Attention All Husbands

I have been married to the beautiful and beguiling Pamela J. Dunnevant for nearly 40 years now. It has proven to be the single finest decision I ever made. Nevertheless, after all these years one would think that I would know everything there is to know about her. You would think that I would have picked up on all her unspoken idiosyncrasies, all of the non-verbal cues that woman are famous for. Well, imagine my surprise when during lunch with friends a couple weeks ago, I discovered that for 38 years, 8 and a half months, I have been folding the towels incorrectly. Not to put too fine a point on it but actually I’ve been folding them just fine—but I have been placing them in the linen closet totally wrong.

Ok, I should admit up front that before Pam and I entered into marital bliss I had never folded anything that came out of a laundry basket. when I was a kid my Mom did that sort of thing. When I moved out of the house after college, I shared an apartment with my sister who did that sort of thing. So, everything I know about folding clothes I learned by watching Pam.

So, there we were at Glory Days after church having lunch and the conversation drifted into the dangerous waters of stuff my spouse does that annoys me. Like any self-respecting husband who knows what’s good for him, I couldn’t think of a single thing, at least nothing that I was dumb enough to bring up. It was then that I was stunned to learn of my towel-folding inadequacies. Pam says to my sister, “Yeah, he folds them right but then he always puts them in the linen closet wrong side out!! Can you believe it?”

Since that bombshell discovery, I have been hesitant to remind her of my past failures. Consequently, this has been sitting on the floor in our bedroom for several days now…

…mocking me. Today when I was home for lunch I made a command decision that I would dive right in there and get it right this time. So, I folded the towels and laid the finished product out on the bed and tried desperately to remember which side goes in first??!!

This way??

…Or this way?

Then as I looked at the two options it occurs to me that having the rounded edges outward would perhaps look better. Perhaps they would also be easier to grasp when removing them for use. But then I thought…there are only two human beings who will ever see how these towels were placed in this linen closet, and one of us could not possibly care any less. So, this is all for Pam’s benefit and the benefit of her advanced organizational mind.

Which brings me to today’s lesson. Gentlemen, it matters not whether you are a newlywed or a 50 year veteran, there is always something new to learn about your wife. The key is always…communication. Everybody remembers that Christmas years ago when instead of getting anything fun all you got was dumb stuff like…underwear. Well, even Santa and Mrs. Claus have had trouble communicating…

Men, don’t let this happen to you!

An Act of Kindness

My back is better, although still not 100%. I’ve been laying low, taking muscle relaxers and pain meds at night to help me sleep. The most frustrating part of having a bad back is when your wife stops you from attempted even the most common of household tasks with, “Get away from that! Don’t even think about lifting that until your back is all the way healed!!” But the absolute worst thing about these past six days has been the fact that I have not been able to do yard work, which has allowed the falling leaves to take over, making my yard look like nobody lives here!

So, there I was this morning around 10:15 sitting at my library desk when I heard the sound of a leaf blower next door. Immediately I was jealous that it wasn’t me. But then I noticed that the sound of the thing was getting louder and louder. That’s when I got up and walked over to the window. There was my next door neighbor, Stewart Garland doing this…

He had blown all the leaves onto the lawn and was now mulching them up with his mower and bagging up the clippings. This man is a married father of three high energy kids less than 12 years old. It’s not like he doesn’t already have enough to do, but there he was cleaning my front yard like a boss.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is why we love our neighborhood and our neighbors. Its also one of the reasons why we still live in the same house we had built 26 years ago. I suppose its also fair to say that this is what happens when you spend almost an entire decade spoiling the Garland kids to death. Their dad has pity on the old guy and takes care of his yard when he throws out his back. No matter the reason, I am so grateful and thankful that I get to live in a neighborhood like Wythe Trace.

Good News/Bad News

What follows is a good news/bad news story. First, the bad news.

Despite two solid months of diligent work done clearing my yard of fallen leaves cumulating in the pre-Thanksgiving sweep, the relentless downfall continued over the weekend. I was informed Sunday evening by my ever-vigilant wife that the County of Henrico was scheduled to visit our neighborhood to pick up bagged leaves this week. So, when I finished lunch yesterday afternoon I thought I would at least make a start. I decided to use the leaf blower to collect all the leaves in my driveway into a large pile first. After this uneventful task I turned my attention to the back yard, where I decided that I would simply pulverize the offending leaves with my lawn mower and dispose of the resulting mess into bags. This took a little less than an hour. At that point, I probably should have called it a day and gone back to the office. But for some reason I decided to bag up the leaves in the aforementioned pile in my driveway. Once the bag was in place I bent over to scoop up my first armful of leaves when I felt a sharp pain in my lower back. It was excruciating and quite familiar…almost one of those seeing stars moments which may or may not have resulted in a brief face-plant in the pile of leaves. Fortunately for my self-respect, there were no witnesses to this episode. Once back on my feet, I eventually managed to get inside the house where I spent the rest of the afternoon alternating between heat and ice compresses.

I know what some of you are wondering. So, you went to the doctor or Patient First or something, right? The answer to that question is a resounding “NO”. Could I use a few muscle-relaxers right now? A couple decent pain pills? Sure. But in order to obtain them I would have to go to a doctor’s office and sit next to germ-spewing, flu-besotted people for half an hour. That’s a hard pass. Besides, I know how this throwing out your back business works having experienced it many times before. It’s painful and annoying for three or four days before it eventually works its way out of trouble and back to normal. I would rather suffer through the next few days than risk coming down with the FLU. 

So today, despite taking almost ten minutes putting my shoes and socks on, I limped in to the office for a while and actually accomplished a couple of things that were on my list. I intend to keep a lunch appointment at noon with a friend. After that I will collapse into my recliner and set my vibrating heating pad to STUN for the rest of the day.

So, what’s the good news? Well, the good news is that this back thing didn’t happen the last day I was getting leaves out of my yard…Thanksgiving Day. What a bummer that would have been. There’s always a silver lining to every dark cloud. Mine was timing…and the fact that there wasn’t anyone with their cell phone camera filming me in that pile of leaves!

The Blank White Paper Protest

Well now. It would appear that the Chi-Com government is having a moment. It seems like only yesterday that Xi Jinping granted himself another five year term as supreme leader, looking for all the world like an autocrat at the peak of his power. Thomas Friedman’s man-crush had never been more fervent. The next thing you know, there are thousands of Chinese citizens in the streets holding up blank pieces of paper demanding freedom. What in the name of Mao Zedong is going on?

It appears that the teeming masses in China have about had it with their government’s Zero-Covid policy. Apparently, even a population that has lived under communism for nearly three generations now can tolerate only so much oppression. Lockdowns enforced by armed troops is proving to be a bridge too far for a people who have endured everything from the Rape of Nanjing to the Cultural Revolution. 

It has always been a subject of fascination to me how any totalitarian enterprise could exercise autocratic control over a population of 1.4 billion souls. Just think about how difficult a time America has governing a mere 330 million Americans. And yet, with the notable exception of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, the people of China have been amazingly docile under Communism’s heavy hand. Until this weekend.

Still, if history teaches us anything its the painful fact that he who has the guns makes the rules. It’s hard to imagine these protests ending well for those brave souls holding up blank white paper…

A Defense of Family Photographs

After each major holiday on the American calendar, social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram become filled with photographs of happy families enjoying the day. Then, like the sun rising in the east and setting in the west, come the denunciations of these platforms as phony, guilty of painting false narratives of American life and, worst of all, the sin of being…boring. I wish to offer a defense.

Long before the internet got invented by Al Gore, if you wanted to see family photographs you had to break out the moldy old picture album. This thing weighed ten pounds and had loose pictures falling out of it all over the place. You would sit on the sofa with ten other people all leaning in to catch a glimpse of old black and white shots of your glum looking grandparents dressed in wool suits in the middle of July. With each turn of the page the pictures looked less bedraggled and just a bit more clear, but still very few frivolous moments. Back then taking pictures looked to be deadly serious business, no time for tomfoolery. But then, somewhere around 1960, the photographs began to show signs of life. There were more shots of kids, dressed in more comfortable clothing doing more normal things. Less posing, more smiles. With each turn of the page and each subsequent decade the pictures became more entertaining. Then suddenly…color. All bets were now off. It became a free for all of goofiness. Thats when the ten people on the sofa began to laugh and point and say, “remember when?”

But nowhere in even the oldest family photo album will you find somber shots of your Aunt Ruth trudging across the courthouse parking lot, leaving her divorce hearing. Nobody ever took a candid picture of your Mom and Dad in a knock down drag out fight over the family finances. There aren’t any photographs of your sister sobbing in her bedroom after her boyfriend broke up with her. No one ever thought to bring a camera along when the family dog got hit by a car and had to be removed and buried in the back yard. There are several good reasons for these omissions from the official record. First, its none of anyone else’s business. For another thing, why on earth would any family wish to immortalize their dirty laundry for perpetuity on the public record?

So, families have been careful what images they allow outsiders to see long before Zuckerberg came along, and I for one am eternally grateful for this discretion. Nobody cares or desires to hear or see other people’s dysfunction for the simple reason that we have plenty of our own to work through. When I see thousands of photographs of happy people sitting around Thanksgiving tables, I smile and am glad to see them all together. At the same time, I am grateful that they weren’t stupid enough to publish the screaming, alcohol-fueled political debate between Uncle Ben and Aunt Betty.

When I often hear the phrase, keeping it real, my eyebrows raise a bit. Really? Do we really want people on social media to keep it real? A quick google search of social pathologies plaguing the American family will disabuse you of any desire to keep it real. I’ll take the pictures of three generations of Smith’s sitting on the front steps of the house any day of the week and twice on Sundays compared to some somber testimonial to despair.

So, keep those beautiful family shots coming people! I love them all.

A Memory Painting

Pam came home with this painting a couple of days ago. She’s into seasonal artwork, and this one spoke to her in a Thanksgiving/Christmas sort of way. Like any painting it is best appreciated when examined closely, something that a mere photograph cannot do. We’re not talking Rembrandt or Picasso here. This was probably brushed together in a sentimental art factory owned by some Chinese conglomerate by child artists working 16 hour shifts for all I know. Be that as it may, whoever painted this managed to capture something.

I look at this painting up close and I want to walk through that door. I already know what it looks like inside because I’ve been there before. There are old, scarred oak pews with straight backs and no cushions and a single aisle dissecting the room. Its cold inside and I’m the only one in the place. At the front there is a mahogany sacraments table with a large bible opened to the 23rd Psalm, with two brass candle sticks on either side. To the left is a black spinet piano with two or three dead keys. On the podium sits a beautiful polished wood pulpit with a cross carved in the front. Behind it to either side are two high back cushioned chairs. Behind the chairs there’s a recessed chamber that holds a baptismal pool. On the wall above the pool there is a painting of a receding river lit up by an oversized ray of sunshine, a white dove soaring in the air.

 I take a seat halfway up on the aisle. The place smells familiar. It is the smell of old men’s after shave, of dust and candles. A memory drifts by of animal crackers, kool-aid and vacation bible school. I am transported back to a simpler time when bald-headed men and white-haired women rustled my hair and tried to teach me important things. I remember all the squirming done in these pews, all the restlessness. But now, I am still. My eyes are closed and I feel an overwhelming gratefulness for this old building. I attempt a quick prayer of Thanksgiving but the words seem listless and ineffective. So I stop trying. Instead I open my eyes and look around again. This time the pews are filled with my family. All of them are there, even those long passed. I see friends I haven’t seen in years, every one I’ve ever been lucky enough to make. They are all here in the beautiful old church. I hear the piano come to life. We all stand to sing an old song…We gather together to ask the Lord’s blessing. Suddenly I feel the warmth generated by the crowd of witnesses.

Thanksgiving is nothing without memories. And this marvelous painting has brought them all back to me this morning.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Walmart Tragedy

It is Thanksgiving Eve in 2022 America, and I wake up to news of seven dead in the break room of a Walmart less than two hours from my house, murdered execution style by one of the managers of the store.

So, while I spend my day preparing for the arrival of family for tomorrow’s festivities, there will be a cloud of sorrow for the workers and their families who will never celebrate another Thanksgiving without the crushing memory of this tragedy.

It’s Thanksgiving and I Have a New Job

This being the week of Thanksgiving, I have a new job—Pam’s Executive Assistant.

Here’s how we roll here at the Dunnevant house. 2022 is the year that we host the White family for Thanksgiving. In addition, Jon, Kaitlin and Jackson will be coming for several days. Patrick, Sarah and Frisco unfortunately will be Thanksgiving-ing in Nashville. This means that we will have somewhere between 12 and 14 souls here for the big meal.

My dear wife has taken the liberty of an entire week off from her day job to devote to this task. Why? A few reasons. First, she needs a break from sitting around a tiny table in a cramped room surrounded by phlegm-spewing elementary school students. Second, there is much to do to prepare for the festivities. If you have ever had the pleasure of attending a holiday get-together at my house you will know that Pam does it about as well as it is possible to do. She tends to the tiniest detail, leaves no stone unturned trying to make each day special. This is where I come in.

I am the sort of man who struggles with authority. Starting with my parents, then several unfortunate teachers, then professors, then bosses, I have consistently resisted taking orders. Ultimately all of this authority resistance resulted in me starting my own business. It suited my temperament. But there is one exception to this rule. I have never had a minute’s trouble completely submitting to my wife’s authority when it comes to the issue of…hospitality. The reason is simple. She is great at it. I have watched this woman plan and execute dinners, holiday parties and other special occasions for almost 40 years now. What I have learned over those years is that this woman is a beast who knows exactly what she is doing. In the early days of our marriage I might object to this order or that because it seemed..well…unnecessary or frivolous. Back in my ignorant days I might challenge her on one of her crazier requests.  Not any more. I have learned that if she wants something done a certain way at a certain time, there is a reason for it. When the results are consistently fabulous at some point you just shrug and say, “I’m all over it, sweetie.”

So, if she decides that since this year’s meal won’t begin until 4:00 it might be nice if we have all the outside Christmas lights put up so we can do a grand illumination after dinner, guess what I’m going to do? I’m putting up the lights. If she needs to clean bathrooms, vacuum the house, travel to Thailand to pick up some rare spice that she couldn’t find at Publix, I’ll get on a plane. The reason for my happy compliance to every request is simple—I know how great it will be, how much happiness and warmth she will be responsible for by the end of the day. And even though she does it all happily, I know what she really wishes she were doing…drinking hot chocolate while watching Hallmark movies with our daughter.

Tragedy Outside of Paris

What an awful experience. There I was sightseeing in a beautiful small town just outside of Paris when I heard a loud explosion. There was broken glass flying all around me. It was a miracle that I came out of it alive. But when I walked out into the street I realized that the explosion was at the cheese factory down the street. It bleu cheese everywhere, the Da Brie was scattered all up and down the street. Along with everyone else, I stumbled down the street in shock until I came across Alfredo who was unconscious. Someone shouted, “I havarti called emergency services!” But unfortunately Alfredo didn’t survive the blast.

As I walked through the rapidly melting streets, being especially careful to avoid the sharp cheddar, I took a whiff of the dairy air and wondered if this was a queso fire negligence. But a local then told me that there had been a string of cheese factory explosions. All I could think to say was, “Holey Crepe”. I will cheddar tear over this.

Three Disturbing News Stories

Three stories are competing for my attention this morning. I read about the latest dangerous escalation of the war in Ukraine, a missile of unknown origin having landed in Poland killing two. Then I learn more details about the murder of three football players at the University of Virginia by a former player, a resident of Henrico County. Lastly, I am informed that Donald Trump kicked off his campaign for President in 2024 last night. All three of these stories give me a queasy stomach and play hell with my confidence in humanity.

First, Ukraine. If it turns out that the missile in question was launched by the Russian military intentionally, there’s big trouble in River City. Poland is a NATO member, meaning that any attack on her must be treated as an attack on all member states, most notable—us. This is the worst case scenario for anyone hoping that this conflict will not conflate into a European-wide war. One is left hoping that the Russian high command will rise up and take Vladimir Putin out. Meanwhile we pray that the Poland missile was a stray anti-aircraft surface to air Ukrainian missile instead.

The killing at UVA involves yet another young man who appeared on UVA’s threat assessment team twice earlier this year. Signs of trouble were everywhere in this kid’s background, with the clear and bright benefit of hindsight. He was a victim of hazing, a participant in series of fights in schools in Henrico County, having endured his parent’s bitter divorce during high school which was so bad he had to relocate to Petersburg to live with his grandmother. So the news that he gets his hands on a firearm and starts shooting at his former teammates on a bus surprises absolutely no one—which is the worst part about the story, that we are not surprised.

The Trump announcement was expected. I suppose there is nothing to be said about him in this space that I have not said before. The fact that he thinks he has done anything to justify a second term is a monument to his colossal self regard. The only thing about the announcement which qualifies as good news from my perspective is the fact that it did NOT get top billing on Drudge. The minimal coverage and lack of breathless hype might be considered a sign that even conservative news aggregators are tired of him.

Sore Monday

Note to future self: It is not wise to spend two hours getting up leaves the day after running an 8k. This sort of thing would have been self-evident to any normal person, but for someone like me who still thinks he is indestructible it has been a painful lesson. 

Now that this thing is in the rear view mirror I can now turn my attentions to the final six weeks of 2022. This has not been a particularly enjoyable year from a business standpoint. Bear markets never are. Financial instability tends to make other areas of life unstable, which for a person of faith seems hypocritical. Shouldn’t my faith grant me a measure of confidence during times of great instability? Yes, it should. To the degree that I still struggle suggests a certain level of hypocrisy. But I am a work in progress, always have been.

These next six weeks are full of great joy and great anxiety. The joys of Thanksgiving and Christmas do fierce battle with the anxiety of preparing for both. But isn’t that the way life works? Everything of value and worth comes with challenges. Nothing is ever easy…except one thing. Lucy’s life…

Sore Monday

 Note to future self: It is not wise to spend two hours getting up leaves the day after running an 8k. This sort of thing would have been self-evident to any normal person, but for someone like me who still thinks he is indestructible it has been a painful lesson. 

Now that this thing is in the rear view mirror I can now turn my attentions to the final six weeks of 2022. This has not been a particularly enjoyable year from a business standpoint. Bear markets never are. Financial instability tends to make other areas of life unstable, which for a person of faith seems hypocritical. Shouldn’t my faith grant me a measure of confidence during times of great instability? Yes, it should. To the degree that I still struggle suggests a certain level of hypocrisy. But I am a work in progress, always have been.

These next six weeks are full of great joy and great anxiety. The joys of Thanksgiving and Christmas do fierce battle with the anxiety of preparing for both. But isn’t that the way life works? Everything of value and worth comes with challenges. Nothing is ever easy…except one thing. Lucy’s life…

Team Dunnevant at the 2022 Richmond Marathon

 Yesterday morning at precisely 7:00 am I found myself standing in the middle of the intersection of 8th and Broad Street surrounded on all sides by my fellow man. It was an unnerving feeling, the kind of which I have spent a lifetime trying to avoid. It occurs to you that you are as trapped as it is possible to be. At the point of maximum claustrophobia, an eleven year old girl began belting out the National Anthem through an on-again, off-again microphone. To take my mind off the uncomfortable presence of so many people, I began taking a video of all of them. At the exact moment that my panning cellphone camera caught my own face, the poor girl’s microphone stopped working for the first time. My expression pretty much sums up the level of my discomfort.

Soon after, my 8k race began. I stumbled along for several hundred yards trying not to trip or be tripped by the million other feet competing for pavement. About the time I passed Miller and Rhodes—less than a quarter of a mile in to a five mile race, I realized I had to pee. For the rest of my race, instead of visualizing the finish line, I was visualizing a porta-john. 

This was a first for me in many ways, not having to pee, but running in a race. Not only had I never run a race, I had never even run with a single other person before, running for me being a solitary exercise I have always done for the single purpose of not gaining a hundred pounds. But several months ago, my son talked me in to doing the 8k version of the 2022 Richmond Marathon. He was planning on flying in from Nashville for the half-marathon and thought it would be fun. Soon, my nephews Ryan and Isaac were on board. It would be Team Dunnevant.

So, I spent the past several months “training”, not an official training protocol devised by Runner’s World, but rather a hodgepodge of my own creation, since I have never liked anyone telling me what to do. During this very unscientific training the best time I had managed for five miles was 47 minutes and 28 seconds. But yesterday wasn’t training, it was the real thing…and I had to pee.

My Apple Watch informed me that my first mile came in at a brisk 9 minutes and 5 seconds. I was quite surprised since it felt like I spent that entire mile trying to find a less crowded piece of asphalt. When the second mile time was announced as 9 minutes and 8 seconds, I thought that I should probably slow down since this seemed an unsustainable pace. The next two miles were mid 9 minutes. But when I crossed the 4 mile marker, something happened to me. Although my hips and knees were loudly barking, I knew from the race map that I had studied carefully, that the last three quarters of a mile was straight down hill on 5th street all the way to the finish line on Brown’s Island. That’s when I made the decision to break into a full sprint, or what passed for a full sprint for a 64 year old man who had already run over 4 miles. I crossed the finish line with an all-time personal best time of 45 minutes and 44 seconds. Then I promptly threw up. But, by the time I saw the large row of porta-Johns in the distance, all was forgiven and forgotten!

Meanwhile, the younger members of Team Dunnevant were busy. I soon found Ryan, who had beaten me by 4 full minutes, walking around the post-race hospitality area looking fresh as a daisy. Youth is indeed, wasted on the young! Isaac, the baby of Team Dunnevant and easily the most fit was flying around his half marathon course like making us all look like slugs. “Youth”, again being served. My son, meanwhile, was at the 5 mile mark and on a terrific pace. I was tracking his progress on an app he had downloaded on my phone the day before. Seeing as how he and Isaac still had quite a ways to go, I decided to head back home, shower off then head back later to be at the finish line for Patrick. In a cruel ironic twist, I received a text from Patrick around mile 7 telling me he was fighting a couple of cramps. He hates running when its warm. His last half marathon was in Nashville last November when it was a crisp 28 degrees at the start of the race. The heat was giving him a lot of discomfort and he still had another 6 miles to go. What made this text cruel and ironic was the fact that I received it while I was soaking in my jacuzzi, giving me a big time case of “dad-Guilt.” The good news is that Patrick gutted it out like a boss and was running at the finish line. I was super proud of him for his toughness and determination. 

Since this was Team Dunnevant we are talking about, Pam and Paula had prepared an after race high carb brunch and photo-session for all the participants.

I was told after the race that the 8k had 86 runners in my age division, which was 60-64. I finished 17th. I’ll take it, even if it resulted in vomiting.

Patrick is already urging me to consider stepping up to a 10k with the not so subtle reminder that the Rock and Roll Nashville 10k is coming up soon. I’m going to wait until every joint from hips to ankles isn’t hurting before making him any promises.

Election Observations

My observations about the 2022 Midterm election results:

- Having secured his third consecutive ass-whipping electoral loss, Beto-O’Rourke has emerged as the leading candidate to manage the Texas Rangers.

- The voters of the state of Pennsylvania have proven their Islamophobic credentials by deciding that they would rather vote for an incapacitated stroke victim than elect the first Muslim senator in United States history. On the flip side, Pennsylvanians have saved all of us from potentially embarrassing lectures from Dr. Oz on the Senate floor about the benefits of monthly bowel-cleansing.

- Stacey Abrams has called a press conference for later today where she is expected to outline the reasons for her second loss to Governor Brian Kemp. Vegas bookmaker’s have set the odds for The Patriarchy at 3:1, Institutional Racism at 4:1, and her plan to fight inflation by making abortion available statewide at 5:1.

- Despite being on the ballot in every state, Democracy got no votes.

- Under the category If you thought this election was horrible—Donald Trump is expected to announce his Candidacy for President next week.

Three Pearls

A couple weeks ago I accidentally clicked on an iHeart radio station called Classic Country, while driving to an appointment. I’ve been listening ever since. Eventually I will tire of it, I’m sure. Some of the songs are horrible, honestly. But occasionally I hear songs that are so beautiful, so achingly tender, so filled with pain and truth they stagger me. I suppose that every genre of music is this way, great melodies with poetic lyrics sprinkled in with lots of hot garbage. Just in case you’re wondering, there are three songs that I fell in love with. I was familiar with all three from years ago, but it had been a long time since I’d heard them. 

I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry by Hank Williams

Making Believe by Emmylou Harris

She’s Got You by Patsy Cline

Do yourself a huge favor this week, Google these three and give a close listen. You’ll thank me later.

Leaf Wars

Every year its the same. Starting around the middle of October all the trees in my yard begin shedding their leaves. There are lots of trees and lots of leaves. Oh, and pine needles, lots of pine needles. So, I have a strategy that has always involved a leaf blower a lawn mower and a rake, along with a meticulous schedule. I remove every leaf from my yard twice a week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I gather them into four strategically located piles in the corners of my back yard. Then, once the battle has been won, I call my man Tim Robinson to come haul them away for me. Its a beautiful plan that has stood the test of time. The reason I use the bi-weekly schedule is a simple one. If I just waited weeks and weeks for every leaf to fall before getting them up, there would be so many the task would be beyond my strength. So, basically I break the job down into manageable pieces. Like I said, its a great system.

But then, yesterday happened.

Leaves were everywhere. It was nuts. I had just cleaned them up a mere three days ago for crying out loud! So I went to work. In just under two hours The yard was immaculate. It was around noon when I finished. I took a shower and settled in for a delightful afternoon nap. But when I woke up my yard was ankle deep in leaves and pine needles! I couldn’t believe it! It was as if my trees decided to lose all their leaves in one day. What in the Sam Hill was happening?

Well, there was no way I was going to let this outrage stand. Yes, I knew perfectly well that if my neighbors saw me heading out there getting leaves up for the second time in less than four hours they would be laughing behind my back. Yes, I knew how Don Quixote-ish it would all look, but it was the principle of the thing. So outside I went. This morning I woke up to this…

Seriously? I’m reminded of the old prophet’s warning—There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.—or at the very least, more work!

Evil in Iowa

It was early in the morning. I had just taken my first sip of coffee, just barely awake. I saw the headline and was very close to ignoring it in favor of a story about the Federal Reserve, but I made the mistake of clicking. I have not been able to shake it out of my mind since.

There was a 16 year old high school student in Iowa who had just received a bad grade from his Spanish teacher. He scheduled a meeting with her to discuss her many deficiencies as a teacher. He left the meeting having not secured any accommodation. His poor grade would stand. Then, he recruited a friend, another 16 year old, to follow the teacher after school ended. They knew that she would stop at a nearby park after school to take a walk before driving home. They met her there and proceeded to beat her to a pulp with a baseball bat. Afterwards they dragged her body into the woods and covered it with a tarp and some railroad ties, then drove her van several miles away and abandoned it on a back road. It wasn’t hard for the police to track them down after they discovered her body since they had boasted about it on social media. When the police took the boy into custody and asked him for an explanation he replied, “the grade in my Spanish class was messing up my GPA.”

There were photographs with the story…

Here are the killers. The one on the right is the boy who’s GPA had been ruined by his poor grade in Spanish. The one on the left is his accomplice. But, there was another picture, this one of the victim…

Meet Nohema Graber, 66. It was when I saw this photograph that I was overcome with what I can only describe as deep sadness along with an emotion that I’m not sure I have ever experienced before…hopelessness. 

This is the kind of story that will live rent free in my head for several days. I will ponder it and try to make sense of such a death as this. There’s just something about her face, sturdy and proud. She could have been retired, probably still worked either out of economic necessity or of a love of teaching and devotion to her students. But now she’s dead, beaten beyond recognition and left under a tarp by two boys capable of unimaginable cruelty. I am left to think about the human race and our limitless capacity for evil.

I ask myself, why this case? What makes it special? The answer is—nothing. There is nothing noteworthy about two teenagers committing cold blooded murder anymore. This is America after all. We are especially adept at this sort of thing. At least they didn’t use a gun. If they did all anyone would be talking about is the scourge of gun violence. Good thing the killers weren’t black or illegal immigrants. Then the subject would be racism and our porous border. But since this didn’t involve any of those things, we are left simply to contemplate how such a thing could be possible? On the other hand, because it didn’t involve either of those things maybe we don’t even talk about it at all. I stumbled on this story almost by accident. Have any of you heard about it?

This murder took place almost a year ago. It was in the news because it is finally now going to trial, the two killers will be tried as adults.

In all honesty, I have never been the most empathetic person in the world. Especially when I was younger I was much more tough love than a shoulder to cry on type of guy. My default reaction to hearing someone’s tale of woe would eventually involve an eye-roll or two and the advice to stop belly aching and do better. In other words, I’ve never been a bleeding heart. But more recently I have discovered a surprising well of emotion living inside me that comes out at the oddest times. Here I was, alone downstairs in my house before dawn reading this awful story and coming across this photograph of 66 year old Nohema Graber and suddenly it was everything I could do to keep from crying. Why? Why this story and none of the thousand others even more brutal than this that have come before? I don’t know. I have no answer other than the fact that I am tired, tired of the manifestations of evil in our world. I’m tired of people murdering other people in cold blood with no remorse. I’m tired of the death of innocents. Hell, I’m even tired of the murder of bad people.

The more I think about this case the more it occurs to me that I don’t know the back stories here. Maybe these two boys have horrible, idiot parents. Maybe they come from unfathomable dysfunction. For that matter, maybe this teacher is no bargain either. Maybe she was abusive and dismissive of these boys, maybe she was a terrible teacher with a vendetta against the kids. But whatever those back stories might be, none of it would justify this outcome. Nothing would.

My church is in the midst of a sermon series on angels. A question has arisen about why it seems easier to believe in the existence of evil spirits than it is to believe in angels. After this story I am tempted to believe that the reason people believe more in demons than angels is that we see far more evidence of demonic work than we see of the angelic. No matter where we look, evidence for evil exists, now to the point where even a story like this one hardly makes a ripple in our consciousness. 

But, I am reminded of the words of the Apostle Paul in the Book of Romans where he tells us, “Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

I’m trying, Paul, honestly I’m trying. But some days are better than others.

Ignorance of the Law is no Excuse

Pam and I have lived in the Wythe Trace subdivision in Short Pump, Virginia for over a quarter of a century. In all that time I have never known how to refer to my neighbors. Are we Wythe Tracers, Wythe Tracians or should I go with the Old Testament Wythe Tracianites? Whichever it is, all residents of this fine community should pay attention to the following public service announcement.

Henrico County’s finest have posted a new speed limit on our beloved Pump Road from the intersection at Broad Street all the way to the intersection at John Rolfe Parkway. I am told by reliable sources that ignorance of the law is no excuse, so proceed with caution. I assume that the purpose of this new speed limit is to lower the actual speed that people drive on this section of Pump Road from 55 to 45. If they really expected us to drive 35 they would post a speed limit of 25, but that’s just ridiculous. I tried driving 35 on this stretch yesterday and I felt 85 years old, but the law’s the law. 

So, just to be clear, Henrico County has now a major road in the west end which when driven from Broad Street all the way to Patterson Avenue features three different speed limits, 45, 35, and two different school zones that when flashing mandate a 25 mph limit. Good luck.

On another note, as I was returning from my record breaking 4 mile run* yesterday morning, I happened to notice the new message recently added to the North Gayton Baptist Church sign. Incidentally, what is it with Baptist churches in this town? Here’s North Gayton Baptist sitting proudly on Pump Road, nowhere near North Gayton, while Grove Avenue Baptist stands squarely on the corner of Ridge and Parham?! But, I digress. What I wanted to point out was the message on the sign…

What a beautiful truth. An Amen is in order, I think. Well done.





* 37:12, average pace of 9:17

Halloween

Ok…Halloween. Here is my sure to be unpopular take on what used to be a delightful children’s holiday, but has morphed itself into just another day that grown adults have managed to co-opt. First, the fun part.

Our neighborhood has a Halloween parade. All the adorable kids in their costumes gather at the corner of Center Ridge and Summer Stream around 5 o’clock. Then they march themselves all through the neighborhood before ending up in our culdesac where the HOA has set up tables filled with 25 pizzas from Dominoes which I have been tasked with picking up in time for their arrival. I am told that there will be over 100 of us in attendance. To guard against untimely rain, two beach pavilions will have been erected. After everyone has eaten, the trick-or-treating begins. Ever since COVID our neighborhood has gone to the curbside distribution of treats whereby you place candy in individualized bags on tables at the end of your driveway. That way, their little filthy hands don’t get thrust into a communal treat bowl. Many of us decorate our tables with Halloween gear and set up our solo-stoves behind us and make an evening of it. Its awesome. The kids look amazing and we get to chat with some of the parents at the same time…one of the few COVID outcomes that was actually wonderful. Of course, Pam being Pam, she has a special section of our table dedicated to peanut-free treats, and special bags for Cash, Kennedy and Boo from next door which somehow gets filled with not only traditional candy but all manner of other trinkets. Good Lord how we spoil those three.

So, that’s the part of Halloween that I love. The rest of what it has become is embarrassing. I look on Facebook and see an endless stream of pictures of adults decked out in all manner of outrageous costumes, attending adults only parties. Celebrities are the worst, some of them even showing up dressed in some ridiculous costumes to parties that weren’t even costume parties! Then there are the attention hogs that intentionally dress in offensive and prejudicial outfits designed for maximum outrage in order to grab attention and hits on their Instagram accounts. Then, this morning I read of the 150 dead South Korean Halloween partiers killed in a stampede. Look, I’ve got nothing against having a good time, but when I see 50 and 60 year olds dressed up either as Sponge Bob SquarePants, or some couple decked out to look like a prostitute and a priest I think, Good Lord, folks! Give Halloween back to the kids and grow the hell up.

But, thats just me.

Incredible

And this, my friends, is why I love post season baseball.

The Perfect Blogpost for a Dreary Friday

On this dreary Friday morning I will ignore the many problems of the human condition to concentrate on one of its joys, the Dad Joke.

Two cowboys were lost in the desert when they saw a tree in the distance covered in bacon. One cowboy says to another, “A bacon tree! We’re saved!” He runs as fast as he can to the tree only to die in a hail of bullets. Turned out to not be a bacon tree at all.

It has a ham bush.

Lionel Messi was fussing at his son for his filthy looking room. The boy said that it wasn’t his fault.

“I can’t help it that I’m a little messy.”

Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd broke into a distillery one night. Daffy picks up a bottle and asks Elmer, “Is this whiskey?”

Elmer answered, “Sure its whiskey, but not not nearly as whiskey as wobbing a bank.”

My wife is all mad at me because I dripped ceiling paint on the floor.

Now I’m just walking on eggshell.

I used to think that my Chiropractor wasn’t any good.

But now I stand corrected.

Last night I called the child abuse hotline.

A six year old answered the phone and told me I was ugly.

Breaking news from the world of sports: The New York Yankees are relocating to the Philippines.

They are going to be called the Manila Folders.

According to the CDC, what is the most popular vaccine in the ghost community?

…boooo-sters.

My brother, the electrician, just had gender reassignment surgery.

Now I have a trans-sister.

I went to visit my Psychiatrist yesterday and after thirty minutes he told me I was crazy. I told him I needed a second opinion.

He said, “Alright…you’re ugly too.”

The Crisis in Public Education

I am a product of the public school system in this country, having graduated from Patrick Henry High School in Hanover County, Virginia in 1976. Both of my children are products of the public school system. I have never been a big fan of Christian schools, private schools, or home schooling, although I understand why some people make those choices. For me, there was no other choice. My parents couldn’t afford anything besides public schools. When my kids came along I could afford other options but never seriously considered any of them. It helped that the local schools were terrific. Perhaps if I lived in the middle of Camden, New Jersey I would have made different choices.

Full Disclosure Alert: I come from a family of several educators. My wife, my daughter, my sister, and one of my nieces have all been neck deep in the public school infrastructure for many years. So what I write here is in part influenced by their experiences. I should also admit that when I matriculated at the various schools available to me as a kid—Elmont Elementary, John M. Gandy, Liberty Jr. High then Patrick Henry High School—I wasn’t exactly what anyone would call a model student. I was an underperforming, mischievous goofball who was far more interested in girls than grades, as my many trips to the principal’s office would prove. But, I learned a lot and many of my teachers along the way made positive impressions on me, some life-long.

So, my devotion to public schools does not come from an idyllic experience, but rather, I believe that public schools are essential to the formation and sustenance of the Republic in ways that expensive private schools, parochial schools and even home schooling could never be. A foundational, quality education available to everyone is the surest and most proven tool to fight poverty, crime and a host of other societal plagues. We all benefit from a well educated citizenry, people who have been given the foundation of knowledge and understanding of the world.

But it doesn’t take an Education Department Bureaucrat to see that public schools are in deep, deep trouble. Since the onset of COVID, and uninterrupted since, some of the best teachers in the business have chosen to leave the profession. Teachers that were anywhere close to retirement bailed. To make matters worse, the number of new candidates has dried up. Fewer and fewer college students are choosing teaching as a career, and it’s not hard to see why.

I will not attempt here to diagnose what ails education in this country. I am not qualified, for one thing. For another, there are so many problems I wouldn’t even know where to start. However, I would like to concentrate on one area that is a universe away from how things worked 50 years ago when I cut my destructive path through Hanover County’s school system. The problem as I see it is perfectly summarized by this:

Although my parents had plenty of problems with my teachers back in the day, they never ever shared them with me. Mom and Dad formed a united front when it came to me and my uninspired scholarship, so if I was having a problem in class it was 99% my fault. In the Dunnevant home, our teachers were long suffering angels for having to put up with our laziness, etc. In other words teachers and our schools were held in a position of honor and authority by my parents, which filtered down to us. This simply does not exist any longer. There are a million reasons, but the underlying fact is undeniable. If little Johnny is struggling at school, too often parents take the position that it is the teacher’s fault. The louder they complain, the more likely it is that the administration will back the student and his bitching parents over the teacher. This is not true in every school or in every case, but it has happened often enough to make it clear to many teachers I’ve talked to that nobody has their backs. 

But as frustrating as this must be and as harmful as the breakdown of classroom discipline has become, its not as bad as the constant moving of the goalposts being forced upon teachers and schools by the mismanagement and bumbling incompetence of the education bureaucracy that has grown up over local schools like mushrooms after three days of rain. There are bloated central offices, reinventing the wheel literally every couple of years in everything from reading to math. Then there are the federal bureaucratic kingdoms mandating outcomes on local schools without providing workable guidance or funding. Finally, local school boards have been taken over by politicians instead of educators. Its a wonder any competent teacher stays on the job. Of course one of the worst things that can happen to a really good teacher is for them to win some kind of Teacher of the Year award. What that amounts to is an increased work load for two full years as they struggle to teach their classes while performing all of the TOY responsibilities, all in exchange for some $500 or $1,000 stipend. In the business world that would be considered laughable. In education, its like every Tuesday.

We have a problem on our hands as a nation. If public schools continue on their present course they will be virtually gone in twenty years, replaced by home schooling, the rich private academy, and some charter/for-profit enterprise hybrid. The only remaining public schools will be in the poorest neighborhoods, producing predictably pathetic outcomes. Something has to be done. We need to attract gifted teachers into the business. That can’t be done solely by raising the pay; it will also require a new level of respect and support. We need to stop tying the hands of administrators by allowing them to enforce classroom discipline. And parents need to stop coddling their children with the false message that they are special and deserve nothing but the best. They, in fact, deserve nothing but a decent education and a chance to succeed. That only happens when they work hard, apply themselves and respect the only authority that matters when they are in class … their teacher!

There’s an Election?

I find myself in a brief baseball hole since the World Series doesn’t start until this Friday. This allows me to think about other stuff, so I better take advantage of this four day window.

Ok, so there’s an election coming up. The reason I know this is because I can’t avoid the political banners and signs that festoon nearly every major intersection in the west end. But for the life of me I couldn’t tell you a single candidates’ name. I could probably pick a couple of them out of a lineup because I would recognize their faces from the banners, but I couldn’t put a name with a face if my life depended on it. Another weird thing is that although every time I find myself at one of those west end intersections I am careful to read every word of the signs, I have not yet been able to identify which political party these candidates are aligned with. Nowhere on the signs is there any such admission. Honestly, I don’t blame them one bit.

Not only can I not put names with faces or know which party they represent, I must admit that at this point I don’t even know what office they are running for. Partly, I blame my appalling election illiteracy on spending eight of the past sixteen weeks in Maine. I do know that up there Former Governor Paul Lepage is running against a woman with blond hair…so I got that going for me. But as far as the political contests in the Old Dominion, I am hopelessly uninformed. Here’s what will happen. I will enter the voting booth on Election Day and be presented with several names with D’S and R’s next to them with the occasional L or I. Then, the ballot will tell me what office they are running for and I will make my choice based on basically zero information. So, the question is, should I vote at all?

Is it good for democracy for everyone to cast a ballot or just people who have taken the time to study the issues and candidates? What about a guy like me who long ago soured on politics to the point where his distaste for it has rendered him apolitical and apathetic? Should I cast a ballot, or let those with passionate convictions one way or another have the floor?

In the five days or so before Election Day I will receive a barrage of slick one page ads in the mail telling horror stories of what will befall the Commonwealth if so-and-so gets elected. Then the airways will be filled 24/7 with ads as each party spends all the money they raised over the past two years trying to scare the hell out of me. Nevertheless, I was always taught by my parents and most of my teachers in high school that it was my sacred duty to vote, my responsibility to participate in the franchise. So, I will vote. Maybe I’ll write in someone. I won’t vote for anyone who is running unopposed and I won’t vote for anyone with misspelled words or missing punctuation in their last minute mail appeals. I mean, I do have a few standards.

Its Friday. Are You Golden Yet?

When I was pulling out of my driveway Monday morning my neighbors, Jamie and Stu, were walking their kids to the bus stop. I rolled the window down to say hello and Jamie replied with a voice that sounded like something you would hear in a tuberculosis sanatorium…three octaves low and as raspy as a two pack a day smoker. I delicately observed, “Good Lord girl, you sound horrible!” Then she said something very cool. In fact, I am stealing it and using it for motivation. 

She said, “I’ve got to get better because we have family portraits this weekend. My plan is to be…golden by Friday.”

Golden by Friday. That sounds like a plan. I know what some of you are thinking. But what about the rest of the days of the week? Shouldn’t we be golden every day? Puhleeze. Most Mondays its all I can do to remember to put my contacts in. And don’t get me started on the occasional sense of despair that comes with certain Wednesday mornings. No, what I like about this golden by Friday thing is the two things it suggests. First, that there is a plan of improvement, that life is a process and there’s a goal. And second, its optimistic. The plan isn’t to be ok by Friday. No, the expectation is to be golden. That’s a high bar.

So, there you go people. Let’s all work on becoming golden by Friday.

One more thing. Any parent of multiple kids knows all about sibling rivalry. Anyone with brothers or sisters also knows about sibling rivalry. But now, thanks to baseball, there is scientific evidence that attests to its existence. A couple days ago something happened in the Phillies v Padres game that had never happened before. A pitcher for the Phillies, Aaron Nola had to pitch to his older brother Austin for the Padres. As Austin walked to the plate, the camera caught the boy’s parents in the stands. The Dad was wearing both teams’ jerseys! In his first appearance, Austin made an out. The second time up he got a hit. But here’s what some statistician discovered. Aaron Nola had thrown over 10,000 fastballs in his career up until facing his brother in that game. Only 9 times did one of his 10,000 fastballs reach 96 miles per hour or higher. 3 of those 9 times were against his brother!!

Have a good Friday everyone, and if you aren’t quite golden…go for silver.

What All of You Have Been Waiting For

Its been a while since I have shared any Dad jokes in this space. I’ve been preoccupied with other things that haven’t exactly lent themselves to the pursuit of humor. For many of you this has been very good news, but for others—like Pam Cole—it has been devastating. I’m hearing rumors that she is inconsolable. So, this morning I visited a few of my reliable sites looking for some new material and I have to say—there’s isn’t a lot of funny happening out there at the moment. But yesterday afternoon I did receive a text from my wife of all people with this gem…

How do you describe Dracula’s fashion sense?

…fang shui.

Then there’s this:

The Ukrainian guy whose job it is to decommission Russian armored vehicles doesn’t get enough credit.

…its a tank less job.

…and by now he probably has turrets syndrome.

…really difficult to get any traction in his career.

What do you get when you send a wolf to therapy?

…aware wolf.

Cancer, diabetes, and COVID-19 walk into a bar.

…bartender says, “what? Is this some kind of sick joke??”

I recently started writing a novel about hurricanes.

…It is only a draft at the moment.

…but I’m sure it will take the world by storm.

What did Abraham Lincoln say when he was on trial?

“I’m in-a-cent.”

…to coin a phrase.

The Best Time of the Year

So, while I was in Maine I was able to read a few books. Its one of the major benefits that Maine-life affords me.

They were all good. Well, all except the Cal Ripken auto-biography. Note to self: avoid autobiographies written by athletes. I mean, Cal was amazing and all but this thing was flat and boring. But the others were terrific. Amor Towles continues to astound me with his writing. Lincoln Highway was brilliant. Also, I had always felt a little guilty that I had never read anything by P.D. James. The woman is a British institution and has twenty crime novels under her belt—almost ALL of them having been made into movies—so I gave Death in Holy Orders a try and she didn’t disappoint, although I had firgured out who the killer was 70 pages before the end! But, enough with literature…its Postseason baseball time, which means I am glued to all things baseball for the next few weeks.

So yesterday the black knights from Gotham advanced to the American League Championship series against the Houston Astros, placing me on the horns of a dilemma. Who do I root for when the choices are between the the spawn of Steinbrenner and the notoriously caught red-handed cheating Houston Astros? After a night of fitful sleep I have determined that I will root against the depository of all that is wrong with baseball, and root for Dusty Baker. If none of this makes any sense to you, its ok. Its a baseball thing.

In the other league, I have to decide between two teams awash in former Nationals players. For the Phillies there’s Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper, while the Padres have Juan Soto and Josh Bell. While I am very grateful to the Padres for ridding us of the dreadfully entitled Dodgers, I have decided to cast my lot with the Phillies who seem to be playing inspired baseball of late. The home run that Kyle Schwarber hit last night was so incredible it got this reaction from Bryce…



So, there you have it. I’m all-in on an Astros v. Phillies World Series.

Whatsoever Things are Lovely

Ever heard the expression—tanned, rested, and ready? It’s normally used to describe someone who has been away on an extended vacation, then returns all rejuvenated. But did it describe me as I returned to work today? Well, because it was a fall trip, I am not tanned. Without question I am rested. The question of whether or not I am ready is totally irrelevant. Life does not much care if we are ready. Life happens whether we are ready or not. 

I woke this morning around 5 o’clock. After my regular routines were completed, I felt the beginnings of mild nausea. I had woken up with a mild headache which was now growing but I knew that a cup of coffee would keep it at bay. I began to think of the list that was waiting for me at the office. It wasn’t daunting, but there was work to be done and a lot of it. But I knew that Kristin would have it organized for me. I also knew that my files would be in infinitely better shape than they were when I left. She always uses my time away to clean things up and correct my alphabetically-challenged system. There will be a box of discarded paperwork, maybe two depending how far she made it through. The woman is irreplaceable.

As I sat on my sofa flipping through the financial news, my spirits began to falter. Its the same thing that happens after every vacation I’ve ever taken. Its the same thing that I felt on the first day of school when I was a kid. You would think that after 64 years I would have evolved into someone wiser and less plagued by anxiety. You would think that after 40 years in the same career I would be better able to handle the pressures inherent in my business. Shouldn’t I be better equipped now than I was 30 years ago? As it turns out—no.

But then I remembered a little exercise that I had started doing before I left for Maine, the thought exercise that goes along with that verse from the 4th chapter of Philippians. I wrote a blog about it on September 26th. So, I started thinking about things that are true, noble and just. Then I closed my iPad and thought about things that are pure, lovely and admirable. Nothing miraculous happened. My nausea didn’t go away. I still had a big challenge facing me when I walked through the doors of my office at 7:30. But, for thirty minutes I did manage to feed my soul with good things. I did feel less fatalistic, less overwhelmed. By 8:00 my nausea had faded and my headache was gone and I was, in fact, ready.

When lunchtime arrived I had cut a mighty swath through my to-do list. As I sat at my library desk I remembered some advice a friend had recently given me—“when you start feeling stressed out, flip back through the great pictures you took in Maine.” So I did. One of them stood out for some reason…

“ Whatsoever things are lovely…think on these things.”

Battening Down the Hatches

Normally, the last full day in Maine is divided into two parts, the part where you get as much last minute fun in as is humanly possible, and the part where you pack everything up and clean up the cabin. Tomorrow is that day. Only, we have been thrown a curveball by Mother Nature. Somewhere in the next couple of hours, we are due to be hit with a fall storm that will last all the way through until Saturday morning. The current forecast calls for up to 3 inches of rain and sustained 20 mph winds with gusts up to 45 mph. The possibility of power outages are also in the forecast. If you are thinking to yourself, “what a horrible way to end a vacation,” nothing could be further from the truth. Unless you have sat inside a warm and dry Maine cabin while watching a fierce rain storm pummel a lake, lashing it with sheets of water while white caps dance across the surface, you can’t possibly know how incredible cool it is to watch. Tomorrow will be amazing.

However, all is NOT well. Pam took her paddle board out this morning when the lake was still as glass. As she was passing a smaller cabin she noticed at least a dozen empty beer cans at the bottom of the lake at the end of their dock. Pam, of course, was mortified. This is Maine, for God’s sake. Why, in the name of all that is holy, would anyone throw empty beer cans into a beautiful lake when their trash can is literally ten steps away? It felt like a unspeakable violation of the laws of nature, some kind of unforgivable sin. It reminded me of the time we were at Loon Landing and one day when I went for a run I saw that some cretin had thrown at least 30 empty cans of BudLite into the woods on both side of Brierly Road. I ended up filling a tall kitchen bag with them, took a picture of my work and wrote a blog about what I considered an outrage. This seemed worse somehow, because they had been thrown in the water. If the water wasn’t 60 degrees, I would have done a dive, collected them all and deposited them on the moron’s front door. But…enough negativity.

Here are a few pics from the last couple of days…

My sister, the new retiree.

So very, very, Maine.

Camden’s town square awash in fallen leaves.

Living the high life…

My No-Internet Day

Yesterday was the first bad weather day we have had since we arrived eleven days ago. It was cold all day and by the late afternoon and evening it began to rain, after which our corner of Maine became enshrouded in thick fog. But this does not mean that we had a bad day, quite the opposite.

When I woke up I made the decision that I was not going to open the internet all day. There were several reasons for this, not the least of which was the tight stomach that has been dogging me ever since I arrived, a result of stock market-induced anxiety. All day long I have been checking the conditions on Wall Street, then checking my work phone for client messages, etc. all in the vain hope that by doing so I can somehow will it all away. I know that sounds ridiculous, but when you do this type of work for 40 years, these are the things you do to trick yourself into thinking you have some control over the situation. Well, yesterday morning I had had enough. Whatever was to happen in the investment world would have to happen without me. First up would be my morning run. 

I did bring my cell phone with me, since Pam has forbade me from running without it—“What happens if you fall and break your leg or get hit by a car?? Have a nice run, Honey!” Before heading out the door I checked the outside temperature and saw the numbers 38. Those are not good numbers, nevertheless I hit the road with enthusiasm. At the two mile mark, I made some new friends…

Although they weren’t exactly captivating conversationalists, I did receive their undivided attention. And when it was time for their photograph, they were 100% cooperative.

When I got back to the cabin and got cleaned up, I picked up a book I started reading a couple days ago and was enjoying…

In two days I hadn’t made very much progress because of the aforementioned stock market obsession, so I decided to take full advantage of my no internet day and finish this door stop of a book, which I did at 10:00 last night. It was nothing short of brilliant. Towles is one of those guys who when you read his stuff it makes you want to throw away your iPad and never write again. I mean, what’s the point? You’ll never be as good as him. Aside from the ego-shattering, spending most of an entire day engrossed in a rich and beautifully written tale is one of the greatest joys of life.

After spending all day doing essentially nothing, naturally we were all starved by the time dinner rolled around and since none of us had the desire to actually do anything close to physical work, we made the 40 minute drive into Belfast for a spectacular dinner at Delvino’s. Its an Italian place that is hugely popular with the locals. We have always had great luck there and last night was no exception. My meal started with some kind of sausage-vegetable soup that had my nose running by the time I was finished. Perfect. Then I ordered one of the pasta specials because I heard the words “Cajun” and “sausage” in the description. It was so incredible, so exquisite that after finishing the dish I shamefully tilted the plate up so I could gather the last dribbles of sauce in a spoon. If there had been any bread left I would have sopped up every drop. This meal is the reason that somebody invented Pepcid.

It occurred to me that my no internet day describes Lucy’s everyday. She never looks at the internet, and it is no surprise that she is the most mentally stable member of my household! All Lucy does is what she was created to do…be a loving and loyal dog. For Lucy this means looking after all of us while we are in Maine. She is never calm or carefree until she has accounted for all four of us. If one or more of us are not in the room, she begins her herding ritual which involves searching the cabin for the missing party and harassing that person until they are present and accounted for. Only then can she take her rightful place on the sofa overlooking the lake and get back to napping. Pam was one such offender yesterday, having gone to our bedroom to have a telephone conversation with her sister, when she took this picture…

“Ok, yous gots any idea hows long you gonna be, Mom? I is worried.”

This morning, I woke up to a completely fogged in lake. But today’s forecast calls for sunny skies and upper 50’s. 

Public Art Work in Maine

I have testified many times in this space of the quirkiness of Maine. Where this oddness comes from is anyone’s guess. I hold the view that when you have to endure Maine winters, such endurance lends itself to eccentricity, in point of fact—entitles you to it. This morning I took Miss Lucy for a peaceful, 45 degree stroll down the narrow lanes of Lermond Pond, which just yesterday we learned is pronounced LerMOND instead of LERmond. This makes us zero for infinity in correctly pronouncing the lakes and rivers in Maine…but I digress.

Yeah, so first there’s this…

If you look closely you will see the drama unfolding above. Yes, this is an epic sword fight between two aspen knights. We do not know the specifics of this dispute but each fighter appears determined to prevail. A visitor from Virginia is left to ponder what went through the mind of whoever put this scene together.

Now, we come to a wine-drinking elderly couple who have Lucy completely flummoxed…

Try as she might, Lucy was unable to get either of them to acknowledge her presence, leaving her puzzled and with hurt feelings.

Finally, someone decided to take a fan blade out of either a standard floor fan or a 1966 Impala, paint it a fetching bright red, then nail it to a random tree without comment.

Again…to each his/her own, but the question remains—why?

Every lake we have ever stayed on in Midcoast Maine has featured this sort of thing. We love it. Everything about it and what it represents—this place is in every way, different.

Where does this trail lead? No telling.