Writing for Sanity's Sake

Never grab the blade of a Jigsaw with your finger and thumb after it has come out of the saw…particularly after you have been cutting some really hard wood for a couple of minutes….It sort of reminds me of the story about the little old man who was walking down the street back in the old days…the late 1800’s, and he was passing by a Blacksmith shop. The blacksmith was hard at work on a horseshoe and as he hit it, it flew out the door in front of the old man on the street…still red hot. The old guy bent over and picked it up and INSTANTLY threw it right back down! “That thang hot?” asked the Blacksmith. “Naw” said the old man “It just don’t take me long to look at a dang horseshoe” Well…it don’t take me long to look at a jigsaw blade either…

When I walk and I remember those who are gone from this earth, I sometimes think…well I should visit the cemeteries where they lay more often than I do.

But then I consider…my Granny and Grandpa are buried 100 miles away, yet I think of them almost daily. Mom and Dad and Karrie Lynn are buried in the old Trion cemetery and I pass it almost every day, yet I don’t go in very often. But I think of them constantly.

All of the people I have loved, family and friends, still live in my heart. In my memory. In my love.

I don’t need to go to the place where their physical remains are residing. There’s nothing there. There will never be anything there…except the emptiness, pain and grief I felt the day we laid them in the ground.

I can do without that.

I’ll keep what lives inside me gladly over what’s been returned to the earth. Those memories light a candle for my soul every day.

I don’t understand very much at all about our creator. I know that we are not here to do some of the awful things we hear about on our TV every day.

I do think we are meant to have love and compassion for other people. I believe we should treat others the way we want to be treated.

I believe if we have more than we need, we should help others who don’t have enough.

I believe we should take good care of our planet, and all of the other living creatures who live here.

When I was in High School I used to sing the song “I Believe”. It was written after the Korean War as a song of encouragement for this nation, and was the first song to become a number one hit to be introduced on our new medium, the television. That was in 1953.

I always loved the ending: “Everytime I hear a new born baby cry, or touch a leaf, or see the sky. Then I know why, I believe”.

I love babies. And the blue skies. And everything our creator has given us to enjoy during our journey here on Earth. It is not in the nature of man to truly understand God, but to just appreciate the nature of God.

No matter what you have chosen to believe as your life’s philosophy, just remember to be kind.

I recall once upon a time a long time ago there came a perfect white snowfall. It was early in the spring and one of my rose bushes had already grown out and shared with the light of the world, a single red rose.

As the snow was falling early in the day, the rose held it’s petals tight, but by the next morning they were scattered on the ground like bright red drops of blood on the pure white carpet of ice. The first rose of spring had died.

But a week later as the sun began to shine warm upon the ground again, another tendril sprouted out of the rose bush. Once again the rose bloomed and this time the flower was even prettier, brighter and stronger than before. And the snowfall was forgotten.

Because it wasn’t the beauty of bloom which was the most important, because that beauty is temporary.

It’s the strength of the roots, and the care, love and compassion of the gardener which stands the test of time against the elements.

I found out not long ago that “they” (the experts) estimate that as many as 107 Billion people may have lived and died on this earth. It immediately made me think back several years…maybe 10 years or so ago, when there was a night in which the astronomers predicted there would be a huge number of falling stars visible. I wondered, in this little old town where there are so many lights from houses, from street lights, where…where could I go that it would be dark enough to have a great view of the meteor shower.

I decided to go to the grave yard. In the middle of the night…at 2 a.m. It was dark enough there, and slightly eerie.

I suppose most people would think I was crazy. I’ve always considered that the people who are in that place are not the ones you have to worry about though…so it didn’t bother me. It was better than I could have imagined….a storm, a huge storm of meteors practically filled the sky. They started out slowly…and I started counted them…but then when they came so fast…so rapidly..I had no hope of keeping pace, of keeping count. I wondered, how many are there? How many were there?

Now, I have to say that I’ve been dreaming a lot lately. I dream of people who I have lost in my life, people who have been dear to me who are now far away…people who I grew up with. I have dreamed of the end of time, and I have dreamed of the world the way it will be in a thousand years. I have dreamed of the Resurrection. I guess “old men will dream dreams” but finally now, today I know for sure how many falling stars there were on that night ten years ago. 107 Billion shootin’ stars baby!! All coming back down to say “hello….once upon a time we stood where you are…”

When you look in the mirror, who do you see looking back at you? Of course, I see “myself” the person who is an amalgamate of my Parents, my Grandparents and all of my other ancestors who have come before me.

Sometimes I see a glimpse of my Grandfather Stewart, sometimes a glimmer of my Dad. As I get older, this happens a little more frequently. I know that genetics has certainly played a part in what I see physically looking back at me. I also know genetics has also played a part in some of the personality traits which I have, some of the ways I act. I know that environment and external influences have also combined with these other factors in making me what I see.

We are limited by our genetics to some extent, but able to overcome much through learning and the environment we put ourselves into. That being said, then only our souls are individually ours, aren’t they? Until we are able to love that creature we see in the mirror and embrace what he or she is, we will not fully be able to love others to any extent. If we are not satisfied with what we see, only WE are able to affect a change for the better.

It is no bad thing to love one’s self…warts and all, faults and all, sins and all. As a matter of fact, it is a good thing. Only by learning to love ourselves can we learn to love ALL others, and only by doing that can we prove that we are individuals worthy of the title “human”

There’s a few things I can still remember:

I remember catching my first fish. it was at Lake Wanda Reita.

I remember my first day in school. They had to tear Sandy Hammond away from her Mom, but she was ok from then on.

I remember every person who lived in every house in my neighborhood in 1958. Jake Woods family lived next door, then the Ardens, and across from them lived Van Buren Rice. Across the street was Frank Watts and family. Up on West Pine was Paul Rosser, Flossie Mae, Dale, Annette, and their older sister…Paulette? was it…

And on the next street was my Uncle Curly, The Floyd family…Sloppy and Doris, Nancy Jim, Susan and Jimmy. The Barfield family, Jan and her sisters. Across from them, the Haygoods, with their boys…Mark was my age, then Randy, I think. Mrs. Rush and Marilyn. The Collettes, Joe and Ruth, Johnny and Jimmy and Marsha. Up on the hill to the North, The Caheelys, The Sprayberries, The Hawkins…with John and Jim. Just around the corner was Dennis and Don Durham and their folks…then the Langston family. I could go on and on. I know I left some out too. The Styles a little further down, and the Webb twins.

I reminisce as I walk that area. Then I walk West Hill, and a lot of those people are now there. Not more than a block from where they lived. Time goes by quickly.

Anybody who grew up in a little bittie town knows how I feel walking these streets. It’s past and present all rolled up a ball, and for people like me nostalgia just sometimes overcomes me, and stops me in my tracks. I’m 68, but I’m 6 sometimes too. But there is also still a future to live.

By the time I get back home, I’ve gotten it all pretty much out of my system. I’m back in the present and ready to press on. And I know why I stayed here. For the memories. To give my kids a chance at the same, not too bad small town raising. Its getting a lot different now, but I can’t complain too much. (although Paula might tell you different) Its still home, and that’s where the heart lies.

Pick up a Rubik’s cube. Now put on a blindfold. Now solve the puzzle…quickly…quickly…

Now, call the Rubik’s cube terrorism. Now you get some small inkling of how complicated is the current situation in our world.

My eyes well up with tears as I see the pictures and video of the carnage, this time from Belgium…as before from Paris, as from San Bernadeno, California, and from a Russian plane with 224 people, as with multiple deaths at a peace rally in Turkey, and a beach shooting in Tunisia, a mosque bombing….yes a mosque bombing….in Yemen, and as “far” back as a newspaper office in Paris, for some cartoons they drew….and on and on and on we could go back. All the way back to 1983 when 241 United States Marines died in Beirut, Lebanon, and six months before that as 64 Americans died at the bombing of our embassy in Beirut.

We forget how long we have been turning the sides of the Rubik’s cube, and still have not solved the problem. As far back as 1095 A.D?

It is a fearful situation again, as with all those other times, and it’s not over, because we still have not solved the problem. We are still blindfolded.

But the entire point of terrorism is to make you afraid to go about your normal life. Afraid to take your vacations, afraid to go shopping at the mall.

Do we keep closing in our circle of activities and living life until we are closed up in our houses with security cameras all around and guns in hand?

Do we react with anger and death dealing of our own volition?

Perhaps instead a Rubik’s cube, we should be trying to put together the three separate pieces of a puzzle ring. One representing love, one representing compassion and one representing patience.

Then when we get those three pieces locked into a perfect circle which has no beginning and no end, we can perhaps begin to understand each other as human beings, and revenge for past atrocities against each other can stop.

I’m not sure if it’s even possible or not in this world, but I’d give anything to make it so.

So I turn and turn and turn the cube over and over. Then finally I figure out that long ago religion has taken the stickers off the cube and moved them and I will never be able to solve the puzzle. I believe in a creator and a creation, but I’m not sure if God chooses sides.

At that point the cube explodes in my hands…….and I start to think, what can I do to make it better. What influence can my one little pitiful, senior citizen life exert. All I can do is just write an opinion. Maybe go somewhere this weekend with the family, and refuse to be afraid no matter where it’s at.

Working on the melody again….

Oh My Child- Lyrics copyright 2005 Larry Bowers

Oh my child,

You’re not alone,

Though sometimes,

It seems I’m gone,

I’m always right beside you,

To love you, and to guide you…

All I need to do is find you..

Call my name….

In this world that pulls you towards the bad,

Makes you want things, you know that you can’t have

Temptations of the worst kind,

Are blown against a weary mind.

Like a hurricane against a house of cards.

We wander in the dark of worldly things,

We rage against the wrong that living brings,

But I tell you one sweet day

When we go away.

The faith we’ve had won’t be a waste of time…

Baby Boomer

Sadness and melancholy creep in, as I think of what might have been.

If I’d been a little smarter, or a little bit more kind,

Could I have really changed the world, or maybe just one mind?

The mind that could have saved us all, and led us to great things,

But I wasn’t paying attention, I was thinking of the troubles life brings:

Paying bills, and 60 hour weeks….all that overtime.

I didn’t have the will to seek, that one imperfect mind.

The one I could have nurtured, wouldn’t have taken the fall.

The one who turned to baser things, he might have saved us all.

It’s the curse of my generation, the fault is mostly mine.

I wish I’d paid attention, and been a bit more kind.

Larry Bowers