a life unplanned

We had a young black tom cat that had the run of the place. He was so full of life he even bullied the dog.  All his previous experience and knowledge led him to believe that life would always be the way it had been before.  One day he confidently wandered into the dark woods and met something that was beyond his ability to cope. It reminds me of a book I read, "The Black Swan - The Impact of the Highly Improbable ”. The author tells the story of a turkey who lives for a thousand days. It is fed by the farmer every day. Each feeding reinforces the belief that it will always be fed my a member of the human race “looking out for it’s best interests“. Then the day before Thanksgiving the farmer shows up with an axe.


Those of us who grew up during the 50’s and 60’s, like the turkey, learned things we thought would always be true. That our homes would always increase in value and be a source of wealth. That a college education would always guarantee a job. That our jobs would always be secure, our wages would increase over time, and there would be a pension waiting for us at the end of our careers. And that the people we elected to protect the American Dream for us would always act  “in our best interests.”

I’ve always wondered what life was like for that generation that came of age on the east side of the Berlin Wall. They weren’t allowed to enjoy the freedoms of those on the west side , but surely they were able to find life partners, have children, and experience some joy in the everyday of life. I’ve read that when the wall came down many people were frustrated at the thought of finding their own job instead of one the government provided for them, or having to find their own housing instead of having it assigned to them by the Politburo. So there was a certain security for them in living without freedom.

Japan calls the years of the 1990’s the Lost Decade. That country was rolling along with an expanding economy until it imploded . The circumstances that caused the economic downturn for Japan are similar to what we are seeing in our own country today. The Japanese are traditionally a frugal people and that mitigated the effects of the downturn on everyday life. But, here in America conspicuous consumption is a way of life and if our economy continues to plummet the perceived quality of life for many people will also sink.

In my opinion freedom and security are illusory. We are all like the turkey. We live our lives according to the knowledge we have and the lessons of past experience not even dreaming that there may be something we are unaware of and incapable of discovering that will do us in. We yearn for certainty but meet vicissitude. Perhaps accumulating wealth and possessions should not be the measure of our success considering how things can change so rapidly.

I always go back to Alan Watts who said, :"But tomorrow and plans for tomorrow can have no significance at all unless you are in full contact with the reality of the present, since it is in the present and only in the present that you live. There is no other reality than present reality, so that, even if one were to live for endless ages, to live for the future would be to miss the point everlastingly."



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roadside produce

Friday, I went with Dorothy to a  doctor's appointment in Tulsa. On the way home we spotted this produce stand in the shade of a tree. We pulled in and bought some okra, a cantaloupe, and a watermelon.
Here you can see Dorothy negotiating prices with the farmer. Tonight she's going to fry up that okra and I'll make some corn bread. My stomach is talking to me just from writing about.

rockin birthday cake

This birthday cake for Tara's boyfriend was a group effort. Tara and Jarrett made the cake, Dorothy iced it and piped on the borders, and I used my pasta machine to roll out some fondant icing and then used a palette knife to cut out the letters,  guitar parts, and music notes.

opposite ends

In 1961 the chairman of the FCC, Newton Minnow, described television as a vast wasteland. That statement is even more true today. I would also extend that description to the internet. There may be some factual information available on the internet but how does one go about obtaining it, and how do we recognize it? Most political websites, whether liberal or conservative are instruments of propaganda and misinformation. What makes them so successful is the fact that we humans will not accept any information that does not reinforce our prejudices. How we come to have these prejudices could be the subject of a different post. The conservatives think that the word liberal is synonymous with evil, the liberals think the same of the conservatives and each side has their sources of information to gather ammunition to throw at the opposition . I am right and you are wrong. There are no nuances of meaning, no mitigating information that would help us to understand another view. Both the liberal and the conservative media are guilty of fanning the flames. But, after all, they are capitalists. They are in the information business to make money. The more sensational the story the more readers/viewers they can pick up. Some of the more well known pundits are making millions of dollars by stirring up the fear, righteous indignation, and anger of the American people. I would like to think that we have the potential to rise above our prejudices, but we seem to be a people who are easily and willingly misinformed. It won’t be the liberals that destroy the country or the neo-cons. It will be all of us who refuse to set aside fear and hatred long enough to listen to each other.

a week with grandpa

Kelly and Marley went to church camp last week so Jenna and Hunter stayed with us. We had pancakes for breakfast almost every day and to beat the heat we spent some time at the creek on my friend Kathleen's property.  She has it fixed up and perfect for a swim or a picnic.

tomatoes

Every year I drive to Tulsa and buy my tomato plants. This year I planted an heirloom variety called "Royal Hillbilly".  They have a good balance between tart and sweet.  The one shown below weighs 1-1/2 lbs. That's a quarter on the table next to it.

Jenna wanted to pose holding the red beauty. We're having the grandkids over tonight for tacos so a few minutes after I took these photos I chopped it up and combined it with onions, jalapenos fresh from the garden, cilantro, lemon juice, salt, and garlic and presto! Pico de Gallo.

what i'm reading now

I haven't read James Michener in years.  I'd forgotten just how much history one can learn from his novels.  Caravans: a novel of Afghanistan is set in 1946. It was published in 1963. It paints a picture of Afghanistan just after WWII when great caravans of camels carried trade goods from India, Russia, and Iran just as they had been doing for 3,000 years. What I found interesting was how a few enlightened Afghans were attempting to bring the country into the modern world. Here it is more than 60 years later and there's been no appreciable progress. It will make you question America's continued involvement there.

July 4, 2010

Long May She Wave!

poor judgement

It seems there is  a lot of poor judgement being shown by people these days. 

• Take the policeman in Washington who slugged a 17 year old girl, for instance. I watched the video several times and the girls who committed the crime of jay walking  were definitely wrong in being verbally abusive to the policeman. But hitting someone with your fist is not part of police training.  There are "come along" holds that cops are taught to use that enable him to get the upper hand with someone who may be larger than he is. It took a long time for this policeman to gain control of the girl. He may have forgotten his training. I can't help but wonder how this officer would be able to arrest a man his own size who was not willing to be arrested when he could not gain control of a teenage girl. Poor judgement? I think so. Not too long ago a policeman was video taped tasering a woman in her 70's. Sure, she was being uncooperative and mouthy, but using a taser?  Extremely poor judgement. I think both these cops should find a job more in keeping with their abilities and temperament.
• Then there is the situation with Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) . After a meeting at the White House where a deal was made with BP to create 20 billion dollar escrow account to cover oil damages and claims resulting from the Gulf oil leak, congressman Joe Barton apologised to Tony Hayward, CEO of BP, for the "shake down" he received by the president. A corporation being held accountable for it's actions is a shake down?  Poor judgement? You bet.  Texas voters will be exercising good judgement if they vote Barton out of office in the next election.  Note: Barton has received 1.5 million dollars in campaign contributions from the oil industry. Money does have a way of clouding your judgement, doesn't it?
• Tony Hayward, CEO of BP would like to have his life back. If he is able to sail his yacht on the weekends then this tragedy in the Gulf is just a minor inconvenience for him. Lives and livelihoods have been lost  but no concern was forthcoming from Mr. Hayward until he was overwhelmed by the public furor.
• U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman has overturned the Obama administration's six month moratorium on deep water oil drilling. It turns out the judge holds stock in oil drilling and pipeline companies, but he assures us there's no conflict of interest. I feel better knowing that.
• General McChrystal is relieved of his command after bad mouthing the commander in chief in a magazine article. As a career military man the general understands the consequences of insubordination and I'm sure that he would never brook such a lack of respect from any of his own subordinates.  So, I wonder if this is the mother of all bad judgements or if there was an ulterior motive.

quote of the day

In America many self-described deficit hawks are hypocrites, pure and simple: They're eager to slash benefits for those in need, but their concerns about red ink vanish when it comes to tax breaks for the wealthy.  Thus, Senator Ben Nelson, who sanctimoniously declared that we can't afford $77 billion in aid to the unemployed, was instrumental in passing the first Bush tax cut, which cost a cool $1.3 trillion.

--Paul Krugman

what i'm reading now

I've been reading some serious stuff lately and I thought it was time for a little escape reading. Nelson DeMille's The Lion was just what I was looking for. Mr. DeMille's  novel is the latest in the Detective John Corey series and is a sequel to The Lion's Game.  The Libyan terrorist that escaped justice in the first story comes back in The Lion to settle old scores.  Nelson DeMille has a talent for hooking you at the end of each chapter and drawing you to the next. I read his books faster than any other author. John Corey is an egotistic, insubordinate, sarcastic, well....butt hole.  There's no other way to put it. But, he keeps me laughing and keeps me turning the pages. If your a DeMille fan you won't be disappointed.

quote of the day

Every attempt to find plan and purpose and respectable rationality in this universe, whether on a supernatural or a merely  naturalistic basis, is bound to end in absurdity, and of the two the naturalistic explanations are the more absurd.  Perhaps the song of birds is "explainable" simply as a device for sexual attraction; perhaps the radiant wings of insects are no more than protective colouring; perhaps the beauty of the morning-glory is merely to entice the bee, appealing no doubt to his acute aesthetic appreciation of colour and form.  Perhaps.  But if the aim of so much splendour is merely to stimulate the sexual processes of purely instinctual organisms, the mountain has labored and brought forth a mouse.

--Alan Watts

another project

The grassy area between the gate and our front porch has always turned to a puddle when it rains so I started another do it yourself project.

I marked off a pathway.....

.....then dug out the grass, set the round pavers, buried the plastic borders.........

.....then filled between the pavers with river rock. Now maybe not so much mud tracked into the house.

quote of the day

The oil industry has tried to prevent some of the possible consequences of ocean drilling. But they are ineffective!

--Jacques Cousteau, 1973

what i'm reading now

Behold the Spirit: A Study in the Necessity of Mystical Religion  is one of the best books on theology I have ever read.  Alan Watts separates the  "earn your way to heaven" theology of the legalistic religions from the simple gospel of grace and redemption found in the Bible.  
The author has a gift of taking a complex subject and making it understandable to a lay person.  If you are a non religious person but are curious to know what Christianity is all about then read this book.  If you are religious, read this book for an in depth exposition of the theology you believe. You will learn something.