Moms are such moms

Moms.

I was lumbering back from the old barn yesterday morn and Mother happened to be perched on her front stoop. O'course I sat with her for a spell, just to chat. "The lottery's pretty big tonight," she comments after a few pleasantries.

"That's what I hears, yes," replies I.

She asks, seemin' to merely inquire to the air about her, "What d'the tickets cost?"

Answers I, "Two bucks each".

Mother commences to fumble through her wallet and thrusts four dollar bills at me. "When you get yours buy me two," she blithely commands. Funny, I'd naught spoken about purchasing any a'tall.

Still, then, I dutifully purchased a pair o'Powerball tickets that afternoon (what kind of boy would not do such a simple favor for his old mum?) and delivered them back to her. And she called it, I purchased me own as well. I was at the party store anyway, eh?

Perhaps she's a millionairess by now. One that knows how much her boy loves her as well too, no doubt.

My doctor is trying to help me. I think.

My doctor laid down the law yesterday. Although my overall health is very good, my blood pressure is too high. Not wanting to give me a prescription without an attempt at 'lifestyle changes' he laid out the gauntlet.

Lose 15 pounds. I guess I saw that coming.

Do not salt any food. That's not too bad as I don't salt much anyway.

Avoid processed food. Okay, that's a toughie. I like quick and easy lunches made from lunchmeats thrown on bread, and often I use no condiments. Not good enough, he says. Har-rumph.

Avoid potato chips. And I really love potato chips; he's really starting to meddle. But I can have one one ounce serving a week.

Avoid red meats (there's a shock) and stop taking Benadryls for my allergies. So I'm trying Claritin on his suggestion. But it's never worked for me before.

No more than two cups of coffee a day, and preferably only one. Come on Doc, you're taking away all the stuff I like most. Heavy sigh. And I ought to have salad for one meal a day. Really? Rabbit food?

I'm told I'll get used to the new rules and begin to enjoy them, and I suppose that's well possible. I do now look forward to my morning walks. Yet they had been followed with coffee and salty breakfasts (hey, I said I rarely salted my food, not that I didn't enjoy salty foods). No more of that. For me, these are very serious alterations to be tossed under the benign banner of lifestyle changes.

Ah well, it's for my own good. I know that, and I want what's for my own good, honest. Yet I can't help wonder what a common blood pressure medicine would cost per month.

Equality is just another word

We are in this world almost daily deluged with calls for equality. It all sounds so good, and everyone seems to want it. But there's only one problem with it.

We are not, any of us, really equal.

This is not to say that we are not political equals. Yet even that phrase leaves a bit of uncertainty: we are only equal because my vote should count as much as yours. That doesn't strike me as equality. It strikes me as justice.

In the same manner, and I have employed this tactic when talking about freedom, education, peace, and so forth, so too do we find that we must apply it to any calls for equality. We need to ask what the supporters of equality really mean. Because any absolute and final equality can only be of circumstances and must actually be something which applies only in very, very few cases. Take equal pay for equal work, for example. Notice that we are asking a question whose answer only applies to very strict and definite circumstances. A woman cancer doctor, 50 years old, with 20 years of practice, who graduated from the same schools with the same grades as a complimentary male cancer specialist in the same place of work, and with the same proficiency of work, should get the same pay. No rational mind would argue otherwise. But the case is so limited that only answer is the right anyway. Again, that's because of justice, not equality.

As to the other facet of the argument, well, calls for equality must ring hollow on their face. A brain surgeon isn't a plumber, no matter how much more we want the latter when the faucet breaks or the basement floods, and no matter which is male or female. As a matter of decency, we should not look well on the surgeon nor ill on the plumber. But yet again, that's a point about justice, not equality.

We could refine the case further, but we trust the point is made. When we are demanding equality we are often (if not in fact always) demanding justice. We are asking that we be treated rightly and properly in light of the circumstances which surround us. We are not asking for equality. We are asking for justice.

So, and I am sure many people may have grown tired of me asking yet I must, when you demand equality, do you really want that? If so, how? Why? For we need to remember that the only sure way to make folks equal is downward, to the where no one is above the lowest common denominator.

That the average person means equality in the sense of true justice I don't doubt. Still, it is when we use terms wrongly that we have the greatest troubles. It is then that the radical fringe of any given group may take the day. Yet when we clarify our thoughts, when we strive to end misunderstanding by calling things what they are, then, indeed, justice wins out. Isn't that what we really want?

One very personal Independence Day

Today is Independence Day. 240 years ago the United States declared themselves separate and equal to Great Britain. But this day I find myself remembering a very different July 4th, one of the fondest memories of my childhood.

It was around 8:30 in the morning and I was 9 or 10, just goofing off in my backyard. I saw Grandpa Joe come out of his house (he and Grams lived next door to us) but he didn't see me. He walked out his back gate and up towards the old barn where he worked, the same old barn I have now. Naturally, I had to investigate. What could he be doing on a holiday?

I got to the shop right as he was opening the truck doors. "What are y'doin, boy?" he asked in that vague gruff manner of his when he wasn't in full on gruff mode.

"Wonderin' what you're doing," I answered honestly.

"Well, c'mon in then". Joe was welding something underneath one of the stake trucks he used for delivering the welding equipment he rented. I held a flashlight for him as he scoped out the job. Then he fired up an old Hobart welder he used exclusively in the barn, gave me a welding helmet with strict instructions to keep it on until he said I could remove it, and commenced with the repair on the truck's frame.

After a while he paused for a break. We went and got donuts ('vittles' he always called coffee break donuts or snacks) and ate them while we drank our coffee as he smoked a cigarette or four. Then he went back to finish the job, me wearing that far too big and heavy helmet and holding a light for him when asked. Soon we were done.

He shut everything down and did a quick clean up, and then locked up the barn. He turned to me and took a five dollar bill from his wallet and told me to take it. "You worked too," he told me to tell his son and daughter-in-law who might wonder how'd I'd come across such largesse. Five bucks was huge, to a 10 year old in 1970. I said thank you. In fact, I believe it was more like "Thank YOU, Grandpa Joe!"

"Aw Hell," he said back, as was his wont.

So I earned my first pay on a long ago July 4th. And I had a really good time doing it.

Does God will evil?

Okay, here I go, trying to make a sensitive blog on a sensitive question. On a Sunday no less. But such concerns have never stopped me before.

I've heard many times when something bad happens that it is God's punishment. I have similarly heard that God doesn't work that way. So what's fella to think? Does God punish or doesn't He? And the short answer is: He might, we just don't know if or when. And I think it's nonproductive to fret too much over that point.

Still, I think a better way to phrase the issue is, does God allow bad things to happen? Yet even then I'm not sure that allow is the correct term any more than I would automatically say that he causes them to happen. My point is that sometimes things just happen, things which may be interpreted as punishment. In fact, the corollary is also often true: sometimes good things just happen. It's interesting though that when good things happen folks aren't so quick to question the motives of the Almighty.

Be that as it may, the bottom line is that God wills what He wills, and we simply don't know when, where, and how He does that. Many actions are simply the result of human free will, and nothing more. So how about we concede that we don't really know God's intent, but we do know our own, and work from there?

When we don't talk so good

While listening to the radio this morning I heard a song, one of many which employ the same sentiment, where the singer laments someone he 'used to know'. But doesn't that mean he stills knows her? I mean, who's he talking about if he doesn't still know who they are?
It's a little like when I was explaining to a small group of family about a new (to me, anyway) way to fill a cup of beer. There was a cap at the bottom of the cup, and the bartender held the cup over a post, pushing up the cap and filling the cup from the bottom. My aunt looked at me, confused, and asked, "But don't all cups fill from the bottom?" I guess they actually do, right?
I'm not one of those who argue that language is vague and confusing. I think the poor use of language and/or honest error either on the part of the speaker or the listener can make it appear confused. Still, the little incongruities can be fun to notice.
Sort of like, when we were loading trucks back in the days working with my grandfather, Grandpa Joe would bark, "Raise 'er down!" when ready to place a load on the truck bed.

Happy Canada Day!

Today is Canada Day. It celebrates the anniversary of Canada being granted dominionship (we hope that is a word) within the British Empire on July 1, 1867. Called Dominion Day until 1982 when Canada earned full independence, it is essentially Canada's Independence Day.

It is one of those subtle ironies of history that such great friends as Canadians and Americans celebrate their anniversaries so closely together. Particularly in border cities such as here in Detroit, where we are able to enjoy the relatively free interchange of people, ideas, and goods with our northern allies, we ought to be somewhat awestruck by the kinship between our nations. There are few nations who truly have the sort of bond which we have, and we in Michigan are able to partake of that friendship every day in almost every way.

Though technically a newer nation than the United States, Canada is in many ways older and more distinct, more nuanced than we are. It gives Canada a depth which the US lacks in certain areas, as it allows her a better connection to the Old World (such a quaint yet endearing term nowadays!) than ourselves while living fully in the New.

Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Ontario, true sister cities bound by proximity and shared interests, keenly aware and appreciative of one another even though in separate countries, share many events during these days. There are of course the massive fireworks, while each city supports various other events: the Windsor Summer Days in Ontario and Detroit River Days. It is something of a shame that they are no longer called the International Freedom Festival, as they were until 2007. It seems to break the unity of the celebrations. Still, their common history marks the anniversaries of each nation's independence similarly and faithfully. The parties remind us of our bond.

We should count ourselves fortunate indeed to have such tremendous associates, such stouthearted and true friends so nearby. It gives us a perspective the rest of the United States may not have, and shows us profoundly what true friendship must mean.

Happy Canada Day, Canada!