Vinegar Lips

I love salt and vinegar potato chips. I also love sports. One day the twain did meet, though not necessarily in the best way.

My oldest son was about two and a half years old, and I was trying to watch the Stanley Cup playoffs. Being a momentarily bad dad, I did not want a distraction. So I sat in my recliner eating salt and vinegar potato chips as I was also supposed to be watching Charlie.

I did watch him, kind of. I glanced over occasionally as he played with his toys while I watched TV. Regularly, he would toddle to my perch, and I would give him a couple chips or let him grab some from the bag I held on my lap, to keep him at bay. It was a divine match. We both got what we wanted; he could play, and I could watch hockey. Cool beans.

After an hour or so of this, Charlie, again, toddled to my recliner for more chips. And I gave him more. Only this time I turned and looked at him. His lips were white. White as sheets, white as ghosts. And it occurred to me that the vinegar was causing that.

So I let him have two more chips and I put the bag away, hoping his mother would not notice the change in his facial anatomy (thankfully no, as his lips had returned to normal by the time she was home). But I think he likes, or did like, salt and vinegar chips himself. I wonder if he still might.

Woodbridge Nature

Nature is resilient. It adapts. That's the main reason why environmental issues aren't at the forefront of my worries. Yes, we should be good stewards. But Nature rules its own sphere.

Over the years in Woodbridge, my local Detroit neighborhood, I've seen wildlife come back in abundance. I've observed pheasants, hawks, rabbit, beavers, and opossum. Feral cats are everywhere; there aren't near the rats there once were, and perhaps that's why. 

In the last year there have been two deer sighted, one right by the old barn. And this very day while on my morning constitutional, I saw a wild turkey. No, not an empty bottle of the famous rotgut. A wild turkey, with a baby in tow. 

Nature rebounds, it answers all challenges. My own Detroit environs prove it.

Angels and Saints

The following is another lesson I garnered from Fr. Malcolm Willoughby, a wonderful priest and friend. It's about our very nature.

Quite often when someone dies we hear things like, 'Heaven needed another angel'. Yet the truth is that we don't become angels. Angels are beings entirely different from humans. They were created in their end form: they were angels right from the start. We were born human, which means we have to develop and grow. We, in the end, become something beyond what we are now, if we cooperate with God's will.

To be sure, we don't correct a grieving friend who makes such a remark during a time of loss. But we don't get wings. We are created in the Image of God, and have our own special place in creation. We don't get transformed into something which we are not. We become friends and brothers and sisters of Christ. We become Saints.

Doesn't Seem Possible

Me son Charlie has been visiting the last few days. Me son Frank spent a few days here back in April. Good times.

What's weird, at least to my tired old brain, is that they each worked while they were here. At their regular, paying jobs. Charlie set up shop at the dining room table, while Frank had arranged himself a work space in his old bedroom. I actually took a picture of that and labelled it, Frank's Office.

Telecommuting is until yet a concept I have trouble wrapping my head around. Working from anywhere with this device called a personal computer? I fully realize it's work but it doesn't seem like it. It would be interesting to know what me Pops or me Grandpa Joe would think. On a certain level it doesn't seem possible.

To be sure, work from home has always existed. Writers, indeed many self employed, have done it for years. Hell, doctors and dentists once did. Yet watching my sons work from home hundreds of miles away from their actual job setting? It's different. But for all sorts of selfish reasons, I'm glad they can.

To Boot

While taking my morning walks, I noticed several months ago a car with one of those wheel lock devices, a boot I think is the slang, on it, one which the authorities apply for things such as unpaid parking tickets. Uh, oh, someone's in trouble, I thought.

That device appeared to stay on for a long time. I guess maybe they don't need their car.

Then I noticed the car had been moved, quite a few times in fact. Finally one morning I saw the owner come out of his house, a tool of some kind in hand, and proceeded to walk to the car, removed the device, get in and drive off. A-ha. I don't know where he got it, but it wasn't about unpaid tickets at all. It was about a guy securing his vehicle. Not a terrible idea when you think about it.

Caught in the Act

Solitaire. I play too much of it, and generally alone because, well, solitaire. A derivative of solitary. I think.

It runs in the family. Dad played, Mom played, and I remember sitting in me Grandpa Joe's kitchen when I was ten or eleven watching him play. Klondike is our version of choice. I didn't even know it had a name other than solitaire until I was an adult. Once I learned that my reaction was, it makes sense. Why should there be only one type of one person card game? Yet that never occurred to me before my twenties.

I was once playing it when I admittedly shouldn't have been. For the last ten years I taught I was in a self driven classroom where students could take a myriad of subjects which were streamed in via computer. As such, we were there to facilitate as much as anything, helping students through difficult tasks, getting them needed materials, and grading finished work among other chores. 

Our sessions ended at 9 PM weeknights. One evening at around 8:45 with few students in attendance, honestly maybe three, and with no immediate demands on my time, I sat down at an open computer which I thought was out of view and pulled up solitaire. About half way through my game I got that feeling we all get sometimes of being watched. Turning around, a young man who was something of a joker (but a cool one) was standing there with a broad smile on his face. He pointed at me and barked sternly, "Get back to work!", and laughed.

I laughed with him. What could I do? I was caught. 

Orange Tupperware

I was watering the plants this morning by using a one gallon orange Tupperware jug. It was handy, holding enough water that I only needed to fill it a couple times to complete the chore.

Me family has a history with Kool-Aid and that jug plays into it. I hadn't used that burnt orange plastic cylinder (I have an exotic description clause in my contract which must invoked from time time) myself in twenty five years. But back then it was our go to container for Kool-Aid. We mixed hundreds of gallons of all the various aromatic, fruity delectables (I've been behind on that clause and have to make up for missed opportunities) when the kids were small. At around 15 cents a packet and with a scoop or two of sugar plus tap water, it was a cheap way to add variety to meals and snacks.

Me son Charlie told me awhile back that a school friend of his, I'll call him young Cloyce just to give him a name (those contract clauses get away from you and lawyers have no sense of humor), loved to visit our house. "Your Dad makes the best Kool-Aid!" young Cloyce would tell Charlie. "Good and sweet!"

You know, I take far too much pride in that compliment. You need Kool-Aid? I'm your man.

Just Askin

Things get stuck in your head, things you just can't erase. 

I know that actors typically have dozens if not hundreds of roles over the course of their work. It's unfair even in one's own mind to too closely pigeonhole them into one character. But you can't help do that, especially with a guy you've only seen in one role.

Leon Askin was a regular in the old comedy Hogan's Heroes. He played General Burkhalter, a nemesis of Colonel Klink, who ran Stalag 13. I've only ever seen Askin as Burkhalter.

Until late yesterday evening. I found myself watching Son of Sinbad, an adventure film from the 1950s with something of an interesting cast. Set in Persia about a thousand years ago, it had Dale Robertson in the lead as Sinbad's son. That was incongruent enough, seeing Robertson as an Arabian pirate, considering he was known mostly for oaters. Then he appears, Leon Askin, as the Khalif of Baghdad. Even done up as an Arabian king, it was clear to me who he was. After that, all I could hear, each and every time he walked into a scene, was "Klink!", in the sharp accent he used to reprimand the inept kommandant of a POW camp.

I can't tell you what actually happened in the movie now. It's the first middle ages Middle Eastern epic I've seen dominated by a Nazi Air Force officer, and that left me confused. 

Well, Why Not?

Father Malcolm Willoughby, a former pastor of our parish at St. Dominic in Detroit and whom I've spoken of in the past, once offered during a conversation an idea I'd have never considered. "When bad things happen to someone, there's a tendency to ask, 'Why me?' Well, why not you?" he said. "Why shouldn't you be as subject to the awful things which can and do happen to others?"

He's right, of course. And, you'll notice, the question rarely gets asked when good things come along, as though the good might be seen as an entitlement and the bad an outrageous affront. Oh, and Fr. Willoughby made this point too as we talked, you don't say that to someone who is currently suffering from a death in the family, or a personal crisis of some sort. But the question, why me?, really doesn't have any value. It may be perfectly reasonable to feel that way when you're down. Yet just as you're not exempt from the good, you aren't protected from the bad either.

The Mulberries are in

Funny, isn’t it, how we sometimes identify people with certain times, places, or things.

In the alley behind our old family repair shop there is a row of mulberry bushes which have been there for years. My grandfather would, in the late spring or early summer when they were in season, always stop and treat himself to a few of the little fruits as he went to and from work.

Little? Well, mulberries are small compared to most fruits. In context, they’re like raspberries who have spent a lot of time in the gym; a scant few are a handful. They’re juicy and sweet, and Grandpa Joe liked them. I remember vividly his picking and popping them into his mouth as he made his way down the alley, as though he were a kid again.

Time passes, and so, sadly, did Grandpa Joe. Yet the mulberries still grew, and I couldn’t help over the years but develop a liking to them myself. As I hike to and from work nowadays I’ll stop and have a few. As it were, my daughter also came to know and like the mulberries too. Often we’ll take bowls and go fill them with the little purple black fruits, snacking as we pick, and my wife will make pies out of those which make it back home. I like the idea that three generations of a family have been able to enjoy those berries ripening on the same bushes.

Now, I’m not all that naive; I know that Joe Cosgriff was ornery and arbitrary, with a hair trigger temper. I know it from the tales my Dad and his siblings have told, and from the personal experience of having worked with him for a good 15 or 18 years. I know too that there was a part of him which was somehow kind and appreciative, and that there were moments when that came out despite, perhaps, himself. There were good times and trying ones, and lasting impressions. I find as I grow older that, in the end, it's the good times which matter more than the difficult, even if it seems there were more tough days than easy. I believe too that the smallest, almost innocuous memories can also be the greatest insights into the honest character of someone.

What prompts me to write this? It’s June, and the mulberries are in. And I’m thinking about you, Joe.

Stretch to the Limit

I have this old friend, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, who seemed be people averse. His personal space halo was about as round as a silo on a farm.

This included things like drive through restaurants and toll booths. When exchanging money, Cloyce would situate his car as far away from the window or booth as possible. He would have to stretch as far as fragile human anatomy allowed to hand over payment. The poor attendant would need to reach out to their limit, often leaning out of their perch, until touching the money precisely enough to take it without a tumble to the pavement.

I teased Cloyce once that there were extension hooks with metal fingers which could be used to grab objects just out of reach. Funny thing: he seemed to give the idea a lot more thought than it merited.

Grandpaw's Bedtime

Me Grandpaw Hutchins went to bed at 9 o'clock every evening and rose at 5 the next day, like clockwork. If you were a visitor, you could stay as long as you wanted and have whatever you liked from the kitchen. But he was calling it a day. 

One night as several of us were gathered around in the front yard he looked at his pocket watch and saw the time. On rising, he explained his courtesy, adding, "Don't even worry about making noise, because I'm taking out my ears." He removed his hearing aids as he spoke.

That was a load off our shoulders.

Father's Day 2024

Happy Father's Day, all you Dads out there. Tell the jokes and burn the burgers on the grill. It's your call. We won't even groan.

The Short End

I wonder what to me Pops and me Grandpa Joe would think of me up in the old barn working in shorts?

Probably not much. But I have done it before, and it's supposed to be blazing hit next week. They're calling for 100 degrees Monday.

Growing up, we all worked in dark blue work uniforms. Man, they were hot. Yet Dad and Joe and me, we wore them just the same no matter the thermometer.

Still, I think I'll go the shorts and tee shirt route next week. It's a sin to hide legs like mine anyway.

High Occupancy My Eye

I noticed while coming home down Interstate 75 awhile back that the farther left lanes in central Oakland County are now High Occupancy Vehicle, or HOV lanes, at least during certain hours. That means that only cars and such with at least two passengers can travel along them.

Hogwash, at least morally. My taxes pay for every lane on that road, not just 3 out of 4. Each one. I have as much right to drive along them at any given time as any other driver. I have as much right to reach my destination in as reasonable a time as I can make it as they do theirs. Limiting which lanes I can use is simply wrong.

I don't care about any of the arguments for them. Encouraging ride share? Don't care. I'm not obliged to share my ride with anyone. Encourage less gas usage? Don't care. I can burn all the gas I'm willing to pay for. The environment? It's resilient. Always has been. It will adjust.

Don't tell me that I have to pay for roads I can't use, under normal and reasonable circumstances. It's my road too. Period.

Fifty Cents

What happened to the gas prices? I was gone five days and the same station I gassed up at on the way up north was fifty cents a gallon more on my return. 

What did you people do? I can't leave you alone for a minute.

Charles Martin Cosgriff, M.D.

Believe me, you do not want Marty as your kindly old MD. Even I will admit that. For starters, I doubt I'd I'd be all that kindly. Then there's fact that I don't care for blood, which might just make being a doctor a tad difficult. But perhaps I could be mistaken for one.

I did actually play a doctor in the background of the movie Little Murder, which was filmed in my neighborhood back in 2009. I was in two blink and you miss them scenes but I was in there, lab coat and all. So there's that. I could believably be mistaken for a doctor. In fact I was once mistaken for a doctor. Or more precisely, the doctor was mistaken for me.

Me Uncle Frank who lived up in Hessel in Michigan's glorious Upper Peninsula had to have surgery. He told me that as he was coming out of it and still very groggy, a doctor came over to speak to him. He thought that the doctor was me. All the while he was answering the surgeon's questions Uncle Frank said he was thinking things like, "Marty's not a doctor," or "Marty's not here, he's in Detroit," and the like. A funny story, in a cutesy kind of way. I assured him it could not have been have been me, for the reasons he cited plus one other. "What's that?" he demanded to know.

"You survived the surgery," I replied with a laugh. 

You know what? When he told the story the next time he added that reason to his list. 

Lawnmower Man

It took some doing, but I was able to get the mowers up in Hessel (we have two) running. They hadn't started in a long time, and admittedly I hadn't done much about them. Oh, there were a couple feeble attempts from time to time to coax them to life. Yet the machines seemed recalcitrant, unwilling to start on my whim, and I would surrender to their will.

But yesterday I became resolved: they would start. I won't bore you with details, and one took a lot more cajoling than the other, but eventually I was able to stand alongside both as they had roared to life in the afternoon Sun. I must admit to wearing a smug grin as I stared at them puttering. Who's the boss now?

My smile soon turned upside down. The thought rose in my mind that, with running mowers, I had to cut the Hessel grass. No more hiring the local landscaper. 

Now I'm not sure I'm the winner in this.

Great Catch

I'll admit up front that it's a bit odd, but one thing I'll say for listening to baseball on the radio is that there's an added dimension of the game when you can't actually see what happened. Two dimensions, really.

I was listening to yesterday's Detroit Tigers game (Bally Sports and Xfinity don't appear to care whether I can watch live baseball) and, at one point, Tiger outfielder Riley Greene made a spectacular catch to save, the announcers felt, two runs. 

It was euphoric to hear. Dan Dickerson, the play by play man (who has a great announcer's voice by the way) described the action. He sounded excited and concerned all at once as the ball fell to earth, telling his audience about Greene's rush towards it, and exploding himself in happiness when the catch was made. I about jumped from my seat too.

This leads to the first point: having the play told to you adds more excitement than seeing it. Secondly, I actually felt greater relief at hearing about the ball caught than seeing it done. It's almost like reading a book rather than watching a movie or TV show. You interact more profoundly when you have to invest yourself in the process. You don't have to pay as much attention when you see something. You have to hang on each word as you read or have a description delivered to you.

I found I had a greater satisfaction for the result hearing it instead of seeing it. Imagination can be better than reality I suppose. At least at certain times with certain things.

The Saga Continues

This post, I'll admit up front, is something of a throwaway. Facebook has been at it again, refusing to allow my blog, The Sublime to the Ridiculous (this very one you're reading) to stay on my own personal Facebook page. It calls my blog spam. Well if it is, then everything everyone or anyone posts is spam, because we're all trying to gets hits whenever we post anything on our Facebook.

Interestingly, Facebook assures me that my page is in good standing, with no violations ever against it. Go figure.

So I'll not waste my brilliance (or obvious lack thereof) and anything laugh out loud, inspiring, thought provoking, or reminiscent today. I'll just write and post it, and see what happens. Enjoy.

Everyone Needs a Getaway

While picking up a few things at a local store in Hessel, a tiny village in Michigan's glorious Upper Peninsula, I engaged the cashier is a little conversation. "I'm up here from Detroit, doing a few things with our cabin," I said at one point.

"Yeah," the cashier, a local, replied, "I have to get down to Harrison and work on our place there."

Harrison is just about smack in the middle of the mitten, or lower peninsula, of Michigan. "It's so quiet and peaceful," the man continued.

Though I didn't pursue it, I couldn't help but think, 'Quiet and peaceful there? You're in the sparsely populated UP. How could it possibly be quieter downstate (downstate is generally frowned upon by us Yoopers, folks from da UP) than Hessel?' 

We all need a getaway, I suppose. I just can't see what he's getting away from in Hessel by going two hours south. No offense, Harrison, because I've been there and you're cool. But escaping Hessel at all...I can't wrap my head around that.

Securely Upset

I wasn't going to write about this, but now I am. Inspiration is the greatest muse.

I sat down at the kitchen table to 'pen' my blog this morning. But I'm using my laptop rather than my desktop computer, where I normally type out the drivel which passes as profound thought and high entertainment. Yet because I've never logged into my Blogger account from the laptop, I was notified that a message had been sent to my cell phone, which is in the next room on the charger. Immediately the phone dinged that I had a message.

Getting up, I hurried (relatively speaking) the few steps and saw a message which said, in short, click yes to verify it's you. I did so. I went back to the computer.

At that point my laptop, exactly as the phone called to me again, asked me through a new window which of three numbers it had just sent to my phone to make absolutely sure I was me. I went back to the phone, pressing on the right number. Then I could finally set to work.

It's a first world problem I know, and how were the powers that be at Blogger to know my cell wasn't right with me? But does all this security, for my protection I'm assured, really help? Or does it merely angry up an old man who just wants to display to the world his writing skills? Either way, it's mild acrobatics which I don't care to do.

Not in the Cards

An old buddy of mine, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, really wanted to play cards. "Come on, Marty, we can play two handed Euchre," he said.

"I don't think so, Cloyce."

"Why not? It'll be fun," he insisted.

I responded, "Not now, man, I got a lot on my mind. I can't deal with cards today."

Would you believe Cloyce hasn't asked me to play since?

Tiring

It's all so tiring, life, isn't it? Everything in politics is a catastastroke, to use the term me me Grandpa Joe invented Sports are analyzed to death. I just want to see a batting average or win-loss record, that's all. The future is bright but might be dim, depending on who's doing the talking. And in all three cases, there's a wave of detail rolling over you from the ocean of media available.

I understand details, if something's your specialty. But part of the trouble with the world is the constant barrage of them, and from all sides. It's really too much. I'm not sure anyone can get it all down pat.

I wonder if that's the point. I remember a shop foreman I saw frequently when I was delivering me Grandpa Joe's welders. A big sign in his office proclaimed, 'If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull'. Don't worry about actually making sense. Overwhelm the masses with too much information to readily comprehend, even if it's nonsense. When that doesn't work, well, create a new wave.

Maybe the best thing to do is ignore it all and act on common sense. I think so. And yes, it exists. The rolling tide hasn't erased basic right and wrong from the chalkboard. It certainly doesn't keep us from understanding hits divided by at bats.

Water For Safekeeping

Me brother Phil is going through a degree of organizing lately. He's taking it quite seriously too. Last Saturday he was showing me a few new containers he had bought for storage. "They're just what I need," he explained. "They're thirty gallon size."

"That is plenty large," I agreed. "But why thirty gallons? You don't need to store water. In comes in from the tap."

I'll show myself out. Just like he showed me out of his house last weekend.

Armenians

Me brother Ed was having a bit of a rant the other day. He become so worked up by current events that he spouted, "Our media won't pursue anything!" 

That's what he meant to say, anyway. It sounded like, "Armenians won't pursue anything!"

Naturally, I called him on that. "Yep, you can't trust Armenians either."

The conversation then devolved into farce about how Armenia actually runs everything and how we should be wary of that former Soviet Republic.

You had to be there.

More Time

I read this morning where there were once societies with eight day weeks. How would that work?

Would we get three day weekends all the time? Or would the work week become six days? Holiday weekends should at least be four days, I would think.

Vacations would be longer. Maybe.

Would we be younger? I mean, longer weeks would be fewer years, right? The years would be longer too.

But that would also make life expectancies lower. Hmmm.

Ah, this is all just a bunch of nothing. But it's what you get when its Saturday and I have a blog deadline.