Moshe

He had the name of a Jewish military hero and the heart of a Jewish princess. Seventy pounds of muscle and sinew wrapped tighter than the string round a top, and all he wanted was to have his hindquarters rubbed and a lap to lay his head on.

Danielle and Chris rescued him from the pound seven years ago. He already had two strikes against—not only was he a large dog, but five previous owners had given up on him. That’s a lot of strikes for a young pup. Nevertheless, for a dog starting out with two strikes against him, he did all right.

He went to obedience school and learned a few words of a second language—the German “sitzen” and “plotz.” Then he did something not that many dogs do—traveled cross-country in the cargo bin of a jet liner. And then two years later he took the same trip back by car. Two cross-country trips—one at 20,000 feet and one at 60mph—with a stop at the Grand Canyon. How many dogs can knock those big ticket items off their bucket lists?

I visited Dan and Chris in Fullerton and noticed Moshe had taken well to California’s laid back style of living. He liked getting attention. He liked the good life. But he wasn’t a prima-donna about it. If you wanted to share a sofa with him, you were always welcomed. That went for anyone. He didn’t show favoritism.

We had become such good friends that Danielle warned me there was a strong likelihood that Mosh would climb into my bed that night. My first thought was how bad could that be? I knew I’d be going to bed first so I would have first shot at getting comfortable under the sheets. When Mosh came in he would, of course, take his place on top of the blankets—a common enough sleeping arrangement between companions that respected each other’s space.

Adjectives, Gay Marriage, and Companion Animals

“All dogs go to heaven; bill would let them in cemeteries, as well” (Rachel Weiner, Washington Post, Feb. 3, 2014) was a very enlightening article and not just for what it had to say about animals.

What I could never understand about the Republican approach to gay marriage was their argument that it somehow demeaned traditional marriage. In the first place traditional marriage isn’t what it used to be and hasn’t been for some time. I don’t think that comes as a shock to anyone—Liberal, Conservative or Leaning on the fence. But I don’t think we can blame gay marriage for this.

The gay in gay marriage is simply an adjective. We all get that gay marriage is between two men or two women and traditional marriage is between a man and a woman. Each of these marriages, if they are to mean anything will have to stand on their own merits, as has always been the case. And should any of these marriages fail, the parties have no one to blame but themselves. You can’t go off blaming someone else’s marriage for your failed one.

Still Conservatives like to ignore the gay in gay marriage and dwell on the marriage part. It’s as if the whole adjective thing is some left wing, Liberal conspiracy to destroy their world. But not anymore.

 Del. Israel O’Quinn—and I’m not sure if the name Israel deters or adds value to the traditional understanding of the surname O’Quinn or vice-versa. All I know is something is going on here that isn’t natural—but back to my point, Del. O’Quinn, Republican lawmaker from Virginia has just introduced a bill to allow pets to be buried in human cemeteries—something not currently allowed. No longer will cremated pet urns have to be clandestinely tucked in coffins.

Really? Clandestinely tucked into coffins? Thank God, pets can finally come out of the closet and rest in peace in their own caskets.

As the childless couple that chose to adopt doggie babies instead of human babies said so eloquently in this article, “Our dogs are our family. We’re all created equal by God.”

If only gays received the same consideration.

The delegate’s bill would subtly change the single word animal to the more acceptable phrase “companion animal.” Apparently this can be done without inflicting an harm on animals in general. Suddenly, it would seem, Conservatives do understand the important role adjectives play in the English language. Finally they appreciate that adjectives do make a difference. English teachers across the nation can at last breathe a sigh of relief, although they are probably still wondering why it took so long.

But while English teachers can now relax I see God’s job as getting even more complicated that it already was. For the last two thousand years mankind has been pitting one religion against another and more or less forcing God to pick sides—the assumption being that the winner was God’s choice.

When does it all become too much—even for an all-knowing, all-powerful God—having to constantly choose between one religion or another, gay marriage or straight, and now whether or not humans can take their pets to heaven with them. And how much responsibility does God accept for creating gays and straights, human and animals, and enough religions to keep arms manufacturers rolling in dough from here to Judgment Day—at which time, hopefully they’ll all be sent to the pet cemetery?

But the problems never cease. If pets can be buried in human cemeteries, why not wild animals that lead a good life. And what about the good pets who happen to belong to evil owners. What if Hitler had a Labrador retriever that was cute as a button and never bothered anyone? Would he have to go to Hell just because his owner died carrying a lot of baggage?

If only we could go back to the good old days—not the days when gays didn’t want to get married, or humans didn’t want to be buried with their pets or religions didn’t want to fight their way to heaven. I’m talking about the days when legislatures weren’t bogged down with ridiculous bills.

You can take the boy off the dance floor, but he'll only find another one

I’ve always had a fascination with tap dancing going back to my earliest days watching dancers glide across our family’s 12-inch television screen. But I don’t think I ever made a conscious decision to become a tap dancer. I probably should make clear what I refer to as tap dancing was really nothing more than an impromptu shuffle making a noise not much different than a shelf of Thom McCann shoes falling off the rack at a K-Mart. Nevertheless, I do remember taking whatever opportunity, whenever and wherever that opportunity arose, to put my talents or lack of on display.

I think it had something to do with the casual, devil-may-care, go-where-you-wanna-go, do-what-you-wanna-do approach that seemed to guide every tap dancer I ever watched perform. I now know I was only watching a charade, a showman’s deceit being perpetrated on a very sheltered and not so streetwise kid.

Real tap dancers, good tap dancers, real good tap dancers aren’t ad-libbing it. They know exactly what they are doing—just as real good banjo players know exactly what they are doing. Every step is planned, every move measured, every tap deliberate. It may look like they’re making it up on the fly but they’re not.

They couldn’t make it up as they go and still make it look spontaneous. But try telling that to a ten-year old kid watching Sammy Davis Jr. or Gene Kelly dance across the stage of the Ed Sullivan Show or up some stairs or atop some bar on a movie set.

Not that I shouldn’t have known better. I was probably in second or third grade when mom signed my sister and me up for dancing lessons. I quickly learned that there was in fact rhyme and reason in what appeared to be rough and reckless.

With our instructor’s encouragement I attempted the intricate heel, step, heel, step   and drop, toe, drop, toe, drop, toe, drop routines until at some point I decided I didn’t like tap dancing after all.

UFOs—Always Around and Always Round

I’m reading a book entitled Earth by Timothy Good that investigates the existence of UFOs. It’s not a bad book. I’m reading it because I’m fed up to my gills with the misinformation being floated about by so-called climate scientists and just about any other scientist for that matter. I’ve decided to branch out into more mainstream inquiry. That and it’s too damn cold outside to do anything else.

I’m not sure what my take on UFOs is. I did once talk to the man who claimed he was from Alpha Centauri back in that bar when I was in the Army. That would seem to indicate the existence of extraterrestrial life. On the other hand we were in a bar, so—so you see my problem.

It’s like the eyewitness account mentioned in the book when I was still in the Roman numeral numbered introductory pages. My reference to Roman numerals is only a cheap segue trick allowing men to mention that UFOs were spotted as far back as the days of the Roman Empire, when Lucullus was about to battle Mithridates when “all on a sudden, the sky burst asunder, and a huge flame-like body was seen to fall between the two armies. In shape, it was most like a wine-jar.”[1]

My only question as I read this account was, “Didn’t they have saucers in those days?”

But back to the eyewitness account. It seems a journalist, a sports journalist at that, was driving through a town at 4:15 one morning. That’s all I’m going to tell you about his account because there are very few places one could be driving to or from at 4:15 in the morning. Throw in that he was a sports journalist and I think we can safely assume he was drunk, wasn’t driving safely and didn’t see any UFO—in any shape whatsoever.

Then there is the report from a couple that encountered a flying saucer, also while driving one night. “‘We kept driving but we both ducked down, expecting it to hit us.’ I thought, ‘This is it. We’ve had it.’”

So far this seems pretty reasonable. I maybe would have stopped driving but had I continued I definitely would have at least ducked down, too. And I probably would have mouthed the words, “Oh shit,” which is practically the same as thinking, “This is it. We’ve had it.”

But what the man said next makes their story seem just a tad implausible.

A Time to Heal

Those familiar with my blog know I have written several times about a 24-hour contest that I enter four times a year. Writers are given a prompt at noon Saturday and must send in a story by noon the following day. About a year ago, my daughter Danielle began entering it with me. We would have a lot of fun calling back and forth about how hopeless the prompts seemed, and how there was no way we were going to get a story out of it, and then finally sending our stories to each other when we finally did get one.

We have both won honorable mentions—sometimes for the same contests, and sometimes for different contests and that’s always fun. But winning is even more fun. Today they announced the winners for the Writers Weekly Winter contest and I am very happy to announce that one of us has broken into the winner’s circle.

 I’m including Danielle’s story on this blog and a web link to a site where a much larger group of readers are enjoying her story today. Congratulations Danielle. Enjoy. 

A Time to Heal

He walked among the market stalls, pretending to ignore the whispering women. They were drawn to his handsome features, his sad smile. They filled his church coffers, even as his words rang hollow.

Feeling a touch on his sleeve, he turned, a furrow creasing his brows. Looking first left and then right, he angrily spat, “I told you to not speak to me again!”

Why does everything in Florida take its sweet time?

Florida—the leisure state, the retirement state, the state where seniors go to slow down, take it easy and get away from it all. This would all be true if Florida didn’t always seem to have something going on—something people in the rest of the country can’t understand. And usually something calling for immediate action.

Florida was certainly quick to step to the plate when they became the first state to pass a “Stand your ground” act in 2005. The law allows a person to use deadly force as a first option not only if they are threatened but even if they merely feel threatened.  This feeling doesn’t have to be substantiated by facts or evidence because its a feeling. Essentially, instead of saying, “the devil made me do it” the shooter could now say he was “hooked on a feeling” and all would be forgiven.

 

Twenty-three states followed Florida’s lead, which could easily be called rushing to action—or at least a rush to please the NRA since there was no great public outcry for such a law.

After a decade on the books a casual observer might conclude that Florida’s law is doing more harm than good—both to the state and to the number of non-threatening but, it-feels-like-they-are individuals that are being killed.

Shouldn’t the state be taking a second look into a law that practically justifies murder rather than prevent it?

Maybe but many are saying, “What’s the rush? Let’s give it time to work.”

My guess is these same people are keeping their fingers crossed, much the way school principals cross their fingers every morning when they turn on the lights in their schools.

     I was going through some old stories I'd written years ago. The article I refer to in this story, “Adam and Eve Were Space Astronauts,” actually did appear in the January 16 edition of National Enquirer—the January 16, 1979 edition—35 years ago. After all these years it seems we are no closer to the truth today than when we started.

     Just last week I saw a clip of an Alabama legislator talking about creation as if it happened last week. Well, maybe not last week but 6,000 years ago is practically the same as last week if you believe the universe is 15-billion years old. Apparently the debate between creationists and evolutionists will go on forever, which so far is either 6,000 years or 15,000,000,000 years.

     There is an outdated reference to eight-tracks in the story. I left it in because when you're telling a story about something that happened 15 billion years ago, or even 6000 years ago,  does anything really go out of style?

Adam and Eve Were Space Astronauts

 

The front page headline in the National Enquirer (January16) caught my eye and imagination.  It said simply, “Adam and Eve Were Space Astronauts.”  Let us go back now to relive those final days of Adam and Eve – Space Travelers and those first early days of Adam and Eve – Earth Citizens.

Adam looked at his wife sitting in the seat next to him.  His face was beginning to show the strain of the many years he had been at the controls.  Eve looked a little ragged herself.