I Don't Care What Pronouns You Prefer

In this Blog I have made many references to the "Long List of Things I Don't Get."  These are just a group of things I don't understand and never will. It includes things like tattoos, jewelry and fireworks etc. I don't know why people like them, do them, spend money on them etc. I can add transgenderism to that list. This is not a phobia, I have trans friends and I am accepting of them, but I will never get it. I have made this clear with them and they seem to understand. I am sure there are things about me that they don't understand. In the same way, that I find every tattoo I have ever seen as gross, but I still have several friends that have them. Life is complicated this way.

Most people won't have a problem with the above paragraph, but they may have a problem the fact that I don't really care what pronoun you want me to use. I am going to use whatever pronoun comes to mind. You can correct me, but I will not make an effort to change or remember the "correct" pronoun for the future. If we have enough interactions, I may get it right eventually, but that will happen more by rote than anything else, not by any effort on my part. I find it silly, laborious and not worth the time and/or effort. I get emails from people with their preferred pronouns in the trailer. What am I suppose to do with this? Should I keep a spreadsheet of everyone I meet so that I can update everyone's preferred pronouns? When I meet or talk about one of these people, I can stop my discourse and pull out my spreadsheet to make sure I have the correct one. Yeah, that's going to happen (this is sarcasm).

Here's an idea. If you want someone to call you "he" but they call you "she," or vice versa, instead of correcting them, just deal with it. This is what adults do; they save their ire for more important stuff. I had a conversation with a trans friend about this and he said it is the young trans folks driving this. Older trans folk don't care. Since he told me this, I have been trying to pay attention to who the Pronoun Army actually is and he may be correct. By the way, I refer to him as "him" and "he" because when I grew up with him, he was not trans, at least not openly, everyone called him "him." I don't know what he prefers now, but I guess he has a lot more things to care about than pronouns. Since he's an adult, I am guessing he doesn't give a shit. He just deals with the small stuff and saves the fight for the big stuff. Choose your battles, the Pronoun Army's battle is petty one.  

Here's another thing I will not do: I will not refer to one person as "they" or "them." Unless a person can prove to me that they are two or more people, I will not do it. This is what "they" and "them" are for. Don't believe me? Look it up. I am not talking about duality or having multiple-conflicting personalities ... I am talking about two or more physical people, that's what a "they" and "them" is. One person, "he," "her," "him," or "she;" two or more "they" or "them."  I will not butcher the English language just because someone who hasn't grown up wants to chose my words for me. I chose my own words; I've been doing so for over a half a century and I don't plan on surrendering that right any time soon. 

Isn't that the ultimate micro-aggression, telling someone else what words to use? 

This nonsense has gotta a bit out of hand. I hope this is something we look back on in twenty years and laugh. I have applied for jobs on-line that actually asks me what pronoun I prefer. For these I select "Other" and type "thee" and "thy." Makes about as much sense as anything else.

A Shout Out to Billy Joel

One of the best parts of having older siblings is you can raid their music collection. I discovered Pink Floyd, Crosby Stills and Nash and David Bowie from my brother, Ronnie, with his copies of Meddle, Deja Vu and Diamond Dogs, respectively. From my sister, Karen, who is closer in age to me, when I discovered Elton John's Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, I was introduced to really great song writing for the first time. Those other albums had great lyrics, but Bernie Taupin's storytelling in Captain Fantastic just blew me away. Definitely, Elton's best. She had Stones albums, the Eagles, Rush and the Beatles among others. At that time, I saw them as their music, not mine. It wasn't until I discovered Billy Joel that I had my music. 

I know a lot of people don't care for his music. He is too light for the rockers; he plays a piano and not a guitar. He has all those pop hits. Yet the pop music fans seem to reject him as well. 52nd Street, probably his best album, did win the Best Album Grammy in 1980, but he is relatively ignored after that. In 1979, "Just the Way You Are" won for best song Grammy, but the album that it is on, The Stranger, has far better songs on it ("Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" and "Vienna" to name only two), didn't even get nominated. It is people like me, who fall somewhere in the between, that hold him in high esteem.

I have always loved the piano. Elton John, Keith Emerson, Leon Russel, Rick Wright (Pink Floyd), Rick Wakeman (Yes), Page McConnell (Phish), Ray Manzarek (The Doors) and Nicky Hopkins (session musician for the Stones) are a few of my favorites. So, it makes sense that I would be a fan of Joel, but he is also a great song writer and a decent singer with an appropriate amount of attitude. 

Saving up to buy an album was an achievement when I was 14.  They cost about $7.00 at the time and so I had to save up at least two weeks' allowance to buy one. Hence, it had to be a good one. The Stranger was one of the first I ever bought. "Movin' Out" and "Only the Good Die Young" was getting played on the radio. My mother hated "Only the Good Die Young." She was one of the Catholic ladies that wanted it removed from the radio because it "encouraged people to be bad," as if anyone ever needs encouragement to do that. I think it was the line "Catholic girls start much too late" that did it.  Perhaps it was the fact that it was forbidden fruit that I wanted it so badly. 

While waiting for his next albums to come out, 52nd Street, I remember buying his back catalog at bargain bins or used records stores. Before The Stranger, there was Piano Man, Streetlife Serenade and Turnstiles. I have a foggy memory of biking home with one of them in a plastic bag in my left hand and my right hand on the bike handle. Kids! Right?

At some point in the early 1980's, I wrote a fan letter to Billy. The only fan letter I ever wrote; in it, I asked him if the next time he came to Providence, if he could play the song "Angry Young Man." The Innocent Man tour in 1984 opened in Providence. I went with my friend Scott and my little sister, (I think I remember this right) and not only did he play the song, but he opened the show and the tour with it. It was phenomenal. It looked a little like this:

When 52nd Street eventually came out, I bought it in 8 track as opposed to album. I loved this album. While my friends started getting into early heavy metal (Judas Priest, Kiss, Van Halen etc.), I was getting into the piano and horns on "Zanzibar", "Half a Mile", "Rosalinda's Eyes" and "Stiletto". It was then that I realized that a lot of the best songs never get played on the radio. I loved the second half of this album (aka side 2) but none of these songs were ever hits. 

Like a good fan, I would buy his new albums as soon as they came out, before I had heard any of the songs. I loved Glass Houses and Nylon Curtain which was very Beatle-esque. Something happened in 1983. An Innocent Man, his 9th album, came out and I hated it. It was all candy pop, very little piano with a 1950's doo wop influence. I was so disappointed. I ended up liking the last song, "Keeping the Faith," but the rest the album I find unlistenable ... even now. 

In 1986, The Bridge, his 10th album, came out and I didn't like either. I thought I would get into it, eventually it was at least back to the style of his older albums, but it never happened. It had a few good songs, namely "Baby Grand" and "Big Man on Mulberry Street," but overall, it was very disappointing. The spell was broken. I couldn't get into the rest of his catalog. I don't know if he changed or if my taste had, probably both but I was done with him. I still love the stuff that I grew up with, but the newer stuff never did it for me. I realize that what I am calling "new" here, is about 40 years old. These type of things happen when you get old. 

I recently saw the HBO documentary, "Billy Joel: And So It Goes." It made me really think about his career and how it influenced me. Last year, 2025, he was diagnosed with normal pressure hydrocephalus causing problems with his hearing, vision and balance. So, don't expect to see him live anytime soon. 

His albums in ranking of my favorite to least:

1. 1) 52nd Street
2. 2) Turnstiles
3. 3) Nylon Curtain
4. 4) Glass Houses
5. 5) Piano Man
6. 6) Streetlife Serenade
7. 7) Songs in the Attic (live)
8. 8) The Bridge
9. 9) Cold Spring Harbor
10. 10) Kohuept (live)
11. 11) Stormfront
12. 12) River of Dreams
13. 13) An Innocent Man
14. 
    

My Generation

I have been unemployed for a few weeks now. Not a big deal we are getting by, but I do get a little frugal when the income gets cut down to one breadwinner. It is not difficult to do other than my addiction... that is, the buying of new music. It is hard to control myself when the iTunes store is so easy to use; it is really difficult to stop. Luckily, I discovered that the library in the town next to ours, Essex, has an incredible collection of CDs. Occasionally, I pack up my laptop and attached CD player and do some ripping of some decent music .... everything from The Clash, Buzzcocks and Television to Adele and Molly Tuttle. This really helps with my addiction, like a nicotine patch. One of the best finds so far is a three-disc compilation of The Who. I have always loved the song, My Generation, but it just started hitting how truly great a song this is. Now that I am in my 60's, it is like I am hearing a different song than what I heard in my teens. This is proof of its genius. 

They are so youthful and full of energy in this 1967 appearance on the Smothers Brothers:

It has really gotten me thinking about the idea of generations. 

Thinking takes me to strange places. Isaac Asmimov's Foundation trilogy takes place in the distant future when there is so much documented history that historians (called psycho-historians) can predict the future using sophisticated mathematical models. We are not there yet, but once I had heard Strauss and Howe's generational theory, it made me think that we are getting a lot closer to Asimov's world than ever. 

Every 80 years or so, America goes through a revolution, a major upheaval that changes everything. Something occurs that changes the basic way to do things in this country. 

Here are the upheavals:

• 1780's: the American Revolution
• 1860's: the American Civil War
• 1940's: World War II and the Great Depression
• 2020's: Trump's bullshit (someday we'll have an official name, until then I am sticking with this)

Smaller upheavals happen as well, I am not forgetting them, like the Civil Rights Movement, the stock market crash of 1890 or the 911 terrorist attacks, but the big ones seem to come every 80 years. Yes, what is happening now in the 2020's, could very well be as big as the other three.

Strauss and Howe generational theory says it is more specifically 85 to 88 years. Generations are defined as groups of people, of similar age, who have a shared experience based on what is going in their society. Within these 80-year periods we have four generational cycles. They label them "adaptive," "idealist," "reactive," and "civic" generations, in order. Major events change our lives, and perception differs based on how old we are when they happen. The 911 attacks shaped the lives of millennials in a way I will never understand as a Gen Xer. 

William Strauss and Neil Howe describe these archetypes that we still use today. If you were born from 1901 to 1924, you are often called the GI generation or the Greatest Generation. This is the civic generation from the previous cycle. Born in 1925 to 1942, the lesser-known Silent Generation, is the adaptive generation. The Baby Boomers, born from 1943 to 60, are the idealists. This group produced the civil rights movement and hippies. Gen Xers, born from 60 to 83, ("I'm talking about my generation") is the reactive generation with the Millennials, from 82 to 2000, being the civic generation. Hence, the Gen Zs are the new civic generation as the cycle continues. No doubt, you could rip some holes in these generalizations, but it is fascinating, nonetheless. 

My generation, Gen X, was originally called the 13's, because we were the 13th American generation. That name didn't catch on. The label Generation X has several origin stories but the coolest one comes from Billy Idol's first punk band by the same name. We are the last generation that has a collective social pop culture memory. What I mean by this, is that we all watched the same television shows at the same time because on-demand media didn't exist and we only had three television stations, mostly. We listened to the same music because there was rarely one or two radio station available to us. VCRs came out in my teens, DVDs in my 20's, DVRs in my 30's and on-line streaming in my 40's and 50's. GenXers had to watch what was on when it was on. Every American Gen Xers can recite the Preamble to the American Constitution. Why? Because we all watched Saturday morning cartoons and School House Rock came on several times on many commercial breaks. 

We had to watch the commercials too. There was no fast forward or skip ad functionalities on our remote controls, if we had a remote. You had to watch what was on or go outside. For a while, I was my family's remote control: "Mark, change it to channel 5. Bonanza is on." "Mark, adjust the antennae." etc.

Regardless of how it sounds, I like being old. If only I had the energy of my youth and the mindfulness that I have now, in my youthful body. That'd be ideal. Truly, whoever said that "Youth was wasted on the young" was onto something. Somethings, though, we should leave to the young. When I see an 81-year old Roger Daltrey singing, "I hope I die before I get old," I really wonder: Why does he still play this song?  

Pete Townshend, the song's writer, said in a 1989 interview with Good Morning America that the line "I hope I die before I get old," was talking about the rich. "Old" is more of a state of mind, representing the establishment. I buy it, I guess. He was in his 40's at the time said this. He was 19 or 20 when he wrote the song. He had to say something to justify singing a song about youth, but he was also very rich at the time, so I am not sure his answer holds up. Like all generations, his, mine and yours, will all, eventually, "fff...fade away!" Everything becomes old and passe. 

I am old man. Please excuse me, my mind wanders. 

 

The Great Tune-Out

Louis C.K.'s comedy is based on how completely disgusting he is. When it was revealed that he was actually a disturbed and disgusting person no one should have been surprised right? Of course not, people freaked out anyway and he was cancelled. People are weird this way. He said exactly what he was, and people laughed, but when it was revealed that it was true, I guess not so funny anymore. Woody Allen is a similar story. He told us exactly who he was. In Annie Hall, he portrays a self-obsessed neurotic who is clearly him. In Manhattan, he was a pedophile. Why is anyone surprised when he ends up being exactly that? I see this same phenomenon with Trump. He told us exactly who he is and what he was going to do. Yet now that he is in office, they seem surprised about what he is doing. Why? He doesn't hide how awful he is. Why is anyone surprised?

During his first term, he had strong opposition in Congress. He couldn't get anything done. He had no capacity to do so. He wasn't a politician. He had no idea what he was doing. He was a bad businessman, a complete fake, out of his league in the public sector. A little boy in a big chair. Trump 2.0 is a bit different in that Republicans control both Legislative chambers and, arguably, the Supreme Court. He basically has a sycophantic, negligent and complicit Legislative branch. The Republican party's motto should be: lean over, open anus, thank you sir may I have another. 

When Trump won his second term, my first reaction was to tune out. For at least a week, I stopped listening to my current event and political podcasts. No radio news. Music only on the road. I deleted my NY Time and Washington Post emails, immediately, unread. I knew it was coming but it didn't stop me from going into shock when it happened. This is the country I live in, I guess. They would rather to be led by an incompetent, hateful egomaniac than ... say ... anyone else. I'd be happier, or more likely, less miserable with anyone else. We voted for the worst person in our country to be President, probably the most powerful person in the world, a second time. The first time wasn't a fluke. We are actually that awful! 

I slowly started up again. I started by reading the titles of my podcasts. Two weeks after the election, I listened to a few. By December 2024, I was completely ensconced in my news-junky lifestyle again. I know many people who are still tuned out. I understand, it is overwhelming. That is what Trump wants, right? For the people who hate him to tune out. He floods the zone so that there is so much going on that you cannot complain too much about one thing, here comes another and another. When it time to start paying attention again. Wake up! 

Filter out the shit and concentrate on the important stuff ... and, man, there is a lot of shit. If you tune out everything, he wins. Tune out the shit: the impotent comments, the juvenile arguments, the social media stuff. 

What he actual does, as opposed to what he says, is more important. 

Here are the bullet points:

• appointed a person who thinks vaccines are bad to be in charge of vaccines.
• claimed to hate entanglements in the Middle East, withdew from Iranian Nuclear agreement in his first term because it was Obama's, tried to get Iran to sign virtually the same agreement in his second term, and then bombed them because it looked cool when Israel did it. 
• alienates our allies
• cozies up to dictators
• claimed that Ukraine started the war with Russia (Orwellian scariness).
• tries to impeach judges that rule against him
• deports people, some who are actually citizens, without due process
• pardoned the January 6 terrorists
• cut funding of public media, Radio Free Europe, Radio Free Asia and the Voice of America. 
• over 1,000 grants cancelled funding scientific research. 
• over 100 lawsuits filed against his administration
• his Big Ugly Bill cuts funding to Medicaid and Food Stamps (aka the poor) to fund tax cuts for billionaires.

Approximately 135,000 government employees have either been laid off or left voluntarily. About one third of them were hired back (oops, we need those people). So efficient! 

I always assumed that I would slowly become more conservative as I got older but they aren't letting me. Between W and Trump, all the awful things I have said about Republicans throughout the years ... just weren't awful enough. I've been too nice. This current Republican party is not exactly conservative, not the conservative ideals I grew up hearing about from Eisenhower loving Republicans. Those Republicans respected the law. This shit we got here is new. It is not conservativism. It is just bullshit and it needs to be stopped. 

Courier Journal - Fall/Winter 2024

As it turns out, working as a courier in the deep of winter in Northern New England is exhausting. I was doing this job last winter, but that was an unseasonably mild winter. This winter kicked my ass. Working a job that you can sometimes walk over 18,000 steps in a day, my being in my 50's and having worked a desk job most of my life ... you could say it was rough. This is my explanation, my excuse, for not putting out a Courier Journal for Fall 2024, I was too exhausted to write. Not only that, but the heater in my living room went on the fritz. For the last month, the room where I do my writing has been freezing cold. 

Fall in Vermont elicits images of idealistic scenes of leaves changing, people raking and lots o' pumpkins. For us locals it means leaf peepers driving slowly and pulling over to take pictures of their trips north. We've gotten so used to the foliage, we often don't notice. You really have to watch your driving this time of year. You can turn a corner on a rural highway and come up on someone pulled over taking a scenic picture. Visitors don't always know how to drive on these roads. It reminds me of how bad I drove in Ireland. As it turns out, round-abouts are extremely confusing when you drive on the left side of the road. My brain doesn't work that way. I had to take several revolutions before I could get off. I have to remind myself of this, when I get pissed off at tourist drivers. 

Ever since I've moved to Vermont, I've noticed something very weird about Vermonters. They talk about Burlington like it is unsafe. I just don't get it, and it annoys me. It appears to me to be the safest city I've ever been in. Maybe it is an example of people not having travelled and not having experiences with any other cities, but it seems so preposterous to me. Business Insider magazine recently rated all of America's cities based on safeness. Burlington came in #4 while its neighbor, South Burlington, was #1. I am very lucky in that I work in both of these municipalities. New England fared well with Warwick RI, Nashua NH and Portland ME all making the top twenty.  

Crime isn't the only factor that is included on this rating but suffice it to say, I am safe when I walk around town or into people's backyards carrying packages for the good people of Burlington. It is not only a safe town but a happy and friendly place. People say "hi," smile and sometimes hold the door for me. One day recently, a woman on Church Street saw me carrying a very heavy package and walked along with me so that she could hold the door for when I got to the storefront I was going to.  One of my coworkers recently said that he feels like he needs a "bulletproof vest" when he delivers in BVT.  (No, he really said that.)  This is just completely fucking bonkers to me, but I lived in Boston for ten years and I never once felt unsafe, so maybe I am the one that isn't normal.  

Another thing I really appreciate about Burlington is this:

That's right porta-johns. Here's another:

I drink a lot of coffee so I have to pee a lot. Having these spread around the city is a godsend. The first one is in Battery Park. The second is on the corner of North Prospect and Loomis, I think. There are quite a few of them and not all of them are on construction sites. I love this town. 

Courier Journal - Summer 2024

Twenty four years ago, when I moved to Vermont, a Boston friend told me that I'd be back. I would get bored. She could not be more wrong about me moving back. I defend boring as a lifestyle. Of all the times of year, Summer in Vermont is the least boring. It is full of tourists and construction and a ton of things to do that are not accessible in the Winter ... like kayaking, hiking, wading in mountain streams. It is my favorite time of the year. Working as a courier in Vermont for the Summer is also great. Sure, it is hot, but Summer in Vermont is by no means as hot as most of our country.  Burlington gets a wind off of Lake Champlain that is quite lovely. 

Burlington vs. South Burlington: When I first moved to Vermont, I was surprised that it wasn't as liberal as I expected. Having moved from Boston, I am not sure what I expected but the people I was getting to know were not as liberal as I expected. Then someone explained to me that it was because I was working in South Burlington, that is where all the Republicans in Vermont live. I have not found anything to back that up. The county that both towns are in, Chittenden, is quite blue. The conservatives live up in the Northeast Kingdom not here in liberal Chittenden, but South Burlington is definitely more conservative than its larger neighbor to the north.  

Burlington is Vermont's largest city. To put things in perspective, it has a population of 44.5 thousand people. This is when school is in, the University of Vermont and Champlain College are in session. It gets significantly smaller in the Summer. South Burlington, a suburb of Burlington, is actually the second largest city in the state at 21 thousand people. Colchester, a town, is third with 17.5 which is also a Burlington suburb. The point I am making: Vermont has very few people and most of the people that live here, live in this county, Chittenden. Burlington is the funky college town. South Burlington is its mildly more conservative neighbor to the south that has no real downtown and a couple of malls. When college students move here and fall in love with the place, some of them stay. When they get older and grow tired of the city, they move into the Suburban city, South Burlington or the cozy lake town of Colchester .... hence they are slightly more conservative. 

People seem less happy in South Burlington than Burlington. I have no data to back this up, only anecdotes. When you don't have hard data, by all means, rely on anecdotes. What else do you have? I deliver in Burlington Tuesdays through Fridays, part-time. I work one full-time day and that is in South Burlington on Mondays. I deliver to doctor's offices, law firms, retail outlets, big corporate and government buildings and residences in both municipalities. In general, people in Burlington are a joy to deal with. They seem to be happy with what they are doing whether at home or at work. The woman that runs the bagel place on South Union St. or the people on the loading dock at the Red Cross ... they are a joy to deal with. I can't say that I run into anyone in Burlington that seems to hate their job or life in general. I can't say that about South Burlington. Some people are very pleasant, but I deal with some truly miserable people in that city. The joy is not there, just one zip code number away. My imagination or bias, perhaps. Take it for what it is worth. I've never liked the burbs so perhaps it is I that is miserable in South Burlington.

The problem with horns: One day I was approaching an intersection. I realized that I was in the wrong lane. Right directional on, I tried to change lanes. Visibility isn't great in a cargo van. The rearview mirror is blocked; the only reason it has one so that you can have a reverse camera. So it has a significant blind spot. I was taking a long time to change lanes. I heard a horn, someone was really leaning on it. When I heard the horn, I thought I was driving into someone that I couldn't see. So I pulled back into my lane. But I wasn't. The person beeping was just angry with me because I was taking so long. Because I didn't understand his beep, I took even longer. The problem with horns is that they don't come with explanations. A horn that says "you are going too slow" sounds exactly like one that says "you are about to crush me." Maybe someday we'll have a solution to this but until then. We will just have to be patient with each other. My rule about horns is that if I am using it in anger, then I probably shouldn't be using it. 

Fall has come. Students are back. Tourists (aka leaf peepers) are still here. Life is back to normal in Vermont. 

How Jim Rice Cured Me of Racism

I grew up around a lot of racism. We were a neighborhood of mostly white, working class Catholics of French Canadian origin. The N word was used often and not ironically. Awful Jewish jokes were told involving ashtrays. The term Puerto Rican was used as a term that meant someone couldn't follow the rules of a game or a lazy person. Stereo-types of the Polish, Asians and Portuguese were accepted as truth. I found myself buying right into it, because I was a kid I didn't know better. I remember an internal dialogue of trying to figure out what it all meant and how true it was. I didn't really have anyone strong in my life to set me straight.

At the time, in the 1970's, the media didn't help. We watched a lot of television, which was three networks of mostly crap with a lot of racisms mixed in there (along with a lot of other isms). We had the natives on "Gilligan's Island," the natives on "F Troop," or the Chinese on "Kung Fu." In serious shows, black characters were pimps and prostitutes like Sugar Bear on "Baretta." Occasionally we had a show that had a diverse cast of complex characters, I remember "Barney Miller" being one of them. The one real thing we had on television, that was not scripted, was sports. In my house, it was baseball.

1974 was the year Judge Garrity ordered Boston schools to be desegregated and forced busing began. For four years, he was kept under guard for his safety. Protesters burned him in effigy outside his home. Boston was a very racist city. In 1975, the Boston Red Sox were in the World Series. On that team were two amazing rookies, Fred Lynn and Jim Rice, often called the Gold Dust Twins for their able to cover each other in the outfield. Lynn won rookie of the year that year, Rice placed second. Lynn also won Most Valuable Player and Rice was voted third. They were an amazing team. If not for the slightly more amazing Cincinnati Reds (aka the Big Red Machine), they would have won the World Series. One year later, 1976, was the year I became a Red Sox fan. I knew nothing of their history.

The Red Sox, historically, was a very racist team. There is no denying this. They had early opportunities to draft Jackie Robinson and Willy Mays and did not do so because of their race. They were the last team to integrate, doing so in 1959 with Pumpsie Green twelve years after Robinson joined the Dodgers. This nonsense was so bad that at one point, they wouldn't even allow anyone on the team who wasn't Catholic. This explains why they were so bad for a long time. Their losing ways was mostly their own making. They were not alone in this, every team in Major League Baseball was doing it, but the Red Sox were one of the worst. It is our cross to bear as Red Sox fans. 

I didn't know it at the time, because children have no sense of history, but when Jim Rice became a star in Boston sports, this was a big deal. He was the first black star in Boston. He was the first of many to come. He was not just an incredible player and future Hall of Famer, but he was a gentleman and truly gentle spirit. Any time I heard a racist comment among my friends and at school etc., my go-to-black-man was Jim Rice. I'd ask myself is that true about Rice. Of course not. How could say that this guy was lesser than anyone else? This guy:

That was that. From there on, racism was nonsense, an embarrassment really. His soft spokenness, his classiness, on and off the field, his friendship with Lynn, Yazz and Dwight Evans, his amazing athleticism ... that's all it took.  I was cured. 

In 2016, I mourned David Bowie by playing nothing but Bowie for at least a week. My wife was a little irritated particularly with the obscure stuff. When Bob Dylan passes, I have no doubt, much to my son's displeasure, I will react in kind. When Kurt Vonnegut died in 2007, I walked around saying things like "So it goes" for at least a week. When Woody Allen dies, I foresee a moviefest even though his private life seems ... well... disgusting. Along with Walt Whitman, all their works have been formative in how I think, see the world and lead my life. Yet not a tear will be shed when they pass. I am not so sure about Jim Rice. I dread the day I hear about him passing; I get weepy just thinking about it. 

Trumps Second Term: Worst Case Scenario

I have always been a bit of pessimist. It is more of defense mechanism than anything. If I assume the worst is going to happen, when it doesn't, it feels like good news. When I was younger, during the Cold War, I'd wake up each day expecting Armageddon was coming. I'd put the radio on to catch the news, when the missiles weren't on their way, whatever I heard was happening in the world, yay, good news. We weren't all going to die today. 

When Trump was elected in 2016, this served me well. While others were shocked, stunned, and/or pissed off, I was thinking, "I knew it." In 2024, I do what I can to prevent him from being elected, but if it does happen, I will be prepared, emotionally anyway. What will his second term look like, I assume the worst of course. 

In 1934 Germany, an event took place, under Chancellor Adolph Hitler, often referred to as the Night of the Long Knives. I apologize for bringing up Hitler, but it is difficult not to when Trump is using words like "vermin" when he refers to Americans that disagree with him and is threatening retribution. For a three day period, Hitler's thugs (aka "brown shirts") went on a killing spree, executing Hitler's political opponents. The official number of victims is eighty but some say it was as high as a thousand. The real number was lost in the fog of war that was soon to come. It is something like this, that I see as a worst case scenario. Trump's "brown shirts", either under his direction or not, go after his political opponents. Not just other politicians, like Harris, Biden and Pelosi etc., but judges, lawyers, journalists, maybe even bloggers. He'll claim he had nothing to do with it and he'll get away with it. 

Trump's language at his rallies suggest that I am not too far off. He said some really disgusting things about fellow Americans, about me and probably you as well, and his crowd of supporters cheer him on. Some have even elevated him to a religious icon. What saved us from his first presidency is his administration's incompetence. Their total lack of direction was their ball and chain. This time around he already has more direction with Project 2025 backing him up. He also had a lot of traditional conservatives around him preventing him from going completely off the rails. His second administration, according to him, is going to have no such people in it. He has talked about a loyalty oath and firing anyone that won't sign it. 

Hopefully, I am wrong about all of this. Kamala Harris seems like a decent and capable person. Since, I'd vote for anyone running against Trump, she definitely has my vote regardless. 

My Grieving for American Democracy

American democracy is dying. It has been dying for quite some time, a long slow painful death. After this past week, one could pronounce it dead. Dead on arrival the moment Biden first talked at the presidential debate last week and showed us all how badly he had declined, intro to Diminished Joe. DOA at the moment that Trump told his first lie, first of many. If that didn't convince you, then certainly when the Supreme Court decided that the president couldn't be prosecuted for anything he/she did that was broadly related to their job ... certainly that killed democracy for you.

The first stage of grief is denial and you could say that is exactly where I was for the past decade or so until Thursday night when I laid down into bed to watch the debate. My wife already started it without me and within a couple of minutes I said "We are fucked" and she said "yup." This is when denial turned into anger, stage two of grief. I am angry that these are the two candidates we have to choose from. We are stuck with them: Biden, who looked like he was going to die on stage and couldn't put a coherent sentence together, and the unhinged Trump, the worst person in America ... a convicted felon, racist, sexual predator, a pathological liar and someone we already know was a truly awful president. 

I know what some of you are thinking, "but Mark, we have more than two choices. There are third party candidates." I have already considered this. The most popular and viable third party candidate, Robert Kennedy Jr., is just as bad of a choice as these two guys. Kennedy is a paranoid nut. If both my father and uncle were victims of public assassinations, I would probably be paranoid as well. He may be younger than our two octogenarians but his health is no better. He is just a notch better than Trump. 

I was on the Biden bandwagon until the debate. Joe has been an excellent president, one of the best in my lifetime. Originally, in 2020, I voted for Joe because I was voting against Trump not for Biden. As his administration progressed, I noticed a lot of good things happening: green spending, Judge Brown, childhood hunger going down, infrastructure spending, student loan debt loopholes sealed, bi-partisan deal on the border (that Trump killed) and elegantly walking a fine line in two foreign wars. His many years in the Senate has really paid off, but is he up to the job. I would like to point out that I still take Biden on his worst day over Trump on his best. The debate performance may have been Biden on his worst day, but for all we know, he has had a lot of these and his staff is just hiding it from us.

The most frustrating part of this is that both party have good and, some, young alternatives. Why are we stuck with these guys? The Democratic party has had plenty of opportunity to address this. Back in February, 2024, special counsel Robert Hur referred to Biden as "an  elderly man with a poor memory." Hur is not a political hack. He spent several days with the president. Why didn't they see this as a red flag? We have some great candidates that all poll well against Trump: VP Harris, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (MI), Gov. Gavin Newsom (CA) and Sec. Pete Buttigeig are all excellent candidates. We still have time before the convention to resolve this. Even the Republicans have some reasonable candidates. Both Mitt Romney and William Weld are still alive (my northeast bias is showing here). 

The next president will probably have two Supreme Court nominations. This is it folks. If you don't like what the Supreme Court is doing, we can't have another Trump presidency. Before I go into the next stages of grief: bargaining, depression and acceptance, lets try the defib pads one more time and see if we can resuscitate this Democracy ... unless you think Emperor Trump is good idea. 

Courier Journal - Spring 2024

It is amazing what a different city Burlington is when the warm weather comes. I attribute this to three factors:

• Once the colleges let out, about half the city's population leaves. So driving around the University and Champlain College is a lot easier. The busyness shifts to other parts of the city once they leave. This is a great relief for someone like me that always fears driving among the texting youth that seem oblivious of their surroundings. For about a week, moving vans clutter the streets. Then peace ensues, but other treachery awaits.
• Burlington is a beautiful city, vibrant and exciting. It sits on Lake Champlain with the Adirondacks to the west and the Greens to the east. Every weekend it seems we have a new festival.  Jazz Fest last weekend. Food fests, Reggae fests, Brewfests, etc. This means we have a ton of tourists, particularly from Boston, New York and Montreal. These aren't cities known for their good drivers. This brings a whole new dynamic to driving. 
• Because we are a cold weather climate, most of our road construction takes place in the few warm weather months. This makes Burlington a nightmare to drive in. It seems like there is construction every other street.  For these months, Vermont's state flag should be changed to have an orange cone on it.

I have always been frustrated with people. To put it bluntly I am not a "people person." Driving in the city during tourist season has not interacted positively with this part of my nature. Here is a short list of how people annoy me: 

• Don't park in loading zones. I've confronted several people parked in loading zones. The response I get is that "it is okay, I'm just going in the bank" etc. No, it is not okay. Loading zones are for commercial vehicles, loading and unloading. I don't think Vermonters know this. They think it is someplace to put your car if you have something quick to do.
• The stop line is where you stop at a stop light. At every light, there is a line on the ground that tells you where you are supposed to stop. Some of them are far back. An expert has studied this intersection and has determined where you should stop. If you stop after the stop line, there is a possibility that a bus may come along and not be able to turn because you are in the way. Just follow the rules and traffic will flow just fine.
• Red arrows mean you can't turn. I don't know why, but people just don't seem to know this. If a green arrow means you can turn, what do you think a red arrow means? 
• If you are going to hang out as a pedestrian and just look at your phone, don't do so at a crosswalk or an intersection. You may be oblivious to this but drivers think you are going to cross and react to you. Stand back and away from the curb.
• Try, if you are close, to use a crosswalk. Some cars actually do stop if you wait in the crosswalk. Chaos is good for no one. 

Traffic flowing helps everyone. 

We recently watched all three seasons on Ted Lasso. If you haven't seen it, you should check it out. If you don't have Apple TV, sign up for a free trial, watch Ted Lasso and then unsubscribe. You'll get all three seasons in before the month is out, I promise. The reason I bring this up, the main character Ted has a philosophy that has stuck with me, that he got from my favorite poet Walt Whitman, "Be curious, not judgemental." I have been trying to get into this mind set when I drive and for the most part it has been working. 

So far I've had these experiences:

• I was at an intersection (North St. and Willard), the light turned green, I was about to go straight (east on North) when I noticed coming down Willard a bicyclist that I knew wasn't going to stop at the light. So I waited or I would have hit him. Not only did he blow off the light but he wasn't even looking at traffic; he was looking at his cell phone. Be curious, not judgemental. Must have been doing something very very important happening on that phone. This philosophy is challenging. 
• At the corner of Main and Winooski, a woman decided driving through the intersection out of her lane through a red light, all the while with her hand on the horn honking. About ten cars were at the intersection and we all stopped to let her go. They probably were as stunned as I was. Be curious: must have been a real emergency, perhaps she was going to hospital (which is in the other direction).
• While driving on College Street, heading toward Winooski and downtown, in front of the library, I had to stop for a group of homeless people (or is it houseless now?). About seven or eight of them were yelling at each other, I had no idea what was going on. I waited until most of them crossed but one woman remained in the street and decided to dance in front of my truck. I lightly beeped but she seemed oblivious. I drove around her by driving with one tire on the sidewalk. Luckily there were no other cars or pedestrians coming. The traffic behind did the same. If this were to happen again, I might get out of my truck with blinkers on and tried to escort her out of traffic. Be curious: I wonder what she was on.
• This philosophy is difficult at times, but it seems to be working. I was driving up College Street one day and I noticed a car driving erratically in my rearview mirror. He seemed to be yelling at me. He decided to pass me on a city street. I yelled, "What the hell?" or something a bit more vulgar. I noticed his Quebec plate and judgement ensued, but I stopped it with curiosity winning over. He pulled in front of me and stopped. He got out of the car and approached my truck. "Holy shit!" I unrolled the window. In a very polite French Canadienne accent, he said "Your back door is open." My freight was exposed. The guy that I was about to yell at just put a lot of energy into saving my butt. The weather stripping on my cargo door was preventing a good closure on the door. I had to do a quick repair. Ted Lasso and Walt Whitman rule. Merci beaucoup! 

The quote does sound Whitmanesque, but I didn't recognize it. I know my Walt. I was curious, of course. Snopes says it isn't Whitman, I have to believe this is true. To me, it just makes Ted Lasso a more realistic character. He is wrong on a little thing but overall, he is very much correct. 

Most of the Spring was spent delivering in Burlington and occasionally South Burlington. The only exception was the day of the total eclipse. Because of the chaos downtown, most businesses were closed so my boss didn't need me in Burlington. So he sent me up to the islands which is a really beautiful spot in Vermont. The most Northwestern part of Vermont are a group of islands in Lake Champlain that border Canada and New York state. It was a gorgeous day and I finished working in time to get back home to watch the eclipse with my family.

Courier Journal - Fall 2023

I know three people who died of heart attacks in my time as a software analyst/engineer. Some of them younger and in better health than me. So when I had a heart attack this past January, still unemployed from my IT career, I decided to find something that I enjoy to do that ... well ... won't kill me. One of the joys of my life is driving around Vermont. So I became a courier and now I drive all over VT and get paid for it. I don't get paid a lot, less than half my old salary. You could say I am working for benefits and winding down to my retirement. I am enjoying it.

After a regiment of training and tests, I started off delivering, solo, in the towns of Charlotte, Vergennes, North Ferrisburg and Shelburne, and occasionally in Panton and New Haven. These are all beautiful towns that hug Lake Champlain south of Burlington along routes 7 and 23. These are truly stunning places. 

Here is an example of a driveway I had back down in my truck.  It is not the most difficult one I've had to do either. 

I believe I was at the foot of Mount Philo in North Ferrisburg when I took this.  That is Mt. Mansfield, VT's largest mountain, in the distance. 

This is the Otter Creek taken from MacDonough Park in Vergennes (the smallest city in the US).

Taken from a covered bridge in Charlotte, VT (I believe):

This horse farm is in Shelburne. 

I believe this is West Charlotte.

I don't take pictures while I am driving. I have to pull over or sometimes, I am delivering something and I see something picturesque while I am at a stop ... I pull out my phone and snap it. I was planning on taking a picture of something beautiful everyday, but that is difficult when weather is bad.  Also, something else happened.

This is a long route which means a very long day. On some days, I was in at 6:30am and out at 7:30pm, not getting home until after 8pm while my son was going to bed. I was exhausted and made mistakes because of it.  I told my boss that I thought this route was a young man's route and I didn't think I could take it. He understood and we worked it out that I am a part timer now. This is actually great for me, because I get home in the afternoon now and can usually catch my son's bus. I keep my full benefits as well.

Now I am driving the Burlington priority route. I still really enjoy this, although it is less pretty, this is a really great city. I deliver priority packages all morning to the College, Church Cherry and Main Street area. I get a few non-priority packages in the afternoon and then I head home. I deliver blood to the Red Cross, drug and vaccines to pharmacies etc. It is a good living. 

I try to time it so that I am around Church Street for my break. So I can go to Muddy Waters for some chili and coffee or one of the other funky cafes. I am getting to know the business people on my route, some of whom I see everyday. While some of the drivers who deliver to Burlington seem to be burnt out on my place, I seem to love it more everyday, warts and all. Hopefully that doesn't change. 

I do have a suggestion for you if you want to make things easier for your delivery person. Make sure the number of your house is visible. If you are rural, try to put your number on the road somewhere. I waste a lot of time trying to find the correct house. It is not always obvious. On the days I do work late, finding a house in the dark is very challenging ... especially if the number on a brown house are also brown or just not posted. Make it obvious and easy to find and read. Safety is something to which we all contribute.

Jon Lester's Eulogy (the cat, not the ball player)

In my house, when a baseball player wins the World Series for both the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs, you get a pet named after you. I am talking about Jon Lester, the pitcher who won the Series with the 2007 and 2013 Red Sox and the 2016 Cubs. Our cat Jon Lester was named after him. This is the cat's eulogy not the pitcher. I understand that the pitcher is doing fine and living out his retirement in the state of Georgia hunting, drinking a lot of wine and writing, last I heard.

When you live in a rural setting, you really need a cat. Mice do find a way into your home. Our cat Mavis kept them away. She wasn't a very good cat. She is probably the only pet I've ever had that I did not bond with. She wasn't friendly, she seemed to hate humans but loved our dogs. She would duck when we went to pet her but she would run up to our dogs and rub them. She would disappear for days, even weeks. We only deduced that she was dead when she failed to return, when mice started showing up and she wasn't eating her food. I didn't write her a eulogy. 

We replaced her with Jasper who was a truly awesome cat but we only had him for a couple of months. He was hit by a car in front of our house. I had to pick up his near dead body off the road with blood shooting out of him. It was one of the worse things I ever had to do. 

We had Wrigley for only a couple of months as well. We didn't let her outside because I didn't want to go through that again. She was a timid sweet animal. She got outside once and while my dog Hazel was home alone. When I got home with my other dog Woodrow. I let him outside to be with Hazel. A few minutes later, I looked out the back window and I saw them playing tug of war with something. This is one of my more awful images I have in my brain. 

2016 was very bad year for us. Our dog Max died, we had a drought here causing us to go without water for a few weeks and Trump got elected. If it wasn't for the Cubs winning the World Series, it would have been our worst year together as a couple. The other great thing that happened that year we adopted (Jon) Lester from the Addison County animal shelter.

We needed a tough cat that would stand his ground against Hazel who was kinda a bitch. He was a barn cat. The people who brought him into the shelter had too many cats in their barn. He ended up being the perfect cat. Gorgeous as well! 

Hazel was afraid of him. He swiped at her whenever she walked by which was perfect. He was a great mouser. He cuddled with me almost every night, sometimes on my shoulder, my chest, sometimes at my feet. He even played fetch. If you crinkled a ball of paper and threw it, he'd run and catch it then put it back in your hand. I still haven't had a dog that would play fetch but I've had two cats that have. Go figure! I was convince he was smarter than my dogs. If his water bowl was empty, he'd stand on the side of it and meow. My dogs, and even some humans I know, don't communicate that well.

It was early in the summer this year that he got out. He occasionally did this, but always came back right away. This time he did not. I put his food out for him. Something was eating it, but I had no proof it was him. So I set my wilderness camera up to verify it was him. I moved it closer and closer to the house until it was on the front porch. This is a video of him on June 4th. 

I borrowed a trap from one of my neighbors and the first night I had it out there, I caught him but because I didn't set the trap correctly, he backed his way out. Here is the video of that feat:

The panel behind him wasn't set properly so I am guess that he just continued to backed out of the trap. He was too smart for his own good. He appeared on my video for about month after that. He never got caught again. Then he stopped showing up around mid-July.

We assume he passed away somehow. Either a car, a fisher or a coyote got him. Maybe someone took him in. I only hope. I still look for him when I go out in the yard. I miss him very much. 

My Fragile Faith in Humanity / The Plague

I live with a fragile faith in humanity. I waiver, sometimes within moments, between being an all out humanist believing in humanity's unadulterated ability to overcome all to an occasional belief that humanity is a virus upon this planet. It is not an easy way to live, but I have growth to be accustomed to this dichotomy. I have adapted and it has become the norm for me. 

I go about my life like anyone else. I drive along picturesque, pastoral rural Vermont. I look upon the windmills on Georgia mountain and their awesome turning. I think of progress. I think to myself, "How wonderful we are leaning to live in harmony with our environment!" and then drive on and come across someone with a chorus of plastic blowup Walmart crap cluttering their lawn. It could be Christmas, there could be blinking lights with Santa, elves and reindeers. It is at this point when I change over to my other self. We are fucking doomed. I am in constant battle with myself. 

I just finished rereading Albert Camus' The Plague. It is a perfect book to read coming out of the pandemic. It is bubonic plague in the book but symbolically it is a different plague he is writing about. It is a plague of bad ideas. It is written shortly after World War II and it take place in his native Algiers in a small city called Oran in 1947. The world was fighting a plague of isms in mid-20th century: communism, socialism, capitalism and fascism. 

This is a philosophical novel so the journey is a personal one, one of thought and self reflection. Like most books of this nature it's soul, it's place where it sets the reader straight, it's denouement, if you will occurs towards the end of the book when the character Tarrou finally tells the main character Dr. Rieux what is on his mind. 

"... this epidemic has taught me nothing new, except that I must fight it at your side. I know positively ---- yes, Rieux, I can say I know the world inside out, as you may see --- that each of us has the plague within him; no one , no one on earth is free from it."

Life is a battle of internal dialogue in a search what is right and what is wrong. For me, the wind mills are right and a sign of progress, but the plastic blinking Santa on some idiot's lawn ... that is clearly wrong. All I can think is "What the fuck?!"  Plastic comes from oil. Roughly13.9 million acres, globally, are being used for oil production on this planet. All that habitat being destroyed so that blinking Santa can exist. Why is anyone buying this shit? If you bought it used or a long time ago, you don't have to use. You don't have to waste the electricity using it! I have to control myself not to pull the car over, in the dark, sneak their lawn and destroy this shit. I think of this each time I see one of these. My faith is fragile, but calmer minds do prevail in the end. 

The character Tarrou smiles a lot. He doesn't show his internal struggles. This is not true for me. My internal struggles are obvious. I bitch a lot, sometimes loudly. Here I go again, our plagues here in the early 21st century are different. We have global warming and the destruction of bio-diversity and it is capitalism that is bringing it on. The other isms are mostly gone but capitalism is alive and well and eating our planet, much like Galactus in Marvel Comics. Each time you buy some plastic crap, something you really don't need, you taking a bite, your bite, out of her. Capitalism is our plague. 

Camus' narrator says this early in the novel:

"In this respect our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves, in other words they were humanists; they disbelieved in pestilences. A pestilence isn't a thing made to man's measure, therefore we tell ourselves that pestilence is a mere bogy of the mind, a bad dream that will pass away. But it doesn't always pass away and, from one bad dream to another, it is men who pass away, and the humanist first of all, because they haven't taken their precautions. Our townsfolk were not more to blame than others; they forgot to be modest, that was all, and through that everything still was possible for them which presupposed that pestilences were impossible. They went on doing business, arranged for journeys, and formed views. How should they have given a thought to anything like plague, which rules out any future, cancels journeys, silences the exchange of views. They fancied themselves free, and no one will ever be free so long as there are pestilences.

Camus is considered an existentialist, which is perfect for humanity's current predicament. We fight for our literal existence. But he didn't care for this term. He considered himself an absurdist, our search for meaning leads us into conflict with the world. This is me. Recently, I was having breakfast with some acquaintances and a young mother mentioned that she wanted to have five more children. I was screaming inside. I don't know why, but the pestilence of the plague is not obvious to everyone, even smart people. Denial is a lot easier than confronting reality. 

Let us not forget to be modest. 

 

Try That in a Small Town

I have started going to a commercial gym lately. My time at the Cardiac Rehab gym, where they connected electrodes to my chest as I exercised, has expired. I will miss the crowd there. I signed up for Planet Fitness which is incredibly inexpensive and has all the machine I need to continue my progress. The contrast between the two places is striking. I was one of the youngest people at the Rehab gym, the employees were all healthcare professionals and the exercise equipment looked out onto the Adirondack Mountains. I could let my mind wander pondering the natural beauty. It was nice. Planet Fitness seems to be run by teenagers, I am the one of the oldest members, it seems, and the workout machines all faces televisions, not mountains. All the ellipticals, treadmills and stationary bikes face a line of  sixteen televisions.  All tuned to either ESPN, CNN, CBS, Discovery or Fox News among others. You can't get away from it. Closing your eyes is the only way to get away from the tyranny of the television.

This change is both good and bad. It is bad because I miss my lovely workout view of the Adirondacks. It is good because now I can see all the awful things that Fox News is saying about me.  As a liberal I have always found Fox News entertaining because it always implies that liberals walk lock step together on everything. It is my experience that if I get ten liberals together, I am going to have ten different opposing opinions with lots of nuance. Arguments will ensue about the silliest minutiae. The only thing those ten people would agree about Jason Aldean's song "Try That in a Small Town," is that it is really awful song. It being a racist song, that would be debatable. If "libs" are saying this, like Fox is saying, I can guarantee it is not all of them. Most of them have better things to ponder. 

Last Friday, I saw this on the Fox News banner: "Libs are saying that Aldean song is racist." Something close to that. I was on the treadmill for a half hour and they talked about it the entire time. I did another 15 minutes on the stationary bike and they were still on this. I didn't realize that I was suppose dislike this song, until Fox brought it up. I never even heard of the song or the musician until I saw this. I went back to the gym again after the weekend and they were still talking about it. The volume was muted so I don't know what they were saying but the banner was more of the same. You think they would have something more important to talk about ... like, say, a war in Europe etc. After all, they still claim to be a news network, even though most of us know that they aren't. 

Most of the people I know that I would consider liberal don't listen to country music, particularly those that live in the city. Who can blame them with country music bashing the city like it does? That is all this song by Aldean is. "Try That in a Small Town" is a just latest in country music attack on city folks.  Country life = good, city life =bad is a country music trope that goes way back as far back as Hank Williams, probably even further. If country musicians want city folks to stop being so negative about country music, they might want to start by not being such dicks about the city. 

Here are the lyrics of the song if you haven't heard it yet:

Sucker punch somebody on a sidewalk
Carjack an old lady at a red light
Pull a gun on the owner of a liquor store
Ya think it's cool, well, act a fool if ya like

Cuss out a cop, spit in his face
Stomp on the flag and light it up
Yeah, ya think you're tough

Well, try that in a small town
See how far ya make it down the road
Around here, we take care of our own
You cross that line, it won't take long
For you to find out, I recommend you don't
Try that in a small town

Got a gun that my granddad gave me
They say one day they're gonna round up
Well, that shit might fly in the city, good luck

Try that in a small town
See how far ya make it down the road
Around here, we take care of our own
You cross that line, it won't take long
For you to find out, I recommend you don't
Try that in a small town

Full of good ol' boys, raised up right
If you're looking for a fight
Try that in a small town
Try that in a small town

Try that in a small town
See how far ya make it down the road
Around here, we take care of our own
You cross that line, it won't take long
For you to find out, I recommend you don't
Try that in a small town

Try that in a small town
Ooh-ooh
Try that in a small town

Like most bad writing, it over-simplifies. Hate is like that. Emotional in content, self-righteous in nature. I've lived in the big city (Boston) and I've lived in small towns. The town I live in now has roughly 2,000 residence, which is, by the way, much smaller than Aldean's home town of Macon, Georgia. I don't find people that different as individuals here than in Boston. The big difference is the number of people. Here in rural Vermont, we have a lot of room, fresh air and privacy. When you have the density of humans that a lot of our cities have, all of that is difficult to find. That affects a person. But I've had great neighbors in Boston just like I have them here. I know I am a better neighbor here than I used to be when I lived in Boston. This is mostly because the quality of life is higher and this has allowed me to be a better person in general. Traffic in Boston, alone, is a bad enough experience to change a person's outlook. Vermont, indeed, has made me a better person, but no traffic, more quiet alone time and cheap/free parking, had a lot to do with it. 

Unless you think that being anti-urban, by caveat, also means it is racist, then this song is not racist. It is simplistic, kinda idiotic and mostly just shit ... but racist, I don't think so. I've grown to like country music, some country music. This wasn't always the case. I grow tired of rock n' roll lyric being opaque and not very well written. The straight forwardness of a good country song is appealing and refreshing. Like rock, rap and jazz, most of country music is bad. But country also has its geniuses. Emmylou Harris' "Red Dirt Girl" is a masterpiece and Towne Van Zandt and Steve Earl are better song writers than most rock musicians which now leans towards tight assed and self-righteous. You don't have to find subtext to find racism in a country song because they are so direct, there is usually no subtext. But isn't being anti-urban enough to alarm you? Aldean's song is saying that if you live in the city, you suck or at least you are complicit. Also, you try that here, we'll kill you. This song praises vigilantism. That is alarming enough for me. You don't have add racism to make me concerned. 

I wrote most of this before I ever watched the video.

I admit the lyrics coupled with the imagery makes the song a lot more disturbing. It is clearly a right wing call for arms. Yes, disturbing. Racist, I still don't see it. I see a lot of referencing to racist "dog whistles" in internet chatter but I don't see it. I could be wrong. 

How To Defeat Trite Man

Nothing is so inane as small talk. On some level small talk is necessary. When I meet a co-worker, in the elevator perhaps, that I know nothing about and I don't feel like learning anymore, a nice quick conversation about the weather can come in handy. Sometimes I am just not in the mood, whether it is a lack of coffee on that particular morning or as a result of my anti-social tendencies. Weather, sports, keep it light, keep it quick, move on.

Trite Man over does it. Trite Man lives in a perpetual state of small talk. He lives and breathes it. Don't let him pull you in. I have been attending a rehab gym for my post-heart attack recovery and Trite Man has been attending the gym on the same days as me.  It is unbearable to hear. I have been blowing out my ear drum via earbuds just to drown him out. I took a short movie of his "performance" so that I could post it here but I decided not to post it. That was probably a good idea, so this clip from Star Trek: The Next Generation will suffice. 

Data is an android testing a new small talk sub-routine, so he has an excuse, but the other character is a perfect portrayal of Trite Man. He is terrifying. If Trite Man pulls you in, it can be very hard to escape. If you get stuck in a room with two of these fuckers, they can truly drive you to insanity. No shit, complete insanity. 

Think of Trite Man as a super villain, everyone of them has their weakness. The only way to defeat Trite Man is by ignoring him. He feeds on inane content and empty gestures. Answer him with one word answers or simply pretend you don't hear him. Put your headphones in your ears regardless if there is music playing. Starve the beast. It doesn't matter if he is dispensing folk wisdom or repeating something "witty" his aunt Tilly always says. Just say "Nope" no matter what he says, no explanation, this will diminish his power greatly. 

This can get difficult if he says something that you disagree with greatly. This almost happened to me the other day. I went to the urinal in the locker room and I had left my phone and headphones on the bench. Trite Man entered and said aloud, "oh no, someone forgot their stuff." I yelled back from the other room, "no, those are mine" Oh no, I had engaged him, how do I get out of this?  "Oh good," he said, "you can't be too safe these days." The giant sucking sound was pulling me in. I so wanted to tell him, "No, the world is a much safer place these days." This trite nonsense about the past being idyllic and safer than now is everywhere. Trite Man loves misinformation. I had data and historical analysis in my corner but he had fear and a popular saying in his. Surely I could convince him that he is wrong. But I did the right thing, I didn't engage. I walked away. 

Please help me in defeating Trite Man. Ignore him. It is the only way he'll stop. 

I Speak for the Trees

I've had this discussion many time:

Friend: "You're an Atheist, you don't understand what 'sacred' means."

Me: "But I do, every tree I see is sacred."

Like the Lorax, I speak for the trees. Sacredness is readily available, not in an old and tired symbol from the Bronze Age, but right here in front of us. Life giving, carbon sucking trees. I don't hug trees, not at least until I get to know them. Even then, only after I have their permission.

But seriously, I am not the only person of this ilk. The idea of trees being sacred goes way back to Egyptian, Asyrian and Norse Mythology as well as Celtic, Germanic and Hungarian folklore predating many of our major religions. But I don't get my inspiration from these sources. Mine comes from personal experience. I grew up in a miserable town where they hated trees. Trees were hard to find and were talked about as if they were a nuisance. 

Dramatization from my youth:

Neighbor 1: Whatcha doing his weekend?

Neighbor 2: Removing that darn tree in my yard. I'm sick of it cracking the pavement and having to pick up those damn leaves?

Neighbor 1: You smell that? The stink in this city is getting worse all the time 

Neighbor 2: And hot as hell as well.

It didn't occurs to them that their hatred of trees, the stink and outrageous heat in the city were related. Luckily, I spent most of my summers of my youth in southern Rhode Island on the bank of a river not too far from the Atlantic. I got to know plenty of trees. I climbed a tiny oak to get away onto the roof of our family cabin to be alone, another two older oaks held my hammock where I escaped into books or several moored my boat as I adventured onto land. Trees were great hiding places, behind or among the branches. I can't imagine a childhood without them. If I believed in magic, it manifest itself as a tree. 

I look to literature for the spiritual. For the scientific minded, spiritual is just a word we use to describe the flush of emotions (aka chemicals reacting) that happen when something spectacular happens, when a connection is made. In this particular case, in a book. Trees as a symbol are all over literature. You can start with the Old Testament, Adam and Eve chomping at the Tree of Knowledge. I think more of contemporary references like Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree, Herman Hesse's Trees and Siddhartha, W.B. Yeats or the marvelous ents in Tolkien' trilogy The Lord of the Rings whose slow and persistent power help usher in the age of humanity ... and of course, Dr. Seuss. 

Usually, a tree is a symbol of growth but not always. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee has the two children, Scout and Jem, use a tree as a conduit for communication with Boo Radley, the local recluse and scapegoat. They put mutual gifts in a knothole, but when the hole is cemented shut it quickly becomes a symbol of intolerance and injustice which is the greater theme of this masterpiece. 

I just finished reading Betty Smith's classic A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. The tree in the title is called a tree of heaven, really, that is actually the species name. It is an invasive species originally from China which is apropos for immigrant laden Brooklyn. Anyone that grew up in the Northeast US would recognize it. Check out this factsheet: Tree of Heaven. Nothing kills this thing which it why it grows so well in cities. Not only is it a symbol of growth but it is one of resilience and strength. It is probably the only symbol in the book. It grows through cement. The narrator is third person omniscient so we get to hear, Francie Nolan, the main character's thoughts on the tree. It "likes" the poor which describes her family and everyone she knows. Something is radical about this tree. Its leaves make "fugitive patterns" on her white pillow case. Francie says this about the tree after someone calls it a "homely thing:" 

"If there was only one tree like that in the world, you would think it was beautiful, but because there are so many, you just can't see how beautiful it really is."

This is a coming of age novel but it is unlike the many that come before it that it is often compared to. Little Women and Anne of Green Gables. It takes place in the gritty world of Brooklyn in the 1910's. This is a world of spousal abuse, alcohol overdoses, pedophile doctors, foot-fetish dentists and animal abuse. This is a not a pretty world Smith is painting. To make it even worse, their neighbors are mean. Poverty means you are cold and hungry and sometimes you have to do things you regrets to survive. Like the tree, you adapt. 

Chapter Ten is the last mention of the tree until the very end of the book, 46 chapters and over 300 pages later.  Spoiler: on the last page of the book she tells us that the tree was cut down because it was causing problems with the clothes lines, but a new tree is growing. Another generation gives us hope. They survive however stupid our priorities are. 

Before I end this, let me introduce you some trees in my yard. First off, we have the Big Ass Sugar Maple. I took a picture of this tree everyday for a year and made a movie out of it:

These two were transplanted from my backyard to the front where I am trying to create a forest to replace my lawn. As you can see, the one in the front is not doing so well and may not make it. But the other one was like this for at least a couple of years before it finally caught on so I am waiting for this baby to shine. 

One of these from the backyard is next to be transplanted:

And here is what the yard looks like in the winter:

Just lovely. I love these trees. 

My By Pass

Dear Blogosphere, 

For those of you who are worried about me because I haven't blogged in a few weeks ... and my last entry was about my heart attack and upcoming by pass ... ta-da ... I survived. Worry no more. 

My surgery was delayed about a week, rescheduled three times, but it eventually happened. The first two delays were because my blood being too thin for surgery. The last time it was delayed, one day more, due to another patient whose needs were more urgent than mine. I was bumped. I was in the hospital for 13 days waiting. It was like being in a hotel, if the staff came into your room several times a day to stab you. That is what it felt like. They drew my blood everyday. I had an IV attached to a pole and I took it with me around the room as well as when I walked laps with around the ward. I had an awful view from my room so I enjoyed walking down the hall to see the outside world. I am grateful for internet connection because the television was pretty bad; why watch a movie if every tenth word is bleeped and ever ten minutes it is interrupted with a commercial? I made best of the situation with Hulu and HBO-Max on my IPad. I even got in a Zoom job interview.

Not being a people-person, I am more inclined to complain about a group of people than not. That being said, I can't really find anything to complain about the nurses. They poked me with their IVs, shots, woke me to give me drugs etc. They did all this while being very professional and quite pleasant. There were a couple of annoying incidences, but nothing worth repeating. I tried to remember all their names but there were so many of them and they all wore masks, so this was difficult.

I was shaved the night before the surgery  ... my chest because it was opened to get to the heart, my legs for the veins they were going to take from them and my beard for the anesthesia. This is the first time I have been without a beard in over 30 years. They had already shaved me once before so there was only a week and a half of growth to deal with. The first time, it took about two hours. I am a hairy guy. I also had to wash my entire body with some some sterile pads and clean my nostrils with a Q-tip to make sure I didn't have the MRSA virus present. This was the 24th of January. I slept well and awoke the next morning to find a bunch of nurses in my room, doing what nurses do. My wife showed up shortly after. I was heading to surgery. 

During a coronary artery bypass surgery, the surgeon removes a piece of blood vessel from the patient's leg, chest, arm, or belly. In my case it was both my legs. They had problems finding a good vessel in one of my legs so they had to take one from my arm. Then the surgeon uses that piece of blood vessel (called a "graft") to reroute blood around the blocked artery. The surgery is called "bypass surgery" because it bypasses the blockage. This surgery has a 1% fatality rate and a 1% chance of causing a stroke in the patient. These numbers scared me, one in a hundred is too high when I could easily be that one. But that 1% is usually someone very old and sickly and I was the second youngest patient in the cardiology ward and still reasonably healthy. So I felt good about it. This didn't stop me thinking about my death and how I'd be leaving my wife and son. There must have been about 20 people in the Operating Room buzzing around me. So much activity prevented me from thinking about it too much. They scooped me onto a metal table and connected me to the machines. I was asleep shortly thereafter.

I awoke at about three the next morning in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). I was on a lot of drugs, but still in some pain. I could feel a stinging pain in the incisions in my legs, arm and chest. I had a tube in my chest as well, a catheter and two IVs in my arm. It was pretty awful. I am amazed that by 6AM I was able to stand up (with nursing assistance) and walked a step over to a recliner that was next to the bed. By early afternoon I was out of the ICU and in a regular room. This was amazing because I remember back in the 1980's when my father had his first bypass, he was in very rough shape for a few days. The progress they've made is stunning.  

One of things that changed is that they wake the patient as soon as possible now. They find that the healing is quicker when you are awake. Also, the incisions in the arms and legs are much smaller than they used to be. One of the nurses told me that patients used to complain that most of the post-surgery pain was coming from the arms not the chest. It may be because the surface area is much smaller in the arms and legs than on the chest. Also, the arms and legs are used much more than the chest. So they make very small incisions now in the extremities because the large incisions are just not needed and patients are more comfortable. I have not researched any of this information. This is all from the many conversations I have had with many of the medical professionals that came into my room.

The stay in the hospital, post-surgery, was surprisingly not that long. I spent more time pre-surgery than post. I had surgery on Wednesday and I was home by Sunday. I was walking around the ward again alone just a couple days after surgery. The hospital food was surprisingly pretty good. I learned, after being there for almost three weeks, what to avoid on the menu. When I ordered, the person on the phone would tell me if I was over my carb or sugar limit for the meal. This was good practice for my new life. My post-heart attack life means keeping close track of calories, carbs and sugar. I have an app on my phone that tells me when I am over or approaching my limit.  

We had a long list of things to go over to get out of the hospital. I was not allowed to lift anything over a ten pounds for a month. That is about the weight of a gallon of milk. I am also not allowed to sit in the front seat of the car when I travel. Of course, this means no driving.  These rules are because my chest is not completely healed. I also had a pile of meds that have to take for a variety of reasons. I have to walk  for five minutes several times a day which is very tedious when you can't leave the house. My yard, driveway and road are very icy/snowy and it's 13 degrees today ... hence, I don't leave the house. 

I guess if you have a heart attack in Vermont, January is the best month because there isn't a lot you can do here anyway this time of year. It has been a month since the surgery. I've been outside the house only a few times, mostly for doctor's appointments. I've taken walks to the front yard to meet the boy at the bus stop. I've walked to the compost bin and the wilderness camera on my land. My big trip this past weekend was to our town's annual Winter Fest where I enjoyed some good company and the chili cook off.  I'm hoping by the Spring I will be running again and most of this is behind me.