More Meanderings

By

William D. Dannenmaier

On March 9^th, Breitbart.com reported that Judge Karen Henderson of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia wrote that the Second Amendment does not apply to the District of Columbia because it is not a state. What an incredible decision! Following her logic, none of the remainder of the Bill of Rights or the United States Constitution apply to the District of Columbia either. I assume she is a Democrat from Hollywood, San Francisco or the East Coast.

I pointed out to my bride that when morning came she fed the dogs first, the cats second, the fish third and the stray cat that has taken up residence on our front porch fourth, then me. When I asked if there were any significance to this she replied, “They complain, you don’t, but if it makes you feel any better, I feed you before I water the plants.”

Occasionally, Sheila and I have other disagreements. At present, we are on a campaign to lose weight. She does well with less food in her stomach, but I get hungry, so I fill a side plate with vegetables. She calls them relishes. Today, I pointed out to her that beets are not relish, even if pickled it is still a vegetable, similarly cabbage is not a relish, even if cured with red pepper, cucumbers are not relishes ... At that point she interrupted me and proclaimed, “When cucumbers become pickles, they are relishes. So are the others.” I replied, “They are still vegetables, relishes are like ‘I relish you.” “You are supposed to.” “Or maybe the word was ‘ravish.’” “That too,” she replied.

Talking with my eldest son, Walter Christian, he reminded me of our drive to Fairbanks and asked if I was willing to leave the reservation and drive to see the Artic Ocean. He said he didn’t want to do anything there, just see it, dip his clothes in it and come back. I said it sounded interesting, but I had to do the income tax, a job I hate. He told me that I should ask for an extension. He said, “At your age, if you’re lucky, you’ll die before the extended time you have to do it. If you survive you haven’t lost anything, you just have to keep asking for extensions every year and one year you’ll win.” My sons are always considerate of my interests.

When I mentioned this to a fellow sufferer at the Cardiac Rehabilitation unit he replied, “I’ve told my wife that when I slip into dementia she is to put an electric wire around the pasture and let me out there for exercise, but that she should make certain the gate is locked.”

We had a “whole hawg” barbecue in the Furnace last night. For those from more civilized places, this begins about noon on Friday with the building of fires. The hogs, we had two, are placed on the grill about nightfall where they remain overnight. The men responsible maintain the coal bed and turn them as necessary. In the morning, they are turned skin side down, to keep the grease from falling into the fire and flaming up, and the meat is raked out of the skin. Bones are thrown into a barrel. I always go early in the morning to buy my meat (seven dollars a pound) because then I can get bones for my dogs. I do even better than that. The ribs are always thrown away, it being too much trouble to scrape meat off of a few ribs when you have the meat from two entire hogs to chop up, so I get a side of ribs for Sheila and I for breakfast. This morning there was a rather forlorn, mangy, black dog hanging about, cringing at the approach of any human. I gave it a bone with some meat on it, which it gobbled down. Bone followed bone. Finally, the beast was coming up and taking them from my hand. Then he took one and ran off. “So that pup is finally satisfied,” I thought. But soon he was back, took another bone and ran off. Finally, several bones later, I caught on. This thing was taking those bones and burying them, not just burying them, but burying each in a separate place! This dog had more sense than half of our citizens. When faced with abundance, he banked the extra. He didn’t even, so to speak, put all of his bones in one basket, he spread them about. Maybe the man in St. Louis who registered and voted his dog knew what he was doing.

My grandson August just telephoned. A marine, he has been in Africa for the last six months. He had just landed in America and was on the bus headed for camp. He said that he has several months before school starts and is planning on visiting family, an uncle who is a mechanic having put his car in best possible shape while he was gone. He said, “Knowing your reputation for having work for all visitors …” Actually, the last time August was here I had him painting the house. He did well, but I can find other jobs now: one shouldn’t allow young men to get bored. He is planning on volunteering for Iraq in January, which concerns me. I would rather no one had the experiences I had in Korea (or the memories). Unfortunately, it is necessary for some to do it. I can’t complain as I volunteered also. Anyway, I’m proud of him.