Stepping out of character...

A wife with a car and a problem, so I had to dodge and weave and change stride, and take time off to take care of it. So the Library was closed Thursday afternoon, those normal Thursday patrons are going to believe that ever since Thanksgiving the POWERS that BE (ever referred to as 'they') have it in for them. I got to watch the coverage of the splash landing in the Hudson, and think about how cold it was there. I paid the tab, drove the vehicle around, testing it and listening to satellite radio - the Blues show - my kind of music. Stopped at the Tacoma Public Library to see what was new on their shelves and then onward to the home. Normal food for dinner, evening at home with Heinlein and too much coffee. Wake and prepare for today as my wife backs the car out of the garage I hear the Blues, not her kind of music. So, taking my cup of fresh morning coffee, I walk down the drive with her, stop her as she turns, wait until she rolls down the window and reach in and change back to her Korean station. She says 'thanks, you really love me' and I tell her she doesn't know how much. She responds with 'get some shoes on!' Yeah, marriage is like that.

Okay, let's wrap this year up and get to bed...

Don't think that will happen too soon, but soon enough. My wife is out praying the old year away, thankful for many blessings and asking for those that need a few more special ones. I got the email, my sister is a grandmother again - another boy, Garrett Michael, 8 pounds 8 oz, 20 1/2 inches long. I could find remembering his birthday easier than I do his two brothers. That makes my sister and brother-in-law too grandparent-like for hanging around with, but they are both better people than I and I could love them, but I am a guy and you know that wouldn't work...

I worked today, some great work with the crew, some great response to my supervisors that try to keep me from failing to perform, sigh, they have so much to worry about. I have closed last (2008) years statistics down and am prepared to record the circulation and important stuff we will be doing in 2009, provided the folks with the big bucks and responsibility have enough money to keep a prison library open. The possibility of budget shortfalls make the rumors fly that many of the inmates will be getting out earlier - only a rumor. The slick inmate that tried to walk out of the prison and onto a ferry boat a couple nights ago, is still the subject of conversation. Seems someone hadn't locked a door, and he got out of the fenced area through two total control areas without an ID badge, on the dock waiting for the ferry in a crowd of visitors his state issued shoes called undo attention to himself - and he was busted. I have always been aware of the difference between the truth and the published account - having been rescued from a burning home that I walked out alone from... still it was an embarrassing moment for Department of Corrections. An extra five years for trying is normal.

I have to make another pot of coffee, the Blues are blasting through the home, and I am alone - where are all those lovely lonely women that I read about -- actually I am reading Breakout and you might understand where part of my problem with military dreams comes from, but this book makes the last couple of snow days into big nothing... very big nothing. I don't have trouble with military dreams, stopped hitting my wife in the middle seventies as I got farther from Vietnam - in my sleep, folks.

Well, it will be a great year next, for me and for thee. More motorcycling (safely), more shooting well, and helping others get over being afraid of the gun and the gunny (not that Gunny ever cared about being loved - fear worked well when in a hurry). Fresh coffee and Blues without commercial interruption, thinking good stuff. You know what Country music is? Blues with a twang. You know what Gospel is? Blues with the certainty of Divine intervention. You know what Heavy Metal is? music that didn't get me here... ah, well, probably can't hear its frequency. Sixty-one going on forget-about-it. Do have a great year, God loves ya, and the world is beautiful when viewed properly... look at the Universe outside geopolitical boundaries - it is awesome.

How to Destroy a Library

Libraries have always been part of my life, I find them full of things I want to know about, think upon and stories to enjoy . They insure that I am continually learning, long after departing the classroom, and they have always supported the quest for knowledge about fighting, loving and foolishness unique to my life. Since I am not the only patron to use the library I would say that for my tax dollars the public library achieves more than the public school system in education, far beyond the K through 12 range. Imagine Lincoln, Douglass, Jefferson and others that valued the printed words with the library systems of our last one hundred years.

Ignorance is destroying our libraries, the people that think they can steal the whole book, CD or tape don't understand the worth as part of a shared collection. I have been weeding the collection at McNeil Island's library of all the books that are missing pictures, pages and sometimes whole chapters. To the one individual that took something away from us all - a curse on your efforts for evil - not that I am a cursor. I don't need to be - in your little world things are stolen from you, you live in fear of being found out. You know the reason you want those pictures of scantily clad elves is because you are attracted to desires for the bodies of children - that is an ugly thing and most of the other inmates will do bloody things to you if they find out. No, you don't need to be cursed for your life is dark, the hidden pictures of beautiful cars, women and motorcycles that you think give you power are just waiting for the corrections officers to find or for you to toss out when the fear finds you again. I know that you won't stop messing up your library, stealing from it and ruining it - not until you grow up and learn to value things you haven't had to pay for, that don't cost you anything directly, until you grow up and learn to share, until you get really old and accept that others will get better people around them in life, and that you will die alone because you never became a better person. You will be back to the library that you have profaned and marred, and those wounds you left don't heal - there isn't enough money for repairing the Vandals' destruction.

Another type of ignorance that destroys libraries, is budget cutting. So having worked in libraries for over fifteen years, the fears of the staff always focus a bit on the budget cycle. There are only so many dollars, and one can hire five people at thirty thousand a year and only one at one hundred and fifty thousand a year. Which is fine if the the big payroll provides more donations and bequests and improvements in how the library provides services and relevance to the community needs. Having been one of the five on budget cuts while there are always well paid leadership and management - leading and managing less every time the budget is cut - I have my opinion. Seems that I have voiced my opinion and shocked some of that leadership a bit before - but I blame that on not being well led and stress relief. Budget is exactly like diet - a word that exists to describe a process and quickly becomes associated with an uncomfortable process that hurts something in one's good life, but if you had always known and observed the process - and lived in moderation - the pain would never be there. But when one has over-reached in spending, the cut back comes and the staff is reduced, the hours shortened, the service slinks off into only a memory and an old fairy tale, until that final cut must be made - that closes the door to the library. Those doors don't ever seem to re-open, and another light in the lives of the library patrons old, new and future is extinguished.

Working a prison library, where there aren't too many lights for the most terrible population of prisoners, 1200 inmates with open time for only six hundred and sixty to have one hour a week, every week that the one Library Keeper is around to open the door five days. There are too many potential patrons that can't improve their minds, lives and futures. They will be coming one day to live with you - to become part of your community. Will they be better neighbors? Did they get a chance to learn what they hadn't before being imprisoned about working for a better life, making good choices and basic good manners? Or are you going to get the fools that still steal from library books, that don't share, that don't care and that only know how to scare?

Almost November and Washington Winter...

Have been a lot of dry days, but the Sun is slinking off to the South and taking the migrating birds with it. I leave in the darkness and return just before the Sun sinks in the Southwest, somewhere over Hawaii. As it has gotten colder the temptation to drive to work in the Caravan looms, but then I would have to scrape the frost off of the windshield and driving doesn't make me smile and I have troubling zooming around corners in a lean with the engine winding up higher. It just doesn't work in the front wheel drive - four wheels on the ground lumbering beast.

Still, the temptation is there, I didn't put my motorcycle boots on this morning, I thought I was late by ten minutes of the normal starting time, and I was - but I can wheel the motorcycle out of the garage, start it, pack my lunch in the back pack and grab helmet, kiss the wife good-bye and hit the garage door switch (don't ask why I don't carry a remote with me - I am traveling light). Before I had checked for frost on the van's windshield I was on the motorcycle and rolling down the driveway to another adventure. A few days back the fog was thick enough to cut and stack off to the side, the condensation on the face mask didn't help visibility either, crack that face shield and get some cold air on it and me. It is cold, leather jacket, good gauntlets, scarf and maybe ski mask - if the road is dry I am going on the motorcycle. Days in the gray fog are the ones where I wish I had that brighter or darker color for the bike, but that passes.

As I ride I feel the road and remember the first tentative times turning at some corners, I am glad that they have finished the short stretch has been sitting grooved waiting on the finishing asphalt layer, I don't like grooves in my direction of travel - constant riding on edges - and grooves perpendicular are just little bothering bumps-s-s-ss... But enough dry days and the promise of an election mean the road crew puts down that solid smooth surface to lean deep into and power on and around upon... Nicely done, thank you all very much, another place to play. I have been riding aggressively, only slowing down for future stop lights when I have to, if I see it red it should be green by the time I get there - I do look that far ahead. If I have to slow then I really slow, scoring extra points for not having to full stop and place a foot on the ground (only I keep score, but I watch the other riders - many count the same points for the same slow).

I pull into the parking lot, find my space and shut down until later. I put a ball cap on and start the walk to the dock, so I am late, still I must stop and buy the three Lotto tickets (only fools, those with faith in more than themselves and the ones certain the government hates them but wants their money buying Lotto tickets - think I fit all three of those). Then I swing into the stride and get down to the dock, the canopy of maple and oaks have changed color and it is getting light enough to enjoy the sunrise on the leaves as I wade through them, rustling them dryly. Washington will be the Evergreen State, but the flaming reds, orange and burnt yellow and browns make a magic memory of the glory of Summer with the Sunshine and Blue skies, catch it before the real grim gray grips in gloomily.

Just me and the Blues, babe, what's cookin' ?

Stopped on the way home to pick up a pistol and two hundred rounds of ammunition for the weekend familiarization. I also picked up a desire for that Springfield M1A Scout Squad on the wall rack behind the counter, too polite to ask to hold it. Bank those embers of desire before they flame up and burn my good sense away. I also picked up Dave Workman's Washington State Gun Rights and Responsibilities, reading is good for building knowledge and raising questions. So after dinner and listening listlessly to the news a bit (wanted to know about the weather tomorrow) I spend some time reading the manual that came with the fine American firearm; all the safety, all the mechanics, all the good advice and all the disclaiming of my foolishness with their fine product, and the warranty information. The ammunition is also made in America, George the Third in his goodness has restored my confidence, dignity and sense of responsibility. Oh, I hadn't lost those things before the benevolence of the government giving a little back, had I? Nope.

I also put on my spandex NRA 5.11 holster shirt from NRA, yes they embroidered their initials on "MY" shirt, ugh, not cool and it is made in Guatemala. But the shirt is great, makes me look like a superhero, will have to get a Superman or Batman T to go over it, and find some muscles and lose some spare tires, but I will be so cool. And the pistol fits either pocket, tight to the body and it is comfortable wearing it, all day and under a shirt or jacket a very nice option for concealed carry. I also check out the Kangaroo Holster and have one for the right and the left carry positions, very comfortable. I keep thinking I want to get to the position of forgetting that I have the pistol, unless I need it. Very much the way I look at my knives, I put them on when I dress and then forget about them until I need them. Range is coming up Saturday, if I get the mowing done Friday evening, at least the front yard.

Things that make me sad: the disarming of the 82nd Airborne Division for their Division Review on Pike's Field during All American Week. The Praetorian Guard is in charge, or as we know it THE SECRET SERVICE are intent on being the only armed force close to the President that could complete a coup d'etat. They read history, and hope you haven't. But then they aren't sent overseas unless with the politicians they protect or trying to find where all those bogus bills are coming from now. The 82nd Abn Div remains eighteen hours to wheels up to anywhere in the world (courtesy of the US Air Force). I trust the 82nd, always and All the Way!

The other thing that makes me sad is the number of ways I can become a felon by carrying a weapon that the Government feels they need to infringe upon my rights, sigh, for the children I am sure. They don't get it do they? or is it just me - I don't get it? If I had the time left I would seriously think about working to get rid of those laws that had to do with no crime except that we passed this rule and you broke it. Forty-two people carrying weapons, one or two commit a crime (assault with a weapon) and the forty others have broken a rule (carrying in a public library in Ohio?) but committed no crime (hurting people or property). I guess I will have to start speaking up more, making me a felon is not the purpose of government. And I thought I was such a quiet nice guy, anyway, Earl's rules for carrying guns still applies: too heavy to do often and I am never anxious for an opportunity to shoot someone trying to kill me - been there and done that, except in video games it is highly over rated - except for the survivin' another day, which has it's own sweetness. Love life, and get a love life.

Holiday Blues in Limbo...

There is a Ceramic Green Christmas Tree in the Library, it is quiet, one of the only programs open, since much of the staff has departed for the holiday celebration nearer to home. I have been in similar places, far from home and warm Season's Greetings. In the forgotten areas of warfare, in the prisons, on exercises in the deserts and the snows or lush jungles, in a bunker or a guard tower - the Limbo of waiting for the magic moment to pass by, that piece of time when parents once loved you, grandmothers fussed over you and fed you the best cookies, when your siblings and cousins gathered to test the sleds on the snows and throw snow balls and make snowmen, that magic isn't here but it is inside everyone's tormented soul as we wait for the time it should have rung in JOY! to pass. We go on living and waiting for the return to normal, knowing that our family can't call, email, or even visit where we wait... for the minutes stretch and the sleep doesn't come and there is no peace in Limbo. We hope you have it, Peace on Earth, where we came from and hope to return one day.