Turning Our Fires Into Faces

It's a miracle when everything in my house is working properly. Most of the time it isn’t, but when it is, I stand in awe and take a deep breath from our ionic air purifier. I’ve come to realize that a tell-tale sign that everything is running properly around the house is when all the cuts and bruises on my hands have healed. That means I haven’t banged my knuckles or let a pair of pliers slip from a maintenance assignment I gave myself here at the Bender Abode. Stopping to look around when all the gears are ticking smoothly, I take a moment to marvel at my domestic tranquility and be reminded that a lot of conveniences I take for granted are working continuously to make my life easier.

That fact was made ever the more apparent the last two weeks watching the horrific footage of fire damage in California played and replayed. Ravaged by the inferno, Hell warmed over on the residents in Palisades and burned down houses and schools to the bare earth. Watching the news clips of yet another American town succumbing to another disaster has left me taking new inventory on things in my life that are flaming away unchecked. Do you have any of those fires going on?

 As I watch victims interviewed, their faces bear a sad and stark resemblance to pictures I have seen of refugees from other countries that have been forced from their families and homes and have no idea what they are going to do next. The fires in California have created an emotional storm that has transformed a picture-perfect coastal town into a war zone – a humanitarian crises of unimaginable proportions. The faces aren’t from another country this time though. They are our faces, our people, in our country. And for those of us who have been around the block once or twice, who have experienced the unpredictable nature of life, we recognize the anguish and pain in those faces.

Many years ago, when I worked as a reporter on the Gulf Coast, I had to report on a forest fire that had started in the dry season. As I approached from a half mile away, I could feel the intense heat, and was soon pulled over by a state policeman that told me my gas tank might explode if I moved any closer. I got out of my car and walked the rest of the way down and took pictures of meteor-like fireballs that leapt over the street to engulf trees in flames on the other side. Intense heat will do that, and the hotter it is the farther it can leap.

What are the rest of us, the onlookers, to feel about the destruction we have seen in Palisades? For myself, there is a shudder that moves through my skin, a kind of creeping helplessness that wants to look away, as if I’m that reporter again, parked a half mile away watching firebombs on another planet.

In California, survivors wandering through what is left of their neighborhoods can barely speak, shake their heads, and begin to weep. It is heart wrenching to watch of course, and I found myself only being able to view so much of it. I see utility vehicles lined along the highway, National Guardsman, rescue efforts for animals, neighbors carrying neighbors down the blackened and scorched remnants of what was once picturesque and bucolic. All these pictures are made starker by contrast, as we look at one of the most gorgeous stretches of American scenery anywhere in the country, a stretch of highway only feet from the Pacific beach and a stone’s toss from a stunning Mediterranean stretch of rolling hills. Now this area, as the song says, is dust in the wind.

I don’t know if any of you out there have ever been in a place where all the layers of your life have been peeled away. That stripping down is paralyzing, a terribly raw and vulnerable place to be. If you have gone through such an exhaustive loss, you know that your life will never be the same again. Like an onion, the slicing and dicing of your life leaves a film, an odor, that never really leaves. You can try to close your eyes to it, but the sting of the afterimages still burns.

My onion appeared when I was thirty-three, living far from home, and going through a divorce that was 99% my fault. My career was in the dumps, I had perhaps one friend I could depend on, and was sleeping on the floor of a screened-in porch. My marriage was over, I was not able to eat because my depression had removed any desire for food.  Sitting alone one night on the only piece of furniture I owned, a rocking chair, I stared at a blank wall thinking of a line from a Gordon Lightfoot song that reads, “does anyone know where the Love of God goes when the waves turn the minutes to hours...”

For those living in Palisades, folks who are squatting on a cinder block in the middle of what was once their home watching smoke still trickling from their burnt-out couch, they now have a front row seat to something on the scale Hiroshima, and their view of the love of God has all but disappeared. It went away with their big screen that was carted off by a scooter- looter, and when their photos of loved ones blew down the street and were covered in ash. For that person the love of God is some face trying to interview them on Fox, asking them unanswerable question about their future. Where does the love of God go when the waves of fire turn the minutes to hours? If we are human, we will admit that we have all had hours like that, when our faces looked like hell warmed over and desperation tried to speak but couldn’t.

For me, the love of God came through an unexpected drink of cold water from my mother. At the lowest point, when I was most desperate, my mother, a meek and demure lady showed up at my door in Florida with a thermos of cold water. It was sweltering hot that day, and my hungry-angry-lonely-and-tired dial was on full throttle.  I had come home from a dead-end job, rounded the corner to find her sitting on my busted concrete staircase, waiting for me.  

She had placed a soaking wet towel down to keep herself cool and the fire ants from biting her, but she was waiting for me, nonetheless. I sat down next to her, began to cry. She hugged me and told me things would get better, and that I could build something out of the ashes. Over the course of our conversation, she never pointed a finger, she never gave me any advice or told me what she thought I needed to do. She sat and listened until my words brought me to that one statement that we all face when our own Palisades goes up in flames. I imagine every one of us has been in that place, searching for words that are layered under that deep loss and sadness, that hardest part, that last layer of the onion.

Perhaps it is then, when we feel like we have lost everything and our personal town is burnt to the ground, we get to a layer we didn’t know we had and cut through it, shed the tears, and let go of our worst fear, and wave off that last bit of odor from life’s onion, and let a new life begin.  

I think my prayer for every residents of Palisades is that if they can ever return to the rubble of what was once their home, that they would come around the corner and find a person sitting there waiting for them with a cool glass of water who has time to hear their story and not judge them in any way, and help them peel back the layers of grief that hurts the most, so that a new layer of tougher skin will be able to grow.

I’m sure, coming out of this disaster, residents will never again hold on quite so tightly to their stuff but will have a more solid idea of what really matters. It will include a future that is stronger, perhaps more aware, no longer smelling of onions and total loss, but of something sweeter and refreshing. The person who is waiting down the street for them, the face they will look into, will never replace the home that burned to the ground, but it will begin to answer the biggest question they have right now, the most important question, and tell them where the love of God goes when a fire turned their minutes to hours.

Where Men and Mountains Meet

Years ago, I wrote about a mammoth black gum tree in our back yard that had been slowly dying back, limb by limb. It suffered slow demise when the ’08 ice storm crashed through our area. We hated cutting it down, but in so doing we avoided the danger of this recent winter storm where the weight of ice and wind left trees bestrewed at every possible angle. Like some weird postcard from Rome, split trees in our neighborhood look like ancient stone columns, that held up a coliseum archway before the Argonaut of weather came through and pushed them over.

Of course, like thousands of residents in this tristate area, we began hustling to stock up on groceries long before the worst hit us.  As the thunder sleet storm built up, we knew we would soon lose power and have to begin the process of improvisation, that semi-quasi state of survival that doesn’t quite tip the desperate scale but still requires small doses of anxiety medication.

The problem I have with being snowed in, and the accompanying frustrations that it brings, is that I can never really settle into that rustic cabin romantic ambiance I see advertised in mountain retreats, lodges and ski resorts. Don’t get me wrong, I love looking at the pictures and the momentary fantasies they bring. I even imagine myself glissading down a hill, coming to athletic stop along a riverbed where a pride of caribou look up at me with curiosity.

Yet even when I have been in those types of places, sitting in a lodge with my hot chocolate and pebble sized marshmallows, I still cannot get in the mood of a wintry wonderland. I watch people stumble into the lodge, squinting and unable to adjust to the dim light, with faces looking red from snow burns they received as they face planted down the bunny hill. They stand there like statutes wearing neon thermal clothing, their small red “finder light” blinking on and off so they could be located if they were swept away by an avalanche. Imitating Norwegian soldiers, their snow suits are also covered with commemorative patches and logos that indicate that they were once part of a special branch of the Swedish military who just returned from guarding a fiord on the upper crust of their homeland coast. We know though, that no human has ever set foot on that coast, whose frozen beaches reveal only the white vertebrae of narwhals that lost their way.

Vacation skiers who walk in for some warmth, maybe some encouragement, are weighted down with cinder blocks boots, and appear as if they have survived something extraordinary out there. When they begin to thaw and are able to speak an hour later, they brag about how they whizzed through a pine forests, planted their poles and kept their weight on the inside. Sadly, their words are unintelligible because their lips are still frozen solid and crusty. Relaxing in an armchair on a Sundance couch, nobody who is sitting around has any idea what they are saying. Multi-syllable words sound like a baby beaver who lost its mother and difficult consonants like B, F, M, and P are never attempted at all.  Last year, a downhill skier stumbled in and tried to speak, made the mistake of using too many “U’s and in so doing pushed her lips out too far. Paramedics had to be called in to help her, and when they ask her where she hurt, her lips fell off and lay quivering on the floor.

These are the things that happen when one is exposed to temperatures found only in meat lockers and cheap motels whose marquis are missing half of their letters. I have friends that return from ski trips and tell me all about their adventures on the slopes. I smile, of course, because that is what one does in polite society, but I have trouble getting past the obvious signs of their various injuries – a slight limp or broken nasal cavity, or loss of memory from high altitude oxygen deprivation. In addition, I feel embarrassed for them as they walk away with their ski passes, which melted in the dryer, are still stuck to their bottoms.  

So, all of my guilt for not being more adventuresome in the snow and ice, of not having any inclination to head out and be an extra in the sequel to Jeremiah Johnson, where I might run into Mr. Redford himself – all of these feeling are gone now, completely  replaced by a scene I recently witnessed, a treacherous scene just outside my daughter’s house, where her son Carter, five, was fighting for his life as he climbed a snow bank.

Lacking no imagination, Carter was pretending to scale the slick hillside as if he were in a documentary on mountain climbing. To the casual observer it would have only appeared like a scene of a child playing in the snow, but in Carter’s mind, it was a life-or-death attempt to reach an imaginary summit, possibly Mt. Everest.

And this will be the story we will read in a biography of his life many years from now:

“As he neared the summit, pickax in hand, little Carter, the only child to ever attempt a solo assault on Mt. Everest, felt his crampon slipping beneath the ice wall. He was losing his grip on the sheer sheet, an ice flow that never sees the sun, peering over his shoulder to look down into the mist. Below, was five feet of free fall down his front yard where his body would never be recovered. Could he make it to the top where only a few men have ever stood? He could see the flag a previous climber had planted at the peak – an image that would haunt him the rest of his life. Would he make it to the top and be able to take a selfie to show his own grandkids one day – that victorious moment when he planted his country’s flag and stood at the top of the world?

His thoughts filled with doubt. A memory of his grandpa flashed through Carter’s mind, a memory of a short, slow-witted man who had tried, valiantly, three times, to climb this same mountain. The record books say four. However, during the last attempt he had only one leg, having lost the other from an attack by a deranged Yeti in Nepal. After that, his homeland of Scotland would not recognize him as a legitimate explorer and they refused to enter his last climb in the Everest record books. Carter thought of this, and more, as insecurity swept over him.

The barely visible flag, that magical goal floating above him in the clouds, had faded from view and Carter lost his grip, and felt the snow give way beneath him on the treacherous ice.

‘Use your sticks,’ he heard his grandfather saying, ‘use the sticks!’

Yes, he thought, those ancient scrimshaw walrus tusks he had put in his jacket at the last second. Plunging one into the snow, Carter held on, then pulled himself forward and up, then stretched once more and plunged another tusk deep into the ice. Upward he inched, stab by stab, feeling the power of the carved symbols and figures surge through him as he strained towards his elusive peak.”  

‘I can make it,’ he yelled even as his strength appeared to be giving out, ‘I’ve got to hold on and keep trying…’

And it will be there, in Chapter Fourteen of Carter’s biography, entitled “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Climbers,” where the five-year-old’s epic assault will comes to a sudden, suspenseful close.

As a family, we hope to read it all someday. For now, we helplessly stood at the living room window, watching him act out the entire scene. He looked like a taco wrapped in a blue cellophane, and he made one last attempt to pull himself up, but he was losing ground. It was hard to watch him fail, and listen to his scream of desperation, I have to tell you, as he aquaplaned helplessly downward. We could see his mouth moving, narrating the entire epic scene himself, playing all the characters, including the barely audible voice that trailed off the imagnary mountainside.

We want to believe he survived, yes we do. I don’t know the final chapter myself, because I haven’t written the book yet, but the last scene, of him reaching up that precarious slope, screaming, clawing at the white earth, made me proud. I knew I would see him again one day, but it wouldn’t be in a ski lodge or on a winter vacation in Aspen or Sun Valley.  It would be in a photograph, where he will barely be visible through the clouds, and where on a bitterly frigid day, we witnessed the epic climb of one intrepid explorer from the safety of our toasty warm living room, far from any mountain.

Luck and Destiny: Two Ships that Pass in the Night

Of all the animals in the animal kingdom, man is the only creature who can willfully turn his destiny over to God. There is no other living creature on earth that can pursue a goal and then relinquish it to a higher calling. From the wolf who pursues his prey to the smallest deep-water shrimp living off bacteria, all living organisms are subject to the cycles of the natural world and able to make decisions that help them survive, but they cannot reverse them through a spiritual channel. Man’s ability to surrenders his power and abilities and purposely yield to a supernatural force is unique in all the animal kingdom. Sometimes, he may also choose not to use his abilities at all, but that does not mean they are not available. 

It is interesting that not even animals rely on luck. Their behaviors rely on a complex script mapped in their DNA. Patterns like migration and communication are so complex in the animal kingdom that scientists are still unraveling them. We do not like to think of animals as intelligent as we are, as decision makers, but they rely on their skill and knowledge just like we do. A wasp, for example, may buzz around a garage for hours before choosing the optimal spot for its next generation. Man, on the other hand, can add an entirely different layer to finding a home, and may call on a prayer for guidance when there is no other acceptable option. While surrendering may not the easiest solution, his ability to accept his destiny and allow for the death of his own determination distinguishes him among all living entities.

That last statement is not always the most comforting answer, but it is certainly a human one. When we finally drop our shoulders, take a deep breath, and give way to our higher calling, we do so by realizing that we are relinquishing some of our human power and strength in hopes of gaining some insight into what we do have control over. We can be sure it will be more than just luck, however. Our potential to depend on a “higher power” often runs counter to our other human traits, our ability to use logic and reasoning for example, but we sometimes find it much more compelling – and exhilarating – to throw our lot in with the random happy accident.

A preacher once admitted to our congregation that if “we do not impose our will on life, life would impose its will on us.”  I would like to say that those words led me to a life of uplifting and inspirational experiences, but they did not. Instead, they led to a life of rather common experiences that involved letting go of heartaches, disappointments, and personal baggage. They led to a relationship with an extraordinary God whose challenges required introspection, prayer, and finally acceptance, but they certainly did not lead me to random good fortune.

Like myself, most of the hardest learning curves come from the pain of growing, and growth cannot happen without change, a prospect that often is laden with a sadness as we let go of what is comfortable and move with faith towards the unknown. Perhaps we are feeling that our luck has run dry. Perhaps we discovered that we can no longer outwit ourselves. Maybe we find ourselves looking into the void, and able to finally admit that where we need to be is on our knees, seeking something more substantial, something with meaning and purpose.  Perhaps in those moments of surrender, we can address something beyond the natural world, something that gives us hope and reassurance in a world where our destiny seems unattainable or inconsequential. 

This kind of seeking can be a nail-biting one if you are human, this business of believing in something one cannot see. In that darkness, man addresses his vulnerability, accepts his limitations and finally is able to reach out further than he thought possible, towards an authority greater than himself. In so doing, he steps away from the precipice of luck, stands on the threshold of a new connection and begins a pathway that is uniquely human, a pathway towards God.

How do we even get to that space? What is the first step towards believing in the unseen, stepping out, so to speak, in faith? “It is not always pretty,” a pastor once told me, “…and it will not be easy, but it is always good if we lean into it.”

I’d like to say that there was a moment when I gave up on twists of fate – ditched the idea of luck and did an about-face. I would like to say at that moment I saw a clear vision of God’s plan for my life, but I have had no such experience. As a kid, I relied so heavily on my own skills and “smarts” that I never needed to rely on anything else. As I grew older, I pursued more knowledge and more skills to compensate and repeatedly came head-to-head with a growing discontent and dullness to my life.  Throwing the dice, balancing my wins and losses, I began to feel like I was part of a card game whose outcome was dependent on the luck of the draw. Occasionally, I hit pay dirt, experiencing a temporary high, but it was not long before the same blunt question appeared in front of me: “Where is all of this leading?”

Consider this example:

Many years ago, two ship captains squared off to do battle. Each captain had equal power on their ships, and there was no advantage on either side as the battle ensued. The two captains agreed on a few simple rules of engagement before their encounter. First, only one shot would be fired at a time until one of the fleets was completely sunk. Oddly, both captains also agreed that no matter who was victor, there would be no casualties.

As the battle began, each captain released one shot at a time into the night as agreed, some of the boats sinking with just two hits and some with five. With neither captain able to see the other’s fleet, where would skill come into play as they fired round after round of cannonballs into the void? It seemed that by shear chance some of those shots were hitting their marks while others were falling short, but when the smoke cleared, it was clear that one captain had devised a clear and crafty strategy for winning the naval conflict. 

How, you might ask, could such a battle take place in the dark, with no casualties, and yet finish with a clear winner, particularly when chance and sheer luck seemed to be playing such a critical part in the outcome?

Well, if you were ever a kid and played the game of Battleship, you’d know the answer right away. It's a game most of us played when we bored of television in the winter and the unleashing of a few cannonballs let off some pent-up energy. Do you remember? There we sat, cross-legged at our boards, trying to outwit our opponent, calling out coordinates behind a hidden board. 

“B5!” I’d yell out, hoping for a hit.

“Miss!” Came the reply. Then, “E3!”

“Rats! Hit!” And on and on it went until someone sunk a ship or perhaps the last ship to end the sea faring conflict, the game of Battleship.

Was it luck or skill when hit an enemy ship?

Let’s return for a moment to the two captains who are battling it out on either side of their boards, taking turns firing one shot after another from behind the helm of a hidden board, each calling out points on the “grid” ocean where their ships have been hidden. One captain is named Lucky Pete. He has one eye, the other having been lost to shrapnel. His enemy is a seaworthy opponent, Captain Truly Serious.

In the beginning both captains have an equal chance of tasting victory because neither knows anything about the placement of the other’s ships. However, here is where two very different attitudes may come into play. While Lucky calls out grid numbers, gambling for a hit, Truly Serious is taking into account his last shot and carefully adjusting his aim. Lucky is shooting in dark, depending on blind luck, so to speak, while his opponent employs a far more strategic approach. As the battle ensues, Truly Serious cannons become more accurate at producing hits. Furthermore, his fleet remains safe from random reports from the enemy.

Same boards, same number of ships, Yet Truly is clearly winning the battle by relying on his knowledge and maximizing his efforts on each shot. Lucky, on the other hand, continues to flounder and sadly his last ship sinks below the surface to Davy Jones locker.

We could easily make a case for having a very similar mapped-out design as opposed to the happy-go-lucky approach. However, at some point, we might come to the realization that our faith requires the same kind of difficult mental work that Truly Serious used – planning, thinking, and study. It requires the rearranging of some thoughts, and giving up on some coordinates that are not working out. It requires taking some responsibility for our decisions, the spiritual ones as well, as we pay attention to the hits and misses in our personal battles. We would eventually find out it is actually far more difficult, more unreliable, to guess at life’s coordinates, hoping an imaginary cosmic force will take over and land us a hit on an unknown target.

Although the game of Battleship does not mimic the high stakes of real life, and sometimes as ship captains we may feel we have lost our entire fleet, the game does illustrate the fine line between getting a lucky break, and the notion that we have some control over our own destiny. Whether we choose to use our most human gift, the one involving our spiritual nature, is up to us. 

In her book America the Beautiful, Blythe Roberson talks about the peace she finds in her interaction with nature, which she describes as the delicate interwoven relationships between every living thing on the planet, as we navigate our destiny…

“I don’t believe in heaven,” she writes, “but I believe that after we die, if we’re lucky and our family remembers our request not to be embalmed or cremated…our body continues on through those interwoven relationships, feeding a worm, or a mushroom or a tree…”

And what if we are not so lucky? What if the family member we are depending on is like Captain Lucky, that same ship captain who threw caution to the wind and used coordinates he pulled out of thin air? Perhaps it might behoove us to not to rely on him, but to tap into a strength beyond what we could muster by simply guessing. 

There it is. The word that stumps us. Beyond.

Of the accounts I have read from those who have seen heaven and returned, I have never heard of one person who said they felt as if they were being recycled back to nature. There is no mention of having spoken to a worm, nor of anyone who developed a relationship with a mushroom after they died. Instead, the accounts I have read describe a place of intense light, of overwhelming love, of well-being and peace, and often, the person recounts their near-death experience with unbelievable accuracy. Everything is seen as having a purpose; luck is not mentioned as having played a part, and for that matter, there is no mention of worms either. For this person, believing, is where living begins, and blind luck – firing shots in the dark at a mysterious target – is no longer an option.

Which kind of captain are we seeking? If we are seeking answers, it is by faith that we move forward and not by a string of last-ditch efforts, coordinates that we call out in panic in the heat of battle. Although it may seem simplistic, almost child’s play, I see Captain Lucky standing at the helm in our board game as he watches his fleet destroyed and be swallowed into the drink, wondering how he could have been so soundly defeated. It is too late now for surrender, as he will soon be down amongst the sea worms, being recycled back to nature, before he can acknowledge his defeat. That chance has come and gone.

Taking a Knee at Midfield

There is a special category of card I get every year. It’s the type whose missives are packed with a year’s worth of information and a picture all-in-one. Included in these twelve-month sum-ups are trips, surgeries, house remodeling projects, and usually, how the year went for their family pet as well. Sometimes, it is difficult to tell which figure in the photo is the animal or…is it a family member that just needs a bath and a good shave? In one card I received, there was tall, narrowness, a shadow of a figure that I thought was the bearded father, but who, upon closer examination, was an Irish wolfhound. The skinny dog was squashed between two college sons, beer mugs in hand and home for the holidays, who looked like they had not changed their clothes in a month. Below that there was a description of how the dog had lost its sight in one eye over the course of the year, and now, sadly, bumped into walls as it walked. This condition really seemed more descriptive of the two returning sons, who seemed barely able to stand upright for the Christmas Family photo.

While all of this is part of the unexpected fun we enjoy around the holidays, and God knows we all need our share of jolly holly-ness, some of the greeting cards I receive are apparently printed on home printers using an inferior ink that does not hold up so well in the mail, whose letters are smeared and blotty. These cards make me question the family’s integrity as they arrive with only a few words left that are legible – with questionable phrases like, “probably will be released in a couple of months,” or “due to mechanical failure after takeoff.”

On one card, in explaining the events of their last year on their card, the mother made this comment about their pet snake, a ten-foot boa constrictor named Sly, “who escaped from its cage and unfortunately could not be found in time for the Christmas family photo.” That might have gone over as just a passing comment except there were two toddlers in the picture. Even that could have gone unnoticed, but the father had handwritten this interesting tidbit of information beneath his two children: “Don’t worry friends! When our snake gets hungry enough, it’ll find us.”

Gulp.

I’m always taken aback by those cards that are really disguised as a business proposition. This year, I received a card from a heating and air company who I had asked for quote from twenty-five years ago.  The photo was of a fine-looking family with twelve, (twelve!) children, all dressed cleverly in somewhat grimy, dust covered coveralls holding typical furnace tools, wrenches, filters and the like. The father was holding some sort of rescue dog, an attempt, I think, to give some normalcy to the photo. I took out my magnifying glass, because I do that sort of thing, and upon closer inspection, saw that the dog was wearing a knitted sweater bearing the furnace company’s logo, “Bringing on the Heat,” as slogan I thought entirely inappropriate for a dog, or for a family of twelve.

One year, I tried my hand at one of these all-inclusive cards, except I thought I’d be clever and do a kind of Saturday Night Live version, thinking that the readers would see my parody as humorous or satirical or ironic or possible even genius. I didn’t hear back from any of the people I sent it to – for several years actually – except my neighbor across the street who thought I needed to have my head examined, and suggested I seek medical attention in the New Year, which would be in March since most of the medical community in this area goes to Florida for the winter. Just to be on the safe side, I made that appointment as suggested however, included my medical results in the greeting card I sent out the next year at Christmas, with a QR code that allowed you scroll through the MyChart whose password I can never remember.

I thought I’d learned my lesson after sending that card out and made a private vow to go into the new year being less tacky, perhaps even more classy in my outward manner, give my character some major or minor tweaking, leave out some of the cynicism and so on. I started off by buying some tickets to an NFL game and took my family up to Indianapolis to see the Colts play the Tennessee Titans, which was great fun. It was a couple of days before Christmas and accordingly, the football game was charged with skits and entertaining attempts at audience participation with hardly a dull moment with cannons firing off confetti, or Colts cheerleaders doing flips and cartwheels as they stampeded down the sidelines.

There were some sixty thousand people in the stadium, yet everyone was behaving, enjoying the Colts trouncing the Titans. Laughter was effervescing from every corner. My grandson and I had on ridiculous hats and tried to get on national television by doing some form of the “Gritty,” –all of which was adding up to a memorable outing by anyone’s standards. Of course, on one end of the field, a mammoth TV screen kept a running show of its own going, prompts that told us when to cheer, replays of touchdowns with fireworks, and interviews with the players. I had almost settled into my seat for along winter’s nap, popcorn in hand, feeling that life was complete and that I had reached some imaginary pinnacle in Lucas Stadium, when the screen began showing hilarious pictures of awkward family photos at Christmas time.

We’ve all seen these, of course, they are the same group of pictures we get every year from our friends on the cards I was talking about earlier. One family, for example had about forty- five family members, who were all laying on top of each other, and who had decided to place all the women on the bottom in a sort of epic failed attempt to separate the two sexes. Then, a few pictures later a photo appeared on the big screen of a family whose members had climbed a thousand-foot Ponderosa pine and were standing on branches at various altitudes, with smiles that looked like they might never see each other again.

Still, I was jazzed and laughing like a hyena on a caffeine high until a picture flashed up on the screen of a family, each one dressed in identical striped pajamas. In fact, there were so many stripes flashing across the screen that it had the effect of making everyone slightly  dizzy while looking at the mesmerizing pattern of ridiculous red and green crisscrossing lines. In fact, most of the stadium audience were forced to turn away from the optics just to give their eyes a rest, which created a moment of unusual silence. It was only for a split second, but it was just long enough to give my grandson time to yell out, “Hey, those are OUR pajamas!”

Which was true. Those very pajamas had succeeded in quieting sixty thousand fans, most of whom were looking at us now and trying to figure out how one family could be so unbelievable insensitive to their own appearance.

As I sat trying to make myself as small as possible, putting my jacket over my head and shushing my grandson, I felt the true nature of our family had been revealed to the entire NFL audience in attendance. At the same time, I could feel the chemistry in my body reduced to sub-atomic particles and knew some of the distinctive chromosomes of our family were being filtered out and destroyed, ones like the DNA that gives me my double chin from my great, great grandfather, and the manner in which I mispronounce our first president as Worshington instead of Washington.

If it were not for the final image of the game, a touching moment when the players gathered at midfield to pray, I might have branded myself as part of a family whose pj’s agitated an entire stadium audience at a nationally televised football game. However, a circle of football giants each took a knee, held hands and began praying audibly. I heard God come into the middle of them and speak using words like family, and fellowship, sportsmanship, and love and I heard the word Emanual. Men took off their helmets who, only moments before had been on different teams and had knocked each other down and some, even penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Their heads were bowed and they were all praying and recognizing the blessing that God’s son brought to us by the birth of his son on Christmas. I heard them praying for those who didn’t know about Jesus, and for them to take a knee and ask for Him to come into their hearts today. The circle of players were putting all of their brilliant passes and interceptions and their runs and endzone dances aside, and putting on a different uniform, one of humility, and there was nothing – nothing – awkward about it.

Fifteen Minutes of Pancake Fame

Allow me to cut straight to the chase. I’m a breakfast person, through and through. My stomach makes noises only heard on Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom, so I couldn’t imagine starting my day without digging into the most important meal: breakfast. I know a lot of people who just can’t do breakfast, and I wonder why their bodily organs haven’t walked out on the job or given their owner a pink slip. On the rare occasion I do skip that meal, I face the consequences of a grumbling stomach that, when translated to English, sounds like this:

“Excuse me, EXCUSE ME! We need some help down here! A little sustenance please! It’s a team effort, you know and that includes you up there, Mister-lounge-around-the-house-like-you-got-all-day. Let’s get something down the pie hole stat, for crying out loud!”

In the background I begin to feel the vibrations off my esophageal passage as other major organs begins to pipe in:

“Breakfast, Breakfast, give us something that will last! Breakfast, Breakfast! All we got is fumes and gas!” (over and over til fading out…).

While I can drink the coffee and do the slow wake-up in the pajamas, look under the tree at all of the stash, throw open the shutters and throw out the trash, if I don’t eat something pretty quick after rising, it’s either because I’m in a coma or someone stole our refrigerator in the middle of the night. And since my wife does not eat breakfast unless it’s lunchtime, which is to say, she never eats breakfast, I fend for myself, diving into various oatmeal concoctions or an omelet, calming down the raucous crowd down along the beltline. Then it’s time to get out and let the honey have her kitchen back.

However, there is one breakfast every year that is sacrosanct in my family, one requiring mandatory attendance, and that’s the one on Christmas morning where I personally oversee the cooking of giant, platter size pancakes. Here is where I truly shine, an opportunity to prove that my skill set goes beyond the remote control and into the realm of the classic breakfast cake, and showcasing my cooking skills to the entire Bender clan.  Like Punxsutawny Phil on Ground Hogs Day, my pancakes emerge from the griddle on Christmas morning exuding a golden deliciousness and usher in the festive atmosphere with a declaration that Christmas is alive and well. Not only will those in attendance soon be slathering on the butter and syrup but they can put their name in the hat for a personal invitation to the annual Global Warming Convention for the Advancement of Pancakes, held every year at our house, whose keynote speaker is me.  

I’m not saying that my pancakes are renowned for their unique character and tasty consistency. Nor would I propose that my neighbors line up at sunrise, hoping for a deal-breaking give-away like a pancake version of Black Friday. I’m only stating what has reached near mythic proportions here in the Blunder enclave, the production of a griddlecake so yummy it practically cries to be in a food class all by itself.

Nonetheless, since my reputation has grown over the years, I get a bit of stage fright now, a bit wobbly at the knees, as the temperaments and mood of the morning falls on the success or failure of pancake making skills. I won’t make up an acronym for that feeling because it would not be appropriate but suffice to say that a great batch coming off the griddle can either lift the camaraderie and fellowship to delectable new heights or it can take on the frightening face of Jack Nicolson in The Shining,  a domestic nightmare that turns out flatter than a…well…yea….

But let’s be honest here. It's pretty hard to mess up pancakes and that is one of the reasons why my family gives me full authority over the kitchen for twelve minutes each year. And really that’s fair, because pancakes aren’t complicated – most of what you need comes already prepared in a container – add an egg, some milk and there you go, a gleaming hubcap on a plate with some serious mettle, hold the skid marks please.

But wait. We’ve forgotten one thing, one ingredient, that adds a special level of sophistication to the mix. That would be me, the cook, a variable soul who is afflicted with an overactive imagination, driven by random incongruities such as phases of the moon or the sudden molting exoskeleton of a hermit crab. Then, the recipe for pancakes takes an odd turn, as I throw out all reason and logic and lean solely on inspiration to design a pancake no one has ever seen before, a completely original slapjack. Understand, I’m used to dealing with my muse, that voice that tells me to go off the rails. Sometimes it’s more noticeable than other times, but it’s always there on the surface, an affliction kind of like a birthmark.

“What’s that on your skin?” someone might remark as I go off the grid.

“Oh,” I reply, “that’s just a birthmark. I’ve had it since I was a kid.”

“Interesting, I never noticed that mark at all,” the observer might say, looking rather intently at my arm, “If you look at the right angle,” they add, “it looks a little like the profile of Winston Churchill.”

“Hadn’t heard that one before,” I answer, “but thank you, I guess. Yes, that’s mine. It’s different, for sure. I’ve been told it means I was kissed by an angel, but man, she sure was a sloppy kisser…not something I’ve discussed with my wife, but anyway…”

And so it goes with my creativity. The mark is there, it’s part of me, and part of everything I do, including making those now legendary Christmas pancakes. As a result, my imagination rises to the surface as I mix the pancake batter, sprinkling in sunflower seeds and cranberries and spraying hazelnut whip cream to the final stack. While others who try to make pancakes access the left side of their cerebral cortex, I’m at the griddle with the right side of mine, producing new and different pancakes every year, mixing my batter with chutney or coconut and not to be forgotten…my very favorite… a virtual diabetic nightmare, peppermint Hershey kisses and Nabisco Fig Newtons.

And let’s get something straight right here and now. When I use the word “mix,” I am using the word very loosely when it comes to pancakes. In fact, I looked up the word “mix,” and did not find one synonym that I felt gave my creations the proper holiday flare, not one. I saw words like blend, mingle, stir, jumble and merge, but all of them sounded more like the seasonal parties I went to when I was single, the mingles where my alone-ness got mixed up with other single people’s alone-ness. Flapjacks aren’t meant to be singled out for Pete’s sakes, they are meant to be part of a community of other pancakes, so I searched for better suited word.

And I discovered these: fuse, join, unite and amalgamate. Do they even sound like anything having to do with pancakes? No, they don’t. They sounded like an episode of The Apprentice, which meant that I would have to join a consortium of small businesses, get an audience with Shark Tank and have a board of directors. No, I thought, there will be no amalgamation going on with my Christmas morning pancakes.

Finally, in one last attempt I found these synonyms for the word mix: meld, mesh and blunge, all of which I do anyway right before I brush my teeth and go to bed at night, which falls into the category of a little more information than you need right now.

So no, and No! with a capitol N. Inventing the unique pancake on Christmas morning demanded a new kind of all-encompassing word, a word that would both represent the larger global picture of pancakes, but also a word that would leave enough room for a spatula to slide in and take over, flip the pancake narrative, and make it a sort of one of a kind signature experience for my family so that Christmas breakfast would no longer be just the standard for our household, but more of a destination pancake, a once in a lifetime getaway that could never be ignored or forgotten.

The word I came up with is panoramacakes.

Yes, from now on I would be making the quintessential pancake times two, the panoramacake, a noun describing the full range of what is possible from a global perspective regarding everything pancakey. This would mean I could not only add anything I darn well please to the batter landscape but also sprinkle in that essential ingredient, the one that flips a regular pancake over onto its new side, revealing a panoramic vision for peace and goodwil, for all men.

Thus, as I add a bit of eggnog to the batter, I envision a small town in Germany where a plaid family gathers around the table, singing “Alles Gesundheit,” possibly sneezing, before sitting down to a towering stack of panoramacakes.  Then, as we travel across the globe, we see Australian children on a Christmas Walk-about, who have paused to sit down in the oppressive outback heat, take their daily vitamins with kangaroo extract, and eat a panoramacake with butter made from the milk of a wallaby. We begin to see the whole international picture now, how pancakes can be a unifying force on this special day, Christmas. Even in the barren and remoteness of Siberia, an area that has been purposely omitted from Google maps, a band of Russian herdsman who have been subsisting on nothing but fur and Yak hooves, sit huddled around a fire and make one mammoth panoramacake the size of Moscow and eat it from the outside in, and sip Vodka from their boots.

It's a beautiful picture isn’t it? One large, sweeping, round pancake, the panoramacake, an intercontinental experience that fills the griddle, starts to bubble on top, then rises into the morning air as it flips and rotates in silence like the earth does on Christmas morning, then falls to greet every member of the human race in every kitchen across the globe.

You say it’s just breakfast, that I really shouldn‘t be making such a big deal out of it, but now as you take your first bite, this panoramacake has expanded to the edges of your plate, and the syrup is running off the edge of your table onto the carpeting, across the Strait of Magellan and the Chwynoafx Peninsula in China, into the nickel mines of Sudbury to the Halls of Montezuma. Good will has amalgamated into that humble breakfast cake made with a little flour and a couple of free-range eggs, perhaps a few blueberries or boysenberries, and butter from a Yak if you are so inclined, syrup of course made from dried daisies, crumbled Oreo cookies and maybe a dash of ground sesame seeds and a Fig Newton with nutmeg or even turmeric…

Yuletide Aisle Dis-Ease

The holiday season is creeping up on us like the second hand in a scary movie. No one hears the ticking sound until the camera zeroes in on the gothic metal clock on the wall and the last few seconds tick off in slow motion. Will we make it out of the holiday Twilight Zone before the clock strikes twelve?

I can answer that with one word, Jane. NO. We won’t make it. We will reschedule our schedules and retime our timing until we are exhausted from rearranging our arrangements. We’ll convince ourselves we can go about our regular business and add three extra layers of life on top of everything else and still make our self-imposed deadlines. It won’t be easy, and it won’t look pretty, but we will succeed, at some point, in overdosing on obligations, guilt, and sugar plums dancing in our heads.

I have one piece of advice about the holidays to share before you get revved up with your seven swans a-swimming, and before you realize that there is a month-long holiday season that is beginning to hover ominously. If you heed my advice, you may make it through this month with some sanity, and it pertains to a little-known but often felt ailment called Yuletide Aisle Dis-Ease. This is an affliction you won’t be able to find in any medical book, a condition that has an especially strong presence when you are running in and out of stores and crossing off items on your shopping list.

Here is the set-up. You’ve made a quick dash into the grocery to pick up some banana nut bread for a coffee breakfast you volunteered for. That big scary second hand on the Hitchclock  is ticking, TICK, TICK, TICK, TICK (like that), in your head because your day has already been pressure packed with a to-do list a mile long. You enter the store, grab a cart and hose it down with antiseptic lotion, round the corner and sideswipe someone you haven’t seen in at least ten years.

Jane, I can tell you in one word if this is going to end well. NO.

The problem here is timing. When you run into an old friend at the beginning of your race though the store, it is like trying to stop for a yield sign. You were prepared to yield, but not to stop. In fact, you can’t stop. The yield sign isn’t meant for stopping and neither are grocery stores. But all injuries aside from the near cart pile-up, you exchange low impact hugs as well as buckets of inessential information. Both of you are talking simultaneously, as if you both just stepped out of an airplane together and have only 42 death defying seconds to get every word out.

This is when you must stop, grab a breath, and get a grip on yourself. You need a strategy. You must face the reality that you are going to run into this same person in almost every aisle after you say your goodbyes, because they are on the same holiday grocery aisle skydiving freefall as you are. Like you, they are also running late, feeling pressured, and will be trying to beat you to the next aisle so they don’t have to run into you again and have to think of a new way to say the things that were already said when you both stood catching up on the last decade of relational silence three minutes ago.

The ground is coming up fast on this fall. Jane, this is very dangerous territory, so breathe, get a grip on yourself, think ahead and follow this critical rule.

 Don’t ever use up your best goodbye in Aisle One.

You are going to need those witty sound bites again in the next aisle. Remember: Every aisle in that store holds the potential of another possible encounter with this same person, which will be even more conversationally awkward if you already used up your best goodbye. For example, don’t say: “Goodbye. It was great to see you. Let’s have coffee sometime when things slow down. I’ll text you my number. Ok, now. Take Care. Yes, love you too! Have a great holiday! Bye!”

Instead, just say, “See ya in the next aisle,” and peel out.

If you don’t, everything from this point on just gets worse. If you run into them again, which you will, you’ll be picking out something embarrassing like a tube of head lice shampoo, or hemorrhoidal cream. They won’t be able to talk about that of course, and since you already talked about everything under the sun in Aisle Three, their only recourse is to look down at their shoes and shuffle their feet around in circles as if they lost something down there. What other options do they have?

That’s the MOMENT! That moment is when you know you have Yuletide Aisle Dis-Ease, and there isn’t anything you can do about it. It’s the lockjaw of social encounters. You already have used up your best goodbye. You have shown your sweet holiday side. You’ve used up any reserves of Christmas spirit, all on this one person. Your shopping trip is now stuck in an irretrievable time warp right before your eyes. There is one second left on the Hitchclock. In your head you are thinking of abandoning your cart right there in Aisle Ten and getting your banana bread tomorrow. And you ARE wishing you had head lice instead of this Aisle Dis-Ease.

Say yes to planning ahead! YES! Save those nimble goodbyes until Aisle 4 or 5. Save them! Have a few in your pocket ready like the pull chord on a parachute. They will soften your fall during this holiday season when life gets insanely busy and long-lost friends who said they’d call but never did pop up suddenly like cardboard cutouts of Buddy the Elf. And when they do, don’t say “Son of a Nutcracker! Is that you?”

That’s the one you save for the deli section.

And the Toys Were Hung by the Chimney with Care

With all the anticipation of Christmas, it’s impossible to walk through the excitement without some kind of playfulness, and nothing but nothing says playfulness on Christmas morning like presents. As a kid I got so excited about what was under the Christmas tree that my dad had to medicate me before bedtime with a baby aspirin, which he told me would put me right to sleep. I didn’t want to miss anything during the night in case Santa dropped by, so I slipped the little pink pill to our toy poodle, Coco, who weighed in at about 9 ounces. After eating the pill, Coco wandered down the hallway half asleep to the kitchen where she snuggled into a box of baking supplies and slept like a dog, which she was.

When she woke the next morning and made her wobbly entrance into the living room where we had gathered to open our presents, flour and baking soda fell around her like a scenic snowstorm. For a moment, I thought that maybe my pill had killed our poodle, and that she had died and gone to heaven where she was cleansed and returned as a celestial replica of our former pet. My mom began humming “Angels We Have Heard On High,” and Coco, embarrassed by her new powdery white coat came towards me bearing its toy poodle canines. As she approached, I noticed a strong hint of garlic in the yuletide atmosphere and felt the gaiety of the morning with kids in their pajamas and my dad with his scrimshaw pipe, sadly, get sucked right out of the room.

Thus, as with our family, we are reminded that Christmastime and the sensitive spirit of holiday cheer can change on a dime. We think we are navigating the most precious holiday of the year with the newborn Jesus ushering in new hope. We think we are building another layer of memories, tightening up our relationships, but our get-togethers are not always that straight forward and linear. All it takes is just one person or one incident to throw what should be a predictable line of behaviors into a downward and tragic spiral.

Shortly after hosing down the baking residue from our poodle, our family returned to the business in our living room, complete with twinkling lights and a perpetual nutmeg candle that had been burning every Christmas morning since Armistice Day in 1918. Taking their prominent places in the room were the two staples you could see in all our family photos, a Sears Silvertone record player, and a giant fireplace. The fireplace was built on a brick harth, which allowed us to sit close to it and let the heat penetrate us to the bone. As such it became a kind of a throne, where my mother could insist on drinking her morning coffee without interruption of any kind. Understand that watching her drink coffee for an hour on Christmas morning was pure torture for us kids and rivalled the pain of having our fingernails removed by a pair of plyers. While mom listened to the Silvertone, hot mug in hand, soaking up the heat, we were pumped to open anything we could get our hands on, or what was left of them, when given the go ahead.

I led off on Christmas morning by tearing into an unusually large box to reveal a wooden table of sorts with a lot of tiny bowling pins. This was Skittles, a game played by any number of people involving the winding of a top that spun out into various compartments to knock over standing wooden miniature pins. The farther the top spun into the table, the more pins were knocked over and the higher your score. As I busied myself winding up the top to send it careening and banging off walls my brother Gary had opened his first present, an entire US ARMY base. It came complete with sandbag walls, artillery, lookout nests, several tanks and a megaphone for him to yell out orders during the heat of a military engagement.  I believe there were some four thousand army men in all in Gary’s kit which was more than the entire standing army of the Netherlands at the time.  

By definition, these two presents, the Skittles game and the US ARMY base, supplied my brother and I with enough vocation for the entire next year, given our rather vivid imaginations and our deep-rooted desire to dismantle something when we were in the same room together.

What is important to keep in mind here is that when a kid gets present, whether it is at Christmas time or not, the toy is rarely used the way it was intended. That is because toys are invented by somewhat unbalanced people who had quirky childhoods and relied on something they made to escape the poorly lit recesses of their reality. Where you or I would find a stick on the ground, break it, then drop it back on the ground, toy inventors take the same stick and make it into a magic wand, or an antenna that can pick up conversations in a Russian submarine passing within feet of the border of Norway.

Toys change when they fall in the hands of a kid also because kids think differently. My brother and I were no exceptions. We quickly bored of the intended use of the Skittles game as we understood it, and the army base as well, ditching the directions and opting instead to combine the two toys into one super-toy.  Through a series of unnatural thinking patterns, we realized that the tops from the Skittles, if set spinning around on the living room floor instead of inside their box, could spin wildly around unchecked and mole over huge swaths of army men. I believe now looking back that on a small scale, we had invented the first weapon of mass destruction, a remarkable feat considering our age and that it was Christmas morning.

What happened then can be construed as either a stroke of genius or a miserable lack of parenting skills in our family unit. In either case, it seemed to my brother Gary that the point of the new game should be to figure out a way that the US ARMY soldiers could win every time. I had already discovered that a “V” shape in the leg of a wrought iron chair allowed me to set up the Skittles top in much the same way I did in the board game, so that I could yank the string and send the top spinning out directly across the living room floor. The problem was how to ensure that it knocked over just the enemy soldiers, which would mean the US ARMY would win every time.

“That is the way the Geneva Convention works,” Gary said. “I saw it on TV last Thursday on a Man from U.N.C.L.E. when Illya Kuryakin was in Moscow. You gotta run everything through the Geneva convention when it comes to war.”

I might have argued the point, in spite of the international consequences, but sitting on the brick hearth by the roaring fire had given me a sudden inspiration. If we took advantage of the fire and melted the army men together as one big military mass too large to be knocked over by a Skittles top, our boys in uniform would take on a supernatural power. As we began stacking the soldiers in a pile to melt, I remember Gary and I argues about which soldiers should pull rank and be on the top, whether it should be the guys throwing the hand grenades or the bazooka launchers, but in the end they all were thrown into the heap together, save a couple of army medics for emergency purposes.

I remember being mesmerized, as I watched details in the uniforms disappear, like the ammunition belts and walkie talkies, which melted and drip off. Soldiers who were saluting could no longer hold up their arms at 400 degrees Fahrenheit, and men who were carrying gear buckled under the weight, and tipped backwards until their legs gave out and joined the giant military puddle and a line of plastic smoke. That smoke, which contained chemicals not even allowed in modern warfare, began to permeate the room as the pile of two thousand soldiers became one. The smoke did not rise however, as Gary had planned, but sank down to floor level, liquid-like, as if trying to escape the wrath of my parents, if that could even be done, and began to spread out along the floor into other rooms.

The aroma of the nutmeg candle, which had been burning since 1918, could no longer be detected. There was a threat of the Armistice being revoked because of our country’s attempt to use a lethal plastic toy gas. As Gary had predicted, when these matters are not cleared under the auspices of the Geneva Convention, punishment of the noncompliant country, in this case us, would fall to the commanding officer, who in this case was my father. After he evacuated the room and cleared the air with an industrial size box fan, my brother and I spent the rest of Christmas morning peeling and scraping up thin lines of melted green plastic that had poured into the lines of brick mortar and solidified.

It was a tragic day all the way around, for everyone, that is, except my sister. She had opened her presents and played with them appropriately, and hadn’t tried anything fancy, and apparently hadn’t violated any international peace keeping efforts either. She had instead begun a rehabilitating all the leftover enemy soldiers destined to be run over by a Skittle top and she had instead begun carefully dressing each one of them in her new baby-doll clothes.

By contrast, we sat sweating by the fireplace, gouging out long lines of smelly plastic that imbedded with heads and hands, half melted and protruding while the enemy soldiers who had been earmarked to be creamed by a runaway Skittles’ top, were reinvented as a dainty and precious army of miniature baby dolls. Their identities had changed too, and there was nothing Gary or I could do about it. We heard them being called sweet, lovely names by my sister that made us cringe, names like Karen and Robin, and Kimberly and Dottie, and they became new toys like all new toys do at Christmas.

What You Bring to the Table This Thanksgiving

As family members buzz across the country to join their relatives and our country grinds to a crawl with Thanksgiving festivities, I’ve been asking people what long-standing traditions they practice as they gather around the table, perhaps something that had been passed down generation to generation and has now become part of their family rituals. One friend of mine told me that every year her family makes homemade noodles together and then puts them on top of their mashed potatoes at mealtime. I could make an argument for placing those two items in separate areas on my plate, but that is what defines tradition in their family. It’s part of this uniquely American gala called Thanksgiving, a time to rekindle what brings our nearest and dearest closer together, and in one case that means realizing that if noodles and mashed potatoes can get along on a plate for a couple of hours, everyone else can too. But also, I think it’s a time to exhibiting our gratefulness by revisiting our best table manners as we sit across from each other, thankful for all the blessings that have come our way in the past year.

If you were taking a course on table manners, and there was a final exam, it would be held on this holiday, Thanksgiving Day. While pencil and paper would not be present, passing the course would depend not on how well you crammed the night before, but how well you included the basic social graces your parents taught you, those simple rules of etiquette that score a lot of points on the final report at dinnertime. I won’t say I flunked the manners course as I was growing up, but my score wasn’t anything to brag about either.

One year, my brother and I decided to stage a contest at the table. We thought it would be fun to create volcanoes with our mashed potatoes, fill them up with gravy, carefully constructing a system of channels that allow the gravy to slowly leak out like lava onto the villages we had constructed with our other food. This would of course fall into the category of playing with our food, but we thought it was worth the risk to watch a natural disaster unfold on our dinner plate.  As our game progressed and the gravy ran off into the landscape of our meal, the winner, whose volcanic ash reached the edge first and would yell out, “Please evacuate immediately! Grab your children and run for your lives!”

That attempt at establishing a yearly Bender volcano tradition died a quick death, followed by a moment of silence, and the loss of our TV privileges for the rest of our lives or until we turned twelve, whichever came first.

All seriousness aside, I was fortunate as a kid to have a grandmother living with us, and she loved to cook year-round, but especially at Thanksgiving. In fact, I still have all of her newspaper clippings and hand-written recipe cards stored in a huge plastic box for every kind of dish under the sun, most of which included a couple of sticks of butter in the list of ingredients. And as if adding a couple of pounds of butter weren’t enough, it was common practice at our table to have more butter readily available on the table and a chunk of it on your plate as backup in case you experienced a butter-low and bottomed out during the meal. Under those circumstances, and given what we know now about cholesterol, I don’t know how my grandmother lived to be ninety-four. There is some evidence that she didn’t, but actually died several times before from butter overdoses, once at 37 and once at 72, but was revived both times using a now antiquated technique referred to as marginal compressions.

Obviously, our family threw out the healthy eating rulebook when Thanksgiving rolled around and while it sounds cheesy, I believe our parents balanced out all that thick cooking with equal amounts of laughter and love, and naturally, large portions of manners. The reminders to behave at the table were often summed up in old-fashioned sayings, sayings that made little sense to me at the time, such as “If you wear a hat at the table, you’ll die in a stable.” Every time I heard that, I visualized a horrible accident where I fell off a haystack in a horse stable and impaled myself on a pitchfork, only to find myself looking up at my grandmother, who simply looked down at me and said, “I tried to tell you but you had to learn the hard way, didn’t you?”

Respectfully, many of those old rules for civility still hold court with my family today as we sit down for the meal and let those etiquette tips whisper in our ears.  And notice I didn’t say “plopped down for the meal.”  It seems that current tradition supports the notion of landing on your dinner seat as if tossed from an airplane, which would fall into the category of skydiving, not table manners. In order of succession, we were not allowed to sit down at all until my father, the breadwinner, was seated and after that, the women. That sitting order is a lost art now, falling by the wayside into a set of forgotten mores that made eating a civilized activity, where knives, for instance, were balanced across the back of the plate after each use, and not laid back down on the placemat between bites.

While a more rickety construction of cultural changes have bent many of the old rules on table decorum, I’m now glad for the mandatory class I enrolled in every time I came to the table and waited before taking my first bite until my father picked up his silverware. While I did not always adhere to all of the regulations, good manners created a language of gratefulness and were a silent way of recognizing all the goodness that was laid out before us. It meant that civility would rule, meaning that no one would have the power to turn the dinner gathering into some kind of big-time wrestling match where etiquette was thrown clear of the ring for a cheap laugh.

As I was on the receiving end of the teaching, mealtime could at times seem very stiff and formal, a lot of hoopla over nothing. Both my mother and father did a lot of correcting and redirecting that ultimately developed an appreciation in me for what it takes to bring a meal to the table. While I didn’t like being told nine times to get my elbows off the table, chew with my mouth closed, and put my napkin on my lap, over time I began to understand that if someone was taking time to do the grocery shopping, prepare the food and present it, the very least I could do was to bring my best manners to the table and leave any slovenly habits I’d developed somewhere else.

Perhaps you are part of a Thanksgiving meal that looks more like a Viking reunion – where licking your fingers is normal, and huge bites of turkey are stabbed as if it the turkey was still alive. Perhaps the blessing at your home, if said at all, sounds like “Good food, good meat, good God, let’s eat.” However, by the time the sweat equity of cooking had poured itself into the marathon of overnight baking and broiling it was expected that we kids would try a bite of each type of food even if we didn’t like it, and not expect any seconds on our favorite dish until everyone had their first helping.

Did I like being corrected? No, but I see the pay off now as I mourn the loss of decency, replaced by people on their phones, reaching across the table for more food, and chasing their food around their plate with a knife as if it were dirt on a construction site. It makes me wonder how digestible their actions are when the meal is over and they go out into the world.

Manners, when we decide to bring them to the table, become the social glue that holds those tasty Thanksgiving casseroles together and demonstrate our gratefulness, good fortune and good bounty. As we lay our napkins on our laps and wait our turn for the favorite dish to come around the table, we avoid mocking the hard work that went into all the preparations. No doubt, you’ll get enough food this Thanksgiving, but your social graces and good manners will instill a silent but powerful message to those seated next to you of what thankfulness looks like and perhaps even establish some new traditions that will last longer than just one meal.

And one more thing…I would love to hear what table manner your parents instilled in you that held you in good stead as a grown-up. Send those gems to me and I’ll share them with my listeners next week on Knee Deep. There are some funny ones out there, and some that are written in stone, but regardless, send me the details! Until then, Happy Thanksgiving to you, my gracious fans, and I promise you this year, I’m going to refrain from making that mashed potato volcano. I don’t want to have to evacuate our family when the gravy spills over and overtakes the sweet potatoes.

Either Way You Slice It: Part Two

I had waited an entire day at Annie’s Brickyard Truckstop Diner, waiting for a call from a mechanic I never met at a garage I never heard of. There is nothing like doing nothing that will make you mind wander, and mine had been wandering plenty.

Whatever the mechanic was going to tell me wasn’t going to be good – I knew that for sure, but if he could patch up enough to get me across four states and home, I could live with whatever he told me. Until then, all I could do was wait, eat my breakfast, and watch semis roll in and out, dragging their dirt and gas fumes behind them. During the last day at the diner, I had read everything that hung on the walls, twice. In the narrow hall back by the restrooms, I had scoured hand-written notes on the bulletin board and read local notices about foreclosures, and OSHA regulations. Stapled along the edges I read notes like these: “Babysitter wanted, must have driver’s license,” or “Maytag washer, rusty but works great.” On and on they went, layers of them, some yellowed and illegible.  

I was stuck in Checker Saddle – not even a town really – because of an overheating radiator and who knows what other headaches. No one knew me, and I had little to show for my joy ride across the country that was supposed to open the throttle on a long-distance relationship. It didn’t and I was stuck with this view of Annie’s parking lot, and smelling clouds of dust and oily asphalt, staring at a plate of pumpkin pancakes with pumpkin flavored syrup.

The pay phone rang, and my waitress grabbed it, balancing her tray of eggs.

“Anybody here got a pick-up being worked on?” She said, holding the phone out like a statue.

“That’s me,” I said, and got up to zig zag between tables to grab the phone.

“Hey Bud,” came the mechanic’s voice, “got your truck ready, but all I could do… really… is put Band-aids on it. I’ll drive it over and we can talk about what works.”

“Ok,” I managed, but I didn’t really want to hear it.  And did he say, “what works?”

That didn’t sound good, I thought, like my truck was dying a slow death. I already knew the tires were bald, the fanbelt was worn, and the tailpipe was held on by a bungee cord. The only thing I knew that did work was the color, a razor blue that couldn’t be ignored.  I stood in the parking lot, listening to the mechanic describe my truck on its last leg – the rebuilt carburetor and a battery that wouldn’t hold a charge – “enough to get you down the road,” the mechanic said, but no guarantees.

I handed him some cash and climbed in, adjusting the wing mirror.

“Oh! And don’t go over fifty!” It was the last thing I heard and I managed a wave, and glanced at the Brickyard marque flicker orange as I pulled out. The only thing looking east now was utter flatness and a monotony of tawny dust and boulders. Still, I had one good memory there at Annie’s when I heard a trucker mention that there had been talk of making the truck stop the new location for the United Nations, a nod to the soothing effect that the world’s best pumpkin pie had had on everyone who ever walked into the diner.

“Hey, believe it or not, that idea almost flew,” I heard him say. “Being right on the continental divide and all, the pie supposedly has some magical effect on people.”

But I couldn’t imagine a place like Checker Saddle, which fell right on the fold of my road map, being the location for worldwide diplomacy, the United Nations. Anyway, I had had enough of Annie’s and I leaned into the wheel for the long slog through some serious stretches of highway, hoping to make it home by Thanksgiving.

An hour later, when my coffee started to wear off, the mechanic’s comment came back to me. “What works” he said about my truck. Like that was less than what didn’t work?

 “I’ll tell you what works,” I said out loud, angry, “classic side paneled windows, that’s what , and wipers that run off a vacuum. That’s what works for me. Where do you find that anymore in a truck?” I knew right then it was going to be a long, slow descent back to the Midwest if I was going to start arguing with myself and I glimpsed at the expanse of farmland full of cows. Lots and lots of cows, standing frozen like cardboard cutouts.

My coffee was wearing thin and a parade of passing cars made me feel like time was moving backwards. There is nothing like doing nothing to make your mind wander, and past mistakes I had made seem to be riding right beside me. I was going over those bumps and potholes I had hit earlier in my life. Now they seemed deeper and felt more like regrets, deeper each time I went over them. I was picking fights with my own circumstances, and blaming everything around me, especially myself, until it seemed like I was trying to wipe clean even the parts of my life that were good. With a thousand miles of highway still to go, I was downshifting hard – on both my truck and myself – and anything that still worked.

The worst of it centered on the nasty and unnecessary comments I had made about Mr. Pumpkin and they began to rush forward. My sour opinions and judgements about the overly consistent nature of pumpkin pie, about its blandness and lack of personality, was rising to meet me head on. I could try to say I’m sorry for the succession of insults I had spewed out, or I could ignore these wrongs from my past and continue this same road.

I looked down the highway as the unchanging yellow lines swept by, lines that converged a long way off and ended at some dot on the horizon. My eyes had been staring at that dot for too long, and I was squinting hard, looking for some new point of reference. There was a destination out there – where the earth rose up slightly – and perhaps my guilt set it off, I’m not sure, but I thought I begin to notice veins of light, little pulses popping up along the landscape, just under the surface and they were igniting other lights out in front of me. I remembered reading about how pumpkin vines crisscrossed the earth and wondered if those thousands of interlocking pumpkin vines were sending a message to me. I realized they were the flashes of brilliance I needed to see. It was time to adjust my rearview mirror on life, get the gears rolling again, make amends where I needed to, perhaps to Mr. Pumpkin himself.

I came around a long bend and suddenly saw a tattered billboard with a tattered advertisement shredded from the weather. One lightbulb illuminated the torn surface: Something, something… it read, but I couldn’t put it together and slowed down. Then I saw this at the top in bold letters: BEST PUMPKIN PIE, NEXT EXIT. and perhaps the exit number, and that was all.  

I pulled over and stared up at it. I saw a faded picture of a plate of pumpkin pie and it enveloped me with a memory of what goodness and sweetness tasted like, and I let it seep into my bones and  through the blue color that was the only solid thing left to about my truck. Nobody had to be strong here, not me, not my Chevy. I just had to surrender to the past, let my heart make its apology to Mr. Pumpkin and his nation, and then, God willing, everything would fall into place for a while until the next sign for pumpkin pie came along. Follow the billboards home. Yes, I thought, that is what works, that’s what the mechanic meant. There was still more goodness out there for me, waiting, in the next billboard if I looked for it. And forgiveness would be granted to me at each sign as they appeared – that was what really worked.

Long hours later, I turned off the highway whose traffic had all but disappeared and wound my way through the old familiar streets of my neighborhood, and glimpsed the stop sign that was still bent from a bicycle crash that required ten stiches, and around the final corner. I hoped a family would be waiting up, and a door would open, and all my regrets would die there on the front door and be replaced by the smell of everything that had been baking for the last twenty-four hours.

I saw one glowing pumpkin at the end of the block holding vigil against the dark. It was sitting proudly beneath a maple I had climbed a million times, a tree that had been my childhood hideaway from too much worldly noise, a place where ridicule could not be heard. Now, sitting stately under the tree was one lantern of welcome, a large, lone pumpkin with a single word carved in capital letters, letters that filled the yard with their outlines. The message was a kind of transfiguration – a glowing radiance that had something to say about what the past meant and my return home. Carved in the pumpkin was one word, and it was JOY, and it beamed like a brilliant smile just for me, pure and orange.

Either Way You Slice It

I must admit I have been so confused about the identity of the pumpkin that over the years I have both extolled its great qualities one minute, then lambasted its merits the next. Listeners that have been privy to my stories about pumpkins, have been witness to the times when the leader of the Pumpkin Nation, Mr. Pumpkin, has railed on me for what he has called, “the ruthless and insensitive slurring of the pumpkin family, which is rooted in long-standing moral fiber and of course, high-quality topsoil.”

While I have not heard from Mr. Pumpkin in two years, I have a sneaking suspicion he is still angry at me due to my comments about his inadequate taste. This time of year, I am particularly sensitive. I believe Mr. Pumpkin has positioned his carved cousins everywhere I go, particularly on porches, where they can spy on me, and monitor my every move. Messages are then sent to him using a rarely used font called Gurmuhki Sandham Bold, a cryptic font that can only be decoded by pumpkin decoders at Pumpkin Headquarters.

Lest you listeners are taking all this lightly, let me remind you that this pumpkin family of Cucurbitaceous includes some 965 members that, if lined up next to each other, would circle planet Earth nine times, no small feat for a mushy carbohydrate that still hasn’t quite decided whether it is a fruit or a vegetable. Infrared satellite imaging has indicated an interconnection of family roots just below the earth’s surface, creating an intercontinental pumpkin communication system far exceeding anything scientists thought possible. From that system, a vast population of some 150 million pumpkins are produced and carved each year in our country, or one pumpkin for every two and half people. That half person, a tragic mathematical anomaly, would explain why so many pumpkins are never fully carved, and remain half-finished carved pumpkins with just one eye, or a half-carved mouth that has just a few teeth. I would mention some of the other deformities, but I run the risk of having my phone tapped or being followed in the produce section when I shop for melons.

The first time I became aware of the power of Pumpkin Nation was when my car broke down in Checker Saddle, Montana and I had to stay a night at Annie’s Brickyard Truck Stop, a motel and diner which according to a nearby billboard, had the best pumpkin pie east or west of the Continental Divide. For those of you who are geographically challenged, the Continental Divide is a boundary that divides North America’s river systems, with each side eventually emptying into separate seas. Reportedly, if a raindrop fell on the west side of the divide, for instance, it would end up in the Pacific Ocean. I don’t personally know how it would do that without stopping in Las Vegas to see Elvis, but that is the theory. Rain falling on the other side, however, flows east, stopping to flood an intersection near our home every time there is a downpour, and then eventually flowing into the Gulf of Mexico.

Interestingly, Annie’s Truckstop Diner was built squarely on the Continental Divide, which means that there naturally will be some interesting encounters with customers, and pumpkins there. While taking their seat on a stool at the bar, these patrons order a piece of Annie’s pumpkin pie, the most neutral tasting of all pies, and after taking their first bite, become anesthetized to any strong feelings about anything one way or the other. The service is not that great, really, and the view from the diner is not that scenic either, but the blandness of Annie’s pumpkin pie makes up for all that. Customers who come in wound tighter than a Swiss clock, step on the Continental Divide, have a piece of pie, and detach from their rough and tumble world.

Picture, for example, if you will, a piece of pie being served to an elderly couple who just stumbled into Annie’s. They are exhausted from traveling in their rented RV, and their partials hurt from sucking on too much hard candy. They dovetail into their booth, and begin eating their soft pumpkin slice, looking more and more relaxed as if they just entered a jacuzzi, floating in bubbles and ready to take on the next leg of their trip, a grueling nine-hour marathon to the flats of Iowa. It’s the pie of course that does that, but it is also the idea that while they were eating the world’s most mushy and agreeable desert, they were enjoying it while sitting on the continental divide, with no worries about falling off the mental deep end either way.

Apparently, people like that come in from across the nation all the time at Annie’s, knowing that the pumpkin pie has not been baked with any commitment towards either side of the line, or on behalf of one ocean or another. Folks that normally could not stand to even look at each other – are perfectly content to pull up a stool and order a piece of completely objective and uncomplicated pumpkin pie, pie that does not stand out in any way by taste or form or consistency and have conversations free of histrionics or drama. These people are in the middle of a carb high, a euphoric pumpkin haze that was documented by Cucumberly Ross in her landmark book, The Five Stages of Pumpkin Recovery.

So well-known is the diner’s reputation that Annie’s was recently offered up as a negotiating location after a recent statewide teacher strike. Both parties arrived, ate their pie and ironed out their differences in forty-five minutes.  The state agreed to put in more dry erase boards and give teachers Christmas Eve and Christmas day off. On their side of the Continental Divide, teachers agreed not to be so cranky when a child raised his hand for the fourteenth time, and both parties wiped the pumpkin pie off their lips with napkins that had a capital A printed on them, shook hands, and walked out laughing, telling jokes about how back in the day schools had only one fire drill per year.

Can you see now how a stop at the diner for a piece of pumpkin pie held this kind of magic? One day early last Spring, a biker couple sped into the diner’s gravel lot in a cloud of flying dust, came to an abrupt halt, and began making snarly comments to one another even before they walked through the diner door and let the unbiased nature of the Annie’s pie work its miracle. A sudden rainstorm came up, unusual for the area, and somehow, although the details aren’t clear, the angry bikers were washed down separate sides of the Continental Divide, eventually being carried to separate oceans to cool off. When they made their way back to Checker Saddle and to Annie’s again, calmer temperaments prevailed and they allowed themselves to eat the tasteless and uninspiring pie first before they spoke another word to each other.

Annie herself commemorated their decision by framing a picture of them sharing a piece, a picture that hold a proud spot back in the kitchen behind the oven. The Divide, coupled with the pumpkin pie, has that effect on people who use their words sparingly and eat first before spouting off opinions about how this or that ought to be or should be and could be, and give each other the what-for and why-not and Bob’s-your-uncle, and so forth and so on ad infinitum. Burst of anger just are not necessary when you sit at the capitol of stability – Annie’s Truckstop – with a plate of overly palatable pumpkin pie.

Be that as it may, I recently have had to confront my whole belief system on pumpkins, and although it has taken some time to come around, I have come to believe that pumpkin pie does have distinguishing merits beyond just its affable, monotonous nature. Recently a photograph came into my possession which shows me at the age of five, gorging myself on a canned version of pumpkin. It appears as if very little of the dish made it into my mouth, which I took as evidence that I had an eating disorder of some kind, yet I must admit that seeing myself at such a young age, vulnerable yet unmannerly, covered with orangey-brown crusty pie goop…well…frankly, I was flooded with emotions. Clearly, I had stuffed back a lot of pumplings, short for pumpkin feelings, over the years, that I am only now coming to grips with.

So, many years later, leaning back in my booth there in Checker Saddle, Montana with my triangular desert, I thought of Mr. Pumpkin, an old adversary, and hoped he was doing well. I had not heard from this leader of the Pumpkin Nation, as I said before, in almost two years and I had been very careful not to say anything negative about him. I had assumed he and his constituency – the gourds, melons, and zucchini – had moved on to bigger pastures, that he had forgiven me for references I had made on previous podcasts about pumpkin spice, pumpkin candles, pumpkin mathematical formulas, and one comment in particular, a slam about talk show hosts that wore puffy pumpkin sweatshirts.

Looking through the local newspaper, The Innocuous Herald, I read that both presidential candidates had bypassed Checker Saddle on their campaign trail, and therefore missed an opportunity to eat some pumpkin nothingness at the last stop you can make for miles in this part of Montana. They both could have sat for hours, and not only found nothing to argue about, but they would have left the diner with a new continence, an orange glow, as if they have been worshiping in a pumpkin field all day, praying for the future ripening of the next generation of pumpkins.

“Have time for a piece of pie?” Annie would have said to them, as they entered the diner.

“Time? Pie? Oh, well, gosh, yes, we do. I’ve heard it’s very, very good here,” they both would have answered as they sat down in a booth.

Then there’d be a misty warmth, not dominating, but a delicate, trickling waft that might smell of nutmeg. Its omnipotence would drift upwards, not to the left or right, but straight up, because at Annie’s Truckstop, this most blasé desert, inert pumpkin pie was being baked in the oven. Annie would then serve them each a piece, and their plates would slide silently across the table, uncommitted, neither east nor west, but directly on the continental divide.

Happy 102nd and Climbing, Dad!

In the wee hours of the morning last Tuesday, we learned of our country’s new president, and although there were still a few states left to weigh in, all the hoopla of rallies, and slogans and posters was fading into the background of new leadership. As it happened, my adrenaline was  burning like a newly lit birthday candle as my own father, leader of our family, turned 102 years old the day after the election. He had seen 18 different presidents come and go in his over one hundred years, and although he couldn’t remember what any of them had done with their four or eight years in office, he did mention the time President Regan’s dog, an Irish Setter named Peggy, squatted on the White House lawn to do her business. As a urologist, my dad noticed things like that. Well, Happy 102nd Birthday Dad, and welcome everyone else to Knee Deep, episode 83. I’m reprinting an essay I wrote about him several years ago when he turned one hundred, an essay that gives credence to his role as a soldier, a father, a grandfather and now a great, great grandfather and one I think is worth republishing given the historic nature of this week in our country. For more stories and glories, visit IG @authorjeffbender or go to my website at jeffmbender.com. This episode is dedicated to all the loyal and brave leaders of our government who keep us safe and allow me to have the freedom to even have this podcast. Thanks, and Happy Birthday Dad!

When I was in college, I went to hear a speaker named Tom Hayden, a political activist. Hayden was thought of as kind of a kook at the time, speaking about the blunders of the Nixon administration, and against America’s involvement in the Vietnam War. He made a comment during his lecture I did not expect to hear from a man who had spent his life rebelling, and the comment stuck with me ever since. In describing a demonstration where he and other protesters were surrounded by American tanks that had their muzzles pointed down at their sit-in, he came to grips with his own anger and realized he didn’t like himself very much.

I’m paraphrasing here, but in essence Hayden said this: “Many of you sitting out there can’t stand your parents. You don’t like who they are and what they stand for. I can tell you, that day when I was looking down the barrel of a tank, I realized that whatever I was so angry about wasn’t my parents’ problem. I was my problem, and if I didn’t learn to forgive my father or mother, I would never learn to like myself, because in the end, we are all the products of our parents, and the sooner we come to the end of who they are and start looking at who we are, the sooner we can start making a difference.”

That was the moment I realized I didn’t like my father very much either, or myself.

If we are smart, we go through life keeping the best of what we have learned from our parnets and not dwell on our own mistakes. Those of us who choose to ignore our errors, however, risks dragging our anger into the future for the next generation to deal with. Our blunders, when ignored, are dumped in the corner like so much dirty laundry and left there stinking until they unwearable.

How do we learn from our past and let go of it at the same time? We do so by taking time to look both backwards at the things our parents taught us, and forward at the same time, like Tom Hayden did. At some point, a healthier world must do the same thing, that is, look in both directions to accurately see where it is going. If we can take that stance, of looking at ourselves in the middle, and press forward, we will be able to take responsible for cutting off the dangerous cycles of the past, reload the washing machine of history so to speak, and try a more thorough rinse cycle on ourselves.

We may begin with a dangerous assumption that our independence and courage will fix the world, but if we are taking a close look at our parents and who they are, we learn that our interdependence, relying on each other, makes the world better. We can try to live without looking at our shadow, but inevitably, as we stand motionless, we will realize we have become one dimensional without it, with no history of the darkness or the light that got us here. It is our history that marks our past – is the best and the worst of what we have done thus far – and it is best to pay attention to it before we too are looking at a tank looking back at us.

I have only seen my father cry one time, and that was after the funeral of his mother. I have no doubt that my father wanted to cry when one of his patients died during surgery, or when he was alone, serving out his military stint in Korea, but other than that one time, I have never witnessed his tears. When I was very young, I once ask my grandmother why my dad never cried. Her answer, which made a strong impact on me, is that he didn’t have time to cry.

 From that answer, it would be a mistake to think that he led a charmed life, that throughout his lifetime, there was not much cause to cry. His history tells a different story. Before Dad was ten years old, he had lost his only brother to muscular dystrophy, a fact that may have established his resolve to become a doctor. My father also watched the early passing of his mother from the fog of a tragic mental illness, and he tried to love his distant and dismissive father who held everyone at arm’s length. My dad was also deeply saddened when Gary, his oldest son, died at fifty from a sudden heart attack and left him with a burden of guilt both as a doctor and a father. Many times, I’m sure, he has held himself responsible for not securing a healthy future for Gary, but I have not seen my dad cry.

In the story of how my dad conducted himself, I do not see a man that was so callous that he could not cry, but, like those of his generation, a man that had seen so much pain that the outpouring of emotions were not a luxury he could allow himself. When President Kennedy stated, “It is not what your country can do for you, it is what you can do for your country,” my father was already looking forward to a place where our best history was in front of us, and trusting those inalienable rights spoken of in America’s declaration. His was not from a generation that whined and cried. It was a generation whose survival would not come by way of spilt milk as the world became unhinged by ruthless dictators, diseases, and great depressions. Men did not cry together as much as they pulled together, they did not fuss as much as they held on, and they did not crusade as much as they went into combat.

My dad was a witness to the loss of personal freedoms in the hopelessness and hollowed eyes of North Korean prisoners indoctrinated to believe that human life is completely expendable and worthless. Framed in his study is a written statement, conveying the distressing nature of communist ideology:

“As an American doctor serving in Korea my assignment has been serving Communist prisoners of war for many months and giving medical support. In spite of the hazardous nature of this work, the task proved to be the most revealing experience of my life. I have been able to work in intimate contact with an enslaved people who are the products of a communist dictatorship providing for me a vivid contrast with our democratic ideology.

One notices that propaganda had so entwined their minds in the roots of suspicion and antipathy that many refused medical care and died or suffered severe complications even when they could see all about them the compatriot lives that had been saved by the skill and sincerity of Americans.

Justice was wielded through kangaroo courts. Prisoners who showed disobedience, dissention or the slightest suggestion of reluctance to accept the Communist doctrine or purposes, were often bludgeoned or stabbed to death by their leaders.

The attitude toward others was rebellious and aggressive; cooperativeness was replaced by unreasonable demands. Agreements were made to be slyly violated. These men lived in an atmosphere of mutual distrust, with the curse of fear as the chief instigation for their actions.

Their only God was their leader, their only religion Communism. One noted a complete loss of individualism; These people could no longer think for themselves. They became automatons, puppets to be easily moved into destructive or suicidal actions by the capricious strings of their leaders. So immune to the slavery had they become, that is separated from their leaders their spirits withered like a leaf separated from it stem.

As the months passed, I came to realize that in the past I had accepted American citizenship with smug naivete; but that in the future I would regard it with the deepest respect and humility. I had learned by sharp contrast that the preservation of individual character and integrity and respect was a most cherished possession of Americans. Freedom of worship of a God and religion of our choice is a unique privilege not enjoyed by the enslaved peoples of the world. I had learned that justice according to the whims of a dictator or excited mob results in death; that “justice for all” is a percept only of a free nation. I had learned that government structures built on sophistries, fear, and guile result in personal degradation and the ultimate results border on slavery.

And finally, I had learned that our ultimate happiness as Americans was a function of valuable heritages of freedom and justice and inviolate respect for individual human dignity. I am proud and thankful for my American citizenship.”

When dad wrote that in 1952, he did not know his future. If any of us make it to one hundred years old, like he has, it may be because we don’t give ourselves the luxury of crying when the proverbial barrel of a tank is pointed at us. In our longest season, when our own sun is sinking, the one where our lives cast the longest shadow, we will be able to stand firm as my dad did and know the difference between right and wrong, between evil and good, between adversity and triumph. We will be forward looking, as my dad has been his last one hundred intrepid years, and not give in when darkness is the easier path to take. Rather, we will walk forward as he did, in the light of a brighter future, with an “inviolate respect,” the same one that determined my father’s legacy, and then know that it can be our legacy also.

It WAS Melba Peach, with the Crock Pot, on the Porch

This last week I threw caution to the wind and tried to squeeze in one more Indian Summer project before Old Man Winter got cranky. Ignoring all the safety labels that suggested I do otherwise, I decided to paint the beat-up seventy-year-old concrete on our back porch. The pamphlets on staining concrete suggested application temperatures above fifty degrees and emphasized avoiding any foot traffic for two weeks. I disregarded all that information and applied the paint when it was thirty-seven and then walked on it the next day. I was convinced that any damage I made would look better than the decrepit concrete pad which, by the way, had an enormous glaring stain in the middle of it. Over the years I’ve had plenty of time to study that stain, and I have concluded that its mysterious shape bore an eerie resemblance to the chalky-white victim outlines you see in detective movies.

I’m not saying the shape had to be the result of a murder, of course. It could be that the outlined person/shape could have resulted from a person falling off our roof, except that the shape looked more like it had shifted forward, not straight down, leaving me to conclude that the victim was hit from behind. Secondly, the human shaped stain had to be made from something that could withstand all types of weather and could not be washed away easily, like grease. Using my deductive reasoning, I concluded it was probably the grease from spilt burgoo soup, a local favorite of southern Indiana, and the murder weapon, of course, would be the crock pot that was holding it.

At first, I thought the grease stain might come from a crock pot of chili, but now I don’t believe that is the case. People at a Fall party in Indiana normally devour chili as if it is their last meal, so there wouldn’t have been any of that left as the murderer left our back door, crock pot in hand. Burgoo, while popular around here, does not have quite the same appeal, and there would have been some left over that would have emptied itself over the concrete after the victim was knocked on the head – a horrible thought – but necessary if we are to get to the bottom of this back porch mystery.

After years of looking at the stain, I could not entertain the idea of looking at that human-like shape much longer, crying over spilt burgoo as it were, and so I began focusing on the chore of picking a paint sample from the thousands of choices available at the local paint store. Turns out, the number of color samples there numbered in the hundreds, giving me full reign to use the word plethora, as in there were a plethora of color samples available for me to choose, and not when describing the remains of an enormously beaked flightless dinosaur, unearthed in the Ngorongoro Crater in 1922.

As Halloween was approaching, I narrowed my color samples down to a batch of twenty-seven different oranges, resulting in a lot of squinting that required me to use a small bottle of moisturizing eye drops. At that point I considered just gluing all my samples down in a repeating patten and not paint anything at all. Who cares if my porch looked like a checkered Amish quilt from Vermont? As long as the burgoo stain was covered and there’s no evidence of murder, I asked myself, does it really matter?

Turns out, it did matter, quite a bit actually, because everyone of the color samples I picked had a name suggestive of a unseemly murder, names that were evocative of all things slightly sinister. I had read the entire collection of Agatha Christie’s mysteries, and knew, of course, that suspicion by its very nature is never slight, and that all my paint samples were absolutely, very, very, slightly suspicious. For example, one choice for our porch was a color named Delicious Fog, a dark gray with a hint of orange if you looked at it when there is a full moon. I thought immediately of a scene from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of Baskervilles, when a savage murderous beast is heard howling from the bogs of the Grimpen Mire, and decided then that using Delicious Fog might suggest that our porch was part of some cover-up and that through infrared technology one might see a stain had been scrubbed for hours with a hard bristled brush to erase evidence of a murder by crock pot filled with leftover burgoo.

As I looked through other favorite samples, I noticed that all of them had, as I said before, a suspicious character. For organizational purposes, I divided them into three categories, first, second-, and third-degree orange samples, the least offensive being the third-degree kind. Burnt Cavern and Rustling in the Night immediately came to the forefront as options, with Terra O’Cotta floating in as a close second. Terry Who? A quick google search led to one Terry O’Cotton, close enough I thought, a now deceased Irish gang member whose body was found at the bottom of a ceramic brick kiln. On that tragic and gory note, I eliminated the color of Terra O’Cotta altogether. My wife has some stellar Irish heritage running through her veins, and invading our cozy back porch with a color that puts her ancestry in a bad light, even if a terra cotta orange, might create some marital discord, particularly if we all took a ceramics class together.  I moved on to the next level, a striking, no pun intended, series of second-degree orange samples.

Here, the names began to get downright dark, names like Knives Out Tan, Thrown Headlong Off A Rusty Bridge, and the worst, Deader’n Doornail Bronze. All of these, mind you had the orange tint or shade I was seeking, but left me feeling that, instead of covering up the shape of a creepy chalked outline, I would be covering up evidence for, and thus somehow complicit in, some kind of wrongdoing. It seemed unlikely that I would be implicated in a crime just by making a poor color choice for a back porch, but stranger things have happened in the grisly business of second-degree orange choices. I had a family, and a legacy to consider, which seemed to me, as I studied the names on the swatches, superseded any selfish wishes I had for beautifying my back porch.

At this point in the process, I began to get very anxious. I was running out of orange possibilities. Out of literally hundreds of possible choices, I was now left with only a few selections, and unfortunately, they were all first-degree samples, the most gut-clenching and nefarious of all. These samples give even the most experienced detective night sweats and have names whose records are stamped with the word UNSOLVED and left sealed in the archives of police records. No one looks at those records once they are filed away, much less consider them as a color choice for a back porch. They are case mysteries, with inconspicuous suspects and missing murder weapons. Occasionally, there is a breakthrough, as in the case of a detective who was only days from retirement and gave one of the unsolved files a last look. He deduced the fatal weapon used was an icicle, which quickly melted, leaving nothing but an irrelevant puddle of water.  That color sample’s name? Icicle Orange. And that is a sample you put away and don’t ever mention again.

This is a very tender subject of course and we are a tender, sensitive group at our house. Something as simple as a color choice, while seemingly harmless to most families, is like a slow leaky faucet around ours. We have sensitive minds around here that drip slowly, and those drips begin to sound louder and louder as they echo off the metal of our stainless-steel brain late at night. Our thoughts turn our psyche into a dark rusty orange around our house and by Wednesday we realize that we haven’t talked to each other since last Saturday, that we have been bothered by some torturous noise in the background, or possibly what is beneath that layer of Icicle Orange we used on our porch.

I realized that, and found myself back at the paint store, this time inspecting much more tranquil selections, gray swatches with names like Open-Minded Synchronicity or Light Drizzle and my personal favorite, Warm Flannel Pajamas. Those names did not have quite the punch that the orange samples had, but then punch wasn’t a word that we were using anymore, especially not ever on our back porch.

Speak Softly and Carry a Big Jell-O Salad

When I was a kid, my grandmother advised me to stay away from three topics in conversations. One was politics, the second was religion, and the third subject she advised me to stay clear of was her recipe for Jell-O salad, which was passed down from generations of Patterson women who prepared their Jell-O concoction in a jello mold ordered from an 1888 Sears catalog.

Grandma, if you can hear me, I won’t touch your Jell-o recipe today, but I’m going to broach those other two topics – politics and religion. This is risky business for a podcast that touts itself as scrumptious and easy to swallow. However, I find it difficult to wade into the world without occasionally taking the deeper plunge – in this case that would mean weighing into the gelatinous mixture of our upcoming election. In a few weeks it’ll all be over though, and our emotional investment will jiggle its way back down a degree or two.  Still, whether your candidate wins or loses, we both will still have one thing that didn’t change at all and that is my grandmother’s Jell-O recipe and the metal goldish-colored mold it went into.

Grandma Patterson’s recipe survived many spirited presidential elections throughout the twentieth century. Her father was a staunch Democrat and union president for Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, back when that company’s union stance was a kind of gold standard for Democrats. This was first made evident to me when a carpenter, and also a Republican, was hired to work on my grandmother’s apartment and gave her a generous sampling of his homemade Jell-O salad. He had worked as a cook in the military and claimed, as he handed her his homemade Jell-O fruit salad, that the best cooks in the world were men. He would have been smarter to say, “there’s always room for Jell-O, a popular commercial jingle during the 1960’s, but my grandmother, always gracious, was perfectly calm and demure as she thanked him for his gift. However, later that day after the carpenter’s work was finished, my grandmother calmly removed his salad from her refrigerator and dumped the entire dish into her trashcan. “The best cooks may be men,” she said as his Jell-O salad wriggled down to the bottom of the trash, “but in the Patterson home, we eat Jell-O from the golden mold.”

It has never been clear to me how much the carpenter’s affiliation with the Republican party played a role in her decision to throw away his salad dish. She was probably well versed in his views on politics as he worked on her cabinetry and engaged her in conversation. Nevertheless, she was ever the picture of politeness as she accepted his homemade cooking, even when his political views and opinions on male cooks did not line up with hers. They were standards that had served her well during her lifetime, and it was clear she prioritized civility and good manners over petty bickering and political hair splitting.  It was an old-fashioned  and stable mold for living, but offered the assurance of an outcome that would turn out well regardless of how she felt politically. She simply wasn’t going to let how she felt about her one vote influence how she treated those who came into her kitchen.

Do you know what your gold standard is? Hyper-bowl-ies aside, have you been caught up in the frenzy of news which has left you counting down the days until you can pull the lever, or is there some other mold you were cut from that is more tangible than an outcome of an election?  

 Here’s is a favorite parable of mine that may help us to answer that question.

There was a farmer who had two sons that helped him tend to his crops each day. In the evening when their work was finished, the sons came in to sit down at the table with their father for dinner. To the first son he gave a large, tender portion of meat, as was tradition in the land. To his second son, the father gave a smaller helping.

One evening, after toiling in the hot sun all day with their father, the sons came in as usual to eat their dinner. As the father placed the meat on their plates, he gave the larger portion to his first son as he always had. This time however he was overcome with curiosity and asked, “Why is it that you never complain when I give you the smaller portion?”

“Well,” the second son began, “My brother takes pride in having the larger portion, even though I labor in the fields as he does. But his food is soon gone and he is left with only an empty plate. I find my joy, not in what portion I get, but in the work I do for my father which lasts all day.”

I like this parable because of the value placed on the company we keep and the work we are doing “in the field.” Those are solid virtues that are keep us from asking for more and more. They are stable and constant. While it is important in this country to take advantage of our right to vote, we can quickly become convinced that our greater goal is to embroil ourselves in what we are going to receive, the bigger piece of meat we get at the end of the day. We may realize, too late, that while we have satisfied our appetite, we mistakenly put our emotional weight behind something that only adds up to a few minutes of satisfaction. Our plate is empty again. Our day has gone again. We have little to show for our time, and worse, we disregarded the human “candidate” standing right next to us. We missed the mother of three who was just diagnosed with cancer. We neglected the donation box at church that still sits empty. We ignored the stranger at a bus stop who would have been filled with renewed hope as you handed him the extra sweet Lipton iced tea you just purchased for yourself at CVS.

So yes, we are all aware how important it is to enjoy this journey we are on, to savor our special moments of life because we know they are fleeting. However, for those who depend on the larger portion of life, it seems to me that life will always move along with an undercurrent of disappointment and that at the end of the day the journey will whittle down to who had the most wins and the best steak dinners. Those victories will be a poor substitute for the father, who is sitting nearby, who offers us a fair portion and quite enough work for us tomorrow.

Are you trying to figure out which candidate to vote for, which one has the strongest principles, best track record, biggest piece of the blue or the red states? Are you convinced that things will be fairer when your favorite candidate wins? Is it possible that you may be, like the son with the larger piece of meat, left wanting more as you begin your next day in the fields? Now that you have listened to the news rhythms and done your research and made your case to your friends, picked the right hat and the right sign for your yard, could you get home and find that the portion on your plate will not be the porterhouse you thought you were working for?

From his humble beginnings in the Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina, renowned preacher Vance Havner once said that what man needs is “not a boost from below but a birth from above.” My grandmother was far from perfect, but she would have agreed with that statement. Politics and religion never entered her conversations, never dominated her work, never determined her civility, and certainly never made a dent in her Jell-O mold. She toiled in the field every day, she received her ample portion at night, and was grateful for the company she kept at dinner. That was her solid gold recipe, and she never worried about how it would turn out in the end.

Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are!

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 “I am out with lanterns looking for myself.” – Emily Dickinson

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Ever since my grandkids were old enough to fill a diaper, I’ve been getting to know them better by practicing a little ritual with them. It starts with the simple notion that as humans we have a natural desire to be recognized and acknowledged. Even as grown adults, as we play our own version of the game of hide and seek, we eventually want someone to look under the proverbial bed and find us. We crave are own space but we also have the innate desire to be around other people, and more importantly, to be verified and confirmed for who we are. We can be an island for a short amount of time, but as we were reminded of so vividly during Covid, our fierce independence brought out some deleterious mental side effects. So, this business of being near one another is a push-pull phenomenon. We need our own areas, our “personal space,” but we also don’t want to feel that we are alone either.

Growing up with two other siblings, when noise reached fever pitch and tempers were short around the house, one of my parents could be heard bellowing, “Can we have some peace and quiet around here!” Hearing that voice of authority, all three of us kids would get quiet and slink away, usually outside to play basketball until dinner time. Funny thing about that slinking, though. Inside the house, one of our parents began missing our company. I know they did, because we could look through the windows and see our mom and dad talking and gesturing, kind of intensely, and not really looking like they were enjoying their precious peace and quiet. It seemed, at least from our perspective, that they were the ones who were being loud and temperamental.

And guess what happened? In short order, at least one but usually both of them would come outside with us, those little hellions that only moments before had been the cause of the crises.  Dad would dive into the basketball game, which we had only just started when we saw them start to come outside, and my mom would walk amongst us passing out carrot sticks. I never understood the carrot thing, but apparently, she had learned through an issue of Better Homes and Gardens that carrots provide a wonderful re-bonding experience for families who are experiencing stress.

And so it was. We all had rejoined the family game. Where before we had gone hiding, each of us had shown our ID at the door of the family unit and found our way back into the show.

Earlier, I mentioned a ritual I have with our two grandsons, where I teach them what it looks like for me to recognize who they are. It begins when I appear at their door and anticipate that hug that all grandparents love. expect a hug. However, that doesn’t always pan out the way I would like.

Let’s say I’ve just walked in the door to their house and the kids are wild and crazy, running around like a herd of wildebeests on the African Plains of Instability. After a while, when they sort of burn themselves out, they wander over to me, and begin explaining everything that’s happened lately, including their latest toilet habits or when they tried to eat their cereal out of the dogfood dish.

They are still basically uncontrollably excited as kids are want to be, and it’s obvious that I’m not going to get that hug, which is a horrible thing for a grandpa. At this time, according to my ritual, I do nothing and say nothing but stand there, looking out into space as if they don’t exist at all in my world. I take that position because I know a secret about my grandkids. I know that eventually they will not be able to cope with not being recognized, that my lack of attention will eventually drive them batty. This is where things get interesting.

At this time, I simply look over to my wife or to their mother and ask, “Have you seen Cash or Carter? I haven’t seen them anywhere. The Cash and Carter I know always give me a hug. Hmmm,” I say, “I wonder what happened to them?”

Well, you can imagine what happens next… They come in for that hug like a couple of F-14’s on a mission from God. I mean, it works every time. Admittedly, it took a few times to get them trained, a couple of visits ignoring them, a few blank stares and so forth, but they did eventually learn that until they hugged me, nothing else much was going to happen. They began to recognize me to be the hugger I knew they could become. And the significance, I think, of what has become kind of a game in our family, is that now when I arrive at their house and begin with “Do I know you?”, they come right to me like wildebeests at a watering hole.

In her book How to Disappear, Akiko Busch describes in beautiful soliloquy the need for invisibility in our modern world where networking and wireless dialogue has made it almost impossible to be lost. Throughout her book she intimates that where once we could safely retreat and eventually be safely found, we now find it almost impossible to be invisible even for a short while. She follows that it is important for humans to have the capacity, and more importantly the freedom, to both be there and not be there.

Reading Busch’s chapter on imaginary friends, I had the sudden recollection of my childhood companion and protector, Davy Crockett. Perhaps it was the popular TV series that inspired me, but I had long conversations with the “king of the wild frontier” as I set out down the street with my play-rifle and coonskin hat, loaded for bear. Like most kids who have an imaginary friend in tow, I used both voices in my neighborhood excursions – “the me voice” and “the Davy voice.” Unknown boundaries that could never be tamed in my own unfinished mind, were not so scary when my frontier companion, Davy, could be sent out ahead to scout the unknown, then report back to me. He was unquestionably loyal, fearless and adaptable to every “treacherous” adventure.

Who are the people that recognize us then? That depends on what your priorities are. If we continue our most important relationships by including ourselves in what author Jack Kerouac described as the “mad swirl of everything to come,” we run the risk of not being recognized by anyone after a while, or at least not available. They will see us only as a function of the activity we are involved in or perhaps only see us as their imaginary friend. However, if we come out from under the covers of our game of hide and seek and allow ourselves to be discovered, and in effect take off our Davy Crockett hat, we immediately can be recognized say, “It’s me! I’m here!”

Do I know you? It is not exactly what we want to be asked as we are greeted by those we love, because it cuts to the heart of whether what they are seeing is the truth, the real McCoy, or some imaginary friend that is our temporary stand-in. While you may think that I am manipulating my grandsons into hugging me, that this is only pretend game, their hug tells me all I need to know about who they really are at the core. They may be running around with underwear on their heads or eating cereal out of a dogfood dish, but I get a chance, if only for a moment, to recognize them for who they really are ­­– loving, caring, and empathetic. After that, I don’t care what they do, I know where to go, and who I’m going to find when I ask for them again.

One Big Happy Swarm

Here in my hometown, cooler temps and hints of Fall were followed by the effects of driving rain from Hurricane Helene. While I am thankful for that moisture here that converted the cracked earth in my garden back to soil again, the news cycle lately has been more than just heavy. And so, before jumping into this blog, I want to dedicate this podcast to the millions of people trying to recover from the damages of the hurricane in the southeastern parts of our country. Would you join me for a moment of prayer for those who have lost family members or been displaced from their homes?

Father in Heaven, we come to you always grateful that we have a God that is bigger than any crisis or storm. We are grateful that we can approach you simply by calling your name and knowing with confidence that your lovingkindness is always available and ready to answer our petitions for help. Father, we pray for all those caught in the fray of Helene, that you would restore their hope and that they would turn to you for assurance and know that the trials they are facing are not too big for you. We know you have deep compassion for their sorrows, so help them come to you in the difficult days ahead and find renewed energy. Bless them with the much-needed supplies for their families. Thank you, Heavenly Father, that you hear these cries for help and that you are ready to wrap your loving arms around them during this crisis. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.

Well, as the humbling pictures from the south continue to fill up our screens, we also have a country that is embroiled in the election of a new president which has been a storm in and of itself. Additionally, we have a Middle East war that has ramped up into a worldwide crisis.  So, as I began to write this week, I began to wonder whether anything I had to say would be worthy of putting out there that would either give credence to the grim destruction I was seeing on the news or somehow, lessen it. Is there a part of you, like me, that would like to stick your head in the sand and stop the scroll? In a world where it seems like chaos reigns, I sometimes give in to the helplessness of it all and then buy into the lie that there is nothing I can really do about any of it.

“Well,” a friend of mine once answered, as I sat obsessing about my problems, “I guess the devil has you right where he wants you.”

“Whaddamean?” I stammered.

But I knew what he meant, and it was true.

We cannot rise if we do not stand. We can easily forget what we are capable of with God and relinquish our armor without a fight. Instead, we plant ourselves at the mercy of the enemy who loves nothing more than to watch our world burn in chaos. In other words, we can give up before we start, and allowed the king of hate to move into our hearts. Folks, that ain’t good.

There is no doubt that it is heart breaking to watch thousands of our countrymen bearing the weight of a storm surge. Then, across the globe, as we witness missiles lighting up the Israeli sky, knowing they will be returned with twice the force, our fears go internal as nations pick sides and square off. Those fears, if we are not careful, can become a picture that is more about us playing the victim than one about helping those victims. We do not need to stumble around in chaos and confusion.  There is always something we can do when our efforts might seem insignificant, even if it is just a change of attitude.  

Perhaps during this time when the world seems to be going mad, you can close your eyes and revisit a part of last summer …when you were being dunked with huge buckets of water at a theme park, or maybe watching your grandson hit his first home run or were smelling your favorite meal being grilled out back on the porch. All those things were in the mix for me over the last few months, reminders that the best predictors of the future are what has happened in the past. If you close your eyes and picture your favorite memory, it can lift you to a better place, to a promising microclimate of hope instead of a desert of victimhood.

My memory begins just outside my back window where there was a buzzing, swirling whirlwind. In a roundish berm I built, I watched droves of bumblebees flying all over the place as they gather nectar. In that area, I angled three huge sandstone rocks near each other so they could gather the sun’s heat all day and radiate in inwards. Even during the winter, as plant life goes dormant, the rocks emanate enough heat during the day to turn the area into a small canyon that acts as a thermal pocket during the night.  Plants that would normally wither during the winter do not succumb as easily to the ice and snow or the thawing and heaving of the soil. It is an oasis for the eyes, in some dreary months when we’ve all had our fill of the grey and gray.

Last summer, however, that same area becomes a hotbed for a tough annual called gomphrena, a workhorse that produces blooms all summer, and thrives in one-hundred-degree temps when other annuals are wilting under the heat. By late summer they are three feet tall, bulbous and trying to outreach other in their head-to-head race to the sun.  When a fellow gardener visited me last July, we stopped to marvel the sea of bumblebees swarming over my miniature canyon filled with those giant purple flowers of gomphrena globosa.  

“Did you know you can pet bumblebees?” she asked.

“What? Pet them? You are joking aren’t you?” I asked, incredulous.

Before answering, she had already stepped into the tall mound of purple flowers and was surrounded by bumblebees. They were momentarily startled by her presence, performing fly-bys and barrel rolls, but each eventually settling down on their own flower top.

“You have to go slow,” she said as she reached in, “they are very social, not like other bees. If you’re careful you can rub their backs.”

Gently, she reached in towards a particularly porky bee and put her finger on the yellow and black striped body, stroking it magically for a few seconds before pulling back.

“See? They don’t seem to mind as long as you don’t move too quickly.”

 Now it was my turn to get my moxie going. Although my hand was not quite as steady as hers, I slowly leaned forward, and found the tiny fuzzy back of a bumblebee, letting my finger caress it while trying to ignore the ones that were wildly buzzing from flower to flower around me. In spite of the thought that I may need an EpiPen at any moment, it was exhilarating to connect with something that could zap me with instant pain. It was an even better experience when I shared it, with permission from their mother, with my grandsons. They too, were able to pet their own bumblebee before summer ended, and become, not paralyzed with fear, but part of the one big happy swarm.  

In these days when our country is ramped up with mega-doses of drama, including the political kind, you may be looking for some moments of lightness, levity, and laughter. I found mine in the smallest of places, on the back of a bumblebee, but even so, it lifted me into another realm where fear was a bystander and where wonder and delight and the joy of being alive had a chance to catch a buzz.

I didn’t think I had much to say this week. I was deep in the middle of the rockets flying, the pundits screaming and the catastrophic pictures from the south. However, on a very hot day last summer, I found some bliss in a petting a bumblebee and making it part of my own warm and fuzzy. I didn’t like the frenzy of crisscrossing flight patterns around me, and the thought of a painful sting didn’t do much for me either, but in stepping into the flower bed and beyond my fears, I found I was stepping away from my worries and the world’s madness. I found a bunch of bumblebees that were willing to work with me, and for a brief moment they let me in to their flower patch unimpeded. I was trying to pet them, and they were giving me their own kind of a pat on the back. In the middle of our shared world, the bees and I were going about our business, both looking, as I think we all are, for the same thing – some of that sweet, sweet nectar that is still out there.

The Unremarkable Diet of Dora Hubbard: Part Two

We tend to move our lives in imperceptible ways, a tad to the left then back to the right again, until we notice we may have not made any real progress at all. Dora, our protagonist of last week’s episode, also felt her life was going in circles. Then she heard the voice of Dr. Adcock, a scientist being interviewed on Progressive Nebraska Radio about IBS’s, ignorant-based calories relentlessly entering our bodies, useless sources of energy that mess with us mind, body and spirit.  Dora’s life was about to change, as Dora tries to get her question in front of expert Dr. Adcock and unlock the secrets of her unremarkable, ignorant-based diet.

Sitting at her kitchen table, Dora stared at her computer screen, and as she began to type her first words to Dr. Adcock, an overwhelming sense of sadness overtook her.  While she had tried every self-help course and diet plan imaginable, even a cabbage and water plan for a month, she could not shake the feeling that there was something wrong with her physique and constitution. It was like a physical cloud of shame hanging over her, like a nasty spell that she could not shake. The thought that there may be some mysterious unhealthy force at work in her own body was driving her to get her question aired on Progressive Nebraska Radio with Dr. Adcock. She began to type.

Dear Dr. Adcock:

I was driving home from work today when I heard your interview on PNR. I almost had to pull over when I realized that all of the shame, I’ve been carrying all these years about my body could be a result of some mysterious and needless energy source, the Ignorant-based calories you mentioned last week. I am desperate to find myself again and to get some control over my life, and I believe your research may hold the key for me. Out of respect for your time, I will go straight to my question: What is wrong with me? Do any of us have control over our lives, or are ignorant calories you referred to in you interview on the verge of defeating us all?

Yours truly,
Dora from Trendy-Mart

Dora’s stopped and looked at her message, and then, with a wish and a prayer, she hit the send key, closed her laptop, and headed to bed.  The rest was up to cyberspace.

The sun had barely etched through her window when she heard her phone vibrating across her bedside table.

“He..hello. Hello,” Dora answered.

“Hello, this is Progressive Nebraska Radio,” came the automated voice. Please press the pound key if your birthday is November 4, 2001.”

Dora had to think about it, but hurriedly fumbled for the pound key. She heard a click on the other end and thought she’d been disconnected.

“Miss Hubbard? May I speak to Miss Hubbard please,” came a female voice.

“This is me, I mean it is her. I’m Dora.”

“Miss Hubbard,” this is PNR, Progressive Nebraska Radio. We received your question late last night and Dr. Adcock would like to speak to you on our show today. Would you be ok with talking to her live…today?”

“Today? Really?” Dora said, jumping out of bed, “You mean Dr. Adcock took my question? Well, yes! Yes, I’ll talk!”

“We go on the air in three minutes, and we’ll call you back just before you go on the air with her, ok?”

“Three hours? Ok I’ll be ready…”

“No, no Miss Hubbard, three minutes. Can you take the call in three minutes? We’ll call you right back in three…”  and before Dora could even answer the station manager had hung up. Dora scrambled out of bed in a panic, starting her coffee, racing back across her apartment to throw on a pair of jean and t-shirt, but no sooner had she fluffed her hair, the phone was ringing again.

“And now our next caller,” she heard a radio voice say, “is a woman who wrote to us with an urgent question, one that addresses an issue of concern for our expert, Dr. Adcock, a pioneer in the study of ignorant-based caloric intake and sustenance research. Our caller today has a lifetime of struggling with some deep-seated shame about her body and is hoping Dr. Adcock may be able to turn things around for her. What do you think doctor?

“Yes, I read Dora’s pleas for help and indeed it sounds like there are some ignorant-base calories unaccounted for. Dora, Dora?” Dr. Adcock called out, “Are you on the line?”

“Ahem, hi, hello, this is Dora. Thank you for returning my email and for having me on your show today.”

“Well, welcome to PNR. Glad you could be with us. How are you doing right now?”

“Well, I haven’t had my coffee yet, but I’m ok.”

“I understand you listened to our last broadcast, and were hit with a startling realization,” said the doctor. “Can you tell us a bit more? How can I help you?”

“Uh, well. I was driving home, listening to you talk about these needless calories from bee stings and toothpaste backwash and realized that you may hold some answers for me. We’d just been talking at work…I work at the Trendy-Mart… about the calories in unlicked envelopes, and I suddenly realized I may be under the influence of those IBS’s you talked about.”

“Yes, yes, I understand, Dora, and you are not alone. But there is help. It sounds like you’ve tried about everything you can to get your weight under control, but somethings missing here I feel. Did I hear you say that you work at a discount store?”

“Uh, yes, I do,” Dora replied.

“I may be mistaken, but could it be possible that you are in contact with a lot of rather, not to be insulting, but rather untidy surroundings?”

“Oh, its filthy there,” Dora stated, with a disgusted tone, “I mean, the place needs to be hosed down.”

“Just as I thought. Dora, and I think I know your problem. You are getting your ignorant calories, hundreds of them each day from the ingesting of prehistoric micrometeor dust,” the doctor postulated.

“Meteor what?”  You mean like the space type? Are you saying I’m eating small meteors made of ancient dust?”

“Yes, in a manner of speaking, you are!”  

In her tiny apartment, Dora felt the urge to cough several times, and leaned over to put her air purifier on high.

“I thought asteroids were way out there in space?” Dora winced.

 “Yes,” the doctor continued, “but they break down into tiny bits and fall to earth over time and, well, Dora, and for all my listeners out there, new research has just been done involving the composition of common dust, and you know what we found?”

“I can’t imagine,” Dora excitedly answered.

“We found that the small particles that make up a common dust bunny are exactly the same as those found in meteorites, and in fact they are constantly entering our atmosphere in small chunks, building up in little piles.”

“Oh my,” Dora said, “Lately, they’ve been working me in Lawn and Garden, and I’ve noticed a ton of dust out there. Do you think…?”

“Dora, I don’t think, I know! You’ve been succumbing to a concentrated dusting of micrometeorites and all their traces minerals, especially, I suspect, palladium, one of the worst offenders of ignorant calories. Palladium in itself is not so bad, but it tends to weigh us down and makes us feel lethargic. Have you been feeling sluggish lately?”

“Well, I just got out of bed, but at work I don’t seem to have any energy…”

“…and do you feel the urge to shower all the time?”

“All the time, and I even rinse off at lunch time!”

“Well, there you go, Dora! I believe that you are a victim of meteor dusting, specifically palladium poisoning. You are being blasted with meteor dust, and your body is collecting it! I bet your IBS score has skyrocketed lately.”

“You mean I’m hoarding cosmic dust and carrying it around all day?” Dora exclaimed?

“Well, yes, in a matter of sp….”

“What do I do with all my palladium? Am I poisonous or contagious? How long do I have to live? Oh, no, no…Should I notify my next of kin or quit my job or give my cat to a friend?!”

Dora was whimpering now and heard the doctor’s voice fading away…

“Doctor?! Are you there?! Help me! I don’t want to die ignorant! I’m not a cosmic hoarder, really, I’m not. Help me please, help me…” Dora groaned.

She felt the gentle hand of Mr. Clemendorf on her shoulder, shaking her…

“Dora, Dora. You’re here, Dora, wake up. It’s me, Mr. Clemendorf. Dora?  Dora?”

“Wh..wh… what?” Dora said, sitting up to brush off her clothes. Have I been poisoned by a meteor?” Am I dead?”

“Dead?  But your pay is gonna be docked if you don’t wake up and get back to work. Break’s over.”

Mr. Clemendorf grabbed his Diet Coke dropping from the vending machine, turning back to Dora before he left. “Hey,” he said, “we’re switching you to Appliances this afternoon, so, let’s get out there, ok? Appliances! Let’s go!”  

Dora wiped her eyes and looked around, still trying to shake off the voice of Dr. Adcock. She wasn’t dying after all, not from envelopes, or bee stings or meteor dust. Suddenly she didn’t feel ignorant at all, but ready to tackle the afternoon. As she turned to clock back in, the late afternoon sun shone across the break room table revealing a thin layer of dust. Dora stopped for a moment to look, and then shook her head.

“Not my dust, not my problem,” she thought, grabbing her ID badge, “I’m in Appliances today.”

The Unremarkable Diet of Dora Hubbard

Dora was not exactly sure when she first noticed the uptick in unsealed envelopes arriving at her home. Maybe it was around the holidays when an unusual flurry of seasonal ads dropped through her mail slot. There on the worn linoleum she would stoop to pick up the loose assortment of insurance premiums, skin care samples, and an insert from a local grocery. It seemed there was always an endless trail of junk mail and lately, envelopes that had never been sealed. Unless it was the birthday card with fifty dollars in it from her aunt in Minnesota, the mail pile waiting for her was just another reminder of the drab life she led at a retail job that had long since run its course.

Still and all, today’s conversation with her co-workers had been an interesting ripple for Dora in a life of little variation. It started in the Trendy-Mart break room when their stodgy boss, Mr. Clamendorf marched through the door and did what he always did every other Friday – drop some change in the vending machine for a Diet Coke and throw their weekly checks across the lunch table with a trite warning to not spend it all in one place.  

His arrival brought an abrupt end to the lunch gossip, as Dora and her coworkers, Trudy and Bertha, stared across the table at the stark white envelopes holding their checks. For these three, it was money that was already spoken for before it hit the bank.

Sitting at the wobbly fold-out table, only the oscillating fan made the atmosphere in the break room tolerable. All three were thinking the same thing as they unfolded their pay stubs – this day couldn’t be over soon enough.

“It’s bad enough they tax you on everything but the kitchen sink…” the older Trudy snapped. “Oh, and look, aren’t I special, they did it to me again. Every flippin’ week,” she moaned, “This gets soooo old.”

“What happened? The other two asked, looking up.

“They forgot my overtime… again,” Trudy snarled. “Now, I gotta walk all the way over to HR and have them write me another check for my overtime. It happens every paycheck. They know I worked the overtime – they know it, but they think that they can get away with it. The lady in there, you know, the one with the frizzled hair?”

“You talkin’ about fried Frieda?”

“Yea, that one,” said Trudy. “She always says, ‘Oh, did I forget your overtime again? I’m so sorry.’”

Dora tossed her check back across the table. “Look at this,” she said pointing at it, “they don’t even have the decency to seal the envelope. I mean, c’mon, have a little respect for our privacy. Close it up for crying out loud and seal it.”

“Right?” said Bertha, working on a bag of Doritos, “I think they leave the envelopes open on purpose. C’mon people, it’s not rocket science.”

“Respect, right?” added Trudy. I don’t want anyone looking at my check. Lick the envelope and close it up. Good Loooord!” added Trudy.

“Maybe they don’t want the calories from the seal. I heard there’s two to four calories on the seal of every envelope,” said Bertha.

“C’mon, really?” said Dora. “Two calories? You kidding me?”

“Right, like, who’s going to care about a couple of calories from licking an envelope?!” Trudy burst out. “I hate even touching the seal, like, it’s gross. I don’t want to touch where someone licked something, c’mon! My envelope, my space, y’know? Anyway, you can go to jail for foolin’ around with other people’s mail like that. You know my friend, Daphine? She called the police when a neighbor kept looking at her mail. She told the police if the neighbor touched her mail again, she was going federalo, like the FBI.

Bertha, who had been eating with her mouth open, said, “I don’t know about Daphine, but when I get an unopened letter, I like to lick them, seal ‘em, then reopen ’em again.”

Dora couldn’t believe her ears. “No, you don’t, c’mon!”

“Shut the back door!” Trudy wailed.

“Ohhh, yes I do! What if some handsome actor had licked that envelope that I resealed? It’s like kissing them in person. That’s the way I look at it – a chance for romance.”

“That’s crazy,” Trudy added, “and if I were you, I wouldn’t be tellin’ anyone that.”

“You are disgusting,” Dora piped in, “Seriously?  You re-lick them?  You certainly don’t need the calories.”

Bertha stood up and struck a sexy pose. “Excuse me? Look at this figure, will ya’? Who could resist this? When I get those unsealed envelopes in the mail, makes my day, like a sign from God – true love and new beginnings.”

Bertha taunted them by throwing her head back and pouring the rest of the Doritos down her throat. Shock statements were her go-to method for getting attention, but re-licking envelopes, even for her, was a bit over the top.

“Did you just say, true love? True love my fanny,” Trudy said. “Licking old envelopes is more like true disease.”

She turned to clock back in, and while Bertha followed, Dora was thinking of the unsealed mail waiting at home just inside her apartment door. She wanted to tell them about the increase in unsealed letters she’d been getting but didn’t want to stir the pot.

Yet, by the time Dora got off work and slid into the front seat of her beat-up Corolla, the envelope conversation had stood out as the highlight of her day, and as she merged onto the I-247 that curled around the city, Dora began to question a life where re-licking already licked envelopes took top billing. Seriously, she thought…what kind of demented person would even think about that kind of thing? Talking about it seemed crass, undignified, like talking about cutting toenails or clipping nose hairs.

She leaned over to turn on the radio, for distraction more than anything, catching the end of an interview on PNR, Progressive Nebraska Radio. A scientist with her doctorate in the cutting-edge field of Sustenance Science, Professor Adcock, was speaking about the finer points of her best-selling book titled Hard to Swallow. 

“… yes,” she spoke excitedly, “and what people in our country don’t understand is that we actually ingest all kinds of absurd things that add up to quite a few calories – without even knowing it.”

“So,” the interviewer interrupted, “let me get this right, Professor Adcock. You are talking about things we don’t eat or consume that add to our caloric intake? How can that be?”

“Yes, I am. You have to understand that the human species was designed for many ways to acquire energy. Eating, or as we like to call it, sustenance renewal, can come in many forms. We are exposed to these sources all the time, but we don’t think of them as part of our regular diet, because we don’t actually chew and swallow them.

“So, in your research, what odd things did you find that we take in? Can you give me an example?

Dora reached over to turn up the volume as a semi-truck suddenly roared past.

Well, let me first explain that these calories are not from the usual places. They sneak into our system from sources that aren’t considered food. We sustenance scientists call these sources IBS’s, or Ignorant-Based Sources.

“So, these IBS’s, what are some of them?” The interviewer asked. “Like right now I’m imagining eating an ignorant pizza with extra ignorant cheese.”

“No, no. We don’t know we are consuming them. It’s not like that at all. Take for instance a bee stings. The average American is stung once every two years, totaling 9 calories of venom each sting. Red ants, 3 calories, a rattlesnake, of course, quite a bit higher. In one of our field studies a research volunteer allowed herself to be stung by a swarm of deer flies. We calculated the resultant caloric intake, the IBS, to be somewhere between twenty and twenty-three calories, equivalent to one or two M and M’s.”

“Oh, uh, wow, deer flies,” the PNR interviewer said.

“So, you see, it starts to add up. A person goes out on what they think is a peaceful nature walk, gets bit a couple of times by a honeybee or insect of some sort. At night, they brush their teeth but forget to rinse properly and inadvertently swallow the backwash, which adds more calories, then hits the sleeping bag with virtually a full stomach. Their ignorant-based score skyrockets, and there you go.”

“They might as well have eaten the whole bag of M and M’s,” added the interviewer.

“Exactly. And in this country, our average IBS score is almost ten times that of any other free society,” added Professor Adcock. “Day after day we allow ourselves to take in calories that we are completely ignorant of, and that’s only the beginning. Of course, I give many more examples in my book, An Unremarkable Diet: The Hard to Swallow Truth of IBS:

Listening to the interview, Dora could hardly believe what she was hearing. Apparently, her friend Bertha’s caloric intake from re-licking envelopes fell right in line with the national average of over-the-top IBS scores. She was literally licking herself to an early death. In addition, Dora was convinced her own Ignorant Score was hitting the threshold of what was unhealthy. Come to think of it, she remembered a time in her childhood when an infestation of bedbugs in her home was mysteriously followed by weight gain. As she gripped the steering wheel, her palms began to get sweaty as a dietary epiphany came over her. It may have been rush-hour on the I-247, but Dora had to get control of her ignorant calories, and fast! She certainly didn’t want to be headed towards an early grave and buried in a grand piano like that enormous man in Ripples Believe It or Not.

In addition, a moral dilemma was on her hands. Should she tell Bertha and Trudy about this landmark research for dieting or keep it to herself? A pound is a pound, she thought, and if the IBS trend could be reversed, it could mean the start of a brand new, ignorant-free life, one that would include an inspiring diet with life-changing weight loss. Still, there was a part of her that desperately wanted to hold on to her secret so she could waltz into the break room knowing she would always be one or two calories ahead of her friends.

She pulled into her driveway and entered her apartment. There on the floor, sticking out like a sore thumb, was another unsealed envelope. Dora felt her life was on the threshold of change. A decision had to be made, and she could think of only one person who could help.

“Professor Adcock,” she said aloud.

She pitched her car keys in the bowl on the foyer table and went straight to her kitchen. Laptop in hand, she sat down to email the doctor, hoping to high heaven the scientist would take her question over the air on the next episode of Progressive Nebraska Radio. It was a long shot yes, but the threat of constantly ingesting ignorant, hidden calories had become more than just a break-room conversation with Trudy and Bertha – it had become Dora’s quest to get her life under control.

A bee sting here, some backwash there…perhaps Dr. Adcock would hear Dora’s survival cry for help and help her begin her new path towards wellness and an ignorance-free life. You’ll find out in Episode 2 of The Unremarkable Diet of Dora Hubbard.

Right Between the Eyes

I like to think of my podcast Knee Deep as filled with moments that take our minds off the Big Performance and put the attention on those serendipitous events that add grace to our lives.

Serendipity, by definition, can occur anywhere, anytime. I’m remembering a line from a song on an album in the 1970’s by Crosby, Stills and Nash titled Four Way Street which was recorded live. In the song called Right Between the Eyes, these harmonizing geniuses surprised even themselves by starting out on the exact same note. Given that the popular trio was known for the perfect melding of their voices, the error made the start of the song all the more obvious. As they hit the sang the same note, you could almost see the three musicians freeze up and stare at each other, as if to say, “How did that happen?” Finally, one of them broke the silence with this: “I would never (have) believed we could all have started out on the same note, but we did it.”

Dead silence ensued, then applause and laughter burst through, and the audience relaxed into a song list of what have now become classics. The perfect harmonies created by the trio was replaced by something so much better in that beginning– the charm and personality of three regular guys. Their silly mis-start set the tone for an album full of surprises that seem, each time one hears them, like they were written just for us. It is a beautiful thing when that happens – I think they call it art – when the free exploration of a craft reveals the supernatural skill of the artist and transports the listener or viewer through an imaginative journey. It is a journey where you never want to go home, and it can happen anywhere at any time, even without an artist of any kind, and, it just so happens I went on one of those journeys last week.

It started when a plastic grocery bag blew in from a recent storm and got caught in the top branch of a dead oak tree in our neighbor’s yard. When I first noticed it blowing around up there, I was mildly annoyed that a grocery bag was putting an ugly smear on my otherwise clear view of the sky. I was used to bags being caught in bushes and around signposts and the like, but this bag was waaaaaay up there and had overtaken the space that normally attracted birds of all kinds and had been a haven for a kind of metropolitan squirrel park.

However, this bag was changing all that. It was just a vagrant traveler, a moocher, who had taken up residence without permission, and there was nothing short of a tree service that could do anything about it. Furthermore, looking up at the bag, I had the odd feeling that it was waving at me like one of those people who wave at you from like they know you, but don’t. When you get up close to them, you aren’t the person they thought you were.  Likewise, I knew the trash bag didn’t know me. I knew I wasn’t the person it thought I was, but it didn’t seem to matter. The bag kept waving at me anyway.

Each time I went out the back door, there it was again, flowing back and forth without a care in the world, flipping and flopping around like a kid in a trampoline factory. I knew that nothing short of a gale force wind was going to bring that bag down. And even when there was no perceptible wind at all, the grocery bag was still moving, catching the slightest puff of air and gracefully spinning and twirling, a plastic pirouetting danseur groc’eirre.

It was enough to make me sick. Somehow, in the back of my twisted and cynical mind, I believed that trash bags had no right to be that happy and free, like we are. In fact, I believe that plastic grocery bags had no rights at all, that they had only one place in our world which, by the way, certainly was not next door to me high up in a tree with the best view in the neighborhood. To my point, I believed that trash bags should be used and not seen, that their rightful place was either with other bags of their kind in the check-out line or hanging quietly under a sink waiting for any garbage that might be thrown their way.

And this is where things take a nasty turn. I had, without even knowing it, begun to believe that the placement of this carefree bag high up in a tree had been place there just to irritate me.

Now, having owned a sailboat most of my life, I had always relished being out in the wind and on the water. One would think then that I would have an appreciation for the natural display of nature’s forces and be captivated by watching the wind catch the insides of a little sack up in a tree and equate it with a little sailboat up there in the sky. Next, I would be able to imagine it on a beautiful tack across the aqua-green surface of a bucolic lake. One would think I would have that image etched in my mind like a postcard in a gift shop, and that I would be able to feel the sack fill up and revel in knowing that the vacuum, like in a real sailing experience, is created on the other side was making the sail-sack up moving as if it were truly sailing. It’s a physics thing all sailors understand and appreciate – that we are moved forward to fill a vacuum like miniature sailboats destined for some distant shore.

This image in turn conjures up a picture, doesn’t it, of me on a journey, one where I am taking out my own trash to my own trash can, that I then would be excited knowing that I could leave the back door and look up and be at peace knowing that this universal law of physics, like gravity and thermal vortexes, was still at work around me. One would think then that a warmth would come over me, and I would feel at peace with the world, and know that God was with me, omnipresent and steady, because I could look up and see one of those very laws at work in a grocery bag high up in a tree, and then I would return to the house as if I’d just returned from a prayer retreat, satisfied, sanctified, perhaps a bit holier, having then filled a small vacuum in my own life, and knowing nothing could change the irrevocable laws of our Master, and his invention, the grocery bag.

One would think that, yes, but it would not be true. I looked up at the bag each day as I went out and thought, “There it is again. It’s still there, that lousy, filthy piece of detritus, a grocery bag, blown in from nowhere, trying to be friendly with me and perhaps even happier and better off than me because it has no mortgage or a financial plan and doesn’t take cholesterol medicine or worry about when the warranty runs out on its television set. There it is, up there floating, a drifter, a freeloader without any responsibilities, and serving no real purpose other than filling a vacuum in a tree.

These thoughts had taken up an uncomfortable residence in my mind, and I thought of trying to knock the grocery bag down with a rock or a homemade javelin of some kind. I realized I couldn’t do that because we live next door to a hospital and my spear might land on the cardiac unit being wheeled into the emergency room for a patient who had just arrived and had consumed too much steak and beer on Labor Day weekend. This tubular patient needed an EKG, and not be able to get one because my spear, the one I had thrown at a plastic garbage bag blowing freely in the wind, an athletic launch that I could never repeat again, had missed the bag completely, gone right over it and right through the EKG machine, and disabling it.

I must have imagined in my mind the horrible screech of the javelin through a mobile cardiac unit that jarred me back to reality. I realized one plastic bag was holding some kind of power over me, over our neighborhood and the campus of the hospital. I remembered a time, back in the 1970’s, when three amazing singers from Crosby, Stills and Nash hit the same exact note mistakenly at the same time and botched the beginning of a live concert and that it was a mistake that shot the song to the top of the Pop music charts back in the day, and I thought of the lyrical, serendipitous beauty of that moment.

It could not have predicted or duplicated again, and I went back outside for another look at the skipping grocery bag up in the tree, and I brought up that very Crosby, Stills and Nash song on my phone, Right Between the Eyes, and looking up at my neighbor’s dead tree at the lowly plastic trash sack, and I heard the voice of the grocery sack voice that said, “I could never believe that I could have made it all the way up here, but I finally did it,” and I saw the grocery bag as a little child dancer in the sky who was happy and free, on stage pirouetting and spinning and spinning and twisting and loving every minute of it, and there was a live audience applauding her, the little grocery bag dancer up there, a little piece of beautiful, delicate trash on her way to stardom, who knew all the secrets of physics and the wind, and was moving about without a care in the world.

Balloon Boycott Possible in 2028 Olympics

And…speaking of Olympic medals, don’t you miss watching the Olympics on television at night? I have to admit, I felt kind of lost the night after they were over and I sat down to watch my usual hour of television in the evening. As I began flipping through the rather  shallow list of movies on Hulu and Netflix, I felt disappointed that the best athletes had all gone home and the excitement of world competition was over.

I really wanted to hear more stories of little kids who defied all odds to become an Olympic athlete– future gold winners – and then to watch their dreams come true as they overcame their hardships and became medalist.  In an age where photo finishes and thousandths of a second make a difference, these athletes had pursued a special kind of excellence, the kind that leaves you hopeful for that other race going on, the human race. So, before the Paris games fade completely from 2024, I want to reminisce for a moment about a past Olympics, the LA Olympics in 1984, when I simultaneously watched the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat all in one event, and the audience left feeling both inflated and deflated at the same time

I had boarded an Amtrak to Los Angeles with my father and my brother, a ten-day bro-trip where we were spectators to everything from windsurfing to water polo. One of the things we quickly discovered at the Olympic venues was that since we were watching the best athletes in the world, it really didn’t matter what event we witnessed or whether it was for a gold medal or last place. Each event was a fascinating cornucopia of new rules, new faces, disqualifications, spills and yes, examples of sheer determination that broke the boundaries of what humans can endure.

For example, before witnessing my first judo match I did not know that, at least in 1984, it was perfectly legal to strangle your opponent with their own judo robe. If a match found one opponent in the choke hold, they had a choice to either hit the mat and tap out or, as we later found out, do the honorable Judo thing and just pass out. Several of the wrestlers did, in fact, choose to do the honorable thing slowly drifted off into La-La Land as they were choked into submission.

When I witnessed this blacking out for the first time, I couldn’t believe it. When had the word honor by strangulation become associated with the Olympics?  Had I been thrown back to a Roman coliseum where gladiators fought to the death? Sitting next to me, my father was shocked as well. Having just retired from his medical practice, and seeing the Hippocratic Oath flash before his eyes, he jumped out of his seat and had to be restrained by my brother from racing to rescue the unconscious athlete. As it turned out, the wrestler soon regained consciousness and sat up, straightening out his white robe as if he’d just exited from a washing machine.

This is the Olympics, I thought! I’ve arrived! Anthems, flags, and cold-blooded strangulations!

More stubbornness ensued as we watched the US defeat the Russians in water polo, a match that left the water blood red and flooding the swimming pool arena with a small-scale version of the Cold War. At that time there were no underwater cameras to catch blatant fouls, and all sorts of unmentionable things happened under the pool surface.

At the semi-finals for men’s soccer, Yugoslavia played Italy, and I got another taste of the furor and passion that accompanies Olympic competitions. The soccer field was surrounded by armed policeman on horseback and there was a holding tank for unruly spectators that held an eerie presence at the far end of the Rose Bowl. When Yugoslavia scored the winning goal and won 2-1, the crowd erupted around me in a wild frenzy that bordered on mass hysteria. Huge Yugoslav women who could have been Olympic shot- putters and who had never shaved, picked me up and tossed me around like a wet noodle for reasons I’m still trying to figure out. I can only guess, but I believe they thought I was some kind of Olympic party favor, or perhaps it was my clean-shaven appearance that appealed to their carnal instincts – I’m not really sure.

Surviving that, the next stop on the docket was Dodger Stadium. When we settled into our seats for baseball, an exhibition sport that year, what ensued was more like a marathon, as Chinese Taipa battled South Korea in a 14 inning no hitter. That’s right! Fourteen innings for crying out loud! If you aren’t a baseball fan, just know that the game started at noon and ended nine hours later, with most of the 56,189 fans either asleep from boredom or under the influence. Two crack pitchers at the height of their Olympic pitching careers dueled like a couple of Marvel Avengers and continued to strike out one hapless batter after another as the game dragged on all afternoon and into the evening.

As the saying goes, the game was about as exciting as watching paint dry, and the only reason anyone stayed to watch was due to an incident that happened during the seventh inning stretch. As the traditional “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” begin to play and the mostly drunken audience stood up to sing, a celebration team on the infield cut loose fifty nautical balloons into the sky, each one a vibrant color, each representing a different Olympic nation. As we stood to stretch, we looked to the sky, beholding the spectrum of balloons bolt upward, glorious symbols of freedom. Cheers echoed through the palisades of Dodger Stadium, and we settled back down believing that the refreshing release of the huge balloons would be an inspiration for the ballplayers to slam some homers and get this baseball party started.

However, as the balloons disappeared into the evening sky, one stubborn balloon, a renegade with no manners, floated back down into the stadium, and begun a leisurely circuitous trip around the infield, just out of reach of the maintenance team frantically running after it and trying to reel it in. Just as it looked like they might grab it, the balloon would rise again and hover at the top of the stadium Then, as the baseball players came back onto the field, the balloon would catch a downdraft that blew it out of its holding pattern and fall again. And each time this happened, the runaway balloon would be chased by a rowdy group of a mostly unauthorized, multi-international thugs trying to carry the balloon off as a souvenir.

And guess which nation was represented by this uncommitted, apolitical, unpledged balloon? Why, it was the United States, of course. Yes, it was our balloon up there wandering around like a lost child at a barn dance. Never mind that this baseball game, representing the quintessentially American sport, had already taxed the patience of the most diehard baseball fan, but now we had our own red, white and blue balloon essentially boycotting the game. Fortunately, a policeman shot the balloon down with a flare gun, and the most boring baseball game in history resumed, dying a slow death until the fourteenth inning, when a Japanese player hit a home run to end the game and put us all out of our misery.

After nine hours of watching the most incredible pitching duel in history, you would think the culminating crack of a baseball on a bat would have ignited the crowd but watching the American balloon float apathetically back and forth had exhausted any remaining enthusiasm in the stadium.  I believe I may have heard one singular applaud in the dugout, but the crowd, who were beginning to feel the effects of their hangover, emptied out of the stadium, irritable and grumbling about how Olympic baseball had failed to inspire them.  

I couldn’t help but feel, as we got up to leave, that the United States had failed on an international level, that the lone American balloon floating around Dodger Stadium that day should have been disqualified from any future balloon events on account of unsportsmanlike conduct. The misbehaving balloon that had floated about and had failed in its patriotic duty was an embarrassment to Americans, a kind of symbol for a whole lot of hot air, an inflated ego, and in my opinion, it’s behavior and attitude was just not befitting of the Olympic spirit.

I kept these thoughts to myself, however, as I shuffled out of the stadium. I could still smell a bit of leftover helium wafting through the air, an after-effect from the American balloon that had exploded and I was afraid that if I spoke, my voice would come out squeaky, perhaps an octave or two higher than normal, and a new athletic event would have to be added to the next Olympics, like the Squeaky Talkie-Walk, or maybe the Helium Pentathlon. How about Severe Weather Nautical Balloon Surfing?Yea, yea, that’s it. Surfers would be dropped from an airplane and surf through an obstacle course of nautical balloons. Oh, that would be amazing… (fading voice…)

Education May Come Down to the Last Potato

There is not a better day in all of summer than the first day after school is out.  The Saturday after the last day of the school year, I woke in my bedroom in a state of consciousness that subtly came over me.  There was no school today and not tomorrow. In fact, I didn’t have to be anywhere for three months. I lay in bed staring at the ceiling in a state of euphoria thinking to myself that I had never spent much time looking at my bedroom ceiling, and that compared to going to school, my ceiling was absolutely the most fascinating thing I had ever seen. In that open white space where cobwebs hid and vagueness took over, I mapped out my entire summer, a map that said, “Nothing to do, no place to be.”

“I could lay here all day long,” my summer voice said, “and be content to do absolutely nothing but memorize every single square inch of this ceiling.” That is how insanely happy I was to be out of school.

The day before, when the last bell for the year rang, the teachers did not stop us from screaming our head off as we ran out of the building because they were going to do the same thing just as soon as the buses pulled out of the parking lot. Our teachers, the all-knowing, all-seeing caretakers of our edumacation, had positioned themselves just inside the familiar barrier of their classroom doors as we flew down the halls and swung wide our double doors to freedom. I heard them wishing us well for the summer as we ran by, but underneath their pleasant smiles were the looks of utter exhaustion and fatigue.

And run we did. At the sound of the final bell, we stampeded down the school halls like a herd of African wildebeests on the Serengeti, kicking each other, making cattle grunts and tripping each other, step on the fallen, and yell “see you in the Fall” at the top of our lungs.

Until that final bell rang, the last few weeks of school seemed like pure torture. Everyone was going through the motions, making school look like school, but not putting any sincere effort or commitment into our work. By late April, the cafeteria had run out of food to serve for lunch and the lunch staff, in a last-ditch effort to appear as if food were plentiful, fed us nothing but potatoes that had been stacked in cold storage since Christmas. Even so, the stored boxes of potatoes had sprouted so many spuds that, when retrieved, looked like a bed of sea anemones that had been harvested from the bottom of the Caspian Sea and sold to America on the black market. They were horrible misconfigurations, poor excuses for food that, incidentally, would become the source for a future documentary on the mismanagement of the National Nutritional and Education Act of 1956, an act that Mamie Eisenhower had championed. The mini-series gave historical evidence that potatoes could not be trusted to a democracy and were more suited for underground movements. Championing the starchy plant in the series was the first lady’s great-great-grandfather who had a brief stint as a potato farmer during the Industrial Revolution when he tried to use potatoes as a source of fuel. He died homeless wearing a torn and tattered T-shirt whose logo read, “Taters for a Better America.”

 When I was in school, the decision to feed us nothing but those oblong starch muffins, mashed potatoes, for the last month of school came during a clandestine meeting of the local school board and was made knowing that feeding kids copious amounts of carbs was a natural way to induce sleep. Managing kid’s energy levels through diet was the key.  So, every day from April 1, like some tacky bad joke, our lunchtime plates were heaped with a massive pile of bleached white mashed potatoes, a warm and steamy substitute for melatonin.

During this same period, President Kennedy had mandated a national fitness program called The President’s Physical Fitness Club, so each day, by the time lunch rolled around, we had all exercised for four straight hours, doing continuous push-ups and the like to prepare us for a Russian invasion that would descend on our playground if their revolutionary rocket Sputnik misfired. So intense was the physical fitness program that from the moment attendance was taken in the morning, kids were required to launch into a routine of sit-ups, cardio lunges, and sprints around the school. We ran looking up into the sky in case the Russian satellite should began its descent onto American soil, stopping only to do calisthenics and patriotic cheers and of course, more push-ups and sit-ups.

By the time the bell rang for lunch four hours later, we were so ravenous with hunger that we would have chewed off our own arms if they had let us. There was no need to do that, thank goodness, because waiting for us under a bright yellow heat lamp in the cafeteria was a mountain of freshly prepared hot whipped potatoes with butter and they were generously spooned directly onto our metal trays as if they had been off-loaded from a dump truck.

Finding our place at tables of fifty kids, we were so hungry we never picked up a fork, but ate with our hands, shoving globs of mashed potatoes into our mouths. We ate freely off  each other’s trays as well to reinforce the democratic and cooperative atmosphere, and then raced back to get in line for a second helping. In fact, we were so hungry we did not even take our trays on the second trip but stood in line with cupped and open hands and let cafeteria workers served us a new heaping mound with industrial size spoons made by upperclassmen in shop class.   

“Oh, thank you so much, thank you, Miss Haggathorn,” we said to the Head Server. She always answered, “You are so welcome,” but now I think that she missed her calling as a jail warden, preferring this job of piling steaming hot potatoes into our hands and smiling demurely as the steam rose and burnt the skin off our tiny fleshy fingers. Later it was found that some of the hungrier children ate off small portions of their fingers thinking they were potatoes, because at that age, having only recently stopped sucking their thumbs, they could not tell the difference between the two textures. Some of those children had to be sent to the nurse for treatment, but the other students went straight to the gym after lunch for the culminating activity of the president’s fitness program, the much-heralded tug-o-war contest. Excitement, as much as could be mustered under the weight of a high carb meal, was mounting as a team consisting of the fittest students stood across from an imaginary Russian team made entirely of a janitorial staff of two.

Those who were not in the nurse’s station or part of the tug-o-war contest lined the wooden benches in the gym and watched the best of the President’s team grab the rope and pull with all their might. The rope barely moved either way for a long moment, but unfortunately, the mashed potatoes had already taken their toll and the students was soundly beaten and drug wholesale across the gym floor like a beached whale carcass.

It was a pitiful display of athleticism, of course, and only substantiated what was already a well-known fact, that we would never be able to beat the Russians during the calendar school year while potatoes were being served. (See David Orslaka’s Book, The Battle of Little Big Potato: The Military Genius of Chief Stands-With-A-Spoon). As the final kid was dragged across the winner’s line, the two janitors, dressed in mechanic’s coveralls, hooped and hollered as they did a victory lap pushing their cleaning carts in what was seen by teachers as unsportsmanlike conduct.

By then it was about 1:43, and with so many kids now sound asleep from the effects of eating a month’s supply of mashed potatoes, the teachers decided just to let them sleep it off. It was, after all, the last day of school, and parents would be arriving soon to pick up their children. I had cleverly found a spot to sleep under a gymnastic mat where I would not be bothered and therefore no one found me until well after 5:30, long after everyone else had left. I was in a deep slumber as they pulled off the gymnastic mat, in the deepest of rapid eye movements, softly whimpering to myself and twitching.

My parents pulled off the mat and woke me gently, spoon feeding me sips of black coffee from a thermos that had the president’s picture on it, and my mother waved peppermint candies under my nose to stimulate my frontal cortex, but when I could not stand up without wavering, my father had to carry me all the way out to the car in his arms. Later he told me I was whispering some gibberish about being attacked by an army of Russian potatoes.

Three days later, an article on the back pages of a Russian newspaper came to the forefront and reported that American children slept on the average of twenty-two and a half hours a day, and only rose to the smell of mashes potatoes wafting through the air. The article claimed that this was part of an American plot to thwart the Cold War, to bring some new warmth and détente to an otherwise viscous relationship between the two countries.

I’m not sure if that is true. I awakened the next day feeling, as I said earlier, perfectly happy, blissfully serene, staring at the creamy consistency of my off-white ceiling and thinking that it was the most beautiful space I had ever seen, and that I could stare at every square inch of it, or sleep, for the rest of the summer.