THE LAST ONE UP THERE

 

See it way up there?    That little golden apple.     The late afternoon sunlight turned part of the tree trunk golden and highlighted the little apple.

I didn’t know I had ANY apples this year, not until all the leaves fell away.    It was a bad year for apples and all the other fruit.   There was an early, warm spring which brought out the blossoms on our trees, but followed by a hard frost and cold spell for many days  which killed the blossoms, ending the formation of any fruit.

There’s something sad and brave about that one lone apple.     Unknown, unappreciated, it did its thing.   Of what use is it to hold out to the very end, the very end of your life?

Well, do you remember the short story called The Last Leaf?   It was written by O  Henry,  an important writer in American literature.   I call him important because his writings recorded and carried forth for us the common folk wisdom of our nation’s past, and he did it with wry humor and irony.   I’m grateful to my teachers in two different grade levels, two different states, for making us study O.  Henry’s wise and enjoyable  short stories.

If you’ve never heard of him,  see my last post about the other kind of cliff, and see where you fit in.

The Last Leaf is a sentimental very short story about a dying young woman, cared for by her friend during a serious illness.  Pneumonia, I think, in the days when there was no antibiotics.   She had lost interest in her art work.    She was sick, weak, and tired of trying to hold on, and she believed the doctor had given up on her.    Her bed was near a window which gave her a view of the garden in the late autumn.   And she could just see a certain vine, which was once young and healthy as she had been,  but was now losing its leaves,  fading,  and dying.

Here is  a (public domain) conversation between Johnsy, the sick young woman, and her dear friend Sue.:

The cold breath of autumn had stricken its leaves from the vine until its
skeleton branches clung, almost bare, to the crumbling bricks.

“What is it, dear?” asked Sue.

“Six,” said Johnsy, in almost a whisper. “They’re falling faster
now. Three days ago there were almost a hundred. It made my head
ache to count them. But now it’s easy. There goes another one. There
are only five left now.”

“Five what, dear. Tell your Sudie.”

“Leaves. On the ivy vine. When the last one falls I must go, too.
I’ve known that for three days. Didn’t the doctor tell you?”

“Oh, I never heard of such nonsense,” complained Sue, with
magnificent scorn. “What have old ivy leaves to do with your getting
well?

The weather outside is cold, windy, rainy, and dreary.    As the leaves fall Johnsy gets weaker.  Sue, also trying to make a living as an artist,  visited with an aging, failed artist living in their apartment building.  She used him for a model for her work, as she made conversation and told him about her friend.   He derided her weakness and fanciful ideas.

As it happens,  Johnsy hangs on through the night, her body getting a little stronger, through the next day or so,   and she begins to wonder that the leaf has clung to the vine through all the bad weather.   Youth, nature, life, and increasing health begins to win.

“I’ve been a bad girl, Sudie,” said Johnsy. “Something has made that last leaf stay there to show me how wicked I was. It is a sin to want to die. You may bring me a little broth now, and some milk with a little port in it,  and  —  no; bring me a hand-mirror first, and then pack some pillows about me,  and I will sit up and watch you cook.”

The last  leaf hanging on had given her the time to enable her strength to return.   Johnsy does get better, and the doctor confirms her health:

The next day the doctor said to Sue: “She’s out of danger. You’ve won.   Nutrition and care now–that’s all.”

But the doctor had another patient to tend to.   It was the old artist  who had caught pneumonia.  He had been found that night, a little while ago,  collapsed in the cold, windy, rainy weather.   On the day he died,  Sue came to tell her friend the whole story:

His shoes and clothing were wet through and icy cold. They couldn’t imagine where he had been on such a dreadful night. And then they found a lantern, still lighted, and a ladder that had been dragged from its place, and some scattered brushes, and a palette with green and yellow colors  mixed on it, and  —  look out the window, dear, at the last ivy leaf on the wall. Didn’t you wonder why it never fluttered or moved when the
wind blew? Ah, darling, it’s Behrman’s masterpiece–he painted it there the night that the last leaf fell.”

The whole story is online; and it’s probably in your American Lit. books.    I haven’t told it as well as O. Henry, but I’ve always remembered all the thoughts and emotions and the lessons of hanging on, devotion, self-sacrificing acts — and the big question:  what makes life so worth living?

It’s still up there.   Presenting its quiet little testimony, even if no one notices.

THE OTHER KIND OF CLIFF

We hear a lot about Falling off the Fiscal Cliff  in the  “news”  lately.     Nobody can quite explain what that means, and some people say we’re already falling off,  we’re just getting used to the ride down.

I will submit to you another Cliff, one that I know about, because I was there, involved, at the time we were shoved over this Cliff.  Maybe this one has something to do with the other one:

I’m not going to say too much about this SAT score Cliff right now;   I have a lifetime’s worth of information and studies and explanations, which I probably won’t always be able to keep to myself.

But you can read the graph.

In my particular school, where I was a public schoolteacher, the changes in curriculum were imposed on us by our Rulers (our International Rulers)  in about 1969-1972.      I watched (and protested)  as our textbooks were changed and our goals for “teaching”  was changed for us.

I watched information being taken out of the textbooks.  I watched  new methods of training being applied to the students.    And I watched a whole new political orientation being inserted into the classrooms.

The SAT scores above represent the results of removing information from the textbooks.  Facts were deleted;  important people and events in our history were summarized in the most minimal way;   commonly held ideas,  the ones that held our American culture together, were eliminated or, when mentioned at all,  were ridiculed or demonized.

Uh….I was there watching this.

We no longer taught children the basics of our language, of expressing themselves clearly in our language, nor of examining and analyzing ideas that are presented to them, written or oral.

(Caveat:  I’m not talking about good teachers who really care about their students;  I’m talking about good and sincere teachers who were trained to do something different from what teachers previously did for American children.)

We no longer taught children to read.   Seriously.   Children do learn how to read, left to their own impulses,  but they do not always learn to read easily, correctly, and the effort it takes them to read leaves hardly any mental energy to apply to understanding the meaning and implications of what they read.   Or hear.   Or of what information is given to them.

Who was it that said he doesn’t need to take over our country by means of war?  “Give me the children and in one generation I’ll have the country.”

Oh, do you see the “bumps” upward in the graph?   Somewhere around the mid-’80s and around the mid-’90s  the SAT tests were “adjusted”  for modern children.

Adjusted.    Bumped the scores up temporarily.   How significant is that?    Try reading the newspaper that Americans used to read over their morning coffee:

Many columns of dense text, multisyllabic words, adult (meaning a large) vocabulary;  lots of information to analyze and comprehend — and to form your own opinion with.

The children who were victims of the change from Education to Training in our schools are now parents and grandparents who themselves could not pass on what was never given to them.   Can our young, young, young people recover what our nation has lost?

 

 

CITIZENSHIPS

So…..it comes to an end this week.    (Not my citizenship)

The calendar year.  The Liturgical Calendar year comes to an end.   We have completed another cycle.    There are many nice colorful representations of the Liturgical Calendar, but I like the ones that look like wheels or spirals, because we go round and round, every year, through the same seasons.

It’s necessary.     Since the Liturgical Year represents the expectation and preparation for the Incarnation, the birth, growth, ministry, the passion and death of Christ, followed by the expectation of His Second Coming,  it’s necessary that as we grow in age we also grow in an ever-deeper understanding of these things.

The end of this yearly cycle reminds me —  of necessity, again — of the two places there are that one can belong to.   Christ left the Heavenlies to come to Earth;  Christ died and left the Earth to return to the Heavenlies.   We’re born to  this Earth in order to . . . some day leave and . . . be taken into the Heavenlies.

So at this moment in time,  where do I belong?   Where is my “citizenship”?    I know –   IknowIknowIknow – from about nine years old when I was first given Philippians 3:20 to memorize:  “But our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ.”         And the word “conversation” is sometimes reduced to the word “citizenship.”

So through Jesus our Savior I belong to Heaven.

But apparently Someone thinks I still belong here on Earth.     In the Readings for this Last Sunday of the Year we are told to give thanksgiving to God the Father because He has “transformed”  or “translated”  us into the Kingdom of the Son of God.     Judicially speaking,  if there were no Time involved,  that’s a done deal.   But practically speaking,  with the passage of time,  it is a journey of increasing transformation of our souls into the image of Christ, making us fit for Heaven.

So I’m a citizen here, but becoming more and more a citizen of Heaven.     Two citizenships,  but the gap between them is becoming greater and greater, as it ought to.

Occasionally, it seems as though the earthly country of which I am a legal citizen is flying away, being transformed away from what it used to be.    I don’t recognize this place as the country I have known.

For a few days, I even speculated what it would be like to find another country to live in, one where I would be safe and free. . . .   I won’t tell  you exactly which country I was exploring —

—  but I checked its climate and economics, food,  doctors, cost of living,  what other people experienced when they moved there, cautions as well as advantages — and for the next few weeks my computer screen offered me tickets to that country,  coupons for tours,  recipes, and even “friends” — in  case I’d be interested in the singles scene there.

It was a beautiful idea for a while.  (Here’s another hint) –

But if my country is being transformed out from under me,   it didn’t seem like a good answer to transform myself into a citizen of another country.    Besides, by the time I’d realize I’d  have to  escape from here, it would be too late to make an actual escape.

No.    I’m staying here.   Most likely.     I’ll follow the way the saints before me have taken:   citizenship here is diminishing, citizenship in the next world is becoming more likely, with the help of Christ, Deo gratias.  “Our citizenship is in Heaven”  with Christ.

Just some end of the world/end of the year musings.

 

 

 

“JUST DESSERTS”

“Just desserts”  –  an idiom in the English language meaning “you get what you deserve.”

But no lesson here,  just enjoying the end of Thanksgiving Day activities,  after the dinner,  after the football games,  after reading the newspaper ads . . . .Then comes the dessert.

With a little planning and extra work this year:

Pecans !!  Drove all the way to Georgia to get these sweet nuts at a pecan warehouse.

Can’t tell you how long it took to shell enough of those.    But I wasn’t planning to have just pecans for dessert.

Eggs and sugar and some organic corn syrup – and the shelled pecans.

350 degrees for a while.

Just one piece at a time.

Of course there was pumpkin pie too.

But that lasted scarcely long enough to take a picture!

I think it was worth the “extra work”  this year.   I got my “just desserts.”

HAPPY THANKSGIVING – FOR REAL!

May  God grant us the grace to feel truly and really grateful for the abundance of Love and good things He has liberally given to us…

May we remember that this nation, right from the beginning, was turned to giving thanks by our Founders remembering today  the real historical George Washington,  not the false one offered by our anti-American television movies.

“I do recommend and assign Thursday … next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be.” –George Washington (October 3, 1789)

Florida,  1565,  historically, the first Thanksgiving offered on our soil:

May we remember that giving thanks to God is natural to all Christians, even before this land became America.   Real thanks-giving comes from heartfelt humility before God, our Creator.

PRINCIPLES IN PRACTICE

I was feeling mighty “exposed”  a couple weeks ago:

No doors or windows on my kitchen!   (Just anyone could have looked inside and seen my … kitchen messes.)

The triple sliding glass doors had been removed, leaving a grand opening to the outdoors –

It was like one wall of my house had been turned into a giant theater stage for the outdoors.  It was nice,  but I also was thinking “no more barriers.”    No more barriers to keep out the bugs and the birds….and just….anyone.  We have indeed become accustomed to our doors and windows.

And I wasn’t alone in the house.   There were strangers here –

All big strong burly guys, very skillful, very capable.    Three of them and one of me.

But I wasn’t worried.   It flashed through my mind once that, well,  three  of them and  one  of me!    But I talked to them and I watched them work and I listened to them talk to each other as they worked.    

They were men of principle.   They respected their tools, they took pride in their work, they listened to each other, and they called me “ma’am.”    Very, very important.   

I was safe with these guys.

Now, to understand why I felt safe,   just imagine if they  had spoken to each other dis-respectfully,  with profanity,  with mocking, with a chip on their shoulder,  looking for insults and slights;  imagine if they threw their tools around, because they got them for free anyway, someone else would replace them when they got broken;   imagine if they looked upon me as an “opportunity,”  judging to see if I had anything they could take, judging me, whether I could be bullied or overpowered or cheated.

Imagine a whole nation that is characterized by these kind of men.

The good kind, I mean.    A nation of principles.  Goodness, kindness, honesty, justice, respect, and self-respect.   It would be a good safe country to live in.

                

 

 

 

MESSAGE TO MY FOREIGN READERS

Well, first of all:  thank you.    Thank you to all my readers.    You all make me nervous  when I start to write a new post here –  but hopefully that makes me a more thoughtful writer and somewhat more restrained than I’d otherwise be.

I was informed that my last post was #1010.    I’ve written 1,010  posts here on The Spruce Tunnel.   That’s nice,  but it reminds me how terrible I felt a few weeks ago when I was notified about my 1,000th post.    Long ago I had written about what it would feel like to have reached the 1,000 milestone,  but I didn’t have the heart to post it after the recent election.

So my feeling of accomplishment is a little subdued.

Well,   that being said,   I notice that from time to time I have readers from the Russian Federation,  from Poland, from the Ukraine….from many of what we used to call the Eastern Bloc nations,  eastern Europe.      I have a surprising number of readers from Islamic nations too, but for right now, I wanted to respond to those of you who have lived under socialist rulers,  whether of the Soviet kind or of the Nazi kind.   Fascist or Communist –   you were both under the thumb of socialism.

You know what that was like.    Inexplicably, to most of us,  America  has chosen to create a Big State government to rule over us and to care for us,  to give us everything we want, and to give up our responsibility to work for our own welfare, earning for ourselves whatever it is we need.

“No worries.”     We  don’t have to do anything.   The government will provide for us –

One half of my family is from Finland.  They had ties to people of Russia and of eastern Europe.      From my parents and grandparents I learned what happens to a population when a strong socialist government rules over a nation.     We all mourned for the people ruled by the Soviet system.   — including Finland, whose government policies were very carefully designed to placate the Soviets.     They didn’t want another 1939 war!

I’m interested in you guys.   I love you guys.   I admire all that your history and your culture has given the world.  I applaud your attempt to be good, free, independent people.

Americans were supposed to be an example of intelligent, educated, mature citizens, a beacon for liberty and freedom.   Many of us have been shell-shocked by the political course of our nation over the past few decades, culminating in the last few elections.

We no longer seem to be “mature”  and “self-sufficient”  freedom lovers.

Please don’t give up on us.      We have been conquered from within.    Most of us, as individuals,  are good people and we want our freedom and our liberty back.

But as a nation, we have a long road back to maturity.

 

 

A PERENNIAL DICHOTOMY: “Think and Do”

“Think and Do” — the name of our reading workbooks for so many years when I was a child.     (Anyone else remember these?)     I loved to fill in the blanks and answer the questions and do the puzzles.      Easy…and fun.

It also taught me that there is “thinking” and there is “doing.”        And there are people who like thinking more and people who like doing more.   It’s just like that in this world.   Great lesson for a kid to learn.     And then there are times you’d rather be “thinking”  but you have to be “doing”  – and vice versa.

Today was one of those days – I’d rather be thinking (reading, studying, preparing for classes….)  but there was something to do today:

So I got my supplies ready.     (This  was not easy!   This represents three trips back and forth to Home Depot, as well as a lot of help from Son to prepare the deck, as well as a lot of checking the weather report for just the right temperature this late in the Fall.)

Things were quiet after the football game ended.  TV off.   And I decided against radio or CD player outside.   I thought maybe I could “think” while I was “doing.”

After all, as I started on the deck railing,  I had a beautiful, inspiring view of the birds and rabbits, the deer walking by, the goldfish down there in the pond.

But most of my work was down, away from the railing.   And time was a factor.  I started at 4:10 p.m.   (after the game ended, of course)  and darkness comes early in the Far North this month.

I found time was passing and my mind was AWOL.     No big thoughts were brewing in there,   just:   “don’t splash,”  “where next?”  “how much stain is left?”  “did I miss a spot?”   “this is pretty fun,”   “keep a rhythm,”   “my knee has a sore spot,”     and….”can you get carpal tunnel syndrome in two hours?”

Thank goodness I’m ambidextrous sometimes so neither hand got too tired holding that rather heavy brush!      My body was “doing”okay,  but “thinking” took a back seat to “doing.”

How strange.    When we were children, it was implied we could think and do —  but I don’t think much when I stain the deck (and not much when I rake leaves or wash the cars or do heavy housecleaning or dig in my garden).

Back and forth with the brush today;   left hand, right hand;     thinking or doing. . . .

I finished in the dark.   But I finished.     Feels as good as if I had studied for hours and finally mastered a whole new concept.

I guess I’m done doing and now I’m thinking about what I did.    Learned something:   I like it both ways, and I shouldn’t disparage doing because I’d rather be “thinking.”       I guess my reading workbooks were right:  “Think and Do.”          Nothing wasted.   God gave us the faculty for both.

“And whatsoever you do,  do it heartily, as unto the Lord.”   (Colossian 3:23)

 

BIG ONES FALL IN THE SPRUCE TUNNEL

 

A couple of weeks ago I was feeling a little tense, a little “down,”   a little anxious —   you know,  like I needed an actual visit to the Spruce Tunnel.   It was early Fall, and I thought just being in the Tunnel would help me sort things out. 

The path to the Tunnel was dappled with sunlight and looked cheery,  but I took into the pathway with me all the weeks of illness and pain,  my fatigue from the year’s travels,   my father’s recent unexpected death,  my misgivings about the upcoming election, and a sense of things falling apart, being out of control.

At one point along the familiar path I thought I might have the answer to my sense of gloomy doom  —   

It’s the bench.   One of the several benches that Hubbie sat on, just two years ago during his last walk into the Tunnel.   He stopped at every one to rest.   I had no idea that he had only two months more to live,  but I suspect he knew.    I often wonder what he was thinking while he sat on those benches….and cheerily told me to run off with my camera….what were his thoughts?

Well, alone this time,  I rounded a corner closer to the Tunnel, and nearly bumped into this, about chest high:

That was no “weather incident.”   No wind accident.    Someone had taken down a big tree.  It’s okay.   Trees come to an end and sometimes you have to take an old one out.

But there were so many that day. 

All big ones.     There was one 150-foot long tree fallen onto the brush deep in a gully.    I wondered what had happened in the summer here when I hadn’t been able to visit.     Why are all the big trees coming down.    I had never noticed so many before, all at once.

 

Something made me think of higher ideas. 

I sat down and thought of big trees coming down.  Big things coming down.   Big things coming to an end.  

I sat down for a while, looking down.   I was thinking of all the big things that had come to an end in my world:   Suzy;   Hubbie;   Dad;    my health  (that’s temporary , I think);  and then things in my bigger world:    our  culture,   our  country’s economic viability;  our republican form of government;   our safety and security, actually;   our stability;  our trust;   our strength….

On  and on I went…. until I finally saw the cycles.     Things come and go in this current world.   Even the big things come to an end and fall. . . .

And then I was okay about that.    There will be ups and downs, risings and fallings,  strength aging into weakness and inconsequence;  these things will happen as long as the world is permitted to last.

I’m guessing it’s  all part of a beautiful pattern, like the sunny stripes that greeted me when I finally made it into the Spruce Tunnel.   The sun is there;  the Son is there.    Our permanent home is in the next world.

It’s all okay.

SEASONS CHANGE

I took at least a dozen of these photos last night. . . .

It was about midnight or so,  give or take an hour…or two.   I happened to turn the light on over the deck and was mesmerized by the falling snow.       Much thicker, brighter and “faster”  than the photos can show.

It was our first little bit of a “big” snowfall.   More than just flurries.

So winter’s soon on its way.   Seasons change.   The world still turns.   No matter what we do to ourselves, the world still turns and the seasons still change.

Sometimes interesting things happen:

I expected to see snow on the boards of my deck in the morning.    But it wasn’t snowflakes piled up.  It wasn’t ice balls or hail.  It was a kind of granular snow.   Billions of tiny little snowballs.

Over by the edges the  snowball effect was easier to see.

So….the season changes into winter.   No matter what we do to ourselves, no matter what we do to our country,  the world still turns as it flies out into space, circling the sun.     Right?     And even though I think I know what the winter snowfall is supposed to look like,  upon closer reflection,  the world still surprises and delights.

 

VETERAN’S DAY – THE UNIFORMS WE LOVE

All right,  this is my third little Veteran’s Day post.  How about some pictures this time!

That’s a photo of my Dad’s uniform.     See the Marine Corps emblem by the collar?    These are not his Dress Blues;  they are his wool greenish-gray ones.  This hangs in my closet along with his matching great-coat, when he needed to be warmer.

I am “silly” around uniforms –  or parades or our country’s flag.     Silly in that I can’t keep the tears from my eyes.    Gratitude and Pride for these soldiers who solemnly swear to protect us and our Constitution.

Here are some more uniforms.   Put your “thinking caps” on –

(My high school band uniform was black and orange too!)

(But the red one is from the Muslim world.)

(I’m remain acerbic;  but that will fade. . . . )

VETERAN’S DAY – THE STAIRWAY WE’VE WALKED DOWN

Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor,    wrote:

‘The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years.   During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:
1. From bondage to spiritual faith;
2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
3. From courage to liberty;
4. From liberty to abundance;
5. From abundance to complacency;
6. From complacency to apathy;
7. From apathy to dependence;
8. From dependence back into bondage’

He wrote this in the 18th century, after long years of study and observation, and at a time when men’s minds were very much clearer and capable of rigorous thinking.     It was a former time when men could  express themselves with precision and with directness and courage.

 

 

On this Veteran’s Day I’m thinking that the Veteran’s didn’t let us down,  we let them down.

VETERAN’S DAY – BELONGING TO SOMEONE IS NOT FREEDOM

I cherish photos and objects and stories from my grandfather’s time in the Navy;  my own Dad’s service in the US Marine Corps;  my uncle’s service in the US Marine Corps;   and  my cousin’s service in the US Army.

I’m grateful to all the servicemen in our country who protected our nation during their time of service.

I can’t post their photos, though, this year.   Not so soon after…   The images and words of our Rulers in Washington is still warring in my mind:     “THE GOVERNMENT IS THE ONLY THING WE ALL BELONG TO, ” they told us recently at their  political convention,  expressing the commonly held Progressive ideals that we have succumbed to.   You can watch them say it  or you can use a Search engine.

YOU BELONG TO THE GOVERNMENT  —  the exact opposite of what the American Republic stands for.     The veterans I know did not give their years and their lives for this foreign idea.

 Victory over us.    They write on their blogs:        WE WON!…This election was won with progressive constituencies and a PROGRESSIVE AGENDA….

 

If  our veterans lived and served and died to keep us free, how come we belong to the government now?

ELECTION LESSONS FROM SANDY

A silly title, I suppose, but I’ve written so many posts and will publish none but this one to kind of  sum them up all together.

Some of us watched Hurricane/Superstorm Sandy crash into the coastlines of our northeastern states.  It was hard to comprehend the above-human Power of the ocean magnified by storm-force winds, the surges, and the full-moon high tide.

Human foresight and planning and preparations just didn’t  seem to be enough.  Wisdom turned out to be:  “Evacuate!  Get out of there!”      Not everyone was able to evacuate.   We watched with sorrow and disbelief the destruction of lives.

There’s another tidal storm surge washing over us.  

We are in the later  stages of the Great Revolution and, like a tidal wave,  it brings with it  destructive forces that we’re apparently unprepared for.   This Revolution began in earnest in the late 1700s and continued on with great destruction throughout Europe and South America in the 1800s, and reached full murderous power in the 20th century.    It has used up most of its resources now.  It’s financially and morally bankrupt,  and very few can even examine the goals of the Revolution anymore.

But do not confuse senescence with powerlessness!

The tidal waves of the Revolution still wash over us with overwhelming power.   And it’s our turn now to feel its force.

“In every Revolution, the People are the Enemy.”

Why?    Why are people its enemies?  Because  people are the sources of courage and strength to resist;  they are the sources of individuality and discovery of Truth.     Individual people are the enemies of domination and collectivism and the culling out of undesirables.     People must be organized, trained, indoctrinated, subdued and subjected or else they’re of no use. . . .

“Anything that stands in the way of the Revolution must be destroyed.”

Any criminal activity, bullying, cheating, fraud, deception, and gleeful gloating that helps the Revolution will  be rewarded.

Anyone or anything that stands in the way of the Revolution will be punished and crushed.

Even the things we love:   our nation’s pride and history,   our former republic,  our freedom to pursue our own lives without the control of a Big Brother State,  freedom to think publicly as we do privately, without fear,  the rewards of accomplishment, our personal dignity.       All individual initiative and freedom must  disappear.

The Revolution destroys everything in its wake, like a huge full-moon tidal storm surge empowered by winds of hope-and-change.

 

AN UNEXPECTED RESPONSE

 I focused so much on my own country that I forgot to think about what this election might mean to the rest of the world.   I’ve been reading news articles, comments, and opinion pieces by both professional writers and by non-professionals from around the world.   I was astonished to read many, many expressions of disappointment, bewilderment,  and even anger.  Some say they had looked to us to help defeat the powerful global Statist system that they are struggling under.

Yes, we blew it.   We were too weak, too uninformed,  too eager to be hoaxed again, and we couldn’t throw off the net of socialism that has been descending on us.

This is deadly serious to the rest of the world.   They understand what we apparently don’t:  that there are two ways that socialism/communism/ liberal-leftism, whatever you call it, takes over a nation.  Let’s not forget that sometimes they do it this way:

But sometimes, and more commonly now, they do it invisibly.   They infiltrate and change the system from within, either setting up parallel structures of governing and social organization or else by subverting the existing structure.   It can take decades.   Premier Khrushchev told us communism was going to do it to us this way,  back in the 1950s.   The words are published and freely available to us to read.

They get the children.   I’m sorry to our children and I’m sorry to the world, but we know our schools were teaching our little children to sing praises to that man they put back into our white house. They used little children in political ads to cheerfully tell lies to us.   They taught our children the values of a socialist state while the parents weren’t looking….or understanding.

Uncle Stalin was very successful in his school system.   Now our schools and universities sing praises to a big State power system that takes care of all our needs.    Even young adults believe that the government exists to assure our life, liberty, and happiness.

We sold our freedoms very cheaply:   A few cell phones here.  A little injection into our EBT cards there.   Just leave us alone to our self-gratifying pleasures, and we’ll leave you alone to complete your plans for total control.

I’m sorry to the rest of the world.  We did indeed let you down.   And now we will know your suffering.

A MOST UNLADYLIKE RESPONSE

YAHOOOO!

SMOKIN’   O’      !!!!!!

 

 

PARTY ON, DUDE !!!!!!

 

 

(What is that “revenge”  you kept talking about in your campaign speeches?)

 

A most unladylike, knee-jerk, emotional response, I know.

I’ll show you in the next post that I’m capable of rational thinking, as a historian.      Later. 

So . . . sorry.

A Serious Story: EXPOSING OURSELVES

Very rarely do I wake up in the middle of the night worrying about something.

My growing concern compels me to write just one more Serious Story.   It’s a story about mandatory exposure of our most private selves to many dozens of strangers who will determine if we are worthy of care.   The storyline is based upon the reading of pertinent parts of an actual bill that was passed – but not read – by the very  legislators we hired to protect us.

It begins with the creation of many  more government workers and paperwork, above that which we, as a nation, can afford.   But it is mandated anyway.

And we will have to prove our compliance with this new bill by filling out, personally,  a new form proving that we are in compliance , and then filing that form with the IRS enforcers.     We will have to do this EVERY year.   They are creating the form right now.

 Fill it out and fill out it with the correct answers, or else you will pay increased taxes  or when it is protested that it is illegal to impose taxes in this manner,  they can be called big fines, except when it’s argued that fines cannot be imposed legally in this manner – in which case you call it a tax.   Either way,  the IRS enforces compliance.

Exposing yourself freely and openly:

Once you go to your doctor, everything you tell him about your body, everything you show him about your body, your questions, your concerns, your mannerisms, and your mental state will be sent to our Rulers in Washington, where a committee of unelected bottom-line budgeters will then tell your doctor what he can and cannot do for you, regardless of what he, in his medical opinion, knows what should be done for you.    That is, according to the words written in the new Health Control bill.

We’ve already got the “electronic medical records” system in place.  And, yes,  there are already lawsuits concerning the SELLING of our private medical records to corporations who would like to profit from that information.    Your private electronic medical records are being sold.

You are not a human person, you are a human “resource,”   and your statistics belong to the State who will then use you – or not – according to its needs.    It has to be that way because no government system has ever proved to be profitable or economically self-sustaining.    There will be a diminishing amount of medical care available.   We will be exposing our medical needs to those who cannot deliver medical care.

Do you get medical treatment or not?  Do you live or do you die?

Do we today vote for the repeal of the Powerful State Health Control bill?

Is it possible to pry such control away from the State once they have it?

A Serious Story: PIXEL POWER

Or:   “Winning Through Technology”

I am a Luddite.   A Luddite at heart, if not quite in behavior.   And I’ll tell you why.  

You’ll maybe remember from visiting The Spruce Tunnel that I’m a fan of TRON, both the original and The Legacy.  That’s the imaginative world in which humans enter the ephemeral electronic dimension of activity inside a computerized system.   It’s a great big complex world in there!   I don’t know if they are “good” movies,  but TRON stokes my imagination.

The thing is there are lots of action points going on inside of “computers”  where the instantaneous POPS!  of bits and bytes interface with us humans at the point of pixels, arranged to make sense to the human brain….and that’s where the tricks can be played.  

Tricks can be played and mistakes can be used, and a large proportion of Americans will rely on, well, the cast of TRON to move their vote from a push-button or a touch or a pull over to a place where all such touches and pushes and pulls will be tallied by another set of TRON-like characters.    

The total will then be reported to us – electronically –  from a Far-Left socialist-associated corporation located in a Far-Left socialist European country for many of us.   

Consulting with Alice in Wonderland, no doubt.

Mistakes can be made?     People move from place to place, but find out that they are still registered to vote in all the previous precincts they had lived within.   Mistakes can be used.

People receive double sets of absentee ballots, same name, two different numbers.   Mistakes can be used.

NPR and Pew Research report today that there are nearly 2,000,000 dead people on the active registered voting rolls.    Mistakes….

Hundreds of reports that a certain political party is “helping”  elderly, befuddled, and dementia patients fill out their voting cards.    (My own Mom among them.)

This same political party received tens of thousand of votes on electronic voting machines from deceased or unknown-whereabouts Native Americans on reservations in recent elections.

Tens of thousands of Americans in the military have been disenfranchised this year due to “electronic glitches” of various kinds.   Ooops.    (They’re not known to vote with the Far Left.)

Early voting this year has uncovered more TRON characters at work:    I think it’s six states now where people have reported their experience of voting for one person, but the name that gets highlighted is the name of the man occupying the white house.   The explanation is usually “the machine needs to be calibrated.”    But further inspection shows that the PIXELS leading to the false choice cover a much larger area than shown on the touch screen…the area of the person chosen has an unexpected and unindicated smaller area on the screen.  Winning by pixel position.

A news article today analyzed that this happens in “swing” states, and an official from Nevada said it has happened to them only in the “swing”  counties.  

Reports of ready-made little cassette vote-collecting things that are inserted in electronic voting machines are waiting to be inserted in place of the ones that leave the precincts – where needed!

In my own quiet locality, a good friend of mine worked as a precinct vote-verifier in the last election.   He and his co-workers found a 10% difference in the votes counted and the votes officially reported.  They reported it.   Nothing changed.  They reported it to the newspapers.  Nothing was investigated.   One very small precinct.

I must stop now or I’ll be setting out examples for the next 24 hours….until after the November 6th “opportunity.”

I’ll return my frantically beating heart to its calmer Luddite state, and proclaim that the safest way to vote is with a PAPER ballot, and barring that,  get a paper receipt for the votes you cast – and CHECK your receipt.  Maybe paper ballots will deter “mistakes.”     Let the paper be counted – honestly.  

Just 24 hours.    The majority of the voting will be over, but we probably won’t know the outcome of this election right away.

Meanwhile,  I think I’ll just start whimpering and head for a warm and cozy quilt with a copy of the latest paperback book from Vince Flynn –  at least someone can right the wrongs of this world!

Serious Story (Books): TRANSFORMING A NATION

We hear much about the word transformation lately.   The man currently occupying our white house has vowed many times in speeches that he will bring about the “Transformation of America.”    He wants to transform us, away from what we are.

Discussions as to what we are being transformed to are deftly suppressed in the public arena.   We can ask,  but we have to dig for the answers.   Actually, I suspect we know what the goal of transformation is,  but we dare not believe it can happen.

There is a man who has spoken quite plainly about the coming complete Transformation:

This man is Eric Arthur Blair.   It’s a story of how the Leftists transformed him during the Spanish Civil War and then used him.     Once his writing skills were known and made useful to the Cause,  he was given another name:  George Orwell.     He is eyewitness to the growing Transformation of the world into a Global Socialist Dreamworld.

If you don’t read this book,  try his far more entertaining and accurate book called 1984.   If you need a simpler introduction to 1984 – and the last several years of our country – try reading his Animal Farm.

These books used to be taught and analyzed in high schools, to prepare future citizens and to help them guard against Tyranny.

. . .Especially during times of elections when we have somewhat of a choice to make.

 

A Serious Story: AN ANCIENT EMPIRE FALLS

“Those who don’t know history are condemned to……”   (…you know)

I was an enthusiastic history major during my college years, way back before the content of history got changed by those who wanted to convince us of their own legitimacy.    Before the politically correct “history” came to be.   

Roman history is probably familiar to all of us.   At least it’s known that there was a Rome, right?   And it used to be a Republic, with a leader elected for a limited term (remember the noble Cincinnatus?)  and representatives arguing on behalf of their people.   The pride in the worth and nobility of the idea of “Rome”  provided guiding principles.   

And then, after approximately 200 years,  the average length of time of any republic, historically speaking,  within a few generations, the Roman Republic became an Empire, with Augustus Caesar as its Ruler.     After a time it became increasingly unworkable, unwieldy, and unaffordable for an emperor to dictate his will over the citizens.   As the pressures mounted,  one emperor decided that it would be better to delegate some of his power to a helper, and reaching back into Rome’s history, he gave this man some power and the title of “caesar”

And then  both of these caesars chose a helper, so  there were four “caesars.”      The governing force of Rome was now divided into four segments, and it wasn’t long before Rome itself could no longer make governing decisions;  and then, soon,  could no longer govern.   The Empire had fallen.

Really, it’s a sad, serious story of what happened to a once great republic.

In Russia the word “caesar”  was  tsar or   czar.      Same idea.

We can speed forward through time and we can speed up time.    Suddenly, for the first time,  our nation had, by July, 2012,   32 czars!     And then in October, 2012,  we had 45.    In November’s news reports there are more “czars”  planned.     (This info is easily found by any Search engine.)

Certainly, this means “nothing.”     Just a coincidental use of the Russian term tsar (czar).  

And we don’t have an emperor dictating to his people.      And we still have our freedoms.     And we don’t have to violate our religious beliefs and pay for other people’s beliefs.

And Christianity,  the majority religion in America, is not in danger.