I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: Random

  • Images


    IMAGES

    She sits in her large recliner that is covered with worn blankets for extra warmth.

    She is shrunken with age and her spine is so curved by scoliosis she slumps down into the

    bowels of the chair.   It seems to swallow her tiny body.

    She has lost weight since she came to this place three months ago.   She doesn’t eat.

    Her meals are pureed in a blender and fed through a large syringe.

    Open, please.  Thank you.

    She wears bright blue flowered pajamas which I know don’t belong to her.

    She is covered by a Christmas blanket and looks like an incongruous mixture of Hawaii

    with the North Pole.

    Her beautiful white hair is uncombed today and she periodically raises her right hand to

    carefully brush a few strands from her forehead.   There, that’s better.

    Two other women sit in similar recliners in the dark den lit only by the reflected light of

    a massive television screen which is the focal point of the room.

    How I Met Your Mother is playing this afternoon.   No one watches this episode about

    misadventures on New Year’s Eve.

    I find the irony in the sitcom’s name since the woman in Chair Number One is my mother.

    She has needed care for the past four years, and I have sat with her as her dementia progressed

    in medical jargon from mild to moderate to severe.   Severe is where we are for sure.

    I try to talk to her about visiting my aunt over the weekend.   No response.

    Instead, she gazes at her black leather shoes on the floor in front of her.

    Slowly, very deliberately, she bends over and painstakingly reaches for her left shoe.

    I move to help her because I am afraid she’ll fall out of the chair.

    Do you want to put on your shoes, Mom?

    She stares vacantly at me and shakes her head.

    Ok, I say and return to my seat on the large overstuffed sofa next to her chair.

    I make conversation with one of two sisters who care for my mother and the

    two other mothers who sit in the recliners.   Mothers and daughters and sisters.

    We are all connected in the little den with the big tv.

    My mother ignores me as she continues her ritual of laboriously picking up her

    black shoes one by one, tugging on the tongue to ready it for her foot, fiddling with the

    shoelaces as if to adjust them and then lowering the shoe to the floor in front of her to the

    same place it was before.     She does this over and over again.   Ad infinitum.

    During one of her attempts, she drops a shoe beyond her reach, and I put it in front

    of her chair with the other one.

    Do you need help to put on your shoes?  I ask again.

    No.  I have to keep on this road, she answers.   She was on a mission.

    The mother in Chair Number Two tells me she tried to help my mother with her shoes earlier.

    She told me to get away from them so I did, the woman said with a note of exasperation.

    I’m sorry, I say.   That isn’t really who she is.

    But I’m wrong.   That is who she is now.

    I talk and try to avoid watching my mother and her little black shoes for an eternity

    that is only an hour.

    Mom, I have to go, I say.

    She looks at me with some level of recognition and says Don’t leave me.

    I’ll be back in a day or two, I say and hug her and kiss her on the cheek and tell

    her I love her.   I love you too, she says.   I really do.

  • Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh


    GOLD, FRANKINCENSE AND MYRRH

    A CHRISTMAS STORY FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

                And it came to pass in these days that there went out a decree from the personal laptop computers and hand-held computers and iPads and iPods and high-definition televisions and Sirius radio satellite stations that all the world should be buying gifts for Christmas in 4G.   And all went to buy gifts, every one into his/her favorite retailer, or online.

    There was an old woman who lived in the world

    and her eyes saw and her ears heard the decree,

    but her heart refused to buy 4G.

    For, you see, too many Christmases had come and gone

    And the old woman’s heart had turned to stone.

    The gifts she wanted couldn’t be wrapped.

    They were buried in memories too deeply trapped.

    But, behold, the old woman was visited by wise women this year,

    And they came bearing gifts of good cheer.

    Gold, frankincense and myrrh from days of old?   Not quite.

    But the women followed the same bright light.

    I’m a basic Bah, Humbug Christmas person and have been for years.   I’m not clinically depressed during the Holiday Season, but neither am I joyful.  I resist the pressure to shop ‘til I drop, but that isn’t limited to a particular time of the year, either.  I’m considering the possibility I may suffer from borderline Scrooge disorder or at a minimum, Holiday Harrumphs.

    This year is different.   I’ve been jolted and shaken out of my cynicism and once again believe in the Magic that is Christmas.   I think my transformation actually began last year when my new neighbors in Texas on Worsham Street decorated their homes and yards with spectacular exterior holiday lighting.   They adorned trees, bushes, windows, doors, porches, benches, roofs – anything they could find to attach a string of lights – and the little street came alive with white icicle lights and plain white lights and multi-colored lights of all shapes and sizes that glowed and blinked and gave the appearance of a miniature Disneyland.  I absolutely loved them and of course, I had to participate with my own lights on our house on the street.  I felt my Christmas ice melt just a little each time I turned the switch that lit my bright lights.  This year the street is again beautiful, and I thank my neighbors for the inspiration of their lighting traditions.

    I miss my family at Christmas, the family that defined Christmas for me as a child.  That family is gone as that time and place are gone, but the child inside me mourns their loss every time I hear “Silent Night” and other carols sung during this time of the year.  We were musical people and much of our holiday revolved around music in our churches where my mother was always responsible for the Christmas Cantata.  Sometimes she played the piano for it so my dad could lead the church choir and sometimes she drafted another pianist so she could lead the choir herself.  Regardless, music was the reason for the season for us and we celebrated the season in church.

    Family has been re-defined in my adult life by my partner and four children in furry suits that I adore.  I have a step-son who now has a girlfriend he lives with and so our family grows together.  Through the past forty years I’ve been away from Texas I’ve been fortunate to have wonderful friends who have become closer than the DNA-linked group I left behind.  In my gay and lesbian community in South Carolina, the term “family” is a word we use to describe ourselves.  The question, “Do you think she’s family?” is translated, “Do you think she’s a lesbian like us?”  Being part of a marginalized sub-culture creates strong bonds within that environment and my friends have been simply the best.

    Coming home to Texas to live has connected me once again with my DNA family and that’s been an incredible experience and part of the Magic of Christmas for me the last two years. First cousins, second cousins, third cousins once removed and the people they’ve married and their children are good, and a few questionable, surprises for me.  Gathering for a cousins’ Christmas potluck luncheon or going with cousins to the Montgomery Annual Cookie Walk or having cousins come to our home or visiting in their homes rekindle good memories of the times when our hair wasn’t white and our figures were slimmer and the great-grandparents at the table weren’t us. I see these relatives and I am a part of them, and I feel good to belong to them at Christmas. Our conversations honor and celebrate our heritage and the ones who are no longer with us.  We laugh and cry together because we are moved by our memories. My family is a Christmas gift.

    But just as the familiar story goes of the Wise Men who followed a bright light to Bethlehem and brought gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to the baby boy in the manger, Wise Women in my life have brought gifts that rocked my Christmas complacency. My partner surprised me with an early gift at Thanksgiving when I went home to her in South Carolina.  It’s worth its weight in gold to me.  It’s a western saddle made of leather and rides a wooden quilt holder that a neighbor gave me when she saw the saddle.  It’s a perfect combination and looks good in my Texas den underneath a picture of a cowboy sitting on a fence.  Whenever I look at the saddle, I think of two of my favorite things: my partner who knew me well enough to buy this treasure for me and my days of riding horses as a child. I feel the love of the giver of this perfect gift.

    Frankincense was used in ancient times for medicinal and calming purposes including treatment for depression.  Burning frankincense was also thought to carry prayers to heaven by people in those days.  One of the Wise Women in my life gave me my own version of frankincense last week when she bought a plane ticket to South Carolina for me to be with my partner for Christmas.  I marvel at this generosity from a friend who surely loves me and who chased away the potential Christmas blues. This gift came from prayers to heaven that were unasked but answered on the wings of a snow white dove called US Airways and the spirit that is the Magic of Christmas in the heart of my friend.

    Myrrh is an Arabic word for bitter and it is the resin that comes from a tree that grows in the semi-desert regions of Africa and the Red Sea.  The Chinese used it for centuries to treat wounds and bruises and bleeding.  The Egyptians used myrrh as an embalming oil for their mummies.  Yesterday I received another gift that reminded me of myrrh – not the bitterness nor the embalming properties – but the unexpected present was a live blooming cactus plant that arrived at my house via a congenial UPS driver who I believe thinks he is Santa Claus.  When I opened the box and removed the moss packing per the enclosed instructions, I was stunned by the beauty of the pink blooms and the deep rich green of the plant.  The gift came from another Wise Woman who is married to my cousin in Rosenberg, Texas and was an additional reminder of the Magic that lives in Christmas.  Every day I’ll see these blooms and think of my cousins who sent them and the healing power beauty affords us when we take a moment to consider it.  I’ve always loved a Christmas cactus.

    Gold, frankincense and myrrh with a 21st century twist.  The Christmas story of Mary and Joseph’s plight in the manger in Bethlehem has been told and re-told for thousands of years.  Regardless of your belief, it is a tender tale of a family who welcomes a baby boy into a world of conflict and hardship and hopes he will somehow change it for the better.   The same conflicts continue two thousand years later and hardships of every shape and description plague our families today, but we move on.  Sometimes forward, sometimes backward.  But onward we go.  And in this spirit of hope for a better world where peace becomes the norm and hardships are made more bearable, I abandon my Bah, Humbug  with a Merry Christmas to all!

  • ‘Tis The Season


    Ok, I am clearly all over the board in this blog and have mixed new essays with excerpts from the book that was the ulterior motive for beginning  Essays with Humor in general and I’ll Call It Like I See It specifically.   The good news is one of my August posts has been published in a literary ezine called bioStories!   I’ve added the link to my blogroll here and hope that you will visit the site – it’s a very interesting concept, the stories are compelling and the editor was very encouraging to me.   I’d like to do the same for him.

    Since I find it impossible to develop a semi-schedule of writing for my posts here, I decided to forge ahead with my Thanksgiving essay a bit early this morning.   (My alter ego, The Red Man, has no trouble with his Rants and Raves and refuses to shut up which may partially explain my struggles here.)  

    I’ll miss Thanksgiving in Fingerville, South Carolina this year due to the vicissitudes of life, as my daddy used to say, but it will be with me wherever I am.

    SEASONS GREETINGS FROM FINGERVILLE, SOUTH CAROLINA

     

                Today is a day of giving thanks.  We cleverly named it Thanksgiving Day and have celebrated it for more than four hundred years in the United States.  I was surprised to learn that this tradition was actually introduced to the U.S. in 1565 by Spaniards in St. Augustine, Florida.  This newsflash made me feel a little better about the Texas Thanksgiving Day weather of my youth.  My elementary school textbooks portrayed pouty Pilgrims wearing ridiculously tall hats, oversized belt buckles, and heavy coats—all in black.  They invariably stood in deep white snow and appeared to be near freezing.  I recall being embarrassed at our lack of proper cold temperatures for Thanksgiving in rural east Texas.  If snow was good enough for the Pilgrims, it should have been good enough for us.  It makes me happy, then, to think that this holiday really began as a fiesta in Florida with lots of warmth and sunshine and people who knew how to party.  I have visions of tortilla soup, cheese enchiladas, and key lime pie.  (I’m not sure how we made the leap to turkey from tortillas or pumpkin pie from key lime, but that’s a question for another day.)

                Thanksgiving is still my favorite holiday because it is the most resistant to crass commercialism.  Halloween and Christmas have become impostors that pave the path to New Year’s Eve, but Thanksgiving remains the holiday for celebrating family and friends.  It is the lull between two storms that blow powerful winds of spending and of buying more of what we don’t need in larger quantities.

                When I was a child, Halloween was a night for wearing a costume made by my grandmother and walking with my friends to trick-or-treat in our little town.  We each carried small paper sacks to collect the few pieces of candy offered by our neighbors.  The highlight of the evening was the home that gave away homemade popcorn balls that were the size of tennis balls and had the rich aroma of freshly popped corn mixed with the white Karo syrup that held it together.  They tasted as good as they smelled.

    Sixty years later, I am astonished to see bags and more bags of Halloween candy in grocery stores.  I’m talking about bags.  I’m talking about the biggest bags you can imagine.  I’m talking about bags of every color with every kind of candy known to the human species.  Some of the bags are so big that they are difficult to carry.  Enormous bags.  Enough candy to last for years.  Take several, will you?  I’m drowning in Halloween candy.

    And I’m talking about decorations, too.  When did Halloween require stringing orange lights and black bats outside your house?  When did it get out of control?  Last year I stood with a large group of my neighbors who were mesmerized by the elaborate decorations of a house in our neighborhood.  The entire front yard was filled with ghosts in an array of positions and the ability to become animated when activated.  Our neighbor started the display regularly every night for two hours and did this for several weeks.  On his cue, the ghosts in the bluegrass band played country music and hymns as the other figures performed by popping up from behind bushes to frighten the children.  Seriously, hymns.  Hymns for Halloween.  Oh, yes, and yet another ghost repeatedly beat the head of one that tried to rise from a coffin.  People came from far and near to watch.  Halloween is officially an Event.  Put a special note on your calendar that October 31 is an important day in our lives.  We party.

    But, on November 1, watch out.  Clear the aisles.  Christmas candy—bags galore—has miraculously supplanted the Halloween candy, which is now half price.  Christmas decorations appear out of nowhere to signal the retail onslaught of the season.  If you think you’re seeing red, you’re probably right, because red is the signature color for this time of the year.  Red Santas, red stockings, red wrapping paper, red cards, red candy canes, red ribbons, red blinking lights—everywhere you look, you’re seeing red with a splash of green or gold or white for emphasis.  It’s time to buy.  A gong has sounded, and no payments will be due on anything until next year.  Thank goodness.  Because we won’t be able to afford them this year.  We must decorate.  We need to get out our trimmings to make sure they’re blinking properly, and, of course, we’ll need to buy some new ones, too.  The season demands it.  Something old.  Something new, nothing borrowed, nothing blue.  Mostly something new.  Definitely something red.

    The march is on, and good cheer has a price.  Merry gentlemen, God doesn’t rest ye.  O Holy Night, you’re not really silent.  As a matter of fact, you’re all about the noise of cars and planes and people in a hurry to get somewhere.  It’s time to travel, and the highways and airports are hubbubs of activity.  We are rocking around the Christmas tree.  Every creature is stirring on the night before, during, and after Christmas.  Hallelujah.  Let’s make it a chorus.

    Sandwiched between Halloween and Christmas is the poor relation, Thanksgiving.  On this lesser holiday, I am thankful for the memories of my family and our life before cell phones interrupted us while we feasted at the tables of my grandmothers.  I am thankful for a grandmother who got up in the wee hours of the morning to put a turkey in a large cooker that was used only twice a year.  I can still smell the aroma that permeated our whole house by the time we got up on Thanksgiving morning.  The turkey was on its way to perfection.  I am grateful to that grandmother for working ten hours a day, six days a week so that we would have a roof over our heads and food to eat.  I feel her love today as I felt it then, but now I know how fortunate I was to have her in my life—and I also know that not everyone is so lucky.

     My daddy used to tell me it was pointless to compare my life to someone else’s.  He said  I could always find someone who had more than I did, or look in another direction to discover someone who had less.  My daddy was a wise man.  Today, I count my many blessings, and, as the hymn says, I name them one by one.  For the father who insisted the whole earth was my territory and who tried to show me as much of that world as he could, I am thankful.  For the mother who wrestled her own demons as she tried to accept her daughter’s differences but never quit loving that daughter, I am thankful. For the partner who knows me inside and out and loves me for who I am, I am thankful.

    I celebrated last Thanksgiving with my partner Teresa’s family.  We drove from our home in Columbia to the First Baptist Church of Fingerville in the upstate of South Carolina where she is from.  (No kidding.  The town’s real name is Fingerville.)  This wonderful extended family from her mother’s side gathers in the fellowship hall of the church every year to eat an evening meal and to remind each other that family differences don’t necessarily mean family disconnections.  Although politics and religion are divisive issues and shelved as topics of conversation during the gathering, the gossip surrounding the activities of children and grandchildren are fair game.  The aunts and uncles who are older now speak volumes without words, and the simplicity and sameness of the party suggest a time long ago and far away.  In the midst of a truly southern meal, our souls were nourished.

    Three different kinds of cornbread dressing went well with either the turkey or ham.  Several dishes of creamed corn, sweet potato casseroles, green beans, black-eyed peas, fruit salads, and green salads completely filled the main tables in the fellowship hall of the church.  A second large table was reserved for the desserts that included pumpkin and pecan pies, coconut cake, lemon pound cake, and an assortment of Krispy Kreme donuts.  Drinks were available in the kitchen that was adjacent to the dining area of the fellowship hall.  Sweet and unsweet iced tea and coffee provided the right amount of caffeine to make sure everyone stayed awake during the ride home.  It was a feast, and an exact replica of the meals I had in Texas for Thanksgiving.  No wonder Teresa and I were happy—our families shared the same recipes!  I miss the ones in my family who are gone, but I’m fortunate to have another one that welcomes me to their table.

    Whether it was the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock or the Spaniards in Florida or some other group yet to be recognized, I salute this day of giving thanks.  It’s a meaningful one for me and suits my tendency to ponder.  For those of you who prefer the orange lights of Halloween and the white lights of Christmas, I wish you joy and strands that are easy to untangle.  I also fervently pray to the Gods of All Holidays that Thanksgiving candy and Thanksgiving outdoor decorations are hereby permanently prohibited.  Amen.

  • Answer: 300 Million Dollars A Day


    Question:  How much does the United States spend on the War in Afghanistan?

    Sigh.   If only I’d been watching Jeopardy instead of 60 Minutes last night.   If only The Good Wife hadn’t moved to Sunday nights for the new fall season in 2011.   If only the football game on CBS had ended on time so I wouldn’t have gotten started watching 60 Minutes because I wanted to know when The Good Wife would actually be coming on later.   If only I’d remembered my New Year’s Resolution to avoid TV news shows at all costs.  

    But no, I wasn’t watching Jeopardy.  Instead,  I got hooked on a segment of the  60 Minutes  Sunday evening news program commemorating the anniversary of the ten-year War in Afghanistan and an interview with the two men responsible for its, ahem, conclusion.   As if. 

    So the interview goes by swimmingly with numbers rolling off the tongues of men who look stern and tired and unhappy to be where they are, including the interviewer.   Number of American lives lost so far?   1,800.   One thousand eight hundred men and women no longer with us or their families and friends.   1,800.   Gone.  Immense, immeasurable, staggering loss.

    Number of dollars spent so far?   Half a trillion.   I don’t even know how many zeroes to put in half a trillion.   I’ll call it a gazillion and I’ll break it down into smaller numbers so we can all relate to it.   Let’s see.   That would be about two billion dollars a week or 300 million dollars a day.   Oh, okay.   That’s easier to understand.   If we put this in Powerball lottery terms, we’re spending 20 Powerball lotteries of 15 million dollars each on a daily basis in a country that hates us on a war that will never be over and wonder why we have an uncontrollable federal deficit.   Seriously.   As my daddy used to say, the inmates are running the asylum.

    Oh, and the two men responsible for bringing this war to a successful conclusion?    The same team that helped to end the insurgency in Iraq.   I kid you not.

    I will not watch TV news shows.   I will not watch TV news shows.   I will not watch TV news shows.   Maybe if I don’t watch them, the news will vanish Without a Trace, which is what I prefer to watch along with The Good Wife.

  • My Rich People’s Eye


    Here’s another essay just finished and hot off the presses…comments?

    MY RICH PEOPLE’S EYE

     

                The surest method I’ve found for beginning a new nonfiction work is to start writing fiction again.   When I speak about writing, albeit infrequently these days,  on panels or in workshops or in my friend’s writing classes at the University of South Carolina, someone always asks me why don’t you write fiction, with the less than subtle implication that fiction must surely be every writer’s dream and the most compelling of all literary art forms.   You know who you are, short story writers and novelists-to-be and fiction reading enthusiasts everywhere.   I applaud you.   I salute you for your loyalty to the genre.   Unfortunately, I find it impossible to join your ranks – yet.   I’ve tried.   God knows I’ve tried.   This week I dusted off my trusty Cowgirls at the Roundup short story a/k/a historical romance a/k/a blistering lesbian passion novella a/k/a my version of Beethoven’s Unfinished Symphony.   When I woke this morning, eager to resume my writing about lesbian cowgirls in Texas in the early 1900s, I lay in bed a few minutes too long.

                I have a game I sometimes play by myself in bed.  Aha – see?  I could maybe turn this into a sexual story about women’s libido in their sixties and all the women who read this will be immediately captivated by the topic and wait with panting breath because they want to know if there is sex after sixty.    And possibly a few of the men, too, although the men are fairly confident there is.   Good news, or bad news, depending on your sexual appetite, I can assure you the sexual self lives on.   However, that game isn’t what I’m playing by myself in bed today.  No, the game I’m talking about is the difference in how we view our world.   I call the game My Rich People’s Eye.

                My game started simply and it’s been such fun I play it over and over again.  But first, the back story that led to the creation of the game.   I feel like Milton Bradley must have felt when he developed The Checkered Game of Life and other equally entertaining board games.   Exhilarated with the creative process.   Practically giddy.    You see, earlier this year I had scheduled cataract surgeries in both my eyes.   Yes, yes, I know.   This is what old people talk about all the time.   Their health… blah, blah, blah.  I can remember when I used to say why do old people always talk about their health?   This was when I was under fifty.   Now that I’m sixty-five, I totally get it.   But, I digress.

                When I made my initial visit to the ophthalmologist who was to perform the typically routine surgeries, he mentioned I had a choice for my new lens.   The Medicare lens which I qualified for would cost me approximately $200 per eye and would correct my nearsightedness roughly 80 – 90% within a few weeks following the surgery and he could almost guarantee I wouldn’t need to wear eyeglasses except for reading and close work like computer work, which by the way in case you’re wondering, was my only form of work.   So far, so good.  There was, however, a super deluxe eye treatment available which Medicare didn’t cover and the cost of that eye lens was approximately $2,000 per eye but  it offered all sorts of advantages with top-notch reading vision as well as distance correction.  In other words, it was The Bomb.   I quickly told my doctor I would take the Medicare eye since my current budget wouldn’t allow the additional expense.   No problem, he said, and made the notation in my chart.   My first surgery was scheduled for June 23rd on my right eye and July 5th. on my left one.

                At some point not long after my initial visit with the Eye Doctor with two kinds of eyes for the choosing, I was discussing this interesting dynamic of my perception of the Medicare Eye versus the Rich People’s Eye with a close friend of mine and out of the blue my friend told me she wanted to give me the Rich People’s Eye for my birthday.   I was astonished, touched, and, frankly, overwhelmed by her generosity but told her I couldn’t accept her largesse.   She countered with the irrefutable argument that it was her gift to offer and she would be disappointed if I rejected it.   So there you are.   In one of those quirks of fate and vicissitudes of life, as my daddy used to say, I called the Eye Doctor’s office and signed up for the Rich People’s Eye.

                Everyone who knew I was having the cataract surgery had a story to share about how uneventful it would be.   Nothing to it.   Outpatient surgery in the morning and return the next day for the doctor to do the follow-up review of his work.   What could be easier?   Indeed, the procedure went just like that for me.   I went in to the eye center on a Tuesday morning and came home with my Rich People’s Eye by noon.   The first thing I noticed was the difference in color and that’s when my game began.   The game goes like this:   I close my left eye and open my right Rich People’s Eye.  I went upstairs to my office when my friend brought me home and the room looked so bright and the gray walls seemed to be a different color if I closed my left eye. Magic!!   My right eye now sees life in vivid bright colors and my vision is nearly the same in that eye as it is for people who don’t have to wear glasses.

                So I can still play the game four months later because I never got even the Medicare left eye.   The evil gods of herpes zoster, or shingles as they are more commonly known, struck a mighty blow against my Rich People’s Eye two days following the routine cataract surgery and the battle was on.   Since I was familiar with these enemies from previous wars in the same eye, I wasn’t too surprised at their appearance but I was most assuredly unprepared for their ferocity.   It has taken four months, three doctors, two French hens and a partridge in a pear tree to send these evil gods away.   I can only now begin to contemplate a new Medicare left eye.

                In the interim, I play my game with no winners or losers because I have no actual opponents.   It’s simply me and my view of the world.  This morning while I played the game and lay in bed with my dog snoring quietly beside me, my mind drifted to how people see the world and then you know how the mind takes these strange curves like a good baseball pitcher throws?   Well, I thought of the activists who are engaged in a political movement known as Occupy Wall Street.  Hundreds of people are protesting their frustration with the disparity in assets and liabilities in the population of the United States by moving into and settling in the Wall Street financial district in New York City in a peaceful statement of dissatisfaction with the status quo.  It is a movement spreading to other cities in other states, and my mind made a connection to my Rich People’s Eye proposal versus my Medicare Eye option.   Wasn’t this really the heart of the problems in our world in a microcosmic view?   Game on.  

                 We in the United States are now beginning to experience the financial hardships not seen in our country since The Great Depression.   Our financial institutions that manipulate the markets which move world economies have a Rich People’s Eye and tunnel vision marked by greed and self-centeredness.   Hedge funds, smedge funds – they’re like casinos.   The House always wins.   Gone are the days when workers are valued for the quality of their work and not their abilities to take short cuts.  The amazing prosperity and wealth generated by some of the Baby Boomers in the Post-World War II Era of technological advances and innovations in communications have been the gold standard by which all nations measure their own achievements.   Are we as good as the Americans?   Are we better than the Americans?   Why aren’t we rich like the Americans?   And even if we have as much money as the Americans, why are they so cool and hip?   Thank God we still rank first in one category according to a survey published on AOL this week.  We are very cool.

                Now we see China and India and the Middle Eastern countries controlling much of the wealth Americans have created because we have sold our collective souls to the company stores as Tennessee Ernie Ford so aptly sang in the classic country lyrics for Sixteen Tons.  “You load sixteen tons and what do you get/ Another day older and deeper in debt/ St.Peter don’t you call me ‘cause I can’t go/ I owe my soul to the company store.”    Or in our case to Bank of America or Citigroup or Chase or Goldman Sachs or Beijing or Saudi Arabia or Kabul, et.al.   We are adrift in a sea of debt and the waves crash relentlessly against our shores without relief.

                Whew.   I need to play a different game.   My Rich People’s Eye has put me in a world of hurt and led to pondering and mulling over and ruminating to beat the band.   Truth seems to be stranger than fiction and much more stressful.   Let’s see.   Where did I put that Cowgirls at the Roundup manuscript?