Time and Time Again

First there is Time; then there is time again. The most obvious thing about Time is that it is happening right now. I don't know what you are doing at this moment. But I do know what I am doing. I am sitting in my living room, with brilliant sunshine streaming in as it passes through the millions of autumn leaves, green and gold and brown, that hang in the hundred or so forest trees on our mountainside here in the Blue Ridge.

Please string along with me for this moment of reflection. Our house, built on the sloped edge of a small mountain in the Blue Ridge, was not damaged when Helene blasted her way through western North Carolina. But there is something about catastrophic events that prompts a composed response on the keyboard, an offering up of literary sacrifice… what used to be called literature, to commemorate the event that changed the lives of people in a thousand Blue Ridge households. So now, here I peck away at the keyboard. A chronicler of my age cannot resist the urge, after such a whirlwind, to peck out a few thoughts about life and the challenges thereof. So. . . here I sit in the golden, indoor sunshine, listening to Classical WDAV, 89.9 FM streaming out of Davidson North Carolina. Suddenly I was hearing one of my old favorites - an orchestral concerto that was first heard in baroque Venice about 300 years ago. As if by magic, the golden glamour of afternoon sunlight streaming through golden leaves, accompanied by the sound of Vivaldi's "Autumn" concerto, transported me to - not a different time and place; I am still here in my home in 2024 - but to a different frame of mind. I had a notion to find my old CD player and listen to all four of Vivaldi's Four Seasons concertos, which is what streams through my ears and brain as I write this. I feel a strange fascination, cranking up that CD player, a device that I have not laid eyes on in many a year. Like I mentioned in the title above. . . Time, and time again. . . cranking up an obsolete device to listen to a musical masterpiece that will never be obsolete. Put that thought in your glass and sip it. All this self-entertainment because the internet is down after Helene blew it away, Imagine that! When the newfangled stuff fails, the old tech gets retrieved from the closet for a spin down memory lane. So I take leave of our Blue Ridge Mountain homestead, intending to drive the four miles to the Boone Library for Wi-fi, to post this reflective moment on the world wide web, so you folks out there in cyberspace will catch feeling about Helene, or autumn in the Blue Ridge, or the passing of time . . But guess what ! You just never know what little glitch will get spun into your path. I had to change a flat on the old Subaru before spinning my way to the Library to post the blog. Then, by that time, the library was closing, so I had to duck into Josiah's Venture wine and chocolate shop on King Street, to get to the Wi-fi. This time of day I'm not into the Local Lion coffee gathering place. No problem. A glass of Cabernet and its a good day for posting a blog about Time, memory, and recovery in the aftermath of what was - for hundreds of people in my region - a cataclysm that totally rearranged their lives. But not mine. I'm just happy to be alive, still able to appreciate the sunshine through home windows, and a beautiful place to live, on an autumn day in the Appalachian mountains. Glass half-Full

The Ballad of Brett and Blasey

Listen to an ole song I composed, back in 2018, when the Senate Judiciary Committee was blazin' through a Supreme Court nomination: You can hear it sung, home style, here: Here's the story: Lindsay and Mitchie were gettin kinda itchy just to leave the Judiciary behind. . . Chuck and his committee, workin' for the ditty, trying to get Brett's nomination on time. . . On Committee fence Jeff Flake sat, cuz victims' rantings knocked him flat. Lindsay and Mitchey, still a pushin' forward in the Senate. . . you know where's that at . . . And no one's getting tweet 'xcept Blasey Ford! Lindsey said to Grassley we need to go fastly just to push this nomination on through. Let's go fast; but Flake said to Grassley we just cant pass it until we truly know what to do. On Committee fence Jeff Flake sat, cuz elevator tirades knocked him flat. Lindsey and Mitchey still a-pushin' forward in the Senate you know where that's at, and no one's gettin tweet 'xcept Blasey Ford. When Blasey was in high school, accosted by a drunk fool (she said it was the nominee). In committee testifying: implied the nominee be lyin' and stop his nomination immediately! 'cuz he was talkin' crazy back in school days! She said he had accosted, in a drunken haze. Lindsey and Mitchie still a-pushin' forward in the Senate. You know where that's at. . .and no one's gettin' tweet 'xcept Blasey Ford.

Ah, Ole school, Senate rules; smart fools; America drools. The escalating hype is so strong! Ah, tweet up, face up; everything is hype-up, to make drama, and drama prolong. Now here come, y'know, a last minute surprise: Jeff proposed a compromise! Lindsey and Mitchie still pushin' forward in the Senate; y'know where that's at. And no one's gettin' tweet 'xcept Blasey Ford. Ah. . . broke, busted and Blasey can't be trusted. Mitichie wants to go to the floor. Diane can't take it; she says she'll have to shake it; we knew she'd wanna shut that door. Slidin' on procedures and rules. Y'know it's low-ball; but politics is old-school! Blasey's 'criminations and sad accusations can't go on indefinitely. And Brett's nomination is becoming a reality! Glass half-Full

Court a Lot

While touring the JFK Library at UMass yesterday I snapped a pic of President Kennedy, long past.

Now watching news of more recent yesterday I detected ’tween then and now a stark contrast. And so on this bright and sunny Boston day I revise an old show tune to elephants and ass: A song, to be sung to the tune of “Camelot”, as sung by Richard Harris in the 1967 movie of the same name: A law was made a distant moon ago here: Civil War rebellions must not burn too hot, and there’s a legal limit to the rebels here in Court, a lot. Yes, here in Chutkan’s court we shall see Justice as prosecutor’s case reveals a lot in evidence of the joker’s private plot here in Court: a lot. We see the wheat set apart from chaff here as official duties fade behind a private plot ‘cuz a President has no business breaking laws here in Court, a lot. Supremes had made an order in their Court here: As Merlin’s magic likewise had begot: Immunity’s woven from whole cloth here in Court, a lot. So go ask Jack to make a list here to separate official acts from those that are not Cuz there’s legal limit to trump’s plot here in Court a lot. So Jack got busy in his task here of culling private acts from those that are not depending on who was called to smear our Rule of Law, in Jan6 riots, so hot. No President ought our Constitution smear whether in private or official, he should not but if Jack must spell it out so clear here We believe he’ll give it all he’s got: One hundred eighty special pages here, of private acts on January 6th, so hot! Insurrectionary gangs from far and near having no official duties, so they fought! Against our Capitol and DC police here Where violence and killing ought be not Cuz a Law was made a distant moon ago here in Court a Lot! Glass half-Full

Shutout at the Jan6 Corral

“There must be some way back into here” said the trumpster to the thief, whilst sitting in his oval hovel, whining and dining, pretending to be a Winner. But truth be told, now according to the People of the United States he was no winner, but rather. . . a loser, not what he presumed himself to be, no, no winner at all. . . but rather no more than a mere sinner. . . a loser who had been told by the people of the United States, “You’re Fired.” So now he had appointed himself to be the Chief Insurrectionist. Back in the day . . . on the jersey shore, it was . . . constructing tall towers high up into the sky, having them erected to a certain lofty point . . . and then stiffing the contractors, perfecting the fine art of having an ace up his sleeve, and a tangled web to weave as then he had purposed to deceive. But now, January 6, fateful day, the great game robbery, wherein the trumpster had drawn his Chance card. And it said, Go to hell, go directly to Losers’ hell. Do not pass go Do not collect even two dollars. Yet there he sat at the the pinnacle of power, sitting in the oval, commanding his minions of huliaani, while sidney hung towels out to dry in the beaten by ’n by, cuz the devil went down to Georgia looking for some votes to steal; but he couldn’t find any so he played his desperate wild card, except it didn’t do the trick—they couldn’t make the charges stick, so he ended up calling the peach state guv, with a desperado angling cast for 11,780 fishy wishes. Oh, but lamentable day. . . t’was all sound and fury signifying nothing, so he rounded up his proud toys and his oathweepers and this three deceptors and he sicced them onto the Dome. He sent ‘em into the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. . . yessirree, he did, he cut ‘em loose at the rotunda to bust glass with a 2x4

and to make thunder under the Rotunda and to the desecrate the sacred halls and to profanitize the walls and to fall upon the House ushers with putrid fountains of profanities while firing up the ire of the Vanities, until, in the unsweetened by ’n by, one man put a stop to it. One man, driven down into the depths of Capitol subterranean sub-State blue, said. . . wait for it! “I’m not getting in that car!” Even as Daniel of old, back in Babylon had said to ole King Neb, “I’m not bowing down to that entitled idol, so had Hoosier Mike said to his lackeys, “I’m not getting in that car!”

And the rest is history. Glass half-Full

Let Justice Roll on!

Let Justice roll down like the waters, and what is right, as a mighty stream!: A stream of information, revealing, in detail, to the American people, what obstructions donald trump attempted to foist on the American people on January 6, 2021. . . A filing by Special Prosecutor Jack Smith, released now by Judge Tonya Chutkan in the DC Circuit Court, alleging the former president’s attempt to corrupt the President of the Senate, Mike Pence, to convince the President of the Senate to forsake the counting of Electoral Votes that had been presented to Congress by the Electoral College, an electoral process established in Article II of our Constitution.

Now is the time for all men and women to come to the awareness of our Constitutionally-prescribed process by which our nation, properly and legally, elects our leaders, specifically in this case, the President of the United States. In the last Presidential election, the (incumbent at that time) president launched a vast conspiracy to steal the election. The scheme, the conspiracy to steal that election is revealed, in detail, by the 180-page filing that Prosecutor Smith has submitted to the Court for judgement to determine the guilt, or innocence, of donald trump. Forget all the noise of election-year politics. Forget the antics of the magamaniacs to divert attention to irrelevant stories that have nothing to do with our civic duty to, legally and legitimately elect a President who will perform his duties for the benefit of the American people. Let the foxes try to steal the vines of public media, but pay attention to our Justice Department and the DC Circuit Court, gaveled in and out by Judge Tonya Chutkan. Let Justice roll down like the waters, and what is right, as a mighty stream! Glass half-Full

New Day: 100 years!

So I was sitting here in my northwest North Carolina home, on a forested mountainside with sun shining through tall trees. (Thank God for trees!) Awakening from a good night’s sleep, sun shining in, I walked my way downstairs, cranked up the generator and called it (the beginning of) a day, another day of post-storm recovery,  here in the Blue Ridge.

Having survived the storm, having gotten through, as John Lennon had sung, another “day in the life.” I ascended our little stairway to heaven on earth . . . found my way upstairs and, as as Paul McCartney had sung it back in the day, “drank  a cup” of yesterday’s coffee.  So far, so good. With electrons now flowing through the temporary power setup, I tuned into NPR and heard a radio presentation about former President Jimmy Carter, who turns 100 today. Being a writer, I couldn’t resist the idea to reflect on the life that has transpired since good ole boy Jimmy took the helm after the disaster course our nation had traversed after the adventures of post-Watergate America:  Nixon in, then Nixon out, Ford in and then, and then, wait for it, Jimmy Carter in.  For this born’n’bred southerner, the news of Carter in the Oval was like a breath of fresh air.  I understand that, four years later, when Reagan achieved that office, the Republicans called in “morning in America.” Because, y’know, all the Watergate and post Watergate blah blah had blown over. Yeah, I know, he was the guy who arrested protesters back in California and now he was in charge of the whole kit’n’kaboodle.  Ok. So life goes on. I get it. But as Carter was, as Gladys Knight had sung it, taking the “midnight train” (back to) Georgia and Reagan was taking the helm, it just so happened that we were in an international crisis, because the Iranians were holding 444 Americans hostage in the American embassy in Tehran. (or was it 444 days that they had been held?) Anyway. . . I mean, those Iranians are still making trouble. . . but that’s another wild goose chase through time. (Don’t go there.) As I was saying. . .Just as Carter was leaving and Reagan was taking the mantle of Presidency, I assembled some friends and had them accompany me to sing this song, which I called “December ’79”. Actually the song was more about the ancient rivalry between the Jews and the Arabs in the middle east, but I used the moment in time to make a statement about how events in the ancient lands reflect an arc of history, and an ark of deliverance for those of mankind who are willing to turn to the Almighty to get through life, instead of just, you know, slogging through on their own strength. So I named the song “December ’79,” but just a few years ago I renamed it “We’ve Got a Song to Sing.”  The message therein is based upon the state of grace that Jimmy Carter had spoken of when he talked about being “born again,” which phrase had been lifted from chapter 3 of the biblical book of John, where a wise man Nicodemus was drawing wisdom from the Well as he was conversing with Jesus.  Remembering Carter today on his 100th birthday, I decided to toss up this old song that I had recorded, “with a little help from me friends,” back in the day. If you care to listen, you can hear it on:   “We got a Song to Sing"     http://www.careyrowland.com

The Waste Klan

As September is the month of falling let us go then, you and I let us venture forth and assess the mauling and see what predicament we shall spy. We find members cauterized upon a fable and members fleeing from beneath the Dome as gavels go silent, rendered unable to find their way back home, rendering Rule of Law unstable 'cuz the joker had said to the thief There must be some way to force 'em outa here Thus the members were driven into grief while insurrectionists matastasized the fear. Our Constitution, formerly consecrated, they smashed to bits and pieces; our Rule of Law they desecrated as if it were their stinkin' feces. And so the People were forced to go reeling, fleeing, like herded cattle so magas could put on their shit show to claim fleeting victory for their battle Meanwhile up at the podium where the boar and the wolf were high on the hog the air was foul with odium. As they damned our legislative river into a bog. Yeah they came from the Right they said; trump pumped them up at the Ellipse. They blamed it on antifa instead, while insurrectionists did back flips. "Our maga, which art in maga"; Maga be thy name!" while the elephant's tail ceased to waga pud'n tane; ask me again 'n ill tell ya the same. So the loud din of the disconsulate chimera they cranked up in that formerly holy space casting maga spell in their imposed maga era with the maga winning the race, As for Law . . . they care not a wit Legality's gone the way of the buffalo As for Constitution they care not a twit, Take this Law and stuffit low. Nosiree!, no Law here in this twittering wind Send out the call on X! "Stop the steal" stole over and over again as they swore and they cast up their hex. With "Stop the steal", they stole the show. Yeah, "stand-back"s went raging far and wide as "stand-by''s raged to and fro. Senators had no place to hide; Reps lay low while "stand-bys" did go until Capitol/Metro police turned the tide. America cried: No! No! No! We the People cried Woe! Woe! Whoa!. While the rabble babbled Rule of Law came falling down, falling down Yeah, the rabble unraveled Rule of Law is going down, going down

"There must be some way out of here" said the Lawbreaker to the thief! As Americans were stricken with grief. The magas thiught it a beautiful shit show. But the American people still come and go speaking of their grief and woe. Oh! lamentable day! That is all I have to say. Read 'em and weep. I pray the Lord our nation to keep. Glass half-Full