Category Archives: Writing

Pub Theology, Vignettes

Sierra Alpha Alpha Bravo

Last Thursday, I came into the house after plowing the garden.  Lunch smoked and sizzled and simmered and my wife said accented things. With her soft little hands and insistent invitation, she coaxed me to sit and eat.  I seldom knew what she said but I usually knew what she meant.  Sated from an unusually satisfying meal, I headed out.  To the couch.  For a sit and a snore (this she will tell you).  Leaving my worries in the pasture, I began counting sheep.

Later, I heard honking.  Insistent.  Not like the geese but like a birch trumpet poorly played.  Sounds emanating from other than goose.  The far front gate beckoned me.  Ha.  I recognized the iron.  The trapezoidal grill.  An old foreign relic.  Scandinavian, maybe.  Feeling hurried, slipping on my clogs, I trundled out to the rumpus.  An old acquaintance stood stiff, adding oil to the gas tank.  I lurched forward to stop his craziness.  Then halted.  Oh, yeah, it’s a three cylinder and requires oil in the gas.

The man turned and frightened me with a smile.  His familiar face featured a fresh scar, cheek to chin and across his mouth.  Speaking slurred, showing only a partial tongue, he either greeted me or cursed me.  No, it sounded more like he’s selling me peaches.  My well-developed translation skills served me well, despite his alternately pointing and poking a walking cane – at the road and then at my head.  I didn’t know what he said but I knew what he meant: Let’s go for a ride.

Scooting in, I wrestled with the frayed shoulder seat belt, finally latching the rusted relic – just in time! As we sped off, I figured I’d feel sorry for this ride later, but I felt safe for now.  Even with my window open, there was a foul small.  Like swamp.  Like a flood vehicle?  Was this new car smell from wherever and whenever they manufactured this foreign object?

This fella’s reckless reputation filled my memory.  Not for long.  Something jolted my inquiring mind back into the present moment.  Veering off road and off-roading in a farm pasture.  Freewheeling downhill toward a farmer’s stock pond.  Several feet from the pond, tires skidded.  Wheels stopped.  Engine off.  Column shifter in gear (now days we have an emergency break).  The car pointed down… heading toward the pond.  My battle-scarred driver got out without comment. Wobbled across the cow pasture.  Sat on a tree stump.  What next?

I pushed down on the seat belt latch.  I couldn’t figure out any of this mystery auto’s contraptions. My angry elbow hit the column shifter, popping the car into neutral.  Tires started to roll. I pushed again at the belt latch.  Jerked and yelled for help.  My former friend sat agape.  Tongue partially tied.  In a moment of clarity, I looked down.  I saw the decal on the glove box – SAAB.  That’s it, I knew it!

I cried noisily, making loud, convulsive gasps. Suddenly, a soft hand reached through the moving open window.  The little fingers lifted the latch, freeing me.  The delicate hand shook my right shoulder.  Then the other hand slapped my left cheek.  I heard a far-off voice calling my name.  I couldn’t understand the last word.  But I knew what it meant:

“Wake up!”

 

Vignettes

Murder in Muleshoe

This past weekend my wife and I went out to dinner with another couple.  I asked the guy if he was a native Houstonian (my standard ice breaker question).  My friend answered, “Let me tell you about my granddaddy.”

Born up in Nacogdoches.  The youngest boy.  His eldest brother had married a girl and moved up to Muleshoe.  In the Panhandle.  Some while after the brother’s move, his wife killed him.  My granddaddy’s granddaddy bought a gun.  He gave that gun to his young grandson, my granddaddy, and admonished him, “You take this gun and you go up to Muleshoe and shoot that woman”.  That grandson, my granddaddy, bought a train ticket to Farwell, and said his goodbyes.

Farwell, Muleshoe’s closest neighboring town, provided the boy with a wealth of information about his older brother.  Many people knew of him.  Some people feared him.  More than a few hated him.  He labored at the rail yard about one day a week.  He got drunk every day of the week.  And he beat his wife. And his kids.

Farewell – This boy didn’t travel to this one-horse s***hole to mourn his brother. But to avenge him.  He hopped a freight train headed for Amarillo and jumped off at the Muleshoe junction.  He inquired.  He walked hesitantly toward his destination.  He stopped…watched a rail thin woman carrying wash from perhaps a hand dug well to her rain filled stock tank.  She saw him.  She dropped her wash into the rinse tub.  The well’s ferrous sediments bleeding out into the clear water.   At close range…he spoke.

He (ashamed): I’m…

She (relieved): I know…

Neither had any illusions about what would happen next.

She recounted her drunken husband’s cruelty.  The wind died.  Dead calm.  The low prairie grass.  The insistent trill of a distant sand crane.  Rare moisture in drops… washed out along the creases of swollen eyes.  Profuse perspiration in rivulets… stained young, ruddy cheeks.  Congealed mucus… in the breathing of two snot nosed kids.  His brother’s.  His niece and nephew.  Squatting. Curious.  Feeling protected in the dying shade between that tarpaper shack and off-kilter outhouse.

He noticed a tool laying atop a wooden barrel.  Its umbra attempting to hide an irregular stain. The hammer.  Visitor to the crime.  He imagined those nails.  Three cut nails.  Accomplice to the passion.  He envisioned them protruding from his brother’s resistant skull.  This last thought, sobered him to his purpose.  The young assassin’s hand recoiled as flesh touched revolver.  Each chamber held a fate.  Four smooth bullets.

Fare.  You can’t go home.  Not after this.  Not after murder and vengeance and cowardice.  It’s not deeds of family that haunt.  It’s deeds you choose.  My granddaddy traded a near-new gun for a fare to Houston.

Better Living Through Beowulf

Thoughts: Empathy Burnout

I extracted my thoughts on Empathy Burnout from this blog entry on Better Living Through Beowulf

Update on My Heart Condition

Empathy fatigue results from expending physiological resources to help others with their own emotional burdens.

Stop putting yourself in another’s shoes and let your shoes carry you to do the things that can be physically provided without emotional burnout.

Another’s pain plus your pain does not equal relief but multiplies pain.

Allowing another’s suffering to break your heart is a disease without a cure.

Ingratitude, guilt and sorrow can prove lethal, let them go.

Editorial Reviews

Albert Speer Jr. dies at 83

Albert Speer Jr., the architect who tried to overcome his father’s Nazi legacy, dies at 83

The son of Hitler’s architect and armaments minister died recently, click the article below and also read my summary and analysis.

Albert Speer Jr. Dies at 83

Albert Speer Jr. sought to differentiate himself from his father, Hitler’s architect and armaments minister (aka the devil’s architect) in order to overcome his father’s legacy.

Architects glorify regimes and heroes through monuments and so this proclivity exhibited itself from Nazi Germany forward into today’s Communist China. The Dictator of the Elder frightened the world; the father of the Younger frightened his children. Hitler’s demeanor enchanted both father and son; the former seeing Adolf as a hero and friend while the latter saw the leader of the Third Reich as a kindly uncle with dogs and sweets.

Albert Speer Jr. sought to disassemble his legacy and it became manifested in the innovative stadiums he designed which when disassembled, found resurrection from one regime to the next.

Rhetoric

Summary: Think Sarcasm is Funny? Think Again

Here is my summation of an article by Clifford N Lazarus Ph.D. on Jun 26, 2012 from Psychology Today:

Think Sarcasm Is Funny? Think Again

Sarcasm disguises hostility as humor: a smiling, put down jerk, cutting and hurting his victim.

Sarcasm heightens the perpetrator’s own underlying hostility, while ceasing it brings happiness to self and victims.

One can use sarcasm sparingly to spice up conversation with humor but when overdone it creates emotional bitterness in the recipient.

One creates wit intelligently with cleverness and consideration, ending in appreciation; while one who composes sarcasm simply with anger, criticism, meanness, humorlessness and talentless, ends in bitterness.

In summary, sarcasm hurts because it disguises hostility as humor, while wit hurts none because it delivers undisguised and harmless humor.

Here are your words to shield against sarcasm…

I don’t appreciate your comments because they are veiled hostility and unacceptable bullying.

Editorial Reviews

Reflections: From Prison to Ph.D.

New York Times, Eli Hager September 13, 2017

From Prison to Ph.D.: The Redemption and Rejection of Michelle Jones

My reflections on this article.

The leaves of the trees fall and whither and die.  Not so with fallen people.  Some people fall and whither but fight not to die.  Without assistance and little sustenance, one can rise by will from the ashes.  A public past refuses to be forgotten, but a fortified will must needs overcome that refusal and that past.  While belief in redemption needs each us to participate, belief in oneself to redeem thyself remains the most important factor.  Perfect fruit can die on the vine if caretakers neglect it.  That fruit may serve its purpose if responsible people simply serve their calling.  The fruit serves only then its purpose.  If fate somehow provides manna for the fallen in the form of abundant grace, then sweet be the results.  One who has fallen can never satisfy the relentless critiques.  Fear of being associated with controversy lurks enough to dampen soft support.

Early crimes against the fallen hardly count for anything.  Incessant abuse further corrupts the tender corrupted.  That horror begets horror should not horrify those who witness.  Where do the sentiments which raise the living dead to life originate?  Where does commitment to right wrongs which can never be righted seed and grow?  Where those sentiments come from remains a mystery, but the steps to achievement are simple.  One step then another, and endless and eternal and undeterred.  Examine where one is presently.  Find others who have been there and what happened to them.  Accept that what is present is also past.  Express it.  Rewards sit invisible at the end of blind journeys in faith.  The alone find company and competition.  One adjusts solely by self and will.  Judgements remain, but they must remain in the past.  Punishment, it its purest form, lies in itself.  If publicly served, guilt already recorded must be let go by all.

A fresh start.  Courage.  A second chance.  Each of these may manifest in supporters, but must emerge from the fallen.  None deserve anything from life, yet life serves pain and its opposite to each every day.  Let past pain be future strength.  Being an eyewitness to life’s pitfalls provides a foot path out of them.  Honest and full narration means much to investors, but most to the scrutinized.  Others may hijack a career, but they cannot derail the dream.  Don’t make a crime a focus, make it a fulcrum.  Realize the dark place people place the fallen and don’t forget it either.  Stay interest in the world and be cosmically connected.  Coming to means awakening to a world that was always there but that has changed its accoutrements.  Adapt and take the steps.  Expect curiosity.  Expect to have to prove.  Teach them resourcefulness is strength and nothing will ever be taken for granted.  Presumptions and underestimates lay before.  Experience and exceptional await.

Issues

This Week in the News: October 2016

Traffic Accidents affect life, spirituality

“The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent, but if we can come to terms with the indifference, then our existence as a species can have genuine meaning. However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.”
–Stanley Kubrick

Voting faith in Government

  • rigged election
  • Voting as a responsibility
  • Waste
  • Third Party

The electoral map really was rigged by Republicans after the 2010 census.

Polls – are election polls rigged can they be?  Online poll for Justin Bieber, Pitbull.

A restriction-less 2010 poll set up by Faxo.com to pick a destination for Justin Bieber’s “My World” tour saw North Korea steal the top spot…

A Facebook poll launched in the summer of 2012 to sponsor a Pitbull concert at the Walmart franchise  sent Pitbull to the most remote Walmart store in the U.S Kodiak, Alaska.

Can poll results affect beliefs

Jason Kandor TV ad

Missouri Democratic Senate candidate Jason Kander released a television ad last month in which he put an AR-15 assault rifle together blindfolded while reciting a script about gun rights. Mr. Kander’s poll numbers soared IMMEDIATELY. Have you ever changed your opinion due to a stunt? Are your beliefs based on first impressions or lasting principles?

Can one’s ability change your beliefs

AT&T wants to merge with Time Warner. Do you care? Does the phone you have affect your decision?

Galluping Polls and Pew Surveys…Are these Big Riggs?

  1. A restriction-less 2010 poll set up to pick a destination for Justin Bieber’s “My World” tour saw North Korea steal the top spot…  A Facebook poll launched in the summer of 2012 to sponsor a Pitbull concert at the Walmart franchise  sent Pitbull to the most remote Walmart store in the U.S Kodiak, Alaska.  Do you pay attention to online polls?  Have you been influenced by them

2. A 2016 Gallup Poll concluded that Utah was the happiest state in the Union based on ranking well-being, work and community.  Texas finished 29th.  Could you be happier in another state?  Job? Community?

3. Another Gallup Poll found that both men and women were most afraid of snakes and least afraid of the dark.  But 27% more women were afraid of mice than men.  What probable daily encounters do you fear most?  What things do other people fear that you do not?

4. Confidence in the church

Since 1975, confidence in the church as a whole has dropped from 68% to 41% in 2016.  What factors might have influence this poll?

5. Eleven former presidents of the United States were affiliated with the Episcopal Church.  Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln were unaffiliated.  Does religious affiliation matter to you?  Does it matter to the majority of Americans?

 

 

People, Politics

Summary: Aung San Suu Kyi’s Nobel peace prize

This opinion essay is inspired by my knowledge of the subject and another more extensive opinion essay written by George Monbiot, titled “Take away Aung San Suu Kyi’s Nobel peace prize. She no longer deserves it”, and published on The Guardian website:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/05/rohingya-aung-san-suu-kyi-nobel-peace-prize-rohingya-myanmar

We celebrated when she was awarded the Nobel peace prize in 1991; when she was finally released from house arrest in 2010; and when she won the general election in 2015.  Now, Aung San Suu Kyi has denied the very identity of the people being attacked in 2017, asking the US ambassador not to use the term Rohingya.  With the obvious and often explicit purpose of destroying this group, acts of genocide have been practiced more or less continuously by Myanmar’s armed forces since Aung San Suu Kyi became de facto political leader.  She possesses one power in abundance: the power to speak out, but she does not.  I believe the Nobel committee should retain responsibility for the prizes it awards, and withdraw them if its laureates later violate the principles for which they were recognized.

Aung San Suu Kyi asked the US ambassador not to use the term Rohingya.  Really?  She has upheld the 1982 Citizenship Law, which denies the Rohingya people within Myanmar’s borders their rights.  Seriously?  Her government obstructs humanitarian aid, denies well documented evidence, ignores the UN report on the treatment of the Rohingya.   Unbelieveable!  An abhorrent example: In a well-documented case, Aung San Suu Kyi’s office posted a banner on its Facebook page reading “Fake Rape”.

The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide describes five acts, any one of which, when “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group”, amounts to genocide.  Myanmar is guilty of these four.

  1. Killing…summary executions of teachers, elders and community leaders
  2. Serious bodily or mental harm…documented mass rape
  3. Destroying conditions of life…destruction of crops and the burning of villages; Malnutrition ravages the Rohingya, afflicting 80,000 children
  4. Prevent births… a woman in labour beaten by soldiers, her baby stamped to death as it was born.

With the obvious and often explicit purpose of destroying this group, acts of genocide have been practiced more or less continuously by Myanmar’s armed forces since Aung San Suu Kyi became de facto political leader.   She has blamed the isolated acts of some Rohingya insurgents to justify the mass extermination efforts of Myanmar’s military.   In her Nobel lecture, Aung San Suu Kyi remarked: “Wherever suffering is ignored, there will be the seeds of conflict, for suffering degrades and embitters and enrages.”

Aung San Suu Kyi ~ “It is not power that corrupts, but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it.” She has failed to speak out. Excuses for not speaking out include:

  • jeopardize re-election
  • armed forces intimidation
  • keep China happy

Whether out of prejudice or out of fear, she denies to the Rohingya Muslim minority the freedoms she rightly claimed for herself. Her regime excludes – and in some cases, seeks to silence – the very activists who helped to ensure her own rights were recognized.

Nobel committee: Retain responsibility for the prizes you award.  You must withdraw the Aung San Suu Kyi award for her failure to act.  De facto leader of Myanmar Aung San Suu Kyi: Acknowledge the identity of Rohingya people who have lived there for centuries.  Myanmar military:  Stop executing the Rohingya.  Again, Aung San Suu Kyi, speak out against these atrocities.  Nobel committee: Change your policy and revoke her award.  Public: There is nothing to prevent you from petitioning for the revocation of the Nobel Prize of the de facto leader of Myanmar, Aung San Suu Kyi, for the genocide of the Rohingya Muslim minority.

Editorial Reviews, Trump

Analysis: My Party Is in Denial About Donald Trump by Jeff Flake

Analysis

My Party Is in Denial About Donald Trump

How did we ensure the rise of Donald Trump?  Conservatives mocked Obama’s pledge to change even as we worked to assist with that failure.  Conservatives were silent when marginal figures attacked Obama’s legitimacy.  Depicting current happenings as normalcy requires a determined suspension of critical faculties.  This amounts to the conservative mind being diseased and abandons the normal constraints of reason and compassion.  The bitter pill to cure the diseased mind of the conservative is to acknowledge the accumulation of damage raining down from the president and act before the deluge rather than ignoring the obvious, forming a disaster.

Responding with silence to the erratic presidency abdicates responsibility.  Congress must be unified in defense of its prerogatives regardless of presidential affiliation.  When principles become malleable to the heat of power, they soon deform into something of no consequence and are no longer principles.  When a foreign power’s attack on our democracy results in a rejection by the presidency of his own intelligence, there is something rotten in the state of Denmark.

Despotic men are deposed but their ambition resurrects in others who have learned from the departed. Here now, our forebears cry out from their graves, warning us of the foreign transgressors now at the gates of our Republic.  Republicans win bigly when they shortsightedly play to populism and prefer protectionist policy, while handicapping the country without a long view, long term.  The ruling party engages in reckless politics and reenacts history to the detriment of the people that they are here to serve.

Issues

Summary: Increasing Voter Turnout for 2018 and Beyond

Below find a summary of this New York Times article (Ctrl Click):

Hillary supporters voted underwhelmingly.  Only 43% of those under 25 voted last year.  Low turnout favors extreme candidates and incumbents.  To inspire turnout, inspire voters with a good candidate.  Also, personal contact increases turnout.  Voter anger increases turnout.  Activism increases turnout.  Voting’s structural obstacles preserve rich, white, old and suppress poor, young, minorities.  Institutional reforms make voting easier.  For example, Denver mailed ballots and allowed registration and voting on same day.  Republican officials make it harder to vote.  Automatic registration does not necessarily increase turnout.  Weekend and holiday elections increase turnout.  The many voting entities cause voting to occur every week and, so, decentralization decreases turnout.  Voting is easier in US than ever before but turnout is declining.  Making voting a habit increases turnout.  All improvements add up.