Life in the country while preferable to me to living in the city has some decided drawbacks. One of these irritable factors recently had me really going. My laser printer suddenly developed a strange problem. A peculiar asterisk shaped mark began to appear on the pages I was printing.

    I took the printer apart and discovered a small spider embedded on the platen roller. This explained the asterisk having a couple of extra legs. Cleaning off his remains restored the copies satisfactorily.

    Now I don't know how many of you have ever had a spider making his impress on your copy work, but it is a hazard not found in your printer manual. I did take the further precaution of taking my computer apart and, sure enough, little spiders were habitating its innards. Fortunately I discomfited the small arachnids before they began to do weird things to the machine.

    Yes, I know the spider makes his way even into kings' palaces but bugs and various critters and varmints of all descriptions do proliferate more readily in rural environments. Most of us have learned to live with the multitude of gremlins that inhabit printers and computers. But I can't help sharing the one about the spider and reminded me of a reply from a U.S. Senator concerning the amendment for the protection of children from molesters that had this statement: “Thank you for contacting my office and relating your concerns regarding dog eating.”

    I immediately re-read my copy of the letter I had sent the Senator and, sure enough, I had not mentioned anything about my concerns regarding dog eating. I was reasonably sure I hadn't expressed my thoughts about this problem to the Senator but I double-checked anyhow.

    A couple of days later I received a phone call from the Senator's office apologizing for the glitch. Seems some correspondence had become confused in their computer and I can only imagine how the citizen who was concerned about dog eating responded to a reply involving a U.S. Constitutional Amendment for the protection of children from child molesters. Since I prefer cats to dogs, I may look further into this situation.

    Not sure why this reminds me of a recent study that concluded a few things about why children become negative and ill behaved but here they are:

    One: The parents of such children were more anxious, depressed, hostile, and less friendly to each other.

    Two: Such families had lots of work related stress.

    Three: Such families had fewer economic resources.

    Now I know how amazed all of you are about these astounding revelations and might mistake them as taken from an Obama “speech” and his plans for America’s “future.” There is such a thing as dumb and dumber; but there are few as a group that can beat our Congress for the title of “Dumbest!” If more people are found praying these days, there is good and sufficient reason for doing so. However, don’t make the mistake of a great nature being the result of a religious experience, belief or conversion. Consider, rather, how much greater the individual might have been without such artifices!

    According to Benjamin Franklin, the coastal Indians were done in by rum. He reported an old Indian told him that since all things were designed of God for humans to use, surely God provided rum for the use of the Indians. Not to dispute the old Indian's theology or the fact that rum was the invention of men, not God, I don't think he made a distinction concerning moderation. But the coastal Indians of Franklin's time are gone and the rum remains.

    It was thinking of this and re-reading some of Emerson's remarks about moderation and toleration among other things that led me to thinking of how religion, like drunkenness, sometimes seems to bring out the worst in human beings. I make a distinction between Jesus and religion. Religions are the inventions of people. Jesus preached the love of God and your fellow-creatures. In this, he became very confrontational with organized religion, which invariably makes God's love and approval conditional on keeping the rules of the club regardless of the religion.

    Religions make distinctions and set requirements that separate people. But in my own philosophy of belief, I can't accept God's being divided in His own mind concerning acceptable behavior. I believe it is wrong to lie, cheat, steal, betray, molest children, persecute and murder. And most people feel the same way about these things regardless of their religion or philosophy of belief.

    Yet anyone conversant and knowledgeable of the history of religions is fully aware of how prejudicially hateful some people become when given over to a fanatical belief, a belief that they are specially chosen and ordained of God and all others must submit to their belief system. It is easy for civilized people to see the hypocrisy of a system of belief that makes others suffer and leads to superstitious, prejudicial hatred of others. It is not as easy to see the more insidious forms of this in some other systems.

    We look at the history of Christianity and rightly deplore some of the cruelties like the crusades and inquisitions, some of the superstitions and political chicanery that led to some of the vilest acts against humanity in the name of God! There is no such thing as a systematic theology in any religion. They all leave questions of monumental import unanswered. The fanatic is in his element pronouncing damnation against the wicked, i.e. those that don't listen to him and follow him.

    All that is necessary for the forces of evil to win the world is for enough good men to do nothing. The saying is usually attributed to Edmund Burke though it is one that has been recognized from the earliest times of recorded history. If this is true, and most people certainly concur, I would like to call your attention to a very hurtful fallacy in the teaching of religious people who say there is no hope for the world. But Jesus did not question Satan’s claim of owning the kingdoms of the world, of the world being the Evil One’s dominion.

    Here is the conundrum such people face: You simply cannot save your cake and eat it too. Either Burke is right or he isn't. If he is, it is up to good people to confront evil and overcome it. If it is up to people to do this, where does this leave God in the scenario? We generally accept that God will bless, guide and help those who choose to do right. We accept that there is a judgment to come against the wicked. The weakness of the churches and good people generally is the misguided notion that God will overcome evil without our doing our part. I believe God is going to have the last word; in the meantime He expects His people to do the work of legitimate children of God and confront evil.

     But to call attention to a weakness in Burke's statement is his mentioning only men. Where are the women? As usual, when it comes to philosophy and theology, they are conspicuous by their absence. Now I know the use of the term’s man and men is often generic of the human race including both men and women. But the generic use of the word man does not usually include women in the philosophies of men.

    Burke wrote men because women were not included. Our founding fathers wrote all men are created equal. Women definitely were not included in this equality. Suffice it to say that unless women come to have the same value as men, there will be little expectation for peace in the world. It is this disparity in value between men and women that leads otherwise good men to miss the mark in their philosophies.

    I believe the religious right in this country has some good men in leadership positions, men like James Kennedy and John MacArthur. But, like James Dobson, Pat Robertson and others, they lead male-dominated, religious empires. Though I have changed my views about many things over the years my background, theologically, is exactly the same as men like Kennedy and MacArthur: Conservative and orthodox. In fact, MacArthur and I were contemporaries at Biola/Talbot.

    Because of my own background and knowing good men in the ministry I have the courage, and the knowledge, to find fault with such preaching and teaching. I was one of them. And I know how insulated they become when they surround themselves with only those of their own kind. When you have lived, studied and believed a certain thing all your life, when you associate with only those who reinforce your beliefs, you fall prey to a very narrow view of life. One thing you most certainly do not have is a Weltanschauung, a world-view. And without this, you do not have any concept of Weltschmerz, the pain of the world or the pain of God.

    The sects and cults, religions in general are given to such a narrow view. Whether Christian, Jewish or Moslem, all lack a world-view that is willing, and consequently unable, to consider the whole of humanity.

    My own belief system is Christian based for the greater part. But I came to realize some years ago that God is not a Christian. Nor is He a Jew, Moslem, Hindu or Buddhist. In short, God is not religious.

    Those not steeped in theology as I have been might have read Michener's “Hawaii” or seen the movie. If so, you are acquainted with the Black Calvinism of Reverend Hale and his form of prayer. To pray to God in such a manner goes something like this: Oh, God! I know I am unworthy of Your slightest attention, let alone Your help. I know I am a black-hearted sinner, conceived in sin, that all of my righteousness is nothing but filthy rags before You. I know that You are all-powerful, all-righteous, all-knowing, all-wise and You know the deep evil of my own black heart!

    Now of course if you believe this of yourself, you may believe it of all others as well. It you are totally unworthy of God, if you deserve nothing but damnation and have invited God's righteous wrath so with your neighbors as well. Your duty, then, is to go out and tell everyone else that God is a vengeful, wrathful deity that will punish the slightest infraction of His will. And if you don't belong to this club, you go to hell!

    The biggest problem I had to confront with such teaching was how much I enjoyed telling people to go to hell! It was great! I could stand in that pulpit and tell people that if they didn't believe the way I believed, God was going to punish them; that the flames of the pit yawned before them and they were on the slippery path to perdition! And best of all, I could say such things in love; or so I thought at the time.

    So I watch these preachers and I hear them telling people, just as I used to, that unless you believe their way you're going to hell. But of course they are doing it because they love God and they love you! Your part is to prove you love God and love the preacher enough to give them your money. I finally came to the conclusion that unlike God religion too often brings out the worst in people.

    Of course the Reverend Hale’s all believe in Jesus. But they delight in dwelling on your sinfulness, your unworthiness of eternal bliss. They delight in consigning all who don't agree with them to the eternal flames and outer darkness (How to distinguish between the two, they are never quite clear about). Now you get enough of this kind of preaching and it isn't any wonder you are left powerless to confront evil. Why, you are so unworthy, so evil yourself you can't think beyond that.

    But we face a conundrum at this point. If God is our Heavenly Father, why should he treat with us so differently than earthly parents their own children? If a heart of love, as with earthly parents, motivates God, why should He make impossible, unreasonable demands and be tyrannical, vengeful and despotic?

    I accept and love my children warts and all. My love of them is not conditional. Yes, I expect them to comport themselves in such a fashion that they will not shame or disgrace me as their father; but that is for their sake far more than mine. Should they fail in some manner, I expect contrition, repentance and, wherever possible and justice demands it, restitution. Parents have a right to expect this much from their children. No less does God of us. But He is not standing there with a whip to angrily keep us shaped up. As with an earthly parent, love and mercy, forgiveness is a criterion of God's love as well as discipline. If the grown child, the adult does something that removes the possibility of my helping him, it does not lessen my love, only my ability to help or intervene on his behalf. So I have come to the conclusion that God cannot do some things; that He must, as with any parent, watch the adult child make the mistakes and pay the consequences.

PsychoSearch: Since it is now common knowledge on the stock market, I admit to starting PsychoSearch some years ago. With my background in both science and the social sciences, especially psychology with an emphasis on the paranormal, I realized that regression to past lives held the promise of regression to lives that might have been lived. With the rapid progress of computers, this great dream of mine was finally realized and the classic study of Arnie Schmartzkoptfer is well known.

    Arnie's case seemed ideal to me to test my hypothesis that a person cannot only be regressed like Shirley McClain to past lives, but with the computer power now available, could be regressed in such a manner as to predict what that person's life might have been had circumstances been different. The cause of Arnie becoming a mass murderer, killing over seven hundred elderly people in various nursing homes before being apprehended, was well publicized.

    A few harping critics wondered how it took so long for Arnie to be apprehended. This was explained very satisfactorily when it became known that the homes in which Arnie was employed used the same methods and criteria for determining qualifications for employment as those of Social Services, particularly Child Protective Services.

    As Arnie's trial dragged on with great publicity attached, it became clear to me that something had happened to Arnie as a child that caused him to act out this kind of antisocial behavior toward the elderly. Having honed my hypothesis with the customary rats, guinea pigs, and grad students, I was ready for Arnie.

    My reputation was sufficient to gain me entrance to the poor fellow while in prison (the jury had found him guilty of mass murder but innocent by reason of insanity). Of course, the conditions for testing were ideal since he was confined to the psychiatric ward of the prison.

    After days of testing, I discovered Arnie had come to this sad pass because of chalk dust. Or, rather say, the lack of chalk dust. Arnie's first grade teacher, a Miss Granola, was quite elderly and well past retirement. But she used dustless chalk for writing on the blackboard.

    During Arnie's regression to that point of his life, I discovered that had Miss Granola not used dust free chalk, Arnie would have been chosen to shake out the erasers. Deprived of this special privilege of responsibility, Arnie had subconsciously known he was being cheated; and cheated by an elderly person.  What Arnie did not understand was that he was being cheated of the life he might have lived had he been able to shake out those erasers.

    With these facts in hand, it was no trouble at all for me to convince a fine lawyer to undertake for Arnie. A new jury acquitted him on the basis of my findings and an excellent defense by this fine lawyer.

    So it is that PsychoSearch came into being and is now available to all that have been unjustly incarcerated for having been deprived of the lives they should have lived had they not been cheated by those like Miss Granola and dust free chalk.

Where but in America would such a triumph of justice have prevailed? But being the sensitive soul that I am, I was grieved to the quick that some few would misunderstand and misconstrue the noble efforts of myself through PsychoSearch to the point of suggesting that I am a few feathers short of a full duck. Some even suggested, benighted souls they, that Arnie did not deserve to be set free. Fortunately for Arnie, cooler, and may I say more sensitive, heads prevailed. I notice that the willow flycatcher here locally in the Kern River Valley is being subjected to the same abuse as I have been by misguided people who think they are more important than birds.

It is too easy to get caught up in emotions, trivia and peripheral issues and miss the larger picture. After all, was it not for fine legislators, a Supreme Court that cares about America, and my friends like those of the ACLU, caring, knowledgeable and sensitive people just like me, where would America be today? Would the entertainment industry be free to tell children that perversion, gratuitous sex and violence are perfectly acceptable in our great society? Would our teachers be told to teach our children that homosexuality is a perfectly acceptable alternative to normal sexual behavior?

When well meaning but misguided adults and parents try to keep such things away from children, don't they understand that children know they are being cheated, deprived of the total experiences and realities of life? Such things will always lead to warped psyches and the poor Arnie's that engage in anti-social behavior.

Granted that a few eggs are broken in making an omelet, like the 700 plus elderly that Arnie dispatched (mercifully, by the way), how can it fail to grieve sensitive people that the real blame was that of a society that simplistically, even callously, failed to take his feelings into consideration? What can you say of a system that would fail poor Arnie in such a manner? This was a miscarriage of justice that cried out for amelioration!

Fortunately, most of the response to my being instrumental in freeing Arnie was quite positive. Not a few commented on the constructive action of his making so many beds available (which are becoming a premium) in nursing homes, savings in Medicare, SSI, etc. In fact, not a few suggested... but I digress.

I only regret that PsychoSearch and my services were not available for another poor misunderstood victim of society, Jeffery Dahmer. How that cruelly tormented man must have suffered! No one seemed to take his side. Imagine if you will, suffering the addiction of cannibalism. You develop a sweet tooth for something like this and few trouble themselves to understand the control it has over your life. But where was the compassionate understanding of our justice system in his case? Conspicuous by its absence!

In correspondence with President Obama, whom I found most interested in my efforts as he attempts to fix a badly broken health care system and was most sympathetic toward Arnie in particular, I have made it clear to this fine leader of the free world that he needs to take look at the death penalty. Far too many in Texas, for example, are being executed, innocent victims like Arnie, that if my talents and PsychoSearch were put to use, would be found to be stellar citizens if society had not failed them in the way it failed poor Arnie and Jeffrey.

But how many are inclined to think of such people as victims? We should beware of the labels given such people, labels like mass murderer, rapist, serial killer, labels that are strictly detrimental to justice and mental health, labels that deny the merits of the individuals and beat down their self-esteem. How can clear-headed people fail to see how this produces victims like Arnie? Regardless the slings and arrows of the misguided, PsychoSearch (with the continued help of the ACLU, Supreme Court, Alec Baldwin and Hollywood in general, and People for the American Way) will carry on in the cause of fair play and justice for all.

“Listen up, Adam; let me put it this way. If you don’t take a bite I’m cuttin’ you off’” A slanderous, vile canard, a calumny has been raised against me. I did not accuse Eve of threatening Adam with having to sleep on the couch if he did not cooperate with her and the Serpent in eating us out of house and home. I simply raised the possibility. A far greater possibility, to my mind, was a threat to Adam’s “manhood.” I think it far more likely that Eve appealed to Adam’s ego, his sense of “superiority” as the “High Mucky Muck” of the Garden. “What kind of wimp are you, anyhow, Adam? scairty cat, scairty cat, afraid of God. The Serpent and I aren’t afraid. I took a bite and nothing happened. Big man, afraid to do something to stand up to The Boss. The Serpent’s really got your number. If you were any kind of a ‘Real Man’ you wouldn’t have to let a woman go first!”

Ah, gentle reader, the possibilities are really there. You men, what would you have done in Adam’s place? Taken “Abiola’s“ advice and given Eve a punch in the mouth? Or, like Adam, possibly, let the “Real Man” in you feel threatened and “rise to the occasion?” Or, would you, as Adam should have done, as a truly Real Man would do, obey God and let Him handle the consequences?

Well, in any event the possibilities are fascinating but the bottom line is that Adam “hearkened” to Eve and we live with the results of his rebellion to God and his failure toward his wife. I do wonder if Adam became the first Wife-beater as a result. Perhaps this would account for their first son, Cain, becoming a murderer. Adam did try to blame God and Eve for his own failure. That was a poor beginning for a relationship. It may be the reason that God finally had to destroy the world by a flood and start over again with Noah. Unhappily, Jesus was correct in pointing out things weren’t going to get any better until God calls an end to this age.

Now if Eve had been smart she would have moved to California before all this took place. If poor, old Adam tried that “Rulership” nonsense here, then she would have divorced him and her lawyer would have made sure the “Mine” was “equitably divided” so she would have gotten the gold and he would have gotten the shaft. She would have wound up in Mink instead of “leaves and skins.” But, alas for poor Eve, there was no California at that time and lawyers hadn’t been invented back then unless you count this as one of Satan’s areas of expertise, something that comes readily to mind.

In any event, Adam could hardly have been looking for a suitable companion among the beasts of the field. So I think it possible the Serpent described as beautiful and intelligent may have been in the running; and if a female we know “Hell hath no fury…” So when God came up with Eve, the Serpent having been rejected by Adam may have laid plans for an ambush. She gained Eve’s confidence, invited her to Tupperware parties and so on, all the while plotting revenge. The Biblical account infers Eve was used to visiting with the Serpent so there was no surprise by the creature striking up a conversation with Eve when the Serpent felt the time was right to initiate her revenge.

Jewish theologians came up with a “first wife” of Adam called Lilith in an attempt to make sense of things. But I think the Genesis account has it right with the Serpent playing the hypotenuse in the Eternal Triangle. Whatever the truth of the matter, God’s curse fell most heavily upon Eve and the Serpent. The curse of sex and the ruler ship of men over them would be most harsh on women.

Since the curse of death took quite a while to come about for Adam and Eve, it may be the Serpent didn’t immediately start crawling on its belly but may have gone off to the land of Nod and waited for Cain’s arrival, the two of them producing children of the Devil leading to violence filling the earth. This may explain the commingling of the “sons of God and daughters of men, the further progeny of Adam and Eve and those of Cain and the Serpent. But things got so bad God was sorry He made man and he could only find Noah worth sparing. But there would be the perverted son of Noah, Ham, who would start the whole thing of violence all over again and we live with the results today.

Well, it isn’t to be wondered I have had more than a little difficulty finding a church “home” when I speculate about the things of the Bible.

“It was a dark and stormy night!” It wasn’t, really, I’ve just always wanted to start a story with the infamous line. In reality, it was a beautiful, balmy, summer evening; so there.

My brother, Ronnie, a friend and I were on our way up the Canyon on 178 out of Bakersfield to Bull Run Creek to get in some trout fishing. I was driving the friend’s dad’s truck, a ‘40 Studebaker. I hit the first “S” curve a tad fast and we managed a four-wheel slide through it.  Fortunately, there wasn’t any other traffic. It did not bode well for our journey but we were young and, hence, indestructible and laughed about it.

It was great to be young and single in the Fifties in America and, especially, in California. Tax-fattened hyenas, otherwise known as “politicians,” hadn’t yet perfected their methods of robbing responsible, working folks blind, teachers were still trying to educate, welfare wasn’t yet an approved life-style, you could buy a house for $3,000, gas was fifteen cents (even twelve cents at times) a gallon and Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Baker were still virtual unknowns; all in all, a pretty good time to be alive in the good, old U.S. of A.

It was a beautiful night, filled with the aroma of the marvelous scents of the river and the vegetation as the road wound along its banks, climbing toward Isabella and Kernville. Mice scurried across the road in the beam of our headlights, we could hear the croaking of frogs and the occasional, soft, soggy balloon “pop” as a tire would roll over a toad, his tongue, eyeballs and sundry juices squirting out, tracing an intricate pattern over the warm asphalt. Once in awhile a hawk or owl would make an appearance as they chased their dinners of the smaller critters. We passed road-kills of snakes, mice and one skunk. Don’t mind the smell as long as the little fellows keep it at a respectable distance. But, then, I’m not overly offended at the smell of the old privy either, so I’m a little weird that way (some other ways also, according to my ex-wives and women in general).

In addition to our fishing and camping gear, I had with me one of the first new-issue, Single-Action Army Colts. Beautiful work of art in .38 Special caliber. Colt hadn’t yet put it out in .357. I got one of those later and kept it for years; my favorite sport shooter- 100 rounds and one Jackrabbit, fast-draw. That’s fun and easy on the rabbits. But you have to be a hand loader to afford it and, fortunately, I had been one since I was 14 years old, living on the old, mining claim in Boulder Gulch.

The holster for the Colt was a professional “Hollywood” rig with steel insert. I had been taught by a real pro and thereby avoided the “Clutch and Grab” gang that was popularizing the sport of shooting themselves in the foot by trying to imitate James Arness and Hopalong Cassidy. Actually knew a kid that had managed to put four holes in his leg and thigh with one bullet trying this trick; wouldn’t have believed it possible if I hadn’t seen the holes in him. Fortunately, he was using a .22 and the slug missed the bones.

But to get back to the story; we arrived in Kernville about 9:00 p.m. and took off on Burlando Road. In those days, you could drive past the pavement on the dirt road clear up to the old smelter. Awful rough road even then and you had to know where you were going. A short distance in we could hear the Creek, the swift water making its own music. The stars were shining brightly, trout were waiting for us and we could smell the pines and lupine. Marvelous.

Then, disaster! There was one stretch of the road that cut into the side of a hill, was quite steep and overgrown with branches and often wet from a spring that flowed across it. Breaking brush and branches, I tried to barrel through when the rear wheels of the old Stude hit a slick spot and slipped off the side. So there we were, the right, rear wheel jammed against the brush and branches, dangling off the road and no means of getting it back on track. We couldn’t go backward, forward or sidewise. Stuck.

Exchanging the appropriate expletives and good-natured pleasantries the situation demanded there was nothing to do but start hoofing it back to Kernville in the hope of finding an adventurous tow-truck driver at the local gas-up. Not wishing to leave the Colt unattended, I stuck it under my shirt in the waist of my Levis.

After an hour’s hike through the darkness, we reached Kernville. It was now about eleven o’clock. The only place still doing business was the local “cuttin’ ‘n’ shootin’” joint, the saloon. Feeling the need of some refreshment after our hike, we bellied up to the bar. I was mindful of the Colt, snug in my waist, but the place was peaceful and no one was being rowdy.

While we drank our beers, a couple of guys, feeling no pain, were intrigued by our tale of woe. They were up from L.A. and had been fishing the Kern and getting plastered, alternating pastimes. Nothing else would do but that they were going to take us up the road and get the “blankety-blank” Stude back on the trail. Sloshed as they were, common sense was a “no-go.” Of course, we were in no real circumstances to argue against even a remote possibility. In a spirit of liquid camaraderie, we left the bar on our quest. And then I saw their car. It was a spanking, brand new, Plymouth station wagon.

Now you really have to see the trail up to the smelter to understand what was going on in my mind. It is a twisting, jagged path hardly deserving of the name “road.” Pan-bustin' rocks jut up from its surface here and there, it’s full of holes and in some places large granite boulders line both sides of the narrow path. In other places, tree limbs and brush rake the sides of any vehicle going through. An occasional muffler or pipe will be found to give mute testimony to its ruggedness. And a couple of drunks were going to take us up this “road” in their brand new vehicle! And we were going to let them!

Piling into the Plymouth, we hit the highway. Long live truth, justice and the American way! We got to the end of the pavement without incident. Fortunately, there was no traffic on Burlando at midnight as the driver took his half out of the middle and both sides going. Then we hit the dirt at the end of the pavement with a cloud of dust and a hearty “High Ho, Silver!”

A deep trough of sand in the road helped slow us down as we got to the first boulders. “Crash” as the Plymouth bounced off one and “Crash” it went against one on the other side. “Bang, crash, crash,” we caromed off the rocks. “Wham” into a hole. “Clang” went a rock against the pan.  By now, drunk as he was, a note of genuine doubt and concern began to creep into our driver’s voice. A pine limb scraped against the windshield as another large boulder banged against the left, rear door and he hit a large hole at the same time. “I don’t think she’ll make it boys!” the guy said. We were sure she wouldn’t make it.

To the accompaniment of loud and colorful language together with gut-wrenching impacts of the wagon against various obstacles, he managed to get the poor, hapless Plymouth turned the other direction. He was going considerably slower now. Even so, he added a few more dings in the skin of the “used to be new” vehicle going out.

There was a pronounced shimmy to the wagon as we got back onto the pavement. We could hear the roar of the exhaust where the pipe must have been dismembered and a loose shock was knocking against the back axle.  There was also a scraping noise as a fender was chewing rubber off one of the tires.

We managed to get back to Kernville and I discovered I couldn’t get the door of the wagon to open on my side. Ronnie and the kid got out ok but I had to roll the window down and crawl out it on my side. The poor Plymouth looked like it had been through the wars, as indeed it had. We didn’t wait around to exchange pleasantries but beat a hasty retreat after quickly surveying the damage. I’ve often wondered how those good Samaritans felt when they sobered up and could clearly discern the carnage. Not good, I suspect.

Well, here we were with no answer to our dilemma. We trudged across the bridge in the hope of seeing something open on the other side of town. Suddenly, our luck changed. The local sheriff pulled up to us.

“What’s the story, fellows?” the deputy asked somewhat guardedly. We explained our predicament and the constable, a young fellow also, was a good Joe and invited us to hop into the squad car saying he thought he knew someone in Isabella that might be able to help us out. I crawled in front with him and Ronnie and the kid got into the back seat. It was only then, sitting next to the deputy that I thought about the Colt in the waist of my Levis; an interesting situation.

I considered the reaction of this minion of the law if he knew I was sporting a loaded Hogleg under my shirt. My emotions were mixed as I tried to keep from laughing out loud at the possibilities. Fortunately, for all concerned, we got to Isabella without incident and the deputy found a fellow with a truck who was willing to help us. He was a little dubious about our telling him we had gotten the old pickup in as far as we said. He knew the “road.” So, bidding a fond “Adieu” to the nice, young deputy we set out into the warm night back to Kernville.

To make a long story short, he got us there and managed to get the Stude out of its predicament and, after giving him twenty bucks, a princely sum back then, went on his way. It was now about 3 a.m. and we finally crashed in our sleeping bags.

We were up early and the trout were obliging. Some of the pools at Bull Run are as much as twenty feet deep with beautiful waterfalls emptying into them.  I’ve caught five-pounders here. Some years ago, Forestry put up a gate at the end of the paved road to keep the riff-raff out. I’m glad they did as some bums had begun to litter the place with trash. Let’s face it folks, if it’s easy to get to idiots will ruin it.

It was later that I found out that Ronnie had an AAA card and could have used it to pay the tow truck driver. I was not happy. But my brother has never been noted for his quick wit in a crunch. Oh well, if you are a real fisherman and know Bull Run you know that in spite of our minor set-backs the fishing made it all worthwhile. Now, many years later I have almost forgiven my brother his moral lapse, having that Triple A card that would have saved me the twenty bucks and the whole incident is a mostly pleasurable memory of simpler times and continued thankfulness that poor, unsuspecting deputy never learned of the Colt.

In attempting to make any sense of what Obama and Congress are trying to say when they aren’t busy “explaining” what they are not trying to say I’m reminded of too many preachers I have known that fall into the same category.

Not long ago, I was in conversation with an old friend of nearly thirty years. We are good enough friends to love each other “warts and all.” I shared with him my concern that preaching, since we both are “men of the cloth,” does not meet the needs of people.

Grandad was an imminently practical man. It was practicality more than anything else that “ruined” me as a “professional educator” and preacher.  In education, having earned an honest living as a machinist and mechanic for years before becoming a teacher, I faced the “fairy-tale” world of make believe that is inhabited by “Ivory tower” citizens, those without the haziest idea of the requirements of the real world and “teach” accordingly.

By far my most disillusioning experience in education was trying to teach a class of graduate students who were prospective teachers. They were incapable of writing a proper paper and had come through the “system” to graduate status, fresh B. A.’s in hand, and unable to do even adequate, undergraduate writing tasks. But their respective colleges had told them they were “well educated.” I shudder when I think of it.

But seminaries have not done any better in preparing those that “heed the call” to “divine service.” Is there life after Hebrew, Greek, Hermeneutics, systematic, and dogmatic theology? I’m afraid not in most cases.

The Bible is very practical. Much of it is in the category of “If you touch the stove, you will get burned!” variety. But the flowery obfuscation of erudition will cover a multitude of sins according to modern “exhorters.” No matter how thin you slice it, it still comes out “baloney.” Without application to real life, without the merit of real teaching (I am appalled by what even well-intentioned men have the nerve to call “teaching”) these so-called sermons are too often nothing but attempts to earn a paycheck at best and ego-inflators at worst.

“You know,” my brother told me on one occasion, “Stealing is wrong!” To fully appreciate this remarkable revelation of my brother’s you have to understand that it came to him at fully thirty years of age. I could hardly fault the soundness of his theology and had to agree with him.

Now my brother and I had been taught that stealing was wrong but it took events in our lives to take the “abstraction” and move it to where dear old J. Vernon McGee would say, “The rubber meets the road.” It does seem at times “abstraction” is what preachers, as with politicians, major in. But God deals in absolutes. We are supposed to teach our children not to steal. If they do steal, we are supposed to punish them. If they are obedient and do well, we are to reward them. Simple ethics. But somewhere along the line, sermons became “professional.” The minister pours over “notes and outlines,” reviews his commentaries on various “proof texts,” inserts his favorite “humorous story” and “current events” and he is ready to “minister to the flock.”

The fact that such “sermonizing” has little or no effect in the lives of either the preacher or congregation does not seem to faze the “professional soldier of the cross.” He is at his best when he can take today’s headlines and, with feeling and “Scripture,” convince his audience that they have done battle with the “powers of darkness” and learned something of value. What that “something” is, none can tell specifically.  But the best of these “pulpiteers” leave the people feeling that something of worth, intangible as it may be, transpired.

My particular prejudice is that the professionals have never considered how God feels about all this. He is, after all, supposed to be the “Boss.” Maybe, it is as simple as most of them not really caring about how He feels about it.

I do believe that most people, the “leadership” included, have a completely erroneous concept about the very nature of God. The “party line” is that God is omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent. This is simply, by His own Word, The Bible, not true.

In sharing this with some people a while ago, I met the “party line.” In good, orthodox “religionese,” these people made the record quite clear; they have a solid church and school background and expect someone to accept a few, well chosen, religious terms to be accepted as explanation of a position when all that has been said is a parroting of meaningless gibberish, albeit perfectly acceptable gibberish unless an explanation is insisted upon, by the faithful.

The tragedy of this was the fact that they really believed they had actually “explained” something when, in fact, had said nothing. Now I love these folks but their egos would never allow of a “pagan” like me to contribute anything of substantive value that might disabuse them of their own cherished prejudices.

The “rightness” of their own “orthodox answers” to my “heterodoxy,” carefully cultivated by adhering to the party line, lo these many years, does not insist on answers to the really tough questions about the nature of God; much safer (and, seemingly, more intellectual) to parrot the “professionals” whether you really see the inconsistency in their apologetics or not.

Unhappily, the party line does not answer the really tough questions of life. Nor does it answer to the needs of people. And here is where the professionals fail. People need help; not religious platitudes, pious phrases and sanctimonious “holier than thou” pretense.

Perhaps it is my serious concern for children and young people that led me to some “unthinkable” conclusions about the nature of God. My grandparent’s little church in East Bakersfield was a happy place. It took organized religion and the “professionals” to teach me that God didn’t know how to have fun or appreciate a good joke. But after my years of being a good, orthodox “professional,” The Lord was kind enough to make a few things clear to me. Among these “new” lessons was the fact that He would like us to be able to include Him in our laughter and enjoyment of life.

Walt Kelly was one of my early teachers in political and religious humor. Being a “Pogo” aficionado, I am reminded, when I think of those “sober brows” that try to rob us of enjoying our relationship with The Lord, of a keen observation by “Seminole Sam.” He said: “Wonder what language the Romans used for the old 14 karat bamboozle?” This as a reaction to Owl’s use of Latin to attempt a “scam.”

In religious circles, the languages are Hebrew and Greek. But, too often, as in Law, the bamboozle is the same baloney. Of course, it helps, as Elmer Gantry learned, to use some of those 16 cylinder words like Eschatology and Supralapsarianism, etc. to accomplish the purpose.

No one who knows me would accuse me of denigrating the hard, honest work of God’s scholars. I consider them among the “Gifts” to His Church. I am speaking of the abuse of learning and scholarship by those that willingly or ignorantly, “twist” God’s clear intent.

It was a simple matter for me, as a shop teacher, to teach young people the value of being able to use a lathe or mill, of being able to overhaul an engine or build a radio. But they could see such skills as desirable things to acquire; these “Learnings” had relevancy.

The abstractions of math and language were more difficult. They are also more difficult to assess in terms of immediate benefit. As adults, we know how very badly such skills are needed for survival in a technological society; but how to make them as desirable as learning to do a valve or brake job? When the skills lack the incentive of easily seen desirability and relevancy, you are left with having your students accept yours and a society’s assessment of their value.

Preachers fail miserably in both cases. They not only fail to teach the necessary skills for living, they try to “bamboozle” people by religious clichés and “spiritual” nonsense.

But, these “colleagues” seem determined to “explain” things by religiosity and “mumbo-jumbo” that makes no sense to poor benighted souls like me. I suppose Walt Kelly could prick the balloons of these pompous asses without rancor but I have the disadvantage of having to have worked with too many of them personally, both in the churches and the schools.

As religious leaders have failed to impart real knowledge, have failed to call sin what it is, have failed to provide real, moral leadership and substituted situational ethics, Hollywood entertainment, their own peculiar theologies for the clear Word of God, they have led an entire nation to judgment.

Shadow of the past: I have taken a break from the writing to “visit the folks” out at the old mining claim in Boulder Gulch and do my “walkabout.” I like to visit the old pines and granite boulders and commune with my great-grandmother, grandmother, granddad, and my brother Ronnie. I like to think these departed loved ones hear and see me. I ache for their love and counsel when I don’t know what to do or what I should be doing. Whether it’s true or not, I find comfort in the thought that they are with me in a way that transcends our limited physical “reality.”

I walk up the hill behind where the “main” cabin used to be. Ronnie and I, on one of his infrequent visits with our mother, sled down this slope on barrel-staves one winter when we had a nice snowfall. The old cabin had served as a cook shack until grandad, with some “help” from me, had added on to it. In the summer, we would move the old, wood cook stove out of doors and cooking and eating took place under the pines.

Great-grandma (always “grandma” to Mom, Ronnie and me) took up residence in the other cabin. How I miss sitting in her lap while she would read to Ronnie and me.

I stand under the tall, old pine where I shot the hawk. I was feeding the chickens and rabbits when I spied the Red-tail land on the very top of the tree. The .22 Remington single shot was, as usual, close at hand. I always kept a gun close in case of Indian uprisings, bear and lion attacks and the usual calamities which were sure to occur to a “pioneer woodsman” in the “wilderness” (Thanks, James Fenimore Cooper).

Unfortunately, the only round I had with me was a “short” already chambered in the gun. Now I know, looking back, that the Red-tail was probably not a threat (unlike owls and the wild donkeys) to our livestock.  But it was a real enough “threat” at the time to me as a child and, carefully shouldering the .22, I took aim and fired. The hawk came tumbling down through the branches.

Running up the hill, I saw the hawk. He was standing on his legs, lop-sidedly, bracing himself with his right wing on the ground much as one might use a crutch, and breathing heavily. His bright, intelligent eyes pierced me. It was soon obvious that, due to the low velocity round and his natural “bullet-proof vest” of feathers, that the small bullet had only knocked him off his perch. The fall had probably done him more hurt than the small slug.

I entertained the thought of doing him in with the butt of the rifle but, for two reasons, did not. One: I might damage the gun and, two: I simply could not bring myself to do violence to such a noble bird when he was so obviously at such a great disadvantage. I won’t flatter myself as to which of the two objects of reticence were most objectionable. I’d like to hold to the latter, and nobler, motive.

For some reason, perhaps my Choctaw Cherokee heritage, I struck up a conversation with the Red-tail while he huffed and puffed, gathering his strength and getting his wind back. Now those of you not familiar with the ways of a boy in the woods might have cause to wonder about having a conversation with a hawk (or any other critter) that is lacking in the social grace of making small talk. But, for me, it seemed perfectly natural that I would be discussing the nature of his present discomfiture and “explaining” what had happened.

The Red-tail did not seem particularly impressed with my explanation; in fact, he seemed rather in a hurry to terminate the discussion with little regard to the polite niceties of civil conversation. Looking back on the incident though, I’m reasonably sure, had the hawk been able to voice his opinion of the affair, he would have added greatly to my, then, woefully, deficient knowledge of maledicta.

Teetering back and forth, he brought his dragging wing back up into normal position and, taking an experimental hop, began to hop, hop, hop, down the hill, his wings taking a couple of practice flaps. After a few yards of this exercise, he gathered speed enough to make a low-level take-off. Wings now fully distended, he glided downhill slowly a couple of feet off the ground. Then, with a few, slow flaps of his wings he began to gain altitude. Finally, he was high enough to soar over the opposite hill from me and out of sight.

As I stroll the hills among the rocks and trees, the old, familiar sites bring on both the aching melancholy and the precious memories of precious loved ones. My readers of some years have heard most of the stories. I know you understand the state of mind and heart that keeps drawing me back to this site and a few others of like preciousness. These are the “pilgrimages” that help me to maintain a perspective of the “best of the child” in me, that nourishes the poet and keeps butterflies and trout streams not only relevant, but essential; and most essentially the gentleness of strength to confront evil and to love sacrificially without any sense of sacrifice. How else I often wonder, to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself?

“The crisis is arrived when we must assert our rights, or submit ...  till custom and use shall make us ... tame and abject slaves. ...” George Washington to his friend and neighbor Bryan Fairfax, a royalist, after the “Boston Tea Party.”

Sam Adams, often referred to as the Father of the American Revolution, applauded his “gang,” ill disguised as Indians, on a crisp, December night in 1774, for tossing three shiploads of the King’s tea overboard into Boston Harbor. On guard that night, keeping lookout was John Hancock, a compatriot of Adams’. The two were to become the Crown’s “Most Wanted.” Paul Revere was to save them from capture at a later time.

History records the fact that King George III was not an evil man.  Far from it, he evidenced much of a character that most would find laudable. According to Churchill, he was one of the most conscientious sovereigns to ever sit the English throne.

It was not despotic “Kingliness” that led to the Revolutionary War and cranked up the presses of Paine and Jefferson. It was a host of “little” things like the sugar and stamp acts, the grinding away, by petty bureaucrats, of personal dignity and the rights to forge a man’s own destiny without undue governmental intrusion. It was the actions of these little tyrants, like our own building inspectors, corrupt cops, judges, “faceless bureaucrats” that attempted, and still attempt, to make us “... tame and abject slaves.” It is indeed, “Custom and use,” that system of evil laws and all forms of penurious taxation that prevent any hope or vision, that rob men of their manhood, rob women of their special place of homemaker and tender nurturer of children, rob children of their right to be children, that is killing us as a nation.

From Columbus, Bradford, Eliot, Penn, Adams, the “Molly Pitcher’s,” and Betsy Ross’s, Witherspoon, Asbury, Webster, our history has had its roots in a thousand men and women who had a profound belief in God, His Word and the destiny of this nation. It is a tragic loss to mine and the younger generation that so little is now taught or even known by those who purport to teach, about the History of The United States of America. And, in all, it is a noble history of noble men and women.

I have commented on the fact that mine was the last generation of readers; this, largely because of the film and TV industries together with the change from pre war agrarian populations to post war urban. The changes over the last fifty years have been deadly to families and reading in general. Much of what is called “critical thinking skills” was lost in the process. Critical thinking requires ability and practice in the area of reading and reflection on what is read. The reading must challenge to be effective. Therefore, it has to cover a broad spectrum, not just one, specialized area. The highest thought processes, involving imagination, are enforced in such a manner.

As a “simple honorary Okie” I may lack the verve and panache of my “betters” but I know something of the effects of the literature that has impacted our course as a nation. I also know that American literature is one of the richest in the history of the world. It is a truism that “The pen is mightier than the sword.” It is for that reason that, some years ago, I left off speaking engagements and took up the pen. Notwithstanding the fact that we have become a nation of non-readers, it is still my hope that my printed words will accomplish the task I have set.

My distinct advantage was being raised without TV and in settings that promoted reading. My grandparents made sure books surrounded my brother and me and the radio and literature were marvelous mediums to encourage imagination and dreams. The “How To” genre was well represented also. On the mining claim, lacking electricity or plumbing, I learned much as a child in the “How To” category. It also made reading the essential means of entertainment and the source of knowledge to satisfy curiosity.

James Fenimore Cooper is a name, like so many others, tragically lost to our young people. The writer, famed for his “Leatherstocking Tales” and the riches of imagination he provided for millions of readers is little known to, or past, my generation. Oh! But how I thrilled as a child as I would read of the great forests, of the constant battle between good and evil with good, invariably gaining the triumph, as the Deerslayer, (Natty Bumppo) also known as Hawkeye and his companion, Chingachgook, and the noble Uncas did battle in the name of honor and righteousness.

The wooded mountains and their teeming creatures would come alive in my imagination as Cooper skillfully weaved his tales of derring-do. I would stalk the trails of the wilderness with the honest, courageous and upright Hawkeye and his Indian companion as they fought evil men and explored this native and unspoiled vastness.

But Cooper was far more than a gifted “teller of tales.” He was an American and his commentaries are of far more significance than the tales he wove. Cooper recognized the many evils of his day and rightly addressed them in much of his writing. For example: “What the world of America is coming to, and where the machinations of its people are to end, the Lord, He only knows.... towns and villages, farms and highways, churches and schools, in short all the inventions and deviltries of man, are spread across the region.” Thus it was that Cooper foresaw the evil that government, even then, was capable of. And because he loved the wilderness, loved the country where men could be men and could work, explore, dream and hope, he warned of the evils he saw coming upon the land.

It was in the creation of Leatherstocking that Cooper evidenced hope that the wisdom of natural virtue, the desire for good that such wilderness as he describes where men could roam free of the restraints of the selfishness evidenced in the “villages” and “settlements,” free from the evils of petty tyrants, bureaucrats, would prevail.

Cooper wrote: “The doctrine that any one may do what he please with his own, however, is false...Thus, he, who would bring his money to bear upon the elections of a country like this, abuses his situation, unless his efforts are confined to fair and manly discussions before the body of the people...In this country, it is the intention of the institutions, that money should neither increase nor lessen political influence...If left to itself, unsupported by factitious political aid, but sufficiently protected against the designs and rapacity of the dishonest, property is an instrument of working most of the good that society enjoys. It elevates a national character, by affording the means of cultivating knowledge and the tastes; it introduces all above barbarism into society; and it encourages and sustains laudable and useful efforts in individuals. Like every other great good, its abuses are in proportion to its benefits...A people that deems the possession of riches its highest source of distinction, admits one of the most degrading of all influences to preside over its opinions. At no time, should money be ever ranked as more than a means, and he who lives as if the acquisition of property were the sole end of his existence, betrays the dominion of the most sordid, base and groveling motive, that life offers.

“The principle of individuality, or to use a less winning term, of selfishness, lies at the root of all voluntary human exertion. We toil for food, for clothes, for houses, lands and for property, in general.  This is done, because we know that the fruits of our labor will belong to ourselves, or to those who are most dear to us. It follows, that all which society enjoys beyond the mere supply of its first necessities, is dependent on their rights of property.”

But, as I have pointed out, forcefully, in previous epistles, the evil system we live with today precludes a man doing with his own property as he wishes. The “State” has robbed us of the hope of building for those we love and, if exorbitant taxes are not paid, the “State” will be the beneficiary of all we have worked for, not our children and those most dear to us.

Farewell old friends, my soul brothers and heart’s companions, James Fenimore Cooper and Hawkeye. Farewell to your vast, virginal mountains of forests, abundant wildlife and crystal, pure lakes, rivers and streams.  Farewell your voice of warning that the loss of such that gave dignity to men would be sold to the “villages” and “settlements” where “deviltry” would prevail in seeking the “Almighty Dollar!” with all its attendant corruption, devastating taxes and devastating, mountainous system of emasculating laws and codes.

Cooper also leaves a legacy in regard to the media to which we would do well to heed: “This is a terrible picture to contemplate, for when the number (newspapers and, today, TV) of prints is remembered, and the avidity with which they are read is brought into the account, we are made to perceive that the entire nation, in a moral sense, breathes an atmosphere of falsehoods. There is little use, however, in concealing the truth; on the contrary, the dread in which publick men and writers commonly stand of the power of the press to injure them, has permitted the evil to extend so far, that it is scarcely exceeding the bounds of a just alarm, to say that the country cannot much longer exist in safety, under the malign influence that now overshadows it. Any one, who has lived long enough to note changes of the sort, must have perceived how fast men of probity and virtue are losing their influence in the country, to be superseded by those who scarcely deem an affectation of the higher qualities necessary to their success. This fearful change must, in a great measure, be ascribed to the corruption of the publick press, which as a whole, owes its existence to the schemes of interested political adventurers.”

It is a tragedy for our nation that conscience has become a “vestigial organ” of politicians. I would call them all Asses but for the fact that I know of a few exceptions and, further, that would be defaming to that, comparatively, noble beast. The festering, suppurating sore that is now Washington, D.C. with its enormous crime rate, its beehive activity of every kind of corruption imaginable, is a heritage of those that have sought their own gain at the expense of an entire nation.

I have to assume that the only reason the drug problem in our country is not solved in common sense fashion is the result of the need by that “shadow government,” that system that operates behind the scenes like the C.I.A. and the “Doomsday” government which continues to use the enormous profits from an “illegal” drug business to finance itself. As with the BCCI of the not distant past, these shadowy, unaccountable groups like the Federal Reserve have the billions of dollars with which they give no account to Congress or the people. How appropriate that the trail of slime these creatures leave and Obama pays homage to invariably leads to the halls of Congress where it is effectively lost.

Ah, but the beat goes on and evil men and women, the evil that they do, must be confronted and this burns in my bones and the fire is released in those hard things that I am compelled to write of rather than the soft and gentle things that would be the joy and happiness of my own soul and heart. It is the evil that stifles the music and poetry that I would far rather compose and enjoy. Once in a while, however, I let fancy have her wing and go off on a tangential journey of the heart and soul. So: I’ll call her Rosie.

She sat in the cheap, plastic-covered recliner; its cotton guts oozed from the various rips and tears in its hide. Rosie was wearing a thin, nondescript, threadbare robe that didn’t obscure the fact that she was overweight. As she said, when you are poor and stressed, you eat and cheap food is fattening. But she was going to get her weight down in order to attract a man. “I’m not someone who has to be alone.” She said this with a voice that trembled in an effort at pride and conviction.

I would guess Rosie’s age about 57 but the years had been cruel. Her face, marred with the veined and seamed tracks of the alcoholic, had once been quite lovely.  She sat there, playing with her hair, twisting the thin wisps in nervous fingers. Two plastic curlers were stuck, like an afterthought, in a few entangling strands on the right side of her head. I wondered if she was even aware they were still there?

“You’ve been a good friend, Sam.” I didn’t know how except for the fact that, knowing of her desperate circumstances and how she had suffered to try to make a life and care for her children, I had brought some groceries and listened to her try to talk about her life. I had also taken her to some essential appointments. She couldn’t afford to register her old, rusting Chevy. It needed a good deal of work and a smog check anyhow, which she couldn’t afford either. Insurance; what’s that? People like Rosie, about 50% of California drivers, among them the host of illegal aliens, not only can’t afford it they wouldn’t buy it anyhow. The taxpayers, the workers, the “system” will take care of them. They have nothing to lose so why worry?

It looked like Rosie had been a lovely girl and woman once. You needed to look beyond what the years had done to her. I had no doubt that she would, indeed, find another man. But, in all probability, he would be one of the many drunken leeches looking for someone to support him on her welfare check. I knew of too many young men looking for the same “meal-ticket” and preying on younger women, especially with children who could never expect anything much better and actually had been taught to believe they deserved such a life with their continued abuse by evil men.

Rosie wouldn’t say it. It lay unspoken between us. She would never have a chance at a decent man. Neither would her girls. Once youth and beauty are gone, the pickings get slimmer and slimmer. This together with the fact that vulgar language, drinking, lack of education dooms attracting young men of value in spite of good looks and a nice figure.  Sex may be the prominent commodity of exchange while girls and women retain their youth and beauty but once that is gone, what is left for them in our culture and society?

There is no idle, philosophical double-talk about so-called “equality” between the sexes in Rosie’s world. She knows the truth, at least in this regard, when it comes to the value of older, wrinkled women with no well-turned ankles or trim figure to catch the eye. It reminds me of the pitiful scene I witnessed in a bar. The young lady was very attractive. She had been dancing and all at once she stopped. I don’t know what caused the outburst but she said in a loud voice to her partner: “Quit looking down there, look up here (pointing to her head), I’m a person, not ‘that!’” Ah, young lady, you had my deepest sympathy. Tragically, you aren’t a “person” to most men; you are only “that!”

Rosie was staring out the dusty window of her small, drab trailer.  Cheap rent, welfare and a collection of neighbors in similar circumstances were her world. Her absent-minded gaze told me she was lost in another time and place where she had been young and full of hope. The small black and white TV had a snow-filled picture making it virtually impossible to tell, apart from the audio, what show was on. No money for cable and the rabbit ears didn’t respond well in this mountain community. But Rosie was used to not really watching TV. Just the voices were needed for companionship, not unlike the way we used radio in my youth.

There were no books or magazines about. Rosie didn’t read much.  Neither did her daughters. There was a son. He tried to make money cutting and selling firewood. But he often didn’t have enough money for the gas to take his decrepit old pickup out to find the wood. He seldom went by to see his mother and sisters and couldn’t help them in any event. I recalled seeing him, along with a few others of the same “brotherhood,” on the boulevard occasionally with his truck; a small pile of wood in front of it with a Firewood For Sale sign against the meager stack.

Years ago, when I was a freshman, high school teacher at Jordan High in Watts, I would visit families in similar circumstances, my white face being a real rarity even then. Drugs and alcohol were the curses of welfare slavery then as now and had no distinction of “color.” I was thoroughly familiar with the lifestyles of those who victimized, preyed upon one another, a “fix” or bottle not having any respect of persons, not even family or friends.

My introduction to Rosie had come about with my finding one of her daughters in a bar. Rosie had called me and asked if I would please bring her some wine. She complained of an anemic condition and stomach problems that the wine would alleviate. Now I have had enough experience with alcoholics to know the stories and the symptoms. I worked with a drug and alcohol abuse group in a professional capacity once.

But there is more to this than allowing yourself to be taken advantage of by the scheming of a boozer. Those who are familiar with “The Winter of Our Discontent” and “Cannery Row” will understand why I bought the wine and went to see Rosie. What I didn’t know was that she and her daughter had gotten an early start on the evening by consuming a twelve-pack. Now, with the wine, their life was full. They knew I wouldn’t drink with them but had, thoughtfully, made a pot of coffee for me.

Rosie’s Mexican live-in was there. But, unlike them, he drank very little and was not an addict. I had gotten to know him as a good man, unlike many I have met in similar circumstances. I could tell, through our broken conversation, that he deplored the drunkenness of the women. Jose was probably in his early 60s and retained some of the better qualities of civilized manners of his native country.

Rosie was at that point of inebriation where “confidences” were shared, congeniality reigned and all was right with the world. But the combination of the wine and beer were about to have the anticipated consequences. The music was being played louder with each glass consumed. The daughter was dancing with drunken abandon to a variety of Mexican and English tunes. She was obviously an experienced and talented dancer. She had done quite a bit of professional dancing, topless, in a number of bars and, being intoxicated, was displaying all her “talent,” the loss of inhibitions, one of the curses of drunkenness, betraying all sense of decorum.

Rosie soon joined her daughter and, grabbing a most reluctant Jose, made it a threesome. I sipped my coffee and watched the whole thing deteriorate rapidly. Evening had passed into nighttime. Rosie’s other daughter called. After a mostly incoherent conversation with her mother and sister, she asked to speak with me. She asked if I could possibly spend the night with them, as she feared what might happen if things got out of control. I said I would attempt to do so.

Jose tried to maintain some degree of sanity in the situation. The women couldn’t even pour the wine in their glasses now without spilling it on the table or floor. Rosie knocked her glass over and slipped off her chair. Jose struggled with the near dead weight of her bulk, finally getting her back up on her now precarious perch and grabbed a towel to clean up the mess.

The daughter was making drunken attempts to use the telephone to call someone but her eyes, mind and fingers weren’t cooperating. She gave it up and returned to the wine and the dancing. The music was blaring painfully now. I went outside to escape the noise and the smell. Jose joined me. He spoke sorrowfully of his circumstances. Fists clenched and clutching his crossed arms to his chest, he articulated in broken English the feeling of pain he was enduring, far from home and family, a virtual prisoner of Rosie and her welfare check, of his fear of deportation and his fear and repugnance of having to live any longer in his present surroundings, of enduring the humiliation of what we were presently experiencing.

The daughter came to the door of the trailer and shouted at us to come back inside. Jose, shoulders stooped and his head bowed down, went inside.  It took a while longer for me to gather my strength to follow him. Upon entering, I discovered Jose mopping up Rosie’s vomit. She lay on the floor in it passed out; not unexpected result of the beer, wine and dancing. We managed to get her up on the couch and left her there to sleep it off.

It was now quite late and I had to consider where I was to sleep. But the daughter had disappeared and Jose wasn’t sure where I could bed down. If Rosie came out of it during the night, he would have to take her to the bedroom. Fine. But I couldn’t stay awake long enough to use the couch she presently occupied. The stench from the floor would prevent me laying down a blanket there and sleeping. It was now 11 p.m. The phone rang. Jose answered. It was the elderly couple in the trailer next door. The daughter was over there and if someone didn’t come and get her, they were going to call the police.

I went. The girl was incoherent and staggering. The old folks were incensed. On the way back to the girl’s place, she fell down a couple of times in spite of my efforts to keep her upright. Somehow, she had managed to add a pipe or two to the combination of beer and wine. As a consequence, she was well wired and I considered whether it would even be possible to spend the night. I’ve known people in her condition to last many hours without sleep before crashing.

As it turned out, the decision was made for me. The girl began to insist that I go to the store for more wine. I refused, pointing out the fact that even if I were to do so, the stores were now closed. She turned to Jose. “Walk to the store, Jose, and get us some more wine!” In her intoxicated mind, what I was doing was refusing to accommodate her and making excuses. Jose tried to explain to no avail. Then she turned abusive when cajoling failed. At that point, I had no choice but to make my exit.

Leaving Jose to the nightmare of attending the two women, I took my leave into the cleansing air of the mountain night, sorrowful for the tragedy I was leaving but so very grateful that I could leave it. Also, I have learned that no matter how bad something is, with just a little effort I can make it worse. So I left.

Sally Jessy Raphael had a good point in “Living Without Answers.” So often in life we are left in exactly that position. Even in the working out of so much pain and grief, we are still, too often, left with no other answer than to just keep on keeping on which, of course, is no answer.

Rosie and her daughters will call me tomorrow. They will be profoundly sorry for what they did and, they will be sincere in their apology. They will tell me it will never happen again. And they will mean it. But it will; as sure as the rising of the sun. Pathetically, they know very few, if any, people like myself- educated and caring, self-supporting. The advantage they try to take of me is, pathetically, child-like as in Cannery Row, the subterfuge of acquiring the wine, for example. But the lengths to which they would go, equally pathetic, no, tragically, in order to give something in return can best be understood by the following: I could “have” the daughter for $20 or even $5 if necessary. Make no mistake, this is not the hiring of a prostitute, this is not “Love For Sale,” it is an offer of friendship by those that have nothing else of value to offer. Also, I present the image of a wealthy man to such people because of my education, independence, of owning a home, a car in no need of repair and being free of debt. Further, as a writer, they hold me in near superstitious awe. I not only read books, I write and publish them!  They don’t understand, of course, but they know this is somehow terribly important. As a consequence, the daughter would be “honored” to do this for me and I would honor her by complying.

Such folks as Rosie and her daughter know nothing of the world of F.  Ross Johnson or "Barbarians At The Gate" but they understand his reputed methods of earning money the old fashioned way; Steal it! However, they will never have the opportunity to steal, legally, on such a monumental scale as per the S&L and BCCI thieves and congressmen. They won’t even have the opportunity or know how to steal on the more equitable scale and level of lower echelon, prostituted politicians, judges and crooked cops.

To be sure, Rosie and her daughter steal. They steal every chance they get. It is a part of their “lifestyle.” One has to be very cautious around them. Human nature being what it is, envy and greed are alive and well in their lives, particularly since they are undereducated, have no job skills and face a hopeless existence, hopeless of anything ever being any better than what they now have. But the evil of welfare robs them of any of the “nobility” of poverty. Irrespective of color, those within the welfare “society” victimize each other simply because those outside the society usually have nothing to do with them, leaving one another the only choices of victims. And, admittedly, it is risky to associate with them. I have no illusions on that score.

As I drive “home” in the clean, crisp, late night air, there is the leaden weight of the feeling of failure, of the vague uneasiness of knowing I should have been able to help in a way that utterly eludes me. I know full well the futility, the heartache and grief, of trying to help boozers. But the tragedy of the scene keeps playing over and over again like a video stuck on replay. And, over the years, I have had to witness the same tragedy too many times in too many other lives. I’m far too well acquainted with The Days of Wine and Roses to give in to futile and wishful thinking of “what might have been.”

Once at my small cottage I put on an album of the kinder and softer music of a gentler time to try to wash out the destructive noise I left behind with the women and Jose. I move a folding chair out front and look up at the stars, the music providing the background I often need in order to fully appreciate God’s glory and promises in the heavens. The thought stabs in my mind that Rosie and her daughters are denied any real comprehension of the joy of such a quiet and contemplative lifestyle. They would, doubtless, consider it “boring.”

I warned during Desert Storm that it was only the “opening gun” to a permanent U.S. “presence” in the Middle East. I also pointed out the “need” for the U.S. to establish itself in Africa. Seems Somalia is the staging area for this “need.” In spite of congress being Israeli Occupied Territory, the need for a gateway to the Arab oil fields has always been a given. Somehow, I don’t think it takes that much perspicaciousness or suprasensibility to figure all this out- certainly I didn’t think Arab nations were having any difficulty doing so.

Americans used to be able to face elemental realities; they no longer do so. We have been cheated of the inalienable rights to do so. For example, why shouldn’t a man be able to have a couple of acres and build a cabin on it for his family at a total cost of about $10,000? Get rid of the unconstitutional “building codes” and a family, once more, could actually own their own home rather than renting from the bank! Common sense alone dictates that a family would far rather reap the benefits of their own labor than be slaves to the state and its banks. And, again, common sense dictates that children are far better off being raised in an environment of family and family labor for family benefit than the drug and crime infested cities. Who stole this natural right and personal liberty from families?

The “Land” is still there. But who stole the opportunity for men to be men, women to be women and children to be children? By all means, read Cooper, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, Poe and a host of others to get at the bitter root of the problem. Of America Theodore Parker wrote: “There is always a conservative element in society...which resists the further application of Christianity to public affairs...Here I think it is represented by the merchants.... Here trade takes the place of the army, navy, and court in other lands.... It takes the place in great measure of science, art and literature.... All is the reflection of this most powerful class. The truths that are told are for them, and the lies.”

We do not lack for Savonarola's in our own history. But where are they now? Were it not for my being the beneficiary of Hawthorne’s “cursed habits of solitude,” I would have been far more outspoken in time past. Since I have long agreed with Brownson that “...no reforming leadership could come from ‘priests and pedagogues’ ...They always league with the people’s masters,” I have found myself the recipient of a far deeper orthodoxy, that of Truth, Fact and Reason.

I admit to the “frailty” of hearkening more to the cricket’s song and the call of the quail than to the staccato yammering of commerce but: “Let men, true to their natures...lead manly and independent lives; let them make riches the means and not the end of existence.... This curious world which we inhabit is more wonderful than it is convenient; more beautiful than it is useful; it is more to be admired and enjoyed than used.” And, please, don’t mistake either Thoreau or myself for those that would abuse men at the cost of saving an owl or tree! If Truth, Fact and Reason held sway, such a “choice” would be neither “convenient nor necessary” because of the truth of the fact that: “I would rather suffer evil the natural way.... The only good one can do another is to give him an example of a true life.... and to maintain one’s self on this earth is not a hardship, but a pastime, if we will live simply and wisely.”

In Thoreau’s attack on the laws and Governor of Massachusetts in which he correctly, and prophetically, labeled such laws as enslaving by keen and subtle masters worse than Southern overseers, he called to the higher law of God as evidence of the chicanery of politics. “What signifies the beauty of nature when men are base? ... Who can be serene in a country where both the rulers and the ruled are without principle? The remembrance of my country spoils my walk. My thoughts are murder to the State, and involuntarily go plotting against her.”

Without ignoring the fact that “getting a living” and caring for a family is of the greatest importance, acknowledging that Plato might have found the society of philosophers “comfortable” because his aunt remembered him in her will, there is still the essential need for the philosopher and poet. I could wish that the necessary poetry and prose for our time could be read with such purity by men and women that they could do so without harm and still understand. But such is not the case. Fact, Reason and Truth dictate that the issues have become such that nothing but a candid ruthlessness offers a way out of the present chaos.

One such truth is the fact that the opportunity for necessary, menial tasks that provide learning and independence are denied our young people. Just what “learning” and “opportunity” are there in “flipping hamburgers?” There is far more of building character in digging holes, weeding gardens, caring for livestock and making the earth yield her increase, of framing your own cabin on your own land, than anything our young people presently learn in our schools.

If young people could learn these tasks, and they would, given a wiser and more responsible and caring, elder generation, in the hope of maintaining their own independence and liberty, we would restore their hope of a future. Given the proper parameters of responsibility and liberty, given the proper role of the schools to advance technology by relying on aptitude and propensity rather than a dilution of the lowest, common denominator, the future could be restored to our children. Reading, writing and ciphering to the extent of necessity is learnable by the end of the fourth grade. The complexities of literature and history, of higher mathematics and science, are the purview of a society that both cherishes its young and, at the same time, acknowledges the necessity of providing those practical skills that enable young people to “do for themselves.”

Obviously having lost our moral moorings and being without a moral compass, the young bear the brunt of a careless generation that has betrayed their hope of a future, and without moral absolutes how could it be otherwise? If I’m to be labeled “Intolerant” of the agenda of sodomites, of that kind of “cultural diversity” which is engendering racial strife, destroying any hope of reclaiming the birthright of my children, if I am to be called “bigoted and prejudiced” by the enemies of my America, so be it! Let the battle lines be unmistakably drawn and take a careful look at who is doing the name-calling!

If there is to be abuse heaped, let it come on my generation that betrayed our children! Would young people be drawn to rock stars and pornography, drugs and violence if we hadn’t countenanced the evil, from the beginning, rather than taken a stand against it? Maybe it will have to come to the point that good men and women must serve their time in prison as a testimony against such an evil system that is destroying and enslaving our children. If such is the case, it would be ignoble for us to be outside of prison!

 Maybe the time has come to trade the Caesar-created class of “drug criminals” for those, like myself, who harbor Thoreau’s brand of “murder of the State” in our hearts! I will take my stand with Patrick Henry who, under better circumstances than those patriots face today said: “If this be treason, make the most of it!” Far better to be adjudged of such “treason” than supporting and enabling, especially by silent acquiescence, the real treason that is presently cloaked by the infamous laws and distortions of reasonable laws, that have stolen our liberty and promises to enslave our children!

As for the churches, may God do what is necessary to bring them to their knees; this is the only position from which they have any righteous appeal to Heaven! But God has given fair warning of His judgment beginning with His Own House!