To my good fortune I still have a treasured copy of R. E. Winsett’s 1931 edition “Latter Rain Revival” hymnbook, the one my maternal grandparents used in our small church on the corner of Cottonwood and Padre in southeast Bakersfield. One of the hymns I recall from childhood was titled “God’s Radio,” and the refrain went: “You’re in touch with heaven o’er God’s radio. You can talk to Jesus, get the answer right away, There will be no static, every word He’ll hear you say; In the air above, or on the earth below, You’re in touch with heaven o’er God’s radio.”

As a preacher grandad expressed outright disdain for the charlatans’ message over the airwaves “Put your hand on this radio and be healed!” accompanied by requests for “love offerings,” but God’s Radio continued to be sung in our church. Thinking back, perhaps grandad didn’t find the idea all that farfetched, maybe he believed communication with God was accomplished in some manner like the way radios worked. After all, even in the 30s there was much of actual mysticism associated with things like radio waves and one only need listen to some of the radio programs and watch some of the films of the era to understand this seeming naiveté of the times. We were still being thrilled by Buck Rogers and fantastic things like “death rays” and such, so it isn’t surprising people would think of communication with God or the departed by means of something like radio waves. Though apocryphal, the story of Edison thinking such a thing possible to contact the departed made sense to a lot of people back then.

My reason for calling attention to God’s Radio is reading the latest thoughts of astronomers and physicists concerning our universe. There is much speculation right now whether the theories of gravity may be all wrong, or whether a rapidly expanding universe may be simply the result of the way things react to all explosions. As I put it in the comments section of one website: “The simplest explanation of explosive force resulting in accelerating expansion and lessening gravitational influence is to me the better choice without esoteric presumed phenomena such as black matter or “extra” dimensions. However, until we know exactly what life and death are, what animates and departs with death, there can be no ‘theory of everything.’ For me, this is the primary weakness of attempts to understand a universal constant. We may accept such a constant, but not be able to understand it and perhaps it will remain an ‘unknowable’ part of such a constant. I think Einstein believed this, but drew back from the potential ‘paranormal’ implications.”

It’s an oft heard expression about shooting pool: “I’d rather be lucky than good,” and Sinatra sang true in “Luck be a Lady Tonight.” People like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, and Donald Trump aren’t that smart, they were born under a lucky star. Astrology, the Tao, Feng shui, these and many similar things are honorable and serious beliefs among millions of the best educated people. Whatever one’s thoughts about the paranormal, things like “luck” have been a constant throughout the history of humankind. As an example of why so many continue to credit such a thing, you only have to witness how many in show business without any special talent to commend them become successful. And to prove the point how many politicians, especially those now running for the White House, have anything that really commends them to hold elected office? But luck and good fortune are properly in the domain of the paranormal with things like clairvoyance, déjà vu, telekinesis, and telepathy, things that do not readily submit to laboratory and scientific testing, verification and replication.

After many years it occurred to me that I am not a skeptic, but a questioner. It seems my often melancholy task to question things, especially things that while surrounded by an abundance of circumstantial evidence admit of no scientific proof. In discussing this with a dear friend who has had some experience with the paranormal, things like feeling she was somewhere that made her fearful without understanding why, the idea of telepathic communication with God or supreme extraterrestrial intelligences came to mind. Hence, recalling God’s Radio and wondering if “someone” is suggesting the questions that arise in my own mind and thereby preventing my becoming a skeptic, in which case I don’t really expect any answers to such questions though it seems my fate to continue reading, studying, thinking and speculating about the possibilities rather than retreating into a comfortable skepticism for some peace of mind.

It may very well be some like Newton and Einstein have better “reception” than others, their “radios” tuned to the proper frequency to receive communications from more advanced civilizations in the universe, and much like the hopes some pin on SETI are able to tune in on the “Universal Lyre.” The problem the people at SETI have is being able to scan the heavens with limited bandwidth. We know the necessity of the proper antenna being used to transmit and receive radio and other waves, we know you must be on the proper frequency when using any kind of radio to transmit and receive communications. In a similar fashion, some minds may be tuned to the proper frequency to receive information from advanced intelligences that would account for the genius of insights and “intuition” on the part of those like Newton and Einstein, even the builders of the great pyramids and the great inventors and artists like Michelangelo and Da Vinci.

One of the problems that seem to plague thoughts about communication from advanced civilizations and intelligences is the mode of interpretation of such telepathic communication whether by radio waves or other means. For example, if the prophets of the Bible were trying to communicate such things but limited by their own human understanding such things may not make any sense. It was one thing for God to tell Noah just how to build that ark, and quite another for the Apostle John to make sense of his apocalyptic visions and attempt to make sense of them in written expression. A “star map” may have been suggested to the ancients from “dwellers in the stars” resulting in a description of the constellations, and the Mayan artists may have been given their calendar but forced to configure it on the basis of their own culture. And so with the Nazca Lines, crop circles, etc. Ancient peoples did things that they neither had the science nor mathematics to do, and often seeming to have no purpose to them and making no sense to future generations. In far too many cases, some of these things became corrupt forms of religion even to the extent of human sacrifices!

In the old days of radio some of us would just turn the dial seeing what we could pick up, with TV people often “surf” channels, and today we do the same thing on the Internet. But in every case, if you really want to hear, see, or read something you have to be on the right “frequency” and stop there in order to receive intelligible communication. Dreams may be a kind of “surfing” where our minds travel unknown airwaves, but occasionally stop at something demanding our attention. There may be a sound reason in the stars for things like Joseph’s cup of divination and his ability to interpret dreams, for people like Nostradamus and Cayce, even for a Hitler and Stalin, though these latter two would at least suggest some malevolent mind than anything intent on benefiting our species, and we live with the ancient monuments in stone of both demons and angels. So, in the ways of astrologers things good and evil reside in the heavens.

This we know; the great scientific achievements of humankind have been made in a relative “blink of the eye” on the timeline of our species, and more recently things like nuclear weapons and computers that cannot be accounted for on the basis of normal human ingenuity alone. The phrase “A stroke of genius” may have more to do with what is “in the stars” than anything merely human; and perhaps God’s Radio is not so farfetched as it would seem.

Royal Crown Cola was a favorite of mine as a boy; but I didn’t pay all that much attention to those yellow pyramids on the bottles of RC. The color scheme was attractive, and the twelve-ounces for a nickel was a good deal and it tasted good. It would take a while before I began to wonder about those pyramids as well as the pyramid on dollar bills. It finally occurred to me that such pyramids were actually “alien” shapes that did not normally occur in nature and were not used in conventional structures. And the more I thought about this, the more the word “alien” suggested itself in respect to pyramids such as those of Giza, the smooth-sided kind like the Great Pyramid rather than the far more common step-pyramids found in so many other places globally. Four-sided structures are easy to understand, even those of step-pyramids, but not those formed of smooth sides reaching a pointed apex. To use a good Southern expression like that of Mammy in GWTW, “It ain’t fittin’.” And no matter how you try to explain it, those huge smooth-sided pyramids coming to a point on top “just ain’t fittin’,” they are alien to our eyes and minds and in some mysterious way just out of place.

But do a search of the literature on those Giza pyramids and you will quickly realize there are no simple answers to these alien structures. In fact, the more you study the subject the more alien they seem to become as even the experts are divided in so many different directions. One of the reasons for the paucity of answers is the fact that these particular and distinctive pyramids like so much of the knowledge of ancient civilizations were beyond what those ancients were capable of knowing, beyond their native abilities of design and construction on their own without “outside help.” I’ve used the example several times of the constellations as a “celestial map” and various “zodiacs” being beyond what the ancients could possibly have known to their unaided eyes or any mathematics or science available to them unless there was some outside help; one of the more common theories being that of advanced civilizations such as Atlantis in some manner preserving their knowledge and passing it on to ancient Sumer, Babylon, and Egypt.

As to various ancient structures given to the study of the heavens, many believe the Giza pyramids are oriented astronomically, and in a way not possible without help of some kind. As to the Mayan Doomsday Calendar, the same thing would seem to apply as well provided the calculation of 2012 is correct. A search of the literature here, as with the Giza pyramids, can be very confusing, but it is generally agreed very particular astronomical things will occur in this year, including those of a galactic nature important to our solar system.

Whatever one’s opinion, the Sphinx and Giza pyramids for the most part remain mysteries, as do so many ancient structures and science not possible to the contemporary people of the times and must be explained in some way unknown to us. And it is in the attempts to explain these mysteries so many theories of religion, UFOs, etc. gain adherents. For my part, I incline to the theory of advanced civilizations in some manner following catastrophic events that destroyed them imparting their knowledge to future civilizations. And why not consider the possibility of extraterrestrial minds unhindered by the constraints of any known physical limitations?

One idea is that of peculiar genius such as that of Newton and Einstein being imparted by telepathic minds in some way able to communicate their thoughts to the proper “receivers,” much in the manner of claims for “channeling.” And when some raise objections to this it still leaves the problem of trying to explain how the ancients accomplished things literally impossible without help of some kind. Granting the idea of some kind of telepathic communication from superior beings is in the realm of Psi and mysticism such as reincarnation, an idea embraced by some very notable people even of genius, nevertheless it remains a legitimate area of speculation in all attempts to explain the unexplainable.

One very peculiar but intriguing idea concerning the smooth and pointed Giza pyramids is the design would be suitable for enormous atmospheric pressures, including that of the greatest ocean depths. But what ancient and lost civilization would have needed such a design for any practical purposes? For the present it is a question in search of an answer, though many are willing to accept their astronomical design and orientation.

As to the Mayan Doomsday Calendar, my own thoughts as I consider world conditions is that whether true or not we seem to be on a doomsday path globally, and given the circumstances it is a legitimate question of how we are going to last another five years without something of catastrophic significance happening; nuclear, climatic, biological, or other? And those Giza pyramids will continue to appear “alien,” and perhaps the writers of the apocalyptic literature of the Bible, the inexplicable ancient structures and things like the Mayan Calendar may have had “outside help?” Whether or not, few would argue we need the kind of help we can’t expect of world leaders including our own.

Of course, unlike the mysteries of the Giza pyramids and the one on our dollar bill those pyramids on the RC bottle could simply have been a promise of a cold, thirst-quenching and refreshing drink set against an arid landscape. But I wonder? And before anyone is too quick to dismiss my wondering about such things given so much lunacy abounding in politics for example, who would be so uncharitable as to cast the first stone?

Wherever you go throughout my native Kern County you will find people living in abominable conditions, too often illegal aliens that are forced to live in places many would find unsuitable for the family dog or cat, without proper sanitation or even running water. It might be a junk trailer or even a camper, but people are crowded into these for the sake of slave labor and the rent charged for places no better than the sties and chicken coops on farms. Some are so crowded they deny anything like the “privilege” of closing a door for privacy, and some evidence the presence of people utterly ignorant of civilized living and hygiene.

But even here in the Kern River Valley we have our “gypsies,” those without jobs or housing that simply “camp out” wherever they can find a place to do so. Not long after I bought this cottage in Bodfish some years ago I had to enlist the aid of Carl Sparks to come with some of his deputies to clear out the “shanty-town” that had grown up around my property. Things had come to a head after my place had been burglarized, and when some of these people were running hoses from my property for water and I came home once to find the cops had six of them lined up in handcuffs next door.

Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” continues throughout the world, and even here in America instances of such atrocious working conditions may still be found. I was raised among the Okies and Arkies who had their own stories of being reduced to slave labor such as Steinbeck made infamously memorable. I’ve always known how to work with my back and hands, skilled with hammer, saw, pick and shovel. But where jobs were once plentiful in America, jobs that held the promise of advancing to something better have fast disappeared, shipped out of our nation by a duplicitous government and corporations to employ and feed the slaves for less money elsewhere in places like Mexico, China, and India.

Working in places like Watts and East San Jose, as a teacher as well as for CPS I’ve witnessed the intolerable conditions many children are forced into because of the irresponsibility of individuals and our government; local, state, and federal. Children invariably suffer because of the irresponsibility of the adults who have children in their “care.” Some time ago when three, small children came screaming and pounding on my door, one of them badly injured and bloody because of accidentally breaking a window with his arm I had to call 911. Only after the paramedics and the required fire truck arrived was it discovered the children had been left alone without an adult in attendance. The call was put in to the sheriff’s department and the children were placed in custody with CPS, as is usual in such circumstances.

If it were not for my broad experience working with children in so many diverse circumstances the stories I have told in some of my books would only be anecdotal, but from childhood on I have personally experienced so many of the dreadful things done to children this removes the things I write about from simply being anecdotes, the melancholy accidents that occur to children anywhere. Over forty years ago I began to tell parents things were not as bad as they thought in the schools, they were worse! And now things seem to be worse for children even in their homes. The conditions children are living in is a mirror reflecting an entire society, and the reflection is increasingly one of distress for children.

The better educated among Americans have only the number of children they can reasonably be expected to care for. But this is a diminishing factor in America as the preponderance of children are being born to the irresponsible and uneducated, primarily illegal aliens; the result being a diminishing hope such children will ever know anything but want and ignorance, too often left for responsible taxpayers to support in one way or another. But given the economic uncertainty for America, responsible taxpayers may soon not be able to support a burgeoning population of those that cannot or will not be productive members of society. And “subsidized housing” for a welfare population will certainly fail when responsible people can no longer afford the kind of taxation that comes with a growing population of “drones.” Knowing this, I reflect on the shanties many millions in America now inhabit and my own experience with such deplorable living conditions.

Affordable housing was a keynote of Henry Thoreau’s “Walden,” and since he realized how important shelter was he dwelt on this theme at some length including the experience of building his own little cottage by the pond. In one telling remark Henry asked whether it would be wise for the Indian to trade his wigwam which he owned for the comparative palace of the white man which he would never own. Henry also remarked on how rare it was for the citizens of Concord to actually own their homes and farms, that most were mortgaged, and often for more than they were worth the result being in many cases passing on to heirs property that was more of an encumbrance than something of value. The infamy of present money-lenders has a very old “pedigree” here in America, even going back to the times of the Bible.

I’ve experienced living in what would qualify as the “Irish sties” Henry referred to, one such shanty he bought for materials to use in the construction of his own cottage. The six years I lived as a boy on a mining claim here in the Kern River Valley without utilities of any kind and having an outdoor privy were an education in Henry’s “simplicity of life.” Later when I first read Walden I could easily relate to Henry’s thoughts on the subject, especially when it came to affordable housing. I knew why he could refer to that toolbox for the railroad workers being sufficient for shelter, though it might only be large enough to sleep in. For a dollar, Henry suggested, one might have such adequate shelter rather than rent a more commodious dwelling and find yourself worrying and looking over your shoulder for a “remittance man” dogging you for the rent.

With my background in building skills, when the tracts were being developed around the Saugus area in L. A. County I knew I could design and build a better house. Buying and subdividing some raw land in Acton, I did so. It was a three bedroom, two bath house with attached double garage. I had it sold before I finished the framing. Over the years, I continued to build and rehab many houses, but in all these efforts I never forgot the importance of “affordable housing” as per Thoreau. I never deluded myself that people were buying houses they would actually own, but as Henry warned were incurring mortgages that precluded their ever actually owning their homes. And the story of the Indian trading the wigwam he owned for something better he would never own stayed in my mind; I knew very well from personal experience exactly what Henry was talking about.

Few would argue the advantages of civilized living are vastly preferable to that of the Indian living in a wigwam, but what is the advantage of living comfortably yet in fear of exorbitant taxes, rent or mortgage that can have you out on the street at any time? One might suppose when enough of such people from the better classes are dispossessed and forced to live in third world conditions an answer to the millions being increasingly subsidized by taxpayers might be resolved.

I’ve always had an interest in “alternative housing and energy.” I’ve done a few experiments along these lines and know shelter and energy can be reduced to very small means. But in most cases government restrictions such as building codes prevent many of these things being utilized. A few shelving boards or bricks of adobe, even native rocks would provide shelter, and the absolute requirements of food and water might be available in the right locations, though even a “tent in the wilderness” is only suitable when such is the manner of a culture and society. Here in America people expect “better,” whether they can afford it or not. But when the means of better runs out…?

A neighbor of mine a few years ago was really into “Pyramidology.” So much so, that he actually constructed a pyramid of plywood and measuring a hundred square feet in his yard. The structure could not contain any metal, so following directions he screwed and glued, and when the glue had properly set he removed the screws and puttied the holes. The idea was to sleep in this structure and gain strength and insights otherwise unavailable to mortals.

While my neighbor claimed he received enormous benefits from sleeping in the structure, it occurred to me that pyramids are not the design of choice when considering shelter from the elements. In fact, they are not the normal shape of any structures; which makes the mystery of various pyramids all the more mysterious. Why would such a design occur to anyone when it is not a natural choice? From grass and mud huts to the designs of great cathedrals certain forms suggest themselves, but pyramids will always remain the “exotics” of architecture and you are not likely to find one being built in your neighborhood.

But pyramids come to mind when considering the seeming lunacy of our leaders that are bent on requiring We the People make bricks without straw. We have a number of crises looming on the immediate horizon, but none of those in office or running for office seem to be willing to give attention to these crises apart from lip-service and the predictably hollow and vacuous “promises.” However, as things worsen economically for ordinary American citizens the thoughts of affordable housing loom as the potential straw that breaks the camel’s back. And subsidized housing, living like rats in cages paid for by taxation without representation is not a part of the “American Dream.” And if heating bills double next year as we have been warned will happen, and drinking water becomes scarce, and gas and food prices escalate beyond our means, and so on…?

Is the proposed “stimulus package” an attempt to keep the Great Unwashed in its place, much as welfare is designed to “keep those people in their place” and out of places like Rodeo Drive and Malibu? And, of course, when a “Katrina” should occur you quickly discover whose lives are considered of value and whose are not, and demanding a “Chocolate City” only exacerbates matters. But whatever the avowed purpose, whenever those in government express a desire to “help” us we can be excused the resulting cynicism.

Like many including Henry Thoreau, I have generally placed the value of something on the amount of my life I have been willing to exchange for the acquisition of it; but what of the value of life itself? In most cases, it would seem of very trivial value, especially considering the hundreds of millions sacrificed to Mars. And when the “value” is predicated on building things like the pyramids or the monuments of tyrants it would seem the only value is that of slave labor.

In calling into question the doctrine of the sacredness of life, Henry Thoreau remarked of a teamster “… does any divinity stir within him? His highest duty to fodder and water his horses! What is his destiny compared to the shipping interests… How godlike, how immortal, is he?”

While Henry’s comment must be taken within the context of his often quoted remark “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,” his focus on “Self-emancipation” does call into question the Christian doctrine affirmed in our Declaration of Independence “… that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…”

Most would agree that ideals are fine things; that our lives would suffer and be impoverished by the lack of ideals, among which are “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” and this should be accorded to all. But such ideals must often bow to the practical necessities of life; and when these place the emphasis on wealth rather than any quality of life for the masses something must eventually break the cycle of such apparent inequality. In “The Crossing” the point was made to Washington that in the end all kill for profit, though our War for Independence had many worthwhile ideals driving it. However, the subject quickly turns on life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness being the domain of the wealthy, not the teamster who because of his life of quiet desperation shows no spark of divinity. In short, his life is of no value compared to the “shipping interests.” His only value is how he best serves those interests.

The World Economic Forum going on in Davos, Switzerland calls to mind how unfair life is. Some like Bill Gates are vowing to do something to end poverty, but the issue of the necessity of birth control before you can realistically address the problems of poverty would seem to be of no consequence at this meeting. The reason being those like Gates understand the necessity of slave labor, as do all the wealthy like the employer of Henry’s teamster and those of the shipping interests. The stock exchanges of nations like America are a fair indicator of how well business is doing, but this is predicated on how well slavery is doing; and the bottom line is derived from the number of slaves serving their masters.

Women according to the religion of Islam only have the position of slaves dedicated to serving men, both in this life and the hereafter. But in the Industrial Revolution it took many women and children serving as slaves in order to reap the profits for the wealthy. The resulting workhouses in England and later in America were places where the barest means of subsistence and existence was the only thought and hope of the workers, a degraded life that despite his abolitionist views led Henry to favor a Southern overseer over a Northern one. The plight of the poor moved the conscience of those like Dickens and Thoreau, but the dark side remained that of a population without birth control which would have removed the degradation of slave labor. Those noted for a “social conscience” seem to most often miss this point; that without birth control exchanging one form of slavery for another is far short of the ideal, and in most cases where socialism in various forms is encouraged the result is a preponderance of “human weeds” rather than worker slaves put to productive use.

Henry might pity the shepherd whose thoughts rose no higher than the hills about him, but there was a shepherd, David, whose thoughts did rise much higher than the hills about him, and he had a son, Solomon, who built a magnificent temple. This was denied David since he was a man of war with much blood on his hands, but the wars and blood made Solomon’s grandiose work possible, even as Emerson noted concerning the noble families that arose from barbarians. In all these things fields, vineyards, and orchards, flocks and herds are essential, and these require many workers, most of whose thoughts never rise higher than the hills about them.

But let’s educate the masses and enable and ennoble them so their thoughts are encouraged to rise higher than the hills about them. There is still the problem of the fields and flocks needing tending, and there is very little room in the Big House for plantation workers, and the need is comparatively minimal for house servants. If the wealthy are to have their monuments of stone or other, the need is for slaves not the educated masses deceived into believing they were meant for better things.

“Give us this day, our daily bread” is all most honest, working people ask who only want to earn their bread quietly and in peace. But when “bread and circuses” fail of their purpose and the people want for bread, then even the lives of quiet desperation may turn to lives of desperate measures. Here in America for example when so many live as dogs feeding at Caesar’s table in one manner or another the need for slave labor from Mexico “to do the work Americans won’t do” is the real focus of those like Bill Gates, those that know it requires many slaves to support the wealthy, to support their egos and build their monuments. Those at the World Economic Forum realize the “shipping interests” are all that matters, and the bottom line is based on the many millions of slaves whose thoughts are not allowed to rise higher than the hills about them.

History does seem to favor the few over the many, some very few seeming to have a “destiny” of greatness whether for good or evil. But when too many are led to believe their lofty thoughts without labor are supposed to sustain them, they are doomed to disappointment; and when that disappointment turns to anger it has some very unpleasant effects on a society. Here in America where TV leads so many to believe they “deserve” to live lives of “entitlement” without labor we are beginning to suffer from the effects of such thinking. And when “Caesar” is no longer able to deliver on the bread and circuses the portents are grave to consider.

There are far too many now that believe they are “entitled” because of lofty thoughts without labor, or because of race or some other factor. Even Henry was disgruntled about this, believing he should have been given a living by his fellows. And when anyone believes they are not successful because they couldn’t handle fame and fortune and all the while having done nothing worthy of fame and fortune, then you have the disagreeable result of the person feeling cheated in some manner. In this same way, many who have done nothing to get an education but feel they are “above” working in the fields or tending the herds are likely to use force to get what they feel they are being “deprived of.” In too many cases, these are only the human weeds resulting from people rutting like animals with no thought of a future for the resulting babies.

I’m inclined to believe Bill Gates has his sights on increasing the amount of slave labor available to him and his “colleagues” than the welfare of humankind. Otherwise, he and these others would be preaching a doctrine of birth control rather than methods of increasing the means of breeding of more slaves. But whether or not, the net result is the same. And where is the doctrine of the “sacredness of life” or any “spark of divinity” to be found among slaves, whether they be wage slaves or being one of Caesar’s dogs? And I ask myself, just what better than this can we realistically expect of those now posturing and pandering for the White House?

America is fast losing writers deserving of being called such, and in a youth-oriented culture I’m often reminded of the cautionary words of the elderly to young people: “We have been young, but you have never been old.” Of course, there was a time when I was young and believed I was smarter than I was. Such is the case with most young people; but invariably it takes growing old to realize you were never as smart as you once thought you were; and the increasing years serve to cause us to have fewer “answers” to many of the questions of youth.

You know the commercial where the caveman takes exception to the psychologist because she condescendingly considers herself smarter than him. I wondered at the time whether they should have used Dr. Phil in that spot. But when someone catches me making an error in writing I most often recall the film “Safe House” with Patrick Stewart. Not because of Alzheimer’s disease, but because of the errors that begin to creep into the writing of the elderly. Those of us that have reached the “golden years” know the “drawer” becomes quite full, and it isn’t at all unusual for age to not only often cast an azure tint over memory, but for homonyms and other such things to give us trouble. Our eyes begin to fail, and our minds don’t always keep track with what we are attempting to do, and peek in our minds may come out peak in our writing; not because we don’t know better, but such are the vicissitudes of the aging process. Alas, so are the many problems that accompany having lived long enough to remember youth, but unable to recapture it.

But those of us who have lived to an advanced age know what Bill Cosby meant when he said our minds begin to reside in our backside, because we often forget what it was we got out of a chair to get, only to recall what it was when we sit back down. And when we bend over to get something off the floor, we find ourselves asking whether there is something else we are supposed to do while we are down there before straightening up again.

As to writing, I personally admire the elderly that write and post to various blogs. That they are able to do so at all causes me to think “God love ‘em.” They are trying to keep their minds active, they have computers and are still learning new skills and often have something of value to share with others. So I’m not quick to jump their case because of typos or errors of either grammar or memory. Wherever possible, if a particularly egregious error should be committed, a polite email to the writer is most often graciously received. Certainly when I have made such an error I am grateful for being corrected.

Among my most treasured possessions are the letters from my maternal grandfather. Grandad couldn’t spell his way through a book of cigarette papers, but in his declining years he had managed to get hold of an old typewriter. Hunting and pecking he would laboriously type out letters to me, and sometimes they would be nearly indecipherable; but they remain treasures.

But there is another matter that has nothing to do with age; it has to do with something I learned many years ago. A person was trying to share his reading of “The Talisman” with someone and the person corrected his pronunciation of the word talisman. However, as it turned out the person doing the correcting of pronunciation had not even read the book. I generally welcome being corrected, most educated people do welcome such correction, but most would rather the person have at least read the book before presuming to correct them.

In the old Saturday Evening Post there was always a short article entitled “The Perfect Squelch.” When I was a boy I read one of these in which a person had given a speech, but it was obvious English was not his native language. When he had finished, someone commented to the fellow, “You seem to have a lot of difficulty with our language;” to which the speaker replied, “Yes, and I have equal difficulty with six other languages as well.”

When I am going over something I have written and an error suddenly leaps out at me I am grateful I was at least able to catch it. Unfortunately, I don’t always catch these. But nothing serves better than to learn a foreign language to teach you your own native tongue. When it comes to grammar and syntax, I was appalled by my ignorance of English while trying to master German, Greek, and Hebrew, and came to understand why as a boy I struggled so with Latin and Polish.

So, to all my companion oldsters who are hunting and pecking on the blogs I say keep at it; stay active and alive in your minds. We have something of value to contribute to a younger generation in hope of their taking heed whether we spell it correctly or memory should fail. And regardless of how full the drawer becomes, as long as you can see and write continue doing so. The Internet and websites are marvelous tools and venues for the young, but they deserve and need the guidance and examples of the elderly capable of making their thoughts known to others.

When you travel wilderness places like I have and you have the knowledge of government projects I do there is more than enough cause to believe seemingly fantastic stories about the things being done the ordinary citizen is never told about. I’ve done work in Silicon Valley and other places requiring top level security clearance, but on one occasion I was working on a secret project in a shop in Palmdale, and once well into this project despite my security clearance was not surprised when six federal marshals appeared and without explanation took what I was working on and closed down the shop. Once while being interviewed for a job near China Lake, I noticed something I should not have noticed. However, when I innocently called attention to this item and expressed some familiarity with it I was told to wait until the base police showed up to question me, and was politely though firmly ushered off the property.

I’ve had enough experience in the aerospace industry and intelligence agencies to realize the symbiotic relationship with the military to know when not to make waves. These days, you dare not even stop on the roads around Edwards or China Lake to take pictures of the wildflowers, so, all in all, I’ve been pretty fortunate. Certain agencies of our government are still in the business of making people disappear.

But if watching politicians was not enough to convince us there are parallel universes, that ghosts and space aliens are all about us there is the widening gap between the haves and have-nots to prove we do live in a very surreal world, that life itself is becoming increasingly surreal. Orbiting above us is the International Space Station, and here on earth people are still murdering other people in the name of Allah and dying of hunger while TV is devoted to such things of consuming national interest and great import as to whether an obituary is being written for Brittney Spears.

While some uncharitable souls may accuse me of being a few feathers shy of a full duck, when Larry King is devoting air time to UFOs you just have to know the game is afoot. But I found it passing strange the case of Steve Fossett was not mentioned, nor was that of Amelia Earhart. But given the peculiar circumstances surrounding Fossett’s disappearance and the unparalleled and virtually unprecedented search efforts to find him his is still an interesting case, and made all the more so considering proximity to Area 51. However, if aliens didn’t bother Howard Hughes… well, some might say they did and this more than the government drove him into seclusion.

That people are spending enormous amounts of time and money searching for mini-black holes in places like the Bermuda Triangle and elsewhere, speculating whether they may blink on and off, speculating about Atlantis and searching for clues to that fabled city, continuing to be absorbed in the Riddle of the Sphinx, decoding the Bible and proving or debunking many myths and fables the wide range of interest in possibilities natural and supernatural goes on apace. In the final analysis many of us humans are curious as Dee Dee in “Dexter’s Laboratory,” and with an “Ooh” of curious fascination upon our lips push that button just to see what it will do.

When you think about the enormous amounts of time and money being spent in esoteric research together with the resources devoted to exploring our earth, solar system and the universe all the while so many hundreds of millions are suffering from want and ignorance there does seem to be something nearly surreal about this. But right here in America when I first read “Tobacco Road” by Erskine Caldwell, a distant relative, it did not surprise me those people didn’t know you had to put oil in the engine of that car. For that matter, I was born and raised among the very same kind of ignorance as that of people like the Lesters, and those described by Steinbeck and Harper Lee.

In places like Weedpatch and Little Oklahoma, Southeast Bakersfield, I recall an old woman that believed she had to put a cloth in an empty light socket to keep the electricity from leaking out, and the old man that would never eat anything from a can that had been opened on the bottom because he believed this poisoned the contents; though when I opened a can of lima beans the other day and found a very large and very bloated dead fly floating in it I should not have been surprised; disconcerted but not surprised. One expression I recall from childhood is “You have to eat a certain amount of dirt before you die.” Of course, this was qualified by no one expecting to eat it all at once. However, with so many things going wrong with our food supply one has cause to wonder? The old Phil Harris song long ago had it right; some little bug is going to find you someday, and “to eat at all is such a foolish game.” Alas, we haven’t yet come up with a suitable alternative.

Potable water is becoming scarce. Many years ago I read a SciFi story in which some astronauts died of thirst because they could not bring themselves to drink the recycled toilet water provided in their spaceship. Now Orange County, CA is going to provide such water. Do you suppose the bottled water industry might have something to do with this? More and more we come to understand why the ancients drank such copious amounts of beer and wine, and New England rum was in such demand during the early years of our nation. As the haunting refrain goes, “People die from drinking whisky but drinking water’s twice as risky” or, as Tom Lehrer had it, what goes into the bay “comes out of your tap in San Jose;” so, just to be safe: “Don’t drink the water and don’t breathe the air.”

“You’ve got to have a dream.” It’s a line from a song in “South Pacific,” and if dreams were for sale, there would be no lack of buyers. But dreams are not for sale; they are personal. Some time ago I was given a “Dream Catcher” the young woman had made especially for me. I don’t know if it works, but I treasure it nevertheless. A very dear friend just sent me a quote from Clarence Darrow: “Just think of the tragedy of teaching children not to doubt.” It’s an appropriate expression for our times when our children have every reason to doubt so many things, but are forbidden to give expression to their doubts. Worse, our children are not receiving the kind of education that would enable them to verbalize or give written expression to their doubts. And without these skills how can our children possibly survive, let alone have a dream? And surreal will never take the place of a dream.

Despite the promised “fixes” by politicians the news is so bad from so many different directions lately few people in America are guilty of thinking things can’t get any worse. As we wait for another shoe to drop in the way of bad news I recall the scene in “Doctor Zhivago” when he pronounces an old man had died from starvation, but such a thing was not “permitted” to exist by the new revolutionary government. The mad dream of a “workers’ paradise” does not admit of such things like starvation, they simply are not allowed. And being forbidden to speak of such things, they simply do not exist. Because of political correctness and so much in the way of “entitlements” and legal protection for so many minorities of every description and the ACLU determined to force Americans to make bricks without straw, while there are many evils threatening America we are forbidden to speak of them, so they simply do not exist.

It wasn’t an original thought of Thoreau pointing out trade curses everything it handles, and it wasn’t original to Jesus pointing out the love of money is the root of every kind of evil. And when I read about the shortage of flour in Pakistan I immediately thought of the same thing being the basis of the French Revolution. It seems an abomination the leadership of Pakistan can afford a nuclear arsenal, but because of a shortfall, corruption, and ineptness in government the ordinary citizen is having trouble getting flour. But will we face the rationing I recall from WWII once more here in America; in my opinion, yes. And with a worldwide famine being a real possibility the next shoe to drop may very well be a jackboot.

Yes, in my opinion the bread lines and soup kitchens are about to return to America, the contemporary version of “food stamps” will give place to the real thing. And so will the concentration camps be returning; but this time, like so many of our jails and prisons, they will be filled by Mexicans. Our troops will be coming home, but only because the situation in America will require them to police these camps and our cities, secure our borders, and prevent politicians and their corporate bosses from being killed, much in the manner they were in France when the people had no bread.

The reason for this dismal assessment is watching and listening to the abominable “choices” We the People are being offered by way of “leadership,” together with the Bush dictatorship having sold out and betrayed America wholesale. No matter how much blame may be properly placed on his predecessors in the White House, and no one damns the Clintons more than I do for example, I can state categorically the present Bush has run the country as though he owns it and has acted as a dictator. The tragedy for America is the fact the Congress being so totally corrupt itself has been complicit in encouraging this dictator and his predecessors, and despite the threats to our nation there is no hope of this changing to save America. The only “hope” for change will be the threat to America having taken on such magnitude only the military will be able to keep order and offer any security.

Whatever our “new world order” will consist of coming from the election of our next president, the only thing I can think of that we can depend on will be that scene from Doctor Zhivago. We are well on our way to this since so many things are already forbidden to speak of, and being forbidden to speak of they simply do not exist. The fact so many nations are now facing the circumstances that brought Hitler to power and enabled him and his evil twin Stalin to slaughter so many millions with impunity is not anecdotal. These circumstances come about by the same mechanism now threatening America and other nations.

One could almost have some sympathy for the present contenders for the Oval Office. Not a one of them dares speak of the things threatening America; none dare speak in terms of the specifics of how such threatening things can be resolved. And not daring to speak of such things, as per Doctor Zhivago’s accusation, they simply do not exist. But is America faring any better and are our prospects any better than any other nation led of tyrants like North Korea where such things as hunger and starvation do not exist because to speak of such things is forbidden? On the “bright side,” the situation with Mexico will demand a resolution once the “right” people are being threatened, kidnapped and killed, people like American politicians and judges. And the ballooning problems with overcrowded jails and prisons, gang warfare, demands for social services and the closing of hospitals and emergency rooms, identity theft, counterfeiting and forgery will only accelerate the “solution.”

I may not live to see some of the futuristic wonders promised by science and technology I would like to see, but my prospects are good for living long enough to see what I have just written come to pass here in America. Many of us who lived the events of WWII never deluded ourselves the sacrifice and horrors of that period of time would not return, especially when we began to reflect on the many lies our government had told us then and would doubtless continue operating in the same manner no matter what ruin they are inviting for America. In the meantime, while it is still possible my advice to law abiding American citizens who do not own a gun: Get one!

In my opinion many people would agree there are superstitions that make life fun and interesting, things like four-leaf clovers and daily horoscopes, and most people will read those little strips found in Fortune Cookies. My having been raised among southerners, the Okies and Arkies that settled in places like Weedpatch and Southeast Bakersfield I was treated from childhood to many stories and superstitions indigenous to the South that were just plain fun when not downright interesting. And when not intended to do harm, to deceive and take advantage the cultures of most societies are enriched by these things and are often loath to forsake them entirely.

But these many years later and far removed from the fabulous stories of childhood, and now living in a scientific world of enlightenment and technological marvels one would think those superstitions and stories of the past would be long forgotten; but not so. In many cases they have taken on a new appearance in the shape of things like UFOs. However, not everything in the X-Files can be dismissed and those folks in Texas saw something, and most of us believe our government hides many things, some of which equate with Roswell, Area 51 and the storyline in “Independence Day.” After all, given things like JFK and the Warren Commission, 9/11 and that Commission, etc., who can blame any of us for thinking those in our government are quite capable of lying about UFOs? Just watching and listening to the present contenders for the White House is enough to cause us to believe we are living an X-Files or Twilight Zone episode, though in the case of TV and films we have professional actors rather than wannabees.

As I share with friends, one thing keeps cropping up; the feeling we all have of waiting for another shoe to drop. It’s as though we are holding our collective breath waiting for another bit of really bad news. As one dear lady shared with me, she finds herself sitting in her home with the TV off some of the time now and simply alone with her thoughts, something uncharacteristic of her usual mode of life. But we have to acknowledge all the bad news and America being without any real leadership it is no wonder some of us simply don’t even want to get out of bed lately. It all leads to much speculation as to “What’s next?” Nothing good is the general consensus. But never fear, Klaatu may yet come to the rescue; and though I’m not expecting this to happen, I have claim to a few reasons from my own “Outer Limits” for thinking it may not be entirely discounted.

Those familiar with the stretch of Wheeler Ridge between Weedpatch and Highway 5 know how desolate that long piece of road is going through open fields given to agriculture or alkali and tumbleweeds. You can drive for several miles without seeing a house or another vehicle on the road. One morning while driving this road there suddenly appeared from out of nowhere what looked like a new silver-colored pickup tailgating me. Wondering where in the world the thing could have come from so quickly on this long, straight, empty open road I began to pull to the side in order to let it pass, but glancing in my rearview mirror the thing had disappeared! I was so startled I stopped my car, got out and looked all around trying to determine what had happened to that truck; but it was nowhere to be seen! I knew it had to have abruptly turned off somewhere, but there was nowhere it could have gone and the wide open expanse of flatland all about held no sign of it, no dust trail thrown up and no growth or other obstructions that would have concealed it! It had simply disappeared!

There is nothing to match the glory of the heavens, the countless stars to be seen on a moonless night in the middle of our great deserts far removed from any human habitation. This has always been one of the attractions as I wandered such vast and empty wilderness places; but you also become familiar with the various critters like scorpions, snakes, Horny toads and Gila monsters. Generally preferring solitude I would often travel and camp alone in the deserts, and one night as I was blissfully asleep in my sleeping bag I was awakened by something moving on it. Immediately roused from a sound sleep I instinctively grabbed whatever it was and flung it away from me. Fully awake now I was conscious of the thing I had grabbed being a handful of something big and hairy, and decided it had to have been a very large tarantula. Of course, in the darkness of the night I couldn’t be sure.

When you live alone as I do here in the country without any neighbors close by it is pretty quiet, and when I lock up at night and go to sleep I don’t expect any noise or visitors to disturb my rest. So you can imagine my reaction one night to something pouncing on my bed in the dark. As I instinctively grabbed at whatever it was, it turned out to be the resident cat. I thought she had gone out for the night, the usual routine; but this wasn’t the case.

The point being I am used to being alone in the dark, and am very conscious of anything crawling or jumping on either sleeping bag or bed. But the other night something pounced on my bed, and when I grabbed for it in the darkness nothing was there! Now fully awake I turned on the light, got up and began to search; but I was conscious of the fact the cat had gone out as usual before I went to bed. I could find nothing. So, I lit a cigarette and sat on the edge of my bed pondering the situation. On the one hand there had to be a perfectly rational explanation to whatever had pounced on my bed and awakened me. On the other hand, I could think of no rational explanation for it. There are things that go bump in the night, but nothing like this had ever occurred in my life and it simply made no sense.

But when you travel through wilderness places, especially the great deserts, you are not only “treated” to things that go bump in the night you also see some strange sights. It was while lying in my sleeping bag out near Edwards AFB in the predawn I looked up to see three metallic disks in an equidistant triangular formation moving high in the sky above me, reflecting the sun not quite yet risen. They circled in this triangular formation for about ten minutes then suddenly zoomed north and disappeared. Just as I sat on the edge of my bed the other night pondering the imponderable, in like manner I lay in my sleeping bag then and pondered what I had seen.

However, at least in the case of these UFOs I had seen something; and I would far rather deal with inexplicable things seen than unseen, but there are some definite exceptions to this. One night while driving over toward Ridgecrest, as I had just started down the summit from Walker Pass headed toward the desert floor I saw what appeared to be five distinct, large fires equidistant from each other burning on the side of a hill some five miles distant. There were two of these in line, with the other three in a line equally spaced below the two. But while the shapes were those of fires, they were static; they didn’t move or flicker as fires would, and adding to the mystery they were all the same size and shape, each “fire” having five distinct pointed “flames,” two above and three below. I stopped and got out of my car in order to observe the phenomenon. I watched for nearly fifteen minutes, and suddenly the “fires” simultaneously disappeared.

If you live long enough and travel wilderness places as I have you are going to see and experience strange things some of which might properly be described as paranormal. But when I have looked at that night sky filled with countless stars, it always occurs to me that what we consider reality may pale beside what is possible; realities yet unknown and unseen. To use a thought from many philosophers and scientists, one expressed in “Men In Black,” given the immensity of what may be possible what might we know tomorrow? We may even discover why I don’t believe my departed loved ones and friends have ever left at all, but remain with me.

Since the time I first studied astronomy as an undergraduate, there have been many new discoveries in the science. For example, the earth was found to be orbiting the sun. Ok, so maybe it wasn’t that long ago, but when I thought about how long it has been that scene from “Space Cowboys” came to mind where Jay Leno is asking whether the “boys” had fought on the side of the Blue or Gray. All kidding aside, advances in studies of our universe continue to make much of what was known yesterday antiquated today, though the great writers of SciFi seemed to have anticipated some of the new discoveries being made. This is not to minimize the significance of the great minds like Newton and Einstein, but they had to exercise a little more caution when it came to expressing their imagination. Fortunately, due in large part to the popularity of Carl Sagan, Star Trek and other such programs the great minds of those like Michio Kaku are emboldened to make known their flights of the imagination without fear of losing their academic standing, though it remains true there are stranger things in the universe than we have the capacity to imagine.

Within a relatively short period of time the thinking in astronomy of a static universe changed to that of an expanding one. For a while it was thought this expansion was slow and uniformly gradual, but to the surprise of astronomers it was found the expansion was not only uniformly fast but accelerating! Even more dumbfounding was the fact this acceleration began five-billion years ago, somewhat past the half-way age of the theoretical beginning of the universe, and scientists haven’t a clue to why this happened at that particular point in time!

The scenario is one of a football game. Both sides have been struggling and the game is down to the wire, and only a punt by one team will win the game. So, whoever the team was five-billion years ago decided to punt the universe. But as many of you know punting is usually problematical, and oft times a last resort. In the case of the universe, the “punt” seems to be a miss since the galaxies are doomed to move away from each other at an enormously accelerating rate and will eventually leave each one in the darkness of space without neighbors.

A happier thought is one of sparing the “neighborhood.” We all know the problems of congested cities with their degradation of quality of life and those who can move to the “burbs,” but the dream of most is to have a few acres in which to roam. Those like me love the wide open expanses of the deserts where there is no sign of human habitation and your eyes can take in panoramic miles and miles of miles and miles without anything of human manufacture interfering with your line of sight. It’s the old story of those that would move on elsewhere seeking solitude once they heard the sound of a neighbor’s ax. The point was well made by Lee Marvin in “Paint Your Wagon,” and some of us don’t mind having been “born under a wandering star.” Could it be that despite the enormous time involved, the billions of years in the process, the “planning” is for an uncrowded universe?

There may be a “Great Intelligence” at work in the universe, in its creation and continuing to work on it. But if so, it is far beyond either our intelligence to comprehend or even our imagination. However, I can imagine something like gods in conflict much like a football game and punting the universe five-billion years ago. And how about this; some of you are old enough to remember hitting the radio trying to get it to work, and at any age you have probably kicked or thought about taking a hammer to something, the contemporary target of frustration most likely being a computer, and most of us are familiar with the expression that when all else fails “get a bigger hammer.” Might the gods be of the same disposition?

Alas, when it comes to things on an astronomical scale whether in size or time we mere mortals are incapacitated. It is all too vast, too huge to comprehend. We are left wondering like the Psalmist looking at the stars; of what possible significance could we be in the vast scheme of the universe? But, ah hah! We mortals are capable of speculation about such enormous things as the universe, and in our speculations we take on the very characteristics of the gods in such speculation. Despite the very enormity of it all we are capable of wonder, capable of investigating and discovery of things that a few years ago would have been solely the purview of SciFi. And so we are emboldened to think in terms of things nearly supernatural in their characteristics, things like colonizing other planets, star and time travel. If in nothing else humans are gods we are such in the individual empires of our minds, and these minds capable of challenges that were the stuff of science fiction scant years ago.

Though many mysteries of the universe are under scrutiny and investigation, the two greatest mysteries of all that effect our very lives remain; those of life and death. But as I watch, read and listen to those like Michio Kaku I have cause to wonder whether the questions surrounding these two great mysteries may yet be answered. This I know, until these two mysteries are solved there cannot possibly be a “Theory of Everything.” But it wasn’t that long ago TV was the stuff of science fiction, and only scant years ago computers were strictly the stuff of SciFi, and when I look at what changes have been wrought in only my own lifetime my mind reels!

Still the pragmatic problem facing our species is whether we will destroy ourselves before reaching our full potential, and given the tremendous advances we have made that full potential is truly mind-boggling! But despite the tremendous advances in learning and the sciences we continue to have the barbaric wars engendered through politics and religion, the very real possibility of world famine rears its ugly head as too many unproductive mouths breed with no thought of how to feed the resulting children, and the “Lord of War” continues a very lucrative career while the inner cities of America and elsewhere in the world resemble the Black Hole of Calcutta, cages with too many rats.

It has taken wealthy patrons of the arts, a leisure class to give humankind the best of the arts and sciences. It takes time for the best minds of our species to roam at will, to do the kind of stargazing, experimentation leading to discovery that has proven of such benefit to civilizations and the quality of life some few enjoy. But the greater part of the world’s population lives hand-to-mouth, never benefiting from the great advances of more civilized nations. It seems a race, now, as to whether civilized nations will prevail in the face of so many dangers threatening. Even here in America the legitimate question is being raised whether we can weather the threats we now face, those of potential economic collapse and being a debtor nation to those that want to do us harm.

At the same time that I have lived long enough to see such dramatic advances in the sciences and technology, I have lived long enough to experience good jobs being plentiful and one paycheck taking care of a family, to have known a time when gas was fifteen-cents a gallon and bread fifteen-cents a loaf, a nice house could be bought for $3,500 or a nice apartment in Hermosa or Redondo Beach with ocean view and within easy walking distance of uncrowded and clean beaches could be rented for $35 a month. Despite the empty rhetoric of politicians, there are none that have the temerity to promise Americans a return to the kind of hope those like me were born into and once had for the future of our nation.

It could be interpreted as despair that I turn my attention to things like whether our solar system and earth, intelligent life here on earth is unique in the universe, even whether we might be an experiment of the gods, whether the universe can be viewed as a football game and punted. But so long as I am able to even speculate about such things, to me it is evidence of my maintaining hope in the face of seeming hopelessness. The result being that I have not yet thrown up my hands in despair, but continue to maintain the kind of hope some might very well consign to “faith” in science fiction.

But given the scant number of years our species has been around, and given the miracle of intelligent life that has enabled us to do so much in what amounts to the blink of an eye in the cosmogony of it all, how can I not take hope that we humans are very special and the punt may yet prove to go through the goalposts and win the game. After all, the terms infinite and immortal have relevance to us though we haven’t the capacity to imagine them. Nevertheless, they remain the speculation of the empire of individual minds in which we retain the status of gods, and perhaps the children of gods.

But what happens if our species should have to punt and we miss? One idea, and one found in some theologies, is a few favored of the gods will be there to continue the game. In my opinion, why not? There must be a reason we humans are so competitive minded and game-oriented so why not the gods, or even the ending to “Men In Black?” Our god-like capacity of curiosity, to explore, discover, invent, create, and speculate about things beyond imagination leave me wondering about the things I’ve experienced and seen in my own relatively short lifetime; and of course I’d like to know what those folks in Texas recently saw?

The MSM and politicians choosing to ignore the real issues of ordinary Americans while talking absolute nonsense with nothing of substance, given the choice I’m comfortable with my own realities rather than those of the powerful, rich and famous. And having made the choice of my own reality as opposed to that of other lunatics, rather than simply finding an empty cell in the asylum and becoming a recluse I choose to promote my own brand of lunacy.

For example, in discussion with some friends as to why Bush, Obama, and the Clintons are still alive when so many want them dead it occurred to me there may be “special souls” that defy the odds. In fact, the odds are so overwhelming they fall into the category of the supernatural. Michael Corleone was wrong; not everyone can be killed. The proof of this is the fact that throughout history there have been those that despite the odds against their surviving have beat enormous odds in continuing to live, and many that have needed killing despite the numerous attempts made against them, people like Stalin and Hitler, continued to beat the odds.

Is Bin Laden still alive because of the ineptitude of Clinton and Bush or “supernatural intervention” on his behalf? If it were only a matter of money or the desire to kill them, many a tyrant would have met their demise before inflicting so much damage. So I conclude forces unseen are at work in such cases, not all of them in the category of “They are only alive because it’s against the law to kill them.”

Of course, there are good people throughout history that have defied the odds against their living, people like George Washington. Special souls therefore, if there be such, may be good or evil, which would lead to the assumption there are unseen forces at work both good and evil in conflict, the belief of many different cultures since the beginning of human history and continuing to be credited by many; and not just the ignorant and superstitious, but some of the brightest and best educated.

The other day a line from a book I hadn’t read in nearly thirty years came to mind that I wanted to use in an article I was working on. I still had the book in my library, one of over 400 pp. in length, and despite my having an extraordinary memory the thought of leafing through it to find that one line was daunting. Nevertheless, I pulled out the book and much to my dismay there was the very line I needed on the first page I opened to! Many such things have happened throughout my life, not all of them so pedestrian by any means but on the contrary left me wondering how I was still alive! But whether of little seeming consequence or importance or bizarre and extreme they still catch me by surprise. I know they have happened with other people, and when they happen they can leave you wondering whether other forces are at work science cannot explain. In some cases, the things that happen are very much out of “The Twilight Zone.”

In “The Mummy” there is much to Evie’s observation “If I can see it and touch it then it’s real.” Of course, the delight of the film is the many supernatural things going on that change Evie’s point of view and many of us enjoy. But when something of the paranormal happens in a person’s life there is no denying the experience; though some of the “saints” may have in fact been quite mad. But it is my own experience with things inexplicable that prevent me at times from replying to someone with a seemingly fanciful story: “Are you nuts?” To my mind because of some of my own personal experiences there is a chance they may not be despite Evie’s imminently practical observation.

Mythologies such as those of the Greeks quite understandably attribute human characteristics to the gods and goddesses, much as do other mythologies. By this method of interpretation extraordinary people and events otherwise inexplicable fall into the realm of human understanding and acceptance; and it is a given the deities may favor some humans over others, thereby becoming special souls. But both good and evil deities of various descriptions are allowed a place in order to account for both saints and sinners sometimes beating the odds. And were it not for the mythologies, such things would leave us wondering how to make any sense of this. My conclusion is there may be guardian angels in some special soul cases, but the Devil and his servants have their own special souls they care for as well.

To bring it down to where the rubber meets the road, the two coaches of football teams pray God will give them victory. But one team has to lose. The win will usually go to the better team and plays the better game much in the manner of Napoleon’s point God is on the side of the army with the most cannon. The problem is that this is not always the case, and so Lincoln was correct in not claiming God was on the side of the North, and both Emerson and Thoreau were reluctant to accept what men called “good” without thorough examination.

As I watch and listen to Bush making nice with the Saudi’s and talk nonsense about peace in the Middle East I think of the film “Lord of War.” By now most people realize the most corrupt leaders fare better than any noble, should any noble ever gain a position of leadership, but I keep coming back to the mythologies that credit some being special souls. At least this makes sense of so many hundreds of millions born to no other purpose but to suffer and die, just as Nature decrees among plants and animals only a few among the many survive and when the many exceed their limit they die. Blessed, touched, cursed, however much you try to be scientific, empirical, and practical I don’t believe an honest mind can arbitrarily dismiss the case for “special souls” by whatever means natural or supernatural be they good or evil.

So much of the humor of Sam Clemens was dependent on his gift of exaggeration, but he did not exaggerate when he called attention to the fact of how essential it is to good writing that one uses exactly the right word. How many times I have read something by someone expecting to be taken seriously, and doomed their effort by the use of nearly the right word, but not exactly the right word. This of course goes beyond the efforts of people that simply don’t know how to write and often use words incorrectly and know nothing of syntax or the proper rules of grammar.

But not even the greatest of writers is immune from their personal demons. A good example from one of our greatest writers Sinclair Lewis comes immediately to mind in this context. Struggling with his own demons Sinclair Lewis has Mr. Pengilly ask Elmer Gantry why he does not believe in God? You don’t read far in the works of great writers but what you soon realize these were struggling with issues that haunted them, Herman Melville being one of the more obvious.

In the case of Lewis with his character Gantry, there is the dichotomy of being a scoundrel on the one hand and heroic on the other. What Lewis did not seem to realize was despite the hypocrisy of Gantry, Lewis leaves no doubt in the minds of readers Gantry is a believer in God. In Lewis’ effort to skewer religious hypocrisy and blinded by some personal demon he was trying to exorcise, he skewers himself with this glaring contradiction, a glaring error in the novel. Trying for dramatic effect, Lewis failed to use “exactly the right word” in this instance. He could easily have had Mr. Pengilly question Gantry’s belief in God rather than the abrupt, obvious statement of outright condemnation: “Mr. Gantry; why don’t you believe in God?” This would have let Lewis off the hook; but whatever was haunting Lewis, perhaps even tormenting him that caused such an egregious error made him blind to the obvious.

The stories are legion about brilliant and gifted people making blunders. But little has been written about such people making such blunders in attempts to exorcise some demon in their life, and writing being in many cases a form of catharsis it isn’t any wonder some of these blunders on the part of brilliant and gifted people reveal the demons. The really great storytellers redeem themselves by producing great works of literature; but invariably reveal the things that are haunting or tormenting them in the process. Finding such ghosts and demons in the great works of literature is somewhat like the popular show “Ghost Hunters,” but requires much more effort of the mind and a great breadth of reading.

In “Some Came Running,” Dave doesn’t realize the story he has written is finished until Gwen points this out to him. It is a classic case of a writer who has written better than they know; and we find this to be true of many great writers. Certainly James Jones was fully aware of this, and it caused him to make a point of it; he knew this is one of the ghosts that haunts all gifted writers, but he also knew some such ghosts are friendly and others are not, that some may be demons the writer is attempting to exorcise.

It is a tragedy for America that our young people are not learning to read and write, that our great heritage of literature has fallen on such hard times. How many a young person might be able to deal with their own ghosts and demons if they were being properly instructed in the art of writing, and learning the critical thinking skills of dissecting and analyzing the great works of literature doing some “ghost hunting” of their own. In the process of discovery, young people would come to realize that even the greatest names in literature had their own ghosts and demons; and this would be of comfort to young people today, helping them to realize they are not alone in their private thoughts of such things, but on the contrary are in the very best of company.

Of course this would require good teachers, those that are literate and love great literature, capable of instructing young people in the fine arts of writing and reading well. But the universities are no longer producing such teachers, a point made painfully clear by Harper Lee over forty years ago, and one with which I am all too painfully aware from personal experience. It would take a great deal more than throwing the money of taxpayers at the problem to fix it, it would require a leadership capable of recognizing there is no “royal path to knowledge,” nor is there one to making children and their education a primary goal of America. “No Child Left Behind” is nothing but empty political rhetoric until the problems in the universities of America are fixed, until the ugly reality of what our educational system has become is confronted and dealt with realistically.

The joy of teaching for me was in a large measure leading young people into new worlds of exploration and discovery, not just the rote memorization of facts needful as some of these are. If those presently contending for the White House had such an experience working with children and young people how much more believable they might be. As it is, I doubt any of them have known the thrill of discovery in searching for the ghosts haunting great writers, I doubt any of them would even know what I mean by such a thing; though in time past even some politicians were gifted writers and readers of great literature.

You can’t beat the line from the film “Tombstone” when Wyatt Earp is asked what he thinks happens when you die and replies: “Something. Nothing. Hell, I don’t know!” Now that’s as honest an answer anyone can give. It’s too bad so many people are not given to such honesty about the question because to me this is the best of conventional wisdom, and wisdom that transcends any mere conventions.

Wyatt’s reply in the film to the question is far from being original, it’s the one most of us struggle with and many of us would have the same reply to the question. Because of this great unknown, while there is much speculation about what happens when we die admittedly there is little if anything that can correctly be called “conventional wisdom” on the subject. And no matter what personal beliefs one may have about it what, exactly, would be considered conventional wisdom on this subject? Once you think about it, this becomes an intriguing question worthy of much discussion; and what might be suggested as conventional wisdom in one case might be considered ridiculous in another based on a multiplicity of mitigating factors. Still, the sheer honesty of Wyatt Earp’s reply cannot be dismissed, and it is on this basis I consider it the best of conventional wisdom on the subject.

But apart from questions concerning the supernatural and a hereafter, if any, oftentimes scientists have problems with their versions of conventional wisdom that in some cases is very nearly as ethereal as philosophical speculation on subjects like the soul and immortality. The conventional wisdom in science continues to be challenged since the time it was finally determined and accepted the earth orbited the sun. I recall when it became conventional wisdom the dinosaurs met their demise from an asteroid or comet, but now this is being questioned. There were always some like me who doubted the theory, but eventually we wound up on the periphery. However, just as new things continue to be found in astronomy and physics that denies conventional wisdom so with studies of life on our planet.

Thursday, Jan. 10, 2008. Did Insects Kill the Dinosaurs? By Michael D. Lemonick. By now, scientists have a pretty good idea of what conditions were like in the Cretaceous period, which started about 135 million years ago, and came to a sudden end 70 million years later, with the death of the dinosaurs. Or rather, they think they do — but two new sets of research results suggest there’s a lot more to learn. The first has to do with the period’s cataclysmic close. In lots of people’s minds, the mystery of what killed the dinosaurs and other species — paving the way for the rise of mammals — was solved a couple of decades ago: a giant asteroid or comet slamming into the Earth, resulting in a dust cloud that shrouded the sun, cooled the planet dramatically and killed off plants and animals wholesale. It’s a compelling story, but plenty of scientists never completely bought it. The dinos died pretty quickly, they admit, but not quite abruptly enough to be explained this way. So alternate theories — the dinosaurs succumbed to allergies, from the rise of flowering plants, or to world-shaking volcanoes in what’s now Ind