things I remember

Walking out the back door, across the flagstone patio, down to the creek he saw that it had shrunk back down. The earlier heavy rain had brought the tiny creek from a foot deep to more like ten, roaring at flash flood speed over all in it's path. He watched closely along the bank, scrubbed bare now. There, just there, some oddness, a hole too big for frog or snake.  He dug, and digging down found the shell. A painted turtle or what remained of  one.

Some would find it grisly. To him it was a marvel of design and more. A symbol for his people, some of them, of strength and protection, even though it couldn't protect the inhabitant from the earlier flood.

Turning from the bank he caught the smell, musky and sharp, taste of an old penny on the tongue. He froze in place, knowing that taste, that smell for the only thing it could be. Cotton Mouth. It was the only creature here to be feared, killer venomous, evil tempered and devious.  Picking up his staff he swiveled slowly at the waist, not daring to move his legs yet. It had to be close. After standing there, half crouched for some long minutes, sure it was not directly under foot, he retreated into the creek. If he could smell it, it probably was not in the water.

Wading back upstream towards the house he kept a sharp eye out for any movement, any sign. Finally, coming abreast of the back porch, quickly charging up the bank, glad to be getting out of the snake's territory.  He carried his treasure, the new old turtle shell into the basement to be put with the other half dozen collected over the last couple of years. Some day the inspiration would come, he would know how to paint them, to bring luck, power, or perhaps just the connections with this place and his people he cherished.

Stupid & Crazy

This is a post I did a long time ago. It's subject has come to the forefront of my thoughts again, as I struggle with some personal issues.

I heard a comedian the other day...."You can't fix stupid." I've been thinking about this for a while. There are labels that we put on people that we use to make it OK to dismiss them, or ridicule them, or otherwise be less than kind to them. Among those labels are "stupid" and "crazy". It seems that socially two of the lowest things one can be are stupid or crazy.(OK, not as low say, as axe-murderers or animal abusers)

I think part of that is because either of those conditions can cause a person to be generally bad news. If you're stupid, you're going to do stupid things. Doing stupid things is dangerous. If you're crazy, there's no telling what you might do - totally unpredictable to others - also dangerous. Crazy is the next closest thing to a mind totally alien. other......"not we" (we and not-we, also known as "us'ns and them'ns" as in "Us'ns are fine-but them'ns are all messed up." another subject, another post perhaps). I wonder too, if we aren't afraid that crazy might rub off on us....or that others will see us near crazy, and think that we're crazy too.....guilt of crazy by association.

Ok, it's only prudent for people to stay away from those identifiable by their actions as dangerously stupid or crazy. That said, I feel for those who really have a diminished capacity. A matter of how to deal with the myriad of pieces of input coming in. All of which needs to be sorted, like wheat from chaff. Then more decisions have to be made. Matters of perception and judgment. How does someone deal with this when they have a lower than average ability to think, or perception more greatly scewed from reality than usual?

One Father's Day, a radio announcer asked listeners to call in the most important advise they ever got from their fathers. One caller said her father told her "Remember honey, You've got to be tough when you're stupid". On one hand, that seems like a pretty callous, non-supportive thing to say to one's kid. On the other, I can see it as kind of an admonition...something along the lines of "IF you're going to do something stupid, remember you've got to be tough to deal with the fall out".

I often hear people use either the stupid label or the crazy when others just don't agree with our thoughts or beliefs. It's an easy hole to fall into. Especially if you're smart. Or think you are.

OK, so, what's my point? Um......not sure.

I guess I would like to see in myself and others, a little more sympathy and compassion for those who are borderline mentally challenged in one way or another. Especially those who seem to know, somehow, that they're not quite up to the levels others seem to operate on. I see them really trying to keep up...As I feel that I'm constantly trying to keep up.

I say borderline because we as a society seem to be more supportive, more accepting, of those who are severely diminished in thought capacity or quality. It's those who are on the borderline we have no patience for.

Do we think that if they just tried harder they could perhaps be less "stupid" or "crazy"? Hard to tell, huh? I'm not saying we shouldn't try to help people. I could sometimes use some help with both perception and judgment. 

Maybe I'm just stating the obvious ad-nauseum?!? 

A line from a country song comes to mind - "Just be patient - I'm a work in progress".

52 Card Pick Up

Aaron, 6, is learning.

Remember that annoying *game* from childhood, 52 Card Pick Up? 

Some one approaches with a deck of cards - "Hey, want to play a card game?"  Then while you're still thinking about that they fling the deck out at you to fall all around you and holler "52 CARD PICK UP!"

They think this is funny. They say you have to pick up the cards that THEY THREW DOWN, because "It's the rules".

Hold the phone, I didn't agree to this. They're not my cards. It's not my rule.

Pick up your own damned cards.

 All grown-assed man now, I still find people in life who want me to play 52 Card Pick Up. It's  not my rules. They're not my cards. Pick up your own damned cards.

The other side

Sometimes the card thrower is bigger than you, not your friend, possibly just looking for an excuse to pound on an easy target.  You get tired of being pounded on. You pick up the cards.


Ever run into that feeling in your adult life? 

It's a Giant Gundam

Ok,  so maybe it's a guy thing. I just  love that for the 30th Anniversary of Gundam anime they actually built a huge model Gundam.

Hiking with Michael

I remember being the little brother, going hiking with my brother Michael. I was perhaps six or seven then, in the mid '60s. Michael was, and is, about six years older than I.

We hiked out around Grandpa's farm, near Crane, Missouri. That was a big deal to me then.  Down the hill, on the rocky dirt road, past the small old cemetary, along the railroad tracks. He taught me to walk the rails, for balance he said. He could go, seemingly forever, never slipping off the shiny curved top of the rail. I, I was always slipping off, at first. Later, I got the hang of it, barely looking down to see my feet. I recall the smells, in the mid summer Missouri heat. I don't know the names of the plants, weeds along the right of way, but I remember the warm dry smells of things not bothered by heat.

There were lots of things to see and hear. Hawks up high, crows, always, dragonflies & horseflies, the former welcome, the later, not so much.  lizards, if I was lucky, to see and hear, and chase, and miss.

I remember once, standy on a short trestle, perhaps thirty feet above Crane Creek. Looking down into the clear water there were goldfish there, let out from some fisherman's minnow bucket at end of a fishing day.
They flourished there in that creek, for years, growing as big as a large mouth bass, fourteen inches at least, Orange and white  and slow and serene. Our backwoods versions of koi, I think now.

And looking up from the creek from where we stood on the trestle there, across to the vertical bluff were goats, now wild on their own, perched, miraculously to me, on bits of rock no more than half the width of their hooves.

White and grey and brown, nonchalantly watching us watching them. they knew they were untouchable, aloof in their superiority of belonging, the kings and queens of the bluffs, much more at home than we to that place, that time.

It was a good day, among many good days, hiking with Michael.

To my Brother G, childhood memories

Coffeyville, Kansas, about 1967 or '68, walking home, maybe about eight or nine years old, from the west on 10th street. crossing to our alley at the end of the block. 


About then I was surprised to hear really quite loud rock n roll, blasting down the alley way. I recall  thinking Oh, some old people are gonna be yelling at someone about that. I walked on.  Once I got a couple of backyards down the alley, it was obvious the sound was coming from OUR old carriage house garage, OUR HAYLOFT! (I'm guessing Dad wasn't home). You were singing, um, pretty much screaming actually,  Purple Haze.


I went up to be in on this strange & amplfied wondrous happening.  I was the kid, didn't get to stay long.


My second mind expanding shock of the day came maybe an hour or less later. I was on the screened in back porch, trying to make a tornado out of play-dough. It was then a quite attractive young  lady, probably Joanne came walking towards me from the direction of the alley, with the bright sun behind her, silhouetting her form through a white  and yellow cotton dress. I had never seen that back lighted kind of view before. Oh my.


I remember her smiling and talking to me(probably asking after you) as she came towards me. It was pretty amazing, perhaps, as I say, even mind-expanding to an impressionable eight or nine year old. Now I can't help but see her, that dress,  or the old carriage house garage, whenever I hear Purple Haze.  

rock 101-mid 1960's

Mid 1960's; I remember that guitar, my big brother's Fender Duo-Sonic. I was too young to know it fretted badly. For many years I thought it had been a Telecaster or Strat, until corrected. I had never even heard of a Duo-Sonic.

I remember it from the living room on 9th st.,Coffeyville, Kansas(We killed the Dalton gang-woo-hoo?). I would have been six or seven-ish. I was not allowed to touch it, though I dearly wanted to.
It could not have been a more magical or mysterious an object to me if, if - anything. It seems like I only remember seeing it played about once each by my brother G. and by Dad. I may be remembering imagining or dreaming of Dad playing it. 

It did seem like seeing/hearing G. playing became much more frequent after the appearance of the Goya acoustic. I noticed here they're requesting photos of Duo-sonics and some other "obscure" Fenders. Man, wouldn't we both love to have that back, if only to put it on auction, or perhaps in a vault.
Here's a related memory - I remember being downtown, Coffeyville, Kansas at night, 9th street in front of about Newberry's, and seeing G. and some other guys, all about sixteen or seventeen, on a trailer, going down the street playing. Midnight Madness? The Roaches? was that a dream?