Old vs. New

My wife often accuses me of being an old fuddy-duddy, in that I never like anything new, always preferring the versions from my younger days. I must admit that the accusation is mostly true, but not universal. For example, it is my firm conviction that modern country music isn’t country music at all, but rather synthesized pop songs written about nothing, sung by mostly men with southern accents. But...Brad Paisley is still great. There are always exceptions to the rules. I might generally disapprove of modern television programming, but when something like Breaking Bad comes along, I have to admit that it’s as good a drama as has ever been on television. 

However, my attachment to things from my younger days is not absolute.  Craft beer is ten times better than a single can ever brewed by Miller, Coors and Anheuser-Busch combined!  Every single time I turn on the heated seats in my car, I say a prayer of thanks for modern innovation! In fact, from a technological standpoint, I am quite thankful to be alive in 2019. My life has been made infinitely more convenient than it would have been if I were 61 in 1958. My cell phone alone is a life changing marvel. You couldn’t pay me enough money to go back to the rotary phone days. Advancements in medicine make this the greatest time in history to get sick. Ailments which used to carry life sentences can now be cured with over the counter remedies. You want to book a vacation? Try doing that in 1965. Good luck getting that road atlas folded back up.

It’s true...I still prefer 1970’s baseball to the modern game. Games were shorter, players tougher. That doesn’t mean that I can’t realize and appreciate the fact that Mike Trout is an all-time talent. I liked the NBA much more when it featured Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson...but that doesn’t mean that I can’t see and appreciate the greatness of Lebron James. 

Then there’s social media. Contrary to my wife’s putdowns, I have always been a big fan of that most modern innovation. Facebook has a thousand flaws, but it’s ability to bring us together has made keeping up with old friends immeasurably easier. Almost all forms of social media have tremendous potential for good, along with extraordinary capabilities for mischief. Whichever outcome you enjoy depends almost entirely on your behavior as the user. I have been on Facebook for over a decade, Instagram for just a couple of months, and Twitter for almost seven years. 90% of the time I enjoy Facebook. I don’t entirely understand this Instagram business, can’t figure out the purpose of the thing. Maybe I’ll figure it out over time. With Twitter, it’s a different story...

I’m thinking seriously about deleting my account. Why? Mostly because I think it’s making me dumber. I am told that the average user of Twitter is much wealthier, younger, and liberal than I am, although I have heard from plenty of older conservatives. Its just the medium itself that doesn’t lend itself well to reasoned debate...and that’s exactly what Twitter is...a debating platform. A more accurate description of Twitter would be to say it’s a place people come to make misrepresentations of their enemies positions on every issue imaginable. The goal is to come up with the best meme, to own, to troll, to say things that you would never say to another person face to face. At first it was entertaining as hell. I would gawk at the proceedings, mouth agape, for hours. But soon it became like rubbernecking a horrible accident on the freeway, searching for a severed head. It’s started to make me feel guilty for exposing myself to so much cheap hatred. I always come away feeling...dumber, far less enlightened, and generally in an ill-temper. I don’t think it’s worth it. That old scripture verse comes to mind...

...I will set no vile thing before my eyes...

Psalm 101:3

Ordering My New Zealand Brochures

It is now June of 2019. In less than a fortnight the Democrats will hold their first televised Presidential debate. There will be 20 candidates on the stage, three less than the number of declared candidates. It will mark the unofficial beginning of the 2020 election season.

Saints preserve us.

It was my wife who reminded me of what the next 18 months will bring on our trip down to Isle of Palms. Out of nowhere she said, Can you imagine how horrible the next election is going to be? I can’t, actually. First of all, I still haven’t gotten over the last one...https://doug-thetempest.blogspot.com/2016/11/the-morning-after.html.

This feels like unchartered waters. There is no precedent for Donald Trump. The Democratic Party has never in my lifetime been so enamored with Socialism, or at least this willing to admit it. There is talk of wiping out student debt, making college free, Medicare for all, wealth taxes, guaranteed income for all, slavery reparations. It’s like all the dudes and dudettes wearing the Che Guevara t-shirts back in the 60’s are now running the show. Then, there’s Joe Biden. I know that all the polls say he’s the front runner, but I don’t buy it. He looks ancient to me. This doesn’t seem like the year that the Dems will nominate an old white man. The real front runner seems to be Elizabeth Warren. But, what do I know?

Pam asked me if I thought anyone in the Republican Party will challenge Trump. My answer was an emphatic...No. They have made their bed, now they have to lay in it. So, it will be Donald Trump vs. a Democratic Party candidate who will be the preferred candidate of every television network not named FOX NEWS, every newspaper not named THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, every movie star, pop singer and television actor in the country. Every poll will predict a landslide victory for the Democrat. A long list of A-list celebrities will promise to leave the country if Trump wins. Evangelical leaders will predict the unleashing of the four horses of the apocalypse if Trump is defeated. Twitter will become more dangerous to your health than a swim in the pool at the Chernobyl Hilton.

I hear New Zealand is a nice place...

A REAL Dad Tribute

Without even looking, I know that my various social media feeds will be full of Father’s Day tributes. There will be photographs of fathers and sons, and all sorts of conflicting claims as to which one is, in fact, the world’s best Dad. To quote Mister Potter from It’s a Wonderful Life...sentimental hogwash!!

What Facebook, Twitter and Instagram need today is a tribute to the real contributions that our Dad’s have made to our development. What I’m talking about isn’t some song and dance about the virtues of honesty, loyalty and hard work. No...I’m referring to the things our dad’s taught us that no one else could. Who but Dad could have made sure we understood where we came from by reminding us that we were not...born in a barn? What could have contributed as much to our understanding of the connection between consumption and employment more than Dad’s refrain, Would somebody in this house learn to turn the lights off when they leave a room?? We don’t work for the power company!! And what about the Hobson’s choice dilemma presented to us by dad’s instruction...Pull my finger?

But all of these important contributions made by our dad’s pale in comparison to their most enduring contribution...The Dad Joke. To that end, I believe that today is the perfect day to remind us of the proud and enduring sense of humor that our father’s have bequeathed to all of us. Enjoy...

You hear that news story about the cartoonist found dead in his home? The details were...sketchy.

Last night, Mom and I watched two DVD’s back to back. Luckily, I was the one facing the TV.

Went to a seafood disco last night. Just my luck, I pulled a mussel.

Two cannibals were eating a clown when one says to the other...”does this taste funny to you”?

An invisible man married an invisible woman. I bet their kids aren’t anything to look at either.

I went to bed last night wondering what had happened to the sun. Then it dawned on me.

What’s the difference between an angry circus owner and a Roman barber? One is a raving showman, the other a shaving Roman.

Yesterday I accidentally swallowed some food coloring. The doctor says I’m fine, but I feel like I’ve dyed a little inside.

Last night I dreamed that I was drowning in an ocean of orange soda. Eventually I figured out that it was just a Fanta Sea.

Why did the skeleton belch? Because he didn’t have guts enough to fart.

Have you heard that new music group called Cellophane?

No, what kind of music do they play?

Mostly...wrap.

A steak pun is a rare medium done well.

What do you call a group of killer whales playing classical music? An Orca-stra.

An Almost Perfect Day

What a day. What an amazing day.

It was supposed to be overcast. Instead, the sun came out around ten o’clock and stayed out all day, setting in a fireball of orange and pink. A breeze blew every time it started to feel hot.

We walked into the center of the resort where all the shops and restaurants are, and rented a couple of bikes for the rest of the week. We tried to remember how long it had been since we had ridden bikes together and realized that it was over twenty years ago in Bar Harbor. We had both forgotten how much fun it is, how much like a kid it makes you feel. We rode around all morning on this very flat strip of high priced real estate, gawking at the fabulous homes and lush vegetation, delighting in the charm of the white picket fence, which is a staple here. 

Of course, me being me, I got a little freaky with the bike at one point and had a brief encounter with a metal fence post, resulting in a jammed finger and a bloody forearm. No day isn’t complete without at least one eye-roll from Pam. 

After sandwiches at Hudson’s Market, we gathered up our beach gear and traipsed across the 600 feet of sand until we finally found the ocean. Walking the equivalent of two football fields loaded down with beach chairs and coolers is not for sissies. But, it was worth the trip. It was a gorgeous afternoon.

After a short power nap, I hopped on my bike and rode up the street to the Links Course for my 5:00 tee time. I have never had a tee time so late in the day, but it was all I could get. The course was in magnificent condition, and my rental clubs were brand new Callaways. I shot 44 on the front side, which featured an almost comical 8. I will not bore you with the details...but I deserved it! At the turn, I picked up my wife who had come up to have a cocktail and read her book on the balcony of Huey’s. She served as the cart driver for my back nine. She was also my lucky charm...shot 41on the back!

However, there is no such thing as a perfect day. There’s always something, am I right? Ok, so after 18 holes of golf, it was almost 8 o’clock, and we were both very hungry. Unfortunately, Huey’s was only opened for members last night, so our perfect plan to eat at the golf course was foiled by eilitism. No worries, we would just ride our bikes back to the Village Plaza and pick from the various eateries there. By this point in the day, we both started to notice a tightness in our legs, a gentle reminder from God that although riding bikes sure did make us feel like kids, we are not, in fact, kids. Being seriously hungry didn’t help either. But as we saw our first choice...Woody’s, come into view, all was well. Right up to the point when it wasn’t. Woody’s had closed at 5:00. No problem, let’s go across the street to that BBQ place we saw earlier. The young, overwhelmed maitre’d thus began her soliloquy...

Yeah, well...we are really, like, super busy right now and like, we only have like three waiters and each of them have like three tables each and it’s taking a long time to like, serve people...so it’s gonna be like, a while.

At this point, although hungry, we had not yet reached hangry level, so we demurred. There was always that burger place we had heard so much about down on the boardwalk. Now, it was 8:45, and we had to make the long walk to our third choice. We arrived only to be told by a befuddled young man bussing a table that the kitchen was closed...but if we wanted a drink, the bar was opened.

When I looked into the eyes of my beloved...I saw it for the first time. My wife was not only hot and sweaty from all the bike riding and walking, but now she was hangry. There’s always the Terrace in the Boardwalk Inn, I suggested optimistically. She replied with the one word, all purpose response she always uses whenever she’s started to become annoyed...Sssuure!

The Terrace Maitre’d, while possessing a better grasp of her native tongue, was equally confusing in her response to two people who just wanted for somebody, somewhere on this resort property to feed us!!....We have been very busy tonight, but the guys are bussing tables right now and it shouldn’t be more than five minutes. Can we offer you a menu while you wait?

Twenty minutes later, no table. Despite the fact that both of us were so hungry we could have eaten the maitre’d, absolutely nothing on the Terrace menu appealed to us at all. We left in a huff of righteous indignation and headed over to our last resort...Hudson’s Market. Alas, their kitchen had also closed at 5:00.

At 9:15 in the evening on a day when you have biked multiple miles, walked like packmules across a desert of sand, and played a round of golf...your body becomes a rebellious and petulant child. It demands food...any kind of food. Then I saw the...ice cream. Ten minutes later, Pam and I were sitting in rocking chairs gulping down large quantities of the hand dipped stuff. It would be our dinner, at least until we could find our way back to our condo in the dark...on bikes, where a half a sandwich and an orange left over from lunch awaited us.

Other than our dinner dining experience, yesterday was as good as it gets...

Morning Beauty After The Storm

I’m sitting on a screened in porch listening to the thunderous surf in the distance. It was exactly what I was doing for over an hour last night during the wind and rain, watching the heat lightening out over the Atlantic. It is cool this morning, but thickly humid. I just got back from a short walk on the massive expanse of beach on this island..200 yards from dunes to water massive...the widest, flattest stretch of sand I have ever seen. Inexplicably, a single driftwood tree sits perched on the highest spot on the beach, begging to have its picture taken. I obliged...

The beach is so wide and so flat, it makes the sky look bigger than the sky is supposed to look. The last time I saw such a big sky was when I was in Montana as an 18 year old and discovered exactly why that State is called Big Sky Country.

I’m not sure what we will do today. This is supposed to be the only cloudy day of our week. Maybe I’ll use that as an excuse to play the golf course that is right down the street. Dinner last night at Huey’s featured this view...

...which seems a bit unfair. How is a guy supposed to give his undivided attention to his wife of 35 incredible years with this view just to the left of her beautiful face? I would post the competing picture I took of her but after 35 years, I have learned a few things. One of those things is never post a picture of your wife on social media without first obtaining permission to do so. I only look stupid!

For the record, last night’s amazing dinner included this item from the appetizer menu...

Low Country Egg Rolls...filled with collard greens, pulled pork BBQ and drizzled with a smoked mustard sauce. 

Yeah, when you see that on the menu, thats when you know you’re nowhere near Connecticut.

I Win

I get to spend the next five days in this fabulous place...

...with this beautiful woman...

The place is Wild Dunes in Isle of Palms, South Carolina. Neither of us have ever been there before. If the website can be believed, we will have an amazing four nights. The occasion is our 35th wedding anniversary...a month late. Lucy will stay here, accompanied by Becca, the dog whisperer, and the cost of the trip will be paid for with Capital One points. 

I win.

Gail

It was twenty two years ago when I took the call. Everyone had gone to lunch and I was the only one available to answer the phone. Her husband had passed away and he had a policy with Life of Virginia and could somebody help her with the claim? I took down her information and set a time to have her come in, only she didn’t want to drive all the way to Richmond. She lived in Hopewell. Could I come to her? 

Thus began my over two decade relationship with an elderly woman named...Gail. That she would become not only a great client but a dear friend was one of the most unlikely outcomes imaginable, for Gail was and is the most unique person I have ever met. When I pulled up in the circular driveway of her house she greeted me at the door wearing an outlandish pink and green pair of velvet pants and a silk blouse, with an unfiltered cigarette hanging out of her mouth, I remember thinking...Holy Crap. What is this I have gotten myself into? She was tiny, a wisp of a 64 year old woman, with a warm grin on her face. She thanked me for driving all the way out to Hopewell, a place she described as...a place with no hope where ain’t nobody doing well, except me!! Then, I heard that laugh for the first time, high pitched and unrestrained. I walked inside very gingerly.

Her house was beautiful on the outside, all elegant lines with a finely trimmed yard. Inside, the place was a hot mess. It wasn’t dirty, but there was stuff everywhere. Gail was a hoarder. I kept a sharp eye out for cats, but thankfully the only animal was a small Pekingese who appeared from beneath the rubble and was frantically barking at the tall, nervous man in the dark suit. Gail barked out a raspy command..Sweetie!! Shut the hell up!!!! “Sweetie” was never heard from again.

When we finally found a place to sit around an antique table piled high with what appeared to be every piece of junk mail she had received over the past ten years, she slapped her dead husband’s policy down in front of me. I suppose you expected me to be dressed in black, since my husband died. Well maybe I should be, but I look like a God***** old woman in black. Besides, Ed loved these pants.

As I processed the paperwork, she told me her life story. With her husband’s death, she was now completely alone. She had no surviving family, neither did he. They had no children. There was literally no family left, no uncles or aunts, no distant cousins. What she did have was tons of friends and the ugliest Pekingese in the entire world. She grew up as an Army brat, lived all over the world. Her husband was a lawyer. She was once a great singer and dancer and had the photographs to prove it. I looked at the young girl in the pictures. She was a beauty. The more we talked, the less uncomfortable I felt. The stories she told were fascinating. What a life she had lived. In the couple of hours I spent with her that first day I discovered a complex woman with an astounding back story. I wasn’t quite sure how much of it was true, but if she was making it up, well...she was one heck of a storyteller. Her sentences were lively and flowed naturally, as if they had been written in advance, and carefully crafted. All of it was sprinkled with the most hilariously colorful profanity I have ever heard from another human being. Must have been the Army background.

She ended up investing the proceeds of her husband’s insurance policy with me. In the months and years that followed, she entrusted more and more of her money with me. In all of our 22 year business relationship, she has never made the trip north to my office. I have always made the drive to Hopewell, probably over 50 times by now. Over the years we have talked about everything. She wanted to know all about Pam and the kids, was fascinated with my parent’s story. She was astonished to discover that I was a Christian. She had a million questions, including this one...Ok, Mister Christian...what’s your favorite verse in the Bible? I answered with Deuteronomy 8:17-18...You may say to yourself, my power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me, but remember the Lord your God who gives you the power to produce wealth... Tears came to her eyes. Then she dismissed me with a colorful phrase. The next time I saw her, she met me at the door with a beautiful, professionally framed, hand stitched rendition of...Deuteronomy 8:17-18. 

Last week I received a call from the lawyer who has her Power of Attorney informing me that she had been placed in a nursing home after being found unresponsive in her home by a friend. Yesterday I went to see her. She lay there in a crumpled pile of covers, face twisted upwards, mouth ajar, her vibrant personality obscured by the ravages of time. I held her hand and looked closely into her face, and called to her. She opened her eyes and mumbled something I couldn’t understand. Her friend interpreted...She said Dunnevant. She knows its you. Then she drifted back off to sleep, or whatever state she was in before, something that looked and felt more painful and disturbing than...sleep. The doctors say she wont be going home again. She might not make it much longer, or she may hang on for months.

I’ve been around in my business long enough to know the rules of life. Clients get old and die. All the money eventually passes to others, in Gail’s case to seven environmental advocacy groups. It’s all part of the job. But every client is not like Gail. I will miss her friendship, her wit and wisdom, and yes...the side-splitting profanity. 

About ten years ago she asked me out of the blue...If I were going to read just one book in this Bible of yours, what should it be? I thought for a moment and answered...If I were you, I would read the Gospel of John. She nodded and said...Well, Doug...you ain’t me, but I will read the Gospel of John, just for you. Six months later we met again for a review. In the middle of my presentation to her, she slammed her hand down on the table and said, By the way...I just finished up the Gospel of John and I’ve got to admit...Jesus was a bad-ass!! I busted up laughing and we ended up talking for over an hour about her thoughts on the subject. For what its worth, I’m not sure I’ve ever met anyone who understood who Jesus was and what his message was more beautifully than my strange, and profane friend.

It takes all kinds of people to make a world...

How Would You Like to be Remembered?

Thirty six years ago I entered the workforce as an agent for a company which no longer exists called, Life of Virginia. My first day on the job I was introduced to the guy who I would share a tiny 10x10 office with for the next six months. I quickly gave him the nickname...Hexhead...and we got along great. A mutual friend from those old days sent me a note this morning informing me of his passing. Hexhead is dead. This news has transported me back in time to what life was like thirty six years ago. Its been part fond nostalgia and part nightmare.

Some things from those days are nearly impossible to believe. In 1983, I shared that tiny, cramped office with a guy who chain-smoked Marlboros. Hexhead made no apologies, never asked if I minded if he smoked, nor would I ever have expected him to. If I walked down the hall, about every other office had at least one smoker. Every single day, I went home smelling like cigarette smoke. But of all of my worries and concerns back then, the fact that my office-mate smoked was 36th on the list. I try to imagine what I would do today if someone came in my office and lit up a Marlboro!! In one generation smoking inside public buildings has gone from being ubiquitous to unimaginable. Amazing.

Hexhead was a good dude, if a bit rough around the edges. He had a loud, infectious laugh, and a great sense of humor. There was also no chance in a thousand hells that he would make it in the insurance business. He marched to the beat of a very different drummer, one who had only a passing knowledge of the beat. There is one clear memory I have of the man and it’s a doozy...

One Friday, our sales manager invited several of us for a day on the Chesapeake Bay on his beautiful sailboat. Girlfriends and wives were invited, so Pam...then my girlfriend...came along. It was a gorgeous day and as the boat cut it’s way briskly through the water while we sipped our adult beverages...all was well with the world. Then Hexhead got up and moved from the stern of the boat to it’s bow for a better view. Unlike the rest of us who were wearing swim suits so we could dive in if it got hot, Hexhead was sporting cutoff jeans. When he sat down in front of the rest of us at the front of the boat we all instantly realized that he was not wearing underwear.

There he was, oblivious...his full glory prominently displayed for all to see. We laughed. We cried. We had the mental image permanently burned into our brain for all of eternity...so much so that when my friend sent me the news of his passing...it was the very first memory that..er, um...reared it’s head.

I read the obituary. It was exactly the sort of obituary I would expect his family to write. He loved life, was full of fun and whimsy, loved by everyone. Yes, yes and yes. RIP, Hexhead.

Squirrels and the Existence of Evil

 There are two universal constants in my life, which at this particular moment are front and center. These two constants are completely unrelated, and writing about them both in the same blog post may seem odd to the reader, but this is my blog and therefore I owe you no explanation.

The first universal constant is the existence of evil in the world, the latest manifestation of which has been the Virginia Beach shooting and Mr. DeWayne Craddock. By all accounts, Craddock was an unremarkably normal man. He had no criminal record, was well educated, a civil engineer stable enough to hold a steady, responsible job for over 15 years, and came from a good family. But something inside him snapped and inexplicably turned him into a man capable of killing 12 of his co-workers in cold blood. It is a human trait to seek explanations, to assign blame and find a culprit. It is part of our need to discover meaning in life. We all construct belief systems that serve as a template for understanding the world around us. But...what if there is no explanation other than the existence of evil in the world? Some will dismiss the existence of evil in this case by saying that Craddock was obviously mentally ill with some undetected and untreated psychosis, which if properly diagnosed could have been treated and this violence could have been avoided. Perhaps that is true. But, mental illness or not, the act of killing 12 colleagues, in and of itself, is an unspeakable evil that cannot be explained away simply by giving it a name and classifying it as a disease. We prefer our mass murderers to look and act the part. We prefer that they are political extremists. We feel better when we discover that they came from an abusive family or were drug addicted or unrepentant racists. But when they turn out to be the DeWayne Craddocks of the world, what then? If someone like him...like us...is capable of this, what do we do then?

The second universal truth has to do with this photograph which I took this morning at 6:38 AM....

There I was, drinking my coffee and checking out last night’s boxscores, when I glanced up and saw a squirrel sitting up on his haunches, with a lovely rose blossom in his bony little mitts chowing down like a fat kid on a box of doughnuts. There was absolutely nothing I could do. If I bolted out there with my pellet gun, he would be long gone by the time I could get a shot off. If I raised a window and stealthily tried to shoot him from inside my house, his little squirrel ears would hear the slightest squeak from the window and flee. So I just sat there watching this pathetic and worthless creature laying waste to Pam’s beautiful roses. It is my sincere conviction that squirrels were placed into this world for the sole purpose of my eternal exasperation. It is clearly God’s way of introducing a daily dose of humility into my life...Yes, Doug...there are some things in this world that you cannot fix, problems which you cannot solve. Chill out.

Evil and squirrels...but I repeat myself.

Best Dog Culdesac in the Neighborhood

These past couple of days have been glorious. Yesterday when I walked out onto my deck at 6 AM I wrote that Maine had come to Short Pump. This morning it was exactly ten degrees cooler, which turned me into a liar since actually...today is much more like a July morning in Maine than yesterday was! Be that as it may, it is a wonderful thing to be visited by such perfect weather. We have taken full advantage. Last night Pam whipped up an Instant Pot meal extraordinaire called Mongolian Beef something or other. We ate it with our good friend, Al Fresca...

And yes...my wife is still wearing her apron, in my opinion, one of the sexiest garments ever fashioned by human hands.

Lucy loves it when we eat outside. She spends her time alternating between full sniffing interrogations of all quadrants of her yard to bouts of rolling around in the grass on her back, tongue flopped out of her mouth, not a care in the world. As soon as she senses that we are done eating, she brings me her frisbee and insists on a session of catch and keep-away. After three or four throws and three or four demonstrations of Lucy showing off her athletic grace, she is done and back to back scratches in the grass.

We are able to enjoy our back yard this year because we employed the services of an outfit called...The Mosquito Authority. For a tidy sum of cash, I contracted with this service which promised to rid my yard of mosquitos...guaranteed. I was skeptical, but desperate. Before these guys came along, our deck was the mosquito capital of Short Pump, a bloodsucking feeding ground. But now, after a couple of months under their protection, there hasn’t been a mosquito sighting, much less a bite. It’s like a miracle. Of course, if six months from now, one of us begins to grow a new appendage, one of us sprouts a sixth toe, or one arm suddenly gets longer than the other...we’ll know why!

The other day I was out on the deck doing my early evening squirrel reconnaissance when I happened to look over into my neighbor’s back yard and noticed their new puppy standing at their back gate, giving me the once over. This lovable beast is...Boss...their aptly named mastiff puppy who is, without putting too fine a point on it, HUGE, and getting bigger by the minute. Anyway, there he was, ginormous paws gripping the fence, ponderous head cocked to one side, beckoning me to come over for a scratch. What was I to do? Of course, I had to agree. Luckily, I have great neighbors who don’t mind me letting myself into their backyard to play with their dog (at least I HOPE not). Anyway, by the time Boss is full grown he’s going to be bigger than me, so I have a vested interest in getting on his good side. When I returned to the house, Lucy was on me like white on rice...as manic as one of those bomb-sniffing dogs from the Department of Homeland Security. She demanded to know where I had been and who I had been with. She could scarcely hide her disappointment when she discovered that I had been with...Boss. All Lucy knows about Boss is that he was this adorable new puppy next door one day, then she turned her back for a minute and the next thing she knew he was this towering beast slobbering all over her beautifully clean coat!

Our culdesac now officially has the best dog population in the entire neighborhood...

Lucy the Golden

Van the Pug

Boss the Mastiff

Pippen the Golden Doddle

Maverick the Lab

Kane the German Shepard 

...and Buddy the whatever

Why I Hate Running

I hate running. I have always hated running. Even when I was much younger and much faster. Hated it then, hate it now. Nevertheless, there I was this morning out on the sidewalks of Short Pump around 8 am, doing the very thing that I hate. Why?

There are many reasons. First of all, in life there are many things we do which we hate doing. I hate shaving every morning...but I kinda have to. I am in a profession which frowns upon waltzing into an appointment with a client in a t-shirt, sporting a three day growth. So, despite the great annoyance, I shave. I don’t particularly enjoy going in for a colonoscopy every five years, but I do it because...well, cancer. Running is part of my exercise routine. You can spend but so much time on an elliptical, or a stairclimber. At some point you have to mix running into the mix for cardio if for no other reason than to break up the monotony. But, after doing this off and on for the past twenty years, you would think that at some point you would come to some sort of accommodation with running. At some point maybe you would warm up to it, grudgingly admire its benefits. Nope. Still hate it.

But, I am nothing if not stubborn and disciplined, so I trudge on. I even set little goals for myself...try to beat previous times and previous distance limits...that sort of thing.

So, this morning, I sat out to try and run the 5K distance...3.1 miles in under 26 minutes. Why? I have no idea...other than stubbornness. I haven’t been able to in quite a while, for another thing, and its been ticking me off. So, off I went...

I always hate the first mile. That’s when I start arguing with myself...What are you doing, Dunnevant? You hate running. Why are you out here? You’re getting older and slower by the minute. Keep this up and before long, kids on tricycles are gonna start passing you! Somewhere on Broad Street, my MapMyFitness app shared the embarrassing news that I had completed one mile in 8 minutes and 59 seconds. Pathetic. At the time I was approaching the Chuy’s in West Broad Village. I wondered if they were open at this hour. Maybe I could stop in for a Dos Equis!!

The only thing worse than the first mile of a 5K run is the second. By this time, I’m on the back side of the lake in the Village and starting to sweat profusely because for some stupid reason I have picked up the pace. There’s that stubbornness thing again. It’s during the second mile when your hips start feeling unpleasant. Adding insult to injury is the fact that you are not even halfway done. Part of you wants to bag it, slow down and walk back to the house. But another part...the vain and stubborn part won’t allow this perfectly reasonable decision. You plow on, faster and faster.

The third mile completely blows, even worse than the first two miles put together. At the 2.5 mile post you glance at your app and see that you’ve got a shot at breaking 26 minutes. The only problem is that your hips, hamstrings and knees seem to have gotten together and plotted a coup. At the corner of Three Chopt and the John Rolfe Parkway, there’s only .18 miles to go and you find yourself in an all-out sprint up the slight incline, legs burning like five alarm chili, heart pounding in the chest, and sweating like a the barnyard turkey on Thanksgiving. As you reach the finish line you glance at the timer.....26:00. For the love of all that is Holy...are you freaking kidding me?? After all of that, I’m ONE SECOND SHORT.

This is how running works. Despite your very best efforts, despite all the discipline and stubbornness in the world, not to mention the anger one has to generate to get faster each mile...I still fall short.

On the positive side, those 673 calories I burned means I can have a cookie or two at church this morning.

Perceptive readers will have noticed that my times went way up for the remainder of my run. That’s because I stopped running...the only wise decision I made all morning. I simply walked back to the house, tired and frustrated at being so close and yet so far. But, the thing is...I’ll do it again. I’ll be out there somewhere in Short Pump arguing with myself for the first mile, bargaining with myself the second, and flailing around like a maniac down the homestretch. I’m just glad Pam doesn’t run with me. She would be mortified at my behavior. Why do you have to do everything so, so...hard??!! She has asked me this question at least a thousand times in our 35 years of marriage. 

I have no satisfactory answer.

Virginia Beach

My beloved Commonwealth of Virginia is once again in the news. And once again, it’s not because we are for lovers.

At this hour, 13 souls have perished in Virginia Beach, victims of a disgruntled long time city-government employee of the Public Utilities department. He had been fired the day before and apparently came back on Friday to exact his revenge. While at this point we don’t even know the shooter’s name or background, it boggles the mind to imagine what on earth he possibly could have done to get fired from a government job. He must be a piece of work.

No doubt most of the conversation in the days to follow this horrific event will center around gun-control or the lack of it. What always comes to my mind when something like this happens is...What ever happened to conflict resolution skills? Sure, losing a job you’ve had for twenty plus years is no day at the beach, but who decides that the proper response is to march down to the office the next day and start slaughtering everyone in the building? What mind set is at play here, and why do so many Americans chose it?

Some will say it’s all the fault of guns...if they weren’t so easy to obtain, these kinds of crimes wouldn’t happen nearly as frequently. I can agree with this position only up to a point. Before the gun comes into the picture, the decision to commit mass murder comes first. Why? By what reasoning does someone conclude that killing 13 people is even a possibility? 

Some will suggest that pervasive violence on television is to blame. Others will claim that violent shoot-em-up video games have brought us to this place. Still others will shoe-horn their pet philosophy into the debate...It’s Capitalism, man! No, it’s racism and misogyny!!

All I know is, something has gone off the rails when human beings normal enough to hold a job for twenty years start mowing their former co-workers down in cold blood. For me, the shooter’s race, sexual orientation, or political views...or the race, sexual orientation or political views of his victims is irrelevant. What I care about is...what combination of factors is leading more and more people to come to this sort of unspeakable end? We better devote ourselves to finding out...and soon.

Of Course You Know...This Means War

If you look carefully at this bird feeder you will notice a series of scratches on either side of the feeding hole. They were put there by a tribe of squirrels which have descended upon it of late. Since the despicable tree rats are too heavy for the spring loaded rest which is designed to prevent such theft, whenever a squirrel latches on, the holes shut tightly in their rat-like faces. At which point, the fuzzy-tailed rodents are left with gnawing on the housing of the feeder, hoping to create a new hole. Thus has the gauntlet been thrown down. This intrusion cannot stand. 

Unfortunately, my trusted Daisy 35 finally gave up the ghost last winter, but before I had a chance to replace it, my friend, Chip Hewette, came to my rescue by loaning me a far superior weapon...this much heavier and manlier death machine...

Each morning, every lunch hour that I am available, and every evening, I can be found cutting a wide path of death and destruction through the squirrel community. For the most part, my aim has been true and the resulting slaughter has been highly effective in reducing the annoyance of their relentless thievery. But, tonight as I was waiting for dinner I happened to glance out onto the deck and noticed a disturbing sight. There, splayed out spreadeagle, like a sunbather at a nudist colony was a large and grizzled veteran squirrel. All four paws stretched to their full length, tail drooped lazily across the railing of the deck, his beedy little eyes half closed as if he were about to doze off for a nap. Talk about humiliation? What have I been fighting all these weeks for if not to create a climate of fear and trembling in their midst? How, after all the hellfire that Chip’s pellet gun has belched forth, could such an elderly squirrel make such a mockery of my efforts? It was as if this arrogant punk was making a statement...You think we’re afraid of you, gun man? We laugh at your air gun!!

Of course, by the time I grabbed the gun and opened the door to the deck, old gramps had hightailed it into one of the thick oak trees and was protected from my wrath. I could practically hear the lot of them giggling with their high-pitched squirrel voices. I retreated back inside to hatch a new strategy. But, despite this little display of defiance, I will not be deterred from my mission to rid my back yard of these flea-bitten rats. I will redouble my 
efforts to protect our birds, I will steel myself for whatever it takes to protect My tomatoes and Pam’s herbs from the sniveling gray menace.

To quote one of America’s greatest revenge tacticians...Bugs Bunny...Of course you know...this means war!!

Nothing New Under The Sun

Question of the day: What was your first significant memory as a child?

Early memories are difficult for me. It’s as if I made it through the first six or seven years of my life with none of them. For someone who has the ability to remember encyclopedias full of meaningless minutiae, this has always been a frustration. Why were my formative years so uneventful? At least there weren’t bad memories, right? There’s always something  to be thankful for.

But, everyone has a first memory, and I am no exception. I was five years old. I was playing outside in the middle of the day when I was surprised to see Linda and Donnie walking up the driveway, oddly home from school early. It was November 22, 1963. President John F. Kennedy had been shot and killed in Dallas, Texas. Chesterfield County schools had decided to send everyone home for the day.

Of course, as a five year old, I didn’t comprehend much, but I did sense that whatever it was, it was important. I remember my mother running out of the house to hug them tight. I remember going inside and Mom making sandwiches for us...everyone talking in hushed tones. We had no TV, but the radio was on WRVA and even their voices sounded strange, clipped and shaky. Thats about all I can recall from that day. Something big had happened and I could feel it.

Five years later, brother Bobby would be killed in a hotel in Los Angeles. I watched it live as a ten year old, seated on the floor of my grandmother’s trailer, on a black and white television with rabbit ear antennas sprouting upwards forming a V...for violence. Earlier that same summer, Martin Luther King had been shot. I didn’t see it on television but I remember everyone talking about it. The grownups seemed worried, distraught at the direction the country was headed. There were riots, black kids throwing rocks, white kids carrying signs, angry about one thing or another. I had no profound insights about it all as a ten year old kid who’s primary passion, despite social upheaval, remained...baseball. But, I do remember feeling unsettled. The world was suddenly a strangely unpredictable place. Everyone seemed furious and fever-pitched.

Which goes to show you just how wise King Solomon actually was when he said, There is nothing new under the sun.

Something Beautiful

It was starting to get dark and I was getting stiff from the six hour drive to Columbia as we sat eating our Firehouse subs at a picnic table in Congeree National Park. It was our first time seeing the famous synchronized fireflies that our son-in-law had been so instrumental in promoting. Tonight, Jon was not a ranger. He was just my daughter’s husband in street clothes, leading his church small group on an outing at the park. But, in uniform or not, he was busy answering our questions and telling us what to expect once it got dark. Thousands of what I have always called lightening bugs were about to come together, and for reasons that are not entirely understood, start flashing their lights...all at the same time. He explained the rules...no cell phone usage, no cameras...they wouldn’t do us any good anyhow since their shutter speeds aren’t fast enough to capture the sight. 

People began to show up and stream through the entrance to the special viewing trail that Jon had devised and help cut through the low lying and heavy thickets. At the gate, people who had flashlights were given strips of red cellophane and tiny rubber bands to cover them and told to only use them pointed down at the ground, that unnatural light would throw off the synchronization. The trail itself was lit by cellophane covered lamps along the ground on either side of the trail, and cordoned off by glow in the dark rope. The early arrivals had staked out spots for themselves at the chairs and picnic tables that had been set up in random spots along the trail, most of them with huge special cameras atop tripods, waiting for the perfect shot.

I was getting impatient, a frequent affliction of mine, waiting for something to happen. This was Columbia, after all...in late May. It was hot and getting more humid by the minute. I was waiting not only for the fireflies to arrive, but their distant cousins...mosquitoes... to make an appearance. As more and more people began to arrive, I felt that familiar sensation that comes over me at times like this. Whenever I am waiting for some long awaited event, or some over-hyped big thing that people have been telling me I just have to see, I become detached and cynical, sometimes to the point of becoming determined not to be impressed. It’s part of my nature, I suppose, and not a very attractive part, this contrarianism.

When we finally got in line and made our way to Jon’s suggested vantage point, it was still dusk, not quite dark. The fireflies were visible now but not an impressive number of them and not yet snyched up. I could feel the jaded cockiness coming to the surface. I remember thinking, Are you kidding me? I came all the way out here for this?

Then, around a quarter to nine, about the time that the last glow of the setting sun was disappearing from the horizon, something clicked. Suddenly their numbers swelled, and the darkening woods began to pulse with white light. These were not the lightening bugs of my youth, which blinked slowly and whose color was more a greenish yellow. These fireflies were bright white, almost like LED lights and their flash was like Quicksilver. I was mesmerized. And then I noticed it...the silence.

There aren’t many places in this world anymore that involve large numbers of human beings...and silence. Even in churches, where people used to gather to be quiet, there is always some sort of buzz. Libraries are still quiet I guess, but who goes to libraries anymore? But, here I was, in the middle of the woods...in a swamp, surrounded by hundreds of strangers in tight quarters in now total darkness...and suddenly everyone was hushed by the moment. Suddenly, no one felt it appropriate to speak above a whisper. Why? No one had warned us that loud noises would make the fireflies go away or get out of synch. Still, everyone seemed to somehow know that silence was the proper response for this moment.

After a time of gawking, we decided to move along the trail. By that time it was pitch black, the almost complete lack of man-made light had cast a black blanket over the world. We inched along, holding on to one another, glancing down only to find the cellophane covered trail lights and the dim red glow that assured us that we weren’t wandering into the swamp. The fireflies were on both sides of us now, blinking, blinking, blinking. The only disturbance was some girl who tried to take a picture with her cellphone. The flash of it exploded like a bolt of lightening and a murmur of disapproval rippled through the crowd. It never happened again. There’s always at least one idiot.

As we stumbled along in the darkness, carried along by each other and trust in what we could not see, it occurred to me that the assembled crowd had absolutely nothing in common except our humility in the presence of this mysterious beauty. There were Christians, non-Christians, several different races, democrats and republicans, meat-eaters and vegetarians...all of us brought down from our high horses for a while, humbled and silenced by something that no one can quite explain...synchronized fireflies. If you believe in God, it was if he was saying to us...Here, slow down for a minute. Rest with me for a while. Let me show you something beautiful.

Getting Ready

Back to work. After a week away, it’s time to find out all I’ve missed at Dunnevant Financial. Thanks to my intrepid assistant, I already know plenty...enough to know that I’ve got a lot to do over these next two weeks. Pam and I will be (finally) celebrating our 35th wedding anniversary from the 12th thru the 16th of June down on Isle of Palms. Then it will be back for two more weeks of work, then my reward for spending 36 years in this business—I take the month of July off—first, a week on Hatteras Island with my large, unruly family, then MAINE.

Speaking of Maine, yesterday, the owner of Loon Landing (who I am shamelessly ingratiating myself with for the purposes of convincing her to eventually sell me the place) sent me a photo of the dock they had just put back in the water...with the enticing tag line..getting ready. They always open the place on Memorial Day weekend. I drooled over this picture the rest of the day...

In no time at all, I will be a semi-permanent fixture on the end of that dock, interrupted only by the occasional kayak trip to my favorite fishing spot or a jaunt into Camden for pancakes and shopping.

Counting the days...

A 30 Year Old Son

Today is my boy’s 30th birthday. He is, of course, no longer a boy, having become a man years ago without my permission or consent. This is the way of the world, the current of life, ever forward, always grasping around the bend for the next thing, making what came before harder and harder to remember, eventually even to comprehend. This is altogether proper. The excitement of life is always in what is to come, never what was before. And yet...when it comes to my kids, no matter how far they progress or how much they accomplish, my heart’s image of them remains frozen in time. In Patrick’s case it’s this...

All those years ago he depended on us for everything. He had very little choice when it came to what he wore or what he ate. His plans for the day were what we said they were...and he was, for the most part, cooperative and compliant. Now, he wears what he wants, eats what he wants and makes his own plans. More importantly, he’s doing it all by his own devices and with his own money. I am overwhelmingly proud of him.

But, am I the only parent out there who secretly wishes he could go back in time for just one day? Am I the only one who wishes he could sit with him on that bench in Maine watching him drink his hot cocoa one more time? Am I the only one who wishes he could lift him up to put the angel on the tree again, or watch him racing his sister on the beach in Nags Head at sunset one last time? Of course, there are many things about the old days that I’m glad are dead and gone...the constant financial pressures, the relentless anxiety about their developement, the nagging fear that we were doing it all wrong and that they would grow up to be worthless, ungrateful brats. That pit in your stomach every time you watched them walk up the sidewalk into school...

So, today, I celebrate my son, and the amazing man he has become with great pride and no regrets...

...but I would give anything to be able to hold him in that Tigger suit one more time.

Columbia. Day 2

Second day in Columbia was a triumph. I slept in until just before 7 am, by which time my daughter was long gone, Jon soon to follow, leaving Pam and I alone in their house for the rest of the day. Before she left, Kaitlin thought to send us a text with a list of things we might want to do to busy ourself while...”missing our delightful company.” The first thing on her list was the Riverbanks Zoo.

My last zoo experience was many, many years ago and not altogether pleasant. My limited and quite dated experience with zoos is that they always made me feel sad. The animals all look so depressed and unnatural. But this zoo was a million miles from any zoo I have ever visited. It was beautifully designed and maintained. Great care was taken in creating the environment. The animals looked equal parts comfortable and menacing. 

Although it was warm and humid out, the place was designed with an abundance of natural shade, and just enough air conditioned displays to escape the heat. The prescence of a steady breeze also helped. The three plus hours we spent there flew by.

We got back to the house around 2 or so, just in time for a power nap. Jon left work early for the first time in three weeks (which is also the amount of consecutive days he has worked without a day off—firefly season ). I sent him to his room for a shower and a nap! Then...we waited, and waited, and waited some more, for my firstborn and only daughter to return from work. It is at this point when I began to get riled up, agitated, pissed off, and all up in the pictures. Kaitlin had left the house somewhere around 6 to 6:30 in the morning. It was now 6:00 in the evening and she still wasn’t home. What does she do for a living, you ask? Is she an important government official? Is she the CEO of a large corporation with far flung responsibilities and 10,000 employees? Is she a highly compensated celebrity whose day is packed with public appearances? Is she the only person in South Carolina who knows how to keep everyone’s air conditioning working? Oh no...she is a Middle School English Teacher, with only two weeks of classes left and final grades due this Friday, who was being kept late at school doing some asshat busy work which had absolutely nothing to do with her students or their grades! And this was the second straight day that this time-killing, soul crushing outrage had been foisted on her. And yet, when she finally opened the door to the wild delight of Jackson, she looked fresh, relaxed and had a beautiful smile on her face. I was astonished. I would have thought after two 12 hour days back to back she would at least have been...bemused. Instead, she was like...Whatever, this is my life. I’m starved. Let’s eat!!

I will resist the caustic lecture from a private sector business owner who would never in a million years tolerate the jackassery that teachers endure on a daily basis. I will simply say that my daughter is a hard working genius who, if paid by the hour, would be making less than the minimum wage...in the Sudan. This is an outrage, and the State of South Carolina is very fortunate that Kaitlin’s lunatic father lives safely 6 hours away...grrrrrrr.

Then, the kids treated us to a magnificent dinner at a lovely Italian restaurant for our 35th anniversary. Afterwards, we met their best friends at a local ice cream spot down town...

These wonderful people are Matthew and Bailey Wolfer and their son, Milo. They are the answers to every parent’s prayers when their kids move away to a new city...Lord, please help them find some new friends who will love and care for them like we would if we were there. Unfortunately, these are also the people who will make it hard for Kaitlin and Jon to ever leave this place to move closer to home. They are the sort of people who are frankly, irreplaceable. Love them to pieces.

Our Road Dog

Usually, the 24 hours before Pam and I leave for a trip are quite...tense. My wife is a meticulous planner and packs like a fiend. She remembers...everything. Me, on the other hand, tend to throw stuff in a suitcase at the last minute and often forget crucial stuff...like medications. My lackadaisical approach to packing causes much eye-rolling and heavy sighs from my wife. But this trip has been different. She has been as cool as a cucumber, flitting around the house without the usual manic drive. Last night it hit us...there is a reason for this newfound chill, and it comes from a surprising place...Lucy is coming with us.

Most of the time, Lucy stays home, which means that our super star dog-whispering house sitter, Becca, moves in. This is great for Lucy, who loves Becca. But, it requires a whole other level of preparation. The house must be cleaned, beds made, food must be in the fridge. But, if Lucy is coming with us, we can leave the house in a shambles and no one will know the difference!! The discovery hopefully has been a revelation for my wife, and as we decide whether or not to bring Lucy to Maine this year, I hope she will remember the relative tranquility of the last 24 hours.

Meanwhile, Lucy knows that we are getting ready to leave and has been quite lovey-dovey, hoping that this time we will take her along. After dinner the past couple of nights she has hopped up on the sofa and made a big production of snuggling up to Pam, the one she always needs to convince. It has been quite shameless...

So, this morning when I pack the car, I will be sure to cover all of the scary bags with a blanket so they won’t frighten Lucy. I will carve out a sleeping spot for her along one side of the car. As soon as she realizes that she is coming with us, she will jump in, walk around in a circle three times, then lay down and sleep like a baby the entire trip to Columbia...the best traveling dog of all time!

Fireflies and The Dogs

This week, Pam and I intend to correct a major parenting mistake. It embarrasses me to even write about it. For some inexcusable reason we haven’t visited Kaitlin and Jon in Columbia in over two years! When we realized this fact, we could hardly believe it. How on earth could this be? Over that same period of time, we have visited Patrick and Sarah three times...and although nobody is keeping score...what am I saying, of course they’re keeping score! My children are famous for their competitiveness. Nevertheless, this week we will begin to correct this imbalance. We leave tomorrow and will come back Friday. The excuse for this particular visit is to see, in person, the annual...Synchronized Fireflies at Congeree National Park where Jon is a Ranger. We will gather at the park one night along with a couple thousand others around nightfall and watch an amazing spectacle that happens in only two places in the United States...thousands of fireflies all pulsing light together at the same time.

I’ve been told that it is an amazing sight to see, magical and hypnotic. No one really knows why fireflies synchronize in so few places, or why they bother to synchronize at all. The best scientific explanation is that the whole lighting up thing is how fireflies go about selecting a mate...call it flash-flirting. If this is true, then the occasion of a display of thousands of them lighting up at the exact same moment would be the human equivalent of karaoke night at a singles bar. So what we have here is one of nature’s most glorious displays turning out to be all about sex!! Isn’t that always the way? Be that as it may, I can’t wait to see it in person.

The rest of the time, we will just be hanging out with the kids...and the dogs. Yes, we are finally taking Lucy along on one of our trips...and she is stoked about it. She truly loves going bye-bye in the car, and for the most part enjoys hanging out with Jackson...

...right up to the moment where she has had enough of Jackson’s smothering affections, whereupon she jumps up on our bed and guards her safe place from all intruders, foreign and domestic. The Alfa Dog and the Queen Bee.

The Fever Swamp That Is My Imagination...

I was relaxing in my LazyBoy the other night, watching a Nats game on my MLB app...when suddenly an image popped into my head. This sort of thing happens to me quite often. It’s hard to explain. Sometimes an idea for a story will materialize in my melon, unprovoked, dang near fully formed. It’s the strangest feeling. It paralyzes me. Temporarily, I can think of nothing else. This particular story idea was a multifaceted, convoluted mess. I will now attempt to summarize the outline that’s living inside my head, rent free.

It starts with a man laying unconscious on an empty beach. The man begins to come out of it, opens his eyes, and the first thing he sees is a sand crab, popping up out of his hole...

They stare at each other for a minute. The man is disoriented, confused and increasingly panicked. He lifts himself up, looks up and down the beach, seeing no one. He has no idea where he is or how he got there. It occurs to him that he can’t remember...anything. He checks himself. He’s not injured. He’s dressed in jeans and a polo shirt. He’s wearing tennis shoes. He’s covered in sand. He recognizes nothing. He reaches for his wallet. There’s twenty dollars in cash, a picture of a women he doesn’t know and a driver’s license he also doesn’t recognize. He stands up, looks up and down the beach. No houses anywhere. Then, off in the distance he notices someone walking a dog, heading his way.
The next scene if of a woman driving an expensive car. There are a couple of suitcases in the back seat. She is headed for her beach house on Hatteras Island. She has country music playing loudly on the radio. She feels alive and vital...a thrill of expectation running through her veins. She is headed for a rendezvous with the man she has been having a torrid affair with for the past three months. This will be their first time out of town together, away from the prying eyes of friends and enemies. She thinks briefly of her husband, who is out of town on business. She feels a pang of guilt. She instantly suppresses  it. Although he’s a good man and doesn’t deserve her unfaithfulness, her lover takes her places she hasn’t been in years. She feels powerless to resist.

Her husband finishes up his business earlier than expected, and decides to surprise her by driving to the beach house. She had told him she was going down for a few days by herself to work on her tan. As he gets close to the house, a storm starts to form. The winds pick up and it begins to rain. Lightning streaks across the sky. he pulls into the driveway and sees two cars. He walks up the front steps then around the wrap-around porch towards the back entrance...the one he prefers to use. As he walks past the window to their bedroom he sees them in his bed, his wife and his best friend. They are fully engaged in their treachery, oblivious to the man standing at the window.  Filled with rage and aflamed by the betrayal he begins to enter through the back door but stops short, paralyzed by fear and grief. Instead he runs down the deck steps and out onto the beach while the rain gets heavier and the lightening flashes wildly all around him.

When the man with the dog arrives, he asks, You ok, mister? I hardly ever see anyone on my morning walk? The dog is busy sniffing all around the ground where he had been laying, then suddenly lets out a soft growl.

Excuse me, but...where am I?

Why...this is Hatteras Island.

But where are all the houses?

Well, there’s only three or four on this stretch. They are still where they’ve always been, as far as I know. You sure you’re ok?

You sure this is Hatteras?

As sure as I am of anything. I moved here after the war in ‘46 and have been here ever since...16 years of beach living!

Wait...what did you say?

I said I’ve been here 16 years. Moved here in 1946.

The man reached again for his wallet, pulled out his driver’s license, glanced at the picture, then saw it...his date of birth...June 10, 1962.

Ok...thats all I got. All of this came to me in maybe five minutes. Nothing since. The question is...should I write this story, or is it just too weird?

All My Fault

What follows is a short and incomplete list of Things That Piss Me Off, in inverse order...

5. People who cut in line.

4. People who don’t silence their cell phones in church.

3. People who talk during movies.

2. People who get distracted by their cell phones while waiting at a red light.

1. Making a stupid bank error.

You will notice that the first four things on my list involve other people. The reason the bank error thing is number one on my list is because it’s all me. It’s all me making a boneheaded mistake, and there isn’t another living soul who I can blame it on. All me. Take this morning at 5:41 am, for example...

The 15th of the month is one of two bill-paying days on my calendar. I set aside an hour or so, usually in the morning to get it done. In the Dunnevant household, there are three checking accounts. One of them belongs to Pam ( who this never seems to happen to ). The second one is our joint checking account, out of which we move and have our being (JK!!!), and the third is my corporate account, out of which I pay all bills associated with my chosen profession. Since the majority of my income is deposited into our joint checking account,(since, for reasons that escape me, it can’t be paid to an entity, only an individual), bill paying always involve making a transfer of funds from one account not another. With the miracle of online banking, this is as easy as pushing a button on my laptop, and it works like a charm....except on those rare occasions when it doesn’t. The thing that makes this so painful is that when it doesn’t work...it is always my fault. Something happens. I get distracted. One minute, I am focused like a laser on the task at hand, humming along like a well oiled machine. Then, the phone rings, a client shows up unannounced, an irresistible opportunity for an office prank presents itself, somebody brings donuts, and before you know it, I have forgotten to press send on that $8762 transfer from the joint account to the corporate account, even though I am convinced that I have. The next morning I open my bank app and am notified that there is a negative balance of -$1032 in said account. This has resulted in a $35 overdraft fee. I will have to go by the bank and plead my pathetic case to Clarice, my irritating but patient banker, who will roll her eyes and grant me some sort of dispensation for my stupidity. She will say...Doug, why don’t you delay your bill paying date until the day after you do these transfers? That way if you forget to press send you’ll have time to catch it. We’ve gone over this before!

I blush and nod my head obediently...Yes, Clarice...that is an excellent suggestion. I will take that under advisement. I guess I got distracted...but I could have sworn I hit send.

Naw...you didn’t.

I then will thank her for her forebearance, and slink out of the bank feeling like I used to feel whenever Mrs. Winston made me stand with my nose pressed against the blackboard for throwing paper airplanes back in 4th grade. Rage and temporary self-loathing.