RICK'S GRILL

My pal Rick was the activities chairperson at my group for the last two years. Two years ago he wanted to have a cookout. “Do you have a grill?” I asked. “No, do you?” “No. You’ll have to ask around” I told him. “I’ll pray for one” he said. Which reminded me of this story “Prayer Is A Funny Thing” I called him up on the morning of the cookout. ‘Did you find a grill?” I asked. “No, no one has a grill we can use” "I’ll tell you what buddy. I’m going to go buy us a grill. I’ve been wanting one anyway.” So I went down to Walmart, with every intention of buying one of those little $50 red topped family grills you see everywhere. But the bigger grills kinda caught my eye. And the next thing I knew I was at Academy Sports buying a huge heavy duty All-Pro 300 pound combination smoker grill with a firebox, temp gauge, smokestack and a bag of Hickory logs. I got it home, put it together, found a guy with a pickup truck and 4 of us lifted this monster into the truck and took it down to the group. My buddy took one look at this grill and said “The Lord has provided!” He sure did. Our cup runneth over. Man, the hamburgers and hot dogs were delicious! And now I had a grill to use at home, and the Group would not have to cancel any cookouts and wind up ordering boring ol’ pizza instead. I went and bought a lock and chain and locked it up under the stairs outside my apartment. The next day the apartment manager called. “Mr. Renfro, you cant keep that grill under the stairs. You will have to put it on the back porch of your apartment.” Well, shoot. Its on wheels so that shouldn’t be that big a deal. I just have to roll it into my apartment and through the sliding glass door to the porch. Except when I went to do that I found that it was about 4” too wide to fit through the sliding glass door! After studying the situation for a while I determined what I had to do. I had to take the glass door out of the door frame. So everytime I go to use the grill, that’s what I have to do. But I want you to know something about my buddy Rick. After I bought that grill, he started helping me count the donations for the group every week. See, I’m the Treasurer. I make the deposits, and pay the bills, and every week for the last 3 years he has come up on Sunday morning to help me open the safe and count the money. But 3 weeks ago, Rick was diagnosed with Pancreatic cancer. My good pal died a week later. We had a Memorial for on Saturday, and I talked about prayer, and his faith we’d get a grill, and his wife smiled and laughed to hear this story, just the way I’ve told it to you here, and I shared that I’ve decided to name that grill “Ricks Grill”, because we use it up at the group all the time; there isn’t a time I move it that I don’t think about Rick, and finding a grill for the goup. Its funny. A blog friend posted a link to that ‘Prayer is a Funny Thing “ story on Monday without knowing anything about my friend dying, or his Memorial or the second part of the grill story as I’ve written it here. I cried to see it Monday morning, and to think about Rick some more, and how he became such a part of my life. Became such a part of so many peoples lives. And that's why I don't pray for a grill anymore. I pray no one gets hurt moving it!

LUCY IN THE SKY WITH DIAMONDS

We used to do acid, once upon a time. Its true. Copious amounts. If we had a drug of choice, before discovering our drug of choice, it would have been acid. We’ll tell you what’s a trip. We dropped acid and realized we had a doctors appointment in 3 hours. In hindsight, we can hardly believe we actually went to the appointment. It was for a physical to get a Life Insurance Policy. They turned us down flat. Said we were absolutely un-insurable at any price.
Yet here we are.
A miracle of modern chemistry.

THUMB-BUSTER

I’m thinking about the first gun dad gave me. It weighed almost as much as I did. It was a 1938 model Stevens single shot 12 gauge. Dad said Military Police used it during World War Two, but maybe he was pulling my leg about that. Dad had to cut off a little bit of the stock in order for it to fit where I could pull the trigger.


This old shotgun kicked like a mule. The first time I fired it I think it knocked me back 3 cotton rows. So every time I went to pull the trigger, it was a very conscious decision. I had to have all my feathers on, brace myself, and take a deep breath. After a while I didn’t even close my eyes when I pulled the trigger. Then it was time to reload. A switch released the barrel from the stock, a little mechanism in the barrel would eject the shell. I could pop another shell in, and snap the barrel back into place. But like I said, this gun weighed about the same as I did, and with a 30” barrel came up to my chin if I stood straight up. I reckon I looked like a monkey wrasslin’ a broomstick out there sometimes.


After I got another shell chambered, the real fun would begin. It was time to pull the hammer back. The hammer is what strikes the firing pin when you pull the trigger. Operated by a spring, it took everything I had to pull that hammer back. Some people call these guns with the hammer ‘Thumb-busters” and this SOB was a real thumb-buster for me. I was always afraid when we were out hunting that I would be trying to pull the hammer back and before I could get it all the way back into a locked position, it would slip, the hammer would hit the firing pin, the gun would discharge, and blow my head off. Very embarrassing. That never happened, but for the longest time I was about scared to death to fire it.
That is to say, it had my respect.

Over time I got to be pretty good with that single shot. If a dove was flying towards me, I could get a shot off, break open the barrel, reload and pull the hammer back, and get a second shot off as the dove was going away. Dove were usually pretty safe around me.

Somewhere back about 30 years ago that gun came up missing. Either it was stolen, or maybe I left it behind somewhere when I moved.
I really wish I still had that gun.

THE TRUMP CEMETERY

A MAUSOLEUM FOR FAKE NEWS
“The truth suffers from analysis” and that’s why I like to go to the Bureau of Labor Statistics to look at the data without all the commentary of Piers Morgan, Sean Hannity, Chris Cuomo, Donald Trump or Nancy “Whats wrong with my mouth?” Pelosi.
When you hear someone say ‘Donald Trump created 2.4 million jobs since he was elected”, its at the BLS that they got that data. When they say “President Obama lowered the unemployment rate from 10% to 4.8 %”, or that “Trump lowered unemployment to a 17 year low”, they got that data from the BLS.
Lucky for you that I saved* some of the data from the BLS site, which included ways to import data from charts to Excel tables. For semi-nerds like me, thats a wonderful thing, and I put together this chart for you of jobs created since 2012.
I offer it without analysis, because ““The truth suffers from analysis” and tomorrow we can look at a chart of manufacturing jobs lost and gained since 1981. 

*I went to the BLS today, because they always come out with new data the first Thursday of the month. I'm sad to say they have revamped their tables and charts, and it may take me a while to figure the website out. Dont you hate it when they do that? My bank does that and it really pisses me off. Just stop.

I GOT A WHOLE LOT OF KARMA TO BURN

Its amazing sometimes how fast your brain can go. Shoot, it can flat out get away from you.
She was standing there on the median, shivering.  She had on some sweats, a cap, some gloves, and a parka that didn’t look like it would break the wind so good.
I rolled to a stop and the brain kicked in. She was about 30 I guess, or a young 40, brunette hair and a little cardboard sign. Should I look directly at her long enough to read the sign? My tendency is to look away, remain anonymous, then when the light changes, I’ll be gone and she will melt away like an early snow in my rear view. I look at my dash, I look at the light. Still red. If I look, she’ll see me and think I have something for her. But I don’t. Theress never any money in my billfold, I don’t keep money. I look in the cup holder. Seventeen cents. Not enough for her to blow her nose on. Not enough `to roll the window down.
I look at the light. Still red. Of course its still red, its only been about 8 seconds since I pulled up and my brain is at full gallop.
There is the door for the CD holder. There might be a dollar in there. And just below it is the little drawer. There might be some change in there.  I pause. If I do find a bill and give her some money, am I really doing me harm than good? Am I condoning panhandling? Maybe God wants her cold and shivering penniless out here on Westpark Way to teach her a lesson.  Who am I to interfere.  I’ve been here 11 seconds and that’s how far I’ve come.
I open the little CD door. Nothing, nada.  No tenga nada.  
Its 20 degrees out, the wind blowing 30, in an hour it will be dark. You know what? It aint like she’s out here in flip flops and a halter on a nice sunny day, trying to scrounge up enough for a dime bag. The only way she is out here is because she fucking hasn’t got anywhere else to be. This is it.
Now its een 20 seconds. It took my brain 16 seconds to get here, and that light is still red, but it wiont stay red for long. I open the little drawer.
JACKPOT!
There must be $4.00 in change down there. It takes another 2 seconds to process the idea that I have to honk the horn roll the window down and get her to come over, and that damn light is going to be turning green pretty darn quick. I scoop the change, honk the horn, roll the window down, notice the light turn green and that her sign says “ANYTHING IS SOMETHING”, and that’s when I hear it. The person behind me is honking. Would you give me one break? Its taken me 20 seconds since stopping to get to here, and this is me now, avoiding eye contact as I drop the change into the outstretched hand, and then there it is, they honk again.
“Gobless You” I hear the poor woman say, but it doesn’t really register.  I’m looking in my rear view now. The driver is a lady, smoking a cigarette, talking on her cell, looking like daggers and honking at me.
I ease forward. She guns it and changes lanes, comes up beside me.
A Lexus, go figure.
She’s in a hurry, but guess what? We only go 100 feet and have to stop at another red light.
She’s beside me now, smoking and talking. I roll my window down and honk my horn.
She sees me and I motion for her to roll hers down. It lowers, smoke pouring out and I say:
“Hey Lady, why don’t you go fuck yourself.”

Its amazing sometimes how fast your brain can go. Shoot, it can flat out get away from you.

SHITHOLE PEOPLE

Many of you have seen the image of the tearful Haitian immigrant Second Lieutenant Alix Idrache (left) graduating West Point in 2016.
Standing next to him and graduating also is fellow Haitian 1st Lietenant Pascal Brun. Pascal did not immigrate to the US, but was accepted at West Point as an International Student. Up to 60 students a year from other countries are accepted at West Point.
Alix and Pascal may have come from a disadvantaged third world country, but there is nothing shithole about them.

STILL SNOTTY-NOSED KIDS

“The thought should have comforted Bobby but it didn’t. He found himself thinking of what William Golding had said, that the boys on the island were rescued by the crew of a battle-cruiser and good for them . . . but who would rescue the crew? Suppose the whole idea of grownups was an illusion? What if their money was really just playground marbles, their business deals no more than baseball-card trades, That was stupid... but the words still haunted Bobby. What if there were no grownups? Their wars only games of guns in the park? What if they were all still snotty-nosed kids inside their suits and dresses? Christ, that couldn’t be, could it? It was too horrible to think about.”
~~~Stephen King, Hearts in Atlantis.

Image~ Jay Wilkinson

FAR TOO EASILY PLEASED

"If we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."
- C. S. Lewis

Mercury in Retrograde.

Last week I turned the TV on and Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer was on. The old claymation one with Burl Ives. It was the part where Rudolph meets the adorable pretty-eyed doe with the little red polka dot bow, who flutters her huge eyelashes and tells Rudolph she thinks he's cute, and I cried and cried. It was just so sweet, and even funny looking bashful reindeer like Rudolph deserve to have someone that thinks they are cute to flirt and prance around with them. Then Rudolph tries to join in the reindeer games, and his fake nose falls off, exposing the big red one, and all the other little boy reindeer started to tease him about his nose, and I cried some more, Then the coach of the reindeer’s, in a very Trump-like fashion, starts to bully Rudolph too, and declares Rudolph unfit to play in the reindeer games, and I cried and cried and cried. I was a sopping wet mess. So I figured what the hell, we may as well get this over with and put on "Its A Wonderful Life" and cried pretty much from start to finish. Because Hey, its Gosh Darn Christmas. Mercury in Retrograde. Let it bleed.

TRICKLE DOWN?

“The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellows hands.”
Will Rogers
Thanks to Joe Boyd for such a great quote.

Back in March a friend of mine had paid a guy to remodel their rent house. They paid them up front, and were surprised to find a certain disinterest by the contractor to finish the project.
In short, he screwed her.
So I stepped in and did some tilework, and a few other things that I am not qualified to do, and we got the remodel completed.
Never ever pay the contractor before he does the job.

Here at Renfro’s FB page, we have been up all night working on our tax plan. We have decided to allow the tax cuts to corporations on two conditions:
First, the Tax cuts don’t kick in until AFTER a corporation has brought jobs back to American soil. Not before.
Second, AFTER the workers have been given an increase in wages, which is what the tax cuts were for, the corporation can get another tax cut, the size of which is commensurate with the size of the workers increase. Not before, no sir.

That pic up at the top? If you shake it really really hard no money will fall out of those guys pockets.

THE SEVEN YEAR ITCH

In the sexually repressed era of 1960-1966, with Rob and Laura Petrie safely sleeping in separate beds, I was quite aware of Marilyn Monroe. I was quite aware of Ginger, a castaway on the desert island. I was quite aware of Stella Stevens in The nutty Professor, and hoped someday to have a love potion that would turn me into a chick magnet, just like Jerry Lewis was transformed into Buddy Love. I didn't really know why, but the power of suggestion was pretty strong, and one did not need to know anything about the mechanics of sex to feel its undercurrent.

In the first grade, I didn’t know what sex was, but I knew there was something there that I was SUPPOSED to like. It went on between men and women, and I was supposed to like it a lot. By the age of eight I had some awareness of what "The Seven Year Itch" was about. There were several movie titles that set my imagination running wild. I remember "Mans Favorite Sport" being one, and I knew it was probably not a movie about fishing.

All you really had to do to know everything you needed to know was watch one Elvis movie.

Like these famous guys getting caught these days, there are probably a few girls, even dating back to about the fifth grade, that would tell you stories about me that I would find embarrassing. 

What stories? Well, lets see.

In the fifth grade there was  playground game we played for a day or two.  A bunch of us guys chased a couple of the girls and eventually cornered two by the fence. Everyone was pawing at them. Somehow I managed to get my hand up a skirt, if only briefly. After recess, I was invited to the principals office and quizzed about this episode. Like President Trump I denied any wrong doing and it was my word against hers. maybe all the guys got invited, I don't quite remember. It seemed like harmless fun back then. 

How terrifying this must have been for those girls.

I was 23 and had just broke up with a girl I went with for two years.
One summer night I was standing in my driveway, smoking a cigarette, forlorn over my lost love. Two young girls wearing skinny little halters, and them cut off britches came walking by the house. They stopped and talked a bit. They were still in High School.

The next night they came by again. 

About the third for fourth night (like clockwork I was hanging out hoping they would) just one came by. Next thing I knew we were in my bed and I was just about to stick her. Another half inch would have been past the point of no return. I stopped. Got her dressed and out of there. I quit hanging out in the driveway after dark for a good while. You don’t have to be a predator to get your ass in a sling. 

I pretty well have that episode blocked from my memory mostly. Fact is I very nearly fucked a 16 year old when I was 23.  

It takes a lot to shake it loose.

Judge Roy Moore, he shakes it loose.
His accuser says he had her down to bra and panties. I believe her. Its not that hard to do. And just like me, I bet he got to just about there and thought "What the fuck are you doing, Steve" and let her pass. Someone has to be the adult, right?

I guess if I was running for senator, I'd have a hard time admitting to it if this young lady were to suddenly surface.

Shit, would I even consider putting this on Facebook?

I think probably not.
Not at this time.

Growing up in 1964 I didn’t know much about the mechanics of sex, but I knew this movie probably wasn’t about fishing.

THE FITBIT

My doctor threatened me last month with some kind of diet.
All I really heard was “Protein Bars”.
I said “Give me a month Doc, I’ll lose some weight. I’ll get the amount of my diabetes medicine I take down some”.
I bought $100 pair of shoes. I was invested.
But I hate walking.
After a month I’d lost two pounds. That’s not much on a 280 pound guy.

“How’d you do?” he asked.
“Two pounds Doc, but I reduced my medicine by 15%”
He laughed.
“You need to get a Fitbit”
“Will that help?”
“Yes, 10,000 steps a day” he says.

What we are doing is avoiding the elephant in the room. The protein bars, the diet.

I break the ice.
“What about that diet thing with the candy bars?” I say.
“Protein bars.” He laughs and looks at me. “If you aren’t into it, it won’t work”
I say “Doc, I like good food. I cook a lot and eat real well. No junk food, REAL food and lots of it”
He says “If you like to cook, this diets for you. Its real food, with the protein bars supplement. No junk food”
I think about it a minute.
“I just have one question Doc. Will I be able to still have my pancakes with real maple syrup on Saturday and Sunday? Its kind of a tradition.”
You should have seen his face.
“Steve, I want you to go get a Fit bit and start waking 10,000 steps a day”


Next time I go in I'll have to tell him about "The Bulletholes Ten". Its a ten minute loop around my apartment. If I'm feeling frisky, I'll do two laps.
I always think about my nephew Dave, and what it takes to do one of these ultras he runs. An Ultra is an 80 mile jog over mountains and rivers and stuff, and you have like 24 hours to do it. I wonder how long it will take me to achieve the mindset of the ultra runner.
I had told Dave about "The Bulletholes Ten" last month. I said "The great thing about "The Ten" is that if I decide I need to bail, I'm never more than 10 minutes from home".
Dave looked at me, pitifully.
"You mean five. You are never more than five minutes from home" he said.
I paused a moment, quickly reviewed my calculations, rocked back on my heels a bit and grinned.
"Right, Dave my boy! Only five minutes from home!"
Dave is not just a great Ultra runner. He's a damn fine mathematician as well.

I MIGHT NOT SAY NO

I’ve had girls make unwanted sexual advances to me. Some fairly flagrant, even after being told no. Like maybe I’ll change my mind. I’ve used the same tactic. Its very uncomfortable, especially when they look like Harvey Weinstein.
Why can’t it ever be Scarlett Johansson?

"I promised the good Lord not to dig no coal" Blind Willie McTell

WAYNESBURG, Pa. (Reuters) - When Mike Sylvester entered a career training center earlier this year in southwestern Pennsylvania, he found more than one hundred federally funded courses covering everything from computer programming to nursing.
He settled instead on something familiar: a coal mining course.
”I think there is a coal comeback,” said the 33-year-old son of a miner."

“The Stone Age didn’t end from a lack of stone. And the oil age will end long before the world runs out of oil.”
Some kid on a skateboard at the Mall

FATE

"Do you also hurry, half-dressed and barefoot, into the garden,
and softly,
and exclaiming of their dearness,
fill your arms with the white and pink flowers,
with their honeyed heaviness, their lush trembling,
their eagerness
to be wild and perfect for a moment, before they are
nothing, forever?"

~from New And Selected Poems
by Mary Oliver

Statue~ "Fate", by Hugo Lederer
Ohlmsdorf Cemetary, Hamburg Germany

A WITCH HUNT

1. George P. is a 29 year old man who joins the Trump campaign as a foreign policy advisor, cultivates Russian contacts in order to get dirt on Hillary Clinton and to secure a meeting between Putin and Trump, then lies to the FBI saying he did all this before joining the Trump Campaign. When charged, George pleads guilty. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation.

2. In the year 1693 in Salem Village, Sarah Good is a woman living in poverty and disliked by the townspeople. A jury of men decide that she was a witch after forcing her to confess that she signed her name in the “Devil’s book,” a thing that does not exist. She is hanged several days after giving birth to a daughter. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

3. Paul M. is Donald Trumps Campaign Manager. Paul holds fake passports and accounts, funnels money from shady Russians with ties to Putin and has it laundered offshore. Paul uses his hidden overseas wealth to buy property and avoid taxes, then secures loans on fraudulent loan applications and uses the money for purposes other than stated on the applications. While investigating these transgressions it was found that Paul knowingly and willfully made false and misleading statements regarding his work for the Ukrainians.
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

4. Sarah Osborne doesn’t go to church like the townspeople of Salem expect her to. Because of this, a group of men decide she is a witch and is accused of using dark magic to pinch several young girls in town with invisible knitting needles. They arrest her, put her in prison, where she dies. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

5. Under the direction of Vladmir Putin, Russia creates 200,000 Facebook and Twitter accounts and floats a campaign of disinformation and fake news designed to manipulate the 2016 Election. These posts, ranging from reports of Hillary’s declining health to the idea she had given up Top Secret Nuclear Launch preparedness times, spread like wildfire on the pages of the more easily duped participants on Social Media. Easily debunked, yet picked up by Right Wing news organizations, hundreds of Russian sponsored fake news stories were then used by Donald Trump in speech after speech. Its hard to tell if he is plain stupid, a savvy ruthless unscrupulous opportunistic blowhard, or in bed with Putin. This is:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

6. Tituba is a woman from Barbados, but is now enslaved by white people in the town of Salem. She continues to practice her religion, which the people of Salem don’t understand. They assume it means she is a witch and beat her until she confesses and rambles about black dogs and riding on sticks, then imprison her, despite no evidence that witches actually exist. Is this:
A. A witch hunt
B. A fair accusation

Inspired by and partly stolen from McSweeny’s.

And much thanks to Arthur Miller

OLD FLAME

A restaurant I used to work at 40 years ago had a reunion. It got me to reminiscing about an old girlfriend. I hadn’t talked to her since 1982 or so. We went together for about a year and a half.
So I thought I’d look her up, see where she is. I found a likely candidate, way out in Santa Monica. That’s where she was from originally. And it seems she is a Doctor of Psychology, which also made sense.
She had wanted to be a Doctor.
Her Website had a message center, where you could set up an appointment by message, and a phone number, and also a picture of her. No doubt in my mind that was my girl.

It took a few hours to screw up my courage and send her a message. I cant recall exactly what I wrote. And the pity is --what tortures me is—that after sending the message you have no copy of whatever idiot thing you might have written!
Agghhh! What have I done?

A day went by. No return message. Did I give her my correct email? A week went by. How dumb was that message I sent. Then two weeks gone; she must hate my guts, even after all these years. But on the sliding scale of breakups it wasn’t nasty, it wasn’t dramatic, it probably fell somewhere between the thrill is gone and disappointment. She could never have a bitter heart.

So I wondered should I inflict myself on her further by calling? Perhaps when I sent the message, I messed up on my return  email address.
And then the dreams started…

I was sitting at a bus station, phone in hand. I called and left a message. A few minutes later a woman is walking by me. Its her! Wearing the cranberry floweredy knee length skirt she used to wear
I called her name "******" and she turned and looked, but didn’t notice me and turned away.
"******" again, and she turns, and turns away again.
So I said “****** “ a third time, and she turned and this time she saw me.
She came over where I was and started explaining that she didn’t want me to try to contact her any more.
“Hi Steve! I got your message at the office. And I saw you called a while ago” she said and smiled “but you shouldn’t call again”

She wasn’t rude, she wasn’t mad, she was just...her.
Her voice was perfect, her mannerism’s, just like I remembered.
She was really cool, California cool and laid back. I never saw her mad, but she was excitable in a happy kind of way, and really really mature for her age. Me, I was 22 going on 14. Somehow after all these years I still remember her birthday as being March 16. The day before St. Patty's.

You would think a dream like that would prevent you from calling, right? Not me baby. In for a dime, in for a dollar. I came this far so what the hell…
It went to a recorder. “Dr. ****** cannot take your call right now but if you leave your name and number we’ll be glad to get right back with you….BEEP” and so I left my message.
Unlike my written message (from what I recall) I kept it shorter and sweeter. A keyboard is a dangerous thing in my hands. God only knows how creative I got. How charmingly idiotic I might have tried to be.

Its been a month or so. I guess that would be the end of it. Of all my girlfriends in the past, there is only her and one other that is not still a friend that I see and talk with from time to time.
~But I did have one more dream.

I was cooking for ******. A pasta dish, glasses of wine poured, flowers on the counter, silverware and china on the table. She was ****** from 1981, 20 years old. I was Steve of present day, 60 years old. But she didn’t seem to notice. As we were talking I wanted to reveal to her that I wasn’t present day Steve, that I had come from a dream, I had come from a future, and started to speak.
“You are going to have a great life, ******. You’ll meet lots of men. You’ll stop playing with frogs, except in school. You’ll give up golf, and tour the Alps. You’ll trade fishing from my piece of shit boat for scuba tanks and Cozumel. There will be loves found and lost and found again, puppy dog tails, honeysuckles, and Dom Perignon. You’ll go to France. You’ll study hard. You’ll be a doctor.”
“How do you know all this?” she asked.
And I knew better. I knew I’d gone as far as you can go in a dream. I knew I wasn’t supposed to say, not in a dream, but I couldn’t help it. I looked deep into her eyes, then down at the ground.
My voice cracked a little. "Because I’m not really here, ******. I’m just visiting in a dream” and I looked back up to her.
And she was gone. Gone.
Just me, the steam from the pasta, and the Cabernet.
Two Things
(1)Never reveal that its a dream to some one you are dreaming of,
(2) Not all who are lost want to be found.

I never realized how much she looked like Catherine Deneuve until I found this picture of Deneuve.

And here  with me as scarecrow, Halloween, 1981

THE PLEDGE DRIVE

Every year I’ll be watching something on PBS and it will hit me. I’ll make the call. Time to support Public Television. Its not out of a sense of duty. Its always because I’m moved by what I am watching. And every year when I make the call I always end up with a lump in my throat. Two years ago the gift was Louis Gates “Many Rivers to Cross” the story of black history in America. It was an 80 dollar donation. With a cracking voice I asked the lady if we could just go ahead and make it an even $120. “Are you OK?” she asked. “Yeah, I’m fine “ I said, but I had tears streaming down my face. Last year the offer was Ken Burns “Baseball” “Jazz” and “The Civil War” for a $240 donation. It was during a commemoration piece on the 25th Anniversary of Burns heroic Civil War series. I pick up the phone. They answer. What is wrong with me? I can barely say it, I’m so choked up with emotion. “I-I-I’d like t-t-to pled-pledge t-t-wohunderedandf-f-forty…..dollars, for the K-K-Ken Burns package” Whew, I managed to get through that. ‘Thank you Mr. Renfro, that’s wonderful” And that’s all it took. The floodgates opened. Now I’m bawling, and tell the lady: ‘It j-j-just means s-s-s-o m-m-m-uch to me” I can barely get it out. ‘That’s OK” she says. “Does this ever happen to anyone else calling in? Where they end up crying on the phone?” “No Mr. Renfro, I don’t think so. But I’ve only been doing this a week” “Well that makes me feel better” There must be something wrong with me.

MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE U.N.

"Right now we're living in what Carl Sagan correctly termed a demon-haunted world. We have created a Star Wars civilization but we have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions and godlike technology. That's dangerous."
- E. O. Wilson

Image~President Donald Trump mocks and threatens North Korea during speech at UN General Assembly while Secretary of State listens intently.

FOUR ARRESTED IN EMPATHY TENT RUCKUS

“If you look at them, it’s ridiculous,” Sgt. Marquis told the Los Angeles Times. “You’ve got a guy with purple hair with a fucking lightsaber talking about Hitler to a guy dressed in a banana suit. Then someone takes a knee, allegedly just to tie their shoe and all hell breaks loose. It’s hard for me to take any of this seriously but I'm sworn to protect the peace and dignity of the community.”
Good luck, Sgt. Marquis

JERRY TAKES A KNEE WITH ONE THING ON HIS MIND...MONEY

"Maybe none of this is about control. Maybe it really isn’t about who can own whom, who can do what to whom and get away with it, even as far as death. Maybe it isn’t about who can sit and who has to kneel or stand or lie down, legs spread open. Maybe it’s about who can do what to whom and be forgiven for it. Never tell me it amounts to the same thing."
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaids Tale

A LIST OF FAILS

I look back on my life and see failure after failure.
When I was three I failed at eating Brussels sprouts. When I was four I failed my ballet and tap dancing lessons. At the age of five I showed a lack of talent at not setting things on fire. Then came First Grade and things got real. Of the many things that I failed at my first two years of school, perhaps standing quietly in line and keeping my hands to myself was the most challenging. Its been a life long problem. In the third grade I single handedly turned the class mural into a vulgar piece of graffiti.
A year later I hit the wall at memorizing poetry.
When we moved back to Texas my baseball dreams died when I could not hit a 40 MPH David Hutts screwball. My football career ended on a high note when I finally made a tackle on my very last play and the coach asked me “Where the hell have you been all year, Renfro?”

In the ninth grade it was Algebra fail.
In the tenth grade it was Geometry fail.
In the eleventh grade I blew Chemistry, Typing, General Business, and History. But for Dan Washmon spotting me a point in Journalism I might never have graduated.
So I decided I would be a chef, and I failed at that too.

I sat there at the State Fair yesterday and watched a woman demonstrate how to make Gumbo. She talked about roux, and explained how long it took to make it. She had a long list of ingredients, about half of which I would not have thought to put in there. She had a little nylon bag full of spices she threw in, probably made by Zatarains, and cautioned against leaving in too long because it would eventually burst and there would be bits of sassafras bark, peppercorns, bay leaves and God know what else floating in the Gumbo, and it would take hours to pick it all out. Somehow I knew this is what would happen to me if I used one of those bags.

I wanted to stand up and display my years of knowledge by asking her if she had ever heard of using cheesecloth to make a bouquet garni (which classically is what her little store bought bag is called), but hey, she’s the one still in the business, doing the glamorous work of demonstrating proper culinary technique, explaining we get the word “Gumbo” from the Bantu word for “Okra” in front of hundreds of fascinated State Fair attendees. Would I earn any points to point out that a nice roux can be made in minutes? No, I would just end up looking like a washed up, bitter old chef that thinks he used to be hell on wheels.

The fact is I’m just a lowly shipping clerk in my twilight years. I remember little about Teapot Dome and the Dawes Act. I couldn’t math my way out of a wet paper bag. In ballet, my allegro is mostly adagio, I tend to confuse avant with arriere, and that’s just the “A’s”. I also discovered my jete’ grande’ ain’t as grand as I imagined. and not because someone had tied my chausson de danse together.
But at least I no longer wake up smelling like shrimp and onions.

TAKING A KNEE IN PROTEST

The best explanation I can think of to your question is that sports bring out the best that one can hope to aspire to. The amount of dedication and desire it takes to excel and win can hardly be measured. it requires a high level of personal competence and accountability. For the student fans in the stands, its a metaphor for what they should try to acheive in the classroom. I never went to college, but I would imagine after the game over the weekend, whether won or lost, inspiration is drawn from that and applied to their studies. Same with everyday folk. I went to a Rangers game a few weeks ago. I watched Gomez, on his first at bat as a Ranger, hit a 3 run homer. It made me proud to go to work the next day,a nd proud to live in a country that lends itself to such principles and aspirations.
So we say the pledge, and listen to the National Anthem at sporting events to remind ourselves that the principles of fair play of the event we are about to see also reflect what should be the principles of the country we live in.
In reality this is not always the case, and the history of sports reflects that as well, as in the cases of Jackie Robinson, Hank Aaron, Mohammed Ali, and countless others. For that reason, I don't see taking a knee during the pledge as being traitorous; I think it is patriotic. Its very brave to go against the social norms, and lend your voice, and your ass, to a group of people that wants to be heard.
Thats the best explanation I have for you.





I think it has a place. Sports bring out the best that one can hope to aspire to. The amount of dedication and desire it takes to excel and win can hardly be measured. it requires a high level of personal competence and accountability. For the student fans in the stands, its a metaphor for what they should try to acheive in the classroom. I never went to college, but I would imagine after the game over the weekend, whether won or lost, inspiration is drawn from that and applied to their studies. Same with everyday folk. I went to a Rangers game a few weeks ago. I watched Gomez, on his first at bat as a Ranger, hit a 3 run homer. It made me proud to go to work the next day,and proud to live in a country that lends itself to such principles and aspirations.


So we say the pledge in classrooms, and listen to the National Anthem at sporting events to remind ourselves that the principles of hard work and fair play of the event we are about to see also reflect what should be the principles of the country we live in.





In reality this is not always the case, and the history of sports reflects that as well, as in the cases of Jackie Robinson, Hank Aaron, Mohammed Ali, and countless others. For that reason, I don't see taking a knee during the Anthem as being traitorous; I think it is patriotic. Its very brave to go against the social norms, and lend your voice, and your ass, to a group of people that wants to be heard.

OCTOBER

October smells like smoke to me
Smells like dogs and leaves and bare trees
It looks like rain in blurry beads
on windows
Like slippery streets, corn in rows,
Tight woolen sweaters on busty girls
I can almost taste it
Blue cotton candy at the fair,
Wet fall kisses and juicy over ripened pears.

bulletholes 10/2017

WHO WON THE VIETNAM WAR?

"In 1967 at the Pentagon they had a big mainframe computer in the basement. It was the size of a football field. They fed in all sorts of numbers; number of men, guns, tanks, planes, helicopters; ammunition stores, rations, portable bridges, APV’s; everything an army needs to wage a war. They let it run all weekend and came in Monday morning to see who the computer said would win the war.
They pulled the card out of the hopper. It said:
“You won in 1965”
~from Part 5 of the Ken Burns series "Vietnam"

ANOTHER FACET OF VIETNAM....HEROIN AND ADDICTION

When I was a kid, from the age of 7-18 there was always the background noise of Vietnam. Sometimes it just about drowned everything else out. The 52,000 Americans dead, images of SE Asian jungles, the protests going on in the streets of America.
A standing President that didnt want the job anymore, and said so on nationwide TV.
Four dead in Ohio.
Pictured above~ Frank Plada,16, shirtless and flipping the bird, protesting Police Brutalty in Chicago, Frank joined the army and returned from Vietnam with a heoin habit.
Tune in tonight for Ken Burns new 10 part documentary The Vietnam War on PBS.

WHY DO YOU THINK THEY CALL IT DOPE?

Once upon a time I played the role of Office Manager at restaurant.
Left to make the deposit one day and decided to stop by my house and get my pot.

While there I twisted one up. Took a few hits. Why not?
Stuck the pot in the deposit bag, went out to my car and headed for the bank.
Got to the bank, handed the teller the bag, started studying the texture of the marble countertop.
How marvelous!
I was mesmerized by seashells, bubbles and Angels on horseback, all in the marble!
Then the teller brings me back to reality.
“Um, sir” he says “did you want to deposit this?” and he’s holding up the baggie of pot.
Aw man.
“No, please don’t “ I said, and he smiles and slides it across the marble top.

Lesson learned… always go straight to the bank when you are going to make a deposit. Don't stop anywhere.

This is a really nice looking piece of marble, especially when you are stoned.

THE RIB

I woke up last night. My sweetie was laying there crying. 

“Whats wrong?” I asked. 

“I think I broke a rib” 

“How did you do that?” I asked.
I expected her to say "on the way to the bathroom", or "I fell out of bed". 

But no. 

“While we were making love” she said. 

I laughed. I couldnt help it.

I didnt know whether to say I’m sorry, or you're welcome.

BUGGER ME

A few nights ago part of my anti-virus clean up program wasn’t working right. I pay 50 bucks a year for this program. So I called the company, told them the problem. They verified my account and wanted to LAN in to my computer. I let them. The dude obviously knew what he was doing. Scrolled thru file after file. Asked a few questions like “Do you do banking on the computer? Do you make online purchases?” Well, yes and yes.

So then he downloaded a malware detection program. It says I have 93 potential threats on my computer! 93! He tells me I have BIG problems, but he can fix them. I asked him why my clean up program I paid 50 dollars for wasn’t working, which is why I called in the first place. “They are updating that program this week” he says. "That’s why its not working. But you have other problems and your computer is at risk"

Then he brings up the screen that shows me what he can do to make my computer safe again. One is $100. That fixes me. One is 150. That fixes me and gets me another service call if I need one. Then the $200 package. Its has all the bells and whistles. He again explains to me how at risk I am. So I say “let me think about it and I’ll get back to you”. He puts me on hold. Now on the line comes a fast talking supervisor. She puts on the hard sell. I cant get a word in edgewise until I finally say :

“WHOA WHOA WHOA let me slow you down. I’ve had this computer for five years. Used your basic service, which has been outstanding. Now you tell me I am at severe risk all of a sudden. I’ve had no one hack my bank, no one has charged a thin dime to a credit card, there have been no strange unauthorized purchases at all, not one. And suddenly I need this?”

‘You are at risk Mr Renfro”

“We are all at risk baby. But lets go back to the beginning. I called to ask why your program I paid 50 bucks for isn’t working. You tell me its being updated and will start working again in 3 days. But that suddenly I’m in imminent danger unless I shell out another hundred bucks. If I hadn’t called you about your program we would'nt even be having this conversation.”
And you know what she did? She HUNG UP on me! The dude was still LAN’d in and everything! 

So, I shut it down , rebooted, downloaded the same malware they did, ran a check, determined none of the 93 “Threats” were malicious, cleaned the quarantine and rebooted again.
My question is….who am I most at risk from at this point….some outside hacker or the fucking dude at AVAST that LAN’d in two nights ago?
I’m thinking I should remove anything they have on my machine and find a new provider.

NEW MAINTENANCE REQUEST

On 8/21 maintenance responded to my complaint of ants in the kitchen presumably by leaving a little white box for me to fold up and place on the floor that would get rid of the ants. I dont know if they also sprayed or not. All I got was the box.
A week later I hadn't seen any ants, but there weren't any in the box either.
Then last night I left a few fried pies from Turner Falls on the counter and had a million ants swarm out! I took the box and put it up there with the ants and they crawled all over the box, but none ever went in it. Not a one. So I squished as many as I could.
I hope you will send someone over to do something more than leave an ant motel on the counter for me to install, and they will let me know what they did. I’m really missin’ those fried pies.
I made my kids watch this old movie about the giant ants. When the ants came out they groaned and said “Aw Daddy,its so FAKE!”

YOU CAN RUN BUT YOU CANNOT HIDE

Freeways rerouted so both sides could exit Houston during Rita, 2005. 12 hours =20 miles.
Every time I go to Houston, somewhere on 45 the traffic is stopped. Sometimes for a car on the side of the road or a bus on fire, sometimes for a naked guy with a machete on the freeway, sometimes for no visible reason whatsoever. Its just stopped.
I can't imagine 6 million people trying to leave that city.
What could possibly go wrong?

NO WONDER THEY TURNED ME DOWN

ADMISSIONS ESSAY FOR ONLINE COLLEGE COURSES SUMITTED A FEW YEARS AGO

The greatest piece of technology affecting our lives today is without a doubt, the computer.  Forty-Five years ago when I was busy flunking High School mathematics class, the teacher brought in a huge machine he called a computer. It was not anything like what we have these days. It looked like something out of a B-Grade Science Fiction movie, dials and windows and buttons all over.  My buddy Scott leaned over to me and said “I’m going to make a million dollars off these computers”.
I just laughed, but Scott is a millionaire now.

Computers touch on just about every facet of our lives every day. Almost everyone has a cell phone, and cell phones are no longer just telephones; they are computers. Cash registers are hardly meant to hold cash anymore. They total the bill using electronics and microchips, and the payment is made by cards that provide electronic  access directly to a person’s account, and funds are transferred, all through the computer and the internet. I haven’t paid a bill with a check in many years. It’s all done online, through computers.

Even now as I type up this essay,  I can recall my typing class in High School. We had a machine back then, very modern, called a typewriter. You struck the keys, much like I am doing now, and a little silver ball with all the letters of the alphabet spun and flew around stamping ink on a piece of paper you inserted into the machine. If you struck the keys correctly you could remove the paper with your 800 word essay, put it in an envelope, lick a stamp and address it to Western Governors University to be graded for your possible admission there.  With the excellent work of the Postal service, it should be there by the end of the week.

Instead, here I sit typing away at a keypad connected to a machine that bears little resemblance to a typewriter, other than the letters being in the same place. When I finish writing, a few clicks, and  within seconds it will have been received by Western Governors University for their perusal. That is truly amazing.

This technology is used for much more significant endeavors; everything from space flight to smart cars, global positioning to law enforcement. Even the company I work for that provides communications for the airline industry relies almost completely on computers. I did not know when I started ten years ago, but most of the communication between a plane and the ground does not occur by voice between the pilot and the control tower. It occurs in the form of data, transmitted by computer, received by computer, and recorded by computer.

The mathematicians from the 19^th century saw it coming, the great science fiction writers saw it coming, and they even say certain Aborigine tribes saw it coming. Certainly, my friend Scott saw it coming. 
I never did. Too busy flunking math.

MAKE MINE SUNNY SIDE UP

"The mind wants to live forever, or to learn a very good reason why not. The mind wants the world to return its love, or its awareness; the mind wants to know all the world, and all eternity, even God. The mind's sidekick, however, will settle for two eggs over easy. The dear, stupid body is as easily satisfied as a spaniel. And, incredibly, the simple spaniel can lure the brawling mind to its dish. It is everlastingly funny that the proud, metaphysically ambitious, clamoring mind will hush if you give it an egg."
Annie Dillard, writing about an Eclipse

Watercolor by Joseph Zbukvic

A SAD LITTLE LIZARD TOLD ME ON HIS MOTHERS SIDE HE WAS A BRONTOSAURIS

Something has been digging little dime sized holes in my garden. They don’t go straight down. They go kinda sideways. Like a little thumb sized armadillos. They leave a little pile of dirt that is dug out, and this little dime sized hole. I thought “What could it be?”
Then Friday I came home from work. I was startled by an animal making a sudden get-a-way in my garden. A Lizard!
A BIG lizard!
He must have been a foot long and he had been digging. There was a hole about the size of a silver dollar and a huge pile of dirt there. So that’s what it is. Its these little lizards I been seeing, and the great-granddaddy. But why? Why are they digging these holes? For food? For shelter? Hmmm….

So I went inside and got ready for Susan to come over so we could go out to eat. An hour and a half later there’s a knock at the door. Susan!
I open the door, and there is Susan at the other end of the porch. She is freaking out.
“MY GOD STEVE THERE IS SOMETHING ON YOUR PORCH! ITS HUGE AND BROWNANDGREYANDGREEN WITH BIGTEETHANDGILLS WITH A LONGTAIL AND CLAWS”

She’s wild eyed, Susan is, so I smiled and said ‘I know! It’s a lizard! He and a bunch of others live in my garden. Come see!” So Susan eases over real cautious like and I show here the little holes, and then the big one. “I think there are five or six big ones living down there. It goes down about 5 feet into a huge anteroom” I tell her. She’s calmed down a little now, and bends over a little to look down the hole.
That’s when I yelled “AGGGHHHH!” and pinched her on her leg, and she jumped about 15 feet into the air and screamed “AGGGHHHH” and now we are both looking at each other wild eyed and screaming AGGGGHHH and that’s when she clobbered me. “Its not funny” Susan said and we laughed and laughed and laughed.

So we went inside, talked a bit, and decided on Mexican Inn. Its right across the freeway. When we stepped outside I looked again at the big hole. But the big hole was gone! It was all covered up! Why would that lizard dig a hole and cover it up? About then Susan said “Look! There he is!” and I looked down and this great-granddaddy of a lizard was looking up at me, just calm as could be, from right there at my feet.
“Hello Mr. Lizard “ I said.
He bobbed his head as if to say hello.
So I knelt down real slow like, and I swear that lizard was looking at me like a big ol’ Cocker Spaniel, and he swished his tail.
“Do you know how to shake, boy?” I said, and stuck my finger his direction. He cocked his head the other direction lifted a little lizard foot and shook my finger. “Pleased to make your acquaintance”
‘Susan said “Oh my God Steve, you just shook hands with that lizard.”
I said “You know, it aint natural for a lizard to do that. He must be like Mr. Jingles, the circus mouse from ‘The Green Mile’ ”.
But then the neighbor’s cat jumped down from the balcony and POOF, Mr. Lizard scurried away.
So I looked it up today, what Mr. Lizard was doing in my garden with all the holes.
 He’s laying eggs!
You know what that means?
That great granddaddy of a lizard is a girl!
From now on its Ms. Lizard!

ANOTHER SEMESTER OF THIS SHIT

Somehow I wound up in an Honors algebra class in the 9th grade. I wasn’t smoking pot for another year, but I discovered Rhonda, and how much fun getting my hands in her pockets was, and I also discovered that I was brilliant enough to pass Algebra without doing any homework. This set the tone for the rest of my academic career with the discovery that a class could be passed without actually, you know, knowing the material. I may have PASSED Algebra, but by no stretch of the imagination could I actually DO Algebra.

The chickens came home to roost the next year in Geometry, where I was surprised to find that knowing some Algebra would have been good. That’s how I flunked my first class ever. Oh, the pot probably didn’t help.

The next year I was in Chemistry, and without any Algebra or Geometry skills, I was toast there too, and ended up in a remedial math class as a Senior, because the State required its students to have passed at least one HS math class.

It was Speech Class and the Debate Club that saved my HS experience. Watergate had been going on, and Nixon resigned at the start of my senior year, and I was into it enough to think I might want to be a lawyer. I thought I did until about April, when I was called to the Deans office because I hadnt attended any classes except for Speech and Government in months. I had to sit outside his office and wait while he got ready to bust my balls, and it was while I sat staring at pictures of past Principals lined up on the wall that I had an epiphany.
I was a horrible student.
I didn’t want to be a lawyer, if being a lawyer meant another 8 years of school. I didnt want to be a lawyer if it meant even one more semester of this shit. So I decided then and there to be a chef. Because, well I like to eat.
The last day of school when you clean out your locker and turn in your books? I had to go to the office and find out my locker number and the combination.

TRADITIONS

My mother asked me if I remembered
The time we got drunk and cheered for the Cowboys.

“It was our first playoff without Staubach” said I 

“I cooked a roast, there was beer in the fridge” said she. 

But there hadn’t been enough beer for a game that close. 

I went to the corner store at halftime.


By the time the fourth quarter started we were down 

Fourteen points with two beers each left.

 How could I forget the way that she howled 

The way that I screamed and danced 

When Pearson put us ahead with forty three seconds left?


We didn’t make a tradition of it, 

The way we made a tradition of playing 

“BugBite” when I was a boy 

The way we sat together at church, 

Me holding the hymnal 

While she sang In The Garden 

Saturday night and Chicken Spaghetti 

Roast beef with homemade giant bread 

Shopping for school clothes 

Meeting the new girlfriend 

The way she called me Stephen when I was in trouble- 

“Wait till your father gets home”- 

And Stevie when I was not. 

We didn’t make a tradition of getting drunk,

 Mom and I, 

(I wish that we had) 

And I‘d never heard her howl like that. 

There was no way of knowing 

Mom would die a few years later. 

The summer had been hot, 

Now the January days were crisp and blue, 

We had no way of knowing that Danny White
Would take us to 3 NFC championships in a row 

And lose them all.

S'POSED TO KNOW BETTER

When I was about 9 years old I would sneak up to dads room. I’d open the top drawer of his bureau, move aside the three stacks of handkerchief's, and pull out his .22 caliber revolver with the 9” barrel. I’d feel the heft of it in my hand, aim it at the window, feel the resistance on the trigger. 

One day while doing all that I accidentally discharged the gun. Right onto the wall behind the bureau. 

WHOOOPS! 

It didn’t leave a real big hole in the wall, less than the size of a dime. It took a week or two for dad to notice it. 

Dad had taught me about guns. It wasn’t the first time I’d fired it. It was the first time I fired it unsupervised though. I knew better than to do what I’d done. But lifes lessons with me are usually hard learned. Dad didn’t whip me. He didn’t even move the gun. But he took the bullets out. From time to time Dad would get a far away look on his face and tell me how sometimes he would wake up in a cold sweat thinking about me and that gun.

I think about that gun every now and then, especially when I’m tempted to do something that I know better than to do. 

It was weird last night. I was shifting from one dream to another. In a moment of lucidity I thought about that gun.
And I did something I’d never done before. 

Quite on purpose, I dreamed of the house in Detroit with the bureau and the gun. I walked up the stairs. There was the weird purple wallpaper. Take a right at the top of the stairs, and into the master bath, with the tile, glass and mirrors. Then into mom and dads room, with the big wall of windows looking into the backyard, and the fireplace at the end of the room. Turn right, and there is the bureau. 

I’m nine years old again, and have to look on tippy-toes into the top drawer. 

I move the handkerchief’s. 

There it is. Dad’s old revolver. 

I pull it out and wonder what would happen if I put it to my head and pull the trigger. 

Its just a dream, right? 

Or would the whole world change- now-then-everything in between- with me not in it? 

I looked at the gun. Felt its heft. Aimed it at the window, felt the resistance on the trigger. 

I put it back in the drawer. 

Better not risk it. 

Better not risk changing the whole world. 

Besides, I’m supposed to know better, even if knowing better hasn’t always stopped me.

WE'RE GOING TO TAKE CARE OF EVERYONE

There was a great golden maned lion that killed an elephant and brought it home for dinner. He dragged it into his den, proudly`.
The wife took one look at it and said “You cant keep that lyin’ there”
And he said “But honey, its not a lion, its an elephant”

THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND

Years ago a girlfriend and I drove from Niagara Falls to Texas. Driving through Pennsylvania was gorgeous. Living down here in the south, we tend to think of the northeast as just one big city. But its not that way at all, is it? The big city is the exception, even in New York, is it not? Head north from the city, and see the Hudson. Head west and behold, the Finger Lakes!
So yes, driving through Pennsylvania farmlands, over rivers and streams, both large and small, and past vineyards on the eastern slopes of mountainsides that enjoy the morning sun was very nice. So too were the green fields with perfectly placed golden bales of hay, as though arranged by a great painter. But first…
But first we had to get out of Buffalo.

BLACK SABBATH

I saw a story today that reminded me of the 9th grade, when I discovered Black Sabbath.
I was in my room, listening to Ironman and mom cracked open the door and peeked in.
"What is that you are listening to?" she asked.
"Black Sabbath mom"
She looked concerned, but only said "Oh my".
I said "Some people say they are satanic, but I dont think so. What do you think mom?"
She scrunched up her face. "I think they might be" she said.
"No mom, I mean do you LIKE them?"
"No, not too much Stevie" and she closed the door.

And here is the story, as gathered at Alive On All Channels:

You Don't Have to Say You Love Me: A Memoir
by Sherman Alexie~


“And then after your mom was done singing in the choir,” Pernell said, “I saw your mom rolling in the aisle and speaking in tongues.”
“No way,” I said. “She was probably just speaking Spokane.”
My mother was one of the few tribal members who were still fluent in the old way of speaking Spokane.
“It wasn’t Indian talk,” Pernell said. “It was her Jesus voice.”

There were quite a few Spokane Indians who fell in love with Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity. I think it’s rather easy for a universally damaged people like Native Americans to believe wholeheartedly in miracles, in the supernatural. But I’d never thought of my mother as a Spokane who’d go that far.
“I’m not lying,” Pernell said.
“I believe you, Jack,” I said, though I hoped he was mistaken.
When I got home from school, I immediately asked my mother if she’d been speaking in tongues.
“Yes,” she said.
“Weird,” I said, and walked downstairs to my room.

I figured my mother was pretending to speak in tongues. She was just acting, I thought. It’s like a one-woman show, I guessed. My mother had always been so dramatic. And what’s more dramatic than an Indian woman rolling down the aisle of a little reservation church?

I tried to put it out of my mind, to allow my mother to freely practice her religion as much as she allowed me to fully practice my nonreligion. But, a few weeks later, I crawled out of my Sunday-morning slumber and walked the mile to her church.

And there she was, along with the white couple who led the church and a few dozen Spokane Indians, throwing books, magazines, and music albums onto a bonfire.
My mother and her fellow indigenous Charismatics were chanting something about the Devil—about the evil of the secular world—about all the sin-soaked novels and porn magazines and rock music.
I was grossed out.
On opposite sides of the bonfire, my mother and I made eye contact. But I think she was so deeply entranced—so hypnotized and self-hypnotized—that she didn’t recognize me.
I hurried home to make sure my small personal library of books and records was intact and unburned. And, yes, all was safe.

Later that night, at the dinner table, I told my mother to leave my stuff alone or I’d burn down her church.
“You’re a sinner,” she said, and pointed her fork at me.
“And so are you,” I said, and pointed my fork right back at her.