My Grandfathers Lugar, Drones, and The State Of My Nation

Almost a million years ago, when I was probably six, my Grandfather Paul Cure was my Hero. I knew he had been to war. I knew we won the war; and I knew it was because of him. I knew we weren’t really allowed to ask about the war and that he never talked about it, but downstairs, in the room that held the furnace and a freezer, and a very scary septic tank, was a trunk.

Inside that trunk was an old Lugar Pistol, Uniforms, some very colorful scarves, exotic flags, letters, papers, medals, and pieces of silk in brilliant colors that he had brought home from the war. We, my brothers and I, would sneak into this trunk and rummage around; our voices whispered and eyes sucking it all in.

Even at that age I knew I was touching things that were not only forbidden to be touched by the grubby hands of a 6 year old, but were sacred, and important. I knew these mementos had meaning and I knew that my life was like it was because my grandfather and thousands of me just like him had done what they had done.

Time passed and Grandpa spent more and more time sleeping; on the sofa, under the picture window, of the  yellow brick farmhouse that he had built, with his own hands.  Usually he would wake up long enough to give us a butter scotch candy, and that was about it. More time passed and we didn’t go to the farm to visit anymore, and then, when we did, he was gone.

They told us, my brothers and I, that he had passed away. I didn’t know what that meant until I was older. I didn’t know about chemo, and radiation, and lung cancer, and the pain my Gramma (Rosetta Cure) endured, and no one really discussed it. We just knew he was gone, and that made us sad.

Later I asked my Mother about what Granddad had done in the war. I can’t exactly remember all that she told me but she did tell me that at one point Granddads  job had been to pick up enemy troops and transport them to the places where they were kept until they could be processed. She told me that one time Granddads boss told him that they didn't have any more room for the enemy soldiers, and to take them somewhere else and just make sure they didn't come back. She told me that they meant Granddad should just take them somewhere and kill them. Then she told me Granddad wouldn't do it and that he had almost gotten into trouble for this.

Why wouldn't he do it? I asked. Because, that’s not how war is done, she explained. There are rules even in war, and those rules say that shooting someone who has surrendered isn't allowed. She said there were lots of rules, and she didn't know them all but they helped to protect everyone during wartime. She then asked me how it would be if Granddad had been captured and then they had just killed him? I understood that would be horrible. Like I say, my Granddad had been one of my 1^st Heros.

The thought of Granddad having the chance to kill people, being told to kill people, when he didn't need to, and his not doing it, made me even more proud of him then the thought of him killing the enemy.

See I was told, and I believed, and still believe, that WWII was about freedom for the whole world. Freedom for me and my brothers and family, and freedom for lots of other nations and people, and that if we didn't fight them, we wouldn't be able to be free either.

I believed that America was more than just the states, and more than our borders. I believed that our soldiers brought freedom, and defeated people who tried to take that freedom away from other people who wanted it too.

In my young mind I believed that we were the good guys, and that the Germans, and Japanese were the bad guys. I understood that the Germans were the bad guys because they kept taking peoples countries away, and killing lots of people for no good reason at all. And I believed the Japanese were bad because they had bombed Pearl Harbor for no good reason at all and killed lots of our Soldiers and sunk lots of our ships. I believed that the Germans and the Japanese wanted to take over the whole world and make everyone live like they did, and that the war had to be fought until they would just go back home and leave us alone, and I believed that my Granddad had fought to make this happen, and he had won, and the proof was that I was free, and so were lots of other people.

Even at that young age I had an understanding of freedom. Freedom meant you could go anywhere you wanted to go in the whole United States anytime you wanted to. Freedom meant the police had to leave you alone unless you were doing something wrong and that no one could come on your land unless you said they could. Soldiers were for war or disaster only and they weren't allowed to hurt people in the USA, unless it was an enemy that was invading.  Freedom meant you could have a gun if you wanted one. Freedom meant you had the right to go as far in life as you wanted to and that was based on how hard you worked. Freedom meant you could go to any church you wanted to or not go to church at all. Being a Free country meant you didn't go around trying to take other peoples countries away from them and they weren't allowed to try to take yours away from you. 

I understood that if your country declared war on someone else’s country then you either went to their country to fight or they came to your country to fight. I understood that no matter what you did the law said you were innocent unless you admitted you had done it, or a jury decided you had done it, and this was how we made sure people who were innocent didn't get locked up or shot by cops. I understood that people who worked extra hard or were extra smart by going to college had plenty of money and people who didn’t just had to be poor.

In the eyes of this boy freedom was good, and worth dying for, and if your country wasn't free then you just had to figure out a way to move to one that was.

But now, all these years later things are just all fucked up.

1^st of all I don’t feel free. None of the things that made me feel free as a kid seem to exist anymore. Police can do whatever they want to. They can come on your property anytime they want to and do any damn thing they want. In California I have to drive through check points to get in and out of my State, or if I fly I have to be screened, fondled, x-rayed, and approved. Now you can’t just have a gun if you’re over 16 and passed your hunter safety course (which was free). Now you have to apply for a permit and you might be allowed, and it seems the Government doesn't want anyone to have guns, except cops. Now we are having a war against terrorism which could be anywhere, or anyone, and today I learned that America has decided it’s legal to kill people, even American people, if we think they might be a terrorist with a drone. So to me that means no one is innocent until proven guilty. Also I don’t feel like the people who work extra hard or go to school to be extra smart get to be richer because the Government takes more of their money to give to poor people so they won’t be so poor.

I know at 6 or 7 kids see in mostly black and white, good or bad, free or not, but as for me I always felt that being free was good. Being free, made me proud, and put me on the high road, but now I don’t feel proud, and I don’t feel free, at least not as proud and free as I used to; and that just sucks.

They (the terrorists)  flew planes into our buildings to kill some of us, now we have the right to fly things into their buildings, and kill them. They aren't free because their Governments oppress them, while our Government oppresses us. They can just pop up anywhere at any time and kill us, and we can do the same to them.

I guess it’s just getting harder and harder for me to see the difference between them and us, and I realize that when we become like them, instead of them becoming like us, or just agreeing to leave each other alone, then the war is lost, even if the battle goes on.

I wonder how it will be in 60 years or so when the next generation looks into the trunks of their grandfathers, will war mementos still have meaning, will the Grandchildren look at today’s soldiers as hero’s and saviors of the world or will they just look upon the mementos with the same indifference as if they had found and old briefcase or an Amway catalog.

First hand True Story From Prison 09203-031

A hundred years ago I wasn't the same man I am now, but it was still me. The parts of me then have all jelled, fermented, aged, and calcified to make me what I am today. I open with this statement as a way of disclaimer.

See, I don’t want to embarrass my family, and for some reason this blog has garnered more attention than anything else I have ever put on line. It’s not that I have secrets from my family because I don’t, they know all about me, and love and accept me in spite of it all. But people who know my family, probably don’t know all about me, and if they read this, (and it’s possibly that they will) they might look at the people I love differently.

If you are one of those people please don’t be like that. Please don’t judge my family because of my past, I have been on the straight and narrow since I've been blessed with their association, and none of them have done anything but make me a better man by simply not tolerating or accepting anything less. To be clear I have risen to their standards and they have never, ever, tolerated or come close to mine before I met them.

Judge me, ask me, question me, or treat me poorly, but don’t mess with them. 

See I’m a lot like an old guard dog just lying on the porch, I’m easy to ignore, and convenient to step over, as you notice my ears twitching, and hear me sigh in the heat of the sun.  But don’t be fooled, I’m guarding, and if I were to think you were doing something to make them unhappy; I will bite. Hard.

So with that out of the way I want to share with you one of the many, many, things I learned while I spent four years in Prison for robbing a bank. My number was 09203-031.

The thing about the Federal Prison System is that it has teeth. When the Feds get you, they have you for a while, and my four year sentence was nothing compared to the prison terms of most of my associates.

Now I could tell you about some of the worst situations and people I met, and I saw plenty. Or, I could tell you about beatings, or corruption, or cruelty, or drugs, or violence, or even death by suicide, or murder. I saw all of those things and I imagine if I stick to this blog long enough I probably will. But today I want to tell you something I learned about the human condition.

Some humans are buoyant.

I met this old timer named Harvey. He had been inside for 22 years, he was sentenced under the old law and his sentence was life. I don’t know what his crime was but I know he had the opportunity to see the parole board once while I knew him, and he simply didn’t go. I asked him why and he said that with his crime he would never be granted parole, so he just didn’t see any sense in wasting their time or his.

Now I never asked him why he was in Prison. It’s an unwritten rule that you never ask someone with a 40 year or longer sentence what they are in for. If you have less than a 40 year ticket yourself you are after all a guest in their prison and you must keep that in mind all the time.

But, and here is the point. Harvey was a model prisoner. He had accepted his life and actually had a positive attitude about it. He never bothered anyone, kept to himself, and read everything he could get his hands on. He had a little Job in the warehouse as a clerk, and his pay was about 30 dollars a month. I never saw him send a letter or receive a letter, and he took pride in keeping his shoes shiny.

I kind of watched him in awe because the first year on the inside was the hardest year I’ve ever done. I counted the days down, I watched the news, I read the papers, I cried, I was scared, I had my ass kicked, and I kicked a little ass.

I moped, I hated, I felt sorry for myself, I grew frustrated, I was angry, I hardly slept, I barely ate. All of these feelings washed over me and every day was a lifetime.

But still I wondered how Harvey did it. How did he live, and smile, and endure knowing he would certainly die behind bars.

One day I asked him.

He explained to me that they couldn't take some things away from him and he just focused on them.

Like what? I asked.

I like having the nicest shoes on the yard. I like it when the sun shines on me when I walk on the track. I like to watch the news. I enjoy playing Gin.

In some ways it’s easier, I don’t worry about things I can’t control and I can’t control much. So do you want to play another hand before lock down or what?

So we played some more cards and time passed and now its a hundred years later and I’m here and I don’t know what happened to him.

Before I left I asked him if I could write him after I got out and he just said no.

I’ll never forget Harvey, and I’ll never forget what he told me about worrying about things I can’t control.

Looking back I think Harvey had some kind of magic in him.

I see people every day who are unhappy, or unsatisfied with their lots in life. Sometimes I am unhappy or unsatisfied and then I think about Harvey and how despite it all he somehow rose above.

He was buoyant.

JS

Nipples, beer, and a new kind of cigarette..

As I sit here lighting another cigarette I wish there was a new kind of smoke, one that was bolder, or different. I light this one not because I like or even enjoy it but because it’s what I do. Call it addiction, or habit, or slavery, or whatever; it is what it is.

I think part of getting older is a dulling of the senses.

I remember when I was a boy and my brothers and I would snitch one of Moms cigarettes, sneak it down to the basement, gather around the hot water heater and roll up newspaper, and light a fire from the burner to light the stolen cigarette and pass it around. Damn that was a good smoke. That was a good time.

I think I was about 16 when I went into a grocery store in Cimmaron Kansas. I don’t remember what I bought but I remember when the clerk bent over I could see right down her top; the image was seared into my brain and even now a thousand years later when I close my eyes I can see the plain white bra that was a little too big and the hint of nipple that peeked out at me, as if to say “Oh look at me, didn’t expect this did you?”

I remember the first time I jerked off. I remember the first time I got my finger wet. I remember my first dance, my first feel, my first sex, my first lover, my first BJ, my first dirty book, the first time I fell in love. I remember my first broken heart, my first car, my first computer, my first gun, my first crime, my first prison sentence.

I remember learning to drive in a monstrous pink ford Thunderbird. 

I remember my first car crash, my first job on a shrimp boat. I remember my first flight. The first time my 1^st wife cheated on me and the first time I cheated on her.

I remember my first apartment, my first job, my first car and first truck. So many things and I remember the magic of every one of them.

As I look back over my lifetime so far; at all of the different J. Swaneys I wonder if my changes are coming to an end. Have I finally crystalized once and for all? Or will I again cocoon up and re-emerge different and exciting.

I’m older and supposedly wiser, and quite frankly I miss the high. The rush of something completely new and unexpected. Life has become predictable and I can understand why some people do foolish things when they are my age.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not unhappy or dissatisfied. Honestly I am one of the luckiest people I know. I have a great family. I live in a beautiful area. I can’t remember the last time I was hungry. I am actually surrounded by, married to, and related to beautiful people, the kind of people I never even imagined having the nerve to speak to. I’m a lucky and appreciative man.

But..

I can understand a mid-life crisis. A sports car, a young lover, cocaine, a small business, political obsession, strippers, whores, alcoholism, or any of the other things that trip men my age up.

I see it all around me and recognize it for what it is, so I’ll take a pass, but I can understand it. 

I remember when I was younger and working in Brownsville Texas in this huge un air conditioned tool and die shop. It was so fricking hot. You don't even know. Brownville TX in the summer has temps over 100 degrees, with humidity above 80. Anyway this buddy and me used to get off work, go to this store that he knew of that had a walk in cooler that had beer that was like 30 degrees, we would buy a 12 pack get back into his truck, drive to his house, sit in the driveway, crack open the cans, pour salt and tabasco sauce on the rims, and then slam the beer. It sounds lame but it was simply amazing.

Remember the first time you ever shot tequila, licked the salt from your hand and bit the lime? The burn of the alcohol, the bite of the salt, and then the explosion of the lime; it was like a roller coaster for your mouth wasn't it?

But… if I jumped on my bike, went to the store bought some top shelf tequila, stopped at the market, bought a few limes, drove home, and did some shots, or even went to the bar, right this second… it just wouldn't be the same.

Is my tongue different; is the tequila? Or is it me?

                  

Anyway, there really isn't a point to this post or a moral to this story.

I guess I’m just ready for the next best thing, or at least a new kind of cigarette.

J. Swaney

If you're a daughter here's a little unsolicited relationship advice...

There is wisdom in some expressions, one of my favorites is ‘Let Sleeping Dogs Lie’. I am also intimately familiar with the expression ‘We all have skeletons in our closets’, truth be told; I have an entire walk in closet, a few garages, and 3 or 4 rented storage units just filled with bones.

So this brings me to this blogs thoughts.

A young woman that is very close to me is having some issues with her Father. He made some poor choices in the past and she is so angry about it.

He now has a new wife and new daughter, and he is doing the best he can with them.

Now, from what I know he is a good man. He never ever missed a child support payment, and always made himself available to see her. At about 15 she decided she didn't want to spend weekends with him and so they grew further apart after that.

Fast forward 10 years, he now has a daughter from a subsequent marriage that is about the same age as his other daughter was when their relationship became strained. So, the second Daughter is getting to do things that the first Daughter never ever did, so now there is this whole jealousy dynamic.

Anyway Daughter number one honestly believes the way to deal with this is to talk it out, but the Father isn’t too crazy about this idea because talking it out amounts to him being chewed out for things he can’t change, and basically allowing himself to be chastised by Daughter number one, when it was she who chose not to spend time with him during those years and not the other way around. As a man with a mans pride I can completely understand his reluctance.

So, when they attempt to talk, the talks don’t go smoothly, and the rational discussions become nothing more or less than accusations. They both have hurt feelings about the past, and neither one of them can change a damn thing.

So, what now?

Some would say that they need to have some family counseling to resolve their issues.

I say, leave the past in the past and move on.

Life is full of choices, and one of those choices; as an adult, is to choose who we do, and do not, want to have a relationship with. Now I am not saying that she should stop having a relationship with her Father, but she should accept the fact that no amount of rehashing, debating, discussing, or delving into, issues of the past are going to undo what’s been done.

So she needs to either close those bones in the closet forgive and move forward, or terminate the relationship completely.

This may sound extreme but the alternative is just sabotaging what relationship they do have.

It would be nice if hurting someone could make us hurt less, or if confronting someone about our injuries could somehow make them heal faster, but the sad truth is neither of these things are the case.

As I see it, he isn’t hurting her right now, actually he wants to take back the hurt and make everything better but he just can’t do it.

Honestly I kind of feel bad for the guy, not because I really know him but because I too am a guy with a non-traditional family dynamic, and further more I came from a family with a non-traditional dynamic. I carry the scars from it too.

My greatest fear is that her relationship with her Father ends up like my relationship with my Mother and Father.

The relationship with myself and my Mother and Father is strained and civil, and honestly I can’t imagine it ever being any other way. I wish it wasn’t so but it is what it is. I don’t like my Mother, and my Father and quite possibly my Mother don’t really like me. We just went in different directions and now we are so far apart that I doubt we will ever find a common ground, and I don’t know that I would really want to.

This is so sad….. My greatest fear is that my relationship with my son and daughters ever becomes like my relationship with my Father and Mother. I may as well be an orphan, and it hurts me.

With that said here is my advice to this young woman who is so close to me.

Please, try as hard as you can to forgive and forget. Do everything in your power to stay in your Father’s life no matter how far you live apart, try telling him how important he is to you instead of telling him how he has hurt you or how you have been hurt by your relationship.

Embrace today and hope for a better tomorrow because life will move you both along, days turn to weeks, weeks to months, and then months to years, and then one day you realize that the piece of your heart that should be occupied by your real Fathers love is empty, and although you can fill it with other things it just won’t be the same.

You will find that you can never ever be loved by too many people but it is very possible not to be loved by enough.

Guns, Hawks, Warmongers, whore-mongers, and Yeats

I’ve been worried about the world lately, well not the whole world, just the piece of it that I claim as my own.

I've been trying to listen to the news in a new way today.

I am trying to hear past the liberals, to screen out the ultra conservatives, to somehow hear past the bias from the networks, and the venom of the hate mongers. It hasn’t been easy. All of my usual sources are disqualified, or have unwittingly recused themselves, with past rants and raves.

In desperation I turned to social media.

I found funny pictures, amusing meme’s, sarcasm, idiocy, good and valid points from the right and the left. I saw people from both sides bullied and humiliated, as I ghosted into and out of chat rooms. I read comments, and verbal blood bathes, threats and insults, humor and passion, the bitterest salts and the hottest peppers.

But I still didn't find what I was looking for.

I don’t want to phrase this personally because my family actually reads my drivel so I will just tell you a story….

Once upon a time this man married this woman. She had children and so did he. She had a significant life before him, and he had lived long before her, but they fell in love, made a commitment and married.

It wasn’t easy.

Her children didn't like him very much, and they had seen their Mother hurt before. He was proud and arrogant, bold and brash, he couldn't hear anything anyone said because he was shouting, her children grew even more frustrated because they weren't listened to. Things went from bad to worse.

But She…. His wife, was the voice of reason. She listened. She listened to him, and she listened to them. Careful, she wouldn't take a side. When one faction got out of hand and began to say things that shouldn't be said she would advise caution. When one side stopped speaking she still always invited their input. She always insisted that she was on the side of the family, and refused to alight herself whole heartedly with either the right or the left. Some nights she would cry, but even as she cried she still loved. She avoided absolutes, she embraced compromise, with calmness and deliberation she led her reluctant crew straight north. She stressed the gray and denied that anyone was black or white, or evil or perfect. Her cause was a higher one, her calling almost divine. She embraced the big picture. She recognized the squabbles and storms were just life, and that as long as everyone remembered that there would be plenty of other days, and that they would probably be better than these, than things would get better.

Like water smoothing the edges of the Grand Canyon, she watched the storms come and go.

Without her that family would have imploded, verbal nuclear options would have been explored, impossible ultimatums would have been laid down, truly hateful things would have been said and done, seeds of trust would have blown away on the wind, others would have been drawn into the disputes to take one side or another, at some point things would have just gotten so big, and out of control, that winning and losing wouldn't even have mattered anymore, the barbaric goal would have simply become destruction, and every day would have been celebrated simply because it was another day to do more damage, to do more harm.

I've been in wars like this. I've been married before, and when it was over I know how it would have ended, just a smoldering ruin where a family had once been, and scarred survivors carrying around grudges and hate.

See… what I was looking for today on the web, and in the news, and on social media, was a voice of reason, a semblance of mutual respect and understanding; someone, anyone, to just say ‘our Nation is’t red or blue, it’s red white and blue. All the colors make up the flag, and all political parties are equally important. I searched for a piece of cilantro to balance the bitter and the hot.

I didn't find it. I didn't read it. I didn't hear it.

Our politics and our Nation, are a lot like a blended family, and unfortunately, no one seems to be putting the family first. Not the Republicans, the Democrats, the far left or the far right.

So what does this mean? Does this mean that we as a nation are on our way out? Is the United, in United States gone for good?

I suppose it could be. No nation lasts forever. But if it is; I’ll be both sad to see it gone and honored to have been a part of it.

And I’ll tell you what I’m going to do tomorrow, or tonight, online, or the next time I’m asked or tempted to tell….

I’m going to look hard for a middle ground, and if the only middle ground we can find is that we both love things about the United States, well then that’s something. If enough of you do it, and it spreads, it just might save my world, and your too.

I’m going to leave you with a few lines from a poem by Yeats, and I hope the next time you discuss politics, or current events, that you encourage compromise, and that you listen as well as you speak, and you realize that these are the glues that hold us together, and that without them inevitably we will come apart.

“The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,”

The Second Coming

William Butler Yeats

Have a great night, or morning, or day, or whatever, and as always Thanks loads for giving me a few minutes of your time. I know it’s your most valuable resource.

Until we meet again…

JS

Accidental Gift, Strippers, Tablecloths, Real Sugar, and Wal-Mart

Accidental Gift, Fancy Tablecloths, and real sugar.

It’s been a few day since I posted anything on this blog and I blame life. Oh, I wish I could think of wonderful, entertaining, and insightful things to write about every single day, but in truth I just can’t.

Some days you are just going to get a slice of the life of Swaney. Hairy belly, bald head, strange dry crusty skin thing I found on my leg the other day, that I have no idea what the hell is, and everything else.

Right now it’s a little after 11pm; Coast to Coast is playing on the radio (I love am talk radio). It’s the last hour of my wifes birthday, and it’s been just too damn cold for Southern California the last few days.

So, this morning I wake up and my plan is to go pick up some flowers for her Birthday. Now that may not sound like much, but we’re just not really that good at exchanging gifts here at Casa Swaney. We’re fortunate in the fact that if we need something, we usually just go get it, or save a few weeks and then go get it. I mean, we’re both grown, and independent, so, well that’s just the way it is.

Anyway, my plan was to buy flowers, even though I always secretly feel like they are a sucky gift because in a week they are dead, and even if she dries them out, well they are still dead, just dry and dead.

So, anyway I tell her I’m headed to the dry cleaners to pick up our comforters, and dry cleaning, and I hop into the Marshmallow (it’s a 2013 white Fiat 500, that we picked up last week, my 7 year old Grandson says it looks like a Marshmallow, and the name is sticking) and head up to the cleaners.

The proprietor greets me by name, gathers our stuff, and tells me how thrilled she is that we came in today. She shows me all of these clothes, quilts, etc etc… that people simply haven’t picked up. She tells me how she has some bills due, and it’s been a very difficult month, with people not picking up their cleaning in Dec and Jan.

I start to feel bad because out stuff has been in for quite a while, and with 2 comforters, and several shirts, our bill is about 90 dollars.

Anyway I’m looking at these two tablecloths, and wondering how the Mrs. would feel if I got her tablecloths instead of flowers.

Marie is hard to buy gifts for because she is just too kind. I’ve figured out in all of our years together that I could give her a dead cat with a bow on it for a present and she would claim she loved it and had always wanted one just like it. It’s only later when you realize that your gift has disappeared into the closet, which seems to have a Bermuda Triangle section in it, to never ever been seen again, that you figure out that maybe she didn’t love it quite as much as she said she did.

So, as these thoughts are running around in my head like puppies chasing their own tails, I look closer at these tablecloths. The more I look the more I like, this is some really fine fabric, tightly woven, with lots of different colors of threads, and some glass stones, somehow sewn into the fabric. I don’t know where they came from as I’ve never seen anything like them. (Now I’ll admit I’ve never really paid a whole lot of attention to fabric but I know this is really cool.)

So anyway I bring them home and she’s thrilled… I know she’s really thrilled instead of gift thrilled, because the tablecloths are immediately put to use, where people can see them and it’s not even suggested that they go to the closet.

So YEA Me!

Well one other thing and then I’ll let you go.

For the 7 years, or so I’ve been trying to eat a little healthier. I’m not getting too carried away but I can say over all we eat healthier then we used to and when I imagine the crap we ate as kids I honestly don’t know how I lived to this day. Now these aren’t major changes, just things that seemed like a simple change and hopefully they add up. We don’t buy 80/20  we use 93/7 ground beef, and eat lots more chicken. We use olive oil. I try not to eat things that I really don’t know what they are exactly, like hot dogs, or bologna, or margarine, or coffee creamer, or instant or decaf coffee. If I can buy something that doesn’t use high fructose corn syrup, I usually do. We eat chips once or twice per month instead of weekly or daily. We use real mayo instead of miracle whip. It’s just little things and I’m as fat as ever but I still feel a little better because I’m eating less things that I simply can’t identify and more things I can.

So, anyway a couple of years ago I started buying sugar in the raw, 2 or 3 times a week I drink coffee with some sugar in it. The things I like about sugar n raw was that it wasn’t bleached, it was just sugar. The thing I didn’t like about it was that it was ground so coarsely that it didn’t dissolve as well, and the last ¼ of a cup of coffee was just too sweet.

So anyway today while we are shopping I find some sugar that is the same as sugar in the raw, just made by another company, but is ground much finer.

It’s real sugar, tastes the same, is ground closer to the same, dissolves the same, but is just un-bleached. So it’s like would you care for some bleach in your coffee? No thank you.

Anyway I picked it up at Wal-Mart, (which I hate and hold pretty much responsible for the race to the bottom in retail customer service, but that’s another subject) which are pretty much everywhere, so give it a shot the next time you shop there.

Well it’s the end of this blog and I appreciate every single one of you who take a moment to read what I write.

If I was a stripper, and this blog were a pole, every single time it’s read is like slipping a dollar into my g-string, except of course I can’t use the dollars to buy drugs, and it probably won’t lead to a career in porn, and I don’t have the protection of two or three huge mean looking guys, to remind you not to get too handsy, and I can’t do private dances, and I am not required to wear pasties, and their isn’t an onsite ATM machine that has a 10 dollar service charge, and I won’t be coming around to your table asking you to buy me a drink, and you won’t have to come up with some excuse for your husband or wife about where you’ve been and what happened to your money.

Until we meet again.

JS

Condoms, Chicken, Magic, and Love

Let’s just say if I were forced to tell the absolute truth I would have to say I believe in magic. Now this wasn't always the case. I’m sure when I was a kid I believed and then I out grew it. But then I lived, and I studied, and I read, and I watched, and slowly and steadily my belief grew.

I think I have a pretty logical mind, sentimentality annoys me more than a little because I am just cynical enough to see it as a form of manipulation more often than not. But still, I have seen some things that I can only describe as magical.

Plus there is the fact that magic was accepted and considered as real as electricity for thousands of years and by millions of people long before I ever came on the scene.

Now I will admit that there is a chance that I know things that all of those people didn't  But then again just the fact that they all believed in it, kind of makes me consider it. I mean is it likely that all of those people were wrong for all of those years, and we as a society are right now? I just wonder.

Like Columbo in the old time TV show, that starred Peter Falk, I bumble and stumble through life but in the back of my mind, like a dog chewing a bone; I am always on the lookout for it; magic.

Today my 15 year old son was hanging around the kitchen while I was frying chicken. (I found legs, and breasts, on sale for .99 cents and brought home lots of it) He was telling me that lately the kids at his H/S have been impressed with his lunches, and have been begging for bites.

“Really?” I asked. I thought back on his lunch for the last few days. I had baked Chicken Breasts, the night before, boned them, and sent the boys with white meat chicken sandwiches with cheese and lettuce, the bread had been fancy deli rolls that were a day old and on sale. Yesterday Marie had boned the rest of the white meat chicken and made a chicken salad, with finely diced celery, boiled egg, pickle, onion, mayo, garlic, paprika, mustard, nothing fancy, just chicken salad.

“Yea” he said. One kid told me he had never seen a chicken sandwich made out of just regular chicken, because his Mother bought the patties, and some of the other kids had never eaten chicken salad that didn’t come already made from the store. They really liked it.

That just made me sad.

But here is the kicker. I know the food isn’t spectacular. My wife is a far better cook than I am but she’s not a Chef, she’s a nurse. As for me, I’m a half ass writer, and half assed home maker. Julia Roberts, I am not.

So now the logical part of my mind kicks in. Is he just blowing smoke up my ass?  I doubt that because being a suck up doesn't earn brownie points in this house, never has and never will; so what would his motivation be for lying to me about this? I can’t think of one so I assume he is telling the truth.

I shoo him out of the kitchen, link my blue tooth head phones, to our Nexus 7, and screen Cruel Intentions on Netflix. But even as I’m watching the movie, breading chicken, turning chicken, and trying to clean as I go, that little piece of my mind is chewing on this bone.

Why is he so grateful for the chicken? Why are the other kids crazy or the chicken? Why is Christopher my Grandson, eye balling the chicken like it’s a prize and begging for a sample? The boys aren't starving. It’s not spectacular chicken.

The evening wears on, dinner is served, the boys go to bed. I run Marie to the Hospital for her night shift, and drive home.

I’m asking myself if this could be magic.

I have a friend who went to cooking school. She used to post pictures of her food on Facebook. I loved looking at that food. These weren't fancy pictures, just snaps with her cellphone, of her accomplishments in cooking school. When she had finished the school, the pictures had stopped. I pulled the snapshots up in my memory and reviewed them. Why had I loved looking at those pictures so much? Honestly, beautiful, professional grade food pictures, are almost as common as porn on the internet, so why were her pictures my favorite?

Obviously because I know her. I know how much she loves her family, I know her Daughter, and I know her Son, and her Husband. I know the love that comes from her hands and went into that food. So it was like I could see the love, I could see the magic. Hmmm could I be onto something I asked myself?

I thought of other times I had personally witnessed the magic of love going into food.

This video I saw on youtube came to mind.

Baking Video

This video is made by a Jewish woman making bread with her friends. The link is above if you want to refer to it. If not, here’s the point, when she is kneading the bread, she knows she is putting love into it. She even says so in so many words.

So maybe the magic doesn't have anything to do with the actual food, but the hands, or even the body.

I thought of some other things that seemed a little magical to me.

By magic I mean the total equals way more than the parts, like when a touch is more than a touch, or a chicken sandwich is more than just a sandwich, or when a woman comforting her infant is more than just some chick holding a kid, or when Rachel's food pictures are more than just pictures of deserts.

Then my mind leaps to other things, like how it’s way more magical to make love to woman without a condom, than with one, or when the Ancient Jews led their livestock into the temple for sacrifice, or when the other ancient tribes and faiths performed blood sacrifice, or when a Bride and Groom first kiss. These things all held magic, they were all more than the sum of their parts, and they all involved personal contact. They all involved a hand, a touch, a sacrifice, something personal given unselfishly, not money, but something more than that something magical.

Then suddenly, something else pops into my mind.

Every meal I fix my Gransons plate first. He is 7 and having him dish his own plate isn’t the best idea. My Son, 15 has asked a few times for me or Marie to fix his plate too. I have always assumed he was joking and flippantly told him to fix his own plate. “You’re grown for goodness sakes.” But now I wonder, is he asking for his share of love, without even being aware of it? If the magic comes from the hands, if the love comes from the actual contact with the food, and he craves it…. And well…..

I think I'll go ahead and fix his plate from time to time.

JS

A Dogs Life, when is enough enough?

Enough.

I've been thinking this morning about enough, and how we, as a society, might need to redefine that word because for some reason it seems an impossible goal to achieve.

I look at my dogs and I envy them because they seem to have enough, but then when I think back of all the dogs I've ever had, and I realize they have always had enough.

When I was a boy we were very poor. Not poor like didn't have the money to pay the cable bill poor, but poor like, no cable, electricity getting turned off, neighbors dropping off groceries on our porch, always going to a neighbor’s house for an after school snack, not even being asked to fill out the form for free lunches, getting immunization shots for free from the health department, prone to shoplifting, would do any chore for anyone for a dollar, nothing new ever, school shopping at the salvation army, five kids sleeping on a full sized mattress on the floor of an upstairs bedroom, without sheets, huddled in blankets, water frozen in the toilet on extra cold mornings, holes in the bathroom floor from wood rot, scratch the registration sticker off someone else’s license plate, and glue it to your own, often ate fried potatoes for dinner, took a generic bag of potato chips for the potluck at the church, Kool-Aid was a rare and wonderful treat, 3 channels on the black and white TV, antenna wrapped in aluminum foil, moved and moved and moved again, wore work boots, or bare feet at gym class, never joined a sports team, hunted when we could and ate every damn thing we killed, raised rabbits to eat and fed them by pulling weeds to put in their cage, our dogs never had shots, or flea medicine, or heart worm treatment, hair-cuts at home, lunch at school, supper at home, no breakfast, never used deodorant until we could buy it for ourselves, built imaginary forts in the wind break, and entertained ourselves with sticks, stones, ponds, and imagination poor.

But, you know what?

That old dog was happy. He met our school bus, he ate our leftovers, he slept on the mattress with us, he played with us, he licked us, allowed us to wipe our dirty hands on him, or cry on him, he didn’t even take it personal when he was hungry or we scolded him. He just had enough.

Now it’s a million years later. We live in a beautiful condo in one of the world’s greatest cities, we have to be careful to not over eat, I can’t remember the last time I was actually hungry, our children are educated and successful. Marie shops at thrift shops for fun. I drive a scooter worth about 5k dollars, when we need a car we go rent a brand new one, when we need clothes we simply go get them, we prefer Tilleys over WalMart, we eat meat in 98% of our meals, we sometimes order Pizza and have it delivered, I’ve eaten so much I’m fat, I get annoyed if I don’t have at least 2 hard liquors, and mixers in the house. The boys eat 3 meals a day. Our cable and internet bill are more than our rent was as a kid. I think we paid about 40 dollars for the wrought iron and stainless steel dog dishes that our dogs mostly ignore for scraps off of our plates. Sometimes I get stressed because we don’t enough snack foods around the house, 2 computers, 3 smart phones, a Google TV, my sons High School has a pool, we have good health insurance, we carry about 300k dollars in life insurance, in case one of us passes, and the Mrs. makes a very comfortable living.

And you know what?

The dogs are happy, they have more than enough.

But me?

Well I really want a 5 bedroom 3 bath house, and a new Honda Ridgeline. I really need a Vacation with just the Mrs., about 4-5 days in a nice hotel in Vegas would do the trick, maybe take in a show. I would also like to only drink top shelf booze. Greg thinks he needs new clothes, Marie would like some new boots, I wouldn’t mind spending a couple of hundred on some new clothes myself. I would like to be able to buy new cars for our 20 something daughters. I worry about them breaking down and that would give them a little less to worry about. Our air-conditioning unit is out dated. I made a promise to a friend and then had to wait until next payday to do it. I would like to put down real tile in the bathrooms and kitchen, and replace the carpet in the bedroom to match the new hardwood floors we put in last year. Our new washer and dryer isn’t front-loading and sometimes gets off balance and makes too much noise. I wish we could keep more fresh fruit and juices in the house. I would like to have a new Honda Goldwing completely tricked out and a month or so of nice weather so the two of us could tour the US, you know, down across Texas, then through the South, along the coast of Florida and then to New York City.

I guess the point is this. The dogs had enough then, and they have enough now. I didn’t have enough then and still often times don’t feel like I have enough.

So either enough is never actually enough, or Dogs have a wisdom that I can never hope to achieve.

Do you have enough? Do your dogs?

JS

Red Lights, The United States Post Office, & My Shit Day

For me today has been one of frustration. I've been snappish, impatient, sarcastic, and a little mean. Long story short I have been an ass-hole.

I didn't plan to be, but some days the world just annoys the shit out of me. Here are just three things taken at random from a list of thousands that have just driven me insane today.

#1 Red lights:

I think California, at least in the San Diego area, must receive gazzillions of dollars in federal funding for stop lights, or, the Legislature must just simply think that no one in California is smart enough to read, obey, and understand a fricking stop sign.

I live less than 3 miles from lots of areas for shopping, and I’ll kiss your ass if I don’t get caught at 12 fricking lights between here and Food 4 Less.

Now I’m not talking about just a simple red light either, and I’m not talking about just at intersections. I’m talking about full scale controlled left and right turn, put the fricking car in park, and enjoy a cigarette stop lights.

Now I live in Santee, not LA or even Down Town San Diego, but these light don’t have timers to turn them to flash at like 3am on a Tuesday morning and they don’t have sensors that might detect you are in the only moving vehicle in a 5 mile radius. Oh no, that would just make too much sense; but I’ll tell you what they do have on them, Cameras.

So when you decide to just go, because it’s the middle of the night, and you want to get home, and you have to piss like a race horse, and your hair is graying, and your mind turns to death, and you have have already had to sit at the stop light so long that you are actually wondering if you have time to run a hose from the tailpipe to the cab so you can just die, instead of live in agony one second longer, the police will have your tag number and mail you a citation.

#2 People that won’t go when the light finally turns green.

It doesn't bother me when people here text, tweet, check e-mail, make calls, write letters, watch a Netflix movie, look at porn and pull one off, place stock orders, read magazines, paint their nails, drink coffee, or just roll their windows down and visit, at the stop lights… G*d knows we have plenty of fricking time. But what does bother me is when the light finally does change they are so engrossed in these other activities that they don’t GO!

GO! GO! GO! The fricking light is green, I’m almost out of gas, my taxes are due in less than 3 months, PLEASE FOR Goodness SAKE! Can you just put the fricking car in gear and GO?!?

Alas, most times they have lost their focus, and right after the light turns yellow they will begin to go, abandoning me, along with all hope for a better life, to repeat the cycle yet again.

THE BASTARDS!

#3 The United States Post Office.

Today we wanted to send off a letter. I know it’s Sunday but the lobby at the Post Office is open and I know they have a vending machine, and I have a credit card so the Mrs. and I are off to get a stamp. 

Sounds pretty simple isn't it?

Well this vending Machine is something else, it’s about the size of a refrigerator, and has a touch screen, with what seems about a 5 minute lag. It goes something like this.

Press Start to begin.

I press start, nothing happens, I wait, still nothing, I look to the Mrs., still waiting, shrug my shoulders, wait some more, roll my eyes, waiting waiting, turn to walk away, and the screen changes.

Are you mailing a package or letter? It asks.

I choose letter, and press the screen.

Nothing… wait, wait, wait, still waiting, wait, scratch, shuffle my feat a little to relieve the risk of blood clots, wait, wait, still waiting, wait……….. and

Does your letter contain explosives, acids, alcohol, chemicals, or any other toxic substances?

Wait another half of a lifetime…. Finally.

Please place your envelope on the scale, and type in the destination zipcode.

Do you want insurance?

Do you want a return receipt?

Are you mailing more than one letter?

Would you like to send it certified?

Would you like to send it next day air?

(There are at least 40 or 50 more questions that I can’t recall. Are you imagining a 5 minute wait between each question? Because there is one. I think I started to black out a little between the questions, it was torturous, like waiting in a foxhole cramped and wet, as artillery comes closer and closer, having to maintain radio silence and afraid to stick your head up because of sniper activity.)

Finally like the pitch black sky turning a slightly less inky shade of black with the coming dawn, I begin to realize we must be getting close to the part where I can scan my fricking credit card. This laggy, appliance sized, blue, monstrous, piece of tax payer purchased, shit, has finally determined that my total bill is .47 cents.

I’m ready! We’re almost there.

Of course the machine can’t charge the card for less than one dollar and forty three cents.

“Fine” my wife and I proclaim in unison. Sell us 2 or three stamps, we will just carry home what we don’t use.

But then the machine tells us that it actually prints shipping labels and would like to know what size we would like 1.43 cent shipping label to attach to our business sized envelope.

Now honestly, this is what we pay for? This is the service that the USPO gives to it’s customers? Honestly I can’t wait until the Post Office is bankrupt, it is nothing more than an example of every single thing that is wrong with the US Government. Honestly I think I would have been doing Santee, San Diego, and The United States of America a huge service, had I just doused the building in Kerosene and burned it to the fricking ground.

Finally we just left.

This is how my whole day has been.

JS

Fracking, Frankenstein Fish, Parenting and Magic

Remember when we we’re kids and if we didn’t know something, or wanted to know more about something we just asked our Mom or Dad, or Grams or Gramps, or even a teacher, and then what ever their answer was we blindly assumed was right? We would repeat it, and parrot it, we would argue it and defend it, and eventually the belief just became part of us.

Man those were good times.

Now we all have monumental amounts of information at our fingertips, with our smart phones at the ready we all know the capital of anywhere, the correct spelling of anything, the correct answer to any math problem we can type into our phones or computers, the highpoints and brief summary, of any event in human history, the secrets of space travel, the exact distance from where we are to anywhere else, the temperature of anywhere right now, and at any time it’s ever been recorded. News from anywhere, in any language, and the ability to communicate with anyone at any time, (unless they send me to voicemail or decline the call) I know the recipe to anything from, perfect lamb chops, to a slippery nipple, I can also order the ingredients or just have it shipped to me. I have more memory and computing power in my DROID RAZR than was used to send astronauts to the moon. This smart phone information rubs off too. I understand the basics of gravity, and worm holes. I’ve seen more people having sex via porn and the internet than probably any 10,000 men 50 years ago. Sodom and Gomorra aint got shit on me. The human body holds no mysteries to me. I’m interested in what is where, so I have a basic understanding of biology and anatomy. I’m not an expert at any of these things but I know, and have access, to more information on anything, then anyone in History ever has.

But guess what?

When it comes to some things, I just don’t have a fricking clue, and furthermore I don’t think anyone else does either.

All of this information, all of this knowledge, and I just wish I could ask my old man what he thinks and blindly accept it as truth.

Last night I decided to read a little about fracking. (hydraulic fracturing of stone thousands and thousands of feet beneath the earth to extract natural gas)

One thing led to another, I read article after article, watched video after video. I read economic studies, social studies, and environmental studies. I read propaganda from gas companies, and environmental organizations. I know people who work in this industry. I saw people with flammable drinking water. I read how it was methanol, and how it wasn’t methanol. I read how natural gas will lead to energy independence and a stronger, richer, America. I read how it will poison the drinking water of the biggest most important aquifers in the US, and how water may become more valuable than gold. I read and read, and studied and studied, and guess what?

Well I just wish I could ask my Dad and be young and impressionable enough to just blindly accept and believe whatever he said.

So then I just walked away from the screen and smoked some cigarettes, and admitted to myself that I still had no clue.

So then I started reading about these new Salmon that are a cunt-hair away from being approved by the FDA. I guess they are exactly like regular Salmon except they have been genetically modified and mixed and matched to grow bigger in ½ the time.

The way I undertsnad it this is done with gene splicing, which sounds a little scary, until you imagine that basically it’s what we have been doing with selective breeding, since we domesticated, chickens, and nature herself domesticated the gray wolf into the domestic dog. (that’s right every single domestic dog is a descendant of the gray wolf), (go ahead google it, I dare you).

Again I read and read, I studied and considered, and I still can’t decide if it’s a good thing or not.

I guess the point of this evenings, (well now this mornings)  blog is this. Information is great but it just isn’t enough, and at some point, it’s like trying to study a snowflake in a blizzard, or a raindrop in a downpour.

Nothing compares to the magic and certainty of a child asking a parent or grandparent or step parent, or whatever, a question, and receiving an answer.

When we as parents, answer a question for a child, we are shaping the future, we are building a destiny, we are creating a bias that surpasses all this information, all of this science, and all of this wisdom.

You would think that me being able to learn all I learned about fracking from my office in my condo in Southern California, is magic but it’s not. Me being able to be 10 again and looking at my Father and asking him, “Dad is fracking good or bad?” and him answering me while patting my head or looking me in the eye, now that would be magic.

I don’t know the answers, and the more I learn the more questions I have, but I have figured this out; it all comes down to what you believe, and our children believe what we tell them. So it probably wouldn’t hurt if we reminded ourselves of this the next time the little one asks us something.

Jan 6^th 2013

Wisdom With Age - Real Stories Of My Family

Father, Son, & Grandson

I remember a thousand or so years ago when I was a child. I loved my Father. Hell I idolized him, I wanted nothing more than to be exactly like him when I grew up. I would do about anything to get his attention.

I honestly remember having imaginary conversations with him. In these imaginary conversations I never said the wrong thing, I always sounded mature, respectful, smart and well spoken. I never put my foot in my mouth or annoyed him by saying something stupid or irrelevant. He was always happy to hear what I had to say, and we visited for hours and hours.

Unfortunately in the real world it wasn't like that at all. I was always using the wrong words, or saying the wrong things. I would mistake a lecture for a conversation; or a conversation for a lecture. (In our home these were different things completely.) I would attempt to answer rhetorical questions, like "Why would you do such a thing?" or not reply to real questions, like "Did you really think it would be a great idea to do that?"

And worst of all the more I would put my foot in it, the worse it would get! I would become tongue tied. I would know what I was saying didn't make sense and I was sounding like a grade "A" idiot even as the words tumbled from my mouth like wood chips from a chainsaw.

Dad would get pissed, I would get frustrated, finally the conversation would simply exhaust itself with him frustrated and wondering how I became so dense and me becoming more than a little convinced he was right. The circle of me being so worried about sounding like a fool that I actually sounded like one, and him wondering what happened to make me a chronic fool, just circled and circled, like a tornado until it just blew a canyon between us. For a few years even under the same roof there was a tension between us. We just simply couldn't understand one another. Long story short it sucked.

So, now it's a thousand years later, all the dinosaurs, and Elvis Presley have died, and my confidence as well as my belly have grown and I can usually say what I mean, and mean what I say.  Oh, I still get intimidated, and I still often say the wrong thing, but it doesn't freak me out to the point of verbal paralysis like it used to.

I used to think this issue was unique to me and my Father. I used to think that it was amplified or exasperated by the fact that my Father was a hands on type of parent, and by hands on, I mean he wasn't shy about issuing a cuff to the head or a clip to the ear when things weren't going like he thought they should. And I honestly couldn't imagine Marie striking anyone, ever.


So, and we finally come to the point.

I see this same thing happening in my own home. It's not with me; but it does happen with my Wife and my Son.

This evening I recommended that when my wife wants to just issue an instruction that she actually just text in to him.

I can actually see him tense up, and I can feel her frustration levels rise, sometimes when they interact.

But now I see that it was a different time and a different kind of parenting but the real issue is still the same. He wants more then anything in the world to impress her, and she wants more then anything else in the world to simply know that what she says, and the instructions that she issues, are heard and obeyed.

Now I know this issue will work itself out, they both love one another, and he respects her almost to the point of idolization, but I for one will be glad when this awkwardness passes.

Hopefully they will both read this blog, and be aware of what's really going on. Hopefully he will realize that she isn't judging him and finding fault with his words, and her feelings for him are locked in even if he loses his power of speech completely, and hopefully she will realize that he is hearing her, and does want to please her, but sometimes like the pimple faced teen at the Freshmen dance he just steps on her gown, and pours punch on her, because he likes her too much.

If nothing else I feel better now that I've written all of this down, and I know this will pass, and I know my family is a good one, and I'm lucky to be a part of it.

JS