To Those

To those that must
To those that waste
To those that run away
To those that quit
To those weak tries
To those that waste the day

Bring back the time
Bring back the sound
Bring back the human noise
Bring back wound clocks
Bring back bright lights
Bring back the black cat’s toys

For there lay lips
For there grew lies
For there goes free men
For there lay sour
For there lay mess
For there lays the dragon’s den

Where she gives life
Where men do care
Where all notes are sung on key
Where She has rights
Where He respects
Where all Rights will heal if let be.

DSS

Polished Blades (Heavy Medal)

Posted Feb. 2018 . An Oldie but Goodie. It’s Olympics Time!

Polished Blades (Heavy Medal)

On this month of Valentines and Presidents
Waxed snow skis and sleds and polished blades,
Men and women with clear rose cheeks
take gasps of sharp cold air and fogging breaths.
Racing on frozen lanes cut by flexing smooth legs
and taut chiseled thighs.
Beneath the soft stretched fabrics
are the hard bodies of youth’s firm human frame,
Judged by fast changing clocks
and watchers and lovers of perfect style and form.
They win or lose by hundredths of seconds
or fractions of subjective points.
On podiums they bow their heads with broad white smiles and joyful tears
To begin wearing medals as heavy as the egos of their national anthems.
And win or lose, to be known forever as having the heart of an Olympian.

DSS

I Should Have Been A Ski Jumper

Posted: January 5, 2014 (Since I wrote this in 2014, A movie was made on this subject)

Funny how you see something and you try to remember back so many years to the ’88 Games and how little you remember.
A while back I spent a week on business in Calgary, Alberta. What a beautiful place it is. The Canadian Rockies I saw are what you imagine as sheer cliffs of rock with much less vegetation than the Rockies of the US. The Banff area is a great place to spend a few hours or a few days if you have the chance. Traveling back into Calgary you can still see the sites of the 1988 Winter Olympics. The Luge, Bob Sled runs and the 70 and 90 meter Ski Jumps are still there and still used today. Amateurs (I should say Newbies) can go down the Luge but must start only half way from the top or bottom depending on how you look at things. If you instinctively say “from the bottom” you probably shouldn’t try it.

But even I, the usually disinterested sport spectator, can bring to mind the most famous athlete of those Games. I only know of one. Eddie “the Eagle” Edwards, ski jumper. He really didn’t soar like an eagle. Eddy was a former wall plasterer from England who had never ski jumped in his life. But he had always wanted to ski jump and seized on the opportunity to become the only ski jump entry from England. Eddie did not have a sleek physique, he wore Coke bottle glasses and had been dubbed “Mr Magoo”. But he had somehow met all of the requirements and was accepted on the team.

The pre-jump press hype was great, some thought Eddie would be the next opening scene of the ABCs “Wide World of Sports”. Most believed he was going to really be hurt taking those jumps, if not killed. Some were just making fun of him for the way he looked and doing such a stunt. Some thought he was crazy for trying. Me? I was really rooting for him. I always go with the underdog. And I really think Eddy was doing something that he felt he really had to do. I couldn’t wait to see him compete.

I’m not going to say Eddie finished last, he finished 58th in the 70 meter and 55th in the 90 m. Not bad 55th and 58th in the world of a few billion people, most of whom didn’t even try. He landed OK and wasn’t hurt too much. And Eddie made the Games exciting for me. Eddie, Mr. Magoo, the Eagle for a few brief days inspired.

And you know what? I have no idea who won the medals for those events so many years ago. But I remember Eddy. I’m not much for saying there is a moral to any story but there must be a lesson to be learned from this somewhere.

Such is the life of John

Cool Water and Wet Feet

The first thing that comes to mind is usually exactly what I write about. When I begin to write and the first lines are these, it means I have no idea what I will have when I’m finished. I just call this my primer, my priming the pump . In the same way as I would begin pumping the handle on our old farm water well pump so many years ago during my childhood. And what do ya know, I have something to write about, the water well!

I have written about my mother and father before. My father was a man that could make up his mind very quickly. When an opportunity would arise, he was very quick in deciding to “jump on board” whatever it was that appeared to be a great idea. In the very early 1950’s, an opportunity was for Dad to take over the family farm that Grandpa was ready to retire from. Grandpa would still draw some of his retirement income from the farm payment, Dad would manage and do the farmwork and also draw his share of his income from the farm. Whenever the time of the death of my grandparents, my father would inherit the farm. My grandparents were in their late seventies, of poor health and it appeared to be a great way to smoothly transfer the ownership to my father.

Dad immediately began to build a new house on the property. He was a carpenter/contractor at the time and quite capable of building a new house from the ground up. He even had a saw mill and had sawed some of the needed lumber already on hand left over from work done of other carpentry jobs. As soon as the foundation, walls and roof where finished, we moved in. The house still didn’t have any indoor running water or furnace and only electric wires enough to light a few bulbs to light the construction job as it was. But Dad was fast deciding to do everything and the seven of us, 2 parents and 5 kids, were living in basically a bare house with a potbelly wood stove, no finished walls or finished floors. There were only bare boards with unpainted drywall only around the outside walls. Our toilet was an outdoor privy and water was drawn from the farm windmill and pump water well a few hundred feet from the house. This sounds like great fun, doesn’t it! I had no idea of what was transpiring. The farm deal fell through and Dad never finished the house. We lived there until I was 8 years old.

I had helped my older sisters do this many times but never by myself. To start the pump well water running I would have to pour a tin cup full of water, dipped from the cattle water tank, into the top of the pump. Then I would start pumping the handle. This primed the pump, wetted the leather seals, providing a suction as I pumped and water would soon begin to travel up the well water-pipe to begin pouring water one pump at a time. After a few pumps and the water running clear, I put the handle of the galvanized two gallon bucket that I brought with me onto the pump’s large spigot.

The average weight of a 5 year old boy is around 45 pounds. The weight of a full two gallon water bucket is around 16 pounds. As I remember this, the first time I was asked to “fetch” a bucket of water by myself I was 5 years old. As I think of it now, this was a big deal for me, being asked to do a chore as important as getting water for the house. At 5 years old I was totally unaware of water weight. But I tried to be very careful to pump and fill up the bucket as full to the rim as possible. Then only to realize that the bucket was almost too heavy to lift off of the pump’s snout. With both hands, I slowly slid the bucket’s handle off of the pump and onto the well’s wood floor, spilling two or three cups of water onto my pant legs and bare feet. This actually lightened the bucket a bit and I was able to slide my load off of the well platform the 3 or 4 inches down to the bare ground, which spilled another 2 or 3 cups onto my bare feet and the dirt path. My water bucket was getting lighter and lighter with each of my actions. I still had to carry the water along the few hundred feet of dirt path back to the house.

If you have ever carried a bucket full of water, you know it is easier to carry it with one arm at your side. But if you are a little guy, you need two hands to lift a bucket of water, even one that has lost a pint or two. Using two hands the bucket is in front of you and your feet sort of get in the way of the swinging bucket. Your knees can’t help but splash water pretty much everywhere. Your wet feet start to pick up mud, grass and little sticks from the dirt covered path you are walking on. And you have to stop a lot to rest! By the time I had travelled the whole path and standing outside of the house, there was probably less than a gallon of water left in the bucket.

Mom only looked in the bucket and to my frowning face and said “Thank you for the water, John!. You know, if you go after a bucket of water for me everyday, it won’t be long before you won’t be spilling a drop and you’ll be strong, too!” and I couldn’t wait.

Such is the life of John

Ingrained Seasons

Dec. 21, winter solstice, first day of winter, the least amount of daylight, is called the shortest day of the year. Winter, the season that gets better from the very moment that it begins. Yes, although the temperatures may be more extreme, we will have more sunshine by a minute or two each day from now until summer begins on June 21 next year. We can start to enjoy winter because the days will now only get better. No wonder this day caught the eye of even the most ancient men. Every afternoon sitting in their cave watching the sun set farther and farther south causing less and less time during the day and more and more time in the darkness of night. More time spent guarding against the predators of the night and less time during the day spent hunting for food and shelter. They seriously wondered if the sun would return.

When did they realize that the sun could be depended on to finally ebb at its furthest reach and slowly begin travel of the reverse bringing with it needed daylight and warmth. I’m sure they celebrated this day as they watched the sun set and rise on the two landmarks they may have physically or mentally erected on the horizon. As should we. They could measure their stored food reserve and know that they would either have enough to last the remaining half of their most sparse days or not enough. They would know that their lean days and confinement would indeed end. Although the remaining days of the season may be hard, they would at least be measurable.

When I notice the sun shining through our south windows and reflecting from the glass doors on our old book-case, without looking at the calendar I know that we are approaching this season. Not as elaborate as Stonehenge but just as effective. And deep down in the core of me, I still feel a sense of relief that the growing darkness is contained and the sunshine will remain just a little longer each day. Although, my food supply is as close as our neighborhood grocery store and the fuel for my fire is delivered to me effortlessly, I have this innate feeling of relief on this day each year. A core feeling that is as surely as much the evidence of the remains of our ancient ancestors as the huge heavy stone pillars of Wiltshire or the small stone circles and charcoal of their ancient fires. The core feelings from the remains of their DNA memory. Their feelings of survival, relief and wonder are in me even though my life is now much easier.

The changing of the seasons are powerful events for man, events that their survival depended on. They mark celebrations, the beginning of tasks and the beginnings and endings of hot and cold climate and the abundance of food. Man is finely tuned to them. We are finely tuned to them because of the feelings and behaviors that were engraved into our DNA from early ancient man as they observed, learned and adapted to those predictable seasonal times.

I wonder what feelings and behaviors we are engraving into the DNA memory of future man from the powerful events of our days. We are not just leaving the ruins of our buildings, pottery, weapons and bones. We are leaving behind either the good knowledge or the ruins of our minds in our inherited DNA. Which of these, the knowledge or the ruins, from today’s events of our civilization will be ingrained and become innate behavior or feelings of our future man? What ingrained seasons will we pass on for them to celebrate from our DNA?

Such is the life of John

Yes, Reality Sucks

Now that I have finished with my Texas political review, I will tread ahead and continue lightening the weight. Remember? I believe in always going forward and leaving the closed minds and ignorant behind. I left the 1950’s years ago. If people in 2021, the 21st century, find comfort in the 1950’s, so be it. Black and white television, called TV at that time, was simple and even capable of being repaired by a local radio and TV shop. And they really needed repaired often. But even freshly repaired, Lucy’s red hair was never seen as red, only imagined. In that time, many things imagined were believed true.

It was imagined, because it was on TV, that ladies fixed dinner in party dresses and high heels (They DIDN’T),  everyone was able to vote (They COULDN’T), the U.S. always won wars(NOT anymore) and the Christmas trees were always filled with electric trains, talking dolls saying only “Mama” and Red Ryder B.B. guns(Only in their IMAGINATION). The 1950’s are when Americans learned to imagine their own false realities.

Wishing for and imagining their own reality continued into the 1960’s. But in about 1963, actual true reality, the way things really were, began to be seen. Most saw and realized that a President could be assasinated, Black civil rights protesters marched and we saw them broken up by fire hoses and billy clubs and the boys that were under that Christmas tree in the 1950’s were now drafted, handed M16s and setting under rain wet jungles, fighting a questioned war. Imagining our make-believe reality in a Leave It To Beaver and Lassy world didn’t seem so real any more. Some of us learned and accepted this TRUE reality that was going on all around us but many, perhaps for a while most, never did. They liked their imagined reality and they were going to keep it. Even if colored TV now showed them a little more truth and actual reality in “living color”. But because so many still thought the life that they enjoyed were in the 1950’s, they wanted that imagined world back. And the way to get the 50’s back was to change true reality by using lies and questionable politics.

Thus began the 80’s. And for the next 40 years the “Imagining our own 1950’s reality”political party hammered their way through their political convention platforms, destroying labor unions, reversing civil rights, reversing free choice, any 1960’s and 70’s legislation, whether it was supported by the majority of their party at the time or not.

Thus, here  we find ourselves. Stuck by an opposing party that now, having practically run out of any more lies trying to recreate their 1950’s world, frozen, unable to legislate  with a more progressive counterpart. Refusing to vote on even the most nonpartisan duty as paying their own fiscal bills. 

Well, the 1950’s aren’t going to happen again.

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The world you saw back then may not of even been. It was only being projected by “make believe” people on a very “make believe” and crude electronic screen. My 1950’s was in a sawed board house with no indoor plumbing, small country school and we had no TV screen. I learned at a very young age that things should be better. People need not live like this. We, at a very young age, perhaps learned to recognize life’s true realities sooner and never wanted to return to the 1950’s again. We wanted a better FUTURE not past, we wanted a life that  makes things better for our families and the families of others and we voted and supported the politics that saw true realities. Life is a rock and we don’t need those that make it harder or have no VISION for that less hard rock. We do not need any of those that only see life in a mis-believed fairytale reality while poverty, poor health, poor shelter and lies dominates. Yes realities sometime suck but it is much better than lies and stagnation. 

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E. 

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Nowhere To Be Seen

I quietly opened the door and slowly peeked inside. Squinting through the narrow opened crevice, I could see a smoking cigarette, half eaten sandwich and cat licking an unwrapped bar of butter. The side of an Ice tea glass was still wet with dripping condensing cool ice cube chill. He had made a quick escape. Good, I would have the house to myself.

OC

 

 

What happened to “don’t tread on me “??

In a Texas clinic hallway, an OBGYN doctor was heard saying, ” I finally discovered her problem! She has a Texan AND a Supreme Court Justice up her Uterus!!”.

Texas, again you are not making any sense. Telling people that asking you to wear a mask is stepping on your liberty but a total stranger, in another state, with no contact at all with a Texas woman, can bounty hunt her Texas vagina for $10,000? What kind of lawmakers do you have down there? Just askin’ ? They may be more backward than I ever thought. I’m from another state and normally I would not comment about what they do down there, but I guess they have now opened the door.

I love ya, but man!

E.

 

 

New Ain’t Always New

Well, here I go, I’m breaking in the new computer.

I’m sure you’re way ahead of me.
There are many things I don’t know
when you say the words you say
Your unkindness can not help but show.

I really don’t know why I’m saying this
There is no amount of words I can explain
So shove this

Stop, stop, stop, STOP!

This ain’t my style! It my Mojo again! I done said diss all before!

Mojo back. That’s what you call it. When will I get my Mojo back? Have you got your Mojo back? You don’t have to put an accent to it. It’s just Mojo, plain and simple.

While you are talkin about no Mojo you can use “ain’t” a lot. You can drop your g’s in the i-n-g’s like, “I ain’t doin nothin about findin my Mojo”. You can do that because you ain’t got none. You don’t know no better. Oh, you will use double negatives, too.

Nobody knows where their Mojo goes. They just know that it’s gone. Away, far away to where you don’t know where. Just gone. You capitalize Mojo cause it’s a big deal. But you don’t know it til it’s gone. You may not know it when you got it. You just know it when it’s gone…..

I lost my Mojo maybe 6 months go, don’t know where, don’t know when, I just realized all of a sudden, I ain’t got none! Mojo that is. You feel sad, real sad and you walk slow with no Mojo. You walk slow, you talk slow and you feel real low with no Mojo. Mojo is a good thing to have. You want to keep it but you ain’t got no chance. It’s goin ta leave when it wants ta.

Mojo…back. Even a new computer don’t bring no Mojo back! Last time Mojo went to da beach!

DSS

To A Man

To A Man

I have always wanted to run after life eagerly
But at this time in my life I am at peace.
Accepting the circumstances of my chance
and the results of my best laid plans.
Plans of best intentions, done with the most skillful of execution
but ending with questionable final outcome.
Gang aft agley *
I am now more fond of watching order from chaos.
After all, the entire Universe was built from it.
Of the largest galaxy to the least of the nests of a shivering mouse.
Both occasionally going awry
And both still doing quite well.
But I, Man, doomed with the ability of foreseeing
the billiard ball’s ricochet
Doing no better

Such is the life of John

• *  Gang aft agley – From Robert Burn’s “To A Mouse“

Food of Life

Here is one from 5 years ago. Perhaps means more now than then.

Food of Life

Here’s to you, sweet food of life
the struggle, the pain, the strife
blood fights won, blood fights lost
Rising from knees, at any cost
Here’s to you, you son of a bitch
One arm behind, rope’s half hitch
As hard as you tried, to tie the knot
you’re not as tough, as once thought
Thrown brown bottles and broken glass
I’ve dodged your throw and kicked your ass

OC