Good Ones

 

  I've lived through enough yuletide seasons now to have seen every kind of present under my tree. There were a lot of sweaters, ties and books. Some were never worn before their trip to the Salvation Army. Some were re-gifted. Some are probably still in a box in my basement or attic waiting for the right moment to be discovered and tucked away even deeper in storage somewhere.

  Now- let's just be honest here- that whole "more blessed to give than receive thing" may be so but most would say it is more fun to get a great gift than give one. At that moment that we tear expectantly into the wrapping paper a little part of all of us reverts to being 5 years old and hoping this one will be the toy we have been seeing on Saturday morning TV commercials since Thanksgiving.

  Most of the presents I have ever gotten were functional and not complete busts or wastes of money and effort by the giver. I wore them some, read at least half of the book or used whatever it was for a little while at least. I would imagine that most of the gifts I have ever given fell into that category as well.

  I remember a few gifts, though, that were right on the money. They were exactly what I wanted or such a wonderful surprise that I was floored. Some were expensive. Some not so much. But all had great value to me. There are three that really stand out. Well, maybe four.

  As I type this I am looking at an antique humidor on my coffee table. It was probably made in the 40s and is mahogany and silver. It's great little box that I got one Christmas from the love of my life at that time. The best part of the gift was that if was completely crammed full of little slips of paper. All had been hand cut and had little handwritten notes about how much I meant to her and why she would love me forever. The box looks cool on my table but the notes were burned in an attempt to scare away a ghost of Christmas past a while ago. I spent a lot of time reading all those notes before I was finally able to send them up in smoke. But the box will always represent love and a great Christmas to me and I will cherish it always.

  When I was about seven years old the hot toy of the year for boys was called Jimmy Jet. It was this little toy jet console that you sat in front of and watched a rotary display of the buildings and scenes you were "flying" over. It came complete with rockets to fire at unsuspecting people below. Here is a link to one of the original ads. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDMQPwE4unw.

  I spent countless hours piloting my Jimmy Jet- patrolling the skies and sending missiles down on probable communist outposts. That toy was still in my parent's attic at last inventory. It's funny how important an $8.00 toy was to my life.

  The next memorable gift was probably the most important thing anyone ever gave me. It is in my closet here now and will always be if I have any say in the matter. I remember doing my customary pre-Christmas snooping that year. By this time I had discovered that if you held red wrapping paper up to a red Christmas tree light you could see through it pretty well. I had also discovered that Santa hid gifts around our house a couple of weeks before he came. This one he hid under my sister's bed.

  It said "Sears Roebuck" on the box and had a price tag of $19.99, which seemed like a fortune to me. I pulled it out from under the bed and saw the picture: a beautiful Silvertone guitar. Just what I wanted!

  There is no way to estimate the hours I spent slumped over that guitar. I held it mornings and evenings and it became my best friend. When I play it now I marvel at how well they were able to make those things for twenty bucks. That present introduced me to the most important form of self expression I have ever known and I will always be grateful to music and that guitar and to my parents for giving it to me.

 The last gift I remember was the year I had just turned twelve. Hunting had become an important part of my interests and I had only had a little single shot shotgun since I was eight or nine. My dad knew it was time to get me a real gun.

  I remember we were at my cousins' house for Christmas that year. My uncle knew a man who had a Remington 1187 12 gauge shotgun for sale and told my dad about it. The next thing I knew he had gone and gotten it for me for my present. I don't know why the prices always stuck in my mind of these gifts but this one was $80. It became my only gun for all the hunting I did until I was married and I was able to begin buying different guns for different kinds of hunting I do. It still resides in my gun case along side the Browning "Sweet 16" that my father always used. There were many dove hunts that those two guns squared off against each other and it was anybody's guess which one would win for the day.

  One gift I got never really got the chance to make the highlight reel. When I was four I got an army uniform. I owned it long enough to be photographed in it on my front porch with a broad smile and giving a salute and then walk across the street to a school playground where I took the jacket off to play and never saw it again. It was one in a long litany of lessons I would learn on a school playground.

  I doubt that anyone has ever gotten a present from me that had the meaning of any of these. I've tried...I really have. It's just hard to change somebody's life with a gift. Who knows, though? Maybe someday... it is such a nice thought that after all the elbowing in the crowds, fighting the traffic and complaining about having to buy anything at all that one day almost 50 years from now someone might be able to glance at a coffee table or closet or display case and say "Walt gave me that. And I've never forgotten".

Flying Rats With Bushy Tails

When I first heard the flying squirrels I thought they were scampering on the roof of my house over my bedroom. I would hear them playfully skittering around above my ceiling and guess I sort of thought the mental picture was cute: a few squirrel friends bouncing along the roof line in quest of acorns and other pals to hang out with. I never even considered a very important truth: there is an unused attic directly over my bedroom- not a roof.
  One day as I prepared my house to list it for sale I decided to check all the attics and make sure they were reasonably straight in case house hunters wanted to take a close look at all the storage. It was an uneventful process until I opened the door to the space over my bedroom.
  It looked like a squirrel bomb went off. The little bastards scattered like a covey of quail. I figured there were 4 or 5 of them. There were a few empty boxes there so I decided to pick them up and put them somewhere else to make the space look neater. I picked up the last box and looked inside to make sure it was empty.
  That's when the flying squirrel rat launched himself at me, gliding over my shoulder and landing outside the door in a walking area of my upstairs and froze. For a moment I froze too. Then I attacked. He ran to the nearest hiding place, my daughter Rachael's room. Thankfully, she was gone overnight and a heart attack, stroke and/or bladder control issue was averted.
  I looked under her bed. I looked under her chest of drawers and dresser. No squirrel. The problem was I was late for a Friday morning writing appointment. So I closed the room up tight and just figured I'd deal with him when I got home.
  That night I eased into her room armed with a broom and a garbage can to try to take him alive. I turned the place upside down and there was no squirrel. So I figured he had escaped into an attic access off of her room and resumed normal living.
  The next afternoon I was doing a video conference with a songwriting group I mentor in Colorado from my easy chair in my den. My daughter walked past in the background and into the kitchen for something to eat. She opened the pantry door, took a look and decided on Cranberry Almond Crunch cereal. She got a bowl down from the cabinet and grabbed the cereal and shook it into the bowl. Only nothing came out. It was heavy like it was full but no cereal fell into the bowl. Her first thought was, of course, to look into the box to see what the problem was.
  The problem, you may have guessed, was a recently displaced flying squirrel who had made his way somehow downstairs into our pantry and into the box of food. When my daughter opened the box she found herself peering eye to eye with a ratlike animal that sprang out of the box towards her and back into the pantry. Rachael did not take this chain of events well. So, in the background of my video lesson a blood curdling scream was heard, which concluded my presentation.
  For fully the next two hours we attempted to trap the critter without hurting him. He ran out the pantry and back in. We caught him under a trashcan lid and he escaped as we tried to release him out the door into the wild. His decision to run BACK into the house rather than OUT towards trees, food and life would prove to be a fatal decision but who knows what makes sense to a flying squirrel. You can't say we didn't try to help him out, though.
  Eventually he ran through my bedroom and into my big, walk-in closet. Now he was really hidden. There was a pile of about a dozen shirts and pants on the floor waiting to be taken to the cleaners and we somehow got all of them with him in there somewhere into a deep whirlpool tub.
  So I removed the items from the tub one at a time and carefully checked them as I did. After checking each one I would put it back in the closet. Eventually I had taken each garment out of the tub and placed it back in the closet. No squirrel. I now realized that he had hidden in one of the garments and I had put him BACK into my closet. It was about 11:00, I was tired and ready to quit fooling with him. I decided to shut the closet door and deal with it the next day.
  About midnight as I lay in bed trying to sleep I began to hear his scratching. I tried to tune it out but kept imagining him eating his way through my most expensive suit and leaving squirrel crap with the faint hint of Cranberry Almond Crunch all over my clothes. I knew what I had to do.
  I got up, got dressed and headed to the place where solutions to 90% of our modern problems are solved: WalMart. I got a couple of huge rat traps and a couple of those big sticky troughs that catch pests alive. At this point I did not give a flying squirrel whether I took him a live or not but these traps looked like they had a good shot at doing the job.
  I got back home, set the traps out with peanut butter in and around them and cracked open the door to the closet. Within an hour I began to hear something shuffling in the bathroom (which the closet opens into). I turned on the light and there he was. He was completely immobilized on one of the sticky tray. The more he had struggled the deeper his problems got. He now looked like Brer Rabbit all stuck in the tar baby. Victory! One down, 4 to go.
  The wildlife eradicators were contracted and the battle was on. I met with a guy named Dallas and he was confident that he could get it taken care of soon. He came every other morning for about two weeks, emptied traps and set new ones until the last rodent was gone.

  Postscript: the house is still for sale although the squirrel attack has been thwarted. I spent an unhealthy day after they were all gone destroying tunnels in the insulation and vacuuming up squirrel poop to return the attic to it's natural and pristine condition.
  Squirrels are not cute. They eat your cereal, make a giant latrine out of your attic, live and raise families without so much as offering to pay any rent and, worst of all, they scare the daylights out of your children. Inconsiderate and insolent little fur bags! It is MY house and I will fight them or any other interlopers to the death before I let them move in. They do not fool me- they are rats with bushy tails. And it is that time of the year when they and all other outside things start trying to commandeer our homes. To arms! Let our attics run red with their varmint blood and may we not rest until we have taken our homes back and hung their lifeless bodies from the branches of all the trees they should be living in. Maybe if a few of them see their cousins' cold and stiff cadavers becoming owl food they will rethink their decision to try to evolve out of homes made of leaves into colonials, ranchers, saltboxes and split levels.
  If any other flying squirrels try to move into my house they will have a bill to settle for their dead brethren: 3 months rent, a big bill from Trutech Wildlife and Animal Removal Specialists, a dry cleaning bill, the cost of four rat traps, some peanut butter and cereal- not to mention punitive damages to my mental health from having to go to battle with them. I will take payment in cold cash or cold carcasses.

The Bottom

  They say the lowest points in our lives are the times we are the most trainable. I suppose the logic is that when we are feeling the most overwhelmed and powerless we tend to search for reasons and answers. Saint John of the Cross wrote about "the dark night of the soul"- that place where people are given so much trouble to handle that their will breaks and they become fertile ground for whatever lesson God has in store.
  It would stand to reason that a man who wants to grow and become everything he is capable of would relish any opportunities to see life from the very bottom rung of the ladder then. I have found I much prefer the view from higher up, though. I suspect that, given the option, most people feel the same way I do. Give me happy times when things are going well and let me just stay an underdeveloped human being...
  I can't imagine the depths of despair that some people have gone to and survived. Some even seemed to come out stronger. Compared to losing a child or close loved one my calamities have been pretty insignificant. But I remember the lowest point of my life well.
  It was about 4 years ago and I was a few months into a marital separation that would result in the dissolution of my 25 year marriage. My daughters were trying to understand the reasons for that and not exactly thrilled with me and our relations were strained. I had cancer at the time but was still a month away from feeling a knot on my neck when I was shaving and beginning the tests and emotional process of discovering, accepting and treating it. I was living in a one bedroom "starting over" apartment and my estranged wife and daughters were in the big house with three little lap dogs- Lillie the schnauzer, Joe the teacup poodle and Bonnie, the bichon frise. All the dogs had their own personalities that made them endearing or, in turn, annoying. But Bonnie was the oldest and sweetest of all three. She had grown old as both the kids had grown up and her health was slipping away. The vet told us her kidneys were failing. The result was that she had become less and less able to make herself hold her head up, much less interact much.
  There came a point that Rachael, who had always claimed Bonnie as her dog, came to realize that Bonnie was in for more and more suffering the longer her living (or dying, more appropriately) dragged on. But she knew she could not be the one who could have her euthanized.
  And so the duty befell me. The strong one. The patriarch. Rachael and I discussed it and knew it had to be done and I agreed that I would take her. Rachael and her younger sister Hannah met me at the parking lot of the 24 hour vet one evening and said their tearful goodbyes to Bonnie and I scooped her up.
  I couldn't look down at her for the 30 minutes that I sat and waited for her turn. Another family was there all gathered around their little dog, crying and hugging her as they prepared to send their family pet back to some mysterious room where the vet would end the suffering and on to the great doggie beyond. I could hear Bonnie panting and feel her looking up at me expectantly but I just couldn't do more than hold and pat her.
  The vet finally came out and told me it was time and asked if I wanted to be with her for her last moments. I just couldn't do that. So I sat in the waiting room until they told me to pull my car around to the back door. They met me there with Bonnie in this cardboard casket that kind of reminded me of something you would get a 36 piece chicken dinner at Popeye's in. Then came the really awful part.
  It was really cold and had begun spitting rain and ice and I started driving towards the house that I no longer lived in. I was not welcome there but there was a reality that it was the only logical place to bury Bonnie. I called Rachael, told her it was over and that Bonnie was through suffering and asked her to bring me a flashlight, unlock the basement door and let me get a shovel.
  There was something so symbolic about burying the family pet on a cold, wet night in the yard of a home I was not even allowed to knock on the door of. I remember driving to my apartment and walking up the stairs to my door thinking I had survived the most depressing job a father can have during the most depressing time a father can go through.
  Within weeks I was diagnosed with stage 3 non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Chemo made me feel like I was poisoned and I was soon watching my hair begin to fall out in clumps. My divorce was heating up to be a ridiculously expensive and drawn out process that was like trying to walk through quicksand. But no part of those experiences were as painful as that night I had to send Bonnie off by myself.
  Four years later my cancer is gone and my kids are getting better with the idea that some marriages just need to end. I live in the house now. And when I mow the yard I always see the spot where Bonnie sleeps now covered with green grass and vegetation. Life goes on for everyone else without the family pet or anyone else, for that matter.
  I have figured out that people usually rise to whatever challenges they are given. Sometimes there are lessons in the rising and sometimes only pain. I am not sure what all I learned that night but I really hope that night was the darkest night of my soul.

Bonnie (during happier times).

A Caveman in A Post Modern World

  I am an artist and, as such, generally expected to be modern and opposed to archaic and outlived notions. For that reason I guess people are sometimes surprised to learn that I am a hunter and support everyone's right to do so in a legal and sporting manner.
  It seems so strange to have to defend myself for continuing what I have always considered to be an honorable tradition that was taught to me by my father (who learned it the same way and so on). It would be logical that something that was once a man's only real job would be a proud and carefully guarded ritual that the whole community encouraged all children to learn. But in recent years it has become so fashionable to protest the mistreatment of animals and hunting has fallen into that category.
  I won't fill this blog with statistics that illustrate that most of the game that exists in our country exists BECAUSE hunters pay high fees for licensing which are used for the perpetuation of natural habitats and breeding areas of wildlife. Most who oppose hunting have never cared enough to give a dime to preserve areas for animals to live. I also wouldn't even make the argument that fresh game is healthier, without additives, growth hormones and preservatives and that I do not favor killing animals for trophy purpose myself and only for eating or population control when there are serious problems with balance in certain ecosystems. My daughter is a vegan and I know all the arguments against eating meat and completely support anyone's right to make that decision as well.
  I do not love thinking about an animal having to suffer in order for me to have a ham sandwich or wear leather boots. I sincerely hope those who prepare animal products for consumption do it with as much dignity for the animals as is possible and realize they are doing a service that most people want and a job that no one really wants to think about the details of. And I do NOT think all hunters are good people who make every attempt to give game every sporting chance and not cause any unnecessary suffering. I wish they would always act as responsible stewards of the earth and it's beauty and bounty but we all know that many people do not. This does not only apply to hunters but also to those who leave trash on hiking trails and leave every light in their house on all the time.
  I really am not prepared to try to convince anyone what is the right thing for them to think about hunters and the sport of hunting. If you are violently opposed to it I believe you should not do it. But all I can tell you is that I feel a connection to every ancestor I have ever had when I am out in nature's harshest elements sitting and looking around me. I am called upon to use every sense and try to become another animal. I must think and act in simple and painfully careful ways. And for those hours that I am there I become my great-great-great-great grandfather and there is a family waiting at home very much hoping for the success of my day. I see things that others do not see and hear noises that are never even heard by the average person who has never sat still for two hours trying not to move an eyelash. The world moves in close to me and I find my insignificance in it. I become my father and his father.
  It would be cheaper and far less time consuming to just go to the grocery store and buy food. A lot of it tastes good because of all the stuff that is added to it to MAKE it taste good. But when I eat an animal I have personally harvested there is a certain reverence and gratitude for that provision that I don't get by just writing a check for it. Maybe those of you who grow your own beans or okra or tomatoes know what I mean.
  I guess hunting has largely outlived it's usefulness for most people. It's a whole lot more convenient to just pay for people to raise, slaughter, prepare and even cook our food. But I still love the concept and age old traditions of outdoor sportsmen and sportswomen who perpetuate and hold dear the lifestyle. It's not about logic, folks. It's about love- love for the outdoors, family rituals and memories and a deep bonding with others of similar belief. Believe it or not, it's about a love for the wildlife, too. If you can't understand it you probably never sat at your dad's feet and heard him speak with great reverence about a big fish he chased for years or a smart old gobbler that no one could ever fool. You wouldn't have ever heard a grandfather or uncle speak with affection about guns and dogs and hunting pals in his life. You have never baited a hook for your own child, shown them where to drop the line and seen the look on their face when the rod bends. And without those common experiences you and I just wouldn't be able to understand each other much.

My Thoughts On Coffee Cups

The "diner" style coffee cup is ergonomically a superior design for drinking coffee. It is heavy enough that it is not easily knocked over, has a comfortable handle, is normally thick ceramic that does not get hot and burn your hand and just feels right. It should be white so the heat is not absorbed like dark colors do. And if it is anything other than plain white it should only say "Waffle House", "Decaf Sucks" or something simple. For a guy, it should be a diner cup or styrofoam one. John Wayne, Robert Duval and Bear Bryant would all look most comfortable with a diner cup, whether it had coffee or whiskey in it.