Short Story: The Visitor

Mama laid a fancy, white table cloth out on the dining room table.  I ain’t never seed such a thing before, and I wanted to touch it, to see if it felt as soft as it looked.  But Mama yelled stop, said she didn’t want no one to touch it and get it dirty.  So I just stared a hole in it as Mama went back in the kitchen to cook.

Onions, garlic, beans - smells came out of Mama’s kitchen that made my mouth water.  I stopped staring at the table cloth and went into the kitchen.  Mama told me to peel some carrots, cause if I wanted a taste I had to help.  So I peel every carrot that Mama wanted, and she gave me some food to taste.

Then I follow Mama upstairs, watching her as she gets all gussied up.  I never saw Mama looking so pretty, I tell her.  Mama smiles at me, and tells me to get a pretty dress on, too.  I do, and Mama braids my hair.  I feel like a princess.  I ask Mama why we getting so pretty. Mama says that Death is fixing to visit, so we need to look nice and have a good dinner on the table.

The doorbell rings.  Mama rushes downstairs.  I follow her, not sure if I wanna meet Death.  A man walks in the living room.  He is a giant, with long black hair on his head pulled back in a pony tail and short black hair around his mouth.  Mama tells me not to be shy and shake the man’s hand.  His hand swallows mine, and I almost forget to say hello when I see his eyes.  They are a bright blue, and stand out from his brown face. He asks me how I am.  I say fine, but I ask him if all deaths are as big as him.  Mama tells me to hush, but Death throws his head back and laughs at my question.  He says that he is only a little Death, but I think he is a giant Death.

We go to the dining room table.  Mama shows Death to Daddy’s seat, then goes into the kitchen to serve the food.  I follow Mama, and help.  We sit down, and Mama bows her head.  But Death stops her, and asks her if we really want to ask the Lord for help this meal.  Mama says no, and starts eating.  I never saw Mama not pray before eating, so it takes me a minute to get a biscuit and pass them to Death.  Mama and Death talk about the weather while we eat.  They talk about the local baseball team, and other stuff that I don’t understand.

When dinner’s over, Mama asks me to clean off the table.  Then Mama leads Death upstairs.  I don’t know why Mama took him there, only family goes upstairs.  But then I look at the table.  Nothing spilled during dinner, and I don’t want to spill anything as I clean it  off.  I carefully pick up the plates.  I hear noises from upstairs, but I don’t listen because I want to keep the table cloth clean.  I get the plates in the kitchen, then the water glasses, forks, knives, and spoons.  I take the napkins off, and put them in the basket to get washed.  Finally, I take the serving plates and bread basket off.  I feel so proud of myself - the table cloth looks perfect!  Then I spot some crumbs, and I rush over to brush them off.

Mama and Death are still upstairs, making strange noises, so I decide to wash the dishes.  I get a stool, take out the drying rack, and get the water as hot as it gets.  Mama says we need a new hot water heater, but I don’t think I want water to be any more hotter.  I wash the plates, glasses, and start on the forks when I hear Mama and Death come downstairs.  I run out of the kitchen, soapy water dripping from my hands.

Mama, I call, I am washing the dishes all by myself.  But Mama’s not wearing her pretty dress, she’s wearing her nightgown.  Death smiles at me, and tells me I’m a good girl.  He tells me to take good care of Mama.  I tell him I always take good care of Mama, we care for each other.  Death nods, yes you do, he agrees with me.  Then Mama opens the door.  Death looks at Mama and says he’ll get it done right away.

Death leaves.  I ask Mama if I should get a plate ready for Daddy.  She laughs.  Daddy’s not coming home, Mama tells me.  Daddy’s never coming home again.

My Winter Travel Diary: Now, A Word from The Dentist...

I apologize in advance if this particular blog post makes little sense, but currently I am taking vicodin for pain and I feel a bit floaty.

Why, you ask, am I taking the medication made famous by Dr. House?

Because the day after we arrived here in Plympton, my teeth began to hurt.  I assumed that I clenched my teeth too much, so I spent most of Monday trying to relax against the rising tide of pain.  But by Tuesday morning, with the left side of my face swollen up, I admitted defeat and went to the local dentist office (name gained courtesy of my wonderful in-laws).  I learned that I had an abcess in one of my teeth - a fairly large and painful abcess that required a root canal.  So, the dentist drained stuff from the bad tooth, packed it with antibiotic paste, gave me a massive amount of amoxicillan, and two prescription - one for more amoxicillan and one for vicodin. 

Last night was a nightmare.  I alternated vicodin and Advil, but when time ran out of either medication my face ached.  When I went back to the dentist this morning, he reopened the tooth and basically drained out as much today as he did yesterday.  Argh!  So, he sent me to a specialist  - a dentist who only does root canals.  He also gave me a new antibioti to take, because the amoxicillian clearly was not cutting it.

The new dentist saw me this afternoon.  He tested my teeth to ensure that only one was infected, then he innocently asked me if I wanted him to lance an area of my gums that was swollen.  I agreed, and he numbed my mouth.  Then he went in with a scapel, made a little incision, and exclaimed, "My!  That was more exuberant that I expected!"

It turns out that I had a *huge* pocket of nastiness in my mouth that was causing a significant part of the pain.  Once the doctor removed the nastiness and relieved the pressure, I felt about one hundred times better.  My tooth is still open, so I have one more appointment up here to close up the hole in the tooth.  But I think I'll be able to sleep tonight without waking up to pain.

And maybe tomorrow I'll be able to walk around with floating on vicodin.

Occupy Wall Street: How the Government Keeps Failing

Just when I thought that the government cannot make this situation any worse, I discover that I'm wrong.

This past week, government officials around the country began to "evict" Occupy protester from their protesting sites.  Now, if I assume that there is a valid reason for these eviction, then I would expect that the various government officials would evict these people by the light of day, allowing the press to record the proceedings.  I would expect the protesters would be given enough time and warning to remove their possessions in an orderly fashion.  And unless the protesters began to violently react, I would also expect close to no arrests.

Did any of this happen?

No!

The government officials crept through the night like bandits and thieves, like mafia enforcers who wish to avoid the eye of the public.  Police men showed up in riot gear, despite the fact that all of the violence so far was initialed by the police.  Tear gas and rubber bullets flew, creating war on our own streets.  Against our own citizens, who want nothing more than for the current government to listen to the people.  They want Congress to stop practicing taxation without representation, to stop representing the wealthy elite who consider themselves about "We the people" and to represent everyone.  They want the laws currently on the books to be enforced, for the wealthy who have been breaking the laws with impunity to be brought to justice.  Stop allowing a small group of business to be virtual monopolies, controlling the entire American economy yet having no responsibility to match their power.

The government failed the American people years ago, when they allowed the wealthy elite to dictate the votes of Congress.  They failed the American people when they bailed out the bank and car companies, citing that these organizations were "too big to fail" but not enforcing the monopoly laws on such companies.  They failed the American people by passing laws that allowed corporations to be a "person" in the eyes of the law, gaining all of the privileges and none of the responsibilities.  They failed the American people by allowing for-profit universities to take money for student loans and not give a decent education in return.  They failed the American people by using the debt ceiling to get personal legislation passed, putting party politics above the entire country.  They failed the American people by faking a "war on terror" and then doing nothing useful to stop terrorists.  Instead, they removed more and more of the rights of Americans until we have the situation of today.

American citizens getting arrested for practicing their right to protest.  A right guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.  A right inherent to the American Dream.

Now, the government fails us again, arresting not only the protesters but the media.  Anyone who has a camera or a video recorder is at risk for being arrested, not for breaking any particular law but for reporting the truth.  For recording what the government is doing, and letting the world see how democracy and the American Way of Life is dying.

ECP: Some Cobb County School Board Members Lied to us AGAIN!!

Yesterday, I sat at my computer, perusing the local news and catching up on local activities, when an article caught my attention - “Wake-Up Call:  Cobb County School Board Vote to Change School Calendar Reveals Stealthy Political Forces at Work”  As a parent of two children in Cobb County, I read the article with a sense of dread.  After all, so far I have not seen anything reassuring from the new school board members; so I sat thinking, “Now what?”

“What?” is a elegantly crafted article exposing that our new board members have ties to Georgians Need Summers, which is supported and potentially sponsored by a Texas special interest group.  Texas???  I thought these people represented East Cobb???  

No, they don’t represent us - they represent Tina Bruno and her desire to have shorter school years and longer summers.  They represent a minority, special interest group from another state, and they do not care what their own constituents think.  They lied during their campaigns, they lied during the school board meetings, and they lied to the Grand Jury.   They called us names, act rude to the people of Cobb County, and refuse to answer simple questions.

All four board members made promises to listen to us.  If you look at Scott Sweeney, Tim Stulz, and Kathleen Angelucci’s current websites, they all say that they will collaborate with the public, form a partnership with the community to help make Cobb schools better, spend our money wisely, and promote accountability and transparency within the school board.

And all of these promises, these statements of intent, are lies.

Nowhere on these websites do any of them mention changing the current school calendar.  Nowhere that I found do they say they want to get rid of the balanced calendar, or that they support the traditional calendar. I wonder, did these people purposely without their views from the Internet, to limit opposition on that point?

As for accountability, none of them has a single factual reason to support the traditional calendar.  It costs more money to run a traditional calendar.  It promotes student and teacher absenteeism.  It lowers scores on standardized testing.  It reduces student and teacher morale.  So why are we using the traditional calendar?  

The public opinion poll in February turned out to be a lie.  Stulz and Sweeney insisted that we have a public opinion poll on the choice of school calendar - they insisted over the objections of David Banks and Lynnda Crowder-Eagle.  But when the poll showed support for the balanced calendar, Stulz called the poll “flawed”.  Does he really  think we don’t know what’s going on?  It was never about getting the community’s opinion - it was about them trying to justify a decision that they already made.  

But what bothers me the most is that Allison Bartlett, Sweeney, Angelucci, and Stulz have all come out with supposed “reasons” that they voted for the traditional calendar.  It’s better for the students. It’s better for the economy.  It’s better for Six Flags and White Water.  It’s cheaper.  It raises test scores.  It’s too expensive to cool the schools in August.  The kids will dehydrate on the bus ride home.

But all of those reasons were also lies.

So what do we do now?  I don’t know.

Bartlett will be out this fall, but we are stuck with Sweeney, Angelucci, and Stulz for the next three years.  I know that it is theoretically possible to recall a board member.  I looked into the process.  You only need 100 signatures to start a recall, but you need one third of the people who voted for a candidate to sign a recall petition.  For Bartlett, that puts the recall number over 10,000 people.  The recall process sets the bar quite high, and there has never been a successful recall.  

Until then, we need to spread the word to other counties in the area, and hopefully prevent another school board turning into a long-distance, special interest political empire.

ECP: Marietta Police Dept. Open House

Last month, my kids and I went to the first Marietta Police Department Open House.  I say “first” because although they do not have a second one currently planned, I’m hoping it will happen anyway.  Why?  Because we had so much fun!!!

Entering the police station, some lovely ladies behind a table laden with sweet stuff and t-shirts greeted us.  They represented Families to Families - an organization that helps the families of everyone working in the police department.  Whether it’s the birth of a new child, to the death of a family member, Families to Families provides support and comfort.  These ladies explained the organization, then invited us to either go downstairs or visit the municipal court.  We opted to visit the municipal court.  Turns out that was a brilliant decision.

The courtroom looks like any T.V. show - stately wooden benches in rows on two sides of a wide aisle that leads up to a solid wooden fence, dividing the seating from the head of the courtroom.  We stood by the two swinging doors, wanting to see the head of the courtroom but intimidated by it, when a smartly dressed woman came through a side door.  Kim Novak, a probation officer, welcomed us to the head of the courtroom, then gave us a small tour of the area.  We saw the special holding cells, used when transporting prisoners to court hearings.  The doors were unlocked, so the kids jumped in for a photo.  We saw the special elevator used for prisoners, as well as a funky, stainless steel bathroom.  Ms. Novak explained that she uses the bathroom for drug testing her clients.  If someone doesn’t pass the test, he goes into the holding cell, to await transportation to the jail.  

When we came back into the courtroom, the court administrator demonstrated how the video recording equipment works.  We watched ourselves walk around the holding cells - a complete trip!  Then we took the elevator downstairs, to view the rest of the open house.

Just outside the elevator, they had a table with Krispy Kreme donuts set up.  I laughed at the joke - cops with donuts!  But before we could walk all the way outside, my kids spotted the firearms training simulator.  Inside a darkened room, a police officer coached participants through simulated situations.  The participants held fake guns, and pretended to shoot bad guys on a screen.  My kids patiently waited their turn, then enthusiastically shot the bad guys.

Outside, we hit the SWAT team van first.  Officer Davis answered all of our questions before explaining the various equipment on display, including a futuristic looking robot they use to view situations in houses and other buildings before entering the premises.  Officer Davis even let my son use the robot a few minutes.  

After that, we saw one of the K-9 units, the crime scene unit van - a veritable lab on wheels! - the drug unit, and the Police Explorer van.  One of the Police Explorers, Kelsey, demystified the group to me.  Explorers is a group for kids between 14 and 22 who want to be police officers.  They get a snazzy uniform, and every Thursday night learn from the officers of the Marietta Police department.  They train with SWAT and K-9 units, work festivals, and participate in traffic stops.  I already know I’ll be driving my son here in a few years.