a crap about weather reports on TV…or anything else. Sleep well, both of you. The way I see it, you’ve earned it, and I’ll never stop thanking either of you. When I was young, I didn’t really realize it, but now I know. Growing up in a small town wasn’t the least bit dull…or boring…or limiting…or even safe…but formative…and WONDERFUL!
So, I say thank God…for America and her small towns…and the incredible experiences they offer so freely…even if you don’t understand what the hell’s going on at the time. By the way, I STILL watch the weather news every night…even though my lady doesn’t really have the slightest idea why I’m doing it so intently.

Guys, I’m THRILLED about how many of you like my blog, but I have more than 3000 comments right now…and that’s too many. I’m sorry, but I have to thin them out a bit. Right now, my plan is to keep about 1000, and if I delete you, I sincerely apologize. If it means a lot to you, comment again, but we ALWAYS have to remember people who don’t have a ton of memory on their devices…and they deserve a chance, too. AC