Billiken Man

My sister sent me a book that she discovered in a bookstore. It was a journal about the lives of -- of all people -- MY great-great-grandparents!

What a thrill!

I've never met any of the ancestors described in the journal -- long before my time -- but I came to have a greater understanding of their heroic day-to-day existence.

They were immigrants, about to become brave Americans.

They drove a conestoga pulled by two oxen over hills, through valleys, across rivers and gullies.

Their kids couldn't leave the wagon -- they would never be seen again, swallowed up by a jungle of grass. The Big Bluestem grass was seven feet tall.

Eventually, they parked the wagon and began to dig a well for their homestead. They lived in the wagon for more than three months while they dug a well -- by hand with a shovel -- before the dry season could kill them.

Then they began to dig their home -- a dugout in the dirt.

How did they do it?

They had no nearby towns, not even county governments. No neighbors. Indians were feared. There were no 911 operators or neighbors to call.

They were at the mercy of floods, droughts, tornadoes, dust storms, ice storms, pestilence, disease, varmints, and bandits. They couldn't build a fire in that tall grass.

How did they do it? The journal described their lives. They were brave, hardy, intelligent people. One little family alone, finding ways to survive through common sense, faith, and hard work. Six years of drouth -- in a cycle with a flood every seventh year. Toil, enthusiasm, disappointment, tragedy, elation -- all centered around toil.

Eventually, other brave little families were located, and a sense of community helped the far-flung families to survive out in the middle of Nowhere. They were all partners with Nature in a dance for survival. Each helped the others with education. They founded a church. I began to recognize some of the family names.

Today, long after God has met Mammon through the auspices of Big Bizness and corrupt politicians, the sense of community is gone. The brave little families have died off, leaving their descendants to forget early struggle and terror. The cycle of toil and survival has been interrupted. The community connections were killed by the likes of Archer-Daniels-Midland, Enron, and politicians who represent them by promoting legislation such as Freedom to Farm.

We fear the terrors of our own making.

We don't know who our true friends are. Mammon teaches: "Do unto others before they can do unto you."

So, as I read that journal written by my great-great aunt, I became aware of some of that gritty stuff that we Americans have lost. Is it too late to revive a little bit of that old spirit? Just a little bit? ...

--"Raise less corn and more hell".

One general remarked lately,
"The U.S. Army is at war, America is at the mall"

and that's the way it goes for a pussy nation.

General Patton once remarked One Thing America cannot stand is a loser. The Republicans have put two pussy-losers in the Wht House, one heads to the basement like an old woman scared of the storm everytime a piper club flies over D.C., the other watches battles in Iraq by remote tv, works up his rare erection, urging the troops to do what he never had the balls to do.
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I read about this kind of LED "tagging" in the New York Times weeks ago. The article noted that the simple little LED lights (bulbs, wires, small battery) beat spraypaint all to hell. The lights are attached with magnets and the point is to surprise and delight.

Here is a video with gentle, peaceful music of a group of people "tagging" a building on a streetcorner. It's beautiful.

http://graffitiresearchlab.com/?page_id=6

You can link on that page to how to make them and other folks "tagging" with their grafitti name. It's easy to spell out a message on foam core and put a magnet or adhesive on the back.

If I saw this (or a Moonninite) I'd never think "Osama!"

Methinks I'll make me some anti-war ones... where the metal buidlings at?

Only Bushco could devise this contraption, a device thru which a vehicle is moved to detect for nuclear materials.
Laughter is the only salvation when you consider that for the sake of Big Agri Bushco is willing to leave our borders as open as an African window.
Oh we should mention this little anti-nuclear toy is going to cost us ???
No telling how much of our national budget and future was squandered on "The Cold War" and all the toys they needed to fight it.

The gaget is reported on by NYT. Click my name for the story
_

America always needs a boogey man is what my grandpa told me 40 years ago.

I hope you have some living relatives who can help you fill in the tale of your ancestors (I done already forgot the first posters name).

See here now this is not right. Not right at all. You left out St. Houston.

Im older now and have been near-death sick and im tired but i once was one of those women who birth 10-pound babies in the morning and hit the proverbial cornfields in the afternoon. Even older and tired and still weak I could take on that stupid bush and cheney with both hands tied behind my back, just so long as there were no hunting rifles.

i am deeply disapponited that you left out st houston. But it is not too late.