My Sunday Feeling

One of the things I like best about my neighborhood is that it really does have a "small town" feel to it.  Pretty much anything you need, from beer to church, is within walking distance.  And people in the neighborhood tend to know each other.  Or know somebody that knows somebody.  

Hillcrest is a neighborhood of walkers and bikers.  I tend to see the same folks out doing their constitutionals when I am doing mine.  One of the more interesting walkers is a man I don't know personally.  What made him memorable is that he always took long strides and he pulled himself along with modified (I guess) snow skis.  Indeed, he looked as if he was skiing rather than walking as he trudged up and down on the hilly sidewalks.

Plant, pull.  Plant, pull. It looked like it made for a good workout.

I have been sick unto death all week with bronchitis and pleurisy.  Most folks are content to get head colds and such.  I prefer getting stuff straight out of Dickens.  So I went down the the Farmer's Market at the Baptist church down the street to get some fresh air and to shoot the bull with the other shoppers after being cooped up for a week.

I was talking with Joe. His kid sells lemonade there on Saturdays to raise money for various causes.  Good kid. I always put money in his jar even if I don't care for lemonade. 

"Did you hear about the skier?," Joe said.  

"The guy that walks with ski poles?," I said. "No? What about him?" 

"About a week ago he got some bad news from the doctor.  He apparently had diabetes.  The doctor told him that they were going to have to amputate his leg."

"Yeah?"

"So he killed himself."

"What?"

"Yep. He put a gun to his head.  Lived right around the corner from here."

"Dear God...."

"They tell me that before he did it, he went by the stores he did business with and told people goodbye.  Folks thought that maybe he was going away on an extended trip or something.  It never occurred to them that...."

"Well no.  It wouldn't occur to them.  They must feel awful."

" Don't you know it?" Joe said as he absent mindedly kicked at the ground. "Don't you just know it?"

It occurred to me that I used to see a woman walking with him but that I had not seen her in some time.  Which means nothing.  It's just funny how the mind works.

It occurred to me that neither one of us actually knew his name.  But we know that he is gone and that he left this life under the worst of circumstances.  Such is life in our little neighborhood.  

Boy.  You just never know.  Suicide is such a short sighted response to virtually any issue you can think of.  Joe went on to say that the skier couldn't live with the idea of not being able to exercise in his usual vigorous fashion.

Had he never heard of Oscar Pistorious?  Ok.  Bad example for any proposition except for the advances in prosthetic devices.  I know of a golfer with diabetes who had persistent problems with one of his feet.  He asked for it to be amputated so he could play golf.  Now, I'm told he plays pretty much everyday unimpeded by his prosthesis. Surely to God there were other options for our desperately sad neighbor.  I'm saddened that he evidently did not have ears to hear anymore.  

Stories like these serve to make us realize that we are all more fragile than we know and that others may be even more so.  

So I resolve henceforth to grab by the lapels anybody that ever makes a special trip my way in order to tell me goodbye.  

And to get to know more people by their name.

My Sunday Feeling

No blogging today as I just now bonded out after this little problem at the family reunion. 

Will get back to you when my lawyer says it's safe to talk again.

My Sunday Feeling

When you get to be a certain age, especially if you have played sports or otherwise been physically active, stuff starts to hurt.  I ran and played competitive tennis until my late forties.  

Due to degenerative arthritis in my lumbar spine, I no longer do distance running.  Due to a slight tear in my right rotator cuff I am banned from tennis and pretty much doing anything over my head.

But even before my most recent physical maladies, I have practically lived on Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs or NSAIDS for the past 20 years.  First it was Celebrex, the ads for which showed older folks dancing on the beach, which I guess was designed to show its miraculous healing properties.  I took it back then to ease my hamstrings and Achilles tendons from the rigors of playing tennis 3-4 times a week. And it worked great. 

Then Celebrex and Vioxx started killing people and it got took off the market. Indeed, Celebrex might have caused the heart attack that took my Aunt Jean in her sleep. So, my doctor switched me to a prescription dose of Naproxen which is sold as Aleve over the counter. I took 500mg of that twice a day until I hurt my shoulder in the gym.  That's when they switched me to meloxicam which I have been taking for close to three years now.  

It works great.  It gives me as much relief as the Celebrex or Vioxx did.  And I only have to take it once a day.  Indeed, I can't imagine playing golf, working out or raising my right arm above my shoulder without meloxicam.  

So imagine my amusement when last week the FDA issued new warnings about the risks of taking all NSAIDS, including meloxicam were greater than once believed.  According to an article on the subject in the New York Times, the evidence of increased risk of heart attack, heart failure and stroke "is now extremely solid."  The risk is higher in people with heart disease and people over 65 with with heart disease are urged to be "extremely careful" with this class of drugs. 

Perfect.  

Of course, I have coronary artery disease (CAD) which is the genetic bequest of my father.  However, I am asymptomatic despite having a pretty high calcium score which is indicative of gunk in my system.  And I have a completely lousy (perversely referred to as "strongly positive" by the medical profession) family history.  My paternal grandfather died from a coronary at 56.  My own father checked out for the same reason at 52.  

But I got a few things going for me.   I don't smoke.  My BP is well controlled. I'm not obese.  I don't have diabetes.  And I am extremely active physically.  The cardiologist didn't do a stress test on me last November because there was "no need" for it given what I do in the gym on any given week.  And none of the docs I got on the payroll right now have called, texted or left me Facebook messages to quit taking the stuff.  Indeed, my PCP refilled my prescription last week.  

So what to do?  It's a risk-benefit thing I suppose.  Do I quit taking a good and useful medicine that helps me maintain my vigorous exercise habits, which in turn, helps my health because of an increased risk of what they refer to as a "cardiac event" and to which I refer as "buying the farm?" They give cancer patients exceedingly toxic medications in order to kill the cancerous lesions or cells.  

That's not a completely lurid comparison and I certainly don't equate myself with a cancer patient.  But there is a cost-benefit aspect to virtually everything. And I guess this is no different.  In any event, my physical is next month.  I guess we will take it up then.  I think I will live that long.

Indeed, if I play my cards right, in October I will be the first male infected with my grandfather's genes to hit 60 in two generations.  

I like my chances.  NSAIDS or no NSAIDS. 

God Save The Queen

No blogging today.  I'm too busy watching Roger Federer return from the dead at Wimbledon.

Keep calm and watch tennis.

The Opposite of the Manly Art of Pugilism

"Any man who hits a woman is a coward. And I don't need cowards on my football team."
                                                                                     Then Texas Tech Coach Mike Leach


Thus was Mike Leach quoted by Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian in their expose of college football entitled "The System." Leach was talking about his code of conduct that governed what players did off the field.  The erudite and eccentric Leach-now at Washington State-called his code the Three Queen Mothers.  Players who were caught stealing, smoking dope or hitting a woman were kicked off the team.  Period. No questions asked.

The image above is of Florida State quarterback De'Andre Johnson slugging a woman in a Tallahassee bar last month.  You can see the full video here on Deadspin.com: http://deadspin.com/video-shows-fsu-qb-deandre-johnson-punching-woman-in-fa-1716030886

It appears that Johnson and the woman were jostling for position at the rail.  Things evidently got testy and the woman appears to take a swing at Johnson.  He then pops her good and beats a hasty retreat.  Er, let's change that to makes a hasty retreat.

FSU Head Coach Jimbo Fisher, who certainly is no stranger to recent high spirited antics from his student-athlete quarterbacks-has hauled off and suspended Johnson from the football team on an indefinite basis.  Johnson has also been charged with misdemeanor battery by local law enforcement.

First the human sideshow known as Jameis Winston and now this.  Can they recruit quality human beings at Florida State or what?

Let's not make this too complicated.  The video reveals that a putatively drunk chick tried to take a half-ass swing at him.  But can it seriously be said that Johnson was acting in self-defense?

No. It can't.  Hearken unto the words of Johnson's lawyer as quoted an hour or so in TMZ.com.

"While it is clear from the video that De'Andre Johnson was not the initial aggressor," attorney Jose Baez said with presumably a straight face. " [h]is family wants to take the lead in helping him learn and grow from this experience."

It gets better.

"He is currently participating in community service, and faith-based programs focused on battered women, substance abuse and the empowerment of children."

This is an organ recital.  It is not a defense.

Nobody asked me but Jimbo Fisher-or whoever is in charge of FSU (and by that I mean the actual institution of higher learning)- would do well to adopt Mike Leach's Three Queen Mothers as the Seminoles' code for off-field conduct.  Don't hold your breath.

I asked the following rhetorical question on Facebook:

"What does it take to get kicked off the team at FSU?  Shooting up a convent?"

My buddy Don posted the following:

"Throwing too many interceptions."

Look for De'Andre in the Garnet and Gold about October.  Surely this will mean that he will have "learned and grown" from "this experience" by then.  And that he will have had the self-indulgent pussiness rehabbed out of him too.

Yeah right.  Business is business.


















                                                                           

On The Road

No MSF this week. I'm off to the Zarks to spend the weekend at Crystal Bridges.

If you must drink and use fireworks please do so responsibly. 

That is all.

My Sunday Feeling

Last week I got to spend a good bit of time with Melissa's son Joe.  He had driving school here in Little Rock and she was jammed up at work.  So I picked him up everyday, got him fed and watered and took him home.  

While I have spent a good bit of time with teenagers the last 3 years or so, I don't often spend a lot of solo time with anybody other than my nephews or my Godson.  And while there were other things I could be doing, spending time with a 15 year old sure beat hanging around my house listening to the floor in my bathroom being torn out and watching dollar signs fly out the window.  

As anyone who has been watching the news lately can glean, last week was pretty momentous.  So I took the opportunity to pick Joe's brain about current events.  Just to get the perspective of a young person about all of this.  

Now Joe is a really good kid and his plenty smart just like his sister.  He is refreshingly free of the narcissism you can find in teenagers in general and boy athletes in particular. I suspect that is due to the fact that he knows in his heart of hearts that his mom would kill him if started copping an attitude. And while we get along pretty well, our deepest and most animated discussions revolve around sports, particularly football and basketball.  So this was the opportunity to change the subject.  Besides, what was he gonna do?  Walk back to Conway?

"So Joe," I asked him at lunch on Wednesday. " What you think about all this stuff with the Confederate flag?"

He munched on his sandwich.  He shrugged his shoulders.

"It's disrespectful," he said. "I don't think they should fly it."

" Do you and the black guys you hang out with ever talk about this stuff?"

He gave me a blank look. He shook his head.

"No." He shrugged again and returned his attention to the feedbag he had tied on.  

He was in class Friday while the Supremes were dropping the bomb over in DC. I asked him if he had heard the news.

"What news?" he asked.

"The United States Supreme Court ruled that state statutes banning same sex marriages are unconstitutional," I said.  

"Whoa!"

"Yeah."

Lunch arrived about that time so he quickly turned to the more pressing business at hand.  After all, a man's gotta eat.

After he inhaled his chicken nuggets or whatever they were, I decided to press him a little.

"So what do you think about gay folks having the right to marry?" I asked as he loudly sipped through the straw.  

"I don't care."

"What do you mean you don't care?"

"I mean they should be able to marry if they want to.  I don't care."

"Ah." 

A confused look crossed his face. 

"What Joe?"

"Tell me again what happened today."

This happens in class sometimes.  Joe, like a lot of kids I have the privilege of being around, is plenty smart.  But he's 15.  I forget this sometimes.  As Huey Long once said, "You got to put the hay down where the goats can get at it." Even the smart goats.

"OK," I said as I backtracked. " The Supreme Court ruled that laws making same sex marriage illegal are unconstitutional. You know you have to get a license to get married right?"

"Right."

 "The Supreme Court ruled that states can't refuse to issue marriage licenses to gay folks just because they are gay."

He nodded his head.  And that was that.

Besides, he wanted to talk about the NBA draft.  Fine with me.  We talked about basketball on the way back to Conway.

Mike Huckabee can threaten to call down fire from Heaven until he is blue in the face.  Right wing pundits can bemoan the alleged eradication of "our heritage." The next generation just doesn't see it that way.  

After all, it's pretty simple to young Joe.  Flying the Stars and Bars is disrespectful.  Gay marriage is no big deal.  I suspect his views are pretty much in line with others in his peer group.  Sure. Not everybody will agree with him. But I'm guessing his opinion is not too divergent from that of his associates.

And that's what won't change.  And that's why things will never be the same. 

It doesn't matter what Mike Huckabee or Ted Cruz thinks.  It just doesn't matter.  

My Sunday Father's Day Feeling

This is hilarious.

I ran into my friend Bill in the grocery store the other night.  We hadn't seen each other in awhile and resolved to go get some dinner soon to hoist a few and catch up on old news.  

I admit to having some reservations about this.  The last time I planned to meet Bill for dinner, I wrecked my car en route in the ice and snow.  But I'm not overly superstitious so I agreed to meet him Sunday night.

This morning (Friday) I got a text asking for a rain check.  Seems he had forgotten about Father's Day being this Sunday.  

Now, I tend to forget about Father's Day with something approaching regularity. I am not a Dad and my own father died damn near 40 years ago.  As I have written before, at this stage of the game it's almost like Buck never existed. He's an abstraction made tangible primarily by the presence of myself and my brothers and a marble marker at the Veteran's Cemetery.

But really that's about all he remains at this point.  No disrespect.  It is what it is.  I forget about people I haven't spoken to in a year.  Try 38.

But Bill has 3 kids.  2 of them are still in town.  I think.  At least one of them is. Of this I am sure.  And Bill forgot Sunday is Father's Day.

I submit that this is one of the main differences between men and women.  No Mom in the long and storied history of motherhood has ever forgotten Mother's Day.  Ever.  I can state this with teleological, if not metaphysical, certitude.  I challenge you to prove me wrong.

Most Dads I know can take it or leave it.  Or at least they don't want a big honking deal made of the day.  My brother Bob probably does but that's OK too. Back when my friend Richard's kids were in the house he used to say that all he wanted for Father's Day was to be left alone.  Bill says that while he can relate to Richard's sentiments on the issue, by the same token he allowed as how he could use a travel coffee mug that doesn't leak.  If his kids presented him with that he wouldn't turn it down despite his ambivalence about the occasion.

The word "ambivalence" would never be used in connection with Mother's Day by any Mom worthy of the title.  Hence another difference between men and women.  

I hope Bill gets his mug.  If you are a Dad I hope you get your wish for Father's Day.  

Even if its just to be left the hell alone for one day.  

"I Have To Do It"

Dylan Storm Roof, pictured above at his bond hearing, is the only suspect in the shooting spree in historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina in which 9 folks were killed.  6 women.  3 men. They were killed Wednesday night during a prayer meeting in the church.  According to press reports Roof joined the meeting.  As it wound down he opened fire.  

Roof seems to fit the usual profile for this kind of perpetrator.  Young. A socially inept loner.  Unemployed or underemployed.  A close relationship with the Internet.  And, oh yeah. White.

If the atmosphere at Emanuel AME is anything like the other African-American churches I have had the privilege to attend, I'm certain that Roof was welcomed warmly by the folks there at the meeting.  Black churches are like that. Which makes the crime even more reprehensible if that's possible.  He intended to kill the pastor he asked to sit by.

The initial reaction from some of our conservative Presidential candidates was that the crime was not about race but was yet another example of the continuing assault against religious people allegedly going on in this great land of ours.  Rick Perry even went so far as to initially describe it as "an accident."I suppose that catching a slug from a stranger that you have welcomed into your prayer group could be broadly construed as an assault on your religious freedoms to be sure.

But they dropped that explanation once it got out that one of the survivors quoted Roof as saying prior to the shooting, " You're raping our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go."

I'm willing to bet that the "you" to which Roof was referring was not the African Methodist Episcopal church.  A doctrinal dispute this was not.  This act was motivated by racial animus in the heart of a disturbed young white man revved up by white supremacist web sites and delusions of grandeur. Who unfortunately had access to a firearm.  And it was no accident. 

I know many responsible gun owners and hunters.  They are safety conscious and obey the game laws.  I know, off the top of my head, 3 or 4 people with concealed carry permits.  They are equally cautious. 2 of the folks I am thinking of have law enforcement backgrounds.  I don't give any of them a second thought. I may even join them during next duck season.  Only, I will be shooting a Nikon. 

And I know many folks that are socially conservative on issues of race and sexuality.  It would never cross the mind of any of these folks I am thinking about to go shoot up a black church, a Mosque or a gay bar.  

But there are people out there who hate fellow humans for no other reason than they exist.  Consider the words "You're taking over our country."  They are fairly dripping with zero-sum paranoia.  The pregnant aspect of this sentence is "It is because of you that I am a pathetic loser.  And I am here to settle the score."

By lighting up a gathering of mostly ladies peaceably attending a meeting in a place they thought was a sanctuary.  

You cannot tell me that the 2nd Amendment guarantees that unstable people, and they are mostly men, have a right to own a firearm.  You can't practice medicine or law without a license.  Everybody has to buy car insurance.  You can't have a parade without a permit. There are regulations that govern damn near everything.

What makes guns sacrosanct?  Not the 2nd Amendment according to the United States Supreme Court which has ruled that the government can pass regs to keep firearms out the hands of, well, the insane.  We have a gun problem in this country.  We have a hate problem in this country.  

Will the 72 people running for President acknowledge this?  Nope.  And I disagree with President Obama.  Mass killings here in America is "the new normal."

At Roof's bond hearing, some of the relatives of the victims were allowed to speak to him via closed circuit TV.  They told him that they forgave him.  You can find the video.  You should watch it. But make sure there's a tissue handy.

I'm not that good a Christian.  I don't think I could.  In any event, Dylan Roof does not merit nor deserve the forgiveness of these poor folks. 

And he damn sure didn't deserve the right to carry a gun.  

AWOL

Taking this Sunday off.  

Off from what? I can hear you from over here.  

Talk among yourselves.  

My Sunday Feeling

At a party some 30 years ago I was introduced to a psychiatrist who, among other things, provided services to folks that were considering transitioning. Her job was to make sure that such a decision was not the product of otherwise treatable emotional issues. It was a fascinating conversation and I remember clearly what she said.

"These patients tend to be very complicated people."

I remembered this cocktail party discussion when former Olympian Bruce Jenner-not yet Caitlyn-revealed to Dianne Sawyer and the world that he was in the process of becoming a woman.  

It is my privilege to count gay people as some of my closest friends. I don't think I know any transgendered folks.  I did, however, once see the tennis player Renee Richards back when I was a kid at Tulane.  At a Bonanza steak house in Metairie of all damn places.  And so I do not profess to have any particular insight into these issues other than I would have to think that being self-aware of a longing at one's core to change the biological condition of one's birth would have to be a scary and lonely place.  Although I try not to write about things I know nothing about, it would just have to be.  

Caitlyn Jenner's "coming out" to the world has been met with scorn by religious and political conservatives.  It has been met with mostly admiration by advocates for LGBT issues.  Indeed, it is not inappropriate to view Bruce Jenner's decision to transition as courageous.  

However, I tend to view with deep suspicion practically anything that has a basis in the erroneously termed world of "reality TV."  And I wonder just what real impact this will have on transgender issues that are grappled with by real people in the real world.

Caitlyn Jenner looks fabulous.  But she should.  She has money and privilege. She has access to the best medical care and cosmetic surgery.  She was photographed for Vanity Fair by Annie Leibovitz for God's sake.  This is not reality. 

Some might  say that I am objectifying her in the same reductive way that women are treated in the media and on the Internet.  No I'm not.  What else am I supposed to do with this person?  She didn't come out of anesthesia quoting Simone De Beauvoir.  One could have waded in the ocean of Bruce Jenner's deepest thoughts and scarcely get your ankles wet.  As far as I can tell she's still got the same brain.  And it is the same one that thought it was a good idea to appear in the movie "Can't Stop The Music."

While I hope Bruce Jenner's transition put transgendered folks in a more favorable light, I fear that it doesn't reflect the "reality" of the issue for most LGBT folks any more than his marriage to Kris Kardashian reflected the "reality" of marriage.  

Caitlyn Jenner couldn't exactly disappear.  I get that.  She has been in the public eye for over 40 years.  This is a legitimate news and human interest story.  I get that.  

I accept Caitlyn Jenner and other transgendered people.  One can hope that her story starts a frank and useful discussion in the culture about complicated issues concerning sex and gender.  

This is, however, also showbiz.  Like the psychiatrist said, these patients are complicated people. I hope that Caitlyn Jenner doesn't turn her new life into a burlesque of the issue.  That will do nobody any good.  

My Sunday Feeling

By now it seems like all of America has turned its lonely eyes to our little State in a combination of shock, disgust, and not a small amount of schadenfreude over the scandal concerning the downfall of virulent anti-gay activist Josh Duggar after it was revealed that he "made a mistake" as a young kid when he engaged in inappropriate touching of some of his sisters as they slept.  

Of course, Josh is but 1/19 (I think.  I confess that I'm not really paying attention.) of the notoriously fecund Duggar family who up until recently had their own "reality show" on TLC.  I wrote "up until recently" as TLC has suspended the show in light of these allegations and Josh has resigned as president of something called the Family Research Council.  

Full disclosure: I have never watched the Duggar's show "19 Kids and Counting." It is my understanding that it provides a platform for them to promote their ultra-conservative Christian values.  But I would think that the main draw for viewers, especially those that have kids, is to see just how Jim Bob Duggar and his dutiful wife Michelle manage all of this.

I mean, I can't imagine there being much interest in inserting the camera into the average,say, United Methodist family, with homework, going off to a real school with other kids, soccer practice, piano lessons and the like being the average stuff the camera would record.  My friends up the hill still have 4 in the house ranging in age from 16-8.  Chaos, albeit happy chaos, prevails.  But it's not a freak show.  

19?  My God.  The mind reels.  

Much has been written and will be written about this situation.  And Jim Bob and Michelle are supposed to appear on Fox to discuss this matter, which has a chance to be fun.  

I mainly have one question which I will get to after a brief recitation of the facts. 

13 years or so ago, it was discovered that Josh had engaged in "inappropriate touching" of some sisters as they slept.  Jim Bob did not notify the authorities.  Rather, he sent the boy to Little Rock for counseling at a religious based center that was run at the time by a friend named Bill Gothard, who eventually resigned after allegations of sexual impropriety and harassment on his own part.  

Except that Michelle says he didn't really go.  She says he stayed with a family friend in Little Rock who was remodeling a house.  Whatever.

Jim Bob also took Josh to an Arkansas State Trooper named Joseph Hutchens who supposedly gave the young man what was described as a "stern talk." Mr. Hutchens, as a law enforcement officer was required to report this to the child abuse hotline.  He did not because the Duggars told him that only one sister was the object of Josh's curiosity.  How do we know this?  

Because that's what Hutchens told the coincidentally named tabloid Touch Weekly in an interview from prison where he is pulling 56 years for possession of child pornography.  

Now I'm not sure that I would turn my kid over to the authorities under the circumstances.  Josh's behavior may well be considered more inappropriate than criminal.  I don't necessarily disagree with Jim Bob's thinking at the time.  And I don't necessarily disagree with having a cop deliver a lecture to the young man. Countless young people have been diverted from trouble by a good talking to from a police officer.  

But it strikes me as really curious that the only people that Jim Bob sought out for help in this matter turned out to have had troublesome allegations of sexual misconduct against them.  What are the odds of that?  Which leads me to my question.

How many sex offenders do you know and have ready access to, Gentle Reader?  

And the Duggars are held out as exemplars of Christian family values?  

I mean, really.  Think about it.

How many sex offenders do you know?

Greetings From Saint Louis

No MSF today as I am in St. Louis for the wedding of my excellent nephew Eli. 

Talk amongst yourselves. 

My Sunday Feeling On Saturday

Beloved: I am jumping the gun a bit as I have a busy Sunday and won't have time to fool with this after today. 

Yesterday a federal jury returned its verdict in the penalty phase of the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev for the Boston Marathon bombing.  And they showed him no mercy as they unanimously recommended that he be put to death.

At this point, a clarification, and not an entirely useless one, is in order.  Most accounts that I have read refer to the jury "sentencing" Mr. Tsarnaev to death. This is incorrect.  Only the judge pronounces the sentence.  The sentencing hearing will be held at a later date, which as far as I know has not been set as of this writing. Theoretically, the judge doesn't have to have to agree with the jury verdict, although surely he will in this case.  But the pronouncement of the sentence is within the strict province of the judge, not the jury.  Indeed, the jury has been discharged of its grim duty by the Court.  They are done. And undoubtedly glad of it.  

It is the same situation with a guilty plea.  I have seen a few in my day, mostly as I was waiting around to do business that I had with the Court.  Guilt or innocence ( or more accurately "not guilty) is a legal conclusion.  If the judge accepts the guilty plea (which he or she does not have to do) the Judge advises the Defendant that "I accept your plea of guilty and I hereby find you guilty." 

I have been asked if I am surprised.  I am and I am not.  I am mildly surprised in that Massachusetts has no death penalty at the state level and the folks there have a long history of opposition to it.  Indeed, most polls indicated that most Bostonians wanted Tsarnaev to catch life imprisonment instead of capital punishment.  

But I am not surprised in that, first of all, a person who sits on a jury in which the death penalty is sought has to be "death qualified." In other words, he or she must advise the Court whether or not they could issue a death penalty verdict in a capital case.  If they cannot, they are disqualified from serving. Which might strike you as stacking the deck against the Defendant if not completely perverse.  You are not alone.  But perverse though it may be, it has been held constitutional.  

After all, swabbing the condemned man's arm with alcohol prior to inserting the needle that will administer the poisons that will kill him is likewise perverse.  But it is part of the procedure.  (Theoretically, there is always the chance that a Stay may be issued before the button is pushed.  It is not as perverse as letting the condemned choose their last meal. But still.)

I am basically opposed to capitol punishment.  Especially as it is administered at the state level.  However, if anybody does it the right way, or as right as it can be done, it is Uncle.  In the first place the local US Attorney doesn't have the authority to seek the death penalty in a criminal case unless the Attorney General of the United States signs off on it.  This implies several levels of review entirely consistent with the gravity of the situation.  

Secondly, the average Defendant in a Federal death penalty case will have access to better quality legal assistance than his state counterpart will.  No knock on state Public Defenders but their case load is too high and they don't have adequate resources to investigate the case.  An indigent Defendant will have access to the Federal Public Defender or the Court has the authority to pay private counsel.  My late friend Hugh was one of three or four private lawyers appointed by the Court in a particularly grisly murder case that somehow violated Federal law.  Which is rare.  

Moving to the particulars of the instant case, the arc of the narrative of the defense was pretty low.  They won't let you plead guilty to capital murder.  And armed with the mountain of evidence of Tsarnaev's guilt, the Feds either didn't offer a plea deal or they rejected any such offer made to them.  

The Tsarnaev case reminded me of something one of my criminal lawyer friends said about the Jerry Sandusky case.  "Talk about nothing to work with," Peter said over lunch one day.  The analysis applies here.  The fact of the young man's guilt was inescapable under any set of facts.  So while the defense couldn't plead him out, they made the decision not to offer a defense.  Or much of one.  And this tactical decision made by able death penalty lawyers, one with which I do not disagree, put Tsarnaev halfway to the grave yard.

Talk about nothing to work with.  

All they were left with was hitting a home run in the penalty phase.  After all, they just needed to persuade one juror.  They failed.  And Dzhokhar Tsarnaev will get to face the music soon and very soon.

So as a lawyer, I get the ramifications of the decision not to aggressively defend the case.  You can't run the risk of pissing off the same jury from whom you will seek mercy.  As a prosecutor friend of mine says of similarly situated defendants, "He put himself in a real tough spot." And so to that extent I'm not surprised by what happened in the penalty phase of the trial. Tsarnaev put himself in a real tough spot.  His lawyers had nothing to work with,

And he did it by placing, along with his brother, improvised explosive devices in a crowded venue at Boston's most beloved sporting event.  They did it with the obvious intent of killing and maiming innocent bystanders and striking terror into the populace.  Later, they tried to shoot it out with the cops as they were closing in.

Here's one of my sayings.  I don't support the death penalty.  But some guys got it coming if anybody does.  That is what I consider to be a practical approach to the issue. 

Dzhokhar Tsarnev is one of those guys that's got it coming if anybody does.

My Mother's Day Feeling

I like Mother's Day.  Not as much as I like Father's Day when I can get in on the Father's Day bargains at clothing and sporting goods stores.  But still I like it.

I approve of motherhood in general without which I would not be typing this and you would not be reading it.  But Moms deserve a special day, if not a special place in Heaven for no other reason than they lugged us around inside their bellies for 9 months.  That is no small feat and is not to be taken lightly.  My own mother did it three more times after having me.  

Mercy.

It is my honor and privilege to be spending a great deal of time with a mom type nowadays.  She's got 2 kids.  The girl is fixing to head off for college.  The boy is heading into high school where he is preparing to play football.  I don't see much of the girl.  She is pretty much busy being the star in her own movie. I don't mean that in a bad way.  She has a boyfriend.  She has her friends.  She has a bent for social activism that I can kind of relate to.  And she is going off to college in St. Louis to enter the marketplace of ideas with a bunch of other really smart people.  Her focus is elsewhere.  She is outta here. I get it.

The boy is pretty uncomplicated and user-friendly.  He's quiet like his mother and he favors her physically as well.  Like her, he is an athlete, tall and strong. He is currently spending most weekends playing AAU basketball.  While I tend to view AAU ball as a continuing criminal enterprise as much as anything, he's a good ballplayer and I enjoy watching him play.  I also like being around him and I think the feeling is mutual if for no other reason than I usually have a hundred bucks on me at all times which comes in handy at the drive-thru.  The boy can put it away.  It's an awesome thing to behold.  

I guess M is like most Moms in that she is a worrier.  I suppose when you put kids on this Earth you tend to have a constant parade of horribles going down the Main Street of your consciousness at least until they get into Med school or otherwise get their feet on the ground.  Maybe "worry" is too strong a word. Our mutual friend K seems to prefer the word "fret." So we'll go with that.

Now as fretty as these two gals can get, they cannot hold a candle to the near constant free floating anxiety that my own sainted late mother could put out.  As I have said Donice Bowen saw a bear in every window.  24-7. For some reason this long repressed memory just bubbled up to the top as I consider this: I remember my brother Dave and I bought an FM converter to install in whatever piece of crap vehicle we were driving at the time.  

Our mother naturally opposed this.  Her reason?  Because we might be busy tuning into a station while crossing a railroad track and get crushed by an oncoming train.  Really. It wasn't sufficient for her to fret about the prospect of mere inattentive driving on our part while trying to tune into the Stones.  No. She immediately cast her mind into my brother and I perishing in a common disaster of operatic proportions as the natural and proximate consequence of our purchase of a 25 buck appliance from Radio Shack.

I am not making this up. This is the way my poor mother tended to regard life. It must have been a terrible way to live.

I don't know that any of the moms I am privileged to have in my orbit are quite at the level of-well-pathology as was my mother.  But they all do tend to worry. Whereas Dads on the other hand tend not to worry too much as a class.  The ones I know more or less expect something stupid to happen eventually as a matter of course. Dads tend to prefer to deal with problems on a transactional basis for lack of a better way of putting it.  

It is my hope that on this one day set aside to honor mothers everywhere that they can turn the volume down on the parade of horribles and just enjoy themselves.  

Except that you know you shouldn't have spent that much on the gift.  There are better uses for the money. 

You know she will say it.  

My Sunday Too Busy Feeling

Between a quick trip to Baton Rouge, AAU basketball which resulted in a trip to the ER with the 15 year old basketball player (he's fine) and a fundraiser for the Little Rock Zoo, there has been no time to share my gilded pensees with the public.

Talk among yourselves.  And if you keep getting decked out there on the court try not to land on the same elbow every time.  

My Sunday Feeling

My buddy Jim is retiring next week.  He will be pretty much the first one of my close friends to lay down the burdens of honest toil-if you refer to practicing law in that fashion-in exchange for a pension.  Rick claims to be semi-retired.  But as far as I can tell he is working as much as he ever did.  Phil has no plans along those lines and Richard-who has to be 72 if he is a day-will be carried out of the US Attorney's office here in a pine box.  And Pat's girls are still teenagers. He will be at it awhile longer. 

Jim and Gaynelle have put the house up for sale.  They are moving to another town to be closer to her people.  He plans to go to work in private practice.  

But the truth of the matter is that he has no idea what will happen until it happens.  He doesn't know that yet despite my warnings.  Of course, I didn't know it either despite the warnings from my financial advisor either.  

Retirement is a really good place to be.  But it is a real change.  You don't just quit doing something you have done everyday for 30 years without it affecting you.  I have likened it to a divorce that everybody agrees is the best thing for all concerned.  But a door closes on 30 years of your life and how you largely defined it.  And it's heavy.  

It took me awhile to get adjusted.  I had defined myself almost completely by my work.  And because I was able to retire so young there was nobody in my age group to hang with. I wasn't retired more than 4 months when I was offered a consulting type job with a local consumer protection agency.  I took it.  The relief I felt at putting on clothes and having somewhere to go 2-3 times a week was downright palpable.  

Maybe it will be different for Jim.  After all, he has Gaynelle.  He has a plan.  I had neither.  All I had was an offer from Uncle to leave early without penalty by a brief time certain.  There was no planning other than making sure that the numbers worked.

Quite frankly, I struggled at first.  And I struggled for at least a year. Maybe two.  I can't imagine that Jim won't feel some of that as well.  After all, he is doing three major life stressors at once-retirement, moving and starting a new job. Unless you are a sociopath-which he is not-one would have to view this as a stressful marker along life's path.  He's a smart guy.  He will figure it out. But nothing is ever like you think it is going to be going into it.  He's got to live it.

As for me, everything is pretty cool. I enjoy spending my mornings out on the deck or taking a walk.  The days which seemed so empty get filled up pretty quickly now.  I practice law a little bit. I play golf.  I work out. I write.  I play music. I read.  I substitute-teach, which I love. All is well.

And I'm with somebody now.  I stumbled into her when I wasn't looking.  I'm a pretty tough guy and I am comfortable both in my own skin and with being by myself.  

But things are better now.  It's good to have backup.  It's good to have a purpose.  It has been too long.  

Jim told me to bring a bottle of his favorite whisky for his retirement present. Which is more than he brought me as I recall. I can do that. I'm a better man than he is.

I resigned from my little consulting gig a couple of weeks ago.  I enjoyed my tenure there.  But it was time.  

And while I will probably work again, I no longer define myself solely along those lines.  I have a different purpose now.

Like I said, Jim will figure it out.  

As for me, all is well. 

All is well. This sure beats workin'.

My Sunday Taking A Powder Feeling

Too much stuff going on this week. As Tony Kornheiser says at the end of every broadcast of "Pardon the Interruption," on ESPN, "We'll try to do better next time."

Talk among yourselves.

My Sunday Feeling

I got the news early Thursday morning from Lafourche Parish that Chris had joined the Club.  His mother Jane McCulla Riviere had passed away.  He told me that her death was peaceful and that she was surrounded by her family.  She was 88 and her health had been declining.  

Comes to us all.  And we should all hope for a peaceful end.  

The Club of which I am referring to is the "Without Parents" club.  I officially joined in 2009 when my mother passed away during a 30 minute stretch when nobody was looking.  Nobody but the lady from Hospice, that is.  We were told that they will do that sometimes.  Bob, who was pulling the night shift, had just gone home.  I was crossing the Faulkner County line around 5:30 AM when I got the call.

They will do that sometimes. 

I may be wrong, but as far as I know, our friend Don is the only one of our group that still has both parents.  I saw them a couple of summers ago when I traveled to Birmingham to attend my first and, so far, only baby shower.  Big Don and Virginia are doing pretty good.  Still live in the home and are independent.  Big Don delighted in referring to me as "that old retiree."

It did seem sort of odd to both of us at that.

My own father, of course, passed away when I was a senior at Hendrix.  At this stage of the game it is almost as if he had never existed.  After all, he's been under a white stone at the Veteran's cemetery for 38 years now by my counting.  That's a long time to be away.  

I don't know if this has happened with Chris yet.  But I was asked by more than one person if i felt like an orphan when Mother passed.  That struck me as odd. If somebody asks him, I'm sure he will find it to be equally so.  After all, orphans are children, and typically are wards of either the state or a member of the extended family. I was in my fifties when Mother died.  I was a full-grown man (to use the country expression) practicing law, fending for myself in a house I own and otherwise getting on as best as I could.  Not much different than now.  

I didn't much even get the notion that I had been orphaned in the psychic sense but I kinda do.  There is this an awareness of the magnitude of the situation on a certain primal level.  It doesn't last for very long-at least it didn't with me.  But when your parents no long exist, it is a sign that time, like a rolling stream, bears all who breathe away. 

That's original with me by the way.

Perhaps I would have felt this more keenly if I hadn't been without one of my parents for such a long time.  My friend Becky's dad up and died two weeks after they buried her mom.  I see from her post on Facebook that their loss still resonates with her on occasion.  That has got to be hard to shake free from your mind.  Anyway, while I imagine, as I say, that Chris might find such a question to be odd, still, he is not made of wood.  And when your remaining parent passes, it is a marker.  And it is heavy.

When I sat up with Mother during her deathbed coma, Chris would call from time to time to check on me and keep me company. Mostly he would tell me jokes about the hapless Cajun known as Boudreaux and his wife, girlfriend, foil (whatever the story requires) Miss Marie.  Chris has been telling me these stupid Boudreaux jokes since our law school days.  He is a bottomless repository of these stories, few of which may be told in mixed company.  A couple of them he has told are unspeakable. 

But here is a clean Boudreaux joke.

Boudreaux, him, was crossing the state highway to get to the mailbox to see if the welfare check from the State of Louisiana had come when-summamabitch- he get hit by a truck driven by Miss Marie, non?  Miss Marie got on that cellphone and called "neuf un un." Then she grabbed a blanket out of the back of the truck and ran over to Boudreaux who was laying in the road.  She put the blanket under Boudreaux's head.

"Boudreaux," Miss Marie say as she knelt down beside that boy, "Are you comfortable?"

"I make a good living, mah Boo," Boudreaux say back to Miss Marie. 

Chris loves these jokes.  And he knew that he could make me laugh at him in spite of myself.  That's what friends do.

Death never comes at a convenient time.  I am usually pretty flexible.  But I just can't make it to Thibodaux for the funeral.  Melissa thought it would be nice if I sent flowers to the house and so I did.  Women are great at stuff like this. I made a memorial gift to a charity the family suggested.  And I said a prayer of thanksgiving both for Mrs. Riviere's life and for the repose of her soul.

Hopefully I can get down there in the next month after things have settled.  We will probably sit on his veranda with a couple of glasses of something amber. His sister lives next door.  If she comes out in the yard he will call out to her "Come see!  It's Paul!"

North of I-10 they say "come here." Cajuns say "come see." Which I catch myself saying occasionally. I can think of no more pleasant way to get someone's attention.  

And while out there we will raise a toast to Jane and Donice.  And I will ruefully welcome Chris to the Club.  

That's what friends do.

My Easter Feeling

They had need of me over to Conway this morning.  

15 year old J couldn't get his tie done right.  M asked me to fix it.

"I can't tie a tie," she said.  

He had done a pretty good job.  He just had it kinda twisted up.  I pulled off my jacket, took the tie from him, tied it around my neck, then helped him get it over his head and under the collar.

Cinching it up his neck, forehead to forehead, I noticed that J is slightly taller than me now.  He wasn't on Super Bowl Sunday when we put our backs to each other.  Now he is. No wonder that boy eats like he is on Death Row.  He's burning it up.  

"Check the back of the collar, please," M sing-songs from the kitchen.

I checked the back of the collar.  Pulled it down.  Good to go.

"That's a button down collar," I said. "That means...."

" Oh yeah," he said as he tried to find the buttons.  J has a lot of his Mom in him.  Her grey-blue eyes burned out of her son's head as he fumbled to button the goddamn buttons.  

I told him not to worry about it.  After all, Carrie back at the office used to fix my collar and straighten out my tie all the time before I would head out the door.  Sometimes you got to have somebody watching your back even with the nickel and dime stuff.  Sometimes it's all nickel and dime stuff.

I have written many times that I have no use for Christmas and that while I don't know what all I believe anymore I do believe in the concept of Easter.  I believe that victory remains in love.  I believe in second and third chances.

M prepared a wonderful lunch for after church.  After we had gathered around the table she asked if I wanted to bless the food. But I was afraid of a lightning strike.  Besides it's her house and she is armed with an M.Div. and I am not. So I demurred. 

She gave thanks for the food for the nourishment of our bodies.  She gave thanks for our health.  She thanked God for the gift of Easter and of His Son Jesus.  And she gave thanks for "friends, family, love and new beginnings."

I hope it is not hubris to think that I might be granted a small portion of the "love and new beginnings" part of the blessing.  

But all I believe in any more is Easter.  

And I am so happy to share even a fleck of this "new beginning."

Amen.  

Happy Easter.  

My Sunday Feeling

"When he came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him;and behold, a leper came up to him and knelt before him saying, 'Lord if you will, you can make me clean.' And he stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, I will; be clean.' And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said to him, 'See that you say nothing to any one but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a proof to the people.' "
                                                                    Matthew 8, verses 1-4 (RSV)

You can't make this stuff up.  Faith healer Benny Hinn was admitted to a hospital in California where he was treated for shortness of breath cause by atrial fibrillation.  According to the official statement issued by Benny Hinn Ministries, this is a condition from which he has "experienced intermittently for over 20 years."

It may be safely said that I have a deep and abiding skepticism when it comes to televangelists.  That skepticism goes into the red zone when it comes to faith healers such as Benny Hinn.  Especially when they resort to conventional medicine for their own care despite making an extravagant living allegedly casting out all manner of disease entities from the gullible and the desperate. 

When I was younger and had more time on my hands, I used to watch Hinn and Oral Roberts in action.  And once, stuck in a hotel room outside Tulsa while a torrential thunderstorm railed outside my window, I saw Oral's son Richard implore a caller to the show to touch his hand to the TV screen in order that afflicted victim might be delivered from his sinus infection.  

As far as I can tell, although this is not a scientific conclusion, if I may use such a phrase given the subject matter of today's post, faith healers tend to specialize in casting out discrete disease entities such as cancers, heart disease, paralysis and such. I don't think that dropping into a Benny Hinn healing service with a severed artery or a gunshot wound would be the smart play.

Which brings me back to Hinn condescending to earthly medical care for what appears to be a chronic medical condition.  What's Pastor Benny doing with a chronic medical problem?  Atrial fib is just the kinda invisible medical problem that is right in his wheelhouse.  You would think that he could just cure himself on the house.  Which leads me to another question?  Does Pastor Benny have medical insurance?  If so why?

OK.  Am I making too much of this?  Or at the very least having way too much fun?  Maybe so.  Maybe no.  But then again my rather paltry net worth is not dependent upon convincing the weak minded to part with their money.  And make no mistake about it.  Showbiz preaching and healing have been really good to Pastor Hinn whose net worth is said to be around 42 million bucks.

I'm no Biblical scholar but I know a thing or two.  The passage of Scripture cited above where Jesus heals the leper speaks to me in the context of fee-for-services faith healing charlatans like Benny Hinn for the following reason. According to the law of Moses, lepers were impure and could only be cleansed by the temple pursuant to an elaborate and costly ritual.

Here, Jesus not only heals the poor man, he also tells him to show himself to the Priest, to show the religious authorities that Jesus has bypassed the system and he did so for free.  A more blatant attack on the legitimacy of the Temple and the Priesthood cannot be imagined.  

Indeed, nowhere in the Bible is Jesus depicted as requiring payment or a "love offering" before he performed any of the miracles attributed to Him.

But that was then.  This is now.  Jesus's base of operations was largely confined to the sticks of Galilee.  Until he went to Jerusalem He was strictly local. He didn't have to fool with satellite, shortwave and cable outlets.  He didn't have to manage real estate.  Jesus may have been the Messiah but he wasn't a celebrity.  The latter can't really be done on the cheap. 

So get well soon Pastor Benny.  

Time is money.  Money is time.  

And be sure to take your beta-blockers. 

Sick Leave

I have been struck down by a sinus infection and pleurisy which is having an adverse impact on my otherwise sunny disposition and steel trap mental acuity.

I'm out.

AWOL

Busy weekend and the sun is shining.

I'm outta here.

Talk among yourselves.