To Phone or Not

That can be a rough question.  Since I retired, I have become really sensitized to today's phone etiquette.  I do not want to make calls that are considered a nuisance. For instance, whenever I call my youngest sister it is a big interuption to important business.  Conversations tend to got like this:

"Hello"
"Hey Sis, How's it goin'
"Fine, you OK ?
"Doing great. Found a good place to eat last week"
"That's nice.  Welllll, let me get off here and get busy."

Yes it's exagerated.  Those of you who know her......know she never gets busy in a hurry.  Had I been one of her friends, she would have talked for and hour.  So, I just try to call only when really needed.  I neither called or got a call on Christmas Day.

I try to watch calls to my working friends.  Thet have things to do....I, normally, don't.

I only ask one thing.....Never Ever, ever, say "I would have called, but didn't have time."  Please....it takes 2 minutes for a descent "hello, how are you".

A note on Face Book is never a replacement for a card.....even an E-card.

Boxing Day 2011

Christmas 1981 will live in my mind forever.  It was spent in jolly old England.....Manchester.  My roommate Dinah and I were spending Christmas with her sister and brother-in-law.  Someday I will tell you Dinah's story, but not today.  We had planned this trip since the summer when her family had been to Greece.  So, on December 24th I loaded Dinah and the bags into my 1970 Pinto and off we went to Hellinicon Airport.  We caught a British Airways flight to London.  Dinah was not feeling well and I asked the flight attendant to have a chair meet us for the transfer to the Manchester shuttle.  We managed the transfer with only a little help from British Airways.  Dinah's sister, Betty, met us at the ramp in Manchester. On Christmas day we had a wonderful dinner.  Dinah was in good spirits, but very tired.  We spent the evening in the pub downstairs.  She had a wonderful time introducing me to old friends and business acquaintances.  The next morning, Peter, and old friend, had volunteered to take me to York to see the Cathedral.  We spent the entire day....again that's a story for another time.  When I walked into the Pub, I did not see Betty or Dinah.  When I asked, they said Dinah had become very ill and asked them to call an ambulance.

My heart did a flip flop.  I asked  if they were sure Dinah asked that it be called.  It was confirmed.  As i was rused around to be escorted to the hospital, I was in a daze.  I just could not get my head around what was facin me.  It was plain her family had no clue.  You see, Dinak was a cancer survivor.  Fifteen years earlier she had had a round with breast cancer and had beat it into submission.  However while that was going on she lost her husband to a heart attack and her 25 year-old son to a car accident.  She had told me the story when we met in Athens two years earlier.  She also told me how bad her experience with the National Health Service had been.  The las t thing she told me before our departure for Englad was, "Norm, I will never go back to a hospital except to die. My boys are gone and I am ready to follow."  I asked why tell me now.  She said she thought it best I understood why she would never let me send her to a hospital.  I quipped that the only one i contemplated had padded cells.  She grinned and said I'd keep her company.

All of this rollong around my head as Betty's daughter drives me to the hospital.  I get there.  Dinah's having supper and joking around with Betty.  She even patted the orderly on the rump when he picked up her tray.  We spent a half hour in pleasant conversation and Betty said it was time to go.  I was hesitant and Dinah gave me a little head shake.  I gave her a hug and we left. I cried in the dark all the way back to Manchester Royal.  I managed to be presentable by the time we got to the pub.  Sat around drinking 'til it closed at 10PM....then did the after hours thing with a couple of Dinah's "Bobby" friends.  At 1115 PM the phone rang.....I told Casey to get ready.  He said for what.  I said Dinah's gone.  He replied she can't be.....just as Betty Screamed.

My flight home was the lonliest ever.

Christmas Eve Headline "Seattle Police Pepper Spray Air Jordan Shoppers "

Yeah, I know it's the Huffington Post, but who in the world riots over a sneaker I wouldn't be seen dead in ? Now, if it was a bright, red, platform slingback in raw silk.....who knows.  Gotta have that good old Christmas spirit.  I'll be spending Christmas "Home Alone" again this year.  Yes, I had a couple of invitations.  They were complicated.

It's just not the same any more.  I will spend tomorrow listening to the MTC sing my favorite songs....especially The Hallelujah Chorus....writing my Christmas Blog....contemplating the new year....and contemplating 2011.  I will miss those days of yester-year. When the house was filled with the wonderful smells and noises of family and friends.  I don't know anyone having one of those this year.  Families are smaller and more nuclear.  They lack those women whose joy was to spend a week in the kitchen to feed 25 or 30 people.  Oh what I would give to see and hear my mother and great grandmother in the kitchen together. Cakes and pies and puddings, several of each, clogged the sideboards by Christmas Eve. Added to this assembly on the morrow would be the offerings of each family.  There had to be enough food, especially deserts, to feed everyone into a stupor and still have leftovers for all to take home for supper. That's Christmas. Loading the cars for the trip to church.  My mother always gave me a special donation for Christmas. Tha's Christmas. Renewing friendships with cousins I hadn't seen for 11 months. Talking school, clothes, rifles, and cars.  Telling the years fishing and hunting stories. That's Christmas.  Only one person got presents at this get together...Great Granny.  She was a perfect Mrs Claus.  Short, round,usually wore an apron and always had a big smile. That's Christmas.  That's happiness personified.  I had my last one circa 1961.  My mother was gone by then, but we gathered at Great Granny's house for the last time. It's just not the same any more.

Norm
Christmas Eve morning 2011
Thanks

Broken already !

I thought I had a good scheme for posting, but no December thoughts this morning.  Instruction, that's what's on my mind.  So much of our lives depend on instruction. Oral instruction is generally the most effective.  The question and answer availability generally trumps any detailed writing.  Yes, written instructions can be a challenge.  Here is a good one; how do you write and instruction for a problem that does not seem possible ?  My good friend Karen sent me a e-mail this morning asking how to get my writings.  She had followed the blog address in my e-mail, but had no place to join.  When I being up the blog site, there is a JOIN THIS SITE gadget on the right top of the posting area.  Now Karen is a pretty sharp cookie.  She did not miss that gadget.  I must conclude that she had none.  Conversely I know my friend Anita had a gadget because she is now a member.  I will presume (pray) that when I ask Karen to try again...the gadget will appear.  If it does not, I'll be looking for plan B.

The final brigade exited Iraq last night.  I am glad our men are out of danger, but this was not a good thing.  We left because we had no choice.  The governments of Iraq AND Iran insisted we leave.  Iran's influence will replace ours and another chunk of the world's oil falls into enemy hands.  Iraq's fledgeling secular governments won't have a chance to build the strength needed to keep the religious parties from taking power.  Iran will see to it.  Writing from my home...near Palestine....God bless your Sunday

Another time, another view ...

Tuesday, April 6th 2010 - 09:27:57 PM

//hong thanh nhan I am a vietnamese citizen. I joined the ARVN Signal Corps, I was 18 years old then in 1969, innocent of politics. Giving that I was born in South Vietnam, either I had to join the ARVN or to defect to Vietcong. I chose the former because I lived in the area controlled by the South Vietnam Government. All during my hitch in Arvn, I was always wondering why American troops must be present in Vietnam and Vietnamese had to fight each other and Americans protested the war. The rationale that the United States fought the war to protect freedom and demmocracy in South Vietnam did not make sense and viewed with suspicion by many Vietnamese. The South Vietnamese Government and its Military forces were not good guys to many Vietnamese people, with corruption and brutality. Then Americans left. The Vietnamese settled their own war with the defeat of the South. Then I went to prison _ so-called reeducation camp. People were forced to dislocation to new economic zones. Properties seized or confiscated,so-called anti-bourgeois campaign. Rice farmers were robbed of land to join collective production communities. THEN, the dim view of a society with freedom and democracy began to take shape in many Vietnamese' thought, even in some communist fighters. More people started to flee by boats, and America gave them asylum... These events were long ago but the memory is still fresh in many Vietnamese' mind. The withdrawal of American troops and the fall of South Vietnam served as an eye-opener to many Vietnamese from both sides of the frontier, eventually. We knew what were precious after having lost them. You guys Americans came to Vietnam with the ideas in your mind to protect the freedom of South Vietnam. These ideas always hold true with time, no matter what the politicians now and then want to distort them for their own benefit. You came to Vietnam to protect freedom and democracy. BE PROUD of that. Soctrang, Mekong Delta, Vietnam.

December 17th, 1971, Phu Loi, Republic of Viet Nam

Yawning, carrying a steaming cup of coffee, I walk outside the quonsett hut for the first observation of the day.  I see immediately that it is going to be a boring day.  Not a cloud to be seen.  I set my coffee on the bunker roof and climb up beside it.  The air is almost cold.....55 degrees and army skivvies and tee shirt tend to clash.  I love these early mornings.  Sun will be up in another hour. The post will awaken with the sun.  Helicopters don't fly much at night here.  I wave at the controllers in the tower.  They are doing their pre-sunrise routines just like me.

I set my coffee down and jump down on the ground.  Time to go in and get the observation on the teletype.  It always amazes this kid from west Texas that the whole world sees my weather report.  The warmth from the well, worn wooden floor feels like heaven to my could feet.  In fact the air enfolds me like a blanket.  Most of the year I flee inside to hide from the heat.  Not so this morning.