Book Reviews: Auraria; Waycross and Winter, both by Tim Westover

I'd put the cover of the book on here, but it hasn't been made yet.  Tim Westover is a Medical Software designer and IT consultant who plays the banjo, has one of those daughters who makes every conversation a "Facebookable" one, and hikes across Georgia and elsewhere looking for the ruins of our recent past.  He finds the rubble of mills and walls covered over by vines and pine straw, the abandoned wooden sheds, the majestic waterfalls appearing out of nowhere and flowing down to make great rivers and lakes.  And he write stories. His first novel, Auraria, was an episodic romp into the supernatural world of the Appalachian Mountains. Briefly, Holtzclaw, a real estate developer in the pre-modern days (early 1900's? there's not really a date given, nor is it needed), is sent by his boss in Milledgeville to the area around modern day Dahlonega, Georgia where a resort town was to be constructed.  There he proceeds to buy up land from the residents, and finds them very odd, almost Alice In Wonderland-ish.  Ghosts play pianos and remain in the houses with their still living husbands, fish are caught out of thin air, and giant turtles sleep for eternity inside the mountains.  It is a wonderful book that I highly recommend, as it's the kind of book that I enjoy.  The plot isn't really the most important thing; rather, it's the experience of existing with Holtzclaw in this strange and wonderful world.  Is the book perfect? No, as I talked about in my review on Amazon, but it was a book that I enjoyed reading. Knowing the author, and going to one of his books signings (at Charis Books Atlanta, in which, sadly, the only audience was me and the people that worked there), puts me in a unique position of being friend and reader, in which reviews are read by the author.

So, when Tim announced he had finished his second novel, Waycross and Winter, at least, a good rough draft, he wanted those of us on his Facebook page to read it and help edit, give suggestions, give impressions. I downloaded it onto my Kobo and took it to work with me so I could read during my lunch breaks.  The interesting thing about reading a book that hasn't been fully completed, with every i crossed and every t dotted, is that it changes the way you read the book. Are you reading it as an editor, looking for grammatical mistakes? Or as a reader, absorbing the text and reading for context? 

I think that in reading the book, I became a book surfer.  If I hit a rock or a large wave, and I fall of my board, I'll become an editor and go investigate the rock.  I told Tim, among other things while reading the book [the block quotes are mine, edited from prior messages to Tim]: 

 Reading is a flowing motion, like swimming in the ocean (no, I'm not trying to rhyme...), and the ebb and flow of words are essential to a text, be it a book or a blog.  I was reading along fine, understanding the character of Waycross, and more importantly, the writing style, as something I would read in a 19th century Gothic book by Stevenson or Shelley (both of which wrote about doctors). And then, on page 3 of the text in my Kobo, I came upon the phrase "conscience wasting my time." I fell flat on my face.  The wave struck me and I got water in my nose.  I know what you mean, but a reader, especially not one familiar with 1800's literature, is going to feel it as a jolt away from the book. [I include this as an illustration of how being a reader and being an editor are different when reading. Tim changed the wording afterwards.] 

 The book tells the story of Aubrey Waycross, a doctor in the early 1800's Georgia, who travels from Savannah to the wild frontier town of Lawrenceville, Georgia to begin a practice.  For those who know the Atlanta area, you know right away that Lawrenceville is in Gwinnett County, near Discover Mills, and Sugarloaf Parkway, and all the modern day everythings that are suburban Atlanta.  But in this time, it was a town far away from anything resembling a city. Once there, he finds that people's medical needs are served by quack salesmen, like those who sell bottles of fizzy drinks that are now found in every vending machine in the nation. They are also helped by old wives' tales, the trial and error of herbal remedies, and, of course, witches. And so, with the righteous indignation of a Doctor fresh out of medical school, Waycross goes up to the house of the Winter Sisters to give them a piece of his mind. It's here that the story really starts, and I stopped worrying about editing, as the flow of that ocean became calm and peaceful.

Speaking of flow, the story starts on his trip to the Winters' residence, especially with the episode with the pigeons.  I could feel you exhale as the character came alive, fleshed out.  Before hand he was a stick figure, a stereotype of a haughty, over confidant doctor in the early years of this nation.  At this point, he becomes human, and I have enjoyed the story since then.  [Since finishing the book,  I realized why the doctor was who he is. Characters change, grow, as a book progresses. You grow to care about Waycross, especially when he grows to care about other people.]

The main problem I had with the story was the usage of so much human excrement when talking about the doctor's procedures on patients.  Of course, in these days, draining blood to calm humors, and using enemas as a way of draining toxins out of people were among the most common ways to cure people of whatever illnesses they might have.  The fact that I was reading while eating made me, admittedly, skim through some of these sections.  I did the same thing when reading Martel's Life of Pi, when he was talking about his waste in terms of his dietary condition while lost at sea.  And I mentioned that to Tim, and he wanted to know if he should take some of it out.  I thought about it for a long while, and actually finished the book before replying back.

I think the main problem with the excremental parts of the story is that I usually read while I'm eating.  But I don't want you to change that just because of my reading habits.  Orson Scott Card included quite a lot of vomiting in his book Lost Boys (which has nothing to do with Peter Pan or Vampires), but he was using it for a symbol of the real or physical world vs. the supernatural. It shows that both Sarah and Aubrey are rooted in the real world, at least, for the time that Aubrey was more interested in what the classic doctors said than the herbal and mental parts the Winter Sisters practiced.  There are strong reasons for leaving those parts completely as they are, but the opposite deals not with the story, but with the readers.  The people that read your book, are they going to stop reading it when they get to Sarah's story, or when cutting off the farmer's arm? The answer should be a simple one. You are the author, it is your creation.  God didn't leave out the gross parts of this Earth because he thought we might not like it. Pat Conroy could have left out the rape scene in Prince of Tides, would have saved a whole lot of challenging by conservative mothers wanting to ban books, but he didn't, because that was part of the story. 

When I finished the book, I began to see the layers of the story, the reasons for the rabid "creature" in the woods, the actions of the doctor when dealing with the supernatural, and when dealing with matters of his own mind and heart.  I questioned the existence of characters, wondering if they were just people in Waycross' mind... It was very satisfying, to see a story more compact than Tim's first novel, one that could be read and interpreted in different ways.

The other thing I enjoyed about the book was the literary references and the usage of themes that have been used in the greatest of literary works.  Aubrey Waycross is, in the context of the novel, part Dr. Faustus (Marlowe or Goethe), part J. Alfred Prufrock (Eliot), and part Candide (Voltaire). Now, this probably has to do with my own reading history, as for most people, you bring into a book the experiences of your life, and it helps to shape what you read. But in these cases, it's true.  It was refreshing to read something that, with a turn of a phrase, it connects you with a work, a twinge of recognition.  I won't give examples, because that would ruin the fun.

I look forward to the time when this book becomes available to the public, when I can hold the actual book in my hands.  I echo the dream of the author, to see Tim Westover's books on a bookshelf at Barnes and Noble, be able to pull it off the shelf, read the dust cover or description, and feel the book calling to me.  Or better yet, to have a bookstore worker be able to recommend the book to readers with the passionate zeal that I know they have (because I have it, too.) Amazon just can't do that, no matter how many reviews are below the price.

 Shelftalker review: Dr. Aubrey Waycross travels to the frontier town of Lawrenceville, Georgia to set up a practice, meeting quack medicine salesmen, flocks of pigeons, and the Winter Sisters. In layers of complexity, with scenes both graphic and hauntingly beautiful, Tim Westover blends the supernatural with the historical in a unique way. Readers of either will be right at home, and any reader will be pleasantly surprised.

Depression and Comedy... Birds of a Feather

Saw Wayne Brady's interview on ET is trending on here (you can find it easily, not gonna put a big picture sharing thing on here.  Text will do).  Comedy is often part of a program, a way to deal with people when we would rather be alone.  Most people would think it crazy that I'm an Introvert, that all the voices and meows and snarky remarks aren't to get attention at all, but as a part of my own mechanisms for living in this world.  I have depression (I've talked about taking Prozac many times, and it helps), and it's a brain chemical imbalance, something that, I think, most comedians have.  It's what divides the serious from the funny, one part of their personality from the other.  It's a program, just like Word or Netscape or Minesweeper is on a computer.  I've had people ask if I was ever suicidal... nope... I'm too self-centered for that.  Life is too wonderful and there is so much beauty in the world (not to mention good food) for me just to give in to all that negativity.  But I do know what Wayne Brady is talking about.  And I know that the comedy is just as important a part of my life as it is to Wayne's or Robin's (RIP) or anyone else that is funny.  The important part is not to silence it, not to say "you should act more serious, more grown up," but to understand that it's part of who I am, that I need to be funny just as I need to breathe, to eat, to pee.  Think of it as the by-product of whatever brain chemicals are going around up in my head.  That's not to say that "Shut Up Denzil" isn't a wonderful response. I need that, too.  That's the ADHD (same brain chemical imbalance, just like Robin or Jim Carey has) kicking in.  

I remember sitting in the center of my bed (at home in Georgia) with my room a mess, and needing to clean it up, and not knowing where to begin.  I can't tell you what day it was, like Wayne can, but I can remember it vividly.  After that, my family decided that I should go to a psychiatrist and she gave me Prozac, which helps, but a lot of the issues I had (and some still have... go ask me to balance my checkbook, see what response you get), had to work themselves out naturally, through time, through circumstances beyond my control.  I'm not over some of it yet, and obviously this past couple of years has helped in some way, but not in others.  You keep having those memories of difficult times that flash into your head when you're sitting at your desk at work, and you have to lock them back up in the filing cabinet, saying "That's the past, I can do nothing about it." It is best to think of the future, or of the present, of things you have control over.  The complexities of my mother's death, those are hard to deal with, even with the obviousness of it all, looking back.  But I can't do anything about any of that now, because I'm not a time traveller, nor would I want to if I could.  I have to learn from my experiences and continue my journey, now here in Dallas.  I've made decisions which I think will help me out in the future.  I also think that I have still other decisions I must make (weight, health, diet...etc.) which I will make in time (some of which is a direct result of the Prozac and the depression side effects).  But for now, I will go to work, and sit in on the conference call slated for today, and figure out how to get Dr. Pepper stocked into our coolers (cause, you know, it's Dr. Pepper!!), and I will come home and read and make snarky remarks on Facebook, and Martin will tell people not to encourage me, which is quite all right, it wouldn't be him if he didn't. I'll continue down this road, and whatever I'm supposed to do with my life (which I'm sure writing these blogs are a part of it) will present itself, as it always has.  

Dreaming of Reality TV

 I dreamt I was at a college dinner, one of those that they might serve to get everyone acquainted with the college at an orientation.  I was sitting at a table with all these other people, most of which were very odd, and there were television cameras all over the place, above and in the corners.  It was perfectly normal, except, I knew that the people I sat with had various psychological disorders, ones that would not get along well without medicine...etc... After a time I left the room and found myself in a large television studio, a place with large "habitats" where people were going about their daily lives, except with cameras everywhere.  Sorta like The Truman Show, except this one had an odd twist to it.  The characters in these stories were picked from mental institutions, facilities, along with normal people, all in an attempt to make a Reality TV show where the people in the situations were just a little more odd than normal, and watch the madness unfold.

I remember while I was working at Borders, that we had a running joke (at least, my coworkers did prior to me working there), that we were unwittingly a part of a Japanese Reality TV show called Happy Booktime Go!, where the strange customers and the strange employees interacted and provided hilarity for the viewers. It made sense, as some of our customers were indeed very strange.

But in my dream, they had more control over the people.  People were taken from one scenario to another, their memories wiped and replaced with alternative ones to match the theme.  Those that were boring or lost ratings were eliminated... as I saw people with machine guns around, for that purpose.  It was built into the show as a terror plot, or a bank robbery, or something like that.

Yes, it was a strange dream, one that I had prior to waking up, which is when I have the strange ones I remember, right before I wake up totally, coming out of the final sleep cycle.  It got me to thinking though.  All our television shows, whether they're actually called "Reality TV" or not, are similar to this. People watch Gotham or Modern Family, and they are just interactions between very odd people, some that deal in gruesome murders, some not.  Some have outrageous violence and sex, some don't. Some make commentaries on society using stereotypes (which may be true or contrived), and some are just made to humiliate people.  I don't honestly think that Chris Rocker is going to become any more loved after his stint on Survivor than what he was before.  He is societies' Joker, made up to be laughed at and scorned, to make everyone feel a little better.  We are better than him, at least.  Push your scarecrows over, and feel better about our lives.  I mean, we all lead lives that may or may not be difficult, but we can all be assured that the side show mentality of the television shows will pick people who are living much worse lives than we are, and it makes us feel good.

So why not pick those people out of the crazy farms, the looney bins, the Mental Hospitals, and put them in a place where they can entertain the rest of us.  There are enough of them, even in the smallest towns, that we would never run out of stooges to laugh at.  So what if they like running down the street naked with a lamp shade on their head... that's funny!! At least we're not like that!

It can easily go that way, you know.  The normal life is no longer appreciated.  Those that live comfortable lives want to see the way others live, so we can laugh at them and scorn their ways. We watch Hoarders or 16 and Pregnant and feel badly for them, even as we laugh at their misfortunes. And we turn the TV off (if indeed it ever goes off) and feel better about ourselves.  It's either that, or take medicine, and the other way is cheaper, and more fun.

I haven't watched much television since moving to Dallas, except for Football on weekends, and even then, I could listen to it on the radio just as well.  I love the Simon & Garfunkel line from "The Only Living Boy in New York," "I get the news I need on the weather report."  It's what I worry about the most, if I got rid of television and cable and everything all together.  I wouldn't have that outlet for looking at storms as they come in.  Sure, I can use the radio and the radar on the Internet which I can read as well as any meteorologist can, but the reassurance of the TV Weather Guy is something that has been coded into me since I was a wee child watching Gary England on CBS in Oklahoma City. So I think I'm going to dump cable, keep the Internet, and then hopefully by the Spring, I'll have an antenna strong enough to pick up the channels on the south side of Dallas (all the towers are in Cedar Hill, and Downtown Dallas is between me and them).  Until then, I'm going to unplug this thing and use it for computer games and other escapes from reality.

I have no problem escaping from reality, but I want to do it without making fun of other people.  I would rather do it with books, Audio or otherwise, and put the images in my head, instead of on my screen.

Road Trip! You Can't Go Home Again...

...but you can try.  I had a prior business arrangement in Oklahoma City, and so I hopped in my Blazer and made a weekend out of returning to the city of my birth.  The saying "You can't go home again" isn't exactly true.  You can, but both "you" and "home" have changed.  The minutes and miles have passed, time's erosion has done its damage.  But instead of waxing metaphoric about the roads traveled, let's put the pavement under foot and experience it ourselves.

Crossing the Red River, which has been shrunk to a small creek with the years long drought here, I was amazed to gaze not upon the "Welcome To Oklahoma" sign that I was expecting, but a huge sign, purple and gold, with a large arch, announcing to the world that a marvelous casino was just a few stops down the road.  I can only imagine a thousand years from now, when archaeologists explore the society of the Native people of this great land, they will find piles of poker chips and alcohol bottles.  It drives me crazy to think that the only way they can make a living is through building of casinos based on loopholes through the separate nation status that the Native Americans enjoy.  And no doubt that the owners of these places aren't "Indians" at all, but outsiders who are using the loophole to their greatest advantage. So you come across the abominations, a casino shaped like all the monuments of the Western World... not the world that should reflect their own heritage... ridiculous...

The area from Ardmore to Sulphur is peaked with slabs of Granite, Limestone, Shale, giant rocks with plateaus that stick out over the Interstate.  What I wouldn't give to stand upon those peaks and look out over the plains, to see for miles, with the Oklahoma wind blowing and the dry heat of the summer. It would be certainly glorious!  And beyond those slabs of rock is Turner Falls, which I've never been to, but from the pictures I've seen of the waterfalls and the river valleys, it is someplace I will certainly explore when the weather turns back warm, the Good Lord willing...

Driving through the town of Davis (past the new Choctaw Casino....), I see the same little town I remember from the 80's.  Sooner's Foods is still where it was, with the darkened isles and the stubborn tenacity to remain in business while Walmarts spring up throughout the area.  And the small shack where we bought firecrackers to set off at the Lake House is still there, still advertising its wares.  There's the turn-off to the Lake House (now cornered by a McDonald's and a Walmart), and past the Chickashaw Heritage Center, a place where they have stored how they used to live so that it won't be lost in neon lights, rounding the corners where mobile homes, A-frame Houses, and people that have lived there for decades still live, still sitting on their front porches and listening to the cicadas in the trees and the wasps building a nest in the corner of the porch.  That's the Oklahoma I remember, taking myself forward on the road and backward through time.  I turn off onto the gravel road that turns to the lakehouse, past the bumps and the hills, but there are new road signs, and Hilltop Road is actually what we called Rock Drive (and that's what it's named on Google Earth, see my prior blog about the discovery), and I drive to the end of the road... to find the gate closed and the grass growing high.  It woudn't surprise me if the bank owned now, from whatever people bought the house after my Grandmother sold it.  The road was the same, and although I was different, it felt good to find my way to one of my homes.

Drove down to the end of the road to the Lake of the Arbuckles, and found that the drought had hurt the lake something fierce.  The buoy that signified "No Boats" was so close to "shore" I could have walked out and touched it.  It's funny, because I remember that buoy being so far out in the middle of the lake, I could never have swum out to it.  But something tells me it's not the drought that made it look odd.  The lake may have grown smaller, but I've grown bigger, and those distances aren't so far anymore.

Pulling into Oklahoma City, the old knowledge of the roads took over, and it would be impossible to get lost.  I asked my mother where every road in town went, and I knew it by heart.  Having time prior to my meetings, I drove out to Westbury, where I used to live.  The outlet malls along I-40 and Rockwell look just as bad as the casinos, but at least they tried to approximate the teepees and other colors of the Native Americans.  The truck stops had grown larger, a sign of prosperity (the outlet mall had sold all of it's shops well before it was even made, and three additions later, it's still full) in the Grand Old State. The houses and roads of neighborhoods newer than anything I knew of (I last was here in 2005) grew up like the grass in the fields, spreading out for miles.  And there is the neighborhood I lived in, the street, the house.... and it looks good! Someone has repainted it and it still looks as I remembered it.   I drove to both my grandparent's houses as well, and they looked okay, both sold long ago and now have new tenants. It's good to take a dip into the past.

I sat upon the bench in front of Mustang Valley Elementary School and called those who I wanted to meet, and while some were out of town, others were there and available.  Mustang Valley look exactly the same... except they paved over the playground to make a parking lot (cue Joni Mitchell) , and the new playground is plastic and safe and looks like the things they are supposed to represent.  We made the rocket ship into such a place, and the Spider, and the gigantic Teeter-Totters that I'm sure would have spawned lawsuits today... but it used to be my playground (see prior blog for that, as well).

I went to visit my mother's friends who agreed to let me stay the night, and we went to BJ's Brewhouse and I had some wonderful Balsamic Glazed Chicken with White Cheddar Mashed Potatoes.  I also went to see the Granddaughter of Robert Orbach, my grandmother's boss.  I found, while cleaning out my house, a scrapbook of all of the goings on of Orbach's Department Store, along with the writings he did on his own Printing Press.  I brought the scrapbook to them, as I felt it would the only place on Earth it would be appreciated.  I was so right on this, as they had lost a lot of Mr. Orbach's writings in a house fire a couple of years ago.  It made me feel good to bring them home.

One other thing I did was to drive to the east side of Oklahoma City and visit the Omniplex (okay, yes, it's now called Science Museum Oklahoma, but to me, it will always be the Omniplex).  It was like reliving my childhood.  Some things had changed, some were the same as I'd always known it.  The balls that rode along their prospective tracks have been doing it for as long as I remember.  I stood there watching it for quite a bit, as it was, if nothing else in that city, the idea that, in a world where change is inevitable, there are always those points of constancy. It made me feel good.  I missed the pendulum, slowly swinging with the power of the Earth's Rotation, and the Geodesic Dome Playset (which probably was taken away when someone got hurt and wanted to sue...).  The Earthquake display was still there, showing that same movie with actors with 80's clothes.  The planetarium did their daily show, and I went into the darkened room with the night sky projected on the domed ceiling and relaxed.... until a family with 8 kids came in and sat behind me... all with attention spans of 30 seconds.  Last time I'd been there, the guy doing the show probably hadn't even been born.  It was a perfect ending to my trip, my look back into my past.  

There's a certain confidence I found there, to see everything that had changed, mutated (the casinos and outlet malls), and grown up all around the city. And so had I.  I could now drive anywhere I wanted, go anywhere, and I had the ability to do it.  I brought things home, even as I had come home, to a certain extent.  But in the end, I drove back to Dallas, to my apartment, to my job, and to my home.  And I'll go back... there's so many people I didn't get to see, places (like the OKC Bombing Memorial and Bricktown) that I want to visit, but there will always be time for that.  Just 3 hours north.  A short jaunt, as the hawk flies.
 

The Great Sleepers

I wrote this about my dad, being one of the few memories I have of him, of the house in Oklahoma City.  The fan was high on the vaulted ceiling, and woe be it to whoever let a balloon go in that room.  The light would shine in from the patio doors and the windows and reflect off the dust (and smoke) in the air.  It was usually quiet on Sundays, when a football game wasn't on.  And when it was....

This poem, in whatever form I submitted it, won the 1999 AWP (Associated Writers Press) Intro Award and was published in the Mid-American Review.

The Great Sleepers

Sunday afternoons, the ceiling fan
whispers as it turns around--
around
A chair squeaks, an ancient squeak,
the contemplative creak of a sleeping lord.

He sleeps in that chair,
old, rustic and blue, the way
Caesar on his throne watched
gladiators battle, and genuflect,
saying "Morturi te salutamus,"
so does this king, owner of all he sees,
snoozes through the Cowboys beating the Bears,
or maybe dreams
of when his dad sat on the couch
eating donuts, smoking cigars.

The rulers of this world, look at them.
They sit in their ancestral halls like old kings
overlooking tiny empires. And then sleep.
Even Charlemagne had blue slippers,
  lying on the floor.

The Pursuit of Happiness

Hiking down the Champion Trail, completing what would look like a large snake on Google Earth, I looked over to the left of me, and the wind created waves on the lake where Farmers Branch and Elm Fork Trinity River meet.  Across the lake were large buildings, office buildings with the well known brands displayed proudly upon the apex of the structure. To the right of me, a neighborhood of spacious, well built houses around park lands and canals and sidewalks.  People rode bicycles or tended plants near the trail, and it all seemed peaceful and calm.

I wondered, "Is this Happiness?" Of course it is, the realization of an American Dream, a house, a job, a considerable amount of security, the ability, probably, to go wherever you want.  Now that's freedom.  "But," I asked, "I'm happy. Does all this make them any more happy with their lives?"  I have an apartment, and it's not big, nor do I have the elegant openness of the houses I saw, nor the office in a large, glass-filled building where, at my leisure, I can look out over the parks and the lake and the canals and see my house. But I have a job that I am happy with and grateful for.  What makes my happiness different from theirs? 

I remember back in Georgia, as I have talked about many times, that my stepdad drove an ice cream truck around the poorer neighborhoods of Rockdale County.  We actually sold more ice cream to the children in the trailer parks than in the affluent neighborhoods.  The people watching their large televisions or playing whatever console was out at the time would not have bothered with the ringing bells of the rickety old van when they could get ice cream out of their own freezers.  But in those small streets that wound their way through the mobile homes, the ice cream truck  distributed not only ice cream, but happiness.  They ate sugary goodness, then continued to play outside.  I never once saw those children unhappy.  For while I'm sure they were aware of those places where rich people lived, where they were was home for them.  It was their world, and the things they had were good.  I will not pretend to think that it was all roses and lollipops for them, either.  I'm sure some had parents that were abusive, or drank, or worked all night to provide a roof over their shoulders.  I'm sure they came home tired and had no time for their children.  But so, too, are the people who live in the opulent homes.  They could be abusive, or drink, or spend too much time at work, not able to see their kids.  The conditions in which they live might be different, but often, the emotions around them are the same.  

So, back to my own situation, yes, I am happy.  I thought about it further, and realized that the ability to be happy in this country is the main reason why so many people come here, legally or otherwise.  And that's a rather common thing to say... you hear it on the radio and the television all the time.  But I don't think that people really know what that means.  To people who live in those houses, to them, why would people cross a river with nothing but what they could carry just to come here? I mean, poverty (as we define it) is here as it is elsewhere?  The difference being that here, there is the opportunity for happiness.  It's an old argument, one that goes back to the Declaration of Independence.  "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."  The argument from the free market 

Trail underneath I-635. Dallas loves their bridges!

world is that our government provides for the opportunity for happiness, not necessarily that you will achieve it.  Honestly, happiness is relatively easy to achieve here, with a job, and the basic needs of survival met, the rest is the pursuit of being happy, comfortable with your life.  Any external force that interferes with this should be dealt with by the Federal Government.  I will admit that this is a little more liberal of a stance than what I would normally take, but every citizen should be afforded the "opportunity" to pursue happiness.  According to Maslow, this cannot happen until the basic needs of human survival are met.  Shelter, Warmth, Food.  I think this is ample justification for the programs that welfare extend to those people who might not have it otherwise.  And this is something that is taken advantage of and used for political gains, undoubtedly.  I do not agree with the extent that these programs are used, but that they are absolutely necessary, I will stand by and defend.  I would even go so far as to agree with the need for basic health care, the basics that keep us all healthy and able to pursue our goals.  Again, this is not to say that everyone should be taken care of completely for their entire lives, as we have had thrust upon us, but for children and those who cannot afford it, it's absolutely necessary.  

I have digressed some, but that's okay.  My main thought was that I am just as happy living my life right now as the people living in those houses and working in those buildings.  I know I've had a lot of stressful things that have happened to me (my Cousin who is a psychologist pointed out that of the list of the most stressful things that can happen to a person, I've had most of them happen to me in the past couple of years). I think I've come through the fire , with Help, of course, very nicely, and that, with that same Help, I can overcome any obstacles in my way.  The journey that I'm on, one that, in the end, will result in my independence, in my "growing up" as it were (you know that's not going to happen fully, but a little maturing wouldn't hurt), is just starting.  The one lesson that a lot of people need to learn is that looking up at the houses on the hill, or the towers of offices and the opulent stores that sell temporary satisfaction, all these things are just that, temporary, and there's little of that which is different from what I already have.  What ultimately improves that happiness is what I do with it.  From the people I meet to the things that I do, that will provide happiness, not the material objects I have around me.  Again, this sounds like a common theme, realized over and over again in sit-coms and cartoons, but it's the truth, and is something that is so hard to realize.  Not when every window out in the world broadcasts what you don't have, and how wonderfully happy those people are that do have it.  It's not the "haves" and "have nots,"  but the "lives" and the "lives not."  I would rather live, and be happy, in my small abode, than toil and strain, simply to get more of what is out there, and not be happy at all.  As Candide said, I am happy simply "tending my garden."  That is what I intend to do.  

Roadrunners, The Galleria, and Global Warming...

In other words, it's time for a "things that bug me!" post.  That's right, once again I find things that irritate the fire out of me, and I let you know what they are! Aren't you excited? I knew you would be.  And this episode is the special Texas edition.

In the last episode, I talked about my Blessed Flyswatter.  You know, the one I can't find in all my boxes and shelves because I. Don't. Need. It. Here. Either the Arts at Midtown Apartments have amazing pest control specialists (and they probably do. I've seen a cricket, and a couple of little bugs inside my apartment, and absolutely nothing outside.  In fact, the whole time I've been here (a month now), I've seen exactly one cockroach (but more on that in a minute).  We have two stray cats on the premises, or at least, I think they're strays, probably belong to someone around here. I've seen no stray dogs. In a huge city like Dallas.  I saw a skunk once, while I was driving home from the college. Never seen one of those before.

The reason I bring this up is that in Texas, as you know, everything is bigger (and that's a stereotype with loads of truth in it). In Texas it's what eats the cockroaches that is a pest.  I need to send these things over to Georgia... they'd have an absolute feast!  Thing is, I don't know what they're called. but they're everywhere.  Birds.  About the size of blackbirds, but they don't fly, and are brown-ish.  They have their mouths open constantly (mainly because it's probably 110 degrees near the pavement), and they make insanely loud squawking sounds.  I call them roadrunners, not because they are, but because the run on the road.  They sweep the streets clean of bugs, leftover food, anything they can devour.  Even the bugs off of cars.  And they're not scared of you at all.  They stand on the sidewalk and watch you pass, about like the buzzards do in Georgia.  And they're everywhere!  I guess it's a mixed blessing, to have no bugs, but lots of large birds around.  (after some looking, I think they're called "Great-Tailed Grackles," and from the description that wikipedia gives them, it makes sense.  A pack of Grackles is called an "annoyance."   It says they're not afraid of humans and make loud, raucous sounds.

***
Couple weekends ago I took a two minute trip west to the Galleria Mall, the opulent center of human decadence located conveniently right next to my apartment.  I even dressed up to go in, thinking it would be better than shorts and a t-shirt.  Four floors, with the bottom being an ice rink and food court, and the other floors ascending as they decreased in price.  On the main floor is Nordstroms,
along with alternating shops that sell the finest of women's clothing and purse/handbags stores.  Fine jewelry, watches, accessories for the latest Apple products... all of which is totally worthless to me.  The one store I was delighted to find was one owned by Papryus.  Borders carried a line of Papryus products, and I was glad to find such great greeting cards within such a short distance of my house.  I would definitely go back to that store for birthday cards and, of course, for amazingly sparkly wrapping paper.  :)


The upper floor is where the normal mall stores are: Spencer's, Hot Topic, Subway.  Packed within this area are all the people who, like me, couldn't afford the lower floors but have to buy something while at the Galleria Mall so they could say they did it.  I declined that opportunity, at least for now, and I do understand the attraction for seeing how the rich spend their money.  However, I feel much more at home at the Valley View Center on the other side of my street, or even at the Thrift Shops over on Harry Hines, where, amongst the loud Spanish Pop songs and screaming children and toys all over the floor, I found some great Jeans for $4.00 a piece, ones that I can wear when it gets cold around here (which I hope never happens.)
***

One thing I have loved here in Dallas is the 100 degree temperatures.  With relatively lower humidity than the saunas that are prevalent in Georgia.  I walk outside and feel the warm (to hot), crisp, air, and it warms the muscles, the skin, relaxes it.  It's amazing that such a ball of fire as the Sun, 8 light-minutes away from Earth, can generate that much heat.  It reminds me of my now long gone Large Dangerous Space Heater which I loved so very much.  Without the humidity, you sweat more here, but it evaporates, keeps you cooler when the Dallas winds go sweeping down the plains (oh, wrong state).  And every single person I know would think I was the craziest person on the face of the planet for liking warm temperatures... I mean, it's getting hotter, isn't it? We're going to bake in an oven of our own making? Global War... I mean, Climate Change... is going to do irreparable harm, and the only way we can fix it is to let the Government tax, regulate, and force us to be kinder to our environment.  After all, they know best, don't they???

Truthfully, do I think that we have had something to do with affecting the overall climate of the Earth? Probably.  I don't know what that is, as I have little proof and even fewer reasons to go looking for that proof.  But... do I want the Government to control everything that I do, consume, and waste, all in the name of protecting Mother Earth?  Of course not!! I will leave my lights on if I want, and sleep with icicles hanging off my feet if I so choose.  And I will pay for that in the electricity bill that I get each month (which, in Georgia, was in the summer around $350).

I say all this because the college that my bookstore serves is requiring every student in the school to read Global Weirdness, and wanting every professor, whether it's an English or History or Science or Math professor to use it in some way.  And I can see how it can work, I took Environmental Algebra at GC&SU, and made an A in the course. It was very enjoyable.  I only hope that in those classes, they are providing the students with a balanced look at the issue, showing evidence that, perhaps the world isn't going to bake in an oven as quickly or as dangerously as they think.  They could easily show how climate change oscillates from one century to the next, cooling and warming, and depending on forces like El Niño, climate is changed more by natural phenomenon than the things we are doing.


The main reason I couldn't care less about the whole Environmental movement is that sometimes the real goals are cloaked in the humanitarian mission of saving the planet.  Control, Power, Money...and the people who are ambitious for them, can easily use the Evironment as a tool to gain them.  And besides, let's be honest about our reasons for doing things.  Do I want to go back to incandescent light bulbs? Heck no... I had to change them every two weeks in fixtures that were impossible to undo.  Put an LED in there, save money, save time, and I can be lazy and not have to change it for years.  That's environmentalism for you.  If the college turns off the AC in a building because they are trying to "conserve" and be "green" about things, that's a load of compost.  They do it to save money. And that's fine.  Just tell us that you're saving money, and not because of some altruistic sense of duty toward this rock we live on.  I'd do a lot of things to help the environment (and I've seen the many things that liter, light pollution, noise pollution, water pollution (the rivers in Dallas are Green), do to our world, and I don't like it. But that's not enough for me.  Give me an incentive to take that extra step.  Saving money, or saving time, or letting me be just a little bit more lazy when I don't have to unscrew that light bulb.  That's all I want.  And that's the true answer to that riddle.... "As few as possible."  And while we're at it, let's go shop online and not have to worry about spending electricity and other utilities to power that thing to my east.  What savings that would create! We pick and choose, when it suits us.