I saw a headline the other day for some website asking the question, if you could have dinner with five presidents, who would they be?

I took it to mean five American presidents, so I went with that – simple, I know, but let’s not get too cute, huh? So here’s my list: FDR (of course), Teddy Roosevelt, his cousin, Abe Lincoln (duh!), Barack Obama (huh? Bear with me – you’ll see why), John Adams and Player to be announced (patience, grasshopper)!

The presidents and I are seated around the table, and everyone is relishing their meal. After the soup course, I clink my water glass, saying “OK, let’s get this party started. First topic: state of affairs in America today. Discuss.”

All of them start to talk at the same time, then start arguing with each other and getting red in the face. I shout over the din, “Hey! One at a time. John A – you’re the oldest guy here – you start. John glowers at the assemblage. “Things today are no different than they were back in my day. Why, I was commenting about that just the other day to TJ – oh, gee – where is Mr. Jefferson? Did he not merit an invite? How interesting. I let it be known to him before I left that he’d not been invi..”

“Hey, John,” I say. Please stay on topic.” John smiles, saying, “Yes, very well. The same debate is going on today about whether the federal government or individual states have the overweening power. That debate will likely never be resolved. When I talked with Abigail about that yesterday – by the way, why wasn’t she invited to this soiree? There are no women here, and she would likely be considered America’s first feminist.”

“Certainly that’s true, John,” I reply. “But I’ve talked with her elsewhere, along with Custer and Crazy Horse.”

John says, “Madam, I know you’ve mentioned those people in the outline of that sequel you wrote to Suffer the Children, but she’s still in outline form. She’s been waiting to speak now for over a year. She asked me to tell you to get on with it, please.”

Thank you, John. Now, let’s see, who’d like to offer their opinion on..”

“Are you doing this chronologically? If so, I believe Mr. Lincoln has the floor.”

I sigh. “Yes, thank you, John. President Lincoln, you’re looking well.”

“As well as a man can with a hole in the back of his head. But let’s not dwell on all that. The state of American affairs today is so very much better than the America I inherited in 1860. You and your ilk have no appreciation of how difficult things were back then. Relatively speaking, the country is in pretty good shape today.”

“I concur,” I say. “But now that you have the floor, I’d like to ask you a question. What were you thinking when you listened to Frank Blair and called for a hundred thousand troops to put down the insurrection after the attack on Ft. Sumter? I would argue you started the Civil War.”

Abe sighs. “I was new to the presidency. Everyone hated that I’d won – you know, Doris G and that guy Tagg both got it just right in those books about how everyone in the country hated me. Blair was the father of the Republican party, and since he helped get me elected, I felt obliged to listen to him. Boy, was that ever a mistake. But I hung in there for four years, and what was my reward for saving the union and freeing the slaves?” Abe turned around for the assemblage to see the back of his head. “Thanks a lot for nothing! Molly was so distraught about the turn of events, and I ..”

Teddy interrupts Abe. “With all due respect, Mr. President, if I’d been in charge, the whole thing would have been over with in two weeks. Why, when I charged up San Juan Hill with the Rough Riders, the day was won and ..”

“Thank you, Teddy. But I’d like to hear from President Lincoln about the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment. They certainly changed the course of American history, wouldn’t you all agree?”

There was mumbling and grudging assent from the group. Abe smiled. “Actually, Congress had already passed something similar to what was in the EP, as I liked to call it. But when they did it, nobody paid any attention. When I did it, everyone howled like scalded cats. It went too far..it didn’t go far enough. I never could catch a break. But credit must be given to my friend, Frederick Douglass. He was the one that got behind the EP, and persuaded a hundred eighty thousand or so of his fellow Negroes to join the Union Army. It made the difference, generals be damned. We just wore Lee and the South out. As for the Thirteenth Amendment, that was just politics. Spielberg got it right in that movie. That Day-Lewis fellow did a pretty good job of playing me..I..”

“Thank you, Mr. Lincoln. Let’s move on as we’re nearly finished with the main course, and there’s lots more to hear from others. OK, Teddy, you’re up. What do you have to say about the state of affairs in this country today?”

Teddy thoughtfully cleaned his round glasses. “Corporations. They’re back. I thought I’d gotten rid of them with my trust busting. But they’re like cockroaches – you can never kill them all. That British PM Truss got run out of office by the power of corporations. They’ll be the downfall of the world with their greed and ruthlessness. I say gut them all..when I was in charge..”

Adams interrupts. “Abigail says what happened to Liz Truss would never have happened if a man had been in charge. Sexism, pure and simple. I agree with her. Now, as for ..”

“Thank you, John. Thank you, Teddy. Now let’s hear from your cousin Franklin. Mr. President, I see you’re still in your wheelchair. I thought heaven was supposed to fix all ills.”

Franklin thrust out his chin in typical FDR fashion. “I was fine until Eleanor showed up. She was the one that persuaded them to put me back in this chair so she could keep up with me. I think that was payback for Lucy Mercer being with me when I had that stroke at Warm Springs. She was a very jealous woman, my Eleanor.”

“I can only imagine how that must feel. But if you would, please describe what you feel was your greatest accomplishment over your four terms as president.”

“Well, technically, it was really only three. I’d only just got started on the fourth when I left. My greatest accomplishment? Hmm..there were so many, it’s hard to say which was the greatest. I didn’t free any slaves..My economic policies after the Depression were iffy at best – the war saved the economy, not me. I’d say my greatest accomplishment was keeping my proverbial powder dry until Pearl Harbor, so the America Firsters – those traitors in sheep’s clothing – were thoroughly discredited. Without America, things would have turned out very differently in that Second World War, and America today would look very different with much bigger problems.”

“I beg to differ..” A voice came from the shadows..he steps up, looking around the table. “Any dessert left? Ah – Viennese torte. Thanks, I’ll have that with some Irish coffee, if you please. Don’t get that much over there – Jackie says it’s bad for my asceticism.”

John F. Kennedy takes an empty seat next to John Adams. “Move over, Lyndon.” He nudges Adams, who explodes, throws down his napkin and stomps out of the room.” Kennedy laughs. “Just as touchy as Johnson.” He digs into his dessert. “I heard about this dinner party, and knew it wouldn’t be complete unless I showed up. You and I have already talked, so we can mostly dispense with whats already been discussed. When I was forced to escalate the war in Vietnam, I knew it was a big mistake soon after. When I tried to scale it back, those crazy right wingers got me – I known Lyndon knew about it and was in on the plot. He still won’t admit it, but his karma is ruined, so that’s proof. He walks around all day, muttering ‘credibility gap’, and ‘Gulf of Tonkin Resolution’. Ha ha. But nobody is talking about what’s happening in Ukraine. I’m pretty sure that crazy bastard Putin is so desperate, he’s gonna nuke ’em. I knew sooner or later that would happen..but who would have imagined that the Russians would use it on themselves?”

The group is silent, trying to digest their rich dessert and Kennedy’s words of armagedden. Finally, the last guest speaks. It’s Barack. “Am I dead? What the fuck?”

I reply, “No, Mr. President, you’re just dreaming.”

He looks hard to at me. “Who the fuck are you – and why are you in my dream? I don’t know you.”

I reply, “Could you have written a better blogpost? No? Then shut the fuck up and eat your dessert.”

I was watching the Ethan Hawke sorta documentary about Newman and Woodward last evening. Ethan did a pretty good job, though the pacing is a bit slow and it’s a kind of name droppish with all his friends doing voiceovers – watch it, ’cause I don’t wanna ‘splain more.

Because that’s not what I’m here to talk about. I’d have to watch it again to see if it was the director Paul Schraeder or maybe Martin Ritt who said when the movie Hud came out in 1963, they got letters saying Hud was a hero, the old man was a grump and the kid was a wimp. They were surprised, but whoever said this then added until those same people elected Reagan in ’80.

Well, I must admit I’ve never watched the entirety of Hud, tho’ I will fix that this week since it’s streaming on the Roku channel. But I saw enough of it back in the day to know that Hud was, to be generous, the beginning of the anti-hero. That archetype was picked up and run with by Dustin Hoffman, Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino and the most emblematic of them all, Clint Eastwood. So Paul Newman, who had toyed with bad guy roles before Hud, started the trend.

How were his reviews at the time? A walk back through movie history says Sidney Poitier beat him out for the Oscar by playing a good guy in Lilies of the Field. Guess good guys – at least back then – did finish first. But the genre was just getting started, and his competition started sweeping the Oscars with roles like Jake Gittes, Michael Corleone and Harry Callahan. Paul was just a little ahead the curve.

But that’s not what I’m here to talk about. I’m still thinking about the end of patriarchy motif I started with the Bodily Control post. Is it possible to correlate the beginning of the end of male domination with the early days of the Vietnam War? Hey, let’s talk about that some.

Hud came out in ’63 when the war hadn’t really taken off yet. The Gulf of Tonkin resolution wasn’t ’til August of ’64 and the increase in troops didn’t occur until July of ’65. Nonetheless, there was awareness of the war, and nearly half a million men had been drafted in those three years. Casualties were low in ’63 and ’64, but I think everyone knew, or had a sense of what was coming.

Hendrik Hertzberg was at Harvard in ’63 and wrote a review of the movie. Here’s a quote from that review:

Just how devastating a critique the film is can be seen in the reactions of, say, high school students to the character of Hud. He is a dynamic, attractive human being. But judged by his actions, he is an unmitigated bastard, motivated solely out of self interest: he sleeps with other men’s wives, he drives his Cadillac over flower beds, he tries to have his father declared incompetent so that he can get control of the old man’s property. Yet high school students have adopted him as a hero; they admire his bravado, his coolness, and they either ignore his amorality or admire that, too.

Interesting that back in ’63 it was noted by a guy who went on to write for The New Yorker that high school students thought Hud was cool. Not college students. So that puts the age at, say, guys born in 1947 to 1949. They would be subjected to the draft in ’65 to ’67.

Aha! So these were the guys primed to self-absorption and then shame when they weren’t able to live up to the image set by their fathers. Long hair. Bell bottom pants. Musicians are the heroes now. Remember? Protesting, burning draft cards and fleeing to Canada put these guys in a completely different category than their fathers, who purportedly went willingly to war and did their duty. At least that’s how it went in the movies, right? And isn’t that how our popular perceptions are formed?

So that says to me that the beginning of the end for patriarchy came earlier than we ever thought. I’d argue what we’re seeing now is the last gasp of that death. If women rule, and they likely will soon, how are things likely to change?

First: women will take over the professions. There are now more law and med students than men. Engineering lags behind, of course, and, sadly, I’m not sure that will ever change. But won’t it be enough that woman will run medicine, law, business and politics?

Second: once they take over politics, the laws will change again, with more balance toward work and family, reproductive and sexual rights, and frankly more balance toward results. There’s actually a name for this It’s called productivism, and it’s a new paradigm starting to get noticed. The old ways, run by male bean counters, aka MBAs, forgot that workers are consumers. So when they shipped all that production to China to save money on labor, they impoverished all those parts of the country that are now called red states. That was unsustainable, and it will only begin to change when women take over the country.

I’m really sorry to be the one to tell you guys, but you are toast. Get over it. Stay home and watch the kids. Forget ‘hold my beer’; now it’ll be ‘hold the baby: I’m changing the American workplace’. I just hope it isn’t too late.

The FX show The Bear is getting rave reviews and they are all deserved. Without reservation, I’d say it’s currently the best show on television, now that Season 1 of Sarah Lancashire’s HBO Max reincarnation of Julia Child is over.

I’ve watched six of the eight episodes, savoring what is left. I missed it when it was broadcast on FX, so I’m watching it on Hulu. If you don’t have Hulu, get it, even if it’s just for a month to binge watch this show.

So what about it is so great? First: it’s about food. The camera work on the chopping, braising and mashed potato-making is thrilling – yes, I said it: thrilling. Brilliant. Fabulous. Second: the storyline is fresh and incredibly well cast, with one exception. I’ll get to that in a minute. Third: It has Oliver Platt. Who? Oh good grief. Oliver the fluffy guy who was incredibly verbose in Lake Placid to Bill Pullman’s straight man routine. Oliver who was the useless husband to Laura Linney in HBO’s The Big C, another great show from years ago. Oliver, who now plays Uncle Jimmy, a character of questionable background who is anything but stereotypical. He alone would make this worthwhile. But wait! There’s so much more.

The main character called Carmy is a guy who uses a family tragedy to escape the mental pressure of foody work at a fancy New York restaurant. We know that from snippets of flashback where he’s being tortured by a sadist of a chef boss. Carmy tries to bring his knowledge and the ways of New York French cuisine to the family sandwich shop in Chicago, and the culture shock is hard on everyone, but especially on Carmy who is struggling with the loss of his brother Michael. That character isn’t even shown until Episode 6, and is played by the incredible Jon Bernthal, lately of the newest series from The Wire guys on HBO about Baltimore’s police corruption. Hope to see more of this character in Season 2.

But the guy who steals the show in this series is Ebon Moss-Bachrach as the wild and crazy cousin Richie who thinks the place really is his. But Richie is a fossil, stuck in the old ways when Michael was running the place into the ground, physically and financially. Michael’s drug problem is mentioned but you the viewer have to make the connections to resulting money and relationship issues. This makes the plot rich without patronizing us. How fresh and unusual!

The one fly in the oatmeal is the dynamics in the relationship between Carmy and Sugar, his sister. Their dialogue doesn’t work, as it fails to help us understand why Carmy avoids Sugar and Sugar is so angry. Abby Elliott, formerly of SNL, plays Sugar and she just doesn’t work in that role. Oh well, everybody has a blind spot.

The Bear has been renewed for Season 2. There is no reason why a second season shouldn’t be as successful as the first, as there is so much more plot to explore. As previously mentioned, I hope Bernthal will be back as he is a force of nature that fits perfectly into the cast. So I, for one, am looking forward to another round of this show. So watch it, people! You’ll like it.

I’ve decided to start putting my book together on August 12th. Which book is that? Why, My Year at the Depot is the tentative title. It will reflect my one year stint with the world’s largest home improvement retailer in the world. I have already gleaned a lot of material for it.

Why August 12th? Because that will be my six month anniversary of employment there as a mixer of paint. Will there be a party to celebrate? Not likely. I am getting a fifty cent an hour raise next month, but not just me: everyone in the store is getting a raise. Why is that?

I think HD is worried about the turnover in the ranks. We are apparently woefully short-handed, and it appears to be a bit of a revolving door, per some employees with whom I’ve spoken. They describe a situation where there’s too much real estate to cover and too few associates assigned to cover it. That is true for flooring in particular. Every time someone catches me over there and asks for help, it’s nearly impossible to find anyone that knows anything to assist – even if they work in that department! Revolving door.

There’s a new person in the department I’ll call “J Prime”. That’s because there’s another “J” that works there, so I don’t want there to be confusion between the two. This is a delightful young lady who wants to learn and work hard. Imagine that! Gal after my own heart.

So gradually we’ll become an all female department. M with the sparkly eyes is back after a short stint in another department. Not sure she’s happy to be back but well, there it is. She had to take a leave for personal reasons, so the change was inevitable. Not fair, but hey – that’s business, right?

Well, maybe. At the meeting where the store manager announced the raises, I commented that I need data to do a better job. He referred me to something called “Pulse” which is available on the phone. At first glance it was hard to decipher, but at least I know it’s there and so I’ll start to dig into it. Already surprised to know that plastic sheeting and buckets are the second biggest sellers in the department. The biggest sellers vary depending on time frame, but sheeting and buckets is always second. Which is really pretty amazing, considering nobody can ever locate the stuff. Goes to show, huh? What? Oh, I haven’t any idea. But I’ll be looking into it, that’s for sure.

Had another return of Dynasty paint, with the DIYer saying it didn’t go as far as advertised. That is a recurring theme with that brand, the most expensive in the fleet. I looked at a YouTube video with a professional evaluating the brand. He affirmed the problem. I’ve had to give discounts twice on Marquee, which I and Consumer Reports thinks is the best brand. But these days it’s hard to say about feedback – especially on Facebook. I think there are fake testimonials on there about paint – all positive about Sherwin Williams, all negative about Behr. Then when you click on the testifier, it looks like they are fake personalities. They have a few pictures, but that’s about it. No details. No life history. Very odd, not to mention suspicious. Who can you believe any more?

I know, I know. I’m starting to sound like a crabby old broad. Well, get used to it. But this is not a rant. Way back in the beginning, I vowed to avoid rants, and with one exception, I have stuck to my vow. So just call it observations. OK?

That’s it for now – August 12th. Be ready.

As is often the case, the day after I wrote a blog piece, someone else contributed something to a media outlet that complemented what I’d written. Such was the case with yesterday’s “Bodily Control”. An opinion piece came out in The New York Times comparing banning abortion with the enactment of Prohibition in the 1920’s. It was written by a history professor from Georgetown University. His conclusion was slightly different from mine, in that he focused on the part I wrote about how unenforceable the newly-enacted state laws will be. He didn’t talk about the fact that the Supreme Court as an institution took a major hit to its credibility. John Marshall is rolling in his grave at the moment. If you find that confusing, just google John Marshall or Marbury v Madison. You’ll figure out what I mean when you read what’s written.

The last time a major Supreme Court decision was ignored was in 1832 by President Andrew Jackson. John Marshall was still there, and the case involved Native American sovereignty in Georgia. As there was no social media in 1832, the impact was reserved exclusively for Native Americans. Relatively speaking, that was a small part of the population, in this case about forty six thousand versus nearly thirteen million whites. This time, the Supremes have upset fifty one percent of the entire population of the country – and there is social media that isn’t going to let this go. So we have another unenforceable decision, upsetting half the entire population of the country. And I’d argue the Supremes aren’t done with us yet.

When they overturn cases that uphold the right to contraception, gay marriage, affirmative action, control over gerrymandering and … uh oh .. interracial marriage? Might that last one hit close to home for one of them? Let’s talk about that.

The case of Loving v. Virginia was decided in 1967, overturning state law that declared intermarriage to be illegal. The basis of that decision was a violation of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. You remember the 14th – the one enacted after the Civil War to grant citizenship to former slaves? Well, kiddies, one could argue that equal protection for women and their bodies might be found in the 14th amendment. Since the Supremes didn’t find that protection there, wouldn’t it follow that this case was wrongly decided as well? After all, white and black couples getting married have nothing to do with slaves being granted citizenship, right? Uh oh. Clarence Thomas, darling – you could be hoisted on your own petard. Wouldn’t that just be too ironic?

I think we’re going to be in for some very interesting times in the next few years. the chaos that results from roiling established law will further the national estrangement. My prediction has always been – and will continue to be – the geographic breaking up of these United States. We shall be united no longer. We will be enclaves, likely in four to six different parts with mass migration of like-minded people. Social and culture issues have undone many a civilization in the past. The “People’s Court” was set up in 1934 by Hitler after he was dissatisfied with the acquittal of defendants charged with the Reichstag fire. There was no presumption of innocence in front of that group of judges. Might the reverse happen here? If the Supremes keep overturning settled law, the result could be adding more judges to the bench – or creating a whole new court like Hitler did. Or each region having its own “People’s Court”. But this time, it would be designed to act as a buffer between the rogue Supremes and the region. Now wouldn’t that be a real kick in the head? God help us.

The thought occurred to me this morning: remember the late 60’s, early 70’s? Probably most of you young’uns don’t, but you know it from the history of the Vietnam War. What did we do? We protested. What did we protest? The draft. What was the draft? Young men losing control over their bodies. Start to see some irony here?

When guys didn’t want to get drafted, men and women marched in the streets. Men burned their draft cards, went to Canada or – in the case of the scion of a famous Bush family – became a pilot in the Texas Air National Guard. What was the result? The end of the draft and the beginning of the lottery. Of course, by then the war was winding down anyway, so a guy’s chances of being selected, trained and sent to southeast Asia were nil. But since then? No draft. Only an all-volunteer army.

Women marched in the streets too – for something called women’s lib. It took many forms, but one outcome was a decision by Justice Harry Blackmun in a case entitled Roe vs Wade out of Texas. Of course, out of Texas. Norma McCorvey, a less than stellar candidate for motherhood, became the face of women’s right to choose whether to have a child or not. Justice Harry decided to find a right to privacy in the Constitution to allow – under certain circumstances – a woman to terminate a pregnancy.

We all went along for forty years assuming it would always be there. But then it wasn’t. Now it isn’t. There was never really a right to privacy in the Constitution. Justice Harry just made it up, because before he joined the Supremes, he represented doctors at the Mayo Clinic. It was about those guys’ right to practice medicine without government interference; to have control over their profession. Begin to see some genuine ironies here? No? Geez – OK, I’ll spell it out for you.

Roe v Wade was decided to benefit doctors, who were predominantly men back then because med school discriminated against women. Eliminating the draft benefitted men, because only men could be drafted. Who benefits from overturning the right to abortion? Certainly not women. But how does it benefit men?

Sigh. It really doesn’t. Nobody wins from this one, not even the ideologues who think they are protecting ‘the unborn’. If the unborn were protected, the birth rate would go up. But the birth rate won’t go up. It will most likely go down, below where it is today. And where is it today? 1.7, less than the ‘replacement’ number of 2.1. There will be fewer babies because women will abstain more from sex or use the morning after pill more or stockpile the abortion pills. Fewer babies will be killed, yes. But fewer babies will be conceived. So what have we accomplished here?

We have made a large number of women angry. Very angry. And a lot of those women are in positions of authority now that weren’t in those positions before. Which positions you ask? District attorneys. Police chiefs. Prosecutors of all sorts. What if they refuse to enforce the law? What happens to the credibility of the Supreme Court, making a decision that is simply not enforced? I think you know the answer to that one.

I think Chief Justice John Roberts knows the answer too. He also knows he’s now saddled with a kamikaze court, thanks to Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell and the newbies on the court who are just flexing their new-found ideologic authority. Oh, but the consequences. Everyone is focusing on the financial implications. As it is, women’s participation in the workplace has dropped because of Covid and child care deficits. So what will be the result? No child care – no child. Duh. Further drop in the birth rate.

China began to realize the error of the one child mandate and, ironically, enforced abortions a few years ago. Their demographics are a disaster. So will ours be within the next ten years. Reversing the reversal won’t fix it. Women will understand they never really had control over their bodies. So they will take control. Over Everything. Watch out, fellas. You’re about to become obsolete.

Ah, there’s too many people for the earth to sustain anyway – been that way since the ’80’s. This is just another step on our way to becoming those lemmings that jump off cliffs.

a customer the other day  needed to come back with a particular color for her dinged-up cabinets. She agreed to do that; then told me she would wait until I was on duty again, as she didn’t want anybody else to wait on her. At first I was touched by the sentiment – in fact, I gave her a hug. Well, that’s probably a big fat NO..No for HD associates, so my first thought was, “Well, won’t be long before I get fired.”

But then I had a second emotion on my way home: guilt. I am a fraud. I act as though I care about the needs of my customers, but do I really? Or is this just about ginning (sp?) up interactions that lead to anecdotes for my book? I went home and mentioned my feelings to both Ray and John. Ray, Lee Ann and Jopie are visiting, taking care of Florida business en-route to relocation. But I digress. Anyway, I mentioned it to those two guys. Ray’s response was what difference does it make what your motive is if you give good service and the customer is happy? I agreed that was true. Later on, as John and I were watching Adam Sandler’s movie The Hustle, I shared those feelings with John. He reminded me: everything is copy. So my feelings about feeling guilty for not being a true “HD” person are just another chapter – or maybe a subchapter – in the book. Wow. Now let’s think about that for a minute. The implications are obvious. EVERYBODY that works at HD is effectively doing what I’m doing. Does M the Elder care about his customers? Most assuredly not – and he doesn’t really try to hide that fact. Does M the AM (parse that one out for yourselves) care, or does he just want more profitability (there’s your hint as to what an AM is). So really, it’s ALL just performance art. Huh? Yep – performance art. What the f is that? Another aside – my friend Margie just wrote a whole piece about swearing – really cool..I should put a link to it if she agrees. Update: she did. Click on the word ‘swearing’. Back to the point. Wikipedia says “Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants.” So we’re in a tableau. Question is: who’s the artist, what’s the art, and who are the viewers? Oh my, pithy questions that deserve more examination. So when you go to the paint department, you the customer are the viewer of performance art. My associates and I are the performers. The book will document the event, so I guess that makes me the artist? But it’s really more basic than that. You the customer want a nice paint color, and want someone competent to help you achieve that end. We the associates and managers want to sell you the paint and brushes and rollers and tarps – you get the idea. We want to add profit to the HD ledger and retain our positions. So let’s get legalistic now. It’s a contract. We make an offer (the paint), you accept the offer (carry the can to customer service), you give consideration (put the cost of that paint on your HD credit card). A contract, executed hundreds of times a day between willing buyers and sellers. But wait – there’s more. At a training earlier in the week, it was stressed that we must ‘upsell’. What is that? That’s where we sell you the customer a higher grade of paint that is more profitable to the store. Well, now – haven’t been told that before. Why? Because the profits were there doing things the way we were before. What’s changed? Covid is over, the season is over and inflation is likely going to depress sales. So the suggested solution is to upsell. Can I do that? Reflect back on my second really nasty confrontation with a customer who accused me of doing just that – upselling her when she didn’t need what I was selling, even though she had specifically requested it. So there’s the dance – knew there was one. An empathetic (or empathic) customer will know when they’re being upsold. I always do, being one. When I encounter it, I recoil and generally do not return to the scene of extortion. So that means every encounter must be quickly evaluated to see if the additional profit is worth the risk of alienating a customer who will know we’re trying to sell them something they may – or may not – need. A dance. My co-worker I made a comment yesterday afternoon that M the AM would likely fire him because he was selling too much low-priced paint. He is sensitive, but not empathic. However, he’s had enough experience to know how to do the dance. Not sure about the others. Time will tell. That’s all – gonna go ask Margie if I can link to her article. If she says yes, you’ll see a hot button above. Later!

It started when the Civil War ended, and the first one was a parade around a race track that was used to house Union prisoners of war in Charleston, South Carolina, birthplace of the war. It was in honor of the dead buried there. Lots of other places also claim credit for it. Do we care? Not really. It’s just important that we take a moment to honor those who “gave the last full measure of devotion” to America.

Speeches will be made; picnic lunches will be eaten and maybe even patriotic songs will be sung. But today, I prefer to think about the loved ones of those who died in all the wars America has fought in since its founding. That is the proverbial ‘ripples in the pond’; all those family members and friends most affected by the loss of that soldier.

The tendency is to never talk about it; my family didn’t when my uncle Clemmie was killed in April of ’44 in New Guinea. Talking about it – about him – brought back the pain of his loss. I have come to know and love the memory of this man who died six years before I was born. I have a profound appreciation for the effect his untimely death at 21 had on everyone

That brings me to a discussion of the nature of grief. Homo sapiens are likely unique in the animal kingdom in that we can grieve the loss of a loved one for a remainder of a lifetime. We don’t forget; we just bury the pain in order to go on living. Other creatures are more fortunate. They have shorter attention spans and likely brains not capable of processing the death of a loved one for long periods of time. That may be a blessing.

So today, I honor Clemmie, for sure; but I also honor his sister Joan, Joanne, Jopie – three different names for a wonderful woman who just celebrated her 91st birthday. She still has memories of him, even though there was a fairly significant difference in their ages. But her most vivid memory is for how his death affected her mother – my grandmother. She has told me the story, and I have documented it for posterity and maybe for subsequent generations who might want to know about him after Jopie is gone.

But right now, it’s her story. She is the only person I gave it to. And I will keep it that way until she goes to join Clemmie, her brother Robert and her husband Jim. She’ll also be with her mother and father again. It is then and only then that I will I share what I wrote for her with my own children. That’s a respect thing. But it’s also important to remember. So on this Memorial Day, 2022, I celebrate Jopie Estaver, my aunt, for all that she is. I hope you have a lovely day.

So what is this thing called leadership, exactly? Like most things of this nature, it’s easier to say what it isn’t, rather than define its true nature. So I’ll go against the grain and try to define what it is, at least so far as what America needs.

Leadership: forget it. I looked up all the various definitions from Merriam Webster to Tony Robbins. Leadership is being a leader. Boy, that’s really helpful. Tony says there’s no single answer. Thanks, Tone.. The Supreme Court would likely say they don’t know what it is, but they know it when they see it. Well, at least they usedta..that was their definition of pornography back in ’64.

OK, so we can’t define it, but maybe we can describe it. Standing up when everybody else sits down. Blue-faced Mel Gibson in Braveheart. Uh, you might say, I don’t think you should hold Mel up as an example of leadership. Oops, sorry. Moving on to real people.

Alright, I’m going back to my old tried and true: Abe Lincoln. Abraham never gave up, in spite of overwhelming abuse from his enemies as well as his peers. Yes, he made many mistakes – likely you could say, but for his efforts, the Civil War might not have happened. But he was a true leader because he never gave up. He wouldn’t quit. He tried everything in his power to see this country through what I would characterize as its darkest days. Yes, worst than now. Worse than the Depression. Worse than Vietnam. The darkest.

And what was it about Abe that made him the right guy in the right place at the right time? He took ownership of the problem. Others tried to take the power away from him; he refused to cede it. Others tried to embarrass, harass and persuade him to do things he knew were wrong. He found clever and creative ways to neutralize their efforts. He was distracted by personal problems – a crazy wife and the death of a beloved son. He just picked himself up and went back to work. He was surrounded by incompetence and, in fact, treasonous intent on the part of one of his early generals (ref: picture above). He used the power of the presidency to keep replacing bad leadership until he found a general that was a keeper in Grant. He never wavered.

Of course, we know what his reward was for all this efforts: reelection and 41 days later, assassination. But that’s not the point. Ross Perot – yes, that one who turned out to be a little nuts when he had a brief run for the presidency – actually had a fairly good description of a leader. He said it was a “monomaniac with a mission.” He certainly embodied those traits, but not always to a good end. Then there’s that character from fiction – Captain Ahab. He was most definitely a monomaniac with a mission. If you read the book – or more likely saw the movie – you know that didn’t end well either. So that’s an example of leadership that loses touch with what is important: the mission, not the missionary.

So what do we have today in our so-called leadership? Hucksters, cowards, frauds, liars, cheats, thieves..did I leave anything out? Oh, yes: traitors. Cloaked in the American flag, with pins on their lapels and crocodile tears shed for those sweet little children that got shot by ‘that madman’, they make suggestions to fix the problem. One door into the school. I guess that’s an allusion to the teacher that propped open the back door to quickly retrieve a cell phone. Sigh. OK. How about arm those teachers? There’s a really smart idea, but not a new one. That was floated back in 2018 after the Parkland massacre. How about this one? Man traps and trip wires. Think base perimeter in the Vietnam war. Imagine your nine year old seeing that as she walks into her elementary school. Oh my God.

So the question must be posed: what would Abe do? If we could resurrect his spirit and ask him that question, he’d likely start with the obvious. “Why does an 18 year old need an automatic weapon?” Raise the age to 40. Whoa! Are you mad? That’ll never work. Hmm. That sounds familiar. When Abe proposed the Emancipation Proclamation, there were very similar reactions from friend and foe alike. But he did it. And we all know how things turned out, don’t we? No? 180,000 black men – freemen as well as runaway slaves – joined the Union Army at a time when recruitment was seriously lagging. It likely made the difference between continuing to fight and the breakup of the union. No big deal. Right?

So what is needed now is audacity. Audacity requires heroic leadership. We need a hero right now. Got any suggestions? No? OK, then, I guess we all have to be heroes – if just for one day. Cue Bowie.

It’s surely been a dreadful week, hasn’t it? The war in Ukraine continues unabated, with no sign that all the arms we’ve sent the Ukrainian army has repelled the invaders. The stock market can’t seem to make up its mind whether our economy is in the toilet or if happy days are here again. And then there’s the massacre in Texas. A gruesome threesome.

Now that I’ve introduced the big three, I’ll dispense with the update on my paintology stylings at the big box store down the road. I continue there, for those that thought I might have quit already. I am always early for work and stay to the end of the shift. I do a decent job – not great, lord knows I still make mistakes..but given the amount of training I received, I must say I’m certainly contributing to the store’s bottom line.

But there’s a problem in the paint department at Home Depot. There’s a pall over it. Why, you may ask? Well, based on my years of work and living experience, it boils down to one thing: lack of leadership. There is no acknowledged leader of the pack that cares enough about how things go in the paint department to come up with new ideas to improve results. It’s really that simple. I am the newest member, so my ability to lead is only by example, with unparalleled cheerfulness and emphasis on customer service. All that succeeds in doing is, my peers try to emulate that with little success..because they’ve been there so long and know that tomorrow will be the same drag they experience today. They’ve given up. I’m too new and stupid to do that.

But talking about lack of leadership takes me back to the happenings in Texas. A lost soul ironically called Salvador (no savior here) took his misery and inflicted it on the parents, grandparents and other assorted loved ones of nineteen children and two adults. The dead are beyond feeling earthly pain. It’s the survivors of those children who now begin to understand the reality that their children and wives were not as important as the lives of the 19 policemen in the hall outside their room. Is it really nineteen, or is that just a catchy number because of the number of dead children? Who knows…irrelevant. The point is the children and adults in that classroom being gunned down by Salvador Ramos didn’t matter. They were pawns in the game.

Lack of leadership on the part of the Police Chief of the Uvalde School District certainly contributed to this massacre. He was likely a desk jockey..good at the snappy repartee necessary to win promotion, but unskilled and uneasy about stepping up, putting his and other cops’ lives on the line to save children and teachers. He was stuck; frozen in place, making up stories to justify not breaking down the door and stopping this misbegotten kid from murdering more ten-year-olds. Understandable. You never know how you’ll act until the real thing comes along. We know now. He couldn’t and didn’t, and will likely retire after this to a full pension and his bitterness at how his career ended. Not his fault.

Not his fault. When the governor of Texas said he was livid at being ‘misinformed’, he wasn’t livid because 19 children and 2 adults died; he was livid because he was made to look bad – ‘blind-sided’ as it were – before the people of his state who expect him to be a good leader. He isn’t. He never was. Now we know that. And that won’t change.

So the question must be asked: what happens next – for Texas, for the country, for the other children throughout America whose lives are jeopardized every time they cross the threshold of their school? This will happen again. And again. It will be groundhog day times fifty. Why? Because we lack leadership. Genuine, authoritative leadership. Not authoritarian leadership. An individual – or a group – that has a clear sense of themselves and what this country is really about. Until we find that within our ranks – that George Washington, Abe Lincoln, Jean d’Arc – the killing of school children will reoccur.

I wrote Suffer the Children in 2019, about children dying at the hands of their parents caught up in a cycle of fear generated by a cult leader. This leader insisted the children could only go to heaven if their souls were pure. This was based on the leader’s Biblical interpretation of the use of the word ‘Suffer’ in the Book of Matthew. It means to bear from below. He tells the parents this, via podcast shared through Evangelical church members:

“Your children are allowed into heaven now when they are still pure.  But if you wait until the end, they will suffer – bear from below.  And the stain they carry from their parents’ sins will prevent their acceptance into Jesus’ domain.  Don’t let them suffer.  Give them a home in heaven – before it’s too late.”

I had in mind the work of false messiahs like David Koresh at Waco in creating this podcasting character called Judge Dreadbear. Twenty chldren died at Waco, most by being shot. Poor leadership on the part of the government led to an assault on that compound that went very wrong: the inverse of what happened at Uvalde. Waco led to the Oklahoma City bombing, where 19 children died. Gee: one begins to see a pattern here.

Maureen Dowd, columnist for the NY Times, summed it up in today’s contribution. She said, “We’ve become a country of cowards, so terrified of the unholy power of gun worship that no sacrifice of young blood is too great to appease it.” Child sacrifice – as old as civilization itself. Death by gunshot is now the leading cause of child death, replacing auto accidents. Don’t you feel proud, you gun owners? I am disgusted.