It is a Sunday afternoon. It has rained too much for me to plant. I was going to go fishing or go visit Muddyvalley but then I ended up calling an old friend I had not talked to in a long time.

I put a steak on the BBQ and connected all the stereos in the house together.

I seem to have lost my Tom T Hall collection and Maria McKee and Lone Justice. I am also infested with fruit flies and I don't know why. 

I did all the dishes and took out the compost.

I'm listening to Don Williams and am kind of struck by the lyrics.

I find it disturbing to see history written in terms of the progressive assholes who have ruined our country with their sophomoric view of life. Their total inability to understand that a real person (and perhaps society in general) is made up of contradictions and it is the conflict between those contradictions that gives you a depth of understanding, is very frustrating. I work against it one workstudy student at a time.

"Soooo... I'm a conservative but yet you like me, how do you rationalize that one?" says I.

"but you are different, not what I expected," says they.

"I'll let you run the lawnmower all day long if you wear a Trump hat," says I...

"Nooooooooo," wails they.

For another perspective:

I called an old friend who I have have neglected and we talked about the old days.

I was struck by two things. First the reality that stories are written by the hero. Second, I went sideways, not a hero or an anti-hero.

When I used to do ag shows and sell moisture testers I like to hear from Organic growers who had failed. You don't hear about failure stories you only hear about success.

My friend's uncle was a tail gunner on a B17. He disappeared over Europe and no one knows what happened to him so you don't hear the story. He may have bailed out and survived most of the war in a prison camp but because he didn't make it through the whole war and write a book we don't know.

Ann Frank is a notable exception because her story was found. (or made up, take your pleasure)

I suggest you listen to the Don Willaims song. It is important as song writer remembers his upbringing but he has moved outside of it. He learned to talk like the guy on the 6:00 news. He remembers being told about honor with a Stonewall Jackson picture on the wall but he is not like his friend who self destructed. He escaped to write a song about it and to benefit from it. He is a better person because he rationalized his upbringing with his reality into a way that made him a better person.

I hope more than anything else in the whole wide world that my daughter can do that...
Forget Muddyvalley... I'm going fishing...