It's going on nearly four months since I quit. It was about the same time I gave up the cigarettes and shortly after the last presidential election.
I stopped watching the news.
The reason I stopped was twofold. One, there is rarely anything on the news that isn't negative or down right gory and two, I was tired of being lied to.
Lied to? I thought so. I had my suspicions a long time ago, but the event that made for my decision to quit, was the day after the election. I had watched the news the night of the election, wondering what the outcome would be. It was getting late when the smiling, from ear to ear, anchor persons looked into the camera and told me, to my face, that Clinton had taken Florida. Not being up to date on just how the electoral college votes apply, I figured since they were all happy, Florida must be one of the big ones to win. I sighed and went to bed, wondering what the future held.
I woke early the next morning and before I got out of bed, I sent a text to my Texas friends inquiring who the winner was. I knew they would have watched the results until the very end. "Trump" was the replying text. I thought they were fooling me. With a little investigation, I discovered President Trump had taken the entire 29 electoral votes in Florida.
The next time I tuned in to see what was going on, all the smiling faces were gone and folks were mad as hell. As far as I can tell, they still are and have been taking to the streets in all forms of protests and odd attire.
If I could ask those who are so bent out of shape a few questions, it would be these....... Why are you so mad about him winning? Why is your anger directed at him? Why aren't you mad at the agencies who told you he would not win? Where is your anger at the news for telling you that the things you have applauded as progress, were, in actuality, only progress for a very minuscule percentage of the population. Where were you getting all of your information?Was 50% of it from watching the news? 60%? 90%? Did they tell you the absolute truth, or did they tell you what they wanted you to hear? Or, what you wanted to hear? If they were telling you one thing and something completely different was really going on, why is that?
My answer would be, because most of the prime time news agencies are corporate owned, we are told what they want us to know and nothing more. We are swept up into a frenzy, while other things, far more important things, go on in the background. I wonder, if the grid were to go down and things got real ugly, real fast, who would be the first to suffer from it? It seems to me, the ones standing in the streets would be the easiest to find. They think they are protesting for a cause, but whose bidding are they really doing? Believe it or not, back in the late 1950's to the early 60's there was a program developed by J. Edgar Hoover called Cointelpro. It's main purpose was to send undercover F.B.I. agents into groups that were trying to bring about positive social changes. These agents would then radicalize the members and push them to violence. When this occurred, the groups' mission was totally lost and they were made to look like a bunch of thugs, intent on destroying the American way........and it worked. Does any of that sound familiar with what is going on today?
It really does not matter who sits in the White House, although, Clinton would have been a much more manageable puppet, because there is a higher force in control. If you do not believe that, I will close with three quotes and you are free (for now) to come to your own conclusion.
"The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of." -Edward Bernays ("the father of public relations") Propaganda, 1928
"It is ironic that the U.S. would begin a devastating war, allegedly in search of weapons of mass destruction, when the most worrisome developments in this field are occurring in your own backyard. It is ironic that the U.S. should be fighting monstrously expensive wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, allegedly to bring democracy to those countries, when it itself can no longer claim to be called a democracy, when trillions, and I mean thousands of billions of dollars have been spent on projects about which both the Congress and the Commander in Chief have been kept deliberately in the dark." Former Minister of National Defense, Canada, Paul Hellyer
"Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of somebody, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it." From the book, The New Freedom, Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States.
I was told recently, that I will not live to see the disclosure of this kind of information. That made me rather sad, because I would love nothing better than to see this information come into the light of day, in my lifetime. But, I will gather my grandchildren around the campfire and tell them the tales......tales that will one day, be their truth.
(All quotes taken from an article titled, "Who Sits Above Trump?" collective-evolution.com February 9, 2017.)
Any two people who are contemplating spending the rest of their lives together need to understand something very important. It is a really good idea to have at least one thing both parties find exceedingly interesting. My husband and I have many interests that we do not share but when it comes to tools, we are a match made in heaven. Time can literally come to a standstill when we enter the tool department of any store that has such offerings. Our favorite area of the tool section would be where the power tools are kept, especially those that are battery powered. There are few things finer than a screwdriver with a motor.
It is also a good idea to have the right tool for whatever job is at hand. Many of my steak knives can attest to this truth, as their tips show the results of being used as a pry bar or screwdriver which was obviously not their intended purpose.
Recently, I was wrestling an acorn squash in the kitchen. I had learned a valuable lesson about squash in the last few weeks of trying new foods. Winter squash, acorn, spaghetti and butternut have an outer skin that is hard as a rock. My first attempt at halving a spaghetti squash was nearly met with the loss of one of my limbs. As I pondered over the best way to cut the acorn squash, I had a brilliant idea. Digging around in the cabinet, I found some super strong packing tape. I located my biggest cutting board and an extra long fork. Placing the squash in the middle of the cutting board, I stuck the fork in the lower half of the squash, with the fork tines pointing downward. I then taped the handle of the fork to the counter top. I had to admit, I was quite pleased with how well the squash was anchored to the cutting board. At this time I called my husband and asked him to bring a certain tool in with him when he arrived home. It was not long after that he came in the door with the beloved reciprocating saw.....battery powered and sporting a brand new clean blade. He walked over and took one look at my setup and laughed. "I think it will work!", I assured him and he handed me the saw. Giving one last double check to make sure the squash was securely on the cutting board, I pulled the trigger on the saw, lined it up with the top center of the squash and cut through it like it was a warm stick of butter. I had just learned a new life hack.
According to the Urban Dictionary, life hack means; "a tool or technique that makes some aspect of one's life easier or more efficient". Anyone older than fifty should possibly read the Urban Dictionary from time to time, just so we can communicate with any one under the age of fifty.....seriously.....the word 'cheddar' means money. Anyway, deciding to try a red wine, I asked several people for suggestions of one not too sweet and definitely not dry. I had several responses and as I walked through the shelves of wine bottles at the local grocery store, I found two that had been on the list. Later that evening as I was tearing off the thin foil on the top of the bottle, I realized there was not a corkscrew to be found in any drawer. My husband and I decided to look on YouTube for a life hack to solve this problem. There were several unique ways of opening a wine bottle without a corkscrew and we chose the 'key' method. The video showed putting a key into the cork, at an angle. Then, applying pressure to the key from the side, slowly begin to turn the cork and watch it come right up out of the bottle. So simple and much easier than hitting the bottom of the bottle with a shoe. My husband chose one of the keys to his truck, the one that opens the door, because it had padding on the end and would be easier to push than the bare metal of an un-padded key. We watched, with great delight, as the cork began to move and slowly start up out of the bottle. It was about this time that the top of the door key, to his truck, snapped off right at the top of the cork. Without going into what words were being tossed around at that time, we retrieved another key, that neither of us were sure what it went to, and tried again. This time the cork began to descend down the neck of the bottle and just as we realized the direction it had taken, the second key snapped off at the cork.
Shortly after this, we put the bottle of wine in the sink, grabbed a long handled wooden spoon and beat the cork down into the bottle. The wine ended up being a bit too dry for my taste.
Mother always liked Red Rose. It comes in two sizes, big and bigger and has a screw on cap. Works for me.
"Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save." Will Rogers
Stepping into the sixth decade of my time did not seem like such a big deal. It was just another day on the calendar, that we all use to measure the passage of what we call time. I would like very much to think things really have not changed over the years. For some reason, I always tell anyone younger than myself they are about to catch up with me.
I never really gave a lot of thought to getting old and I suppose that is because I have never felt old. But, there is always some young whippersnapper (no old term there) to point out the fact that as far as they are concerned, I'm old.
I recalled a conversation I had once with my sister, Lela. This was probably twenty or so years ago and I told her I did not feel old. In all actuality, I still felt like I did when I was a teenager. Lela looked at me and said, "You don't really feel old, but there comes a time when the body does not agree with that."
It seems that the "thing" that is really us, does not change much through out our time here on planet Earth. But, it seems the vehicle we bought when we got here can only be tuned up so many times. As bad as I hate to admit it, I'm beginning to understand this nasty twist of fate. For instance, walking through the door with the big 6 Zero on it, I found all the weight I had lost during the first 59 years waiting on me. It was packed in two suitcases with my name on it and I guess I thought it was a special gift so I picked them up and carried on about my day.
Then there are those things that happen, quite by random selection, that make no sense whatsoever. The other day, while I was going through the morning routine of getting ready for the rest of the day, a routine I have done pretty much all my life, an odd thing happened. I was painstakingly applying toothpaste to the bristles on my brush and somewhere in the back of my mind a thought wandered through about how hard it was to get the toothpaste to come out of the tube. That did not make any sense because I had just purchased a new tube of toothpaste. Satisfied that it was on the toothbrush as best it could be, I placed the tube back into the medicine cabinet. That's when I noticed that I did not painstakingly put toothpaste on my brush, but I most certainly had put my hair styling product on it. I looked at it for the longest time, thinking perhaps if I stared at it long enough, it would turn into toothpaste. Since that did not happen, I washed the toothbrush and watched as the hair product, that I was nearly out of, swirled down the drain.
Just a day, or so ago, Runtly, the ever so entertaining Jack Russell Terrier needed to go outdoors. Since he has gotten to know the territory, I decided to use his training collar and let him have a bit more freedom than usual. We trotted out the door, down two flights of stairs and made our way out to the parking lot to stop and visit with my husband, who was cleaning his truck. Runtly was being a very good dog about staying close and I had not needed to use the remote, for his collar, to give him a warning tone if he wandered too far away from us. It was a good thing Runtly did not know what I was about to find out. I turned to talk to my husband again and he had the biggest grin on his face when he said to me, "Ummm.......you've got the remote control for the TV in your
hand." We laughed like idiots and I made little beeping noises as Runtly and I raced back to the apartment.
Sigh, I may go down kicking and screaming, but I'm not giving up yet.
We are all born into this world with one common denominator, freewill. We are free to choose how we wish to live our lives. We have a set of common laws to guide us. Not the laws, too numerous to mention, made by people or government officials, but a set of common sense laws. They are as follows and these are taken directly from a book titled, Meet Your Strawman:
1. You must not injure or kill anyone.
2. You must not steal or damage things owned by somebody else.
3. You must be honest in your dealings and not swindle anyone.
Three simple, common sense laws that, if were followed, would change the entire world.
When we, as the human race, decide something is wrong, we are placing or casting judgement on whatever that particular "something" is. Many of these wrongs are taught to us, by our parents or the circle of people we spend the most time with. Mother always taught me that to take food or drink into a place of business was wrong. When I asked why, she said it was rude. Since I heard that more than once, I came to believe that it was an absolute truth.
While shopping in the big box store that carries everything from undergarments to fishing hooks, I observed a young woman pushing her cart down the aisle and noticed she was eating something. We were in the personal care section of the store and I was in search of hand lotion. I walked up and down every aisle in this section, twice, and there was no lotion to be found. The next time I passed her, I took a closer look. Yes, she was eating and had obviously just gone through the closest drive-thru and grabbed lunch. The training I had received from my youth kicked into gear and I immediately thought, "how rude", as I swung the cart left, in search of the illusive hand lotion.
Finding the lotion next to the Valentine's Day display, where I'm sure everyone keeps their hand lotion, I had a thought come over me. Did the young woman break any of the common laws? She obviously had not injured or killed anyone while wielding a french fry. She had not damaged anything other than the grease and fat she was putting in her body, but that was her choice and since most drive-thru eateries have a "pay first" window, she most likely had paid for her meal.
I began to turn around my years of indoctrination and think of other reasons why she thought it was a good idea to eat while shopping. Maybe she knew what would happen if she shopped on an empty stomach. Maybe she had numerous errands to run and no time to stop and enjoy her meal. Perhaps her reason was simple, maybe she was just hungry.
This is a simple example and I am not against having manners and common courtesy, although that is a choice I choose to make for myself. I am not saying Mother was wrong in all that she taught, I'm pretty sure she was taught the same thing. The point I am trying to make is, if we would weigh the things we think are wrong against the common laws, there would be lots of things we could stop casting judgement on. We could stop pointing fingers, whispering behind others' backs, rolling our eyes....we could stop judging others by our own standards.
The way we judge, is the same measure as the way we will be judged. Think on that for awhile. Make a list of the things you believe are wrong and then put them on the scale of the three common laws. Figuring out that we have been wrong ourselves is a liberating experience. Without wasting our precious time judging others, we have so much more time to enjoy our lives and to practice our freewill.
