Yes, Let's Discuss Incarceration Rates, Shall We?

What do all of these people have in common? Well, a lot actually. They are all powerful. They are all lecherous pigs. They are all insanely wealthy. All of them have been accused of rape. They are all men. 

...and not a single one of them will ever spend a single night in jail.

Last night I got involved in a social media debate about incarceration rates. Someone tried to explain the vastly different incarceration rates between African-Americans and whites as simply a result of prudent public safety advocacy on the part of wise and impartial judges. If a black teenager is caught selling drugs along with a white teenager, what is a good judge to do? The white teenager shows up in his courtroom with two loving parents, gainfully employed, along with a respectable lawyer. The black teenager's single, welfare-dependent mother shows up along with a public defender, with no father anywhere in sight. Mustn't the judge consider the defendant's support structures when determining a sentence? After all, if he returns the wayward black teen back to his public housing environment, won't he be much more likely to sin again, while the white kid, with loving parents and a nice neighborhood to support him be less likely to return to a life of crime?? Isn't this just a public safety issue? I was incredulous. He was insistent.

But, in the case of these famous serial sexual predators, we see the ultimate fulfillment of my friend's form of equal protection. If any of these gentlemen were poor, lived in the projects and couldn't afford high priced lawyers, each of them would be spending the rest of their miserable lives in the big house. But, because they have such excellent support systems to go home to, each from stable homes located in neighborhoods with finely trimmed lawns, and are represented by legal dream teams, none of them will go to jail. This is what disparate incarceration rates looks like when it grows up. It's also why we have the 14th Amendment, despite the fact that it's protections are so unevenly applied. If you have no problem with the different fates of our two teenage drug dealers, then you should be perfectly fine with the likes of Harvey Weinstein walking the streets, a free man.

Shameful.

Top 5 Things That Annoy Me...(at the moment)

Everyone has them, those irksome things that fray the nerves, stew the bowels, and sound to the heart like nails on a chalkboard. These things change with the seasons. Things that annoyed the heck out of you six months ago may be minor irritants today. Something that you haven't even given a second thought to for months could start yanking your chain tomorrow morning. Although your list might be totally different than mine, I have a blog and you don't, and at this moment, these are the things that are sticking in my craw:

1. The silly, annoying and pretentious martial language of political advertising.

- This time of year my mailbox is stuffed with mostly attack advertising from various political candidates running for statewide office. I am constantly being assured of Candidate X's fearsome willingness to fight for me. I am informed of all the many battles he or she has already waged and won on my behalf. Then I am assured that unlike Candidate Y(who was always suspiciously missing in action during the heat of the aforementioned battles) Candidate X has a clear record of answering the call. Just so I'm clear on the subject, Candidate X then commits to an unwavering commitment to sustained and relentless fighting in the future if only I will vote for him or her. Generally speaking, unless Candidate X has several Purple Hearts in his or her resume, he or she should knock off the false bravado of what a brave fighter they are. Besides, the only politician I've known in my lifetime for whom this sort of advertising would actually be true is Joe Morrissey. So annoying.

2. The type of television commercials that run during the baseball postseason.

- What makes this particularly annoying is that I realize fully that I am the target customer. It's no secret that the median age of baseball fans has been drifting higher over the past twenty years so if I am constantly being beaten over the head with Viagra adds I guess it's my fault for being in my very late 50's. But, it's not just the erectile dysfunction overkill, it's all of the other miracle cures...everything from diabetes to receding hairlines to those pesky fungus-infested toenails, men my age are clearly going to hell in a hand basket. Being constantly reminded of my mortality while watching a bunch of 25 year olds playing a game that I used to play is...annoying.

3. People who act like there is zero racism in the United States

- The most extreme example of this was the recent statement by that noted authority on race relations in America, Mike Ditka, who opined that there hadn't been any "oppression in the last 100 years." Of course, it might be that Ditka is just bad at math, since the footage of those people getting Fire-hosed and attacked by growling German shepherds in Selma back in 1963 would appear at first glance to be within that 100 year timeframe. Maybe he forgot to carry the 1. While an incredible amount of progress has been made in race relations during my lifetime, there is still work to be done, and anyone who pretends that there isn't is.....annoying.

4. People for whom every single solitary thing in the world is about race.

- Yes, there is racism in America. There is racism everywhere basically because the human heart is desperately wicked. But not every human failure can be laid at its feet. Sometimes people get fired from their jobs because they are incompetent. Sometimes you get passed over for that promotion because you're a jerk. And sometimes, there isn't a racist reason for stuff that happens. Just because you're a hammer doesn't mean that the entire world is a nail. It's....annoying.

5. Political situational ethics.

- I'm tired of playing the game called, "My sexual pig isn't as bad as your sexual pig." How about we all just stop comparing our side's creeps to your side's creeps? How about we all agree to call out repulsive and piggish behavior whenever we find it? This particular annoyance is best summed up by Jonah Goldberg who said it this way: ..."If you decry piggish behavior only when it helps your side, or if you think accusers are telling the truth only when they speak up about people you hate (or don’t need professionally), then you don’t actually care about sexual harassment." Yes. Exactly. Otherwise...it's annoying.

Manipulation For Fun and Profit

I have not been a fan of all of the kneeling going on in professional football. Do players have a right to protest? Sure they do. I just think that there's a time and place for everything, and making a spectacle of yourself during the playing of the national anthem before a sporting event is a poor choice of time and place. But, that's just my opinion. Others disagree. Fine.

But, you know what I'm really not a fan of? Being manipulated...and by any reasonable measure, that's exactly what happened yesterday in Indianapolis.

The Vice President of the United States, along with his wife, flew up to Lucas Oil Stadium to attend the game between his home town Indianapolis Colts and the San Fransico Forty-Niners. With cameras rolling, the VP stood ramrod straight with his hand over his heart as the anthem played. Down on the field, as had been the case in all of their previous games this season, twenty Forty-Niner players knelt in protest with hands over their hearts. Soon afterwards, the VP left the game in a protest of his own, quickly tweeting this:

"I left today's Colts game because @POTUS and I will not dignify any event that disrespects our soldiers, our Flag, or our National Anthem."

As if on cue, Donald Trump tweeted:

"I asked @VP Pence to leave stadium if any players kneeled, disrespecting our country. I am proud of him and @secondlady Karen."

Mission Accomplished.

Here's how this happened:

White House Operative: Hey, have you guys seen this poll? The American people disapprove of NFL players kneeling during the national anthem 62%-38%.

White House Ass Kisser: So?

Operative: So...we need to get out in front of this, take advantage of these numbers somehow. Quick...Google which team has the most protesters.

White House Googler: That would be the Forty-Niners.

Operative: Who do they play this Sunday?

Googler: That would be the Colts, at Indianapolis.

Operative: Are you freaking kidding me??!! What a stroke of luck!

Ass Kisser: Wait, I don't get it...

Operative: The Colts are the VP's favorite team. He's from Indiana, remember?

Ass Kisser: Yeah, but I don't understand wh...

Operative: Jeeze bro...how did you ever get a job here!? We'll send the VP to the game, sit him on the front row of a prominent box, and he will stand for the anthem looking for all the world to see like Captain America. Then, when the Forty Niner players kneel, the VP will make a huge deal about walking out of the game in his own protest. Then we'll send out a Tweet about how we can't abide someone disrespecting our flag. It's a home run! We score points with the voters, and we keep stoking this fire for all it's worth. Listen dude, if you're gonna pick a political fight, always pick a fight with millionaire ballpayers who refuse to stand during the national anthem. It's a guaranteed win!!

Before any of you get your shorts in a knot, I am aware that the Trump White House isn't the first one to seek to exploit touchy societal issues for political gain. His predecessor wasn't always Mr. Peace-Maker, after all. But, Trump seems especially adept at the art of division and manipulation. Regardless of who occupies the White House, one would hope that the chief executive would be in the business of trying to bridge divisions, to quell unrest, to be an agent of reconciliation when the country is tearing itself apart. With regards to the national anthem protests Trump seems thoroughly delighted with the issue, first with his undignified and unconstitutional, Fire the sons of bitches comment and now this staged walkout. He apparently feels that he has a winning hand so he's going to play it for all it's worth. Wonderful.

So, yeah...I'm no fan of millionaire athletes kneeling during the Anthem, but what I really resent is being manipulated by politicians.

Reason Number 16 Why I Don't Read Oprah Magazine

A friend of mine recently posted these three photographs online, hoping to begin yet another conversation about race. They come from an article in Oprah Magazine and came with the breathless tag line:

"In three devastatingly simple photos, the yawning gap of inequality between white women and women of color is brought to the forefront."

My friend opened the discussion with his own reaction to these pictures thusly:

"Why do these 3 photos make you uncomfortable? When I first saw them I was confused, startled, and upset."

A vigorous discussion followed. 

When I first saw the pictures, here's what happened. I was watching a baseball game. During a commercial break, I ran across the photographs. As is usually my habit, I looked at the pictures before I read any of my friends comments, since along with most Americans, my eyes are much more drawn to visuals. I noticed immediately two things, how brilliantly colorful they were, almost as if the color had been enhanced artificially, and the fact that all of the people in the pictures were female. Then I scrolled up to my friend's comments. Immediately I thought, Wait, what did I miss? I looked at them a second time. Still...uncomfortable? Confusing? So only then did I click on the accompanying link to Oprah Magazine. Finally, I got it. Racial roll reversal. Check!

The comment section of my friend's post began filling up with puzzled white people, like myself, who felt confused alright, but not in the way the folks at Oprah Magazine intended. When several people opined that nothing about any of the photographs made them feel in the least bit uncomfortable, a helpful suggestion was made by a commenter that we were all probably lying. Another conversation about race ending up careening into the ditch. So, what to make of all this?

After reading the Oprah piece, it's clear what the purpose of the spread was. They were trying to make white people feel uncomfortable about the fact that, as a majority race, we enjoy most of the power when it comes to retail, and more often than not, we are the ones who get served at places that do pedicures, usually by Asian women, and most of the time, if a maid gets hired, it's by a white person and that maid is either black or Hispanic. By staging pictures that reverse this dynamic, it is supposed to produce guilt and grave soul searching about our inherent privilege. Fair enough. 

However, one wonders whether the good people at Oprah Magazine have actually shopped for dolls at a toy store in the past, oh, I don't know, 20 years? The last time I was in the market for dolls was back in the early 1990's. My go-to stores were ToysRus and American Girl. The doll aisle at ToysRus was always a mile long and crammed full of every kind of doll the mind could imagine. Most of them featured white dolls, it's true. Back then, America's population was somewhere around 75% white, so it would make perfect sense that the most predominant doll race would be white. That's called knowing your customer. However, there were always plenty of dolls from a whole host of ethnicities available. I'm not sure of the percentages, but one would assume they were represented in rough proportion to the percentage found in the company's profile of a ToysRus customer. American Girl was a whole other story. Even in the 90's, that place was a globalist one world government dream, a regular United Nations of dolls! Of course, most of them were priced beyond my ability to pay, so...

Now, I'm sure that back in the 50's, one would be hard pressed to find an African-American doll at the local General Store. The fact that this is no longer true makes a point that Oprah Magazine seems unwilling to...that times have changed, largely for the better, in the area of race relations since the 50's.

Moving on to the pedicure shop photo, again...when is the last time the editorial staff at Oprah Magazine has actually been to a nail salon? Although I have no personal knowledge of this subject, my wife does, and in the 30 or so years since she has been getting her nails done, nearly 100% of the time, she is attended by an Asian woman. Why is this? Why do Asian women, particularly Vietnamese women gravitate to this particular profession? I have no idea. But, my hunch is that it has virtually nothing to do with racism. So, a photograph that features smiling Asian women being serviced by white pedicurists proves...what, exactly? Are the Asian women laughing because the white women are doing it all wrong, or what? Why is this supposed to make white people feel some sort of guilt? In this particular picture, it's the white women who are getting paid, and the Asian women who are being grossly overcharged for the guilty pleasure of a pedicure, after all!

The last photograph is even dumber. We see what looks like a young, beautiful, wealthy Hispanic women, being served tea by her uniformed white maid. The stereotype is completed by the lap dog and the omnipresent cellphone. I should point out that this particular white maid is precariously close to getting fired since her eyes are clearly fixed upon her employer instead of the cup into which she is pouring hot tea. One gets the distinct impression that the wealthy Hispanic hero in this photo would be very unforgiving if Fido gets scalded. It is clear that we are supposed to look at this and ponder the irony, or something. When I look at this, I can imagine this actual scene being reproduced in any number of insanely wealthy Hispanic homes in south Florida. Or course, an argument can and should be made that any self respecting Hispanic socialite in Miami should probably hire a fellow Hispanic to attend to her every need, since charity always begins at home.

The fact that none of these pictures had the desired impact on my consciousness is troubling. Why did I not feel the confusion and discomfort that my friend felt? Does this mean that I am insensitive, or ignorant, or both? Perhaps if I had read my friend's comments and clicked on the article first, before looking at the pictures, I would have reacted differently. Or maybe I am stuck in some sort of privilege denial mindset. 

Or, maybe the pictures were just...dumb?

OOOOoooooffffff!!!!

WARNING!!! The following blog contains disturbing images that may offend the sensibilities of many female readers, and cause actual physical pain to many male readers. Proceed with caution.

During my first week back in the salt mines, the one saving grace in an otherwise horrendous week has been the baseball playoffs. So far, four games have been played. The two wild card affairs were truly wild, and the openers of the division series last night were both great fun. Unlike another famous American sport, I have been able to watch each game without having any clue as to the politics of a single player. Our National Anthem was performed before each game without incident. It was quite refreshing. But, this blog is not about political protest. It's not even about baseball. It's about one isolated image from one of the games that I found...priceless.

It was the fourth inning of the wildcard game between the New York Yankees and the Minnesota Twins. On the hill for the Yanks was reliever, David Robertson, who throws a baseball 100 miles per hour with great movement. He is not only hard to hit, but hard to catch. On one particular pitch, Mr. Robertson uncorked a wicked 98 mph sinking fastball towards the plate. Yankee catcher, Gary Sanchez was about to catch it when the hitter swung wildly, desperately trying to catch up with the pitch, but only catching a tiny piece of the ball. This is the nightmare of anyone who has ever played catcher in baseball...the dreaded foul tip. Only, when the foul tip in question is slight...and comes against a 98 mph pitch, this happens:

Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you...this particular foul tip ended up in a terrible place. On national television, played live and many nauseating times on super slow motion, Gary Sanchez took a direct hit in the old family jewels. All across America, in living rooms great and small, across a broadly diverse audience of both liberals and conservatives, rednecks and metro-sexuals, gays and straights, meat eaters and vegetarians, men from every imaginable background let out a collective groan of sympathetic agony. Suddenly, even avowed Yankee-haters like me, put all of the vitriol aside for a few agonizing moments of commiseration with this suffering brother. Sanchez went down in a heap, like a sack of potatoes. Grandfathers all across the country turned to their sons and grandsons whispering, Boys, this is why you wear a cup.

Of course, the one man in America who had the best view of what happened was the guy who threw the pitch, David Robertson. His reaction, caught on camera for all the world to see was....priceless:

Exactly!!! Here's a big league pitcher, performing in a pressure packed game on national television, who suddenly isn't thinking about himself or even his team. He's only thinking about one thing, ladies and gentlemen...and it isn't his next contract!

      

To the everlasting credit of Mr. Sanchez, he remained in the game, as did Mr. Robertson, to the great relief of men all across the fruited plain. Perhaps there's a greater lesson to be learned from this unfortunate incident. Perhaps it's possible, after all, for men to put aside their considerable differences and unite around a common theme greater than ourselves. Maybe it's possible for men and women to lay down the things that divide us long enough to unite in compassionate empathy for the excruciating suffering of a fellow human being brought low by a foul tip. If we can do that, maybe we can eventually figure out how to get along outside of the ball park.

On The Edge of Madness

Sanity, I've discovered, is a fragile thing. You might think that you're basically a stable person with no prior history of mental illness, much like the Las Vegas shooter. You might consider the fact that since there is no evidence of mental illness or instability in your family history, you're in the clear. But, I am here to testify to the fact that Mother Theresa herself could have been driven mad by the introduction of high powered fans into her Calcutta hut. While she might have been perfectly suited to the rigors and despair of living amongst the poorest of the poor, three days of listening to the constant, incessant hum of industrial turbines would have transformed her into a raving lunatic.

I'm told by the powers that be that this protocol is required by the insurance company in order to determine the extent of the damage to our kitchen floor. The very efficient Servpro technicians come by every 24 hours to measure exactly how much moisture is being extracted by the four machines that have taken up residence in the downstairs of my house. They enter the data into their hand held computers, then disappear without comment. Meanwhile, the noise continues...the deafening, grinding, whirling sound of a category 5 hurricane...continues, taking a slow, inexorable toll on our sanity.

If I were a more tech-savvy blogger, I could upload audio of these machines, to give you some clue as to what we are dealing with. But because I am not, I will have to rely on my way with words. But first, let me introduce each of them to you...

This is Judas, named for the infamous betrayer of our Lord. He is responsible for producing gale force winds along the surface of our kitchen floor 24/7, which follow the contures of the cabinets to create a whirlwind effect throughout the space. This has the effect of destroying my wife's hair every time she makes the mistake of entering the kitchen for any reason.

Ok, this girl is the star of the show. We call her Ursula, the Sucker of Death. Ursula is the loudest machine in the house. Her job is to suck any moisture that happens to be lurking under the hardwood floors through the cracks. The big black pads are filled with hundreds of sucking nodules that hold the floor in a death grip when deployed, but whenever the machine is cut off, serves as an occasion to send send you ass over tea kettles if you ever step on them without great care. So, not only is Ursula the loudest, most obnoxious machine, she is also the only one which poses a threat to your physical safety as well. A true dual threat.

Then, there's this guy, Donald...so named because like the other famous Donald, serves no discernible purpose. He just stands there, taking up a considerable amount of space, with the stated job of de-humidifier-in chief. Exactly why the entire downstairs of my house needs de-humidifying is unclear, since the offending moisture is beneath the floor of my kitchen. But, I defer to the experts in matters of de-humidification. A side effect of Donald's presence in my house has been a drying out of every orifice of the human body. Any day now, the nosebleeds will begin in earnest.

Thanks to the open floor plan of our house, there is no avenue of escape from the roar. Even when we retreat to our upstairs master bedroom, with towels stuffed around the door, we still hear it. In the shower, we still hear it. When blasting Def Leppard full blast through the Bose, we still hear it. Even when I leave the house to go to work, the residual sound still rings in my ears for half an hour.

But, very soon, I'm told...this will be over. Then we will get to enjoy the harmonious hum of floor sanding machines for a few weeks.

Why don't you guys all come over and we'll hang out?

Things Are Looking Up!

Highlights of this day, Wednesday, the 4th day of October, 2017:

# My luck began to change this morning when, just in the nick of time, my dentist had to cancel all of the day's appointments because his wife had a horrible kidney stone thing that forced him to flee the premises to rush her to the hospital. YES!!

# I heard on the radio that today is the tenth anniversary of the opening of Big Al's, giving me an excellent excuse to watch tonight's baseball playoffs at my favorite bar.

# Our Secretary of State and fourth in line for the Presidency, Rex Tillerson, called a hasty press conference this afternoon to dispel rumors that he was about to resign because he had concluded that his boss was a moron. He assured the country that no, he had no intention of resigning...despite the fact that his boss is a moron.

# Blood Pressure clocked in at an impressive 120/80 at my doctor's appointment. My new doctor, the one I was assigned after my doctor  of over thirty years suddenly dropped dead, cheerfully informed me that despite my overall good health and fine conditioning, the primary driver of life and death is genetics, so I shouldn't get too cocky about one decent BP reading.

# The US Postal Service finally delivered our mail that we had asked them to hold while we were away for three weeks. To the surprise of absolutely no one, they only held it for roughly half the days that we were gone, delivering it on the other days. According to the advertisements I received in today's haul, one of the guys running for some office in the next election is a real scumbag, and if I know what's good for me I won't vote for him.

# After their victory in last night's wild card game, the Yankees have become the odds on favorite to win the World Series...according to every single solitary talking head at ESPN.

A Troublesome Losing Streak

Ok, it seems like since I got back from Maine, I've settled into a disturbing losing streak of sorts. Maybe it's my imagination, a kind of vacation jet-lag or something, but lots of bad things have been happening. First, the dish washer goes belly up, then all of these ponderous machines take over the kitchen, sucking up water, de-humidifying and blowing air everywhere at deafening noise levels 24/7. If the machines don't fix the bowed floors, they will have to be torn up, replaced and re-sanded...which will require great dislocation for weeks, I'm sure. As a side benefit of all of this, I have had an allergy for two days, no doubt due to all of the mold being flung throughout my home by the aforementioned machines. This particular allergy has featured a swollen and runny eye, always a delight.

Now, today I discover that my day will be consumed largely by visits to a couple of health care specialists, appointments that were set months ago. First up there's my all time favorite buzz-kill, a trip to my dentist. Dr. T (I withhold his real name as a courtesy) is a decent enough guy, well-trained and friendly, but that doesn't change the fact that he makes his living probing about people's mouths with sharp, pointy objects accompanied by the hideous, high-pitched wail of even more machines. I spend my time there holding my breath and trying to conjure up my happy place (front row seats down the third base line at a baseball game, being served kielbasa and beer by an adorable blonde wearing a Cappy's hat...if you must know!). But every time I get close to that image, this guy shows up.

My second appointment is with my general practitioner for a six month check of my blood pressure and a follow up blood test on the results of my new cholesterol medicine regimen from my stroke thing earlier this year. When I was reminded of this meeting via text my heart sank. Just about the time I had put that unfortunate incident behind me, here comes a snooping doctor to rub my face in it again. 

All is not lost, however, since last night saw the beginning of the greatest time of the year... the Major League Baseball Postseason!!!

Of course, I couldn't watch last night's opener between the Twins and the Yankees on my beautiful television downstairs because of the high winds and industrial hums coming from these guys:

I might have watched on the big screen upstairs in what used to be Patrick's bedroom, now the upstairs den, but that television doesn't work because of a faulty Verizon connection or box or some such things that for some weird reason we have failed to have fixed for like two years now. It's on the list of crap I need to get done, and last night I was kicking myself for putting it off. So, there I was, huddled in my recliner in my bedroom, door closed to the violent wind storm downstairs, following the action on my iPad's MLB app. Aaron Judge doesn't look so huge on an iPad, but I still hate the guy because he's a miserable Yankee.

But, I have no doubt that better days are ahead. My son is getting married to a beautiful girl soon, my daughter and her husband are killing it down in South Carolina, and I'm married to the most beautiful woman in Short Pump. Unlike America under Trump, I'm actually winning!!

58 Dead, 515 Wounded

I wake up this morning to the news that a new record has been set in my country for deaths in a mass shooting event. 50 killed and over 200 wounded is the new standard for American violence. A 64 year old man named Stephen Paddock opened fire from his room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel with an automatic weapon into a crowd of 30,000 people gathered below for a country music concert in Las Vegas. A SWAT team eventually burst into his room and killed him. His female companion, a petite Asian woman named Marilou Danley, is being questioned in police custody at this hour. At this point, no motive has been assigned and not much is known of Mr. Paddock other than the fact that he is an elderly retired white guy going through a divorce who likes to gamble.

I scrolled through the pictures and videos from the scene, courtesy of a British news service, the U.K. Daily Mail, and note that it is always the British press that gives me information like this first. It's odd but consistently true. This sort of thing used to fill me with sadness. In the past a mass shooting would enrage me. Now, I flip through the pictures and shrug. Now, I brace myself for a week of boilerplate shrieking from politicians. I wait for my Facebook wall to fill with some new solidarity icon for the victims and their families, then the inevitable memes that will follow. I will quickly get tired of the calls to Pray for the Las Vegas Victims. Why have I become so jaded? This....

-April 18, 2017 Kori Ali Muhammad shoots dead three people before being arrested by police and charged with murder and assault with a deadly weapon.

-June. 12, 2016 Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old security guard, killed 49 people and wounded 58 others in a terrorist attack/hate crime inside Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

-Feb. 25, 2016: Cedric Ford, 38, killed three people and wounded 14 others lawnmower factory where he worked in the central Kansas community of Hesston. The local police chief killed him during a shootout with 200 to 300 workers still in the building, authorities said.

- Feb. 20, 2016: Jason Dalton, 45, is accused of randomly shooting and killing six people and severely wounding two others during a series of attacks over several hours in the Kalamazoo, Michigan, area. Authorities say he paused between shootings to make money as an Uber driver. He faces murder and attempted murder charges.

- Dec. 2, 2015: Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and Tashfeen Malik, 27, opened fire at a social services center in San Bernardino, California, killing 14 people and wounding more than 20. They fled the scene but died hours later in a shootout with police.

- Oct. 1, 2015: A shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, left 10 people dead and seven wounded. Shooter Christopher Harper-Mercer, 26, exchanged gunfire with police, then killed himself.

- June 17, 2015: Dylann Roof, 21, shot and killed nine African-American church members during a Bible study group inside the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Police contend the attack was racially motivated. Roof faces nine counts of murder in state court and dozens of federal charges, including hate crimes.

- May 23, 2014: A community college student, Elliot Rodger, 22, killed six people and wounded 13 in shooting and stabbing attacks in the area near the University of California, Santa Barbara, campus. Authorities said he apparently shot himself dead after a gun battle with deputies.

- Sept. 16, 2013: Aaron Alexis, a mentally disturbed civilian contractor, shot 12 people dead at the Washington Navy Yard before he was killed in a police shootout.

- July 26, 2013: Pedro Vargas, 42, went on a shooting rampage at his Hialeah, Florida, apartment building, gunning down six people before officers fatally shot him.

- Dec. 14, 2012: In Newtown, Connecticut, an armed 20-year-old man entered Sandy Hook Elementary School and used a semi-automatic rifle to kill 26 people, including 20 first graders and six adult school staff members. He then killed himself.

- Sept. 27, 2012: In Minnesota's deadliest workplace rampage, Andrew Engeldinger, who had just been fired, pulled a gun and fatally shot six people, including the company's founder. He also wounded two others at Accent Signage Systems in Minneapolis before taking his own life.

- Aug. 5, 2012: In Oak Creek, Wisconsin, 40-year-old gunman Wade Michael Page killed six worshippers at a Sikh Temple before killing himself.

- July 20, 2012: James Holmes, 27, fatally shot 12 people and injured 70 in an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

- April 2, 2012: Seven people were killed and three were wounded when a 43-year-old former student opened fire at Oikos University in Oakland, California. One Goh was charged with seven counts of murder and three counts of attempted murder, but psychiatric evaluations concluded he suffered from long-term paranoid schizophrenia and was unfit to stand trial.

This country needs more than prayer at this moment. 

Taking the Bitter With the Sweet

What follows goes into the category of the ebb and flow of life, or maybe... you win some you lose some, or even, you must take the bitter with the sweet. If any of you are my secret enemies and read this blog only to collect evidence to support your resentment against me, or if any of you have quietly resented my three week Maine vacation, you're gonna love this!

Ok, so after unpacking yesterday, I collapsed on my bed for a nap. I've come down with some sort of sinus thing/cold or something, so I was pretty wiped out. When I woke up, I walked downstairs and noticed that where my coffee maker used to be there's an unopened box containing a brand new Hamilton Beech model. My wife explained that when she opened the lid to give it a clean after three weeks of inactivity, she noticed a that the filter and grounds from my last pot was still in there, encrusted with enough mold to kill an asthmatic at thirty paces. She had made the snap decision that instead of cleaning it out, the damage was so severe and disgusting, only a new coffee maker would do. So, she did an online search of five different stores, picked out this Hamilton Beech beauty and marched herself over to Walmart to buy it...and there it set. The maiden pot was brewed without incident. All was well until thirty minutes later when we noticed an odd humming noise coming from the shiny new appliance. The side of the thing became hot. The unmistakable smell of burning plastic filled the air, then the digital display began to flicker. It seemed possessed by an evil demon. Pam grabbed the chord and ripped it from its plug, preventing it from bursting into flames. Now, I have no coffee maker.

After this fiasco, things settled down nicely. We had dinner while we watched the first episode of the new Ken Burns Vietnam documentary. After dinner, Pam loaded the dish washer, turned it on, then went about her business. Suddenly, I heard her exclaim...Oh no!! What's this?? There's water leaking out of the dish washer!! 

Over the next couple of hours, Pam and I did our best Keystone Cop imitation as we frantically tried to...get it to stop!!! Turn it off!...was my expert advice. But turning it off did nothing to stop the flow of hot, dirty water being belched out across the kitchen floor. Legions of towels were brought to bear against the gushing beast. I tried opening the door, which turned the flow into a deluge. Quickly I ran to the fuse box and turned off power to the thing, to no avail. Still, the water gushed. Pam, frantic and wild eyed, instructed me to crawl under the house and find the thing that shuts off the water to the house! I did as I was told, of course, although in twenty years here I have crawled under the house exactly once, and had no idea where this magical valve was located. But, there I was on hands and knees, crawling towards the sound of rushing water, with a sharp eye peeled for any reptilian beasts that might be lurking in the formidable shadows. To my great relief, I heard my wife scream, the water has stopped!!

Of course now we had the dish washer door opened, and it was full of water and weighed a ton. The inside of the expiring appliance was also full of water. If Pam's husband was the handy type and knew anything about how stuff works, he might have instinctively known what to do. But, that ship has sailed...so she did what she always does in times of mechanical crisis...she called Ron Roop, my brother-in-law. Within fifteen minutes, he shows up with a shop vac to suck up the water in the bottom of the dish washer. Although it worked, it also began some belching of its own, spewing filthy water out of several places around the the lid. Then we positioned a couple of deep dish pans under the door of the unit and slowly lifted the door, releasing torrents of water all over the place, but mostly into the dishes. After bailing in this fashion for fifteen minutes, it finally stopped leaking. Order was finally restored and every towel we owned was now draped over the deck railings to dry, making our deck look like it belonged to a family of Gypsies.

So, now I have no coffee maker, our dish washer doesn't work, and the hard wood floor in the kitchen is bowing quite nicely.

Welcome back home, Dunnevant's!!!

Back Home

Just a note to let everyone know that we made it safely home this afternoon. It was a largely uneventful two day slog back to Short Pump. And, just like that, it's over.

Lucy has been ecstatic to be back home. She has alternated between sitting on our bed, which has always been her upstairs throne chair, and the sofa, the only piece of furniture she's allowed to sit on downstairs...therefore, her downstairs throne chair. She took a quick spin around her fenced in yard out back just to remind herself that she was home, now she's sacked out on the floor in my library. She may sleep for a week.

It's when you arrive back home from vacation that you realize you're not rich. If I were rich, surely I would have people on the payroll to do all my unpacking. What a miserable exercise...as if I needed any reminders that my vacation is over. You open up your suitcase full of mostly dirty clothes and the delightful aroma of Loon Landing hits you in the face. It's a mixture of pine needles, lake water and campfire smoke. One tumble in the washing machine will take away the smell from my clothes. Luckily, there is no machine capable of getting that smell out of my heart and soul.

The good news is, there's only 9 more months until we go back, this time with the kids. 

Tomorrow is my one and only buffer day between being in Maine and being back at work. It's all I'll need. There are actually things about home that I've missed. I missed my house. We've been here twenty years. That's a significant amount of time which has endowed this place with its own powerful memories. I've missed my office, the people there more than the actual work, but missed them just the same. I missed my church, and the people in my small group. But, mostly I missed the calming, dependable rhythm of my life here. How lucky I am to be able to go to so fabulous a place as Maine, then come back to a good life in Short Pump. Sometimes, I wonder why I have it so good. Why me, while so many others have such a struggle? I have no answers to questions like this. But, I am grateful, and I don't take a single part of it for granted. 

Pam's at the store. Tonight she will make white chicken chili. We will watch something on television while we eat. Tomorrow morning, we will go to church.

Good. Maine was great, but being home is good too.

The Last Day

The problem with vacations is that they all have a last day. Today is ours. 

My profession is measured out in numbers, it's how we keep score in the investment business. Everything, eventually, can be reduced to a number. Not so with vacations. Although it doesn't prevent me from trying:

Loon Landing vacation by the numbers:

Only 1 day of rain.

Pam, inexplicably, only ate 1 lobster roll.

Played 2 rounds of golf.

Hosted 2 sets of guests...Russ and Vi White and Alan and Lisa Smith.

Turned the television on 3 times...two games, and the season premiere of This Is Us.

Fell in love with family of 3 loons who continually entertained us for 3 weeks.

Read 5 novels.

Posted photographs of 7 sunsets on Facebook. Could have added 13 others.

Took at last 20 killer naps.

Logged 25 miles of runs/walks on the paths and trails around the cabin, along with 12 miles of kayaking around the lake.

Caught 4 bass, 3 largemouth and 1 smallmouth.

Cooked at least 20 meals on the grill, including steak, hamburger, shrimp, chicken, smoked sausage and foiled potatoes.

On one particularly fabulous run of weather, took 10 consecutive meals outside.

Of course, numbers tell an incomplete story, turning wonderful things into flat, one dimensional digits. Sure, I can tally the number of sunsets, but to understand the beauty and magic you needed to be here. No mere number can describe what it's like to watch the leaves change in slow motion for three weeks. Photographs help, but only a little. I cannot assign a numerical value to the peace that has come over us during our time on this lake. That's the thing about this life, the thing that our parents told us when we were kids...the best things in life can't be measured by numbers. There is so much more to life than the counting of things...how much we have, what we own, the size of this, the heft of that. Too much counting produces men and women who know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

So, every year we come here to banish the numbers from our mind. And each year, there is a last day.

But this day, like all others, is a day that the Lord has made. We will be glad in it.

On The Home Stretch

Our vacation has entered the home stretch, there's just a few days left and we are already trying to banish images of packing up from our imaginations. Weather still holding on to this amazing run of beautiful, sunny days and crisp, cool nights. It might make it easier to leave this place if it would get rainy and cold, but no such luck. Last night we drove into Camden to have dinner at Sea Dog's, the replacement for our beloved Cappy's, which used to serve the best clam chowder in the world, but now serves clam chowder with a strange spice in it which disappoints. 

Besides, nothing Sea Dog's ever does will be able to top this awesome hat I bought at Cappy's on the occasion of their 25th anniversary back in 2005.

This morning I will be heading into the offices of our fabulous rental company, On The Water In Maine, to begin plotting and scheming next year's four week adventure. I will lay out my must-haves and throw out some possible dates, and they will get to work. We can't actually make 2018 reservations prior to November 1st or something, but we must begin the search right away. Next summer will be tricky. There will be a wedding at some point next year. That may make it difficult for Patrick and Sarah to take a week in Maine after having already taken time off for a honeymoon. Also, funds will be tighter since I will, no doubt, have spent a bundle on the blessed event. But, this is the sort of thing I do. I excel at making things happen when it comes to my children. If I have to fly the two of them up here on a Friday and fly them back on a Sunday, well, so be it. There's a chance that Jon and Kaitlin might be able to come for two weeks. Then there's Ron and Paula, and Gordon and Leigh Ann....probably need to find a bigger house for next year. But, I would love to find one on this lake. Quantabacook is about as perfect a place as we have ever stayed up here. And, if this house had one more bathroom I might be tempted to shoehorn everybody into Loon Landing next year too!

Woke up with a sore throat this morning, which is a bit unsettling, since I hardly ever get sick in Maine, or at least...it's been a while since I have. It's probably God's judgement on me for foolishly getting involved in ( i.e...starting) a Facebook political dispute yesterday about the NFL protests. That was a rookie mistake that you would think a seasoned Maine vacationer wouldn't have made. The key to happiness up here is to stay fully disengaged for the duration. I should have known better. So I wake up with a sore throat. God is just, and he will not be mocked! There will be no more of that!!!

Almost finished Empire Falls. Holy Cow, can Richard Russo write. I can't wait to read everything else he has written. Of course, if you can't write inspired prose sitting at a table at the Camden Deli every morning overlooking the bay, then you should probably give it up.

The Time Thief

Regular readers of this blog might be wondering what has happened to me this past week. After a deluge of lake pictures and vacation posts, I inadvertently went dark and have maintained radio silence for over five days. This was not intentional. It was not due to some creative deficiency or writer's block. Rather, I have been hypnotized by this place into something very much like a trance. While enthralled by Quantabacook , I have found it surprisingly easy to tear myself away from the gravitational pull of my former habits. Instead of writing this blog, I've been occupied with a series of new daily rhythms, which include but are by no means limited to, kayaking, fishing, reading, running hastily constructed 5k tracts through the woods, taking Lucy for walks, floating on inflatable rafts, taking my meals on a wooden table on the deck while Pam and I sometimes talk, but mostly just stare at the lake, soaking up the silence. It is this last thing, this staring at the lake, that has risen to the top of the distraction list. It's hard to explain how such a mindless, effortless, seemingly passive exercise could become such a show-stopper, but...let me try.

I wake up between 6:00 and 6:30 in the morning. Upon entering the main living room of the house, the first thing I do is walk over to the wall of windows that face the lake. 

There is always a rush of expectation. Will it be calm or choppy? Clear, or fogged in? Most days it's been calm and clear, since we have won the weather lottery by choosing September of 2017 for this trip. Locals can't believe how warm and beautiful it's been here since we arrived. We are taking full credit for bringing this weather with us through a combination of Southern benevolence and clean living, global warming be damned. After this morning reconnaissance, I allow myself the distraction of making coffee. 

The only deficiency we have found in this lake house is it's lack of comfortable seating. The two chairs and sofa are fine but don't lend themselves to long, leasurely reading sessions...but I make do. This past few days it's been a book by my new favorite author, Richard Russo and his Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Empire Falls. I cannot for the life of me figure out how I have gone 59 years without reading this guy. His stuff always pops up in books you might like when I'm browsing iBooks, and I've known of him forever, but for some reason, never read any of his work. Well, imagine my surprise when I open this one to the acknowledgement page and see this:

Come to find out, the guy has a house up Main Street just past the library and used to come in to the Deli and write every morning. Richard Russo won a Pulitzer for a novel he wrote at the freaking Camden Deli! I'm hooked. Now that Pat Conroy is dead, I've needed a new literary hero. I've found him.

After a robust morning read, Pam eventually emerges from the bedroom in her kayaking outfit, a snappy pink thing that clashes horribly with her bright red kayak, causing her great anguish, but not enough to prevent her from launching out into the deep for a 3-4 mile meander around the lake. I watch her get smaller and eventually disappear around the point, ripples trailing behind her. I watch the sun spread out its warmth to the houses across the way..the morning sun houses. Pam is jealous. She wants morning sun...right up to the point in the day when those houses across the way are in the shade and our dock is splashed in sunlight from around 1:30 in the afternoon until the last rays dip behind the pines at sunset. Then she's content with what we have. She eventually gets back, and we have some sort of breakfast, usually on the table outside. On the days I run, it's something lighter. Now that our last guests have left, it will be less regimented...if you can call a meal with no start time and no fixed menu..regimented.

Then, I'll fish a little. I've caught three nice sized bass this year, and learned how to fish effectively with crank baits, earning significant upgrades to my man card. However, I haven't let the fishing interfere with the real business of my days here in Maine. My job has been to keep a sharp eye peeled on this lake and all of its surroundings. I watch for the appearance of the Loon pair who own this lake, a Mother Loon and a juvenile. They pop up at various times, sometimes as close as twenty feet from the end of our dock..which drives poor Lucy crazy. Just about the time she is about to explode in excitement, they will suddenly disappear, diving below for fish. This vanishing act is a source of great wonderment for Lucy...What happened?? Where did they go? 

I watch for the arrival of wind, if it comes at all, it usually arrives mid-morning. Ripples start sliding in from the north or sometimes the west. After a while the ripples upgrade to a discernible current, then what can be called waves arrive. When the waves get large enough, the dock starts to bob up and down, which used to emit an annoying metal screech in the joints of the dock until I bought the last bottle of WD-40 from the Fraternity Village store and put a stop to that outrage. Mid-morning brings an hour of sun to the dock surface from 10:00 to 11:00. I take advantage by moving a chair out there in it to warm up. Mornings are chilly here, no matter how warm it gets during the day.

Then, Pam and I are always astounded to discover that somehow it is now 2 o'clock in the afternoon and we haven't had lunch. How on earth does this happen? Seriously?? How can it be 2 o'clock? I mean, we've done virtually nothing all day. Sure, there was the kayaking, the fishing and increasingly Pam's paddle boarding...but 2 o'clock? It is a great mystery where the time goes here.

So, we have a snacky lunch. Then, more lake watching. When the afternoon sun arrives in our cove, I swim and take Lucy out for a swim and a frisbee fetching session. Then, maybe a nap.

Eventually, we are always baffled when we discover that it's now 6:30 in the evening and we're still floating out in the lake talking about the kids, having made zero preparations for dinner. Again, the great time thief has struck. We shrug and watch the sun disappear.

Different Year, Same Result.

The weather has finally turned on us. After ten days of perfect conditions, the past couple of days have been overcast, foggy, and filled with drizzle. It was bound to happen. Yesterday was a lazy day. Pam took Russ and Vi to the airport in Portland. While they were gone, I caught a beautiful bass off the end of my dock with a fancy lure that my buddy Alan had loaned me. 

I took a quick picture of it because if I hadn't, he would never have believed me. 

So, today will feature a leasurely trip into Camden for breakfast and some shopping. I need a new book to read. I've read three novels on this trip, only have one more left on my iPad, and need another to reach my goal of five books read on vacation. So, I will browse through a couple of the great bookshops in Camden until I find something that intrigues me. Then we will come back to the cabin to check on Lucy. If the weather is still cloudy and gross, we will spend the afternoon exploring the town of Belfast, around 15 minutes away. 

Last night, after dinner, my wife and I renewed our Rummikub competition from last year. Alert readers will recall the beatdown she laid on me on last year's Maine adventure. Well, so far this year, nothing has changed. A few nights ago, we played probably ten hands of Gin...she won seven. Last night, she won two out of the three games we played. It's the same thing every year...the woman is a cold blooded killer. 

Come...Walk With Me.

I've taken a thousand photographs in Maine, probably a hundred or more of this place alone. It begs to have its picture taken. But, I'm so often disappointed in how they turn out, not because they are blurry or ill-centered, but rather because they never seem to capture the magic. 

Except for a special few, when you say, Ahh, that's it!

This is the one.

It doesn't matter where I took it. This shot doesn't need context. This photograph captures everything I love about Maine. It's an invitation. It stands before you like a great mystery. Where does it lead? How far? Is it dangerous or tranquil, treacherous or benign? It's impossible to tell. Still, it beckons you with the invitation...Come, walk with me.

But, I don't know where it will take me.

We will find out together. Come, walk with me.

I'm tired. This is not a good day for such an uncertain walk.

All of life is uncertain. Come, walk with me.

But, I've too much on my mind right now. My kids, I'm just too worried about my kids to enjoy a walk.

Come, walk with me and I'll show you the reason you wanted to have kids in the first place.

How can I take such a walk when I'm so worried about my job? I don't even know if I'll ever be able to retire.

If you will walk with me, you'll be better at your job.

You don't understand. Have you read a newspaper lately? Trump is in the White House. They're tearing down statues, and driving cars into crowds of young people!

There is no racial hatred where I will take you, and nobody here knows who the president is...come walk with me.

But, there might be ticks.

Hush...when did you get so fragile? Come, walk with me.

I want to, I really do...

There was once a time when you would have run down this path without even thinking. What happened to that guy?

I don't know. I grew up.

No, you grew inward. Come, walk with me and I will reintroduce you to the person you used to be.

How long will it take?

As long as you like. 

Come...walk with me.

Apparently, There Was an Awards Show Last Night

One of the biggest advantages to staying at a lake house in Maine is the fact that you never watch television. Sure, there's one here and the satellite connection is quite good. I know this because, Saturday a week ago, I turned it on to watch part of a college football game. It hasn't been on since. In its place, I have read three novels. I already feel smarter.

So, I cannot offer an opinion on the EMMY's show last night, since I didn't watch. Apparently, it was a three hour Trash Trump Fest. The fact that anyone would be surprised is baffling to me. Who cares, people? It's Hollywood, and they have First Amendment rights too, so chill out!

Meanwhile, a much more important bit of news is the fact that we are finally supposed to get a cloudy day, all day. If so, it will be the first since we arrived eleven days ago. We are at the half way point of our vacation. Tomorrow, Russ and Vi fly back to Richmond. That means that today we will be heading to Hazel's for a lobster roll lunch. Then we might do some sightseeing along the coast. Only supposed to be in the 60's. Perfect weather for a sweater and some ocean scenery. If I stumble upon any permanent damage done by any of those Trump-trashing one liners from last night's EMMY broadcast, I'll take pictures!