Well, Feel Good Friday is groovy and I haven’t done it in awhile.
Changing things around today and practicing some stuff I need to learn for work on my very own blog. Excuse the mess.
And I went back to where I started in the inverted. I like it better.
When I am in a weird or tired frame of mind, I go talk to strangers. I am personable enough and can pretty much talk to a book of stamps so it isn’t hard for me to strike up a conversation. The reason why that I go roaming is that I usually learn something kind of cool and on the other hand, there are no expectations.
I have said before I have huge commitment issues so I guess you can say I am a love and leave ‘em kind of girl, 
especially when discussing things in a coffee shop or in a bar. I’m comfortable in these places. I’ve had some pretty unique conversations recently and the newscoma of old would have put on her trusty cape and ran to the computer to document all the inanities and serious coolness that I had witnessed. I’ve been going through this thing that I miss blogging for fun and I should do it more often because when you do things for dough-re-mi, they are no longer as much fun. I love talking about politics, but when it’s all you do, you sort of just want to talk about books, catfood, do zombies remember smoking cigarettes or that your dog’s breath having a high stink factor.
Well, these things entertain me.
And so I will take you to the meeting of a stranger who helped me want to write again.
There was the guy I met who was a gravedigger. He had the kindest eyes I’ve ever seen and, quite frankly, was built like you could imagine a man that works in the dirt would. Tight and sinewy, he was listening to a conversation I was having about reality television (No POLITICS or people bitching at me about politics when they don’t know me because I honestly need a break from it thus seeking out a new ear and voice) and I mentioned that I loved Deadliest Catch. I also said that staged dating reality shows make me want to stab a Hummer.
He said, “I do too. It’s a show that makes me cry and it’s real. They should win an Emmy this year.”
We went on to discuss how it was hard not to bawl when Capt. Phil died and how the finale was just as devastating as Edgar told Sig he was ready to take a break.
My gravedigger said, “Sig felt like he had done something wrong. Men do that. We hide behind anger because we can’t deal with stronger emotions because they are bruising to our very souls. We take it out on those people we care about entirely too often. We shouldn’t but we do.”
A poet … I found a man that puts coffins in the ground who was wrapping words around as if they were light feathers caught in the sun.
We continued to talk, with other folks I might add, about genders and what is expected and what is reality.
He knew Squirrel Queen’s father and mentioned that he had been in charge of burying her grandmother last year. He said he had gotten him out of a jam awhile back but he didn’t tell me why or what J.D. had actually done for him. I didn’t press it and no one else did either.
“Are there ghosts at the cemeteries you work at?” I said, because sometimes I have the social skills of a cabbage.
He smiled, “I think so. I feel the air stir sometimes when I am alone. I know someone is there and I always try to say hello, to let them know I’m taking care of them the best I can.”
The conversation went on a bit but it was time for me to leave. We talked of many things, of how the heat destroyed the fresh flowers on the graves, on how he sometimes saw people crying desperate tears for their losses and how he would wait for them leaving them with their grief. He talked of his first child and how she still spoke to spirits in their older house and how she would smile at things he could not see and how he could feel them though when he was alone with the day-to-day tasks with his job.
“What is your name?” he asked as I stood up to go.
“I am just nobody really, but my friends call me Trace,” I smiled.
“You having a bad day? You definitely aren’t nobody,” he laughed and reached for my hand, shaking it within his. “I am Thomas.”
I said it was nice to meet him and that I was having a day of having the self-confidence of roadkill, a summer actually but I didn’t tell him that although I believe I could have and it would have been more than okay.He nodded knowingly saying he had been there, done that.
“You are going to remember me as Thomas the Gravedigger. And when you do, that’s alright with me,” he said. “You aren’t telling me everything and that’s okay too. Did you just need a day to be free?”
I nodded.
“Well, were you?” Thomas asked.
“Yes,” I said. “And thank you more than you will ever know.”
A gravedigger taught me some lessons in life and humility.
Thank you Thomas, I needed that. I needed it like water. I needed to not be anyone or anything other than Trace for a little while who likes a show about crab fishing and likes to talk about ghosts.
Thank you, sweet gravedigger.
Quick observations from Hoots:
- I met a second guy who talked to me about wrestling a bear. Now let me say, wrestling a bear is more popular than I once thought. He was also in his 70s and I guess they really don’t do that much anymore. Animal laws must have stopped it although I have no proof of that. However, there is something quite charming talking to an older man who made money wrestling bears. During his day, he fancied himself as an Elvis of sorts. While I talked to him in a bar and grill, Pat Robertson played on the TV. I found that to be odder than the beer wrestling.
Mabel
- I walked into a local juke joint and heard the saying “Thank God you are hear. Dudes are being stupid and sexist and I told them you would take care of it.” Yeah. I gulped. But I took care of it.
- I heard an elected democrat actually act like a democrat. (Praise be!!)
- I heard a kid say that he didn’t understand why the news loved Lindsey Lohan so much because he thought she was old and sorta sad. (Said kid was 11.)
- I saw Dr. Richard Chesteen and his wonderful wife Gloria, and they are awesome. If you don’t know Dr. Chesteen, you should.
- Went to get a wireless card for my computer and realized Hoots is getting hosed. (Staying at a place that doesn’t have access to broadband or wireless.) I might has well of bought a new car. Needless to say, I didn’t get the wireless card.
- Heard a woman talking about getting botox.
- Investigated things I’m not going to talk about.
- Had an allergic reaction to a woman who apparently decided to wear two bottles of some fruity smelling perfume. I was sitting in a coffee shop and I have to tell you, that wasn’t fun. Death by Eau Du Smelly. She was a really cute girl, she didn’t need that. I will apologize for hacking and coughing here in a delightfully passive aggressive way. I was sick for three hours.
- Got mad.
- Got over it.
- Read another Carl Hiassen book.
- Worked on my novel so I can send it to some folks. Man, I must be a horndog or something because apparently I like writing the sexy.
Not much, but I am writing over at Speak to Power as well. Today’s version is about democrats losing confidence.
This may make you laugh all day.
Given to us by a local farmer
The air conditioner went out on the day after Memorial Day. The car and some other things died too. It is what it is. We are not waitresses or bartenders … bloggers write because we love it and tip jars don’t usually work for writers. We do it because we feel compelled to do it. Yet, there is not always time to write for pleasure these days.
Life gets in the way.
I try though, I do. Recently, I revisted a novel I wrote about five years ago before I started blogging. I have dusted it off, updated the technology terms in it and am trying to break it into two parts. It’s given me a lot of joy in those moments that I have felt isolated at Squirrel Farm. I sent it to some people I trust and they reacted positively. I needed that. I’ll just be honest, I don’t know what to do with it and there just isn’t any possibility at this point to self-publish.
You may be wondering about the A/C, but it won’t be fixed unless there is a $5,000 dollar tab included and that isn’t going to happen .The car went out about the same time although it should be back today and the smart phone … well, you have to make choices …
However, I have learned wonderful things, things that people that are online might not know about my life right now as I’ve been on the farm.
I saw the skunk family more than once. The mother leads her babies out late at night. Mabel will bark and we do not let her out. Steph calls them The McStinkersons. We are not the Partridge Family with their tomato juice. and we know that is the skunks are nocturnal so we leave them be much to Mabel’s dismay (and occasional desire to pee which has be put on hold while they frolic around the yard.) We see the baby foxes wrestling. There are three of them and we believe that the mother is gone but someone is taking care of them. They play and they wrestle and there are at peace with the farm.
There is no broadband. There is not dial -up. Oh, there is at schools and libraries but when children and their parents are working on the farm, there is nothing. There isn’t even access to either option so when you hear candidates talking about access, listen to them. I’m living it now. The thing is that some folks don’t know what they are missing because they’ve never had it. They will have to soon as so much is going online. Education is changing and broadband will be needed for all citizens in the state sooner rather than later.
They are busy people on the farms now. The corn is dry. Soybeans look pretty good. Milo surrounds the farm. Now, it looks like tiny corn but that will change, I’m told.
I advocate for rural America but it falls on deaf ears. Maybe that’s just how I feel sometimes.
This has been a very hard summer. I get up and head to town with dawn pressing impressively at my back.. We now have NPR again which is so wonderful that I can’t even explain it and I listen to it, avoiding the deer who feed to the dismay of the farmers on the burnt corn.
Yet, the bossman filmed several of his commercials in Hoots on Thursday. I showed it off. Hootsvillians answered questions and watched as a very hot and tired production crew filmed the town which came off looking quite lovely, the courthouse standing tall and proud. The response was good. They didn’t know what they were getting into and yet they found that stereotypes are just that, false images of rural America perpetuated. It went well for both those who live here and for those who don’t.
Sales tax was brought in, snippets of small town America were embraced for a few hours and, alas, I left sunburned but relatively happy that I got to show Hoots off.
It’s a start and it was of the good.
.
An exchange between Donna and Josh from the West Wing from the episode Take Out The Trash Day.
Donna: What’s take out the trash day?
Josh: Friday.
Donna: I mean, what is it?
Josh: Any stories we have to give the press that we’re not wild about, we give all in a lump on Friday.
Donna: Why do you do it in a lump?
Josh: Instead of one at a time?
Donna: I’d think you’d want to spread them out.
Josh: They’ve got X column inches to fill, right? They’re going to fill them no matter what.
Donna: Yes.
Josh: So if we give them one story, that story’s X column inches.
Donna: And if we give them five stories …
Josh: They’re a fifth the size.
Donna: Why do you do it on Friday?
Josh: Because no one reads the paper on Saturday.
Donna: You guys are real populists, aren’t you?
You’re welcome.
What I will remember the most about Rick Wilson is his relationship with his grandson Jack. They were together constantly. Rick would feed Jack pickles and ranch dressing while he was checking on his business, which was Cadillacs in Martin. One of the last times I spoke to Rick, he was a bit swollen from the steriods he was having to take for the
Rick Wilson
stem cell transplant that ultimately didn’t work, he talked about Jack writing a letter to President Barack Obama. His actions with Jack reminded me so much of my own grandfather. They were constantly together.
Rick was a part of a lot of people’s lives. He was a businessman, a father, a grandfather and from the way his wife Kathy would look at him, a hell of a husband. He was our friend. I say “our” because it applies. He was everyone’s buddy. He was usually quiet and softspoken, but it was his eyes that you had to watch. It took me a long time to figure out when he was pulling one over on me until I learned to look at his eyes. If his eyes were laughing, even though he might have the most serious look on his face, you knew you were in. It took me quite a bit of time to figure that out.
On my 42nd birthday, he put four beers in front of me in small unmarked plastic cups and told me to tell him which beer was from what company. I struggled a bit with it, not sure what was what. Later on, he told me my first response was right.
“You shouldn’t have doubted yourself,” he said. “You were right up front, but you didn’t believe in yourself.”
Story of my life summed up in two sentences.
He wasn’t afraid to speak his mind but I found that he weighed what he would say carefully. Once again, he reminded me of my grandfather, who did the same thing. He made sure his words had value.
He was a Vietnam vet. He didn’t talk about it much, but the day that Westboro Church came to town is the day I remember the most. It wasn’t about Westboro, it was about putting a fine young man to rest who gave his life for his country. The Patriot Guard showed up and outnumbered the Phelps clan 20 to 1. After the services, Cadillacs filled up with bikers, businessmen and friends who were all together as one. You honestly couldn’t move and there was a satisfaction on Rick’s face that people, military and non-military alike, were supporting the family and friends of Dustin Laird. He told me the next week, very quietly, about how much it meant to him because it wasn’t like that when he returned home.
That meant a lot to me, that he shared this. More than I can express in this post.
When he got sick last year, I had a bad feeling. You could tell he didn’t feel good. He didn’t talk about it much. When people are sick, I’ve seen them deal with their illnesses in different ways. They sometimes talk about it a lot and other folks don’t bring it to the surface because they are more private about their struggles. Rick did not talk to me very much about what he was going through. When he and his family decided to go through with the stem cell transplant, they kept a journal of their experiences though. (Caring Bridge is absolutely wonderful.)
Rick was a good man and he passed on to the next chapter Friday night. We are better for knowing him.
I just wish I could tell him that now. He took care of a lot of people.
And I was one of them.
I never met Gary Coleman. I hate that his life became a satire because he was a real person, but to be honest, I never thought much about him. Dennis Hopper was a cool actor and director but I somewhat have the same response. He was probably in the best movie made in the 80′s in Blue Velvet. He was righteously creepy in that. But, you know, I didn’t think about him unless he was on the screen in front of me. I’ll be honest, I didn’t even know that Art Linkletter was still alive. My bad.
Twitter loves celebrity deaths. Trending topics are either Justin Beiber (who I have never heard sing and who makes me oddly uncomfortable anyway) or who has died. Occasionally a news story will take over, but for the most part, the trending topics tend to be pop culture explosions that die out after a couple of days.
I am going to tell you a story later on. One I will write in a bit because I can’t right now without my eyes getting dusty. It is about a man I knew that was kind to me. I can’t write it yet but I will. He died Friday. He meant a lot to people in Hoots.
Exquisite.
You have always made life better.
Jack, who always had more trouble catching on to the big picture on this television series, finally let go last night. I’ve seen pretty much a mixed reaction from folks who wanted the easy answers. The thing Lost did is not give us that and even though I thought I was going to be highly pissed that I didn’t get an outgoing manual on every answer I’ve wanted for the past six years.
I wasn’t.
If you haven’t seen it, there is more after the jump.
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