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bailesu · 6 years ago

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July 4, 1776, 1863, and 2018

Warning: I hate Trump with a burning atomic fury and what follows is a mixture of my family’s history, America’s history and me damning Trump to burn in Hell for eternity. If you don’t want to read that, skip the read more and go on. I totally understand.

This is the America’s day, for good and for ill, for America has been both a great country and a terrible one. We sent men to the moon and set high ideals of equality and freedom... then failed to live up to them again and again. I love my country, but sometimes it drives me crazy. Its past is full of glory and horror, good deeds and terrible deeds, and above all greatness, but greatness can be wonderful or horrible.

On this day in 1776, the Continental Congress issued a document which declared American Independence. But not just Independence. It laid out the idea that all men are created equal by God, with inalienable rights of life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. This high ideal thus became one of the foundation stones of America.

It was written by a man who owned dozens of slaves and had children by one of them, who he continued to own. Thomas Jefferson managed to embody both our highest ideals and our greatest depravities.

One in four Americans were slaves in 1776. Women could not vote and neither could White Men who lacked Property. Child abuse was the normal way you raised your kids. Threatening to murder your political rivals was basically normal. One of our great leaders of the Revolution, Sam Adams, was basically a man who organized riots and lynching. (Lynching of people who served Britain, rather than Blacks, but lynching is murder, whoever the victim.)

By any modern standard, America in 1776 was a terrible place, a land carved out by killing Native Americans directly to take their land and indirectly by disease. (Mind you, every nation, including the ones we killed off, has a history of killing neighbors and taking their land; the nations without that history died.)

But it was also the seedbed of modernity; it became a democracy, if not a very good one, and its ideals still ring across the ages and have provided leverage to every group trying to get fair treatment instead of stomping. We helped inspire the French Revolution and the rise of Nationalism. In 1945, when Vietnam declared Independence from France, the first lines of their declaration read:

All men are created equal; they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights; among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. This immortal statement was made in the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America in 1776. In a broader sense, this means: All the peoples on the earth are equal from birth, all the peoples have a right to live, to be happy and free.

America has always struggled with the tension between this high ideal and the deeds our country has done which are not high or noble. We often fail, but on this day, we have to look again to this ideal and work to make it real.

My own ancestors were all tangled up in this mess. Three Quaker Brothers fled to America to escape persecution and the loss of their family’s lands due to the British Civil Wars, settling in Pennsylvania. One of the brothers, Thomas, eventually went South to North Carolina. He is my ancestor, and his family soon came to own slaves. They were never top-tier slaveowners but they prospered.

If you are a White Southerner, your ancestors either owned slaves, supported the slave system without owning slaves, or both, unless they came South very recently. We all have to deal with that legacy. Many in the South don’t want to, but if this country is ever to heal the wounds inflicted by over 250 years of slavery, then we have to.

During the Revolution, Thomas’s son, also named Thomas, fought in the Revolution. By killing Cherokees; they allied with the British to save their lands and they found out the hard way that Britain couldn’t help them. On this day, 1776, he was sitting in a military camp, but soon they would return and drive the Cherokee out of part of North Carolina and all of South Carolina. (Ironically, many years later, a member of the Richardson family would marry a Cherokee woman and their later descendant would marry one of Thomas’ descendants.) He may eventually have fought the British, but we have no record of it.

Thomas’ grandson, William Alexander Christopher Biles, was born on the plantation. His family made him go pick cotton with the slaves a lot but we don’t know why exactly; it would serve him well later when his family lost everything but we have to assume that he probably hated it at the time. William’s father was too old to fight (In his 70s!) but William was not. He fought in a North Carolina regiment and was shot and stabbed repeatedly, including having his skull cut open and a gut wound. This happened during Pickett’s Charge, so he was left behind in Union hands; a doctor, his name lost, operated and saved his life after initial triage had said he wasn’t worth trying to save. Whoever he was, he was a miracle worker, because somehow he saved WAC’s life, though he had a plate in his head for the rest of his life. In fact, he *escaped* from the hospital and returned to duty until the final surrender at Appomatox! We don’t know his motives for fighting, but it was probably a mixture of wanting to save slavery and loyalty to his state. It would be nice if I could say he was anti-slavery, but he wasn’t even the Jeffersonian kind of anti-slavery, where you still own slaves, but you do limit slavery’s growth somewhat. By 1860, your choices were basically either to say ‘SLAVERY IS AWESOME’ or flee to the North, that far South. (In the border states, you could say ‘I hate black people, so I want to end slavery so I can get rid of them’. This is not a huge moral step forward.)

His family’s estates unravelled; the Biles clan did not know how to get by without slaves. He went west to Missouri and worked with his brother a while, then became a farmer; he was not good at either, but his cotton-picking skills enabled him to get by; I can only imagine he found it rather humiliating. And as a slaveowner, he deserved humiliating.

To be White in America carries the shame of having ancestors who did terrible stuff. Some of it was so accepted you can’t blame them too much but others *could* have done better and didn’t. The essential problem of being descended of the winners is that they probably did terrible things to win. (And the problem of being descended of those who lost is that your ancestors got thrown down the stairs and lost it all.)

I don’t feel guilt for my ancestors, but I do feel responsibility. I cannot control what they did, but I do benefit from it and part of my response to that has to be to try and make a better America, to help overcome our worst impulses. And I do that by teaching, so that those coming up will understand our past, why we did terrible things, and how we can do better. (And how we did awesome things too, because the hardest part of history is that the same people can do wonders and horrors at once.)

Which brings us to the now. I was describing 1920s and 30s fascism to my students and one said, “So, basically, Trump.”

And it’s certainly way too close. I am lucky; as a White Man, I am automatically spared much of the worst of Trump and his idiot followers. This country has always been tilted in my favor.

Trump embodies pretty much all of America’s past sins, but also is basically the biggest drooling idiot who has ever sat in the White House, making even Harding look like a supergenius. He knows how to work his audience, but he’s utterly incompetent at governing, to the extent you can call it governing. He embodies sexism, racism, egomania, and cruelty. He is a man who instinctively degrades and bullies everyone around him, who has cheated on all of his wives and abused his mistresses, a rapist, a thug, and a cheat. He is a horrible human being in almost every possible way. Many people who claim to be Christian flock to him because they have flushed Christ down the toilet long ago, but unfortunately, flushing Christ down the toilet has a long history in American religion.

If there is a hell, Trump is going to roast in it and if there is not, we’ll have to make one just for him. I want to see him fall like Lucifer from Heaven, if Lucifer fell into a mixture of broken glass, shards of metal, and lava. But it’s important to remember, Trump is not some alien aberration; he incarnates real American flaws, mixed with his personal flaws of being a pig-ignorant, aggressively anti-thinking man-baby molester of women with vast wealth he has always abused to shield himself from consequences. Racism, sexism, greed, and so on all have a long history in this country. And his supporters voted for him with their eyes wide open. We cannot expect any better from them.

America has a huge cancer and that cancer often has been driving the national bus, so to speak. And getting rid of it is going to be a long fight. But bringing change to this country is always a long, hard fight.

So on this Fourth of July, fuck Trump to hell, along with all his shitty supporters. We have nearly two more years of this shithole before we can toss him on his ass. (Impeachment takes 2/3rds in the Senate, so it’s not happening even if we take both houses, I fear). May we sweep the Republican party, which has devolved from the people who ended slavery to a resting place for all of America’s sins, into the garbage pile in November and again in two years. Growing up in America means I’ve watched the Republican party gradually mutate into a degenerate, feral hate society run by a mixture of greed, racism, and fake Christianity.

Fuck the Republican party and all the morons who vote for it, whichever one of the Seven Deadly Sins drives them to spew hatred, abuse immigrants, rob the poor to make the rich richer, and to destroy all our alliances and trade relations. They chose a feral animal as President, a molester and a bully, and I hope he destroys them all.

May they all eat shit and die.

#In Short #Our President is a pile of shit #But he represents America's Shit #So We have to deal with that #History

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littleharpethcrossfit · 2 years ago

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Sunday, 24 July, 2022.......... Warmup..........Deadlifts........ “DIZZY”......Arboretum Loop.

WOW !! It’s HOT ! It’s a good thing we aren’t near any ocean, because the oceans are rising fast and we would all drown.

The Admiral led us in a fine mobility and stretching session.

Warmup:

On a 2 Minute Clock:

50 Hollow-Rocks followed by Plank until time expires. No Score. Dana was our demo model.

Strength WOD:

DEADLIFTS:

20 Minutes to Achieve the Heaviest 2 Rep Max You Can Do Today.

Chase=375 Armando/Bernie=345 Timmy=315 Herb/Coach=275 Scott=255 Sabrina=85 Anna=245 Dana=225 Joe=195 Shannon=125 Alicia/Clara=95 Camille/Will=75 Shane/Robert/Miss Linda/Cheri/Manny/Esther/Hannah and several others=no posting

The Metabolic Conditioner:

“DIZZY”

25 ROUNDS For Time

5 Sit-Ups ( E=GHDs )

3 Toe’s To Bars

1 Deadlift ( 70 to 80 % of your above 2 rep max )

AFTER EVERY 5 ROUNDS OF THE ABOVE, ( 5, 10, 15, 20, 25th )

Run 200 / Row-Ski 250 / Bike ERG 500m.

Elites

Shane=26:24 Dana=28:28 Anna=30:37

RXers:

Chase=21:59 Sue=22:56 Timmy=24:30 Robert=24:47 Herb=26:50 Armando=29:40 Bernie=29:49 Esther/Hannah=no post

Scaled:

Linda=24:44 Clare=25:30 Camille=25:34 Alicia=25:40 Coach=27:00 Shannon=27:50 Will/Scott=29:45 Joe=30:12 Sabrina=32:21 Manny/Cheri=no post

Cool-Down:

Run/Jog/Walk the shady Arboretum Loop (1.1 mIle) while carrying something heavy. ( MedBall/Kettlebell/Wreck Bag....etc) The Schwartz family and Anna and Chase participated. Others I did not see.

NOTE:

Obviously this WOD is a lot about turnover...Going from 1 exercise to the next with minimal rest/delay. Please avoid the temptation to do 25 Sit-ups/15 T2B/and 5 Deadlifts just because you want to win. Have fun.

A friend of Esther’s from CrossFit Nolensville came to play. Hannah has been doing CF for awhile and competes in a regional levels of box competition. She did great, got a T-shirt, and the invite back.

There are about 10 years difference between Clara’s and Grandson Beckham’s ages, but you’d never know it from watching their 15 minute interaction after today’s WOD. From a distance I could not tell who was charming who, but they seemed to be really enjoying each other’s company. In my experience, it is very unusual that youngsters that far apart in age willingly have anything to do with one another. They are both very special kids with very special parents. There is hope for our civilization after all.

Tuesday at 4 PM. Pray for much needed rain. I don’t care if it rains on our workout.

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ts1989fanatic · 6 years ago

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When Taylor Swift came to town

Taylor Swift loves playing in Massachusetts — at least, playing at Gillette Stadium. Since first headlining there in 2010, Swift has sold out the venue seven times, on four tours. The music video for her song “Sparks Fly” takes footage from her live performance at Gillette in 2011. “Foxborough is the first place that I realized it was a possibility to play”to more than 100,000 fans “in two days,” she reportedlytold the crowd. “My time in Foxborough will be filed under one of the greatest times in my life.”

This week, Swift — who has long made headlines for offstage romances, breakups, and celebrity beefs — is upping the ante with three nights at Gillette, as part of a seven-month, four-continent tour.

Here’s a look back at 10 years of Swift’s performances in Massachusetts.

When: Sept. 13, 2008

Where: Comcast Center, Mansfield

Onstage: At just 18 years old, Swift opened for country megastars Rascal Flatts on their “Still Feels Good” tour. Her first song was “I’m Only Me When I’m With You,” which Rolling Stone panned as one of Swift’s worst compositions. Just two months later, Swift would drop “Fearless,” an album that would go on to be diamond certified (sales and streaming equivalent sales of at least 10 million units), win album of the year at the Grammys, and launch her career.

Offstage: From July to October 2008, Swift dated teen star Joe Jonas. Their breakup inspired the song “Forever & Always,” a last-minute addition to “Fearless.”

When: July 31, 2009

Where: TD Garden, Boston

Onstage: Amid her own “Fearless” tour, Swift opened for Keith Urban. In Boston, she performed 11 songs, starting with “You Belong With Me,” one of her biggest hits. Just six weeks later, the song’s music video would win Swift best female video at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, a ceremony famously interrupted by Kanye West.

Offstage: Only 19, Swift was vaulted to superstardom. That year, she was named Billboard’s artist of the year, appeared in the film “Valentine’s Day” and the “CSI” TV series, hosted “Saturday Night Live,” and dated teen heartthrob Taylor Lautner. Oh, and “Fearless” would be the best-selling album of the year.

When: June 5, 2010

Where: Gillette Stadium, Foxborough

Onstage: Before Swift took the stage for the first time at Gillette, fans saw three openers: Gloriana, Kellie Pickler, and a 16-year-old from Canada named Justin Bieber. Swift closed her encore with “Should’ve Said No,” a song that has resurfaced on her current tour.

Offstage: In the late spring of 2010, rumors began swirling that Swift was dating “Glee” actor Cory Monteith. Some have guessed that her song “Mine,” released in August 2010, is about him. (Neither Swift nor Monteith, who died in 2013, ever confirmed the rumors.)

When: June 25-26, 2011

Where: Gillette Stadium, Foxborough

Onstage: Swift’s second round at Gillette came amid her “Speak Now” world tour. She opened with “Sparks Fly,” footage of which formed much of the song’s music video. She closed with “Love Story,” a song she has performed on every headlining tour.

Offstage: Though a crossover artist by 2011, country music wasn’t ready to relinquish its claim on Swift: She won the Country Music Association’s entertainer of the year award, having previously won in 2009. She also won her fourth songwriter/artist of the year award from the Nashville Songwriters Association International, and was named entertainer of the year by the Academy of Country Music.

When: July 2, 2012

Where: Tanglewood, Lenox

Onstage: Swift, 22 years old, made a guest appearance with James Taylor, and the two Taylors — Swift has said she was named after the Boston-born balladeer — performed a duet of “Fire and Rain,” his 1970 megahit. She also performed her hit songs “Ours” and “Love Story,” and left to a standing ovation.

Offstage: From July through September, Swift dated 18-year-old political legacy Conor Kennedy, grandson of Robert F. Kennedy. The two were seen on a Hyannis Port beach, and in August Swift bought her own Cape Cod home — seven bedrooms, five bathrooms, at $4.9 million — near the Kennedys. She sold it the next spring, at a profit.

When: July 26-27, 2013

Where: Gillette Stadium, Foxborough

Onstage: Openers included Ed Sheeran, who has become one of the UK’s all-time best-selling artists. Swift closed with “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” a pop hit reportedly about ex-boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal.

Offstage: “The Red Tour” would gross over $150 million, and in 2013 Swift was named artist of the year at the American Music Awards. After breaking up with One Direction singer Harry Styles in January, her high-profile love life took a pause. That year, Swift bought a beach mansion in Watch Hill, R.I.

When: Aug. 3, 2014

Where: Boston Children’s Hospital

Onstage: Swift made a surprise appearance at the hospital to visit Jordan Lee Nickerson, a 6-year-old leukemia patient from Rhode Island. Swift and Nickerson played air hockey, and he asked her to play her favorite song. She serenaded his private hospital room with “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.”

Offstage: In the spring of 2014, Swift moved to New York City and began work on “1989,” an album of bona-fide pop anthems. Two weeks after the hospital visit, she released “Shake It Off,” which currently has more than 2.6 billion views on YouTube.

When: July 24-25, 2015

Where: Gillette Stadium, Foxborough

Onstage: On the “1989” world tour, which would reach some 2.2 million fans and earn $250 million in revenue, Swift greeted the Foxborough crowd with the album’s first track: “Welcome to New York.” Openers included Vance Joy, Shawn Mendes, and Haim.

Offstage: In March, Swift began dating Scottish singer, DJ, and record producer Calvin Harris. The two would break up the following year. That same spring, Swift’s mother was diagnosed with cancer. She asked her fans to encourage their parents to get checked for any health problems.

When: July 26-28, 2018

Where: Gillette Stadium, Foxborough

Onstage: On her “Reputation” stadium tour thus far, Swift has performed songs from her new album (including “. . . Ready for It?,” “I Did Something Bad,” and “Look What You Made Me Do”) and past hits (“Shake It Off,” “Blank Space,” “Sparks Fly”). Openers include Charli XCX and Camila Cabello.

Offstage: With a net worth over $320 million, according to Forbes, Swift remains a leader of pop (“Reputation” was globally the second-best-selling album of 2017, behind only “÷” by her former opener Ed Sheeran). Critics were mixed on “Reputation,” and less-than-stellar ticket sales on this tour have led some to wonder if her star has dimmed. By the end of the weekend, we’ll know where the Foxborough faithful stand.

TAYLOR SWIFT LEGEND AT 28

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brokenangelwings22 · 3 years ago

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I posted 965 times in 2021

45 posts created (5%)

920 posts reblogged (95%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 20.4 posts.

I added 1,178 tags in 2021

#ichihime - 250 posts

#ichigo kurosaki - 207 posts

#orihime inoue - 192 posts

#my ultimate otp - 175 posts

#bleach - 86 posts

#ichigo x orihime - 67 posts

#ichiori - 57 posts

#lucifer spoilers - 51 posts

#renruki - 49 posts

#renji abarai - 44 posts

Longest Tag: 78 characters

#gotta say having a degree in english doesn’t exactly apply to a japanese comic

My Top Posts in 2021

Isshin: My four year old grandson checked me over with his doctors kit and said "you're too old. I think you should stop breathing now", then told me to give him 600 thousand. His bedside manner is appalling and I need to remortgage my house to pay him. Do not recommend.

24 notes • Posted 2021-07-05 00:09:24 GMT

Here's probably my only entry for IHweek. I've finally returned to writing. This is an excerpt from chapter 2 of my story Come Back Down to Earth. You can read the first chapter either on AO3 or FanFiction

Confession (IHweek 7/4) Please enjoy!

Chapter 2: Crawled In and Never Left

Give me the chance to tonight

I'll prove to you what's in my eyes

(It’s My Turn To Fly - The Urge - Titan AE soundtrack 2000)

Ichigo considered himself a reasonable man, but his patience was growing thin with his roommate.

“C’mon, man! You had a solid chance with Hime last night!” Renji pleaded with him. “Why are you so obtuse?”

“That’s an awfully big word for you.” Ichigo rolled his eyes at his friend. “Ever think of taking your own advice with Rukia?”

Renji let out a long suffering sigh. “You’re both hopeless, and therefore perfect for each other.”

“I’m perfectly happy with how things are with Hime. I don’t want to chance it.”

Renji pulled out a box of pretzel sticks from the cupboard. He fixed a concerned look on his face, and the seriousness unnerved Ichigo.

“Look. I’m not gonna force you. Even if I think you’re absolutely nuts not to. I will, however, point out that you’re an idiot for not telling her how you feel.” Renji pulled out a piece of pretzel and pointed it at Ichigo to emphasize his thought. “You’re gonna lose her one day if you continue to be ridiculous.”

Ichigo narrowed his eyes as his scowl persisted. “You think I am not aware of that?”

Renji placed the stick between his teeth and grinned toothily. “Yup!”

A sleepy noise came from behind the two men just as Ichigo opened his mouth to snap at his friend.

“Mm morning guys,” Orihime yawned as she stepped into the kitchen. “Any coffee? It’s too early.”

“Sorry Hime. Were we too loud?” Ichigo asked, his previous scowl morphing to something more kind.

“No,” she murmured. Her voice was still thick with sleep. She stumbled a little, bumping into Ichigo. “Oh hi wall. You smell nice.” Orihime leaned into his chest and snuggled him.

There was a strangled sound from Renji as he watched the young woman wrap her arms loosely around Ichigo’s waist. Instinctively, Ichigo wrapped his arms around her to steady her.

“Renji,” Ichigo said softly as to not disturb Orihime. “Please brew some coffee for her.”

“Jeez if I had known that Hime could instantly dissolve your sour mood with an embrace, I’d handcuff you both together.” Renji grumbled and shook his head, walking over to the coffeemaker on the counter.

Ichigo hummed a distracted acknowledgement as he idly stroked Orihime’s long auburn hair. She snuggled into his broad chest further. “Thanks. I’ll move her back to her room.” He was already moving towards the living room as he heard Renji’s snarky reply.

“Oh take your time. I’m merely here to serve.”

~*~*~*~

Ichigo sighed heavily as he stepped out from Orihime’s room and shut the door behind him quietly. He turned to walk down the short hallway, only to stop dead in his tracks when he saw his two friends standing a few feet away with evil grins on their faces. Squaring his shoulders and fixing a glare at Renji and Rukia, he taunted “Don’t you both have something better to do? Like, absolutely anything?”

Rukia’s grin sharpened further. “Nah, we’re more interested in heckling you.”

Ichigo grumbled, raking his fingers through his unruly hair. “Yeah yeah. You’re both insufferable.”

See the full post

24 notes • Posted 2021-07-10 20:00:41 GMT

Future dialogue to Gravity’s Ascension, an IH RR dystopian AU fanfic I’m currently writing.

26 notes • Posted 2021-11-22 05:17:05 GMT

Renji: my 8 year old asked what happens when you drive over a stick of butter. I said "it'll flatten". She asked how I knew

Renji: *gesturing to the tire covered in butter* that's how we got here

Renji: So what I'm saying is, when we have a hypothesis in this house, we test it!

Renji: I'm also saying, my wife was away

30 notes • Posted 2021-07-05 00:18:13 GMT

Rukia: Our daughter is now refusing fruit for breakfast, saying she doesn't "like sweet things in the bitter morning"

Renji: So I guess it's safe to say that 3rd grade is when reality first kicks in

33 notes • Posted 2021-07-05 00:05:38 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

#my 2021 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review #long post #who's actually surprised though?

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iathings · 4 years ago

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2042 Will Be the Year of Galactic Ancestral Return 2042 will be the year of galactic ancestral return. Am I talking about Aliens? Read more to find out. 2019 was designated by Pan-Africans as the Year of Return. It marked 400 years since the first Africans were kidnapped and taken in chains to the Western world to labor as slaves. Several West African countries recognized the moniker and invited all Black people in the West to make pilgrimages back to Africa to rediscover our ancestral origins. Thousands of people accepted the offer, which kicked off a new era in the Black Consciousness movement in which Black people in the West are now seeing Africa in a whole new light. The Year of Return was timely because the brainwashing effect of popular culture had most of our people buying into several conspiracy theories that serve to increase our racial confusion. The worst is the White Supremacist initiate that claims that Slavery never existed in the Americas. They use the Moors, the original African sell-outs to spread the message that Slavery was a conflict between global empires that Africa lost. Africans then had to pay a debt of Involuntary Servitude to the British Empire. You can see these Moors on Social Media spreading mis-information about many Black Liberation icons including the most honorable Marcus Garvey. Some mother f-ers even claim that Marcus Garvey was an Agent sent by the British Monarchy to distract Black Americans from their indigenous rights to America because, according to him, the original Americans were Black, not Indian. They should go to some Indian Reservations with that shit and get their heads scalped. All this historical confusion is the result of our own lack of engagement with our true Spirituality. We have failed to maintain our history so now the white man knows more about our history than us. That is why they can manipulate it so easily. The same goes for the confusion about our true Spirituality, which goes all the way back to Africa where Cultism is on the rise in many regions. The HERU Interface of Black Consciousness is not into all the confusion. We have rediscovered our true Spirituality in the Dohgon. Now we know that the year of our galactic ancestral return will be 2042. It will be the year when our galactic ancestors reveal that they have been watching our progress and have returned to Earth to save us from Spiritual destruction. If you are alive in 2042, don’t look for our ancestors to return in spaceships though. Our ancestors are not Aliens, Reptilians, Luke Sky-walker, or any of the nonsense you see in movies. Our ancestors maybe far away in Space and Time but not in Spirit. That is because they are as omnipresent as a thought and have the ability to permutate from abstract energy to physical matter similar to how the Great Spirit that is the Universe creates itself. Our ancestors exist on another world that is a part of the Sirius Star system. The Sirius Star system is 8.5 Light Years from Earth. That means that Light takes eight and a half years to travel from there to here. If you were to travel there in a supersonic Jet, it would take you no less than 250 000 years to get there. That is because the maximum speed at which we can travel is only a small fraction of the speed of light. So how will our ancestors get here? Most people believe in a God but when you ask them where god is, they say everywhere because God is a Spirit; he is omnipresent. That means that most people are perfectly willing to believe in a concept with magical parameters even though they don’t quite understand how such a thing is possible. When you try to explain a more plausible concept to people, they will label you psychotic but we will persevere because we are working for those who desire a more ethical way of living. The Universe is an enormous place. In fact, it is so large that most of us have a hard time perceiving how large it actually is. Imagine that every Star is a trillion miles away from another Star and there are more Stars in the Universe than there are grains of sand on all the Beaches on Earth. Now imagine that the Universe is a trillion times larger than that. Physical Matter cannot travel faster than the speed of Light so if our ancestors are coming by 2042, logic would suggest that they should be on their way now but they aren’t, nor will they ever leave their world. They are simply waiting for the right conditions to exist so that they can travel here on pure dark energy waves. In order to understand how this transcendence will occur, you must first understand the Spiritual nature of the Universe as explained in Dohgon cosmogony. Dohgon cosmogony is an ancient understanding of the creation of the physical Universe. It was revealed to the Dohgon people thousands of years ago by their galactic ancestors from the Sirius Star system. Dohgon cosmogony explains that the physical realm emerged out of the abstract pure dark energy realm through a process known as the “Egg of Creation”. During this process, abstract waves of pure dark energy “fluxed” or cut into half waves until particles of Matter began to form. The formation of the first particle of matter, initiated Space and Time. Fast-forward trillions of years and the intelligence that is the Universe began to create living things by inserting a part of itself inside each individual organism. Each bit of the Great Spirit became a lesser Spirit and that Spirit generates an energy field known as a Soul. The Soul energy of each organism will eventually expire and die but the Spirit is omnipotent just like the Great Spirit. Every living organism that is conceived is immediately inhabited by a Spirit, which generates a Soul. New or lesser organisms receive a new piece of the Great Spirit while more complex organisms such as animals and humans receive the Souls of mature Spirits that have incarnated in life many times before. The Souls of humans incarnate in family lines. For instance; a great grandfather who died will incarnate inside a great grandson. The only problem is that the knowledge of the grandfather cannot re-emerge in the grandson except in exceptional circumstances such as a life saving intervention. In 2042 the Spirits of the ancestors of the Dohgon people will begin to re-incarnate in their descendants. It doesn’t matter where the Dohgon people have been scattered as a result of Slavery or voluntary migration. Furthermore, the knowledge of those distant relatives will be unlocked. Newborns will remember and grow to dispense the knowledge of their former lives on distant worlds to their relatives here on Earth. Sort of like the Indigo children we heard of a few years ago but much more intelligent. So why will this begin to happen in the year 2042 and not 2021? The answer is because 2042 is the year that the Light from the next great conjunction between Sirius A and Sirius B will begin to reach Earth. During this conjunction that happens every 50 years, the energy from the Stars increases. It is the ideal time for the ancestors of the Dohgon people who live near Sirius A and B to send their Souls to Earth. The Dohgon know this because they received the message from their ancestors during their last conjunction festival. The message said celebrate no more because we are coming. #2042 #yearofreturn #ancestors #SiriusA

Integral Dohgon

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crypto4all · 4 years ago

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Ripple Effect

By John E. Phillips and Mike Handley Searching for a buck, even a live one, sometimes requires widening the perimeter. Bo Holcombe wasn’t seeking a change of scenery when he varied from his routine on Dec. 13, 2014. He didn’t throw a dart or a rock. The Brierfield, Alabama, hunter’s choice to spend the evening in a different shooting house was more ripple than splash. The food plot it overlooked wasn’t among the three favored by the buck he’d been hunting, but it was the next closest. And since the buck had gone AWOL, proximity was as good a reason as any. For four years, Bo fantasized about shooting the enormous buck roaming his 850-acre lease in Bibb County, piney woods he shares with his son and son-in-law. He became aware of the studly whitetail through trail camera photographs. “This buck would show up randomly at different locations on the lease,” he said. “It was unpatternable.” Bo has been hunting whitetails for 39 years, and has harvested quite a few bucks and does with bow and rifle. He says The Ghost never stepped in front of his cameras during the daytime after its 4th birthday. “The first photographs I got of this buck were when it was a 31/2-year-old 8-pointer in velvet. Those were the only pictures I had of him in the daylight,” he said, adding that he pursued the deer almost every weekend during bow and gun seasons since learning of its existence. “In 2014, The Ghost seemed to be alternately visiting three different food plots, but only at night,” Bo said. “I rotated my hunting sites, so as not to put a lot of hunting pressure on him in any one area. “If I had my grandson, Nathan, or my nephew hunting with me, I’d let them take any legal buck or doe they wanted to harvest, while I held out for The Ghost,” he added. Bo decided to concentrate his efforts on the three green fields nearest a section he’d declared off-limits to hunting. “That 100 acres is so thick, I’m not sure a rabbit can get through it,” he said. “It’s bordered by a creek on one side and a highway on the other. Quite a few deer trails go into and out of that thicket, but there’s no way to hunt in there effectively. So, we’ve made it a sanctuary; no hunting allowed except on the outer edges.” To give the deer yet another reason to emerge from their hiding place, Bo planted a fourth food plot in the vicinity last year. “I never got a trail camera picture of The Ghost on the new food plot,” he said. On Dec. 13, Bo decided to give the other three food plots — The Ghost’s favorites — a break, and to try the new one. He climbed into his box stand about 3 p.m., hoping the usual mid-December rut might have the whitetails on their feet early.

“At about 4:50, I heard a couple of shots in the distance,” Bo said. “My son, Chris, who was also hunting the property, texted me: The deer must be moving.” Soon afterward, a 6-point buck stepped onto the green field Bo was watching. About 10 minutes later, The Ghost strolled in at the opposite end of the plot. “I thought my heart would jump out of my shirt,” he said. “I was breathing as heavily as if I’d run a 100-yard dash. He was the biggest buck I’d ever seen, about 100 yards away, facing me and feeding. “The 6-pointer got nervous and ran to the other end of the field. Finally, The Ghost turned toward the 6-pointer across the field, and I kept the crosshairs on him. I hesitated because I wanted to know that when and if I finally squeezed the trigger, he would go down,” Bo said. When the old buck was within 75 yards, it turned and gave Bo a broadside target. At the boom, the animal ran the length of the 4-acre field and collapsed. Bo says he heard the whump when the 250-pound deer hit the dirt. Bo was hunting with a single-shot .270 rifle because he says it’s easier to get in and out of a box blind. “Whenever I’m hunting cutovers, I choose a bolt-action rifle in case I need a second shot. But on a green field, that first shot is most often the only shot you ever get,” he said. Bo immediately texted Chris, telling him he’d shot the big one. “Yeah, I bet you shot the 6-pointer,” he answered. Bo says that seeing trail camera photographs of this buck was exciting, but nothing compared to seeing it in person, lying at his feet. Hunter: Bo Holcombe This article was published in the February 2016 edition of Rack Magazine. Subscribe today to have Rack Magazine delivered to your home. Read Recent RACK Articles: • Hold Low at 10: First bow buck teaches veteran rifleman a valuable lesson about where to aim at deer outside (or inside) the pins. �� The Last Bull: Veteran hunter cherished his last opportunity to act like a 10-year-old. • One of a Kind from Every Man’s Land: Sometimes a guy just has to wade into the maddening crowd. Read the full article

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the-record-newspaper · 5 years ago

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Looking back on those we lost in 2019

Lillie Brewer

Her tombstone reads, “Love is a verb” and the life she lived demonstrated it.

Lillie Dean Bryan Brewer passed peacefully into heaven on March 7, 2019. She had been residing at her home surrounded by those who loved her, and whom she taught to love.

She good-naturedly endured the nickname “Dinky” due to her diminutive size, but her impact on the lives of those around her was anything but small.

She was a lifelong learner, attending Berea College and earning a nursing degree from Rex Hospital and an Education Specialist degree from Appalachian State University. She was a devotee of The Great Courses, enjoying them on her iPad for years.

She was an Emergency Room registered nurse at Rex Hospital and was credited by many young residents for helping them learn their way around emergency medicine. She worked energetically right up until the day she delivered her son, the “miracle baby” she was not supposed to have been able to have due to her thyroid cancer. Soon after her son was born in 1958, the place where she worked became her treatment center. She survived cancer that time and lived another 60 years. Some people credited her boundless energy with the thyroid medication that she had to take every day for the rest of her life. However, her family knew that her vim and vigor pre-existed her illness.

She was a reading and English teacher at Boomer Ferguson Elementary and Woodward Junior High Schools whose students fondly remember her kindness, patience, and ability to increase their reading proficiency in a positive and encouraging environment.

For more than 15 years, she was a legal assistant who advocated tirelessly for the rights of Social Security disability and workers’ compensation clients, as well as medical malpractice, product liability and personal injury cases, at her family’s fourth-generation law firm. When her declining health forced her to leave that position, she did so only after diligently and enthusiastically passing along knowledge of the job to her grandson who replaced her. For more than 50 years, she taught children’s Bible classes at Wilkesboro church of Christ. As a lifelong and devoted student of the Bible, she participated in Bible Study Fellowship for several years.

She served in both the Wilkesboro Women’s Club and the Delta Kappa Gamma honorary society for women educators for many years, parking cars at MerleFest much longer than her rich age should have allowed. When not parking cars, Lillie could be found in either the Traditional Tent watching Wayne Henderson and the Kruger Brothers, or at the Main Stage listening and dancing to the joyful exuberant music of Scythian (her favorite Irish/Gypsy music band).

Mrs. Brewer thought hard work was important, but she thought recreation was just as important. She was the driving force behind what is now known as Cub Creek Park in Wilkesboro, NC. It was important to her that Wilkesboro have a park for everyone to walk, have picnics, play ball and play tennis with their family. She served on the Parks & Recreation Board for 52 years and recently was awarded the key to the Town of Wilkesboro. Once when she presented a program on literacy to the Kiwanis club and read aloud the children’s book, I’ll Love You Forever, grown men dissolved in tears. It was a favorite recollection of her husband and one that never failed to make him chuckle.

Together, Joe and Lillie Brewer regularly took in people like some folks collect stamps: the more varied the backgrounds, histories, and nationalities, the better. The collection of extended family that they kept in their own home (many for years at a time) included a 102-year-old grandmother, a high school senior, a newly released felon, several young cousins, and two international exchange students including a Colombian who remained for six years. Her table was always set for family, friends and strangers, and if you could not come to her home to share a meal, she would bring it to yours. She and Joe also paid or cancelled innumerable debts of others, paid school tuition for extended family and friends, and gave rent free housing to numerous families.

Lillie’s wisdom and good advice were cherished by her family. She was always planning ahead and thinking of the next project. In fact, never wanting to be a burden on her family, she planned and paid for her own funeral in 1994.

She took good care of those around her. She was the impetus for building the house next door to hers where her mother, her father, and her father-in-law spent their last years in comfort, surrounded by family members and compassionate caregivers.

Her circle of caring spread far and wide, extending even to those she did not know personally. When a 2014 newspaper article announced the felony arrests of five young Asians for stealing twelve ears of corn from a field beside Highway 268 West, Lillie lifted her pen in action. She wrote a passionate letter to the editor of the paper, asking if the young people had been referred to local help agencies, asking if they had been informed of North Carolina’s laws, and recounting a time from her childhood when her own father had allowed others to take food from his garden. It was not unusual for Lillie to call for compassion, forgiveness and charity as opposed to persecution. She was a member of the Friends of the Library board who initiated the annual Chocolate Extravaganza. On February 11, 2015, when her husband passed away in her arms at his law office, a grieving but determined Lillie stayed up all night at her home cooking chocolate creations for the library event the next day. One of her last acts was directing her daughter to create chocolate-covered Bugles for the Extravaganza a few short weeks ago. In truth, no one person will ever know all of the good that she did in her lifetime.

Lillie was preceded in homegoing by the love of her life, Joe Oliver Brewer; her parents, T.R. Bryan, Sr., and Nell Plyler Bryan, and her brothers, Dr. T. R. Bryan, Jr. and Jackson Bryan.

Cherishing her memory and inspired to try to follow her example are her son, Gregory J. Brewer (Lisa) of North Wilkesboro, NC; daughter, Tonya Brewer Osborne (Joey) of Hickory, NC; grandchildren, Joseph Zachary “Zack” Brewer, David Bryan Brewer, Tanner Paige Clifton, Karsen Elizabeth Osborne and Sadie Olivia Osborne; sisters, Rhoda Jean Billings (Don) of Lewisville, NC, Suzie Bryan Wiles (David) of Wilkesboro, NC, and brother, John Q. Bryan (Janet) of Wilmington, NC, as well as a delightful clan of nieces and nephews, and great-nieces and great-nephews. The family wishes to thank Lillie’s skilled, compassionate caregivers: Nena Shepherd, Donna Poole, Emily Poole, Diane Greer, and Polly Nichols.

Per Mrs. Brewer’s wishes, a public memorial service was held on Saturday, March 16, 2019 at 1:00 p.m. at the Wilkesboro Church of Christ located at 1740 Curtis Bridge Road, Wilkesboro, N.C.

Bill Casey

Mr. William “Bill” Eller Casey age 91 of North Wilkesboro, passed away Monday, September 09, 2019 at his home.

Memorial services were held 11 a.m., Thursday, September 12, 2019 at First United Methodist Church North Wilkesboro with Dr. Tim Roberts officiating. The family received friends immediately following the service in the Faith Center.

Bill was born August 30, 1928 in Wilkes County to Andrew Harrison Casey and Vera Eller Casey. He graduated Wake Forest College in 1950 and was an Army combat veteran having served in Korea. He was a Life Insurance Agent. Mr. Casey was a member of First United Methodist Church of North Wilkesboro. He was active in civic and church affairs, Casey served as president of the Winston-Salem Certified Life Underwriter Chapter, president of the North Wilkesboro Kiwanis Club, and held various positions at North Wilkesboro First United Methodist Church, including cook for the Methodist Men for over fifty years. Casey served as Scoutmaster for Boy Scout Troop 335 for many years and was awarded the Silver Beaver for distinguished service to boyhood by the Old Hickory Council of the Boy Scouts of America in January 1975. Casey, an avid fisherman, enjoyed the outdoors and was a charter member of the OF Hiking Club.

In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by his sisters; Lucille Wilson and Mary Ann Sigmon.

Mr. Casey is survived by his wife; Frances Louise Harris Casey of the home, two daughters; Ellen Casey and husband Thomas Hemmendinger of Hope, Rhode Island and Sarah Howell and husband Keith Howell of North Wilkesboro, a son; Andrew Casey and wife Lisa Casey of North Wilkesboro, seven grandchildren; Emily Pardue and husband Joseph, Anna Hemmendinger, William Howell, Molly Casey, Samuel Hemmendinger, Catherine Howell and Barbara Casey and a great grandson; Carson Pardue.

Honorary Pallbearers will be his Former Boy Scouts from Troop 335.

J.C. Faw

Well known Wilkes businessman J.C. Faw died Tuesday, Feb. 12, 2019.

Mr. Faw began his entrepreneurial career in the early 1950’s when he acquired his first grocery store in North Wilkesboro. Between the early 1950’s and 1983, his principal efforts were directed toward the development and operations of Lowe’s Food Stores, Inc. When Lowe’s food Stores was sold to Merchant’s Distributors, Inc. in 1983, it had grown to a chain of 75 grocery stores, 25 convenience stores and 12 restaurants doing an annual sales volume of approximately $250 million. Part of Lowe’s Foods’ growth resulted from Mr. Faw developing the real estate and constructing strip shopping centers in certain market areas located in North Carolina and southern Virginia, for a number of the stores in which Lowe’s operated.

In the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, Mr. Faw and a business partner built and operated a chain of 11 very successful Hardees franchise restaurants. These restaurants were sold back to Hardees when Mr. Faw and his business partner started the Bojangle’s Restaurant chain. Although he sold his interest in the original Bojangle’s company in the 1980’s, he still owned three Bojangle’s franchises. Other franchise food service operations he owned include Arby’s, Subway and Taco Bell. All of these units are located in the Foothills and Piedmont section of North Carolina.

After the sale of Lowe’s Food Stores, Inc., Mr. Faw formed Fast Track, Inc., a chain of convenience stores located in the Piedmont and Foothills sections of North Carolina. Fast Track currently operates 13 convenience stores and primarily markets Shell petroleum products. In addition to conventional convenience store operations, Fast Tracks also operates co-branded franchise operations with several well known food fanchisers. The real estate for most of the Fast Track stores was developed and owned by Mr. Faw.

In 1984, Mr. Faw started a motel operation which was later incorporated as Addison Properties, Inc., jointly owned by Mr. Faw and his son, James Clayton Faw. Over the years several franchised hotel properties were acquired and later sold.

Although Mr. Faw had been involved in new and used automobile operations on a small scale throughout his career, in the late 1980’s he and another individual acquired the dealership for Cadillac, Oldsmobile and other General Motors products located in Elkin. That dealership was operated profitably until it was sold in 1991. Mr. Faw and his partner then acquired the dealership in Wilkes County, that had the franchises for Cadillac, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, GM Trucks, Dodge and Nissan. In 1992, Mr. Faw acquired his partner’s interest in that dealership with his son under the corporate name of Premier Chevrolet Buick, Inc. Mr. Faw also owned Auto USA, Inc., the Wilkes County dealer for Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep.

Mr. Faw’s real estate development endeavors began primarily with strip shopping centers and Lowe’s Food Stores being the anchor tenant, and these activities expanded over the years to include the construction of a number of other commercial and residential properties. These properties include shopping centers, warehouses, restaurants, motels, hotels, residential subdivisions, office buildings, convenience stores and automobile dealerships. This development has been accomplished both through the use of general contractors as well as through the use of sub-contractors with Mr. Faw serving as his own general contractor.

In March 2017, Mr. Faw was selected Citizen of the Year by the Rotary Club of North Wilkesboro.

During his introduction of Faw, club member Joe McMillan said, “When you step back and look at all of Mr. Faw’s accomplishments over the past 60-plus years of doing business here in our great county, it is only fair to say that this man truly, truly is a legend.”

Barry Bush, who has worked for Faw for more than 25 years, spoke of the effect Faw had on his family, long before he ever went to work for him. He recounted a story of his grandfather, Henry Bauguss, who was a printer and sign painter, who for many years painted the window banners for many of Faw’s Lowe’s Food stores. Bush said that his grandfather was always appreciative of that work and his treatment by Faw personally, saying that, the sign work he did for Lowe’s helped him buy a home and educate both his daughters.

Bush went on to detail stories of his longtime relationship in real estate with Faw, stories sprinkled with humor as well as an obviously sincere affection.

According to Bush, some of Faw’s businesses, in addition to grocery stores, Faw had built and operated a wide variety of homegrown and franchised enterprises, including: Pantry Pride, Run-Ins, FastTrack, Hardee’s, Bojangle’s, Shoney’s, Tipton’s, Holiday Inn, Addison Motor Inn, College Park Cinema, Taco Bell, McAlister’s Deli, Drug World, AutoRack, Rather’s Famous Chicken and Biscuits, Movie Max, the Empire auto dealerships, as well as real estate ventures in West Wood Hills, Shannon Park, Ravenwood, Meadowview, Ridgecrest, Fox Run, The Greens, and The Oaks- One, Two and Three.

McMillan said that the variety of businesses Faw has run and his ability to “multitask” made him unique.

He added that he first met Faw when he went to work for a dairy in Wilkes 57 years ago. He was needing a place to live and was told to call Faw.

“I made that call and Faw had just what I needed,” McMillan said.

He said Faw was also community minded.

“As Mr. Faw grew his businesses he did a lot of good things for other communities as well as his own, especially when he took his commercial development enterprises into other cities and states,” McMillan said.

He went on to add that one of the best things Faw has done for Wilkes County is the development along U.S. 421 in Wilkesboro. “Some call it the Miracle Mile,” McMillan said. “All those businesses, just think about what they do for Wilkes County. There are literally hundreds of jobs in all those businesses combined.”

McMillan continued, “To see the gold mine. To see what could take place with some proper development, this man had the expertise to make it happen, and he made it happen. What a success story.”

Joining Faw the evening he received the Rotary Club award was his wife, Judy, son, Jim, and wife, Sandy, daughter, Diane, her husband, Monty Shaw, and two ladies who help Faw: Kenya Bailey and Keeya Gibbs.

After receiving his plaque from Rotarian Charles Bentley, Faw spoke briefly, thanking the club for the honor and reflecting on his more than 60 years in business.

Charles Avery Gilliam

Charles Avery Gilliam, age 88, of Ronda passed away Sunday, June 30, 2019 at his home. Mr. Gilliam was born February 12, 1931 to Don Spurgon Gilliam and Myrtle Clementine Harris Gilliam.

In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by his wife, Bobbie Ann Green Gilliam; three brothers, D. Flake and wife Evelyn, Robert, and infant brother Rex; two sisters Norma Casstevens and husband Gray, and Kathleen Pardue and husband Glenn.

Mr. Gilliam is survived by his daughters, Jan Gilliam, Ann Deal and husband Thomas; grandsons, Charles “Chas” Deal and wife Hannah, Christopher Deal; brother-in-law O.L. “Lonnie” Brown and wife Dottie; sister-in-law, Dot Gilliam; several cousins, nieces, and nephews.

Mr. Gilliam served in the US Army in England from 1951 – 1953 and was a lifelong member of Bethel Baptist Church.

Mr. Gilliam ran Ronda Hardware for 46 years. He helped establish the Ronda Fire Department and served as chief for 27 years. He played a supporting role in helping secure the building of the “new” Ronda bridge and bringing a branch of Yadkin Valley Bank to Ronda.

Funeral services were held at 2:00 p.m. Saturday, July 6 at Bethel Baptist Church with Dr. Steve Fowler officiating. Burial followed with Military Honors by Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 10346 Honor Guard in the church cemetery.

Pallbearers will be Charles “Chas” Deal, Christopher Deal, Todd Gilliam, Jeff Pardue, Lonnie Brown, Danny Mathis, Mike Johnson, and Mike Nichols. Honorary pallbearers will be John Drum and members of the Ronda Fire Department.

Flowers will be accepted or memorials may be made to Bethel Baptist Church, 2178 Bethel Rd., Ronda, NC 27670 or Ronda Fire Department, PO Box 12164, Ronda, NC 29670.

Since Charles was an avid story teller, the family grew up loving stories and would appreciate any memories that others may have of him or his wife Bobbie Ann; Ronda Hardware, the Ronda Fire Department; or life in Ronda. Memories may be sent to the Gilliam Family, PO Box 306, Ronda, NC 28670 or email [email protected]

Junior Johnson

The last American Hero is gone.

NASCAR legend Robert Glenn “Junior” Johnson died Friday, Dec. 20, under hospice care in Charlotte. He was 88.

Junior Johnson, who was born in raised in Ronda, cut his teeth driving fast cars filled with illicit moonshine through the back roads of western North Carolina. He entered racing at an early age.

Mike Staley of Wilkes, the son of Enoch Staley — a charter member of NASCAR and former owner of the North Wilkesboro Speedway — said his father saw potential in the young moonshine runner.

“Junior and Dad were good friends and went way back,” Staley said. “When he (Johnson) was about 16, my dad picked him up. Junior was working in a field, plowing behind a mule. My dad told him they needed a driver for a race. Junior went with him to the track, got in the car and took off.”

Staley added that his father and Johnson remained good friends up until the time of Enoch Staley’s death in 1995

Racing was in Johnson’s blood. His first NASCAR race was in 1953 where he ran in the Southern 500 at Darlington, S.C. His first checkered flag came in 1955 at Hickory Motor Speedway. Appropriately enough, his final victory came at the North Wilkesboro Speedway during the 1965 Wilkes 400.

He ran 313 races over his 14-year driving career, taking a total of 50 wins, 148 top 10 finishes and 46 poles. His last race was in 1966 in the American 500 at Rockingham.

His achievements in the sport of racing include:

Winner of the 1960 Daytona 500;

Six-time Winston Cup Series Owner’s Championship with Cale Yarborough (1976, 1977 and 1978) and Dale Waltrip (1981, 1982 and 1985);

Named one of NASCAR’s 50 Greatest Drivers in 1998;

International Motorsports Hall of Fame Inductee in 1990;

Motorsports Hall of Fame of America Inductee in 1991;

NASCAR Hall of Fame Inductee in 2010.

About their father’s passing, Junior Johnson’s children wrote:

“Friday afternoon, Junior Johnson passed away peacefully with those he loved nearby. To the world, he was the ‘Last American Hero,’ but to us he was simply Dad. Our time with him barely overlapped with his racing career, but he gave us the last, and greatest, laps of his life. No amount of time, no matter how long, could have ever been enough to spend together. He never missed a night of telling us 'I love you’ before bedtime, or how proud he was that we were becoming the people he’d raised us to be. He was a courageous man, a generous friend, a loving and dedicated husband, and the best father anyone could’ve asked for. He lives on through us, the many lives he touched, and in the sport to which he gave so much. We would like to thank everyone who has reached out or shared a kind story about our Dad, and we are deeply grateful for the overwhelming outpouring of support. It has been a comfort to us all during this difficult time. We love you. Dad, Sissy and Robert.”

NASCAR Hall of Fame Executive Director Winston Kelley said in a statement: “It is with great sadness that we share the passing of Junior Johnson on behalf of the Johnson family. First and foremost, everyone at the NASCAR Hall of Fame offers our most sincere condolences to Lisa, Robert, Meredith and the entire family. We have lost one of NASCAR’s true pioneers, innovators, competitors and an incredible mechanical and business mind. And personally, I have lost one of my dearest friends. While we will miss Junior mightily, his legacy and memory will forever be remembered, preserved, celebrated and cherished at the NASCAR Hall of Fame and in the hearts and minds of race fans around the world. Please join us in remembering and celebrating Robert Glenn Johnson Jr.”

NASCAR CEO and Chairman, Jim France stated: “Junior Johnson truly was the ‘Last American Hero.’ From his early days running moonshine through the end of his life, Junior wholly embodied the NASCAR spirit. He was an inaugural NASCAR Hall of Famer, a nod to an extraordinary career as both a driver and team owner. Between his on-track accomplishments and his introduction of Winston to the sport, few have contributed to the success of NASCAR as Junior has. The entire NASCAR family is saddened by the loss of a true giant of our sport, and we offer our deepest condolences to Junior’s family and friends during this difficult time.”

Mike Staley, as did his father, considered Junior Johnson to be a friend.

“I was invited several times to eat breakfast with him. I enjoyed the time I spent with him. It was great. It was a lot of fun.”

And Johnson never forgot his roots.

Staley said, “He was loyal to Wilkes County and the people who got him where he was.”

Julius A. Rousseau Jr.

The Honorable Julius A. Rousseau Jr., 88, retired senior resident Superior Court judge for the 23rd Judicial District (Wilkes, Ashe, Alleghany and Yadkin counties), died Thursday, Oct. 3, 2019, at Kate B. Reynolds Hospice Home in Winston-Salem.

A Celebration of Life service will be held at noon Saturday, Oct. 12, 2019, at First United Methodist Church of North Wilkesboro, with Dr. Tim Roberts and Dr. William T. Medlin, III officiating . The Rousseau family will receive friends following the service in the Faith Center.

Born in North Wilkesboro on Dec. 3 1930, Judge Rousseau was the son of the Honorable Julius A. and Gertrude Hall Rousseau. Julius A. Rousseau Sr. was an N.C. Superior Court judge from 1935-1958. Combined, the father and son served as N.C. Superior Court judges for more than 50 years.

The younger Judge Rousseau was also an emergency Superior Court judge, a part-time position appointed by the governor, from 1999-2015. He first became a judge when named to fill the unexpired term of Resident Senior Superior Court Judge Robert M. Gambill in 1972. He was subsequently elected to eight-year terms in 1974, 1982, and 1990. He had the longest tenure of any Superior Court judge in the state when he retired in late 1998.

He and the former Gary Maxwell were married in August 1955, and they had one son, Julius A. Rousseau III, an attorney in New York City, who is married to Sharon Campbell Rousseau. The couple lived in Wilkesboro until they moved to Arbor Acres United Methodist Retirement Community in Winston-Salem a few years ago.

Judge Rousseau is survived by his wife, son and daughter-in-law, adopted grandchildren; Daniel, Jay and Stephanie Shinaman, Neal and Jackson Smith and special friends; Dr. and Mrs. Brad Shinaman and Mr. and Mrs. Brian Smith.

In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by three sisters, Nelle Rousseau Bailey, Frances Rousseau Alspaugh and Nancy Rousseau Kern.

Judge Rousseau graduated from North Wilkesboro High School in 1949, from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (where he played football as a walk-on) with an undergraduate degree in 1953 and from the UNC School of Law in 1956.

He had a solo law practice in North Wilkesboro from 1956-1962, and was a partner in Moore & Rousseau in Wilkesboro from 1963 until 1972, when he became a Superior Court judge. Judge Rousseau was chairman of the Wilkes County Democratic Party Executive Committee from 1961-1968.

Judge Rousseau was a lifelong member of the First United Methodist Church of North Wilkesboro, where he served on the church’s board of trustees and was a member of the Men’s Bible Class. He also was a member of the North Wilkesboro Kiwanis Club and North Wilkesboro’s Elks Lodge.

He served for about 20 years with other trial judges on the state’s Pattern Jury Instruction Committee, a volunteer body that creates annual supplements to judges’ instructions to juries, based on changes in statutory and case law. He also was president of the N.C. Conference of Superior Court Judges.

He was a member of the committee that designed the current Wilkes County Courthouse in Wilkesboro, which opened the same year he retired as a senior resident Superior Court judge.

N.C. Supreme Court Justice Sarah Parker presented Judge Rousseau the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, one of top awards given by the governor, in 2012.

In a newspaper interview in late 1998, Judge Rousseau said he simply wanted to be remembered as fair. He continued, “I’ve tried to be the best judge I know how….to do what is right regardless of who or what a person was. I made some people mad in the process, but I have been able to put my head down and go to sleep each night.”

The family request that in lieu of flowers, memorials be made to Wilkes ADAP PO Box 968 North Wilkesboro, NC 28659, First United Methodist Church of North Wilkesboro Memorial Fund PO Box 1145 North Wilkesboro, NC 28659 or to the Donor’s Choice.

Conrad Shaw

Conrad Shaw, a well known educator, civic leader and WWII Marine Corps veteran died on Saturday, Aug. 31.

The following is his obituary.

Dr. Conrad Aldean Shaw, Sr. age 94, went to be with his Lord and Savior on Saturday Aug. 31, 2019.

He was born on Nov. 30, 1924, in Alleghany County. He was preceded in death by his parents, Martin H. and Recie McKnight Shaw, and his brother, Dwight M. Shaw.

He is survived by his wonderful wife of 73 years, Elizabeth (Lib), who he met at Appalachian State University and married on Dec. 21, 1945; son, Conal, and Annette Shaw of Roanoke, Va.; daughter, Cathy, and Steve Snipes of North Wilkesboro; granddaughter, Catherine, and Mac Marlow of Roanoke, Va.; grandson, Jonathan, and Stacie Shaw of Richmond, Va.; granddaughter, Laura, and David Brooks of Wilkesboro; granddaughter, Rachel, and Eric Sutphin of Concord; great grandson, Nathaniel Marlow of Roanoke, Va.; great granddaughter, Olivia Marlow of Roanoke, Va.; great granddaughter, Caroline Shaw of Richmond, Va.; great grandsons, Connor and Corbin Brooks of Wilkesboro; foster great grandbaby, Isabella; a sister, Wynnogene Day of Savannah, Ga.; a brother, Kyle, and Barbara Shaw of Houston, Texas.

Dr. Shaw was a veteran of the United States Marine Corps, having served three years, two of which were in the South Pacific (New Calidonia, Gudalcanal, and Okinawa).

Dr. Shaw and his wife, Elizabeth, and son, Conal, moved to North Wilkesboro in August 1948 to teach business subjects at North Wilkesboro High School. After four years in that position, Dr. Shaw became principal of North Wilkesboro Elementary School (grades one through eight) in 1952 as North Wilkesboro and Wilkesboro High Schools merged into Wilkes Central High School. He served as principal for 14 years.

When Wilkes Community College opened its doors for multi-classes on July 1, 1966 in the Wilkesboro Primary School Building, college President Dr. Howard Thompson invited him to join him in the position of Business Officer for the college. The responsibilities consisted of accounting and budgeting of finances, and plant and grounds management. The new college facilities, consisting of three buildings, were completed in April 1970. Dr. Shaw oversaw growth of the college. It went from zero to eight buildings, 2,200 students, and 90 acres of land.

In 1972, Dr. Shaw and four other Community College Business Officers and the State Community Director of Finance were the founding officers of the Association of Community College Business Officers, ACCBO. The ACCBO meetings throughout the state enabled the officers to learn more as the new North Carolina Community College System progressed. Dr. Shaw served as president of ACCBO in 1974-75.

Dr. Shaw’s educational career spanned 47 years, all of which were in Wilkes County. He earned a Bachelor of Science and Master of Arts from Appalachian State University, and a Doctor of Education from Nova University in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He also took courses at the University of Nebraska at Omaha and Florida State. In 1994, Dr. Shaw was chosen as the Outstanding College Business Officer of Region XI, which included North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Virginia.

Other life contributions included service at First Baptist Church of North Wilkesboro as Sunday School teacher, Sunday School Superintendent, President of the Men’s Brotherhood, Director of the Baptist Training Union (BTU), Deacon beginning in 1952, Chairman of the Board of Deacons several times, Chairman of the Building Renovation Committee for the educational building, and was named Deacon Emeritus in 2017. He loved the church and loved serving the Lord.

The North Wilkesboro Lions Club was Dr. Shaw’s civic love, having almost 100 percent attendance since 1952. He served in a number of positions including the office of president in 1973-74 and 2000-2001. He was named the Rotary Club’s Citizen of the Year in March of 2019. His hobbies included collecting antique radios, and he and Mrs. Shaw were members in the western square dance club, the Tory Oak Twirlers for 31 years. He enjoyed traveling throughout the United States and to many other countries with friends since his retirement from the college in 1995.

The family received friends from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 1, 2019, at Reins Sturdivant Funeral Home. Funeral services were held at 2 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 2, 2019, in the sanctuary of First Baptist Church of North Wilkesboro, with Dr. Bert Young and Rev. Steve Snipes officiating. A private burial was held at Scenic Memorial Gardens.

Tracy Walker

Former Wilkes County commissioner, school board member and N.C. representative Tracy Walker, died Monday, Oct. 14, 2019.

He passed away at N.C. Baptist Hospital in Winston-Salem.

Walker, of Wilkesboro, was born July 27, 1939, to the Rev. Frank and Margie Walker. He was a Republican who represented the state’s 94th House district, including constituents in Wilkes County, in 1998, and again from 2001 to 2008.

He served on the Wilkes County Board of Education from 1972 to 1976 and on the Wilkes County Board of Commissioners from 1978 to 1996.

He was a retired human resources manager at Chatham Manufacturing in Elkin.

With ties to Elkin and eastern Wilkes because of his position at Chatham, Rebel Good, publisher of The Tribune in Elkin, said that many residents of eastern Wilkes considered Walker as being “their” commissioner.

In 1996, Walker was the Republican nominee for North Carolina Commissioner of Labor but lost the election to incumbent Harry Payne, a Democrat.

Walker also served for several years on the Wilkes Economic & Development Commission, beginning in 2001.

Walker was in the U.S. Air Force from 1955 to 1959, rising to the rank of Airman 2nd Class.

Walker is survived by his wife, Nena of the home, and sons Kirk Walker of North Wilkesboro, and Randy Walker of Wilkesboro.

At press time, funeral arrangements were not available. Check our website at http://www.therecordandthursdayprinting.com/ for updates. Reins-Sturdivant Funeral Home is assisting the Walker family.

The following is the formal obituary

Mr. R. Tracy Walker, age 82 of Wilkesboro passed away Monday, October 14, 2019 at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center.

Funeral services were held at Reins-Sturdivant Chapel with Rev. Steve Smith officiating. Burial with Military Honors by Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1142 will be in Mtn. Park Cemetery in Wilkesboro. The family will received friends at Reins-Sturdivant Funeral Home.

Mr. Walker was born July 27, 1937 in Wilkes County to Charles Frank. Sr.and Margie Lou Adams Walker.

Mr. Walker had 30 years of public service. He served 8 years in Raleigh in the NC House of Representatives and was a Wilkes County Commissioner for 18 years. He also served on the Wilkes County School Board for 4 years. He was retired Personnel Manager at Chatham Manufacturing and a member of Wilkesboro Baptist Church and First Light Church.

In addition to his parents he was preceded in death by a grandson; Ryan Thomas Walker and a brother; Charles Frank Walker, Jr. (Pee-Wee).

He is survived by his wife; Nena Watkins Walker of the home, two sons; Randy Walker and wife Shannon of Wilkesboro and Kirk Walker and wife Kim of North Wilkesboro, four grandchildren; Chad Walker and wife Megan, Caitlin Walker, Brandon Walker and wife Ashley and Whitney Nolan and husband Chris and six great grandchildren.

In lieu of flowers memorials may be made to First Light Church, PO Box 2071, North Wilkesboro, NC 28659 or Donor’s Choice.

On Line condolences may be made at www.reinssturdivant.com

Patricia Lynn Worth

Patricia Lynn Worth, age 59, of Sparta, N.C., passed away Wednesday, Feb. 6, 2019 at Wake Forest Baptist Health in Winston-Salem, N.C.

She was born Nov. 5, 1959 in Ashe County, N.C., to June Weaver Worth and the late Will Allen Worth. She was a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a degree in Journalism.

Lynn is survived by her mother, June Weaver Worth of Jefferson, N.C.; two brothers: Thomas Worth and wife Cynthia of Oak Ridge, N.C., Phil Worth and wife Les of Grassy Creek, N.C.; a special niece, Ellen Worth of Arizona; a special nephew, Andrew Worth of South Korea; her furry canine kids: Punky, Belle,and Red along with Tux the cat and his buddies of the home.

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myteaguy-blog · 7 years ago

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Gonfu Tea Ceremony: Origin Stories, Legends and Myths

Back when I was a younger man in my 20’s, tea had already become my drink of choice. While most of my friends ordered coffee with their desserts, I would ask to see the tea selection. I am referring back in time to the 1980’s, so the selection was always standard tea bags such as Twinning’s Earl Grey, Harney & Son’s English Breakfast or Lipton’s Orange Pekoe. Although I had no idea what orange pekoe meant at the time, I would drink it with milk and sugar and… I enjoyed it. As the years passed on, the tea selections improved with the addition of green tea, jasmine tea and herbal teas. I continued drinking and enjoying those teas for years, ignorant of the exciting world of teas which I was soon to discover.

During a visit to China back in 2012, my friend Lester asked me if I enjoyed drinking tea, which I proudly answered, “Yes, I love tea!” He proceeded to take out his gonfu set, and asked me what type of tea I enjoyed drinking? As I was a little confused and a bit intimidated by the gonfu set, which I had not seen before, I told him, “Oh, whatever you like is good, I like all tea.” Well, we ended up spending several hours just drinking tea. It only took him a few minutes to realize that I had never drank tea in this fashion before, however, he still delighted in telling me the tea origin stories and any other relevant details about the tea, as he proceeded to brew them. He truly enjoyed watching me light up with an eagerness to learn more and more about tea. We spent the next few weeks tasting different teas such as tieguanyin, wuyi yanchas, aged and sheng puerhs. All of which, I was tasting for the very first time, and all of which, he had fascinating stories for. Sometimes the stories were the terroir details or the processing method, sometimes the stories were imaginative mythological legends passed down through the generations, sometimes he just shared his own personal experience with the specific tea. Whatever the story was, it was what made the entire experience of gonfu cha more interesting and unique than any other social experience I had encountered. When we visited Hangzhou together, we were invited to drink some longjing green tea with a local farmer family. As the 70-year-old head of the household brewed our tea, her grandson shared the origin story of longjing tea, as well as the story of how his family came to possess the farm and the house which we were now on. The tea was fantastic, to say the least, but it was the stories he told us which made the entire experience unforgettable for all of us present.

I came to realize during this trip that gonfu tea is not just about drinking a beverage. It is so much more! Gonfu tea service is a gateway into a social connection leading to the exploration of many other subjects including culture, society, environment, meditation, moral values, and of course tea and tea ware. Every tea that Lester offered me had a back story. Every gaiwan or yixing pot that he used had a back story. Every utensil he used in preparing the tea had a back story. While drinking tea with Lester, I learned about the many different dynasties of China. I learned about the differences between western and eastern cultures. I learned how to relax and enjoy the moment. I learned how to appreciate nature. I made new, lasting friendships! Whether the stories which he shared with me were true or not, didn’t matter, but the stories all became just as much a part of the tea memory I had formed as the aroma and the taste.

My experience with gonfu tea service in China lit a desire within me to come back to the states and share my tea experiences with others. I gathered a bunch of friends together in my home, not knowing how they would react, since none of them were tea enthusiast. I was pleasantly surprised to see that even people who do not take tea as serious as I do, truly enjoy a gonfu session as a social gathering, when it is filled with fascinating tea tales about the teas being brewed for them.

The more I got involved with serving gonfu style tea to my friends, the more I realized that almost every tea legend which I had heard, I would hear retold slightly different on another occasion, by a different gonfu server. It was refreshing to hear the personal touch added to the storytelling. It wasn’t about the accuracy or the truth behind the stories, but rather it was more about the connection being made with the people present.

In the following pages of this essay, I will be retelling some of the stories which I have come to learn. I have referred to online websites to gather the stories, however I have altered the stories slightly in accordance to my own memory of how the stories were told to me. It is quite common for the version of the story which will be told to you at a gonfu session to alter in accordance to where the story teller is from.

We will begin with three different versions of the ‘origin of tea’ legends as told by Chinese, Indian and Japanese cultures;

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THE ORIGIN OF TEA (CHINA)

Version 1

Emperor Shen Nong set up camp with his entourage in the shade of a large tree. A fire was made and a pot with boiling water was prepared. The heat of the fire brought some of the leaves of the long branches of the tree to dry out. Suddenly, a fierce wind got up and blew some of the leaves into the pot with boiling water. The water turned golden and a delicious scent appeared. The emperor tried the drink and was delighted by the scent and delicious taste. Being immediately aware of the refreshing and invigorating effect, the emperor let out the sound "T'sa", meaning godlike so that, until today, "cha" is the name for tea in Chinese.

Version 2

In ancient times, people knew little about plants. To determine which plants were edible, poisonous, or medicinal, Shen Nong tasted various kinds of plants every day. Fortunately, Shen Nong had a transparent belly, making it possible for him to observe the reactions in his stomach caused by the plants he had eaten. When he tasted tea leaves, he found that the tea leaves passed through his stomach and intestines, checking for poisons in the stomach and cleaning the intestines. Shen Nong referred to these leaves as Cha, which has the same pronunciation as “checking the poisons” and it became the plant’s current name (tea).

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THE ORIGIN OF TEA (JAPAN)

Bodhidharma made a pledge of 7 years of meditation, in which he vowed not to sleep. One night he fell asleep and upon awakening, he was so angered by his failure that he cut off his eyelids and threw them to the ground to prevent himself from falling asleep again. As soon as the eyelids touched the soil, they grew roots which soon developed into a large tea bush. After picking some of the tea leaves and chewing them, he felt energetic, and he concluded that the tea helped him to stay awake. Until today the Japanese language uses the same character for eyelid and tea.

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THE ORIGIN OF TEA (INDIA)

Fakir Dharma took a vow not to sleep for 7 years. After 5 years, it appeared that he could no longer fight the need to sleep. Full of desperation, due to knowing he would not be able to keep his vow, he grasped a couple of branches off the tree where he had made his camp. He put a few leaves into his mouth and chewed them. Immediately, Dharma experienced a refreshing and invigorating effect, his tiredness evaporated and he could keep his vow.

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As you can tell by reading the preceding stories, each story varies greatly. The stories told by a gonfu tea server can be creatively imaginative with very little truth, embellished truth or very straightforward facts. In any case, the stories all serve the purpose of helping the listener to both be entertained and to create a lasting memory.

I will continue with a collection of some well-known and some not so well-known tea stories which have amused tea drinkers for years, decades, and even centuries. While reading them, keep in mind that you may have heard some of them already, told in a different way. This is the beauty of Gonfu storytelling! Each gonfu tea server can retell the story in his/her own way. The stories are told to make a connection with the guest being served. If you can tell your story with emotion, sentiment and passion, you just might create in your guest an unforgettable memory and a desire to learn more about tea and tea culture…as it happened with me.

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LONGJING:

In the year 250 AD, there was a drought that took hold a small village in Hangzhou. The local priest told the villagers that if they prayed to the Dragon who lived in a nearby spring then perhaps he will bring them rain. They believed that this spring led to an underground sea where the Dragon lived. It seemed only plausible that this creature could bring them the water from the sea. The villagers prayed and prayed until finally the rains came. In honor of the Dragon, the villagers named the village Longching (Dragon Well).

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DA HONG PAO

During the Ming Dynasty, the emperor’s wife had grown gravely ill. He sought the advice of every doctor in the land to try and save his wife, however, nothing could be done to save the dying empress. He then offered a reward to anybody in the land who could save his wife. A farmer came to him with a tea which he had made from the leaves of a bush that grew on a high and steep cliff near his home. As soon as the tea touched the lips of the empress, she began to regain her health. The emperor was so pleased that he honored the farmer with a gift of his imperial red robes. In response, the farmer named the tea Da Hong Pao (Red Robe Tea).

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TIEGUANYIN

There was a man named Wei Yin in Anxi County who worked diligently in his tea farm and believed in Buddhism. He always offered a cup of tea to Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy, in his shrine at every sunrise as well as every sunset for several decades. One-night Guanyin appeared to him in a dream and showed him a unique tea plant between the gaps of rocks. The next morning, Wei Yin followed his dream walking along the creek side to the rocky place and found the tea plant between the rock crevices that he saw in his dream. With a great excitement, he brought the tea plant home, put it in an iron tripod, and began to cultivate it cautiously. He treated the tea as a family treasure and brewed the tea only for his important guests. A literati scholar came to have the tea with Wei Yin one day and asked: “What is this great tea?” Wei Yin told the scholar the dream and the discovery. He also told the scholar his intention to name the tea after “Iron Rohat,”, the enlightened Buddhist Dharma protector, because the rocks where the plant was found looked like Rohats, and the plant was cultivated later in the iron pot.

Shaking his head, the scholar said: “Some of the Rohats look too wrathful. How can you name such a precious thing like that? Guanyin appeared in your dream and directed you to the tea, it only suits its elegance to name the tea Tie Guanyin (Iron Goddess of Mercy).

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TAI PING HOU KUI

A mother monkey died of grief after losing her child. A local farmer kindly buried the monkey on his land. The farmer soon dreamt of the monkey guiding him to a place, deep in the forest, where a tea garden was. Upon awaking, he retraced his dreaming steps to verily discover a hidden garden of tea bushes which he plucked to make this tea.

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JASMINE DRAGON PEARL

An orphaned brother and sister lived on the outskirts of Fuzhou. One winter, the brother got very seriously sick and no doctors could help him. An old woman told his sister about a magic dragon who was always helping people in need. The girl decided to go to the dragon’s cave and ask for his help. The cave was surrounded by jasmine bushes of amazing beauty. She told the dragon about her problem and he promised to help her. Soaring into the sky, the dragon made an ominous cry and a beautiful pearl appeared on his neck, glittering on the sun. A small drop fell from the pearl and onto the ground, where a beautiful tea bush sprouted and started immediately growing. Dragon said to the girl that she should take care of the bush and he disappeared. It rained hard the whole day but the girl looked after the bush not leaving its side even for a moment. Finally, small long leaves appeared on the bush. The girl gathered from the most delicate leaves from the top of each branch, dried them next to jasmine flowers, and made delicate beads, like the one that hung around the neck of a dragon. Returning home, she brewed some tea from these magical leaves and their house was filled with the wonderful aroma of jasmine. Having tasted the miracle drink, her brother quickly recovered.

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BI LUO CHUN

The name Biluochun literally means "Green Snail Spring". It is called so because it is a green tea that is rolled into a tight spiral, resembling snail meat, and is cropped early spring. The original name of Bi Luo Chun is Xia Sha Ren Xiang, meaning "scary fragrance". It was so named when a tea picker who ran out of space in her basket, put the tea between her breasts instead. The tea, warmed by her body heat, emitted a strong aroma that surprised the girl.

The Kangxi Emperor visited Lake Tai in the 38th year of his rule. He enjoyed the tea very much and decided to give it a more elegant name, Bi Luo Chun (Green Snail Spring).

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JUN SHAN YIN ZHEN

The Fujian province were experiencing a dry spell which was threatening the lives of the villagers. It was believed that a celestial plant was growing in the Taimu mountain which was guarded by a black dragon. This plant is believed to be able to cure many kinds of illnesses and it will bring up water when the juice of this plant is dropped into the river. Many villages went looking for this special plant but failed and were magicked into rocks in the mountain. A young lady, whose two brothers also went there but were both dead, decided to risk her life. When she reached the mountain, the black dragon attacked her viciously but she cunningly managed to kill the dragon. The young lady then plucked the celestial plant and dropped its juice into the river and onto the people who had been turned into rocks. They were transformed back into human beings. Thanks to her courage and effort, the villagers were very grateful. They transferred the plant from the mountain and planted it widely in their villages. Due to its silvery white color and needle shape, it was named Yin Zhen (Silver Needle).

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KEEMUN

The name Keemun comes from Qimen county in southern Anhui province, where almost all the mountains are covered with tea bushes. Qimen county produced only green tea until the mid-1870’s. Around that time a young man in the civil service lost his job. Despite being totally heartbroken and completely embarrassed by his shame, he remembered what his father told him – ‘A skill is a better guarantor of a living than precarious officialdom’. Following this advice, the young man packed up his courage and his bags to travel to Fujian Province to learn the secrets of black tea manufacturing. Upon his return to Qimen in 1875 he set up three factories to produce black tea. The black tea method was perfectly suited to the tea leaves produced in this warm moist climate with well drained sandy soil. Before long, the superb flavor of Keemuns became very popular around the world.

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MILK OOLONG TEA

The moon fell in love with a comet passing through the night sky. The comet, passed by, burned out and vanished. The moon, in her sorrow, caused a great wind to blow through the hills and valleys, bringing about a quick drop in temperature. The next morning, local tea pickers went out to collect their fresh leaf. To their surprise, when the tea was processed it had developed an amazing milky character, which was attributed to the motherly character of the old moon.

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EARL GREY

The Earl Grey blend is named after Charles Grey, the British Prime Minister in the 1830s. In 1831, one of Charles Grey’s men rescued a Chinese man from drowning. As a token of his thanks and appreciation, he gave Charles Grey this unique blend of tea as a gift. The Prime Minister enjoyed this unique blend and asked his tea merchants, then headed by Richard Twining II to make it for him and his guests. Everyone was intrigued and delighted by the distinctive hint of bergamot that gave this tea a unique taste, something his guests were not accustomed to. The tea was so popular that when it ran out, Richard Twining agreed to produce and sell this sought-after blend. In those days, it was called, Earl Grey’s Mixture, and later came to be known as Twining’s Earl Grey. However, crucially, Twining omitted to trademark the blend enabling others to enter the market.

I strongly encourage anybody who is interested in serving tea to guest in a gonfu style to spend some time reading the origin stories, the legends and the myths of the teas they will be brewing for their guest. When combined with your own personal experiences, which you will accumulate throughout the years, you will soon find your guest sitting on the other side of the tea table, utterly intrigued as they watch you brewing the tea, explaining the intricacies of it, the terroir, the age, the cultivar…and then you will take the whole experience to the next level, leaving them with a lasting impression, while they intensely listen to the story of the tea…as only you can tell it!

“If history were taught in the form of stories, it would never be forgotten.” ― Rudyard Kipling

#tea stories #tea orings #legends #myths #longjing #da hong pao #myteaguy #bi luo chun #tieguanyin #shennong

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2whatcom-blog · 6 years ago

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Greece's invisible minority - the Macedonian Slavs

By ratifying an settlement with the newly renamed Republic of North Macedonia, Greece has implicitly recognised the existence of a Macedonian language and ethnicity. And but it has denied the existence of its personal Macedonian minority for many years, says Maria Margaronis. Will one thing now change? Mr Fokas, 92, stands straight as a spear in his tan leather-based brogues and cream blazer, barely leaning on the ebony and ivory cane introduced from Romania by his grandfather a century in the past. His thoughts and his reminiscence are as sharp as his outfit. A retired lawyer, Mr Fokas speaks impeccable formal Greek with a particular lilt: his mom tongue is Macedonian, a Slavic language associated to Bulgarian and spoken on this a part of the Balkans for hundreds of years. At his son's fashionable home in a village in northern Greece, he takes me by the painful historical past of Greece's unrecognised Slavic-speaking minority. Mr Fokas takes care to emphasize from the beginning that he's each an ethnic Macedonian and a Greek patriot. He has good purpose to underline his loyalty: for nearly a century, ethnic Macedonians in Greece have been objects of suspicion and, at occasions, persecution, whilst their presence has been denied by nearly everybody. Most are reluctant to talk to outsiders about their id. To themselves and others, they're recognized merely as "locals" (dopyi), who converse a language referred to as "native" (dopya). They're solely absent from faculty historical past textbooks, haven't featured in censuses since 1951 (once they have been solely patchily recorded, and referred to easily as "Slavic-speakers"), and are barely talked about in public. Most Greeks do not even know that they exist. That erasure was one purpose for Greece's long-running dispute with the previous Yugoslav republic now formally referred to as the Republic of North Macedonia. The dispute was lastly resolved final month by a vote within the Greek parliament ratifying (by a majority of simply seven) an settlement made final June by the nations' two prime ministers. When the Greek Prime Minster, Alexis Tsipras, referred through the parliamentary debate to the existence of "Slavomacedonians" in Greece - on the time of World Warfare Two - he was breaking a long-standing taboo. Using the title "Macedonia" by the neighbouring nation state implicitly acknowledges that Macedonians are a folks in their very own proper, and opens the door to exhausting questions in regards to the historical past of Greece's personal Macedonian minority. When Mr Fokas was born, the northern Greek area of Macedonia had solely just lately been annexed by the Greek state. Till 1913 it was a part of the Ottoman Empire, with Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia all wooing its Slavic-speaking inhabitants as a method to claiming the territory. It was partly in response to these competing forces that a distinctive Slav Macedonian id emerged within the late 19th and early 20th Century. As Mr Fokas's uncle used to say, the household was "neither Serb, nor Greek, nor Bulgarian, however Macedonian Orthodox". Ultimately, the Slav Macedonians discovered themselves divided between these three new states. In Greece, some have been expelled; those that remained have been pushed to assimilate. All villages and cities with non-Greek names got new ones, chosen by a committee of students within the late 1920s, although nearly a century later some "locals" nonetheless use the previous ones. In 1936, when Mr Fokas was 9 years previous, the Greek dictator Ioannis Metaxas (an admirer of Mussolini) banned the Macedonian language, and compelled Macedonian-speakers to vary their names to Greek ones. Mr Fokas remembers policemen eavesdropping on mourners at funerals and listening at home windows to catch anybody talking or singing within the forbidden tongue. There have been lawsuits, threats and beatings. Girls - who usually spoke no Greek - would cowl their mouths with their headscarves to muffle their speech, however Mr Fokas's mom was arrested and fined 250 drachmas, an enormous sum again then. "Slavic-speakers suffered lots from the Greeks below Metaxas," he says. "Twenty folks from this village, the heads of the large households, have been exiled to the island of Chios. My father-in-law was one in every of them." They have been tortured by being pressured to drink resin oil, a strong laxative. When Germany, Italy and Bulgaria invaded Greece in 1941, some Slavic-speakers welcomed the Bulgarians as potential liberators from Metaxas's repressive regime. However many quickly joined the resistance, led by the Communist Occasion (which at the moment supported the Macedonian minority) and continued combating with the Communists within the civil battle that adopted the Axis occupation. (Bulgaria annexed the jap a part of Greek Macedonia from 1941 to 1944, committing many atrocities; many Greeks wrongly attribute these to Macedonians, whom they establish as Bulgarians.) When the Communists have been lastly defeated, extreme reprisals adopted for anybody related to the resistance or the left. "Macedonians paid greater than anybody for the civil battle," Mr Fokas says. "Eight folks have been court-martialled and executed from this village, eight from the following village, 23 from the one reverse. They killed a grandfather and his grandson, simply 18 years previous." Mr Fokas was a scholar in Thessaloniki then - however he too was arrested and spent three years on the jail island of Makronisos, not due to something he'd completed however as a result of his mom had helped her brother-in-law escape by the skylight of a restaurant the place he was being held. Many of the prisoners on Makronisos have been Greek leftists, and have been pressed to signal declarations of repentance for his or her alleged Communist previous. Those that refused have been made to crawl below barbed wire, or crushed with thick bamboo canes. "Horrible issues have been completed," Mr Fokas says. "However we mustn't speak about them. It is an insult to Greek civilisation. It harms Greece's good title." Tens of 1000's of fighters with the Democratic Military, about half of them Slavic-speakers, went into exile in Jap bloc nations throughout and after the civil battle. About 20,000 kids have been taken throughout the border by the Communists, whether or not for his or her safety or as reserve troops for a future counter-attack. Many Slavic-speaking civilians additionally went north for security. Whole villages have been left empty, just like the previous settlement of Krystallopigi (Smrdes in Macedonian) close to the Albanian border, the place solely the imposing church of St George stands witness to a inhabitants that after numbered greater than 1,500 souls. In 1982, greater than 30 years after the battle's finish, Greece's socialist authorities issued a decree permitting civil battle refugees to return - however solely those that have been "of Greek ethnicity". Ethnic Macedonians from Greece remained shut out of their nation, their villages and their land; households separated by the battle have been by no means reunited. Mr Fokas's father-in-law and brother-in-law each died in Skopje. However, he factors out, that decree tacitly recognised that there have been ethnic Macedonians in Greece, although the state by no means formally recognised their existence: "These battle refugees left kids, grandchildren, fathers, moms behind. What have been they, if not Macedonians?" It is unimaginable precisely to calculate the variety of Slavic-speakers or descendants of ethnic Macedonians in Greece. Historian Leonidas Embiricos estimates that greater than 100,000 nonetheless dwell within the Greek area of Macedonia, although solely 10,000 to 20,000 would establish overtly as members of a minority - and lots of others are proud Greek nationalists. The Macedonian language hasn't formally been banned in Greece for many years, however the concern nonetheless lingers. A middle-aged man I met in a village close to the reed beds of Lake Prespa, the place the settlement between Greece and the North Macedonian republic was first signed final June, defined that this concern is handed down by the generations. "My mother and father did not converse the language at residence in case I picked it up and spoke it in public. To guard me. We do not even keep in mind why we're afraid any extra," he stated. Slowly the language is dying. Years of repression pushed it indoors; assimilation is ending the job. And but talking or singing in Macedonian can nonetheless be trigger for harassment. Mr. Fokas' son is a musician; he performs the haunting Macedonian flute for us as his personal small son seems to be on. He and a gaggle of associates used to host a global music pageant within the village sq., with bands from as far-off as Brazil, Mexico and Russia. "After these bands had performed we might have a celebration and play Macedonian songs," he says. "None of them have been nationalist or separatist songs - we might by no means permit that. However in 2008, simply as we have been anticipating the overseas musicians to reach, the native authority out of the blue banned us from holding the pageant within the sq., although different folks - the very ones who wished us banned - nonetheless maintain their very own occasions there." On the final minute, the pageant was moved to a area outdoors the village, among the many reeds and marshes, with out correct services - which, Mr Fokas's son factors out, solely made Greece look dangerous. "And are you aware why the songs are banned within the sq. however not the fields outdoors?" his father provides. "As a result of across the sq. there are cafes, and native folks might sit there and watch and pay attention secretly. However outdoors the village they have been afraid to hitch in - they might have drawn consideration to themselves by doing that." The ratification of Greece's settlement with the Republic of North Macedonia - and its implicit recognition of a Macedonian language and ethnicity - is a significant political breakthrough which ought to assist to alleviate such fears. However the course of has additionally sparked new waves of anger and nervousness, with giant, typically violent protests opposing the settlement, supported by components of the Orthodox church. An election is due earlier than the top of the yr. Greece's right-wing opposition has been fast to capitalise on nationalist sentiments, accusing the Syriza authorities of treason and betrayal. For Greece's Slavic-speakers, who've lengthy sought nothing greater than the correct to cultural expression, the time to emerge from the shadows could not fairly but have arrived. Mr Fokas has been referred to by his first title to guard his id It is greater than 25 years since Yugoslavia broke into items and the republic of Macedonia got here into being. Till a number of weeks in the past, the brand new nation lacked an official, internationally agreed title, due to Greece's objections to the title "Macedonia". And for almost all that point one man was working to unravel the issue. Read the full article

#2what #2whatcom #greece #greek #macedonian

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livethinking · 4 years ago

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Grégoire Ahongbonon: the eyes that free from chains

«I’m just a mechanic, I don’t know anything, everything I’m able to do is fix car pneumatics. I looked for Jesus Christ in the poor, in the oppressed and in the abandoned, so that was borne story academics and doctors are interested to: they always ask me to tell it». [1]

It’s an extraordinary story, that of Grégoire Ahngbonon, former mechanic, who, after misery, spiritual crisis, grief, he managed to survive, to embrace Christ’s teaching again and go closer to the Other with the whole himself. Grégoire Ahongbonon is a simple man, with a soft gaze (as one can see in pictures), but full of brave and active altruism; a man who won over his own prejudices and fears to welcome the different and save them from those who persists to search the humanity in other ones’ eyes. And Grégoire always managed to do it, even when the mind of who’s before him is haunted with ghosts of mental illness, when words are a verbal codes impossible to decipher, when just a caress is enough to shut up those demons; and this what Grégoire does, saving sick people, he heals them, he givers them dignity and frees them from the chains of prejudice and superstition, and from the real ones.

« But for me the most important thing is not necessarily healing every single person. It’s the dignity of each person. That’s our struggle».[2]

Grégoire Ahongbonon’s life was not easy. He lived difficult moment, tragedies, as he told Valerio Petrarca, an Italian anthropologist. Grégoire was born in 12th March 1952 in a small village near Koutongbé, in Benin, from where he moved to Ivory Coast in 1971, wherein he worked as mechanic, got success and became rich, but moving away from Christian religion, to which he was very close. In a few time, though, he lost everything, he got poor and tried to kill himself, an event that made him get closer to God and Church again. This getting close culminated with a peregrination in Jerusalem, the Holy City. Here, like the prodigal son, he came back to religion, made Christ’s teaching his categorical imperatives, exceeding the limits of fear provoked by not recognise the Other. His gaze became human and now he’s not scared of showing sympathy for who’s victim of the worst indigence, he’s not scared to dig down the abyss and being the light to who’s lost himself.

Thus, the journey stroke a chord in him and, back in Ivory Coast, he proposed to his wife to start a smal prayer group, then to help the poor and the imprisoned, and finally to mental ill people who, in Western Africa, are «the forgotten of the forgotten».[3]

Those harsh lands but full of life, between Benin, Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso, where voodoo religion has a great control on the society and believes the deviations of thought and behaviour should be treated literally with chains, and Christian religion with prayers.

«Looking for Jesus in the outcast, I started to see what I didn’t see before. And thus the story of the mentally ill begun. It was 1990 or 1991. The mentally ill in Africa are a shame for their own family, a shame for society, a shame for public power. They’re abandoned by everyone. You can see them eating garbage, sleeping outside, on the street. Everyone is scared of them. I too was scared of them. I too was scared of the mentally ill. One day, I see a mentally ill person, naked as usual, who was rummaging through the junk, searching for something to eat. But that day I looked at him in a different way. I stopped myself and spying him, I told myself: but that Jesus I look for in church, that Jesus I look for in prayer groups, that Jesus I look for in sacraments, is he the same Jesus who suffers inside this sick man? And if this is so, why should I be afraid of him? If he’s Jesus, why being scared?».[4]

What Grégoire Ahongbonon will do for the mentally ill is something extraordinary, especially in Western Africa. There it’s believed, according to voodoo belief, the mentally ill are possessed by spirits, so that they are up chained to trees, vexed as long as they confess their sins and free themselves. The same is believed by some Christians. Indeed, there are prayer centre where the mentally ill, still chained, are left outside to pray, until they heal from the disease. Grégoire helped a young man reduced to these conditions and he got disgusted: although they’re sick, are they not still human? Don’t they need dignity? Grégoire decided, with his wife’s support, to help them, first bringing them food and helping them washing, then transforming the hospital church to a rescue centre; finally, he founded the St Camille Association and opened clinics in Benin, Ivory Coast and in Burkina Faso. Every year, several psychiatrists comes from Europe to treat the mentally ill according to modern psychiatric theories, nurses take care of the patients and the association works to give dignity to these people, finding a job and a home for them. And many, many women and men, healed from their disorder, can bear witness of the success of the great work of Grégoire, a symbo, of humanity, true charity, sense of Otherness. And all this happened because of a glance. A sincere glance, a deep and human glance. ««There was a prayer centre here where there were more than 250 sick people. But today, there are no more sick people there, because when we started, the families saw the results, and they went unchained the sick people and brought them to us».[5]

People and the family of the sick people started noticing that Grégoire’s method works. The psychotic crisis are not provoked, as priests say, by spirits, but from disorder of behaviour and thought, real and concrete things. Through Christian mercy, Grégoire Ahongbonon imposed the epistemological sense of the world. The results are evident and many and many prayer centre closed, families don’t ask consults to priests or traditional healers, but to Grégoire and his association volunteers. The sick got really healed and not just that: they found a job, they’re taught a profession and, if they want, reintegrated into their villages or families.

Among the many stories of healing thanks to Grégoire’s association, there is that of Judikael, told by BBC. Judikael has suffered of strong psychotic crisis that often showed up with him getting himself naked and run around the city. His grandmother tried everything, consulting priests or traditional healers (but refusing to chain her grandson) but nothing has been enough. On day, she got to know about the St Camille Association and Grégoire. So that Judikael was hospitalised in one of the clinics of the association, where doctors diagnosed a form of schizophrenia. «[…] Judikael now comes once a month as an out-patient to get his injection. He has been treated at Saint Camille for almost a year, and takes one pill every day to silence the voices in his head.

He still struggles with some of the side-effects of his medication, which makes him sleepy and numb in the jaw and mouth, but he has started training as a tailor» [6] the work his beloved grandmother did.

(Pics from BBC news)

Giving the mental ill the dignity of human beings again: this is Grégoire Ahongbonon’s goal. And this happens only creating a healthy and comfortable environment, heal the sick under the respect of their humanity, teach them a profession and reintegrate them into society. Fighting as long as the forgotten of the forgotten get the right of being recognised, as long as the chains, the real and the metaphorical ones, got broken. «Because as long as there is one man in chains, it is the humanity that is chained. When I see a man tied to wood or in chains, I see my own image. And it’s the image of each and every one of us». [7] So, Grégoire Ahongbonon keeps working today, in a global pandemic, to save these women and these men (indeed, he won the Dr Guislan Award in December 2020), giving the whole humanity a great teaching.

Notes

[1] [PETRARCA, Valerio, I pazzi di Grégoire, Palermo, Sellerio editore, 2008, p. 146

[2] THE NEW YORK TIMES, “The chains of Mental Illness in West Africa”, in YouTube, 10.12.2015 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKd9MxBzAUc&t=301s retrieved 18th January 2021)

[3] MINISTRI DEGLI INFERMI RELIGIOSI CAMILLANI, “Grégoire Ahongbonon: quello che vivo è più forte di me”, in camillani.org, 02.5.2020, web (https://www.camilliani.org/gregoire-ahongbonon-quello-che-vivo-e-piu-forte-di-me/ retrieved 18th January 2021)

[4] PETRARCA, Valerio, I pazzi di Grégoire, p. 147

[5] THE NEW YORK TIMES, “The chains of Mental Illness in West Africa”, in YouTube, 10.12.2015

[6] ADJOVI, Laeila, “Ahngbonon: freeing people chained for being ill”, in BBC NEWS, 02.17.2016, web (https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35586177 retrieved in 18th January 2021)

[7] in THE NEW YORK TIMES, “The chains of Mental Illness in West Africa”, in YouTube, 12.10.2015

Sources

ADJOVI, Laeila, “Ahngbonon: freeing people chained for being ill”, in BBC NEWS, 02.17.2016, web (https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35586177 retrieved in 18th January 2021)

MINISTRI DEGLI INFERMI RELIGIOSI CAMILLANI, “Grégoire Ahongbonon: quello che vivo è più forte di me”, in camillani.org, 02.5.2020, web (https://www.camilliani.org/gregoire-ahongbonon-quello-che-vivo-e-piu-forte-di-me/ consultato il 18th January 2021)

PETRARCA, Valerio, I pazzi di Grégoire, 5ª ed., Palermo, Sellerio editore, 2008

THE NEW YORK TIMES, “The chains of Mental Illness in West Africa”, in YouTube, 10.12.2015 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKd9MxBzAUc&t=301s consultato il 18th January 2021)

WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION, “Humble beginnings: Grégoire Ahongbonon and the St Camille Association”, in who.int, 2005, web (https://www.who.int/features/2005/mental_health/beginnings/en/ consultato il 18th January 2021)

#human rights #Burkina Faso #Ivory Coast #Culture #writing #Western Africa #blogging #charity #mental disorder #Grégoire Ahongbonon #mental illness #Africa #innocent victims #mental ill #Benin

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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What Hamilton Doesn’t Say About His Real History with Slavery

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It was mid-October 1796 when Alexander Hamilton released the first in a string of scathing essays about political opponent Thomas Jefferson. By this point in early United States history, George Washington had announced his retirement, refusing to seek a third term as president, and the race of self-styled great men hoping to take his place was on… with none more loathsome to Hamilton than Jefferson, the loquacious, if remote, thinker on a hill in Virginia.

In this first of 25 essays, Hamilton wrote under the nom de plume of Phocion about the many hypocrisies of Jefferson, depicting the supposed philosopher as a moral and intellectual fraud, and something worse: a slave owner who knew slavery was evil but still took advantage, perhaps even of a sexual nature, of the Black people he kept in bondage.

It is moments of moral standing like this, even if Hamilton hid his name under a pseudonym, that Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical Hamilton hangs its hat on. While the actual incident does not technically occur in the musical’s dizzying amount of narrative events, the tour de force work of art still uses its trenchant blending of historical fact and hip hop melodies to convey much the same idea: Jefferson was a demonstrable hypocrite on the issue of slavery. Despite being one of the United States’ brightest thinkers about the rights of men, Jefferson failed time and again throughout his life to truly fight to end slavery—or free the hundreds of people he kept as possessions at Monticello. Even on his deathbed, Jefferson freed just five slaves, relatives all to his “mistress” (if such a word is fair), Sally Hemings.

Hamilton leans into this fact when Alexander Hamilton, played in the new Disney+ movie by Miranda himself, mocks Jefferson (Daveed Diggs) for his hypocrisies in a rap battle.

“A civics lesson from a slaver,” Hamilton seethes in the show. “Hey neighbor, your debts are paid because you don’t pay for labor. ‘We plant seeds in the South, we create?’ Keep ranting, we know who’s really doing the planting.”

It’s one of the many flashy moments where Hamilton brandishes the anti-slavery sentiments of its title character, going so far as to suggest if he hadn’t died in a duel in 1804 he could’ve done more to end slavery. Throughout the show, he’s depicted as standing shoulder to shoulder with John Laurens (Anthony Ramos), who preaches “We won’t be free until we end slavery” during the American Revolution, and is even introduced as a young man horrified in his childhood on St. Croix as he watches “slaves were being slaughtered and carted away.” It was a satisfying message when the musical opened in 2015 with its color-blind casting, and it plays even more satisfying now.

However, like much else in regards to Alexander Hamilton’s life, the contradictions and shortcomings the man displayed toward slavery were thoroughly glossed over. Despite being an immigrant with a rags to riches story, Hamilton was also an elitist with those riches, favoring big banks and commercialism to the supposed agrarian utopia Jefferson imagined. Even the night before his fateful duel with Aaron Burr, Hamilton lamented to a friend that New England Federalists were fools if they really wanted to secede from the Union. Seceding would provide no “relief to our real disease, which is democracy,” Hamilton wrote, hinting at his disdain for popular rule.

The thornier side of Hamilton’s relationship to slavery is similarly overlooked. This is a fact Miranda is now publicly commenting on ahead of the Disney+ release.

In a recent interview with NPR, Miranda said, “[Slavery] is the third line of our show. It’s a system in which every character in our show is complicit in some way or another… Hamilton – although he voiced anti-slavery beliefs – remained complicit in the system. And other than calling out Jefferson on his hypocrisy with regards to slavery in Act 2, doesn’t really say much else over the course of Act 2. And I think that’s actually pretty honest.”

So what were Hamilton’s actual views on slavery? Well, as Ron Chernow notes in his biography, Alexander Hamilton, which the Hamilton musical is based on, “Few, if any, other founding fathers opposed slavery more consistently or toiled harder to eradicate it than Hamilton.” This is probably true, but it speaks more to how little that generation did to confront what became their new nation’s original sin than it necessarily speaks to Hamilton’s trailblazing abolitionist advocacy.

Born on the Caribbean island of Nevis in 1757, Hamilton grew up in a part of the world where slavery was an everyday aspect of life. Indeed, one of the primary reasons the Caribbean islands under British rule balked at the North American colonies’ calls for independence is they relied on the British Army and Navy to keep the local slave populations from uprising. There were eight times as many Black slaves as white colonists on these islands, a far higher ratio than the white colonists outnumbering Black slaves four-to-one in the North American colonies.

Hamilton saw this in his everyday life. After his father walked out on him, he went with his mother and older brother to stay with their in-laws, the Lyton family. Yet the Lytons were sugar planters who owned a vast amount of slaves, and one of the reasons they soon turned the Hamiltons out is because a relative stole 22 of their slaves and ran off to start a new life in the Carolinas—keeping those with dark skin in bondage, of course.

During this period in his life, Hamilton developed a strong distaste for slavery, which he considered barbarous. He even developed rather progressive opinions for an 18th century white man in the Caribbean, noticing there were no genetic differences in mental or physical ability between Black and white men. His ability to express vocal outrage over slavery impressed merchants early in his career, who eventually helped fund his education toward the mainland.

But what did he do with this knowledge? As Manuel said in 2020, clearly not enough. Upon reaching New York and quickly asserting himself as a brash intellectual leader in the Revolutionary generation, Hamilton supported anti-slavery causes, but they were never a high-priority. His dear friend John Laurens did speak out against slavery and even radically attempted to free 3,000 slaves if they fought for the Continental Army, beginning with the 40 slaves he stood to inherit from his father Henry Laurens, President of the Continental Congress. But while Laurens won approval for the plan in the Continental Congress, when he arrived in South Carolina to emancipate the said 3,000 slaves, he faced extreme opposition. Even as a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives, Laurens failed three times by overwhelming margins between 1779 and 1782 to emancipate 3,000 Black lives from chains.

Hamilton supported his friend Laurens’ cause, but he was personally busier with his responsibilities as George Washington’s aides-de-camp (a secretary). He was also working his way into intentionally marrying into a wealthy family like the Schuylers… a family that’s wealth was partially predicated on owning slaves.

In a fact completely ignored in Hamilton, New York was very much a slave colony and then state during the 18th century. While the smaller northern farms never reached the economic needs for chained Black bodies on an industrial scale, it still was a common, even fashionable practice to own a slave. Before becoming a late-in-life abolitionist, Benjamin Franklin owned several house slaves in his youth. And in New York City during the 1790s, one in five white homes owned at least one domestic slave for household chores. It was a status symbol.

For the Schuylers it was more than just one slave too. At his height of wealth, Philip Schuyler—the father of Angelica, Peggy, and Eliza—owned 27 slaves, tending to his mansion in Albany and his mills in Saratoga. And while Eliza herself became a staunch abolitionist in her old age after Alexander died, in her youth, she told her grandson, she was her mother’s chief assistant in running the domestic affairs and slaves of the house.

All of this is expunged in the Hamilton musical that depicts two of the Schuyler sisters as free thinkers. In reality, Angelica long maintained the practice of slaveholding after leaving her parents’ home… as might have Eliza.

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There are several ambiguous documents that would seem to suggest early in their marriage, Alexander and Eliza either bought, rented, or at least provided financial support in others’ purchase of slaves. After his wedding to Eliza, Alexander wrote Gov. George Clinton that “I expect by Col. Hay’s return to receive a sufficient sum to pay the value of the woman Mrs. H had of Mrs. Clinton.” Biographer Forrest McDonald argued that this was too small a sum of money to buy a slave and rather it was the salary for a domestic servant, however others have speculated it was essentially for the renting of a slave.

Later in 1795, Philip Schuyler wrote to his son-in-law that “the Negro boy & woman are engaged for you” at the sum of $250. Hamilton even noted the transaction in his cashbook as “for 2 Negro servants purchased by him for me.” Biographer Ron Chernow argues that this purchase was possibly a reluctant service Hamilton did for his brother and sister-in-law, John and Angelica Church. But the best thing to hang on that is Angelica writing, regretfully, to Eliza that she and Alexander have no slaves to help host a large party. Yet to say there is an uncomfortable ambiguity there is an understatement.

To Hamilton’s credit, he was an early member of the New York Manumission Society, which fought against slaveholders kidnapping fugitive slaves and Freed Black people off the streets of Manhattan and selling them into bondage. The group petitioned the state’s General Assembly to pass a law that would phase out slavery in New York—a policy championed by Burr (before he reversed his abolitionist tendencies when he became a political ally of Democratic-Republicans and remained a slaveholder his entire life). And as the leader of the Society’s Ways and Means Committee, Hamilton drafted proposals that members of the group who owned slaves, including chairman John Jay, free all slaves over the age of 45 immediately; those younger than 28 by the time they’re 35; and those between 28 and 38 within seven years of the proposal’s writing. But even these potentially decade-spanning deadlines were considered too radical by the slaveholders of this anti-slavery society… they were roundly rejected and Hamilton’s committee was disbanded.

Still, Hamilton remained part of the group’s standing committee and even petitioned the state legislature of New York to ban trading slaves from anywhere else in the world, saying exporting Black people “like cattle and other commerce to the West Indies and the southern states” was a monstrous affair.

Nevertheless, all of these stands were made before Hamilton had actual political power inside of the government, as opposed to writing to it. So what did he do when he actually was in the room where it happens? Largely nothing other than treating it as a bargaining chip. During the Constitutional Convention, Hamilton spoke passionately about the need for allowing easy immigration and U.S. citizenry to anyone who wanted it—and argued that senators should have lifetime appointments—but on the issue of slavery, and the infamous “Three-Fifths Compromise” that occurred there, Hamilton gloomily surmised, “No union could possibly be formed” without it.

And what of his visceral admonishment of Jefferson’s hypocrisies in 1796? It was vividly fair. Jefferson, ever the proud renaissance man, was aware that slavery was evil. He attempted to blame the institution on King George III in the Declaration of Independence before Southern states forced him to take it out, and in the early 1780s he published Notes on the State of Virginia, which among other things argued that slavery could be ended in the state by 1784 with emancipated slaves moving into the interior North American continent. Of course none of that happened, and between his many impressive positions in government, from ambassador to France to Secretary of State, to vice president, and finally President of the United States, he never actually acted on these goals… or freed the hundreds of Black men and women he kept toiling at Monticello.

In fact, Hamilton used the hypocrisy and blatant racism within Notes on the State of Virginia against Jefferson, noting the document’s paternal bigotry where Jefferson offered pseudoscientific explanations to suggest in the natural hierarchy, whites were above Blacks, in the way Blacks were above orangutans. “[He’d have them] exported to some less friendly region where they might all be murdered or reduced to a more wretched state of slavery,” Hamilton wrote as Phocoin about Jefferson’s unrealized emancipation plan. But his most damning indictment was insinuating that the well-noticed light skinned slaves called Black in Monticello might have a complicated heritage.

“At one moment he is anxious to emancipate the blacks to vindicate the liberty of the human race. At another he discovers that the blacks are of a different race from the human race and therefore, when emancipated, they must be instantly removed beyond the reach of mixture lest he (or she) should stain the blood of his (or her) master, not recollecting what from his situation and other circumstances he ought to have recollected—that this mixture may take place while the negro remains in slavery. He must have seen all around him sufficient marks of this staining of blood to have been convinced that retaining them in slavery would not prevent it.”

– Alexander Hamilton

Biographer Chernow even believes this hints at Hamilton having knowledge about Jefferson’s affair with the light-skinned Sally Hemings, as Angelica Schuyler Church was a friend of Jefferson’s during his time in Paris when he possibly began that, um, relationship. Hemings was 14 at the time.

Sadly, lest you think Hamilton was simply using the cloak of anonymity to call out the blatant hypocrisy of Southern planters, the uglier truth is that Hamilton was using this potential knowledge as a cudgel against Jefferson in the South. Writing in support of his Federalist compatriot John Adams, Hamilton rather cynically ends the essay by saying, “For my own part, were I a Southern planter, owning negroes, I should be ten thousand times more alarmed at Mr. Jefferson’s ardent wish for emancipation than at Mr. Adams’ system of checks and balances.”

So even in his most full-throated denunciation of slavery, the racism it’s founded on, and the hypocrisy of slave owners, Hamilton was still posturing it for political gain… among slave plantation owners.

For this reason, some historians, and even more activists, hold a wary cynicism toward Hamilton. Author and playwright Ishmael Reed even wrote a full-length lecture of a play called The Haunting of Lin-Manuel Miranda, in which he depicts Miranda as a hapless dupe manipulated by Chernow into spreading manipulative lies about America’s founders, whom Reed compares to Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich.

This kind of broad portrait of these historic figures—or Miranda and Chernow for that matter—may be just as sweeping as the centuries of deification the founders and other “great white men” received before recent decades’ attempts by historians and universities to be more inclusive and objective about the historical record.

The truth about Hamilton, like most men, is a lot more complicated, including how Miranda’s impressive work of art presents him. Hamilton was a forward-thinker ahead of his time who understood slavery, and the basic tenets of racism that white society used to rationalize it, was insidious. “Odious” and “immoral” (complete with italicizations) were his favorite words to describe it. He made some nominal effort to fight it, but like a lot of white men throughout history, and even today, he ultimately placed it low among his priorities and often on the backburner… allowing it to linger to the next generation and the next century, and to the point where it nearly tore his beloved Union asunder in a civil war that claimed more than half a million lives.

Perhaps it’s best to remember, beyond musical stage glory, Hamilton was a man who did good and bad, and maybe cruelty by simply not doing enough when he had the power to do more. But instead of glorifying or vilifying those shortcomings, it’s best to learn from them and see how much (or little) we are doing today to overcome the legacy of slavery. It’s wishful thinking on the part of Miranda and Phillipa Soo’s Eliza at the end of the musical to say if Hamilton hadn’t died in 1804 “you could have done so much more” about slavery. When Burr shot him, his time in power had honestly passed. Ours has not.

The post What Hamilton Doesn’t Say About His Real History with Slavery appeared first on Den of Geek.

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buzzdixonwriter · 5 years ago

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The Coming Of The Fictoids

Each Christmas the grandkids get me presents that allow me to stretch my creativity, and this year my older grandson got me a book called Write The Story.

Each page is ruled like a notebook, but at the top is a title / story prompt and below it ten words to work into the story.

It’s a fun little book that I keep by my side when watching TV after I shut down the computer for the night, scribbling in first drafts of short-short stories, the type I refer to as “fictoids”. There’s enough space for about 250-300 handwritten words, though I reserve the right to add / edit / embellish when I transcribe it to the computer.

Sometimes I think about the story prompt for a day or two, sometimes I just start writing. Once I have an idea where I’ll end up -- the “punchline” for lack of a better word -- the writing comes fairly fast (though I have started a couple with no idea where I was going with them).

Since the market for flash fiction / short-short stories is crowded and pays so little for the effort (that is, the effort of finding the markets and submitting, which is the same amount of effort for longer, better paying works), there’s no reason to keep this to myself so I’m just going to upload them here for everyone to read.

They’ll be popping up every Tuesday for as long as I have blank pages.

#fictoid #writing #writing report

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biofunmy · 5 years ago

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Grandmother and Grandfather Among 4 Endangered Whales That Died This Month

Four North Atlantic right whales were found dead in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in Canada in the last three weeks, representing about one percent of the remaining population that is closely watched.

One, named Punctuation, was a breeding female who had mothered eight calves and then gone on to have several grandchildren, making her death a significant loss for a dwindling population. She had been sighted as long ago as 38 years.

Another, known as Comet, was roughly 33 years old and well known to whale-watching experts, who also said that he had become a grandfather.

Two others were a younger male named Wolverine that died earlier this month, and an 11-year-old female that was found dead along with Comet near New Brunswick’s Acadian Peninsula on Tuesday night.

The New England Aquarium, which tracks the endangered population, said in a statement: “The loss of sexually mature females is biologically a major loss to this species that has seen a precipitous population decline over the past several years.”

The aquarium noted that hundreds of the right whales had migrated northward into the Gulf of St. Lawrence as warming waters reduced their food source, mainly copepods in the Bay of Fundy and the Gulf of Maine.

A new study, published June 20 in the journal Diseases of Aquatic Organisms, looked at 70 North Atlantic right whale deaths recorded from 2003 through 2018. It found that of the 43 deaths in which a cause could be determined, 90 percent were from entanglements in fishing lines or collisions with vessels.

None of the adult or juvenile deaths were from natural causes — all died as a result of human activities, the paper found.

The study offered several recommendations for reducing whale deaths, such as switching to ropeless fishing gear, limiting boat speeds across larger areas of the coastline, closing fisheries and expanding speed restrictions when right whales are spotted nearby, and more research to better understand whale habits and dangers.

The study was written by scientists from a number of organizations, including the International Fund for Animal Welfare, the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Université de Montréal, NOAA Fisheries, the New England Aquarium and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

The last formal count in 2017 indicated there were 411 remaining North Atlantic right whales. Seven newborn calves were spotted this year, up from five in 2017 and none last year.

Right whales, which can grow longer than a school bus, are identified by the unique pattern of a “callosity” — the roughened skin patches on their heads. Researchers at the New England Aquarium have maintained a catalog of the species since the early 1970s.

Wolverine, a 9-year-old male, was found dead on June 4. He was first sighted in 2010 off the coast of Florida, then Georgia and then southern New England as he and his mother returned from breeding grounds in the South. He had been spotted many times since, mostly in Cape Cod Bay. (His mother was believed to have died in 2013 after a severe entanglement with fishing gear.)

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In 2017, Wolverine was spotted for the first time in the Gulf of St. Lawrence off Canada, farther north than the species usually traveled. Research suggests that the whales are following their food to new territory possibly in response to climate change, bringing them into areas where there are fewer regulations designed to protect them.

Two years ago, 17 North Atlantic right whales were found dead, including 12 in Canadian waters. Three were found dead last year, all in the United States. Wolverine and Punctuation are the only North Atlantic right whales known to have died this year.

North Atlantic right whale #1281 was named “Punctuation” because scientists thought the small scars on her head looked like dashes and commas. Her carcass was found floating on June 20. Since 1981, she has been sighted more than 250 times up and down the Eastern Seaboard.

Two of Punctuation’s eight calves have been spotted with calves of their own. One of her calves, #4681, was struck and killed by a ship in 2016. Another daughter had disappeared a year after her own daughter was killed by an entanglement. A grandson was spotted in 2011 with deep propeller cuts to his back and has not been seen since. He is presumed dead.

Since 1985, Comet had been seen in Cape Cod Bay every year and then in 2017, he was spotted for the first time in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the aquarium said. Both Comet and the 11-year-old female found dead on Tuesday had suffered several entanglements with fishing gear in recent years.

It is still unknown what caused their deaths. Researchers now want Punctuation’s body brought ashore for a necropsy. Wolverine’s carcass has been tagged, but not brought ashore yet.

“Understanding how and why right whales are killed is essential to evaluating and improving management and conservation efforts aimed at saving this species,” the aquarium said. “In the meantime, researchers mourn the loss of yet another important whale in this population and an old friend we’ll dearly miss seeing out on the water.”

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pa-awesome · 6 years ago

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Small Lies That Escalated Into “This Is My Life Now”

• I'm disabled. I use two crutches to walk. When I'm not actually hobbling along it's one of those disabilities that can be mistaken for just having a broken leg or something. People frequently ask me "What did I do to need those crutches?" When I started university I told a girl that I cage-wrestled a bear. She was drunk and thought it was hilarious. I thought it was clear that I was completely obviously joking. There is no sane way I could have been serious. About three hours later I'm at the student union. Gareth Gates is singing (that one off pop Idol) I'm trying to take a picture of him, and I hear two girls in front of me: "Do you know why he's got those?" "Yeah he got mauled by a bear or something" "Are you serious?" Several months later I have to go meet my partner for our placement study. I've never met her before in my life, but she knows me already as the guy who got attacked by a bear. At Christmas I head home, (only a couple of hours away) and meet up with some friends for drinks. "Turrabo, why the fuck are you telling everybody that you got mauled by a bear?"

• In college my roommate and I had a KFC taco bell right by our apartment. We would go once or twice a week. One time we ordered and the drive through guy said "hey bro, you're - i remember your car!" Since the name was the same as mine, I was like "hey man!" Apparently he thought we had both worked construction together - or he did with a guy who looked like me, drove the same car, and had the same name. Anyway, he ends up giving us our order to for free. From that day on, everytime we went to the taco bell - kfc, we got free food. He would even tell his coworkers to give us free food and would throw in comments like - "you remember steve, he was a real asshole". I would agree and then accept my food. My roommate also apparently started getting free food even when I wasn't there because he recognized him. Doppleganger me must of been a super nice guy, because I got a lot of love. I lived that wonderful lie for roughly 3-4 years to get the free gorditas and fried chicken. I even got a new friend on facebook. Worth it.

• I told people at my former (American) university that I was Canadian, to get them to stop talking to me about U.S. politics. I hate confrontation and didn't know how to just tell them that political discussion makes me uncomfortable. Now I live in Canada and attend a Canadian university. I'm working towards citizenship. Oops.

• I've been making EDM since I was 13, and in my senior year of High School I had the opportunity to play some of my music live with Ableton for my classmates at an event. But, because I couldn't explain what I was doing in the space provided on the sign-up sheet I just put down "DJ", thinking that nobody would be knowledgeable enough to know the difference. Apparently everybody liked it so much that the prom committee asked me to DJ prom, and like an idiot I said yes. I waited for my birthday, and made sure that nobody got me any gifts-just money, which I spent on software and a Mixtrack Pro. I learned how to DJ in three months, did prom, got payed 250$. I'm making decent money off of gigs now, and I do the prom every year.

• When I was little, my grandma would make me these horrible frozen chicken tenders filled with cheese. They were just god-awful. Because I am a good grandson, I told her that I loved them. From then on, every time that I visited her, she would cook me those abominations. Even when I was in graduate school, I would go visit her and for one meal, I would have to slide those gross things down my gullet. Every time I would say, "Thanks! I love them!" The things we do for love...

• I was having a rough time commuting too far for work for a few months. Decided to quit to find something closer to home, but told everyone I had been approved to work from home. When I went to give my two weeks, my manager asked, "I know the driving has been killing you, how would you feel about working from home?" Work laptop to my left and watching Great British Masterclass as I type, been working at home since then.

• My upstairs neighbor called me Mark in a conversation but since that is not my name, I didn't realize she was actually referring to me so I didn't correct her. The second time she called me Mark it was from a distance as she was leaving her apartment and I was getting in; I registered that she thought my name was Mark but I felt it would be weird to shout back that my name is not Mark. The third time she did this I had a bunch of friends over on the stoop outside the apartment and I didn't want to correct her in front of a group of kids (she's an older lady; we were in our early twenties) because I didn't want to embarrass her. All my friends looked confused that she was calling me Mark but after she went inside I explained to them I was too deep into it to correct her. They disagreed since she had only done it three times at that point. That was 7 years ago. I am Mark.

• Buddy of mine shared this one. He told his wife's parents he liked their Christmas ham at the first family function he was invited to. They took that as he loved ham in general. Ten years later it's the only food they have at any meal where it's him, wife and kids and the inlaws. They have dinner twice a month, it's always ham. They send him ham-centric gift baskets every year on his birthday at work. Every holiday it's ham, ham, ham, at every meal. They took a 3 hour detour last year to get a picture of some sign in Ham Lake MN or a postcard or something and thought he'd be so excited when they sent him the photo. It's like they only ever learned one fact about him and it was he likes ham. At this point I'm not sure they remembered his name and heartily pat him on the back referring to him a their ham-loving son in law because they're too embarrassed to ask ten years in and employ complex, Leslie-Nielsen-level schemes to get someone to steal his wallet or get someone to say his name that always fail. He hates ham, always has, its too salty and makes his hands swell up so much his wedding ring can't be removed. His wife now hates ham. He was just being polite. We're attending a christening of their kid next weekend and I'll get to meat the inlaws in question. I will be asking them if they love ham as much as he certainly does. I want to know if everyone in the family hates ham and they're all just smiling while dying on the inside at every meal, passing the ham with anger boiling like a pot of hot ham water just under surface. So yeah that's his life right now, forced to eat ham because he lied about liking ham and he's in too deep.

• People picked on my brother in high school for getting jumped by some wannabe “blood” thugs in the bathroom. Popular thugs, if you can believe it. It was relentless. His confidence and any friendships were crushed, cause, you know, people can’t be seen with the loser. One day I was confronted by said thugs, basically talking shit about my brother, and in my infinite wisdom, I said I could box so they better back off. Something to that affect. Looking back, I cringe, but you do what you have to. Needless to say, they did not back off. Somehow, I landed a punch on one of the kids that dislocated his jaw. Like, flapping around like a mouth piece hanging from a football helmet. I became the kid who could “box” but never wanted to fight, which I guess gave me credibility. I don’t really know. Everyone and their hyena came to me asking where they could learn said boxing skills, how I’d learned by 16, all that crap. I’d wanted to just come out and say I had been lucky, but I didn’t want anyone to give my brother shit again. So the lie stayed. Luckily, no one ever picked on my brother afterwards, and I did eventually learn some boxing fundamentals, but most because I felt like I was living a lie. Which I was. As a man, I have not had to keep up the facade.

• I moved to a new city, and got a new dentist. For some reason, the guy thinks I used to see him at his old practice in a town I've never lived in. I corrected him a couple times, but he just keeps bringing it up, so now I just kind of roll with it. He asks after my parents, which is easy enough...but we've had all kinds of conversations about local restaurants I've never been to and other random stuff like that.

• "Yea I'd say I'm pretty good with excel." No. No I wasn't. Annnnnnd now I'm an analyst at a fortune 400 company.

• My mother was a super control freak, so one of the ways I would avoid home was after school extracurriculars. I got the date wrong on a math team meeting, so I lied to my mom about it while actually attending the debate team intro meeting. I probably didn't need to lie, but it was always safer to not disrupt her precious schedule. Eventually, debate became a regular activity for me to avoid home. In 3 years, I was a state semifinalist and in college, I coached the high school national champions and turned that into a free ride for a masters degree.

• A new coworker of mine tried downplaying his bday and eventually after me hounding him about why he didn't like celebrating, he eventually told me in confidence that his best friend was killed on his birthday and he hates thinking about it. Fast forward 8 years -- this guy and I had become really good friends. Best friends. Lived together at one point. He was accepted into my friend group and I always made sure to downplay his bday (his is 4 days after another friend) so we just did a group thing and never made a big deal about it. Finally someone got brave enough and wanted to talk to him about it, and he laughed and had no recollection of telling me that and said he was probably just screwing with me. He always wondered why no one wished him happy bday.

• I moved to a new city when I was in 6th grade and on the same day I started two other boys started and they both knew how to skateboard, so I lied and said I did to. Then for months I lied about being able to skateboard to them and other kids at the school, and I never came clean because I didn't want anyone to call me a poser. So I bought skater boy clothes, and a skateboard and learned how to skateboard because I lied about knowing how to skateboard. Still skating since then. I'm 27 now.

• Once my boyfriends mom asked me if I liked their bathroom soap. It’s lavender, I don’t like lavender. But I decided to tell her “I love it, it smells so good!” Now I have an endless supply, she buys me some all the time. It’s too sweet to tell her the truth, so I just keep it to myself and use the mediocre-smelling soap. Oh well, this is how I live now

• My husband's best friend has a 6 year old daughter that I see often. When she was almost 3 she babbled something to me (I think it was "My friends here!") and my husband interpreted it as "My friend Steve!" and started calling me Steve in front of her. Now her whole family call me Steve when she's around, and she still believes that's my name. For clarity, I'm a female and my name isn't anything close to Steve.

• Back in High School, someone in my freshman English class thought he heard someone call me Louis, so he started calling me Louis. Not really a friend, just someone I spoke to on occasion. Now high school me thought he was just him trying to be funny, and didn't care to correct him and he continued to call me Louis and whenever I heard him call for me I responded. It wasn't until our last week of senior year that he stops me in his tracks and goes. "Someone told me your name isn't Louis. Is your name Louis?" "No." "I-I've been calling you Louis for 4 years! I thought that was your name!"

• "You're here for the copywriting position right?" "Yup!" I was the only one in the waiting area... thought I was there for a design/art direction role. Within 15 minutes of the interview they offered me $2K to move and $45K starting salary a week before graduation.

• My life, my dad's lie. He's a GP in the US and had an older Indian man as a patient. While they were chatting, at some point my dad mentioned that his sister loved elephants and had a collection of figurines. The patient went back to India to visit family, and he brought back a couple small carved elephants to my dad to give to me. He'd misunderstood/misremembered and thought it was his daughter who collected elephants. My dad thought it was a one time thing, thanked him, and said I'd love them. Turns out he went back to India every year. For ten years, I'd get a new elephant figurine whenever that patient had come back.

• Said I was a amateur boxer until a real fight popped off. guy was huge, I just put my hands up pretended I knew what I was doing, meanest face I could make. guy stood down, said "fuck that..you could tell he knows how to fight." I signed up to my nearest boxing gym the next day. I actually love it!

#repost #story #liar #lies

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