Writing for Sanity's Sake

Another writing from long ago:

I look over at the clock radio/alarm, and the digital readout glares: “ 4:15 a.m,.” at me in bright yellow numbers, reminding me that I only have forty-five more minutes before the infernal buzzer that some sadist built into that machine jolts me into the reality of the day. It’s been raining poodles and Persians outside, and I subconsciously thought I heard the “drip, drip, drip,” of water into a container of some kind. I must have been dreaming of the old mill house we used to live in over on “smokey” road back when the kids were little. I lay there, and let my mind drift back to that place in time…..

The houses on Smokey road were built back in the 1880’s, and the builders used thin slate tiles which were joined together with metal hooks to cover the roof. We moved into one of these jewels back in 1974, when my little girl Kirsten was two years old. My Dad helped us with the down payment, as we had very little in the way of money, or anything else for that matter, back then. This house was a lot nicer than most of the old company houses, as there had been some renovation done by the previous owners. There were some extra cabinets, a big walk-in closet, and a nice counter in the kitchen. Nobody had dared touched the roof, however.

You see, there is this hard and fast rule about the old slate tiles that they used in the construction of the mill houses. They will last practically forever, if you don’t mess with them. Not having thought about this kind of thing before, I climbed up on the roof one day, and walked my 190 pound frame all over those tiles while installing a T.V. antennae. I got that antennae up, and we had great reception. I was rather proud of myself until the next time it came a hard rain.
“Drip, drip, drip…” the three most dread words in the English language.
“Larry, I think the roof is leaking.” My wife nudged me and said.
“It’s just dripping out on the porch,” I mumbled sleepily, “go back to sleep.”
The next morning I swung my feet to the side of the bed to get up, and:
“Splat.” It was similar to the sound the baseball’s I had hit in the Chattooga river made.
“I told you it was the roof leaking.” I heard from behind me, as I waded toward the bathroom. Thus began a five year long battle with the ancient slate roof.

“How much to replace the roof?” I asked the roofer

“I’ll do the back for six-hundred bucks.” He speculated “But I ain’t doin’ that steep- pitched front roof for less than a thousand.” “It’s too dangerous!”
I felt sick to my stomach.
I ended up helping my Dad, and a couple of guys from the mattress company where I now worked, do the back roof one bright October Saturday. We replaced all of the decking, except on the porch area. I then took a five gallon bucket of black roofing tar up a tall ladder on the front, and covered the obvious cracks with this gooey pitch. I really laid it on thick. When I came back down about an hour later I looked like B’rer Rabbit’s friend the Tar Baby. Joel Chandler Harris would have been proud!

Everything I touched stuck to me. Pieces of paint off of the ladder, loose grass, gravel, pocket change; the garage door. I looked like a piece of walking flypaper. I was finally able to
splash enough gasoline on the gook to get it off me. It also took the top layer of my skin. Looking nice and pink, I went back into the house.
“We won’t have to worry about that anymore!” I stated confidently.

All through the Winter months things stayed dry. We had a great Christmas that year, with Kirsten, and little Larry Jr., who had arrived on a snowy December afternoon in 1975, getting lots of toys from old Santa! It appeared as though I had conquered my nemesis, the roof tiles, through hard work, determination, and a bucket of black goo. Then came the Spring rains in March:
“Drip, drip, drip…”
“Larry……..”
“I know, I know, I can hear it.” I replied catatonically.
I got up and put a pan underneath the leak so that I wouldn’t have to wade in the morning. The weather forecast was for a veritable monsoon over the next three days. I emptied that pan a hundred times, swearing all the while to find a way to stop the maddening problem as soon as the rain stopped. One sunny April Saturday, I hauled out the ladder, and tackled the problem again.

On this occasion I had spent more money, and had bought a gray gook from Ace hardware that was supposed to dry as hard as case steel. I ascended the tall wooden ladder carefully, and applied a five gallon bucket of this stuff to the afflicted area. The sun came out shining brightly the next day, and the gray gook dried as hard as side of a battleship. It appeared impervious. You could bounce rocks off of this stuff, and it wouldn’t even budge! Problem solved!

All through the Spring of 1979, stretching through the Summer and the Fall, nary a drip could be seen coming through the brown water circle which had dried on the white ceiling in our bedroom. I was confident I would never hear those three words again; so confident in fact, that I painted over the ceiling tiles to make them nice and white again. Christmas of 1979 came and went. We were expecting our third child in the Spring, it would be nice to bring him home to a warm, dry house.
In the Fall of 1980, after our son Matthew had been born in March, the remnants of some nameless tropical storm blew swiftly through our little town, bringing several inches of rain, and a corresponding amount of wind. Softly at first, and then with the resonance of a bass drum I awoke to the sound:
“Drip, drip, drip…”
“Don’t even say a word.” I cautioned as I got up to get the pan.
The brown spot came back in the ceiling, and it brought a cousin about three feet from it who hadn’t visited us before:
“Drop, drop, drop…” Another pan. Now every time my wife wanted to cook, she had to come to the bedroom to get a utensil. It was at this point I developed my “leaky-roof-Catch 22-philosophy.”
“Drip, drip, drip..” “Drop, drop, drop…”
“Larry, aren’t you ever going to fix those leaks?”
“I can’t fix them right now, Honey,” I smiled sweetly “It’s raining.”
When the sun came out, I quickly emptied out the pans and cleaned the bedroom floor of any signs of leakage. Most of the time, that worked well.
“Larry, are you going to work on the roof now that it’s nice out?” My dear wife would ask.
“ Darn!” I would say, “I WOULD do it today BUT,.. I (We) already have _(You fill in the blank with anything you want) planned, I’ll do it .” (tomorrow, next week, next month)
“Besides, it’s not leaking today!” I would brainlessly state.

By using this simple but effective philosophy, I was able to procrastinate my way out of ever working on those stupid tiles again. I never mentioned that the source of this intelligence had been from watching Ernie and Bert do the same routine over and over on Sesame Street, which my daughter Kirsten seemed to watch at least five times a day. Never say that grownups can’t get anything out of watching children’s shows!

Post Script: I drove by that house a few weeks ago and those same damn shingles are still on there as they were when we lived there from 1974-1987

“Memories from the corners of my mind”.

When I was a little kid, I found that I didn’t always have to have another person to play with in order to have fun. I guess you might say, I had a vivid imagination. I created my own worlds to play in, and stayed in them for hours and hours sometimes. Many times when I stayed at my Grandparent’s home I would go up behind their house into the hills alone, and stay there most of the day. I would hunt for arrowheads and many times would find one or two. I made myself a bow and arrow and shot at invisible enemies. I dug into the red clay dirt and made a cave in which me and my gang of outlaws hid. I climbed trees….not too high because I was afraid of heights, but high enough. I took sticks and limbs which had fallen from the great high oaks and hickories, and built little cabins. I cracked those hickory nuts, and ate persimmons and liked them. I lived many lives there. Only the way my Grandmother’s voice carried in the thin mountain air served to draw me back into the reality of the world of others.

At home I also had my sanctuaries. The old river dam at Trion was a second home. I fished there with a cane pole pulling out many a tiny bream that my Dad would look at and judge and then say “throw ‘em back…too small” I went on my own many times to the jagged limestone rocks which jutted out into the river at many places and jumped from one to another, sometimes making it, sometimes not. I swam at the “boat dock” sometimes alone, sometimes with friends like my ol’ buddy “Barbeque” who lived on the same street as me. Countless times before I ever played organized baseball, I would play the entire World Series in my back yard. Throwing the baseball up against the rugged red bricks on the backside of our house, sometimes clipping the siding…much to my Mom’s dismay but drawing very little ire from my Dad, who seemed to understand where I was coming from. Playing with my dogs, especially my old buddy Lobo..who was a mix of just about every kind of dog a man could think of, and about as tough a fighter and survivor who ever lived. He was near death so many times, and brought back to life with Peroxide and love, you would think he had a cat’s nine lives. He taught me a lot about the will to live, and how strong it is in every creature.

I also developed a knack of “inside the house” entertainment too. I would sit around and read comic books by the hour. Uncle Scrooge comics at first, and then graduating to Superman and Batman, and finally becoming excited about the “new” Marvel comic books which were coming out. Spiderman, and The Fantastic Four, Dr. Strange, The Hulk, Thor, and Iron Man. I bought them all, just as soon as they came out and then followed them religiously. They were cheap, and it was what I spent my allowance on. If my Mom hadn’t thrown them all away when I went off to college, I might be rich today. I also loved books, and constantly had my nose stuck in one. If I was inside, I was reading. Listening to music and reading. I loved the big 33’s and bought the ones which were cheapest at the store. That means I listened to a lot of Broadway, since they were usually 99 cents versus 3.99 or more for the “Rock and roll” records. I can still sing most of the songs word for word. “Some enchanted evening…you may meet a stranger…” or “I could have danced all night, I could have danced all night and then have begged for more…I could have spread my wings…and done a thousand things, I’ve never done before” Yep…My Fair Lady, The King and I, Oklahoma, Camelot…and on…and on…I was a weird child.

I’ve done so much as a child, before my adult life started, even though much of it was on my on…inside my head, that I don’t feel like I was “cheated” during my childhood. I don’t feel deprived. I feel…normal. My adult life has been equally fulfilling. A lot of you have seen the pictures of my family. I love them as much as I appear to…believe me.

Now, I don’t know how other people feel…don’t know how they experience things. None of us do. We live our entire lives side by side with other human beings, but we have no earthly idea exactly what’s going on inside their head. We assume they process and navigate information the same way we do. That can’t be so, otherwise we would have a world full of people who are essentially alike. I think one of the things which has brought the human race to where we are today, is not our similarities but our differences. We need to celebrate that fact. We need to understand that diversity is a virtue.

We are all a universe inside the frail body of a human being, and even after that body fails us that Universe will go on. Together we will go on.

May we all prosper together. Have fun tomorrow on the last day of October. Be safe. I love you all, no matter our differences.

Hopefully people who are protesting in all the towns and cities where troops and agents are being sent will remain peaceful.

I’ve seen a lot of things lately….uncalled for violence by men who are unidentified and masked, pepper spraying priests, throwing old men to the ground. I don’t like where we are headed. If you do like it, I’m sorry….we don’t agree.

I don’t like what I’m seeing. One person and his main helper, are spearheading this in order to see if enough people will fight back violently for him to call it an insurrection, invoke marshal law, and call off next years elections.

I sincerely hope that violence against this evil army that’s roaming America’s streets can remain peaceful, if so, we might can have elections in 2026. If we don’t get those, our fundamental system of government will be totally lost, if it’s not already. Sorry that’s the way I see it, with lots of corollary scenarios branching out in all directions.

I dug out my old Bible over the past few weeks and found these verses in Matthew that seem to be pertinent:

34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:

35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:

36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink?

38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee?

39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?

40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

42 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink:

43 I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not.

44 Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?

45 Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me.

46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.

I love the sunlight coming from the West. I’m not really totally sure of the reasons. It could be that the bedroom window in my parent’s house on 9th Street was facing the West. A lot of times as a kid, I’d come home from school and lay on my bed to do my homework. Sometimes I’d drift off to sleep, with the soft low light seeping in through that window, like some syrupy sleep potion. I’d dream sweet dreams about the future, about love, about accomplishments. Wonderful dreams, none of which I now can remember. Fall naps on school days. Winter naps on weekends. Summer was for fun, so there was no time for naps then.

Fall sunshine was my favorite. After all the leaves had fallen. I remember being able to look out that high window by standing up on my mattress. I loved to watch the cool winds of Autumn blow through the giant Magnolia tree that grew just outside, and watch those huge brown leaves tumble. I loved those solitary minutes that I was able to steal, as the Western sun light filtered in through that window.

At at our old house on Elm street, our living room had one window which faced West. I used to sit in my recliner many days, especially after 2011 and doze off in the evenings and daydream. In the Fall when the sunshine was “just right” it gave me a feeling of comfort and sometimes even euphoria to have the sweet sunshine lull me. I know, it sounds crazy…but it’s true. It could have been the lingering after effects of a long time on the heart-lung machine the year before. I like to think instead, it was something magical

It never happened to me while we lived in Mom and Dad’s old house on 7th street… from 2009 to 2011. The windows just weren’t in the right position. Something didn’t feel quite the same. I did take quite a few naps with baby Rue and baby Eli there though…..just like I’ve napped with Evie and Ellie in the ensuing years.

Since we moved from the old house to our place here in Ringgold, I haven’t had as many episodes of the “western light daydreaming” as I used to. We’ve certainly got plenty of light coming from the West though. We’ve got four big windows and a set of French doors! It could be light overload sometimes! Especially during the late Fall through early spring, when the leaves are off the trees.

It’s a gorgeous Western view from here though. Lookout Mountain looms just to the right as I walk out our door, and I’ve photographed many a wondrous sunset going down over the mountain. I’ve made pictures of yellow and orange full moons sinking into the eastern Alabama farmlands. I’ve marveled at the hue and color with which nature paints the heavens. What a privilege to be alive and be on this tiny planet on the edge of the Milky Way, in amongst billions of other solar systems. I don’t question why we are here, I just revel in it!

Just last weekend, I was sitting on the couch in our living room and it was late afternoon. It had been a tiring week, and as the light crept in through the closed shades, I slipped off briefly into that nether world between sleep and wakefulness, where the mind makes all things, present, past and future possible. I stayed there for only the briefest minute, but it was enough so that I knew I still could. I still could be in that precious space where time stands still.

I really hope for another decade or so here in this wondrous world. I hope if I get too old or infirm to let anybody know what I want or need, somebody will remember this and roll me over to the window in the West so I can see and feel the light shine in, and perhaps eventually find my way home.

Missing Pieces- a poem by Larry Bowers

Conservative Conservationist. No such thing?

Compassionate CEO. Luigi sings.

Underpaid Professional Athlete? Ha, ha ha!

Overpaid Teacher. La, La La.

Honest Politicians? They all died.

Current Space Missions, Russian Rides?

Starving humans, Gaza cries.

Secret Programs, Supernatural Pograms.

Global Warming, Yellowstone Warning.

Nutritious Fast Food, Mother Earth News.

Worship of Money, Bees and no Honey.

Drones with a Mission, Exploding weapons.

Religious pox, The Pope’s white Sox.

Patriarchal homicides, Handmaiden tale cries.

9 billion people sleeping, Mars rover slowly creeping.

All is said. Little is done. Solar Power from the sun.

Billionaires rule today, Billionaires rue the day.

The puzzle is on the table, but pieces are missing.

How can a person be two things at one time? Can a person be a dunce and a genius simultaneously?

How is it that a person who was considered so infallible that he was allowed to come in with unfettered power, gather all of our information, cut jobs Willy nilly through every department of government….including cutting an agency that has resulted in the deaths of thousands in Africa….was such a genius and doing such great and glorious things but is now on the outs?

Is it because he and some other people don’t agree on how to spend our money. Or more accurately, how much more debt to put our country into and how quickly to do it. Two trillion of debt over 10 years in order to cut taxes primarily for the rich and super rich…is my understanding. Cutting Medicaid via mandatory work /volunteer guidelines. Even MTG said she wouldn’t have voted for the BBB, if she’d read it closer and saw that it took away States rights to control AI for 10 years! I have to admit, this is the first time I agree with her, and wish she’d have read the entire bill before she voted yes, cause it wouldn’t have passed if she’d voted no.

Anyway Emusk called the BBB an abomination….which is a word they sometimes use for certain people, so he does not like it. He says we will never be doing anything in the future but paying interest.

That’s not good either for my little ones.

I’m no genius, I’m probably a dunce….but I just can’t make sense of it all.

I can’t understand either how come Harvard is catching so much flak? Columbia U. too.

Can’t understand why PBS and NPR are being defunded, or how come the National Weather Service has been degraded right before Hurricane Season (that the head of FEMA never heard of)

As a matter of fact, there’s plenty of other stuff to talk about that I ain’t got time to go into now.

Old Emusk paid out 270 million or so to help our current Admin (yesterday’s Wordle word btw) get elected. Probably made the difference. I guess he thinks he shoulda got more for his money. I think he should have just kept it and put it in Treasury bonds. That would have helped us more than giving it away to Superpacs. I swear that “Citizens United” thing old Scalia hung on us was a bad, bad decision.

Oh well, I’ve rambled on way too much on politics this morning. Bye bye for the day.

Warning: political post. Scroll by if you don’t want to read it.

I saw where the president fired the head of the Bureau of Labor statistics because he didn’t agree with her numbers. He agree with them while they were in his favor though. He basically tries to slant and obfuscate everything that doesn’t paint him in a positive light. As Mary Chaplin Carpenter once said in her song “I Feel Lucky”: “The stars might lie, but the numbers never do”

I’d point out a rebuttal for his need to obfuscate. This morning three businesses in Tennessee closed, putting almost 1000 people out of jobs: Perdue Farms in Monterey, Monaghan Foods in Dickson and Prarie Farms in Gallatin. These come on the heels of several other plants closing in Tennessee earlier this year in the automotive industry. All this while Tennessee governor Bill Lee is spending millions unnecessarily calling out the Tennessee national guard to help ICE. He wouldn’t take federal money earlier this year to help feed hungry kids this summer though.

I personally thought that the immigration enforcement program was going to rid the country of convicted criminals, and I saw no problem with that, but arresting and deporting people who are working jobs and paying taxes? I saw a post from a contractor in Alabama who can’t build because he depended on immigrant workers to fill his work force.

I have to mention also, the ridiculous situation in Texas, where their governor Abbott is trying to gerrymander the state map to give Trump his request for more seats in Congress. He’s threatening to send the FBI out to arrest democratic legislators who have left the state. All this will do is force democratic states to reciprocate…..and there we will go, in a cycle of tit versus tat, none of which will benefit the American people.

I could go on, but I’ll save it for later.