Ordinary People Doing Extraordinary Things

The following is a facebook post by Mzvicki Brooks

December 27 at 9:15 AM

I have Great news for everyone🐾Bjarne will be going to Jenny’s Dream Rescue in Pennsylvania🐾💜

I was on the phone all night and early this morning talking with Kate from Rolling Thunder Farms!!! They are connected and they save fighting pits and poor dogs like Bjarne!!! This is their passion!! They are working really hard to put together a private transport!! 

Looks like he will be leaving the weekend of the 4th of January.  If anyone wants to donate for his journey, I would send to Jenny’s Dream Rescue. They take many used fighting dogs and sick pits from Texas and Louisiana!!

Bjarne just had a warm breakfast and his meds!!!  He was wagging his tail so fast and let me doctor his sores!!! I’m So happy Happy for him!!! Him and I are both blessed this morning for the good news of his rescue!!!

It takes a village to save these baby’s for sure, and I will keep everyone posted of his progress!! Thank you for ALL who have helped to save him🐾💜

Editor’s Note: Thank you Vicki Brooks for your tireless effort to save animals in Harrison County. Let’s hope that after years of non-productive talking and arguing the officials of Marshall and Harrison County decide to get serious and take action to replace the 50-year old animal shelter!

Concern citizens, particularly voters, of the Marshall and Harrison County DEMAND that they replace our animal shelter in 2020!

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By Lad Moore

My dad always explained his Ozark Mountain Toddy as being three fingers of light rain and six ounces of fast-moving Artic blast.

* * * 

It was the first morning after a severe winter storm. The ice coated everything with a crystal coverlet, strikingly beautiful amidst all the devastation. Across the yard lay cords of limbs torn from trees, and piles of branches shattered into wooden-cored icicles. Each blade of grass was engorged with glass-like armor, armor so heavy it could not support itself upright. In the rubble also lay the giant left arm of our sycamore, longtime host to my tire swing. I remember having previously worried that the thick rubber truck tire or the steel chain would surely decay before that giant tree would ever so much as bend. Not so. It had come crashing down, violating even the sanctity of the empty doghouse that sat in the tree’s comforting shade for the two summers after my dog Angus had died.

It was an ironic thing about Angus. He and my mother both died the same day, and it seemed they had even suffered the same malady; an increasingly hoarse and rasping cough that finally became a last breath.

My daydream was interrupted by a knock on the door, a knock so commanding it firmly defied the idea that no one would be venturing about. My father opened the door to find our neighbor Stanley Doss, face red from the biting wind.

“Hardy, grab your coat and come with me. We’ve got a small party together to search Porcupine Thicket. Carl Rowe is out there someplace with his son. We think they’ve been out all night.”

Porcupine was a tangled mass of vines, thorns and matted overgrowth that even in good weather was formidable. There were many areas inside the thicket that were completely impassable except by belly crawl. For most people who lived near Summit Ridge, there was nothing in Porcupine that was interesting or curious enough to even consider venturing there. Simply put, there was far more challenge than reward.

“Gimme a minute to wrap up,” my dad replied. “What in God’s name would Carl be doing in Porcupine?”

“Don’t know. He and the boy must have been caught in the storm. It’s still hunting season isn’t it?”

With a goodbye pat on my head, the two men left abruptly. Each carried a flashlight and my father added a machete and a pistol to his belt. I thought: Pistol? What for? Snakes are three feet buried by now.

I parked myself by the front window, rubbing a porthole in the frost so I could watch them as they disappeared down the woods trail. For some distance, I could hear the loud crunch of the icy leaves under their boots. I likened the sound to marching on a bed of sugar-coated corn flakes.

Noon brought enough warmth to begin a bit of melt. First the icicles on the roof began to drip in ever-increasing staccato, and some broke free and began to form a picket fence under the eaves. I put on my heavy coat and boots and wandered out as far as the barbed wire fence. The ice was thawing and breaking away from the wire. Some of the pieces were almost like drinking straws. I sucked on them. They had the taste of iron. 

After an hour of exploring the magic and punishment of nature, I went back inside, fearing that a falling icicle might impale me. I turned on the Philco. For some reason, the reception was unusually weak and given to crackling and sputtering. I ran the dial from end to end and settled on a station that waned from loud to mute as if traversing over hills and valleys. It was KWOZ, a station quite far away, but having a transmitting tower atop Magazine Mountain which boosted its range.

At two in the afternoon I thought of lunch. In the larder my dad kept two dozen cans of his favorite sardines and I opened one. Mostly I wanted the sardines to eat with some crispy soda crackers, but also I liked the process of opening the can with its little key. I had a collection of such keys that I kept in a kitchen match box. They were T-shaped, with an oval loop at the top and a slot at the bottom. I think I cut my finger every time I removed the zip strip in order to free the key. Worth the pain, though, for now I had exactly twenty keys. I might well corner the market someday when I invented a purpose for them.

Five-thirty. I went back to the front window and scrubbed another peek hole. It had turned cold enough again to halt the ice melt. Small drips of water from the icicles were still poised but now unable to fall. The woods trail was empty and the encroaching darkness had obscured the farthest point of it. I lit the kerosene lantern from the fireplace mantle and balanced it on the outside window frame to serve as a beacon for the men to find their way home. Good thinking.

By eight that evening, KWOZ was off the air. I had hoped to catch a weather bulletin or maybe some news of our missing neighbors. I scanned the dial. I heard only distant murmurs of voices; none clear enough to understand. I caught part of a verse of a Bobby Darin song before it drifted away. I sang the remainder of the song a cappella. 

My father always enforced a 9:00pm bedtime. Not just for me, but for him as well. But this night I was participating in a calamity and believed I had dispensation to await his return no matter what the hour. To bolster my sense of authority and stem the rise of worry, I retrieved my detective shoe box from under the bed. In it was a pistol my dad had carved from a block of cedar. It fired rubber bands and was quite authentic-looking. He had nicely checkered the grips and had sanded and shellacked the weapon to a glassy shine. In there too was my detective badge, fashioned from a fruit jar lid and safety pin. On it he had painted the words Nick Carter, G-Man. I pinned it to the pocket of my pajama top and stuck the pistol in my waistband. Also, from the box I revisited my Official Detective Papers, a typewritten letter of certification and introduction. It was also my G-Man License, complete with red wax seal. Oddly, it had been issued and signed by Neptunus Rex who my dad said was the ruler of all the seven seas. This may have been the most official person my dad could recall at the time, given his former US Navy stint.

Armed with weapon and bona-fide credentials, I resumed my watch at the window. At some point I dozed, but was quickly startled awake. My eyes opened to the bobbing of a host of flashlight beams coming up the woods trail. I ran to the door to greet the searchers. 

The house was quickly filled with tired men, soiled overcoats and scratched faces and hands. My dad made coffee as a mingled drone of voices began to recount details of the search. In the center of the huddle sat Carl Rowe and his son Bobby, shrouded in a mound of my Granny Stell’s old quilts. Bobby’s face was ashen. His lips were like grape Jello, vibrating to the rhythm of chattering teeth. 

   The story soon evolved into a tale of adventure gone bad. Mr Rowe and Bobby were rabbit hunting that early morning. They lost their way and were unable to get home before the storm arrived. They were not dressed for rain and ice and had become completely disoriented in the wild thicket. Eventually, knowing the terrain better than most, my dad recalled a favorite rabbit hunting ravine at the foot of Summit Ridge. Here he found them huddled under a shallow ledge of granite.

Carl Rowe and Bobby curled up next to our stove for the night rather than heading for home in the dark. The searchers soon left with final gushes of “Thank You! Thank You!” to usher them home. The room was quiet again. I slid into my bunk and looked deep into my dad’s eyes as he tucked me in. Here was a new hero for me, a defining moment in my life.

As I closed my eyes I thought: Tomorrow will be a day with new stature! My dad would be an even bigger legend than Daniel Boone. 

Yes, I thought, his actions had been exactly the way old Neptunus Rex would have handled it.

* * * 

The author’s three collections of short stories, Tailwind, Odie Dodie, and Riders of the Seven Hills are available at all traditional booksellers. Copies signed by the author  may be obtained by contacting him directly via  pogo@shreve.net or by  accessing his web page at:  http://laddiemoore.blogspot.com/

~~~

The story featured here holds © Copyright 2010 by the author, Lad Moore. All rights reserved.

Image © by Dreamstime, used by compensated license.

By Ron Munden

It is with great regret that I must report the untimely death of Billy Bob Rae in the early morning hours of December 27.   Details of his death are still sketchy, but this is what we currently know.

Mr. Rae celebrated Christmas with a group of friends at a cabin on Caddo Lake. 

Santa was good to Mr. Rae this year.  Inspired by the song, “The Twelve Days of Christmas” Santa left 12 6-packs of beer under the Christmas tree for Billy Bob.  Mr. Rae spent most of Christmas day sampling his presents.

On Thursday morning Mr. Rae called the electrical contractor he was working for and requested sick leave due to a bad headache.  Witness reports say Mr. Rae recovered by noon and he and his friends consumed all his Christmas presents by early evening.  Mr. Rae’s friends decided to go home and declared Christmas a success. 

It is reported Mr. Rae told his friends that they were not half the man he was, and he said he was going to a local bar, have a few drinks, and find a hot woman to go to bed with.  He said that he was feelings lucky. 

The bartender said that Mr. Rae did have numerous beers that evening and did leave with “a date.”   Mr. Rae’s last words on leaving the bar were, “Honey you’re about to see sparks!”

Mr. Rae’s date told police that the two went to a nearby motel and had “wild sex” until early morning when they both fell asleep.

Rae’s date said they both woke when morning light spilled into the room.  The date continued, “When Billy Bob opened his eyes and they stared into each other’s eyes, Billy Bob screamed ‘My GOD WHAT HAVE I DONE?’ His body shook and he collapsed.

Paramedics were unable to revive Mr. Rea.  The coroner believes that Mr. Rae died of a massive heart attack, but tests are pending.

Mr. Rae’s date, John Jones – age 63 – said that he had no idea what could have caused Mr. Rae’s heart attack.

Billy Bob Rae – dead at 56.  He did not die with his boots on, actually he died with nothing on, but he was a good man.  He loved his beer and his WOMEN!

Services are pending.

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Give George Smith feedback on his articles.

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Global warming will strike hardest against the very people we’re told to love: the poor and vulnerable.

By Katharine Hayhoe — Oct. 31, 2019 — New York Times

Dr. Hayhoe is a professor and co-directs the Climate Center at Texas Tech University.

I’m a climate scientist. I’m also an evangelical Christian.

And I’m Canadian, which is why it took me so long to realize the first two things were supposed to be entirely incompatible.

I grew up in a Christian family with a science-teacher dad who taught us that science is the study of God’s creation. If we truly believe that God created this amazing universe, bringing matter and energy to life out of a formless empty void of nothing, then how could studying his creation ever be in conflict with his written word?

I chose what to study precisely because of my faith, because climate change disproportionately affects the poor and vulnerable, those already most at risk today. To me, caring about and acting on climate was a way to live out my calling to love others as we’ve been loved ourselves by God.

I realized, distantly, that there were people on both “sides” who fundamentally believed and were even dedicated to promoting the idea that faith and science were in conflict. But it wasn’t until after I’d moved to the United States for graduate school that it dawned on me, to my disbelief, that divisions within the science-faith arena, originally focused on questions of human origins and the age of the universe, were expanding to include climate change.

Now, this discrepancy is pointed out to me nearly every day: often by people with Bible verses in their social media profiles who accuse me of spreading Satan’s lies, or sometimes by others who share my concerns about climate change but wonder why I bother talking to “those people.” The attacks I receive come via email, Twitter, Facebook comments, phone calls and even handwritten letters.

I track them all, and I’ve noticed two common denominators in how most of the authors choose to identify themselves: first, as political conservatives, no matter what country they’re from; and second, in the United States, as conservative Christians, because the label “evangelical” has itself been co-opted as shorthand for a particular political ideology these days.

But I refuse to give it up, because I am a theological evangelical, one of those who can be simply defined as someone who takes the Bible seriously. This stands in stark contrast to today’s political evangelicals, whose statement of faith is written first by their politics and only a distant second by the Bible and who, if the two conflict, will prioritize their political ideology over theology.

I’m not a glutton for punishment and I don’t thrive on conflict. So why do I keep talking about climate change to people who are disengaged or doubtful? Because I believe that evangelicals who take the Bible seriously already care about climate change (although they might not realize it). Climate change will strike hard against the very people we’re told to care for and love, amplifying hunger and poverty, and increasing risks of resource scarcity that can exacerbate political instability, and even create or worsen refugee crises.

Then there’s pollution, biodiversity loss, habitat fragmentation, species extinction: climate change makes all those worse, too. In fact, if we truly believe we’ve been given responsibility for every living thing on this planet (including each other) as it says in Genesis 1, then it isn’t only a matter of caring about climate change: We should be at the front of the line demanding action.

But if caring about climate change is such a profoundly Christian value, then why do surveys in the United States consistently show white evangelicals and white Catholics at the bottom of those Americans concerned about the changing climate?

It turns out, it’s not where we go to church (or don’t) that determines our opinion on climate. It’s not even our religious affiliation. Hispanic Catholics are significantly more likely than other Catholics to say the earth is getting warmer, according to a 2015 survey, and they have the same pope. It’s because of the alliance between conservative theology and conservative politics that has been deliberately engineered and fostered over decades of increasingly divisive politics on issues of race, abortion and now climate change, to the point where the best predictor of whether we agree with the science is simply where we fall on the political spectrum.

An important and successful part of that framing has been to cast climate change as an alternate religion. This is sometimes subtle, as the church sign that reads, “On Judgment Day, you’ll meet Father God not Mother Earth.” Other times this point is made much more blatantly, like when Senator Ted Cruz of Texas told Glenn Beck in 2015 that “climate change is not a science, it’s a religion,” or when Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said at a 2014 event hosted by the Council on Foreign Relations that “the problem is Al Gore’s turned this thing into a religion.”

Why is this framing so effective? Because some 72 percent of people in the United States already identify with a specific religious label, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center. And if you are a Christian, you know what to do when a false prophet comes along preaching a religion that worships the created rather than the Creator: Reject it!

So this framing plays right into the narrative that scientists are a godless bunch who have teamed up with liberals (and perhaps the Antichrist, according to some comments I’ve received) to rule the world and overthrow religion, an agenda that any right-minded believer will oppose until his or her dying breath. In fact, 51 percent of scientists said in a 2009 Pew survey that they believed in God or a universal spirit or higher power.

And that’s why my favorite question is the one I often hear from fellow Christians: “Do you believe in climate change?”

One of the first times I remember being asked this it was by a visitor to the evangelical church I attend here in Texas, who was surprised (and possibly a little horrified) to learn that the pastor’s wife was a climate scientist.

“No, I don’t!” I cheerfully replied.

A puzzled silence ensued. Wary of calling out the pastor’s wife, the man haltingly asked, “But aren’t you … didn’t you just say you study climate science?”

“That’s right,” I said with an encouraging nod.

“So how can you not believe in it?!” he asked, perplexed.

And with that question, he opened the door to an incredibly constructive conversation about science, faith and truth. As I always do now when someone asks this, I explained that climate change is not a belief system. We know that the earth’s climate is changing thanks to observations, facts and data about God’s creation that we can see with our eyes and test with the sound minds that God has given us. And still more fundamentally, I went on to explain why it matters: because real people are being affected today; and we believe that God’s love has been poured in our hearts to share with our brothers and sisters here and around the world who are suffering.

After hundreds, even thousands, of such conversations, I’ve grown to understand how much of this opposition to the idea that the climate is changing, that humans are responsible, that the impacts are serious and that the time to act is now, comes from fear: fear of loss of our way of life, fear of being told that our habits are bad for society, fear of changes that will leave us worse off, fear of siding with those who have no respect for our values and beliefs.

But as a Christian, I believe the solution to this fear lies in the same faith that many non-Christians wrongly assume drives our rejection of the science. In the Apostle Paul’s letter to Timothy, he reminds us that we have not been given a spirit of fear. Fear is not from God. Instead, we’ve been given a spirit of power, to act rather than to remain paralyzed in anxiety, fear, or guilt; a spirit of love, to have compassion for others, particularly those less fortunate than us (the very people most affected by a changing climate); and a sound mind, to use the information we have to make good decisions.

And you know what? These are the very tools we need to address climate change.

Connecting our identity to action is key, and that’s exactly why I don’t typically begin with science when starting conversations about climate change with those who disagree. Rather, I begin by talking about what we share most. For some, this could be the well-being of our community; for others, our children; and for fellow Christians, it’s often our faith.

By beginning with what we share and then connecting the dots between that value and a changing climate, it becomes clear how caring about this planet and every living thing on it is not somehow antithetical to who we are as Christians, but rather central to it. Being concerned about climate change is a genuine expression of our faith, bringing our attitudes and actions more closely into line with who we already are and what we most want to be.

And that’s why I’m more convinced now than ever that the two most central parts of my identity — that of climate scientist and evangelical Christian — aren’t incompatible. They are what’s made me who I am.

Katharine Hayhoe is a climate scientist at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, where she co-directs the Climate Center, hosts the PBS digital series “Global Weirding” and is writing a book on how to talk about climate change with people who don’t agree.

By George Smith

To all my friends and detractors who are due-hard supporters of President Donald Trump: He is either not smart, senility is being thrust upon him…or  combination of both.

Wait! Don’t flip to the Cute Cat YouTube site just yet!

If he was smart Trump would know when to immerse himself in a cone of silence, he would know that imparting  his personal brand of wisdumb is counterproductive to advancing conservative values and he would stop lying about anything that can be easily checked.

His supporters can like his stances on abortion (on this issue he is a chameleon, changing sides like Jackie O changed White House sheets). 

He laments the influx of dark-skinned immigrants, which thrills rhe racists that help up his base. 

He embraces the worst of the world’s worst dictators. 

He undermines the security of this country by flubberlipping secrets to foreign powers.

Yet, to his faithful, he is the “stable genius” he proclaims.

Do stabie geniuses use terms like “powerful concrete” when talking about a border fence? 

Does a stable genius have to be told by an agency official he is making public classified information at a press conference?

Do stable geniuses lie spontaneously about issues and people that are easily checked with a Google search?

Are stable geniuses prone to publicly lambast individuals because of disabilities, skin color, religious preference or economic status?

Trump is a self-destructive buffoon, a spoiled rich man-child, a self-promoter with a one-sided dubious history of unethical business dealings, abusive  personal relationships and of demanding loyalty while never giving it in return.

Trump, as an ethical leader in business and in the business of politics, is a dismal failure.

As president he has let his country and the world down.

History will punish his childish antics harshly. Believers in democracy can only hope that American voters will punish him in 13 months.

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By George Smith

Partisan.

Party.

Politics.

Those are the elements that are governing this country and until elected officials – like Texas Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn and First District Rep. Louie Gohmert – start working to govern for the entire country instead of an off-balanced off-shoot of so-called conservatives, the cauldron of corruption and chaos the U.S. is immersed tight this minute in will continue.

“With malice toward none, with charity for all…let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind this nation’s wounds.”

Those words, written on a sheet of paper while riding in a steam-powered locomotive by Republican President Abraham Lincoln, were uttered one month before the end of the Civil War.

Today, this nation is in another civil war that, once again, pits father against son, brother against brother; it is tearing families, churches, purveyors of all religions, institutions of learning and neighbors apart. This modern war is an internal struggle among peers, pitting mindsets and single-issue policies and beliefs against one another with no regard for the position of agreeing to disagree or “live and let live.”

The war of today is a tragedy of the upmost importance to the future of the people, the country and of democracy. This war is not about slavery or states rights or populist ideas vs. established traditions; is about the survival of the United States of America, once the most powerful and benevolent on the planet, but no longer.

Followers of and believers in Donald J. Trump fall into four main categories: Citizens who want to end abortion by any means; those who believe the hype that Trump the Businessman knows how to run a country better than a politician; believers that Hillary Clinton and left-wing “fruit-loops” are to be destroyed, and;  haters…those that hate what they cannot understand, what they fear, hate the position they find themselves in the totem pole rankings of life or what they believe is an abomination according to Old Testament scripture.

Most citizens with common sense can understand the primary conservative  “abortion” argument: It is a ideological concept that goes to the heart and soul of each individual. It is totally valid to feel a kinship with the unborn…any unborn, just as it is valid to believe that politicians (mostly white, old men) should not be  implementing laws that govern what occurs between a woman and her doctor.

Those that believe Trump is “brilliant” businessman have a valid point if only dollars and property accumulated is the lone factor considered.

Hating Hillary, to many, is second-nature to many; she is not overly charismatic, not warm and cuddly (like President Clinton) and holds grudges until the sun revolves around the Earth. Even many people that voted for her twice get it.

The hate-anyone-gay (or hating immigrants, people of color or because of personal religion) is harder for many to understand. We all come from immigrant families (even Native Americas); this country is, like it or not, a cornucopia of the world’s people.

For more than four decades, I have written newspaper editorials and columns declaring that this country needed a businessman as president instead of a born-and-bred politician or military leader. Where my reasoning and writings fell short was that I failed to distinguish what type of businessman should be elected.

What I envisioned in my finite wisdumb (spelled correctly) was that a common-sense businessman who would gather cabinet heads and advisers from both parties, the best of the best who truly believed in the reasons the United States was founded. Party politics be damned! Let’s create a nation of which we can all be prpud.

The last president to do this exact execution of filling the nation’s most important offices and executive positions (the best of the best and even some who hted the very sight of him) was Abraham Lincoln. Doris Kerns Goodwin’s “Team of Rivals” is a masterful insight into a man who many career politicians mocked, yet when he died, they all mourned his passing.

There is no more “party of Lincoln”. There is no more Republican Party. The 2019 version is the party of Trump and those that support him – the Cruzes, Cronyns, Gohmerts, etc. – will someday look back on the blind followers of this narcissistic political chameleon and shake their heads in sorrow.

We are witnesses, day by day, story by story, of the end of the Republican Party, the strong political organization that now believes in whatever Trumps dictates in important rather than in what philosophical path the party has traditionally followed.

Mark it down: When Trump leaves office, now that he’s tasted real power (and not just power obtained by the almighty dollar), he will not go quietly into that good night. He will start DJT Network, keep his base supporters glued to this electronic spiel of mistrust and hate 24/7 and the third party he will start (Keep America Great!) will ensure the Republicans will never, ever again win a national election.

If you are a Republican, this is the path on your party is headed.

“…all the people who were with him each covered his head and went up weeping….” 2 Samuel 15:30

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