Please "Americanize" Your Name

 OK, the title is a “joke on the square.”  Who is dumb enough to know me and accept that I would say that seriously.  Oh, probably some humorless bot someplace will squeak, but another part of the joke is that it raises some legitimate concerns in a trans-cultural society. 

Yeah, I just made up that word.  “Multi-cultural” sounds like a permanent thing, like a half-full jar of green marbles into which your slowly pouring some yellow, purple and red marble and occasionally stirring.  We’re really in the first phase of a transcultural society, where we live the very beginning spirit of “E pluribus unum,” that hopeful (yet so far unfulfilled) statement that “out of many, we make one.”

This little writing started when I was doing a card to a doctor today.  The doc saved my life (by recognizing some potentially fatal condition and then no-kidding curing it) and doing so in the kindest manner I have ever encountered.  I had to have my PCP write her name down, because it is obviously a transliteration from another alphabet to English. 

That got me thinking about names generally and “foreign” names in particular.  By “foreign,” I mean not common in the country I live in. And there has long been in America – a probably everywhere – a push (or maybe a pull) to have a more common name.  Igor Igorivich Borodin is harder to spell that John Smith.  Oddly, we expect that when we meet either one, we have different expectations.  That’s on us, not on John or Igor. 

My surname first appeared with an 7 or8 times great grandfather who stepped ashore in the seventeenth century at Hampton Roads, probably as an indenture servant.  Without doing the math[1], the paternal surname tradition in our culture caused me to bear a surname born by less than 2% of my ancestors.  I could just as well be named Gates, Smith, Elliot, or Staib or things I don’t remember as I write.[2]  There is a family tradition – totally unproved – that there is some American Indian name from a foundling in the nineteenth century.  However, the American Indian naming tradition was/is far different from the Main Line American custom. The surname I bear is “Curry.”  My great times 1 or 2 grandfather changed it from “Currey.”  According to the late Rev. Truman Lawyer and the late Marilyn Greenleaf, the custodians of family records, it came from “Currie” about the time when the lowland Scots where chased from Scotland and ultimately arrived in the Western Hemisphere.  The surname “Curry” is modestly unusual, short and easy tp pronounce, so it serves me.

When people emigrated from elsewhere to North America, they often changed their name to something they thought was more American.  Part of the reason is that (probably) genetic us-them thing that leads us to make judgments WAY before we have enough information.  In the movie The Untouchables, there is a scene where the old, tough police sergeant (Sean Connery) engages a rookie officer (Andy Garcia) about whether “George Stone” (the Garcia character) had changed his name from an Italian one.  That was common – and we here in the 21^st century say shameful – practice.  It turns out that Connery was provoking Garcia to observe his behavior under stress.  (It worked.)  People have changed names later on in life for similar reasons.  Dwight Eisenhower came from a paternal family called “Eisenhauer,” and that was changed to “de-germanize” the name.  (DDE graduated West Point – I think[3] - the Class of 1911.  German names were a problem and it only got worse.)

So what should we do about the practice of changing names.

First, relax.  It’s legal.  The patronymic naming system is part-law and part-custom.  It has served for hundreds of years on the one hand and on the other, it’s not written in stone.  Also, maybe there’s a “who cares” somewhere in my mind.  What you call yourself if your problem and your business.  Xi Jinpeng defected, his new buddies would have a hell of a time pronouncing his name correctly.  For that matter, were I to print “Xi Jinpeng” in a Chinese newspaper, the only comment that would produce is “who stuck some random English letters into our paper?” 

Now, back to the doctor.  She is from the Indian subcontinent and her name sounds like the letters and cadence that names from there seem to me to.[4]  I find that some doctors from that region are referring themselves to patients they meet briefly as “Dr. Dev.”  Apparently, the surname “Devabakthuni” is common in India, sorta like “Smith” and those doctors frequently shorten it to “Dr. Dev,” which is short and easy to pronounce, without diphthongs, digraphs or consonant blends.

Back to the jar filled with marbles.  That won’t last forever in a truly transcultural world.  The image should be a jar of especially thick paint.  Sure, you can still see the colors that go in, but sooner or later, everything will mix.  America is STILL the primary place where people emigrate to.  First the freely possible off-the-books immigration and the current press to reverse the off-the-books thing have  NOT changed the direction that many people want to move.  We will have more and more “strange” surnames moving to the U.S.  Oh, how about not “strange” but “sounds strange and is hard to pronounce for someone whose milk language is English. 

The answer?  Oh, yes, I have an answer, but it’s not an immediate fix-all.  It’s patience.  Native English speakers, try to pronounce someone’s name as they pronounce it.  If it’s tough, ask them.  Americans are largely polite people.  “XI Jinpeng” knows that an English mouth has a rough time wrapping itself around his name, probably as much as a Chinese mouth has trouble pronouncing Donald Trump or  Marco Rubio. 

We will have more names to learn how to pronounce.  Do it patiently. But do it.

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[1] It’s late.  I’m sitting up in bed.  I’m lazy.  Do your own math if it bothers you.

[2] And, again, am too lazy to look up.

[3] See above reverence to my being in bed and lazy.

[4] A grammatical note:  A preposition is a terrible thing to end a sentence with.  Unless you don’t have anything else to end it with.   

Don't Blame Me, This Post Just Grew - Beaver Dams, Watercourses, and Ranting

 A former partner, Susan McLaughlin (a truly super lawyer!) replied to one of the endless things I've been posting on Facebook, this one about beaver dams.  It requires more than an acknowledgement in a reply.  In fact, it just grew into a short blog post.  I’m ready for the endless parade of hearings I have tomorrow, so I got time.

Watercourses are - from the source to the ocean - connected ecosystems.   Some people think a word like "ecosystems" is some sort of liberal, modern-day doublespeak and means nothing.  How silly.  It means that nature has slowly evolved, with only rare, occasional sudden changes (think the Mt. St. Helen's explosion, the Tunguska event, etc.), and any figurative grit between the stones has slowly been worn down over geological time.  Nature fits neatly. 

Humanity is the first creature who has had the ability to change nature abruptly and my goodness have we done so with a will!  The examples are legion: carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (bad, good, climate change, non-climate change, whatever, it's still at a high level due to some extent or near-total extent due to humans), the "harmless" cloroflorocarbons which still are wreaking havoc with the protective ozone layer in the mid-statosphere, microplastics in damn near everything (the effect of which we aren't sure about, but it's either neutral or bad, and I'd prefer not to eat plastic), yadda, yadda, yadda.

Yeah, I know I'm on a rant.  Either live with it or ignore it, I can live with either decision.  The Guy From Boston passed away, so I’m using a little of his thunder, although he was a master as cursing which I will never, never match.  Hey, I miss Joe and his cigars.

If you do something to any part of the watercourse, you change it.  Destroying beaver dams because they are damn inconvenient is common, but we don't know what we are doing to the whole system.  Maybe very little; maybe a great deal.  

One major contributor to humanity effects on watercourses is common in Appalachia, mountaintop removal mining.  When you fly over it, even at commercial altitudes, it is fugly.  Fugly is reason enough to quit it, but I’m in a small majority that think that.  They remove the "overburden" (the stuff above the coal seam), take out the coal and burn it, and toss what is not coal in the valleys below where the coal seam was.  That destroys the upper part of the watercourse and the flora and fauna necessary to the completeness of the ecosystem is gone.  Aw, it might kill some fish or mollusks that we never heard of, how sad.  Well, dammit, it IS sad, because we don’t know the importance of those creatures to the health of the ecosystem.  We just don’t know.  Look, we have seriously impacted the bee population.  No bees, no pollination; no pollination, no vegetation; no vegetation, no food; no food, we die.  That’s more than an “oopsie,” that’s serious shit.  We don’t know all of what we are doing.  We know SOME of what we are doing.  By mountaintop mining, we are exposing lots of silicates.  (Remember the Hawk’s Nest Tunnel dug in the 1930’s?  A large number of the people who worked on the project died of silicosis, which is a particularly nasty way to go.)  We are exposing other products which nature has kept underground for Her obscure purposes – Purposes that we will not realize until something comes up and bites humanity.   We sit in the lap of our Mother the Earth, and make a holy mess.  Humanity ought to have our collective asses kicked.

I don’t pretend to know nearly as much science as I need to nor am I amongst real nature nearly so often.  Ok, that’s my fault.  That doesn’t keep me from considering that we might be digging ourselves into a hole that sooner or later, may kill us.  As I tell my client who have dug themselves into a hole, the first thing you do is quit digging.

Mizpah.  I hope.

Someday, I might explain that.  If you knew my beloved late brother Oce Smith, you might already have a clue.

The Lawyer as the Sin-eater

 As a legal advisor and advocate, we lawyers fill a critical role in the lives of our clients and indeed all of those with whom we come in contact.  I still remember the first time I was addressed as “Counselor” by a senior lawyer.  I startled me then and still startles me now.  It is not just a title, it’s a description of what we do and the difference we make in people’s lives.

But it does have a cost.

We are aware of the role of secondary trauma, aka “compassion fatigue” in a lawyer’s life.  That from chronically dealing with direct trauma victims.  Oh, the spirit of “I can take anything, bring it on” still lives on, but the effects of secondary trauma are there.   You can admit them, you can deny them, but they are still there.  The burdensome effects get worse and worse as we take more and more on ourselves.

Prosecutors deal with crime victims.  We deal with juvenile victims of crimes, who are too young to realize that it’s sometimes a very dirty world.  The young ones often believe that their bad experiences are their fault, a sort of vast justice for something they must have done.  Defense counsel must give a “zealous defense” to the perpetrators and then must endure, privately, the effects of encountering a little victim.  Personal injury lawyers – on both sides of the cases – deal with the grievously injured.  They must keep a straight face as victims recount the details of direct trauma and the continuing effects of them and their families.  For that matter, every lawyer who deals with real people faces with what is, to them, terribly traumatic events.  The lawyer cannot help but having the client’s trauma “rub off” on the lawyer. Often, after months or years or decades of helping or wounded people, a lawyer with a shred of humanity in them will develop severe pain from another’s trauma and a genuine case of post trauma stress disorder (PTSD) will result.

If a lawyer has started out with PTSD, perhaps as an abused child or a combat veteran, the secondary trauma brings trouble on all the quicker.

For the client, for the lay person, talking to a caring lawyer – “getting it out” – can be a relief and a start to personal healing.  The lawyer can be skilled at diminishing some of the crushing burden of the client’s prison of trauma.   Often, the lawyer is the first professional to notice – and care – that what the client has refused to believe is a “big deal” really is a “big deal.” The lawyer may be the first one to give the client permission to experience their hurt and deal with it.

Trauma is almost a physical manifestation.  It doesn’t just go “poof” and vanish magically.  Where does that trauma go? 

Often, it goes right to the lawyer.  Then, it the LAWYER who experiences that wakefulness that comes at 3 AM, where the lawyer is the one who counts the holes in the ceiling tile in their bedroom.  It’s the lawyer who has unbidden anxiety and depression.  It’s the lawyer who starts to hide a little booze in their desks.  (Oh, use vodka – it has less odor!)  It’s the lawyer who feels that they need to always be guarded in their environment.  PTSD is real, no matter how you get it.

The lawyer is no more free and available to take on the burden of the client's experiences and sins than the next person, but it is our JOB to do so.

Sins?  Well, yes.  You see, the lawyer has become the new “sin-eater” in our society.

The practice of “sin-eating” is as old as these hills and valleys of ours.  In its original form, “sin-eating” was a mixed Christian-pagan practice brought to Appalachia from the British Isles (mainly Wales and Scotland) in the 18^th and 19^th centuries.  It  endured actually and secretly into the 20^th century and still endures a little bit even in the 21^st century.  We lawyers do it today, even though we call it something different.

Sin-eating starts with the obvious truth that humans are not perfect and, from time to time, they sin.  To a “believer” in one or more Deities[1], to accumulate sin is to “earn” some sort of negative reward after your death.  That negative reward is usually something physically punishing and really bad.  However, in most religious practices, a human can earn a reprieve by practicing good works and faith.  All it takes is the time to do good works and be faithful. 

Everyone can change their negative behaviors.  According to Jacob Marley’s Ghost, Scrooge has no idea of "the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself?  It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago.  You have laboured on it, since. It is a ponderous chain!"  Even Scrooge has a chance:  “You have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate.  A chance and hope of my procuring, Ebenezer."[2]  All it takes is time to bank up good deeds and thoughts.

What if you don’t have time?   What if you don’t really want to live the good and moral life?  How do you escape that post-death experience? 

Simple.  Your friends and relatives find a sin-eater.[3]  The pure sin-eating experience requires a “wayfaring stranger,” unknown to the deceased.  They are shut in the room with the “sin-eating expert” and the deceased.  A loaf of salted bread and a cup of water are located on the body.  The designated sin-eater repeats the “expert’s” incantation and, poof, the sin is translated to the sin-eater.  The soul of the deceased goes to its reward unburdened by sin.  The wayfaring stranger is sent on their way, never to return.  (Do not despair for the Sin-eater!  After good works and faith, they work themselves into good graces with Deity.)

The Sin-eater does what the modern lawyer, with their computers, cell phones, and fancy offices do.  We invite the client to tell us the truth, no matter how bad it is.  We either genuinely don’t judge them or we at least conceal the judgment.  We assure them that while they may have screwed up, everybody screws up now and then.  And then we try to fix it.  Simple, right?

Maybe to the client it’s simple, and relieving.  But then, in our own minds and hearts, we need to process what we have heard.  Then, we must fix the damage to OUR hearts.    We might do it in a healthy manner.  We might go for a walk, go swimming, or practice meditation. We can spend time in nature.  We can ourselves talk with a valued friend.  In some cases, some medication may help. (Booze is NOT a helpful medication.)  We can even (shock!) get some “professional help”!

(Hey, relax, it’s not a huge deal.  Besides, if I can do it, YOU can do it.) 

The first time you ever represent a client, you have absolutely guaranteed only one thing:  There will be a LAST time.  The time between is called your “career.”  And you career is way too important to you, your family and the many people you touch to take lightly.

Take good care of yourself.  You are worth it.

Mizpah!

 

 

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[1] The author is quite comforted and comfortable as a Christian.

[2] Dickens, C.  1843.   A Christmas Carol.  Chapman & Hall.

[3] What follows is a delightful (to the author) discussion of Sin-eating.  It’s drawn from A Wayfaring Sin-eater and other Tales of Appalachia, by James Gay Jones, 1983.  McClain & Company.  You can obtain virtually any out-of-print and low-volume printed books from “Bookfinder.com,” which uses the ABEBooks, Alibris and Biblio condition rating system, so you’ll know what you are getting.

Would You Like to Round-Up for Ronald McDonald House?

 I’m mildly addicted to Diet Coke.  Not the way the President is, I don’t have
a button on my desk, and if I did, I’d get told to go straight to hell.  I’m still mildly addicted.  I get lots of Diet Cokes from McDonald's, as there seems to be one every two miles.  

Every time I’ve hit McDonald’s to feed my craving, some young person at the drive-thru says, “Would you like to round-up to benefit Ronald McDonald House?”  

Hey, who can say no?  What kind of skin-flint, cheap, miserly, old bastard would or could even say “No, thanks.”   Let alone just a brusque “No.”

I know one.  It’s me.  “No.”  Not even “No, thank you,” and I surely will not make any lame excuse.   Just “No.”  If the McD world can’t tell why I do, screw-'em.

It’s Sunday morning.  Am I going to say “No” to the church?  If you want to know the answer to that, you got too much time on your hands. My rule: What I give to others I do not discuss.  If you watch me constantly, you probably can tell my level of public participation, but you will never tell it by my words. 

Maybe I am a skin-flint; maybe I am generous to a fault.  It’s none of your business.

Now, that strangely violates one my rules for making money for charitable causes.   You are supposed to sincerely thank a donor and let them - if they want - let other’s know about the donation.  It’s sort a “to-each-his-own.”  For the last several decades, I have raised money for non-profits, and I have raised a good bit.

  
Now, in my typical aside - I just can’t resist getting side-traced - I came up with a method some years ago when a non-profit we were heavily involved in needed $10,000 BADLY to balance the books.  I came up with a pretty nifty method which depended on knowing-the-right-people, cajoling, pride, preening and a free bar.  (We even found a was for free - to us - booze.)   We got the 10 grand.  But since, that organization has turned that little idea into a major fundraising method.  To be brutally frank, I did not and do not have the skill to convert it from what it was to what it is now.  (And Amy and company, I doff my chapeau to you!)

Oh, there’s a minor rule of fundraising for non-profits there.  Don’t get cocky when you get a good idea, because others can make it a lot better.

But how about the Ronald McDonald House?  Why do I resist?  Let me count the ways:

1 - For the owners of each McDonald’s, it exists to furnish food and thereby make money.  That’s OK.  That’s American.  But don’t get all high-minded and pretend that you’re in it just for the Ronald McDonald house, because you are not.

2 - The McDonald’s corporation apparently has let us down on telling us what the Ronald McDonald house is.  Lots of people don’t know.  Unlike the cute and annoying “Kars-4-Kids,” they don’t have sufficient confusion to hide whatever it is they are collecting for.

3 - The poor, underpaid employee - who probably has to save their money to but a shirt with a collar to wear to work - knows damn well that they are put in spot to pressure customers at the point-of-sale, in the presence of other customers, to make a donation and either (1) be thought normal and a trifle nice or be (2) an irrational, miserly old bastard.  If you’re going to hold someone up, even for change from a dollar, surprise them: It’s so much more effective.

And the big, overwhelming reason: Neither the local franchisee nor the McD’s Corp. has shown that they have skin-in-the-game.  Maybe they do.  Maybe they don’t.  I don’t know.

Let’s assume that McD’s corporation has “Ronald McDonald Houses.  They no doubt do.  Presumably, they give people a place to stay near a medical facility where - I think - their children are being treated.  Oh, I can look it up on their website and since what THEY say they do, but it that’s not my job.  If they want my money, they have the responsibility to tell me what it’s for.

They benefit from modest advertising as being the sponsor of Ronald McDonald Houses.  That is a minor asset to the franchisees and the big corporation and so far, that only appears a modest plus. 

How can they prove “skin-in-the-game”?  By showing some commitment apart of urging customer for “rounding up.”  What costs and what effort do (1) the franchisee’s give up and (2) the big corporation give up?  We don’t know. 

All we know is that WE are asked in an overtly publicly direct fashion to donate.

I get gas & pop in to get a coke at a regional gas-restrooms-and-food mega gas
station called “Sheetz.”  (Buc-ees, Pilot, Maveriks, WaWa’s, etc., are very similar.)  At Sheetz, they run occasional fundraisers for good causes.  (Hey, nearly EVERYTHING is a good cause - taking care of parent while their kids are sick is a good cause - If McD’s does so, they need to explain what they do a whole lot better.)  Sheetz does the collection for whoever by announcing it on their speakers (along with ads, jingles and allegedly happy sounds that make you want to buy more stuff), and then they prove that they have skin-in-the-game:  

“WE MATCH WHATEVER YOU DONATE.”  

If you offer to match me, you’re not just a Salvation Army band with a kettle - You have become my partner, and you can be guaranteed that I’ll pony up.  “Would you like to round-up?  WE’LL MATCH IT.”  That would generate a donation from me every time.  If Sheetz can match it, I’m all in.

I LIKE to find people who spend my money better than I can.  I prefer being asked politely and informed what they will do and that they are indeed my partners.  I have had former life partners who all commented that “You are giving too much money” for a donation, a tip, or such like.   Buzz off.  It ain’t your money.  (A couple of individuals may be afraid for the comment they might believe I’m tempted to make there.  Relax, girls.) 

It is good and it is gratifying and it is culturally a magnificent thing to share what we have earned or been given to improve even a little part of life.  But we don’t to it blindly.  Even as it is our joy to give, it is the users responsibility to tell us what they will use it for and to prove that they really do have skin-in-the-game.

So I’m sure that the Ronald McDonald House donation process can be greatly improved.  Right now, it sorta sucks.

Mizpah!

Free at Last, Free at Last - Escaping the Medical Profession; Well, Maybe.

Everybody claims they “don’t watch TV,” with the hint that they are above that pastime.  Bushwah.  TV (and other passive media choices – in other words, stuff that just lets you watch passively) are universal.  As for me, I often have TV (etc.) on as background noise --  Sometimes it’s some sort of news, sometimes an old movie that I know by heart, but it fills up the room with something predictable.

Of course, the oligarchs know that and try to sell me stuff endlessly.  (Hey, they might not be oligarchs – in fact, I’m not even sure what that term really means, but Bernie’s against them and the term is a part of the current evil-speak.  It makes me sound up-to-date.)  Part of what they want to sell me is drugs or “natural” preparations which you use like drugs, but being natural are something different.  (There is a post there lurking somewhere, and perhaps I’ll get around to writing it.  Perhaps not.  Depending on my muse is a chancy proposition.)

Some well-known physician – “Dr. Drew,” a TV personality – is pushing an “Urgent Care Kit.”  It's available at "UrgentCareKit.com," which redirects you to a site called "twc.health". The kit purports to free you from going to the doctor sometimes.   It provides eight drugs which - I understand - require prescriptions from a doctor.  Dr. Drew, etc., tout the convenience of not having to go to a doctor or an urgent care center when you get sick. 

Ok, forewarned is forearmed.  We can all count on occasionally needing some sort of drugs.   And, yes, it is a pain in the ass to be sick and go to the doctor’s office.  At first blush, it sounds like a good idea.

Now, it sounds to ME like a good idea, but my doctorate is not in anything related to medicine.  Perhaps someone with a medical education will have a different idea.  How about it?

TWC must do alright – What they are selling as a “medical emergency kit” costs $299.99.  (The site also has other products.)  Beats me if they ship for free.  The website has 1500-plus reviews, so we know that they’ve taken in $450,000 anyway.  That qualifies as the low end of “real money.”  They must be serious.  And I’ve seen Dr. Drew commenting on the news about health, so I bet he’s a helluva doc.

 Obviously, they have to prescribe these drugs, but I have zero idea how they do it when the patient is not yet sick.  Well, that’s their problem.  I suppose they have solved it to the satisfaction of the government.

 According to the website, the “kit” includes:

     Amoxicillin-Clavulanate (generic Augmentin™)

    Azithromycin (generic Z-Pak™)

    Doxycycline

    Trimethoprim-Sulfamethoxazole (generic Bactrim™)

    Metronidazole (generic Flagyl™)

    Ivermectin

    Fluconazole (generic Diflucan™)

    Ondansetron (generic Zofran™)

 I can pronounce the names of the drugs.  When I do that, I feel tingly all over.  But I bet pronunciation is only a minor part of understanding what they do.  Surely medical schools teach more than good pronunciation.

 The makers also include a “booklet.”  I bet that must tell you when to take which drug.  (Is that how doctors learn, from a "booklet"?  I hope not.)  No doubt the makers tell you how often to take it and how long.  I also bet they tell you that if you don’t get better, you should . . . take another drug? Punt?  Maybe go to a doctor?

 I know roughly what an antibiotic is supposed to do.  Whenever I picture an antibiotic, I think of Alexander Fleming trying to figure out what is killing the bacteria in his petri dish.  I bet they do things differently these days, but I’m not sure.   Beyond that, I hear that drugs work even if the patient doesn’t have a clue how.  As to whatever is on the list which is not an antibiotic, I’d bet good money that they work on some illness, or they wouldn’t be included.  But what illness they make better is a mystery to me.

 That whole idea of the “booklet” bothers me just a little.  If I am a medical-ignoramus, am I really qualified to figure out what’s wrong with me?  Does the booklet include some advice which can be understood by the average person?  In the US, the average reading level is 8^th grade.  One-fifth of people have trouble with 4^th grade materials.  This seems rather like a challenge for the authors of a really good booklet.

 I’d love to have my medically educated friends try to steer me to understand if this whole thing is a good idea or a waste of money.  I'm not qualified to know.

 But, hey, if you are charged with murder, I'll get you off.  Or at least wave as you are led away by the sheriff.

 Mizpah!

 

 

E-bikes, E-trikes and a Slightly New Idea for Going Places

  Darn it, it snuck up on me.  If it’d been a snake, the concept would have bitten me.  I’ve belatedly realized that the “e-bike” mini-revolution has resulted in more than just a pastime or exercise for some people,  E-bikes have given some seniors and others of limited financial means another fair option to get around.

 I’m noticing of lot of the same people day by day using e-bikes or in some cases, e-trikes.  You can get an e-bike from $400 – 800, and an e-trike for $500 – 1000.  (Of COURSE I priced stuff at Amazon.  Doesn’t everyone???)

 West Virginia and the Ohio Valley are good places in terms of terrain for those machines.  The natural pathways follow watercourses, so the pathways are obvious, though with some limitations.

  Now, with that being said, it is still perilous to operate any sort of two wheeled vehicle on the streets.  We usually lack sufficient street/sidewalk space to operate an e-bike (or conventional bike) safely.  We lack means to safely crack intersections.  There is an unfortunate under-appreciation for headgear.  Yes, they look ridiculous and cute in a bad way, but a head injury is . . . well, it’s darned inconvenient.  And the motoring public (i.e., about 80% of us) lacks a whole lot of awareness of vulnerable people while they are sitting in their nice steel cocoon.

 E-trikes are even trickier.  They generally have the 2-wheel-axle on the rear, which gives an operator a lot of stability problems, compared to fixing the 2-wheel axle on the front.  But the front axle presents a lot more cost due to the need for the turning axle to adjust in the rolling axis.

 The chances of a well-developed bike system a lá Florida or Southern California is not likely to happen here.   I well remember being on the floor of the West Virginia Senate (as an assistant or some such) in the early 70’s when the first “bicycle path” bill was argued.  It called for some limited, almost experimental, money, to be spent on bike trails/paths just to see if the concept was worthwhile.  The late Sen. James Davis from Marion County rose.  The senator I was sitting beside started laughing, telling me to “Watch this.”  Sen. Davis was recognized by the President of the Senate, Sen. (and later Justice) Bill Brotherton.  Sen. Davis “loved the  bill to death” by  proposing an amendment to add something like “, effective as soon as the Division of Highways certified to the governor that all roads have been repaired in West Virginia.”  The amendment passed on a voice vote and that was that for a loooong time.  Later, the only really successful bike paths have been situated on abandoned railroad rights-of-way, often with only county funding.   (See Note 1 – This medium doesn’t give me access to real footnotes.)  Those bike paths do not solve any real access to transportation problems.   Railroad rights-of-way go nowhere special, such as for grocery shopping or, heck, to Grandma’s House.  They are wonderful recreation – and fun - but not designed for efficient transportation.

  And that’s where bike paths stand, and now advances in technology changesthe apparent needs.  What else is new?  We always prepare to fight the last crisis, not the next one.  However, this is a time of budget schizophrenia in every government on this continent, so it will probably have to wait for a resolution.  (I know a good many people who are or have in the Legislature.  Folks, You and I know that the budget is seriously schizophrenic, so let’s not fool each other.)

  Oh, I later ran against Sen. Davis.  One of the best favors the public did me was to not vote for me.  Thereafter, I was involved in politics a lot (for both major parties and for numerous special interests, always with a certain twinkle in my eye and a tease in my voice) until laste until a few years ago.  But I NEVER, NEVER, NEVER again filed as a candidate.  (I did once get appointed to an elective office to fill a vacancy in what was billed as the Shortest Political Career in WV History.  Like the 13^th floor in a London Hotel, that is another story.)

Mizpah!

Hmm – the story of “Mizpah!”  Gotta tell that sometime.  Let me make a note to add it to other notes that I’ll probably never see again.  Random and Unpredictable Efficiency is my middle name.

Note 1 – “Rights-of-way” is meant in the general terms.  Don’t get me caught in the beloved mysteries of easements where I can drone on and on about the intimate details of property law.  I learned those from Londo Brown’s notes as interpreted by John Fisher, and those guys REALLY knew property law.

Meditation on a Rainbow: Stave the First - Red; Or, When Roger's Mind Wanders, Who Knows What Bushwah He Will Write

 The “rainbow,” a progression of colors in the order of the frequency of visible light, is a common representative theme.  Currently, one of its homes is the “Pride movement,” where it no doubt means differences despite unity.  Or something like that.  The motif is handy for describing different things that nevertheless have something in common.  We have a Rainbow (Army) Division, a “Rainbow bridge” for our fur babies, a trout, a symbol on several national flags, and corporate logos for NBC, Apple, the United Way, Skittles, Dickhouse, Care Bears, and lots of others.  Beyond doubt, all of those things will eventually pass but we can count on the rainbow as a symbol living on as long as we have color vision.

 Today, I am thinking of the color red.

 Today is Pentecost, a Christian celebration of the coming of the “Holy Spirit” the “spiritu sancti.”  Christians are supposed to wear red on this occasion.   The color is pictured as a representation of the “tongues of fire” brought by the Holy Spirit and sometimes the blood spilled by martyrs.  I do not know if wearing red on Pentecost gets you any favored position in the pantheon of eternal possibilities.    Red is also the color of shirts/tunics/whatever that the Spartan warriors wore.  If they bled, their enemies could not tell that they were hurt.

 The "tongues of fire" thing is confusing.  All the time, I’ve thought that fire was orange, yellow and occasionally blue, although different things can give off other colors when heated.  Red is considered an “active” color, even though something painted red just sits there unless some external force, such as a human, causes it to move.  It’s not that the color IS more active, the magic comes only from our association.

 If there is a message hidden in the message of this ink-stained wretch, it is that the symbol does not equal in any place outside the human mind with what is represented.  We just associate it – in our minds.  Simple example:  Few people have a neutral reaction to the Confederate battle flag (red flag, white stars within the large “X”) or the “Stars and Bars,” the lesser known official flag of the briefly existing Confederate national government.  Those represent things - disunion; the Lost Cause; slavery.  But other than the connections in our minds, those symbols are meaningless.  How about having a nice blue flag with a large white star in the middle?  Does that either offend or thrill many people?  Why not?  Because it means the same as the battle flag & the Stars and Bars.

 For those into meditation, thinking in color or of colors is a nice device.  There are several videos made to guide a rainbow meditation.  It was the memory of that application that put me into the mood to write this modest screed.

 I cannot describe that mediation feeling.  I suppose you have to experience it.  If you try it and it works you have useful knowledge.  If you try it and it doesn’t work, now you know one thing that will not lead you into that zone of mediation.  If you don’t try, no problem.  This is still a free country.  (If that causes you to want to comment with some version of your political beliefs, please sit on your hands and don’t bother.  This has nothing to do with Trump, Biden, or any of their loyal/dangerous co-conspirators/patriots.  Jeez, does ever f.ing thing need to be political?)

 By the way, the part in the title “Stave the First” implies that there will  be further chapters (staves).  Not necessarily true!  I am a creature of both predictability and whim; and of both seriousness and smoke.  It beats me if there will be future chapters.

 Mizpah!