Ailantha - Blog

So How Do You Defend This?

2/14/2020

I have a question.
Donald Trump's long time friend and associate Roger Stone,

...has been convicted of seven felonies, including obstruction of justice in the Congressional investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election, lying multiple times under oath to Congress, forging documents, and threatening a witness with bodily harm if the witness testified. He blatantly ignored a gag order placed upon him and threatened a Federal judge. For these crimes U.S. prosecutors recommended for Roger Stone a prison sentence of seven to nine years.
In response to the prosecutors' sentencing recommendation for his friend Donald Trump tweeted:

“This is a horrible and very unfair situation. The real crimes were on the other side, as nothing happens to them. Cannot allow this miscarriage of justice!”

Immediately following that tweet senior Justice Department officials

...under the direction of Donald Trump's loyal ally and perennial defender Attorney General William Barr,

...stepped in to overrule the prosecutors' decision and filed a request for a more lenient sentence for Roger Stone. One by one, all four U.S. prosecutors quit the case in protest.
Donald Trump subsequently praised William Barr for intervening in Roger Stone's behalf, attacked the prosecutors and demanded that they apologize to Stone.
Trump also went on to slander the character of the Federal judge,

....Judge Amy Berman,

...who will hand down Roger Stone's sentence, with the aim of intimidating her into handing down the lighter sentence recommended by William Barr.
So then, in view of all of the above, here's my question: To all those loyal supporters and unquestioning, unequivocal defenders of Donald Trump, how do you defend this behavior? How do you defend that he is using his power as President of the United States to influence the court for the benefit of a friend? How do you defend this corruption of our system of justice? Or do you even consider it corruption of our justice system? If you've found a rationale to defend every behavior of Donald Trump's up until this point, how do you defend his behavior this time? Or Do you?

And one more thing: Do you defend Trump's firing of Lt. Colonel Alexander Vindman from his job as a National Security member for speaking the truth under oath during Trump's impeachment trial,

...and, just for good measure, also firing Vindeman's brother, who is also a career Army officer, from his White House job?
Do you defend Donald Trump for those actions? Or not? If so, how?
I'd just like to know.

References
https://news.yahoo.com/roger-stone-sentencing-explained-controversy-063201887.html

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/13/politics/donald-trump-power-justice-department/index.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/12/us/politics/trump-stone.html

https://news.yahoo.com/roger-stone-case-chief-justice-190309748.html

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/roger-stone-faces-judge-who-has-spurned-and-sided-with-trump/ar-BBZXcNa

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Madelyn And Brady's Wedding

2/10/2020

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On Sunday, February 2, My lovely niece Madelyn and her sweet fiancé Brady were married,

...at the Everal Barn, a pretty, rustic venue in Westerville, Ohio

The wedding preparations were a labor of much love for Brady and Madelyn's family and friends,

...and on Sunday morning after Tom and I picked up the flowers,

...we joined the others who, under the direction of Brady, the groom, here with his brother and Best Man Jacob,

...were setting up the barn for the 3pm wedding, putting on the chair covers,

...and table cloths,

...on the first floor and the balcony.

We put together the center pieces and table numbers,

...strung lights and garland,

Donald, the father of the bride,

...set up a pine tree hung with wedding favor ornaments for the guests,

...set up the sound system,

...and put on all the finishing touches.

The wedding ornament favor tree.

The seating chart.

And little by little the barn was transformed into a magical place.

The balcony.

At around 1pm some of us left to go home and change for the wedding,

...while some of us stayed to take care of the last-minute details,

...and hold down the fort.

A little before 3pm everything was ready.

...and soon the guests began arriving.

...and signing the Guest Board, which announced that Brady would soon change his name to Madelyn's.

The buffet, provided by City Barbeque, was set up in the basement,

...along with a table of cookies provided by friends and relatives,

...and where a table had been set up in memory of departed loved ones who were with the families in their hearts.

When the moment arrived,

...the wedding party entered,

...followed by the groom and the bride, each accompanied by their parents.

Madelyn and Brady's friend Carrie was the officiant and family members and friends spoke during the service, which was lovely and heartfelt.

Madelyn and Brady Liszkay

After the wedding, while the bridal party departed for pictures, the guests went downstairs for hors d'oeuvres and socializing.

We then returned upstairs to greet the bride and groom on their return,

...then we all spent the evening feasting,

...socializing,

...eating cake,

...cut and served by my sister-in-law Mary Jane and myself,

...dancing,

...and more dancing.

Then our evening of celebrating came to an end, and it was time for us to turn the magical place back into a barn.

Still, on such a happy night it was hard to stop dancing.

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A Moveable Feast At The Bistro

2/8/2020

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Last Saturday afternoon, February 1, my daughter Claire and her husband Miguel flew in to Columbus from Chicago,

...for the wedding of my niece Madelyn and her fiancé Brady.

Since the wedding was not until the following day, Claire and Miguel wanted to spend some time with Grammy,

...as my mom, here with Theresa, is known to her grandchildren.

But as Claire and her Columbus siblings also wanted to squeeze in a get-together before the wedding I thought it would be a nice idea if we all went out for dinner. However a better idea than taking on the always substantial task of maneuvering 99-year-old Grammy out to a restaurant (See post from 1/8/2020, "A Dilemma") and then trying to find a table for the seven of us on a busy Saturday night was an idea offered by one of my Facebook friends,

...Sharon,

...who suggested that, rather than taking my mom out, we try bringing dinner in to mom's place, Sunrise of Gahanna, which has a lovely gathering area called the Bistro.

To this end I checked with the Sunrise staff who said that bringing in a family dinner was perfectly admissible, encouraged, even. And so we did.
Rather than order restaurant take-out, I thought everyone would enjoy a home-cooked meal, which I cooked then we carted over to Sunrise.

On the menu was roast beef au jus,

...with mashed potato casserole, green beans almondine, mushrooms sauteed in butter, and a pan of hot rolls.

For dessert there was apple pie made by Tom and cherry almond streusel pie made by me.

When all the family members had arrived we brought Grammy from her Memory Care neighborhood down to the Bistro,

...then we dug into the feast.

My mom greatly enjoyed dining in, as did we all.

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Mitt Romney's High Noon Moment

2/6/2020

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I can't help thinking that it must feel good to be Mitt Romney today.
In spite of the shunning he's received by members of his own party, in spite of being immediately disinvited from attending this year's Conservative Political Action Conference, in spite of being mocked and derided by Donald Trump, in spite of a bill floated by a Utah lawmaker to recall him from the United States Senate, in spite of all the hate, invective, and threats that have been heaped on him within the last twenty our hours, still it must feel better to be Mitt Romney,

...than to be, say,

Susan Collins,

...or Lamar Alexander

...or Marco Rubio,

...or Rob Portman,

...or any of the other Senators who voted yesterday to acquit Donald Trump of charges of abuse of power and then had to shuffle and tap dance their way around having acquitted a man whom they publicly admitted they believed was guilty of the wrongdoing for which he was impeached.
It's proving to be a difficult dance, indeed, and even if these Senators can convince the public with verbal gymnastics that they did the right thing in voting to keep in power a President whom they know is a reckless liar and a corrupt self-dealer, how much harder will it be to convince their own consciences?
Mitt Romney, on the other hand, vilified as he may be by his Republican colleagues and constituents, is on the best of terms with his own conscience in this matter, and is still the owner of his soul.

Because when other Republican Senators caved out of fear of the vengeance of Donald Trump, of what he could inflict on them and their careers,

...Romney had the courage and strength to vote to bring him to justice.
Remember "High Noon," the old western in which only one man was brave enough to stand up to the outlaw who was terrorizing the town,

...and was left to face the vengeance of the ruthless outlaw alone?

Yesterday on the floor of the Senate Mitt Romney had his "High Noon" moment.

And though his Republican colleagues may shrink back in silence, though not one may have the courage to come to his defense against the attacks he'll face by Donald Trump, his disciples and his sycophants,

...still history will declare Mitt Romney the hero of the day and the other Senators the craven cowards.
And in the meantime Mitt Romney, scorned, disowned, and isolated, may just be the freest man in the whole U.S.A.

References:
https://www.newsweek.com/sen-mitt-romney-disinvited-cpac-2020-after-voting-hear-witness-testimony-impeachment-trial-1485186

https://www.deseret.com/utah/2020/1/29/21114269/utah-lawmaker-bill-to-allow-recall-of-us-senator-mitt-romney

https://news.yahoo.com/people-pay-trump-appears-poised-164004126.html

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My Mother's House, My Mother's Things

2/1/2020

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...Continued from yesterday:
And so on Thursday, January 23, Tom and I set off on the 500-mile drive from Gahanna, Ohio, to my mother's house in Seaford, Delaware to give my brother and sister-in-law a bit of help with the task of sifting through my mother's things and to procure a couple of mementos that I'd wanted from among them, a ceramic on wood wall hanging that my siblings called "Goiter Guy" and a papier maché on wood wall hanging of a dancing gypsy that our family called "Carmen." (see yesterday's post, "The Goiter Guy and Carmen").

Tom and I stopped for dinner along the way, as we've usually done during our Columbus-Seaford trips, at a Greek restaurant between Baltimore and Annapolis called Hellas,

...where we were, strangely enough, the only ones in the dining room, all the other patrons having congregated at tables in the crowded bar.

However, we were fine having the restaurant to ourselves, and Tom ordered his favorite Hellas fare,

...the jumbo crab cake,

...while I had a yummy lamb cheese steak with sweet potato fries.

It was late when we arrived in Seaford, and we spent the night in the cozy guestroom of my brother and sister-in-law.

The following morning, Friday morning, we headed over to my mother's house where Tom, my brother, sister-in-law and I would spend that day and the next pulling out stuff,

...piling up stuff,

...going through stuff,

...looking at stuff,

...throwing out stuff,

...and setting aside and packing up stuff that our siblings or children had voiced an interest in wanting to take.

"Doesn't it feel weird," my sister-in-law asked, "to be going through mom's house like this while she's still alive?"
I agreed that it kind of did. And yet on the other hand didn't we all feel glad that she was still alive? At least we didn't have to do this undertaking with sad, heavy hearts. More pondersome to me was that this was likely to be the last time I'd ever see my mother's house,

...and my mother's things.

While cleaning out closets, cabinets and drawers we found my mother's wool cape that she received while in Westside Hospital nursing school in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

In my mother's day a nurse's cape was part of her uniform.

My mother, probably about eighteen years old, as a nursing student in her cape.

My mom's fellow nursing students in their capes.

We also found my mom's dog tags from when she served in the U.S. Army during World War II,

My mom.

We also found a treasure trove of old photographs.

...a bushel of which now sit in a box in my living room,

...along with all the other things I ended up bringing home from my mother's house.

Anyway, after having spent two days going through my mother's things and picking out a few pieces I decided I'd like to have after all, and packing up the things that my children and my my sister wanted me to take home and keep for them, as well as a suitcase full of summer clothes for my mother, I had this pile of things to bring home.

I decided that I didn't want Goiter Guy and Carmen after all. I think I just needed to look at them one more time.
However, I did send a text out to my children asking if anyone had an interest in requiring either of the two pieces. Turns out two of my children wanted the pieces,

...so we ended up packing them into the car and bringing them home, anyway.

On Sunday morning, our car packed with my mother's things, I walked through her house for the last time,

...and once more around her yard.

Then we drove for the last time through my mother's lovely neighborhood,

...and headed back to Columbus.
On our way home we stopped for dinner in Cambridge, Ohio at our favorite restaurant along the return trip, a Greek place called The Forum,

...where the food is great,

...my favorites being the Spanikopita Salad,

...and a giant blooming onion ring to die for.

And by strange (or not) coincidence, The Forum in Cambridge, Ohio, has the same piece of artwork as does Hellas, our favorite restaurant in Annapolis, Maryland (See above).

We wondered when would be the next time we'd be stopping at either of those restaurants.

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Goiter Guy And Carmen

1/30/2020

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A few weeks ago my siblings and I came to the consensus that the time had come to begin the process of selling our mother's house.
As anyone who's gone through the logistically and emotionally ponderous process of selling their parents' house knows, the first step in this process is the disposition, distribution or otherwise clearing out - save for a few strategic pieces of staging furniture for showings- of all the stuff that's been accumulated over a lifetime, often along with some additional stuff left-over from previous lifetimes that's been inherited or otherwise acquired by one's parents, such as the pieces below given to my mother by her mother, a washer woman, who received them close to a hundred years ago from a well-to-do customer in exchange for payment.

(Which gets one thinking about one's own accumulation of stuff which will someday have to be disposed of, distributed, or otherwise cleared out by one's own children).
In any case, the task of overseeing the prepping and selling of our mother's house has fallen to my brother who lives in Seaford, Delaware and who was our mother's guardian up until two-and-a-half months ago when we relocated her to Gahanna, Ohio and I took over the job.

My mom in her new place in the Memory Care unit of Sunrise of Gahanna.

     A few weeks ago my brother put out an APB to the siblings that the clearing-out phase was imminent, and if anyone wanted anything from our mom's house, now was the time to come and get it before everything but the staging furniture was disposed of.
      As for me, there were only two things I desired to take from my mother's house, a couple of wall hangings.
      The first was a piece one of my father's artist friends made as a gift for him, an illustration of a quote by the ancient Roman writer Juvenal. The artist crafted ceramic pieces which he glued onto wood:

The words, "Quis tumidum guttur miratur in Alpibus" are Latin and mean something like "What a strange swelling of the throat in the Alps." It's believed that Juvenal was remarking on the existence of goiters among the people in the Alpine region.

    My father being an endocrinologist and diseases of the thyroid being his specialty, his friend thought he'd appreciate this reference to thyroid disease found in ancient writings.
      My father did, in fact, like the piece and it hung in the living room of our home in Philadelphia (See post from 11/29/2018, "The New House, Part 2"). When my parents moved to Seaford, Delaware in the 1990's it hung in their living room there, too.
       I always thought it was a cool picture, sculpture, or whatever it was. My siblings, however, referred to it as "Goiter Guy." Turned out nobody but me was interested in inheriting "Goiter Guy."
        The other of my parents' items I hoped to have was a picture my mom made of the dancing gypsy Carmen from the opera "Carmen," and which she and we subsequently referred to as "Carmen."

    My mom made "Carmen" by dying sheets of newspaper then ripping the dyed newspaper into small pieces which she fashioned into spit-ball shapes. She then dipped each spit-ball into a mix of glue and water and then glued the pieces onto a piece of painted wood.
      Turned out nobody but me was particularly interested in taking "Carmen," either.
    But I was always fascinated by my mom's stylized papier-maché process in making "Carmen."
     I tried it myself back when I was a teen-ager and made a copy of Paul Klee's painting "Death and the Fire"

Paul Klee's opus

Mine

And so Tom and I decided to drive out to Seaford, Delaware to my mom's house for a final visit and to retrieve "Goiter Guy" and "Carmen."
To be continued...

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My Mom, Elizabeth Warren, And Me

1/22/2020

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       What do my mom and Elizabeth Warren have in common? Can you tell from the above photos?
       In case you can't, the answer is great skin for their age. Elizabeth Warren is 70. My mom is pushing 100.
        Oh, my mom has a few wrinkles. But only a few. And again, she is ninety-nine and seven-twelfths.
        The thing is, my mom has always had beautiful skin - as apparently Elizabeth Warren has - with nary a visible bump or pore. And I don't know about Elizabeth Warren, but as far as I know my mother has never consulted a dermatologist, and the only skin care products she ever availed herself of were her bar of Ivory soap,

...as I recall it looking in my youth,

...and her jar of Ponds cold cream.

     My mother swore by washing her face morning and night with Ivory soap then slathering on the Ponds, and she preached this beauty regimen to anyone who'd listen, which wasn't me.
      "All you need is soap and water and Ponds," my mother preached to me from my bad-skinned teen-aged years on through my not-great skinned adult years.
       However I, heedless youngster that I was, had less than zero interest in being caught dead using what I considered to be my mother's greasy old lady goop from the 1930's.

      So, unlike my mother, I never used Ponds, and she gave up trying to convert me decades ago.
      Fast forward to last week when I was reading the Life & Arts section of the Columbus Dispatch and came across an article on an interview Elizabeth Warren did with Cosmopolitan magazine in which she revealed that the secret to her beautiful skin is...Pond's cold cream morning and night! Exclusively. Meaning she uses Ponds and only Ponds on her face. No soap. Elizabeth warren doesn't wash her face. Ever. Ponds in the morning and Ponds in the night. That's it.
      Which sounds to me like dermatological blasphemy and felonious face abuse.

And yet, there she is, with a face as smooth and dewy as a baby's elbow,

...and here I am, two years younger than she, with my face a field of wrinkles and age spots.

   A couple of years ago I saw a dermatologist for a suspicious-looking mole. She pronounced the mole as nothing, but suggested that I try a .5 ounce jar of $75 cream to help with all the fine lines crisscrossing my sexagenarian punim.
      Back when I was young a large jar of Ponds cost about a dollar. Today a 6.5 oz jar costs $4.99.
      I really should have listened to my mother.

       Reference:
     https://www.dispatch.com/entertainment/20200117/would-elizabeth-warrens-skin-care-regimen-work-for-you

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A Dilemma

1/18/2020

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Back to my mother.
It's been a little over two months - though it feels indefinably longer - since my ninety-nine-year-old mother left her home in Seaford, Delaware for her new home at the Sunrise senior care facility in Gahanna, Ohio,

...and I became her guardian (See posts from 11/16/19 - 1/8/2020).

   From the time of her arrival at Sunrise I endeavored to do everything I could think of to make my mother comfortable and happy as she transitioned into her new home.
     Mayhaps I sometimes overdid it.
    My mother being a person who always liked to be out and about and still pretty energetic for pushing a hundred years, I figured that going out to eat would be an enjoyable, beneficial, and doable outing for her.
      Granted, taking mom out was an undertaking: bundling her into her coat, hat, scarf, and gloves; helping her into her wheelchair then tucking her in with a lap blanket; maneuvering her into the car then folding the wheelchair and hefting it into the back of the car; getting mom from the car back into the chair then into the restaurant; getting her out of her wheel chair, hat, gloves, scarf and coat and seated in a chair; then either finding a spot in the restaurant to store the wheelchair or running it back out to the car; then, after we were finished eating, doing the whole process in reverse.
      But after a few times and with the assistance of my faithful, helpful hubby Tom, we got it down to a drill, and Tom and I got into the routine of taking mom out for 8 am Mass on Sundays followed by brunch, and out for lunch a time or two or three during the week.
      On the days we didn't go out I'd visit my mom at Sunrise and hang out for an hour or so, often bringing sweets or snacks or any article that she might need or have asked for.
     Over the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays some of my siblings, my children and my grand children poured into town to spend time with mom, and her days were full of visitors,

...activities,

...and outings.

     Too many visitors, activities, and outings, we were to learn, when two days after Christmas she seemed depressed and tired out.
       Turned out that she was, in fact, tired out. Wiped out, in fact, and, as pointed out to us by one of the Sunrise caregivers, in need of a day or two of peace and quiet (see post from 1/2/2020, "Epilogue").
      But, after the previous weeks of frequent outings, visits, and holiday excitement, my mom was to have a sudden spell of more peace and quiet than she'd had since her arrival at Sunrise; by December twenty-ninth all the visiting relatives had returned home and I was headed off to Los Angeles to spend eleven days visiting my daughter, son-in-law and grand daughters.
      My mom would have no outings during that time and only evening pop-in visits from my daughter Theresa.

     I worried that, in spite of her new friends at Sunrise and her self-appointed task of assisting with the care and feeding of her fellow residents in her Memory Care neighborhood (see "Epilogue"), my mom might be feeling lonely for me or longing for one of our outings.
      But no. When I returned from my trip to Los Angeles I found my mom looking better and in better spirits than when I'd left. I wondered if having some time without me constantly hanging around and schlepping her out every other day had actually helped her relax, adjust and settle into her still relatively new surroundings on her own terms. The Sundowners - the state of anxiety that often grips elderly people - even seemed to have abated, as I noticed when I visited her in the early evening.
       In fact, one evening when I visited her a little before dinner time she was sitting contently around the dining room table with some of the other residents. I sat and chatted with her and her friends for about ten minutes, at which point she told me that I should go ahead and go, as she wanted me to get home safely. I think she really just wanted to get back to her socializing, such as it was.

Or, as my son Tommy put it, "Sometimes you just wanna hang out with your friends without dragging your kid around."

     As for missing all the outings: my mom didn't appear to notice that she hadn't been out for a couple of weeks. In fact, whenever I'd ask her what she did during the day she'd usually tell me that she and some of the ladies had gone out for lunch or dinner to to Mass together. She seemed to be living a very full, satisfying life in her mind, along with her de facto relationships with her Sunrise friends and fellow residents.
      All of which made me wonder whether I should take my mom out any more at all?
      Why have her woken up at 6:30 am on Sunday mornings to be taken out to Mass in a church if she believes she's going to Mass in a church whether she does or doesn't? Why drag her to a restaurant if she gets the same satisfaction from believing she's gone to a restaurant? After all, if taking my mom out is a haul for Tom and me, it's likewise just as tiring for her being the haulee.
      And, I wondered, with the colder weather upon us and all the sickness that's been going around, is it even healthy to be taking her out, tiring her out, and risking her picking up one of the infinite bugs - or, God forbid super-bugs - always stalking crowded public places?
       And, of course, there's always the risk that, careful as we all are with my mom, she could miss a beat getting out of the car or while in the church or restaurant and fall. After all, relatively good shape that she's in, she's not getting younger by the day.
       On the other hand, almost every time I visited my mom since my return she'd suggest that we go out for dinner. Whether it was morning, afternoon or evening, she'd suggest we go out for dinner. Even if she'd told me just a few minutes earlier that she'd gone out for dinner that day. It made me think that she must actually want to go out for dinner for real.
     Or did she? In any case, I always told her that we'd go out tomorrow.
    And so I spent about a week ping-ponging back and forth whether or not I should take my mother out, or whether she'd be better off just staying at Sunrise.
     Finally yesterday while visiting my mom I asked one of the nurses on duty if she thought it would be okay for me to take my mother out. She thought it would be.
     A little later while I was at the reception desk signing out from my visit I poured out my dilemma to the friendly concierge at the desk and asked her if she thought that, under the circumstances, I should be taking my 99-year-old mother out.
     The concierge replied that I absolutely should. She said that everybody needs to get out now and then, even my mother, and more than I might realize. "Take your mother out," she told me.
      So we did. Tom, Theresa, and I took her out today for lunch at the Rusty Bucket.

It was fine, and all the maneuvering and hauling and hefting notwithstanding, we all had a really nice time.
After we returned her to Sunrise my mom thanked me for the movie.

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Hope Was In The Air

1/16/2020

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You didn't happen to watch the Democratic debate the other night, did you?
Well, don't feel bad, nobody else watched it, either. Or just about nobody. Or at least just about nobody I know,

...and I run with a pretty political bunch.

So if hardly anybody I know watched it, I figure hardly anybody at all must have watched it.
I nearly didn't watch it myself. Ever since the first debate back in August, which I found to be a nice getting-to-know-you event (see post from 6/28/2019, "The Air Is Hummin'), I haven't watched much of the subsequent debates, which, after the first one, seemed more like tiresome affairs with a dozen or so people vying to get a word in edgewise as opposed to imparting any relevant enlightenment.
And besides, there's so much alarming, consequential news constantly coming at us, day and night, night and day,

...that it's hard to scrape up enough left-over interest in current national events not of the highest level of heart-thumping urgency. Which the Democratic debate somehow didn't seem to be.
However, with expectations low and attention span at half-mast, I decided to watch at least the first few minutes of the debate.
And I'm glad that I did. Because, from the first few minutes onward, this one was a really good debate - at last.

With only six candidates on the stage:

Joe Biden,

Elizabeth Warren,

Amy Klobuchar,

Bernie Sanders,

Pete Buttigieg,

...and Tom Steyer,

...there was time for each of them to present and enlarge upon their plans in detail, and everyone had plans: plans for dealing with Iran and the middle east; trade plans; plans for affordable health care, child care, and higher education; plans to address climate change, environmental issues, and the economy.
And everyone spoke so coherently. Lots of straightforward “yes’s” and “no’s” to questions. So much meat and potatoes. So satisfying.
And there was so much civility among the candidates, and so much agreement on the issues and on policy. Sometimes the candidates even referenced or agreed with or emphasized each other’s ideas.

There was a sense of collegiality among them.

   They even shared an occasional joke.
      And though the candidates generally spun their ideas in their own way and in their own direction, there was general agreement over goals and principles.
      Nobody went after each other. Nobody’s fangs were bared or claws were out. I liked it.
      I especially liked that Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders cordially agreed to disagree over whether Sanders once told Warren that a woman couldn't be elected President, and when questioned by one of the moderators on the subject neither took the bait to fight.

(Of course there is speculation that the two took the fight out behind the school yard for a moment after the debate was over, but in view of how smoothly they played off any contention during the debate I think we should just let that moment go.)

Listening to these candidates debate felt like, after having been subjected for three years to a steady menu of head-banging, heavy death metal hard rock,

...suddenly hearing the smooth, dulcet tones of fine classical music.
Nor did any of the candidates waste time excessively slamming Donald Trump, but rather used their time to talk about their own ideas for bettering our country.
And what good, sensible, ideas. I found myself suddenly feeling optimistic and hopeful that big ideas were possible, big ideas that really could reform health care in this country, save the planet from climate change, pull us back from the brink of war with Iran.

And suddenly optimistic and hopeful that someone up on that stage could deliver us from Donald Trump.

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A Trustworthy Face At The Los Angeles Airport

1/9/2020

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Yesterday, after a 10-day visit to Los Angeles with our daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren,

...Tom and I were waiting around in the Los Angeles airport,

…already crowded at 6 am,

… for our flight back to Columbus.

We were sitting at an electronics charging station charging our stuff,

…when a young guy sitting in one of the spaces in a row of seats on the other side of the charging station called over to me and asked me if I would keep an eye on his things,

…his things consisting of a couple of bags and a nice-looking computer tablet.

     I said, “Sure” and walked over to take the seat next to his stuff.
     Having apparently expected me to just keep an eye on his stuff from my spot several yards across the room, the youngster said with a smile, “Wow, you’re really rising to the occasion,” and thanked me.
     “Well,” I joked, “if I’m gonna babysit, I’m gonna babysit.”

The guy was gone for about five minutes, and I sat there looking at all the people around me, most of whom were probably as honest as could be and would never dream of stealing another’s unguarded property,

...still, you never know, and there are enough dishonest people out there that things are stolen all the time.
And so I pondered being deemed by a total stranger in an airport as trustworthy to guard his things.
And it occurred to me that, for all the times in my life that people have sized me up as a push-over, clueless, incompetent, addle-brained and helpless; for all the times I’ve actually been all those things, along with confused, indecisive and insecure; for all the dumb, wrong, ignorant and regrettable decisions and choices I’ve made,