What’s It Gonna Be?

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The Supreme Court ain’t so supreme, of late.

Maybe it has always benefited from a certain undeserved mystique- its members aren’t gods, after all, just human beings tasked with important work. Justices over the years have produced many landmark decisions seemingly based on a sincere and fair treatment of testimony and applicable law, even charting new ground from time to time, especially when it comes to human rights and bodily autonomy.

Lately, though, there seems to be some backsliding. More suspicion, more doubt, more finger pointing in the direction of a hand-picked conservative majority on a mission to, oh, I don’t know, tighten things up, bring us back to a “better” place that pleases straight, white Christians everywhere.

In the midst of the Trump mess, the court seems to not want to stick its neck out and abide by the 14th Amendment provision of forbidding insurrectionists from running for office. Though he hasn’t been accused yet, many know what Trump did and who and what he really is, and how dangerous he has become.

So maybe it comes down to how closely the court adheres to the letter of the law, along with its efforts to reel in the temptation to react to certain public sentiment, and to what many are seeing with their own eyes: Trump running roughshod over, and even making a mockery of certain norms that have long served as guardrails.

Sometimes it looks like nothing can be done to make him go away.

Pearls II

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Daily writing prompt
Do you have a quote you live your life by or think of often?
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I must, but it’s not coming to me yet…

Or maybe I don’t. But I do occasionally come across quotes that resonate, that get my attention, make me think, make me laugh, inspire me. Albert Einstein quotes leave a mark. The MLK quote about the moral arc of the universe bending toward justice has stuck with me.

I listed a few last year. I’ll add a few more this time around:

“Dead people receive more flowers than the living ones because regret is stronger than gratitude.”– Anne Frank

“If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.”– Mother Teresa

“Experience is the hardest kind of teacher. It gives you the test first and the lesson afterward.”– Oscar Wilde

“A lie doesn’t become truth, wrong doesn’t become right, and evil doesn’t become good, just because it’s accepted by a majority.”– Rick Warren

“Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.”– Leonardo Da Vinci

“Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”– Martin Luther King, Jr.

2500

The Best People

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Pirro, Kennedy, Jr., Patel, Hegseth, Leavitt, Blanche, Miller, Vought, Graham, Comer, Tuberville… Trump. There’s just no let-up in the pretension and ineptitude and shameless bootlicking.

Yet another attempt on Donald’s life has juiced up the clamor for The Ballroom, a $400 million project now being funded by us, apparently. If Republicans get their way and this boondoggle comes to fruition, it will probably end up costing us way more than $400 million.

Meanwhile, there is no money for cancer research and food programs and infrastructure and help with medical insurance and a thousand other things.

This administration has given us nothing, and has no intention of paying attention to needs and issues we consider important. This administration exists for the benefit of the Heritage Foundation. Its MO is wallowing in old thinking and bad religion, and breaking America into a million pieces. All for the benefit of a relative few.

Imagine that. This is what 77 million of us have let in the door—a gaggle of power-hungry people with a terribly skewed vision who don’t care about anything beyond their own well-being and forcing their will. They are a living, breathing caricature of coldness and evil and monumental selfishness…

… people inspired by capital gains and tax shelters and impenetrable bunkers where they and their “loved ones” can usher in Armageddon while the rest of us suffer the consequences of the collapse they initiated.

Oh, sorry. I’m getting ahead of myself. It’s just that it’s gonna be really hard to get excited about or inspired by our 250th birthday with these clowns running the show. They couldn’t care less about the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Yuletide Cheer

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Daily writing prompt
What is your favorite holiday? Why is it your favorite?
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I guess it would still be Christmas. Apart from the rampant commercialism that begins in September or maybe before, I still appreciate the music and a few of the holiday movies, the get-togethers, and the overall atmosphere.

It lost its childhood magic a long time ago, but some of the mystery remains. Those formative early years cast a long shadow, and I still try to get my head around a virgin birth and a Savior come to earth.

The Great Outdoors

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Daily writing prompt
Have you ever been camping?
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Yes, many times. We started with my parents and grandparents, heading to places in New Hampshire, Vermont, Cape Cod, the Berkshires. It was pretty rustic, as I recall– a big old canvas tent, Coleman stove. Nothing fancy.

We did quite a bit of camping when I was in Boy Scouts, and I got to go to Philmont Scout Ranch, in Cimmaron, New Mexico, in 1968. On occasion, we’d head to the White Mountains and stay at different camp sites, which usually included a climb of one mountain or another.

And we did a bit of camping with our own kids, most often at places in New York state–Watkins Glen State Park became our favorite. And there was one multiple-night stay at a KOA in Canada, near Niagara Falls. No wild treks, but enough to create a few memories.

Always Home

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Well, the 10-day sojourn to New England is coming to an end. It began and will conclude with time in the old stomping grounds, next to the house in which my brothers and sisters and I grew up.

We tended to some tasks, were treated to a wonderful stay with my wife’s sister, got some work done, and in between visited with our son and his kids in Mid-coast Maine, along with another sister-in-law and her husband and his daughter in Connecticut.

I reacquainted myself with Maple, a mixed breed dog getting up in years but still willing and able to run like the wind in pursuit of a tennis ball, and Georgie, a younger Golden Retriever who, perhaps longingly, wishes she could run like Maple. I chopped some wood, drank coffee, we ate fresh fish as one can only find it near the coast of Maine, and waited extra long for an order at McDonald’s.

We were entertained by our two Mainer grandchildren who have no fear of performing, and who are busy with one thing or another for almost the entire duration of their waking hours. I was moved by how our oldest child has grown into a loving, attentive father who, like most parents at various points in time, must take a deep breath when parenthood gets heavy and weighs on your nerves.

Time was spent prepping for the Mom’s homecoming from a trip to an exotic tropical destination, a trip she earned as one of Maine’s best teachers.

We leave for PA in a little while, via a stop to see an aunt and maybe an uncle, the two remaining siblings from my Mom’s family who have both reached their 90s and are still percolating, and marveling, like the rest of us, at the inexorable passage of time and that puzzling dynamic of thinking like you’re still in your twenties but moving more like you’re trapped in a sometimes uncooperative old body.

By day’s end, we should be back in PA, somewhat refreshed and mostly ready to get on with Spring and engage the routine once again.

Reaping

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Donald Trump is such a putz. When asked why he thought he’s been a target for assassination so many times, he said, in a self-congratulatory way, that maybe it was because people (like himself) who make such an impact on the world become targets. Or something like that.

It couldn’t be because he sows fear and hate and animosity and maybe people have reached the end of their ropes with him.

I’m not condoning the violence, but I’m not surprised by it, either. It all tracks with the old saying about living by the sword.

Task Completion

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Daily writing prompt
When do you feel most productive?
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Early in the day, after breakfast, and after I’ve spent time applying myself to some task. It feels good to move, and to contribute and be of help.

The longer into a day I go, the more tired I get, especially if I’m working with my son on a landscaping job. I find myself marveling over the fact that he does what he does for a living, day after day.

:)

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Daily writing prompt
What are your favorite emojis?
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Variations on the happy face, a heart, a coffee cup, and thumbs up. Sometimes I’ll list a whole mess of different ones just because, in an attempt to be intentionally over-the-top, I guess. I’ve never used the poop emoji, but I can imagine certain topics where it might capture how somebody is feeling.

Conversation

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Daily writing prompt
What topics do you like to discuss?
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Politically speaking, I enjoy venting with like-minded people. When it comes to what folks think of Donald Trump, etc., I don’t feel like arguing, since both sides have long been entrenched in their understandings and beliefs and all that happens is that everyone’s blood pressure rises to unhealthy levels.

I enjoy shooting the breeze about sports, especially golf. I like talking about music, woodworking, astronomy, what NASA is up to, what the grandkids have been up to, and maybe a book my wife or I have been reading.

Infrequently, I guess

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Daily writing prompt
When is the last time you took a risk? How did it work out?
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I keep returning to the decision to pull up roots and move the family to Gettysburg, in order to go to seminary. That’ll always be the risk-taking standard for me. Pastoring is a challenging line of work, but it worked out.

Otherwise, I don’t necessarily see risk taking as something great. I’ve never been inspired or moved by the value of “stretching myself” just for the sake of something to do. And adventure is a relative term. The “best version of myself” will always remain elusive and unattainable, which doesn’t mean I haven’t acknowledged my growing edges and tried to be a better person.

I once had to return to college in the middle of a major snowstorm, but that was unavoidable, since I was a passenger in a car driven by the person who just needed to get back to campus that night. If I didn’t get in, I would have been stranded in the Twin Cities without a way to get back to school. It was a risky venture, in my estimation, and a nail biter of a trip, but we made it.