Chthonic Lucubrations

... the Evil that men do lives after them,

the Good is oft interred with their bones...

-Julius Caesar Act II sc. 2

A couple of guys brought a load of wood by the house yesterday.  For the most part it was really good,  fresh cut, solid Red Oak.  There were a few sticks of Hawthorne and Pine and a couple of others I didn't recognize.  Any wood that I don't recognize I automatically put in the category of 'trash tree'.  But I am not quite as Arboreal Challenged as a fellow we met in Spain.  His name was Jose.  Jose said there were two types of trees in Spain, Olive and not Olive.  I really don't know if the unknown species were trash trees, but I know they were 'Not Olive'.

Now, I have to admit when I first greeted Daryl and his other brother Daryl (a shout out here to Bob Newhart), I had these flashbacks of "Deliverance".  But after talking to them for awhile, I figured they were just a couple hardworking good ol' boys from the Ozarks.  Hell, if it had been a Community College course I could have earned a couple of continuing education credits.  After stacking about two cords of wood, Daryl (not his other brother) got this irregular grin on his face and stated in a kind of questioning way, "I hear they's a lot faggots in Eureka Springs?" You know, when someone first makes a remark like that, you don't know quite what to say.  In my youth, the '60s, I grew up listening to 'queer' jokes and all kinds of ethnic and minority humor loaded with sexual innuendo, and never understood the horrible negative effects they had on my views of people who were different from me.  It really didn't dawn on me until I was a young Marine in 1968, that all people were deserving of my respect and that it was morally and ethically wrong of me to try and deprive them of their rights or their personal dignity, but that's a whole other blog.  

Since I have not heard anything like that in quite awhile, I was momentarily stunned.  Of course, the Imp of the Perverse (a Neal Stephenson creation) wanted me to respond with, "Daryl, you are the dumbest mothereffer I have ever met!"  Or better yet, "Why? You wanna squeal for me Daryl?"  But one of my better angels finally kicked in and I responded, "Yeah, there are quite a few Gay people here, as a matter of fact, you never know when you might be speaking to one of them. "  I secretly thought to myself, 'Dang, you hammered him pretty good you think were too hard on him?'   Hopefully, he got my message and maybe even spent about 15 seconds reflecting upon it, but I don't think so.  As they drove away I heard Daryl remark, "You think that ol' boy was faggot Daryl?"  After reading back over this it sounds a little 'preachy.'  That was not my intention, it was meant to be a snapshot of a 'A Day in the Life' kind of deal.  My granddaddy would've said, "God didn't put people here that don't think like you to make your life Hell, He does it to make you more creative!"  

Blackbird singing in the dead of night

Take these broken wings and learn to fly

You were only waiting for this moment to arrive.

- The Beatles