The Soul of Thanksgiving

 

“For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? “    Mark 8:36-37

 

    

The year was 1863. Abraham Lincoln was President. Strife ruled. The nation was at war with itself. The landscape by most visionaries was bleak and dreary. The nation seemed to have lost its bearings and its very soul. Being thankful under these conditions was seemingly impossible. The nation urgently needed to mend its fraying fabric.

 

Under these dire conditions Lincoln issued a proclamation establishing the last Thursday in November as a national holiday. His intent was to coalesce a nation of diverse cultures and individuals into a cohesive whole by remembering the origin of its birth. This year Americans will celebrate the 157th anniversary of Thanksgiving.

 

In 1620 pilgrims departed from Defts-Haven, searching for a new land with an ephemeral idea of freedom. They had no idea what they would face in the quest. As if the hardships of the voyage were not enough to deter them, what they saw at landfall must have made them question their sanity altogether.

 

There, looming before them in the stark winter stood a harsh land with a weather-beaten face. It appeared to them a country full of woods and thickets, a place full of untamed beasts and wild men. It had an ominous and savage hue. Such is the nature of the unknown…wild, fearful but full of promise.

 

It was up to these pilgrims to carve out their dreams and visions.  They neither expected nor received the benefits of ease in the process.  For having left their homes, having said goodbye to their families and friends, they said goodbye to the old life and searched for a better home.

 

We who read this today are benefitting from the sacrifices of these visionaries. We can ask ourselves these questions: Under what tyranny would we now be living if not for the perseverance of these intrepid travelers? How would our destiny have unfolded?

 

Fortunately, we have the answers. Living in America is a blessing of untold and incalculable dimensions. Read the news if you don’t believe this!

 

Several years ago on this date our family and friends sat in a Methodist Church in the small town of my youth. We gathered there to say a final goodbye to our mother. My nephew recalled the influence she had upon his life.  He synthesized it based on his annual visits for Thanksgiving. He recalled pulling into the driveway of his grandmother’s home. The first thing he saw was her face in the kitchen window, welcoming him with a smile.

 

The soul of an American Thanksgiving also has a face.  It’s seen in the Rockwell-blended faces of families, merged together into a national tapestry. Each face represents a precious memory, of a home and a secure place where families can thrive.

 

The blessings of national unity are too broad to enumerate. But the collective voice of Thanksgiving blends them together at every table where food is served, where laughter is heard and where love is shared. The soul of being American is once again revived on this memorable day.

 

Today, the world is a dangerous place. It’s fractious, filled with secular pursuits, religious divisions and seethes with national rivalries. Our country itself is not immune from its own fractured diversity. The horror of continuous news reveals this on a daily basis.  

 

Yet in spite of this, America continues to stand, strong in the collective unity under which it was founded…established by a beneficent God for the purpose of freedom. A continuous remembrance of this fact is what Thanksgiving is all about.

 

Today began sunny on the coast, but clouds are gathering for another storm.  In the front yard a squirrel sits on its hind quarters, gnawing on acorns. It seems to smile as it feasts on the prodigious crop furnished by the oaks.

 

America has endured many storms. Covid is our latest. It will weather more. But, like the squirrel, we can take comfort in the fact that a gracious, Almighty God desires to furnish us with untold blessings. Our collective soul will continue to flourish as long as we remember the Source of these blessings. 

 

* * *

 

Thank you, Abraham Lincoln, for the gift of this holiday. Thank you, God, for blessing the soul of America another year. Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family.

 

 

Bud Hearn

November 24, 2020

 

 

Trucks with Ladders and Other Things

 

Life is full of things that feed our paranoia. Not the least of which is being stranded behind trucks with ladders and other dangling things.

They’re everywhere, these trucks, their loose ladders bouncing about, projectiles of deadly potential, threatening with every bump to pierce your windshield and sever head from body. Oh, the paranoia.

It comes on suddenly when driving down narrow highways where the road slopes precipitously off into the marshy swamps. Alligators live there. No room for mistakes. Nerves can get neurotic.

Recently I find myself sandwiched in behind a beer truck and a long line of kamikaze bumper-huggers. Boxed in again. My sweaty palms grip the steering wheel. Paranoia strikes deep. 

Flashbacks of the horror of being hung-up in the dark crawl space underneath my house resurface. Backing out takes hours and demonstrates another design flaw in the human anatomy: no rear-view eyes. 

An enticing photo of a frosty beer mug is painted on the truck’s rear panel. It temporarily distracts me from the frightening crawl space dilemma. Its momentary reprieve transfers the fear factor over to the taste buds, then back again. The fear is real, the beer only an illusion. 

A large hand truck sways violently in the truck’s slipstream. It dangles from the rear door, hanging tentatively by a rubber bungee cord like a condemned man wearing a noose, waiting for the gallows door to drop. Stenciled beneath it is a warning: “Watch for flying objects.” Trapped again, caught in the vortex where all options are bad ones. 

The mind does visual take-offs on all that can happen. None is good. Thoughts of disaster run wild.  I visualize the hand truck flying off, hitting the highway, bouncing and sending a mass of twisted steel hurdling directly at me. I pray. 

A still small voice answers, whispers in my ear, “Your morning repentance was weak, my son.” Paranoia covers all bases.  

Miraculously, luck prevails. The bungee holds and the truck turns off. Catastrophe averted. But wait, all’s not well that ends well. The day has just begun. 

Ahead is a painter in his pickup. “The Lucky 13 Painting Company” is written on the tailgate. Since when is there a common connection between the number 13, ‘lucky’ and ladders? Yes, there are 13 ladders, ladders that slide, bounce and levitate from overhead racks. Paranoia wakes up. 

My luck is no better on the interstate. Lumbering along is a mammoth Caterpillar, twenty tons of yellow steel and rubber tires the size of buildings. It teeters on the edge of a lowboy trailer. The truck straddles the two outside lanes. Options are limited again.  

The mass of disaster is anchored on the trailer by tiny chains like those found on yard swings. I attempt to pass. The road narrows, a lane is closed ahead. The grassy right of way is the only option. I take it. My past rushes by in a flash. I beg out loud for forgiveness. 

There’s more. Ahead I get stuck behind a logging truck. Pine logs the length of football fields protrude. They wave a red flag and declare, “Watch for Flying Debris.” They’re perfectly positioned to give new meaning to the cliché, ‘a sharp stick in the eye.’ 

Life is perilous on its own and it’s not all just trucks. Hazards lurk everywhere, from chewing-gum sidewalks to random overhead bird droppings. We must watch every step always, including verbal slips of the lips and Facebook posts. Some things can follow one to the grave. 

Vertigo and fear of heights make stairwells a snare.  Escalators are shoe-eating monsters to the non-observant as my mother would have attested. They’re capable of chewing off foot and leg of the less-than-nimble rider. 

Home ladders, while essential, should be avoided by all persons over 30.  These entrapment devices have lured unsuspecting fools into early hospice. 

Home elevators, oh, heaven forbid. Like Smart cars, they resemble coffins. If trapped inside you can say goodbye to sanity and a toilet. Paranoia is everywhere. 

Paranoia breeds on wet bathroom stone floors and rolled-up corners of kitchen rugs. One fall ends it all.  

But look, why carry on with this soliloquy? We all have our own neuroses to nurture. Let’s just leave it at that for now. 

Time distills the essence out of everything. In retrospect, the beer truck episode was not all that bad. I’ll follow it again. Hey, beer is what’s real…paranoia is only an illusion. 

 

Bud Hearn

November 12, 2020

Training a Mule to Dance

 

As a rule, mules are not known to dance. Yet, it might be easier to train a mule to dance than to compel a First Amendment rebellious free-spirited soul to live under the yoke of the woke.

 *   *   *

Why this fascination with mules?  

It’s a family tradition. Plus, it just seems an apt analogy in identifying those of us who are just mule-headed enough to value our own opinions without intrusion from bigoted indoctrination. Hence, the ‘yoke of the woke.’

Life has its share of yokes. It’s meaning hasn’t changed since Jesus offered it as a viable alternative. But what’s ‘woke?’ Until lately it was a common verb, but it has now been transgenderized to a noun. Nothing is off limits for transgenderization.

It entered the Urban Dictionary about 2017. It began as a harmless idiomatic expression, sorta like the word ‘cool’ meant in former generations. But lately it has been hijacked by the progressive self-righteous crowd. It now resembles a noose.  

What does it mean? It’s a force-feeding imposition of an intolerant ideology and a distorted orthodoxy promulgated by mob movements hidden under the banner of acronyms. It seeks to force conformity to certain radical and extremist ideas, or else. Non-conformists are stereotyped with multiple ‘isms’ and ‘ists,’ effectively relegating them to the status of lepers. It demands bowing, scraping, and bending the knees to this repressive philosophy to fit in with the ‘our-way-or-no-way’ crowd. It’s strange music indeed.

Now listen, if you want to get someone’s fur up, try cramming down your own self-righteous views as gospel. Walls go up quick. It goes against the grain of mules and humans.

Mules have been trained for years for yokes, plowing straight furrows and staying in line. Back in the 1880’s my great grandfather farmed over 11,000 acres with mules. Not one of them was known to dance.

Besides, who would even consider attempting to train a mule to dance? It’s easier to train a monkey to walk on water. It’s a feat that’s never been achieved, maybe never even been attempted. Mules don’t dance, and that’s that.

Mules are intelligent animals, but stubborn, mule-headed they say. Their legs are too gangly for dancing, and they have no ear for music. Except country music, I’m told.

Mules are not household pets. They don’t eat treats from our hands, and they don’t sleep with us. Dogs are superior in many ways.      

I get curious about the habits of mules and call a rancher in Arizona, Steve Edwards, a real mule trainer with Queen Valley Mule Ranch. 

“Steve, can mules dance?” He laughs.

“Well, mules are not born to dance, although with a good dose of metaphor one might ascribe mule dancing to a certain genre of people.” I don’t bite the bait.

He continues. “They don’t dance, but they do ‘weavings’ when they get ready to leave the stalls.”

“Weavings? Explain this.”

 “Well, when they get anxious to get loose, they begin to sway their hips, then their heads and necks. It appears that they’re dancing, but it’s totally innate behavior. They’re not trained to do this.” 

“You mean they’re ‘dancing’ to their own music?”

“Exactly.”

“Tell me some more about the habits of mules.”

“There’s an old Ozark Mountains saying, ‘You can tell a horse, but you have to ask a mule.’ Mules have a mind of their own. You see, mules are fearful, even though they can weigh up to 2,000 pounds. They view humans as predators, as well as other frightening things in their environment. Their reactions are fight or flight. Which is why farmers put blinders on them.”

“What is the purpose of blinders?”

“Simple.  If mules look left, or right, they see nothing. Hence, no predator. They simply plod on with the job at hand. Without the blinders, they might see something that frightens them. You don’t want to tangle with a frightened mule, son.

Let me give you an example. The mare is the herd leader.  A new mule comes in. He sidles up to her, espouses new ideas. Her ears pin back, meaning ‘Back off, junior.’ But he pushes the issue. The mare’s tail swishes, ‘I’m telling you nicely, back off.’ He presses on. The mare swirls and administers a double-foot kick to the new mule. ‘Now, buster, I asked you, I told you and now I demand it.  Back off.’”

 “Is there a similarity in this analogy applicable to mule-headed humans?” I ask.

“Maybe. But it would be purely coincidental. I know plenty but I ain’t calling any names over this here phone, partner. You want to hear about coon hunting mules?”

“Yes, but another time.”

 *  *   *

Living under the ‘yoke of the woke’…hey, if it fits, wear it. 

Somewhere in the distance a banjo is strumming. The tune is “Dixie.” The ‘weavings’ begin. The mules begin to dance.

 

 Bud Hearn

November 6, 2020