Author: thegraymaniac

I have run around this little old town pretty much all of my life. I was born two blocks from where I am sitting typing this. I went to grammar and high school four blocks away, right next to the river that I take photos of all the time. I used to look out of the study hall windows and I could see that same railroad trestle that you’re always seeing pop up on my page.

I lived in three different houses while I was growing up here. One of them is one block behind me. The other two were up in “hot town” about a ½ mile away from here. I was married 45 years and a couple of months ago in the Church right behind my house…about 200 steps from where I am sitting. My wife and I raised our three children here…living in two different houses along these narrow streets. There has been a sense of continuity to it all.

I’m sad sometimes that things have changed so much….but change is inevitable. It’s like breathing in and out….like life and death. What does not change does not survive, and therefore change is necessary. I am happy that I have been here, and been here in this time and place. I’m grateful that I have survived the situations in which I have been, and the storms which have blown in and out of my life.

So, here I will be and perhaps will be from now on. You will see more photos of the landscape…probably more than you want to see. Of course there will be some more traveling, some more vacations and there will be time away from here. A cruise or two for sure. Disney World again…Paula likes that place and I kind of do too.

There are just too many ties here to completely break away at this point in life…family, kids, and grandchildren, and the memories…oh yes, there is that. Once upon a time back in the “old days” I dreamed for the day I could get out of this “one horse town” I wanted New York City or Nashville. A lot of my classmates and “city mates” have made it out of here. For some reason I didn’t. I guess maybe it was because I just wanted to stick around and see how things turned out.

It’s going to be another hot day today, then they say it’s going to cool down a little. Perhaps there will be some nice days in September, but I can wait.

I know a lot of times we say “I just can’t wait for_____”.

Fall, Thanksgiving, Christmas, My Birthday, until I graduate….

I just can’t wait! But, I’ve decided I can wait. I can wait for all these things.

I want to take Life one day at a time. I want to see the family, the clouds the sky and the sun. The moon and the stars. The birds in the trees and at the feeder. I want to think about the things that are happening right now. I want to quit wishing time away, because time is so very precious.

So, those things which are coming…for which I hope to be here to witness, I will wait and I will be happy for this day and the joys which it brings.

I now have the cleanest squirrel in the State of Georgia living in the tree in my front yard. The bold little feller is a permanent resident of the Ivy encased Elm tree that stands on the West side of the house providing much needed evening shade. I water my plants regularly and refresh the water in the birdbaths every day or so, and I use a hose pipe with a “sweeper” nozzle so I can get out to the farthest reaches of my postage stamp size yard.

I was over next to the fence, just fixing to quit when the “dirty” little squirrel climbed down off his limb onto the top of one of my birdhouses. Seeing that he needed a bath, I screwed the nozzle to “high” which produces the strongest stream of water possible. Pointed the hose in his direction and let go of the crimp in the hose pipe I had been holding.

Now..I’ve seen squirrels make some amazing moves…they are quite acrobatic creatures, but when that stream of water hit that little bushy tailed rodent he did a double back flip with three and a half turns straight UP onto the limb above his head. It took him two more seconds to get back up to his home base…where he sat chattering and shaking like a wet dog. Well..now he’s clean and I ain’t seen him trying to rob the poor finches today…..

The song I have always loved above all others is “Somewhere over the Rainbow”.

I remember the first time I ever heard it. That was in 1956 on CBS. Judy Garland sang that song, and I knew I would never forget it. It’s one of the few thrilling things I remember from that year.

I do remember pulling one of those extra large ’56 Mantle cards from a bubble gum pack. Wish I still had it.

My favorite line from over the Rainbow: “Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue….and the dreams that we dare to dream really do come true”.

….dare to dream

…dreams come true.

I’m a weird old man. A lot of friends and relatives don’t mind letting me know that fact.

But…I love that song, and its message off hope in a seemingly hope starved world.

Went to Trade Day again today. Been going there pretty regularly since they first started it, back down at the “Triangle Shopping Center” in Trion. It was a REAL Trade Day back then…with people actually “trading” for things…mostly knives, and even guns back in those days, guess it was the late 70’s. The owner there didn’t much care for it, so it moved to it’s current location down between Trion and Summerville.

All these years since, I have been looking for the “Holy Grail” of Trade Day…otherwise know as “the great find” “the treasure” i.e. the one thing that will worth SO much money that I will be able to sell it at Christie’s or Sotheby’s for a cool million and live in the life of luxury from there on out. Only problem is, I have never found it… Oh, I have found some pretty good “STUFF” over the years. I’ve brought a lot of that “stuff” or “high class junk” home. My wife is pretty good about it. She let’s me bring it in the house and hardly says a word about it. Kinda’ Saintly really, considering some of the weird things I have thought were “treasures” over the years. I won’t go into detail about that right now…only to say that I owe her a lot of thanks for her patience. Being the wife of a “junker” is not an easy thing. I have found everything from oil paintings to deer antlers, I have found Japanese pottery, and Chinese statues. Pocket knives and Buddha’s. Baseball cards aplenty!! Old marbles, toys, books, clothes, cameras, military items, rings, and earrings, stamps, postcards, old letters, arrowheads, rocks …you name it, and I have bought it. I’ve found things that I thought were worth thousands…and it turned out they were worthless. I have got somethings for a quarter or fifty cents and sold them for more. But that elusive treasure, that Holy Grail, it’s still out there.

One thing I have found though is a lot of friends. I have met people who would give you the shirt off of their back if you needed it. I have met people at Trade day who I count as some of my closest friends. People you can trust. I know some of these people, who would go five miles out of their way to pay you the dollar they owed your from last week. People who let you sit on the back of their truck and look through hundreds of dollars worth of stuff while they go about their business, or go to the bathroom or get a snack,..because they trust YOU. People like me…who are chasing that “Holy Grail” Some days, like today…it gets tiring to hunt it. I have plowed through more boxes of junk than most people will ever see, hunched over..prodding through the bottom, looking for that 22 karat gold necklace that weights a pound, or that undiscovered Picasso, or Van Gogh. Back hurting…sweat dripping..or freezing to death….I am there looking for it. One day it’s going to be there, and I won’t EVER have to go back to Trade Day again. One day…

Anway, on Saturday if it’s not raining it’s back to the chase…

2006- Insanity

I think I had an episode of near insanity today at work. I think it was due to what I was doing at the time. Because it’s all so absurd! I was standing there this afternoon in this clerk’s office talking about doing DCR’s on CAR’s, and all that kind of stuff (and if you know what I am talking about….poor you!) and then I thought, this is crazy!

What has humanity come to when we place such importance on doing documents on how to produce rugs at the optimum quality to go into people’s bathrooms? Not only documents, but entire Manuals, thick manuals at that! Heck, the first time somebody puts them down, they just gonna get pee’d on by their six-year-old. It was so stupid, and hit me with such a weird feeling that I had to physically grab hold of the desk where I was sitting to keep from jumping up and running down the hallway howling and whooping at the top of my lungs. (I restrained myself, however) It was a surreal experience. I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone almost and that I was not really real, but just living in a kind of strange and hideous netherworld. I hope I never feel that way again, honestly! It was disconcerting.

Back in my Grandparents time, people worked the land for their food. They had cows and chickens and other animals to help provide what their family needed. Grandma made most of the clothes, and a lot of other things that were used by the kids. There may have been three or four other books in the house besides their old worn Bible. Everyone was kind of left to their own imagination for entertainment. Guess it was really kind of boring, honestly. It was simple anyway. Maybe simple is good! Maybe simple is the setting for which a lot of us are pre-set.

I don’t know exactly when the change happened. I think maybe right after World War II. Things have surely changed though. Technology keeps making giant strides forward like some kind of possessed behemoth running amok here on the Earth like something out of H.G. Wells, trying to take us over. It’s like the Invasion of the Body Snatchers, only WE created the alien technology, it didn’t come in a pod from outer space!

We have gone from the agrarian age, that age of simplicity and “boredom” (which equals out to time to do things we can’t find time to do today) to the age of information ( which equals out to NEVER having time to do everything we think we NEED to do) in a space of 60 years or so. From my weird experience in the office I am almost positive that our brains (at least some of our brains, mine included) are unable to absorb the pace of technology that has run over us like a steamroller on hot tar. It’s flattened a lot of us! I use a computer; as a matter of fact I am using one to write this. But if you put a gun to my head and said tell me how it works or I will shoot your brains out, I would have to say “Is pushing the Start button a good enough answer?” I can’t tell you how MOST things work, I only just learn to use them out of the necessity of not being left behind in the dust by the scads of younger folks who want to climb over me on their way up the corporate ladder!

I am afraid I have bought into this unreality though. I use DVD players and Nintendo’s, and Computers to play games, and to work and sell things on EBAY, which is a place for selling things in which the customer never gets to touch or feel the merchandise until AFTER they buy it! I use Satellite Radio, my car diagnosis itself for problems and tells me when it needs to be fixed; my Mom has a pacemaker that the Dr. can adjust by holding the phone up to it. And on and on and on we go!! Woo-hoo what a crazy ride!

I wonder now, if we could go back 100 years, after having a taste of this “Brave New World” would we? Before Jet planes and electric guitars, would we? Before electric shavers and microwaves? Before Atomic bombs?

I don’t know about you, but if the Big Red Button was sitting in front of me that said “Go Back” I don’t think I would even hesitate a second before I pushed it. Would you? At least I think it would keep me from running down the hall someday at work, in a fit of insanity hooting and yelping like a hound dog!!

I have sang the song “I’ll fly away” hundreds of times. In choirs, in duets and quartets. Solo.

“I’ll fly away, oh glory….I’ll fly away”

“When I die, hallelujah by and by”

“I’ll fly away”

I’m looking up at the heavens sometimes at night, as I did the other week looking for shooting stars, and I get strange feelings. I get carried away. I feel like if I could, I would simply float up into the air, and keep on going.

Out past the moon, out past Mars and Jupiter. Out of our solar system and into the Milky Way. Through nebula, and skirting black holes. Past dwarf stars and red giants. To gently go where no man has gone before. But I pull back for now.

I am not finished here yet. Not finished. I’ve things yet I want to do. Little ones I want to nurture and love a bit longer. I don’t for how long I’ll get to. Nobody knows, except perhaps God, and I’m certain sometimes he gives extensions for his own reasons.

Truth be told, I’m really tired this summer. I’ve been dealing with health issues of various kinds practically all season, including a bad spell this afternoon with some rogue PVC’s, and tachycardia. You’d think with all the cardio I do, I’d be fit as a fiddle, but I reckon it’s really simply maintainence I’m doing. No matter though. I’m a survivor.

Robert Frost said it best: “for I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep…..and miles to go before I sleep”.

….or in my case before I fly away.

Have a great week everyone, and when you can manage to, “go home and love your family.”

Sometimes I know when I am seriously in thought I probably don’t look too friendly. I may appear to be scowling, but I’m not…believe me. My mind wanders like a greased pig on slick ice. I’m all over the place. I can’t seem to concentrate on over one thing at a time anymore. I might say “uh-huh” and didn’t understand a word you said. Part of it might be my hearing. I was “borderline” on the last hearing test I took before I left work. Probably the results of a LOT of noisy factories, and some loud Garth Brooks concerts. (That one in B’ham got me…I couldn’t hear normally for three weeks!) OR it could just be selective hearing. Nevertheless, please don’t think me rude..I can’t seem to help it.

I’m praying for a lot of friends tonight. There’s a lot who need it. I hope some pray for me too. Regardless of the fact that I quit going to Church regular, I ain’t lost my religion, my humanity, or my philosophy of life which is live and let live, give when you can, what you can and care about all life big and small.

Perhaps I am getting old because I appear to ramble. Anyway, if I walk by you with my head down and a blank look on my face just holler “hey” and that will get my attention and we will talk. I like you…believe me I really do….I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Going through things trying to decide: keep, sell, give away?

I come across a hot wheels container with multiple used…some well used, toy die cast cars. I recognize some of them. They are left overs from pre 1987, when we lived at 35 9th street. They belonged to Teddy and Matthew.

I posted a few weeks ago about finding all my tax returns from way back in the day. In 1982 through 1987 we were a one paycheck family, and it wasn’t anything to brag about dollar wise. But we got by.

However, every payday I’d take the kids to the store for a toy. Most of the time the boys bought hot wheels. More bang for the buck at .99 cents each. I can’t remember exactly what Kisi got…by 1987 it was probably teen magazine, with Menudo, Cyndi Lauper and Madonna pictures.

But the boys pretty much stuck to the hot wheels during that era. I can’t tell you how many times I’d clean up their room and put stuff into their big old basketball shaped toy box, and there would be dozens of hot wheels in the bottom. They buried them, burned them, and blew them up…but some still survived. They made roads in the dirt for them, dropped rocks and bricks on them, and let Junior have some. Some still survived. Ted started wanting the ones with electric motors, and even cleverly wired one of them up to an electrical cord one day, and plugged it into a 110 outlet. That little motor ran 1000 miles an hour til it started smoking like a bomb, and blew the fuse.

Ted and I moved on to baseball cards in 1988, and Matt started wanting spider man comic books, so one day before we moved to Elm street in 1987, I cleaned the bottom of the old toy box out one last time and put what was left in the box I found today.

After a little reflection, I decided to put them in the “keep” pile. What else could I do??

I cannot reconcile some of the posts I read with the commandment that Jesus gave: “A new command I give you. Love one another. As I have loved you, you must love one another”. You must…he…said…

He didn’t say love the sinner, but hate the sin. What nonsense!

He didn’t say justify your lack of love due to mitigating factors of your own invention.

He didn’t say to cherry pick this verse, nor that verse, and use it out of context to make some convoluted point that proves absolutely nothing.

I’ll tell you this. I have not melted myself down to the dregs in a hot cauldron these past five years…tortured and searching, and repoured myself into a new mold, to see and hear people say up is down, and wrong is right.

It’s not. You can’t make it so just by thinking it.