Ryan Osentowski – Page 13 – The Conservative Blind Guy

The Penis Always Loses

Men can never win!

I’ve been alive for 42 years and the only hard truth I’ve come to realize is that men, no matter what they do, are wrong.

Take the latest issue of Cosmopolitan Magazine, for instance. The editor of the Sex and Relationships section wrote that it’s wrong for a man to enjoy giving a woman an orgasm.

In her view, men derive masculine pleasure from the act of giving a woman a climax. She goes on to explain that the female orgasm should be womancentric and, if the man takes too much satisfaction from her satisfaction, then she is merely a vessel of his own desires reflected and projected.

I’m not making this up. Go Google it if you don’t believe me!

Ok, so for decades, much of feminism has derided men for not caring enough about their partner’s orgasm. Now, he’s selfish if he does?!

How can we ever win. If we follow this lady’s logic to its ultimate conclusion, the best thing for couples to do is to give each other battery-powered implements, or adult DVD’s once a year for their birthday, then go into separate rooms and rub one off. Then they can gather in the living room in the afterglow and compare notes. Maybe on Christmas, they can videotape the experience to give their spouse a bit of an extra thrill, but not too much of one!

Here is my question for the Cosmo editor. If a man is having trouble with erectile dysfunction and the woman blames herself for it, as many women erroneously tend to do, is she being selfish? If he takes Viagra, should she be angry, or should she be as happy as Bob Dole on New Year’s Eve?

You know… Maybe Eliot Spitzer had a point. Prostitution is a more direct means of alleviating sexual tension without worrying about your partner’s feelings. Of course, I can’t afford it, but if I ever achieve Donald Trump’s level of affluence… But never mind. I never did have a taste for Russian women. I certainly have a taste for American women… But there I go being selfish again.

Sorry, ladies.

The Hunt

The more books I read, the more I realize that being an author is a perilous avocation, particularly if you want to write a series. On one hand, you have to keep your books fresh and unpredictable. On the other, you have to keep the elements in place that initially drew readers to your body of work. It must be a precarious balancing act and often, a thankless one.

Take John Sandford, for instance. For years, Evaney From Miami kept bugging me to read the Lucas Davenport series. Finally in May of 2012, I grabbed, “Rules of Prey,” and tucked in. I was hooked!

It wasn’t that Lucas was all that different from many of his literary counterparts. At least, not on the surface. Renegade cop who plays by his own rules? Check. The thing that drew me to Lucas was the fact that he shamelessly flaunted his methods for criminals and his peers alike. By the end of the first novel, it became clear that, while Lucas displayed many of the trappings of his contemporaries, he had (or didn’t have) something that the likes of Harry Bosch, Peter Decker and J. P. Beaumont all possessed. A conscience. Sandford verified this in an interview with the New York Post in 2002, in which he confirmed the fact that Davenport was a sociopath.

This literary twist fascinated me. Here was a guy who cloaked himself in the trappings of upscale civilization (a house, Italian suits and a Porsche, for God sake!), yet he was a thinly-veiled animal underneath.

Each of the Davenport novels contains the word, prey. Yet, as you read, you quickly come to question who exactly is the prey and who is the predator. Is the predator a lawyer who leaves a written rule at the scene of each kill, a crazed Native-American seeking revenge, a sadistic surgeon who steals the eyes of his victims, or a child molester hidden deep in the frozen Wisconsin woods? Or, is the real predator a man who uses his badge only for cover, but who could care less about the rule of law, preferring the thrill of the game to anything else?

This was the Lucas Davenport I fell in love with five years ago. Sadly, this was the Lucas Davenport whom John Sandford could not sustain for more than 10 novels. Eventually, much to my dismay, Lucas mellowed out. He got married, adopted a daughter, had a couple more kids and began hopping from one employer to another in search of villains. Gone was the solitary, nocturnal predator who prowled the streets of Minneapolis playing cat-and-mouse with twisted bikers, warped kidnappers and southern hitwomen. In his place was a more conventional crimebuster who was chasing more conventional villains. When I found myself reading a Lucas Davenport novel that involved quilting, I knew it was time for me to stop living in denial and move on.

In fairness, John Sandford is doing what I only dream about. He’s now writing three series and raking in the bucks, while I eek out blog entries during stolen moments in a control room. Yet, a relationship exists between author and reader, much like the one between predator and prey. Whether it is antagonistic or not, an inherent understanding is present that allows the reader to criticize the author. This knowledge allows me to stem the guilt that I, as a non-sociopath, might feel at criticizing a writer whom I once loved.

As I said, I think maintaining a series is probably tough. Many excellent scribes fall prey to the pitfalls of time. Nelson DeMille is another example. John Corey is a great character, if not original. He’s another rogue cop who always knows better than his superiors, but what made him special was his razor-like wit. When he stopped being funny on a consistent basis, I quit reading.

Maybe Dennis Lehane has a point, I thought as I ran through the Kenzie-Gennaro private eye novels in the autumn of 2015. There are only six. Less is more, right?

To quote Waylon Jennings, “Wrong!” Lehane appears to be done with the tumultuous Boston couple, having chosen to move on to historical American epics. This was probably a good thing as the series was hit-and-miss for me and their final adventure, “Moonlight Mile,” left me with a pretty sizeable meh feeling.

All of this was on my mind as I started the Joe Pickett series, by C. J. Box, in May of last year. Sixteen novels about a Wyoming game warden who solves crimes, I thought? Whatever.

Joe Pickett’s first outing, “Open Season,” left me impressed. A guy drops dead on Joe’s woodpile after being shot. His cute little daughters subsequently discover a mysterious animal hiding in said woodpile. Soon, more bodies start falling and Joe and his family find themselves smack in the middle of a power struggle between the town’s corrupt sheriff, Joe’s former boss and environmentalists with an agenda.

That was great. I bet he can’t do it again, I foolishly thought.

“Savage Run,” is about eco terrorists, exploding cows and a covert range war involving a secret cattleman’s association.

Can we go three for three, I wondered.

“Winter Kill,” involves a group of anti-government separatists, an overzealous FBI director and a man wrongly accused of murder. The man, Nate Romanowski, is a mysterious fellow who wears a pony tail, loves falcons and has a shadowy Special Forces background.

Great, I mused. Mitch Rapp, the nature boy version. But where Mitch Rapp is too often one-dimensional, Nate (a running character who turns out to be Joe’s best friend), is written in a far more nuanced and layered way. As the novels progress and we learn more about Nate, we come to realize that he carries a lot of baggage over the things he’s done in his past.

Let me skip to the part where I tell you that Mr. Box just published his seventeenth Joe Pickett novel, “Vicious Circle,” a few days ago. I am sneaking chunks of it at work when I should be tending to business, it’s that good. Mr. Box is the only author I’ve ever read who has never written a novel in a series that has disappointed me. This includes, not only his entire Pickett series, but his various stand-alone novels such as, “Blue Heaven,” “Three Weeks to Say Goodbye,” and “The Highway.”

One of the elements that makes Box’s novels so compelling is the setting. Michael Connelly knows the streets of Los Angeles like the back of his hand. So does George Pelecanos in Baltimore, or Dennis Lehane in Boston. They have intimate knowledge of the world in which their characters flourish.

C. J. Box is a native of Wyoming and currently resides there with his family. When he writes about Joe Pickett exploring the Big Horn Mountains on horseback, or Nate Romanowski swimming naked in the Yellow Stone River, his attention to detail lends a necessary tint of authenticity to the literary landscape.

But more than that, Box paints an accurate picture of the average citizen of the Cowboy State. The plight of ranchers in the face of land developers, the clash of western values with the bureaucratic mindset of Washington D.C., the relationship between humanity and nature are but some of the themes explored at length in various novels.

Over the years, I’ve lost Patience with crime novelists who I tend to regard as too gimmicky. James Patterson, David Baldacci and Patricia Cornwell are three examples that come quickly to mind. Granted, a series revolving around crime detection is bound to become formulaic by it’s very nature. There’s nothing wrong with that. If I’m comfortable with the formula, I’m happy. Raymond Chandler is considered to be an American icon and, though he only wrote seven Phillip Marlowe novels, he was somewhat formulaic. So was Arthur Conan Doyle, for that matter, and Sherlock Holmes still survives in modern media.

In order for a formula to work for me, I need to care about more than just a basic crime procedural (I’m looking at you, Longmire.) The crime universes I like to inhabit need to have as much of a cultural feel as a sense of forward momentum through plot. C. J. Box does a masterful job of this.

Consider the violence portrayed throughout his novels. Aside from the afore-mentioned exploding cows, people have met their demise from such creative means as, death by hanging from a wind turbine, death by geyser, death by bear and death by arrow, among others.

A lesser author would merely see the wild violence of the west as a means of employing shock value to draw readers, but the violence has consequences, both for Joe Pickett and his family. Box is not an overly-emotional storyteller, but he often conveys Joe’s feelings from the things he does not say.

In one instance, Joe gets into a western-style gunfight with a character. As the other guy lies on the ground dying, he mutters, “It hurts! It hurts!” over and over again. Later, multiple characters praise Joe for prevailing in the gunfight, but he can only hear the dying words of the man in his head.

Sidebar: It occurs to me that Lucas Davenport and Joe Pickett run parallel in some ways. They are both law enforcement officers who piss off their superiors, even to the point of being fired, yet who ultimately catch bad guys. But if you scratch the surface, they are antithetical. Lucas does what he does purely for the sport of it. Both men are hunters, though Lucas hunts humans, while Joe hunts game to feed his family. Lucas is an animal in human form who thrives in the jungle of crime, while Joe is a civilized man who protects his family from the horrors that he encounters on the job.

Unlike Lucas, Joe’s family is integral to his life. Thus, they are necessary to keep the audience engaged. His wife Marybeth is a strong woman who sometimes exhibits more common sense than her husband. Their marriage is not incidental to the action of the story. Often, it serves as a reservoir of strength for Joe and Nate. Joe’s family is a necessary reminder that human civilization can and must perpetuate itself, even in the face of the destructive power of raw nature and the lower elements in the human soul.

Joe is a righteous man, but he is a flawed man. He can’t shoot worth a damn. His optimistic view of the world sometimes blinds him to the darker impulses in others. He has a by-the-book approach that often causes him to butt heads with his friends and family, including Nate, a man who believes in his own code of justice.

No matter how careful an author may be, he/she can’t help but let their worldview bleed into their work. I quickly tired of the Harry Bosch novels because I noticed that Michael Connelly has an anti-police bias that I found to be off-putting. Dennis Lehane and George Pelacanos both love to perseverate about issues of race and class ad nauseam, often straying from solid storytelling into the realm of moralizing. When an author tells a reader what to think, he’s lost them, whether they agree with the viewpoint or not. I agree far more with the late Vince Flynn’s worldview about the war on terror and I share his pro-C.I.A. bias, but even I rolled my eyes (figuratively, of course) at times at the way he wrote any character who dared to oppose Mitch Rapp.

Based on his work, I’m going to hazard a guess that Mr. Box is not a leftist, or even center-left in his politics. Some might read his work and infer that he is a conservative, or even a right-winger. I would not be comfortable making such an assumption. He might be libertarian, or even center-right in his politics. But he does a good enough job presenting multiple angles on an issue that the reader is left to make up their own mind by story’s end. This is the mark of a writer who truly respects his audience.

So, seventeen Joe Pickett novels down, and I don’t know how many to go. Meanwhile, Mr. Box has developed another series centered around a cop who is an overweight single mother in her 30’s. I have a major crush on her. “Paradise Valley,” is the third novel in the Cassie Dewell series and it will be published this summer. If this proves to be Cassie’s last hurrah…well…maybe I’ll come back to this blog and dip my quill in some poison where Chuck is concerned. We’ll see.

In the meantime, a guy known only as, The Real Book Spy, has recommended several new series to me featuring characters with names like Cork O’Connor, Nick Mason and Logan West. With those characters in the queue, plus an unusual foray into the world of Harry Potter, my daily commute from Littleton to Boulder isn’t likely to get boring anytime soon.

Sidebar: I had the pleasure of meeting C. J. Box the other evening at a book signing here in Denver. I was struck by the fact that there is a lot of Wyoming in his demeanor. He seemed to be a man who is unassuming and unpretentious. In other words, there is a lot of Joe Pickett in C. J. Box, and vice versa. I took Katy, since she was the one who introduced me to the Joe Pickett series. She handled herself well, both during the Q&A period and when he signed her bookplate. I was not so fortunate. I had 10 things I wanted to say to him, but when the time came, my tongue got cramped.

Here’s a funny story he shared. He was at a writers’ conference and was seated between Michael Connelly and Lee Child, the author of the Jack Reacher series. Child was apparently complaining that fans kept asking him why the movie studio had cast Tom Cruise, a relatively diminutive figure, as Reacher. Child felt that this bit of casting (or miscasting) eclipsed anything positive about the film.

Hell, maybe I should be glad that Joe Pickett hasn’t yet made it to the screen.

David E. Kelley is supposedly interested in turning “The Highway” into a limited series. I feel more than a little trepidation about this. Kelley’s worldview is decidedly liberal and it suffuses all of his work. To me, this would be incongruous with Box’s overarching philosophy. But Box seemed to be happy with their collaboration thus far.

I’m done now. Time to do a recording studio maintenance check.

“Splat!”

Friends, there are many things that annoy me as a blind person, but the true Bain of my existence are those well-intentioned people who can’t take no for an answer.

Take this morning, for example. Every day, I make my way from my cozy apartment to Denver Union Station, where I lay over for about 20 minutes before catching a bus to Boulder. I know the station like the back of my hand. I know where I’m going and where I don’t want to go.

This morning, I was killing time inside the station when I heard a loud “bang!” behind me. To my ear, it sounded like the escalator breaking.

Curiosity compelled me to walk over to the “up” escalator to investigate to see whether or not it was operational. As I approached it, some guy starts talking to me in a loud voice.

“Hey man! You’re trying to go down the up escalator! Hey man! You wanna go downstairs?”

“I’m fine, pal. Thank you,” I said.

That should’ve been the end of it, but alas, it was not.

“Hey, the down escalator is over there. You wanna go to your right,” he said as I placed my hand on the railing of the “up” escalator and determined that, yes, it was still working.

“I’m fine, buddy. Thank you,” I said again.

Satisfied that the escalator was working properly, I turned to walk over to stand by the wall, which is my customary place whenever the weather is too cold to allow me to stand outside the station.

“Hey man. The down escalator is to your left. Turn left.”

“BE GONE, MEDDLING INSECT!!!” I bellowed. Then, out loud, I said, “I said I’m fine, pal.”

“I was just tryin’ to help. Jesus!” he muttered as he went downstairs.

You guys know that scene in The Departed when Martin Shean falls off of the roof of a hundred-story building and splatters in a Boston alley? The sound effect is exquisite. I’d like to think that it’s what that fellow would’ve sounded like if I’d grabbed him by the neck and hurled him over the side of the escalator, thereby sending him plummeting to his messy doom in the subterranean bus terminal. Alas, we will never know.

A few minutes later, I was walking to my bus gate when I passed the same fellow.

“You’re doing fine, man. Just keep goin’ straight. Keep goin’. Keep goin’.”

I read once in a C. J. Box novel that, when you rip a man’s ear off, it sounds like the bones of a chicken wing snapping. Alas, we will never know.

To all of my sighted readers, I implore you! It’s fine to offer assistance to a blind person, but if they tell you they are doing fine, just leave it at that. You’ll still get your positive karma for doing your good turn daily.

For all of my blind readers, don’t believe the lies. Violence solves everything.

A Hit Is a Hit

Well, we’ve had a lot of heavy, serious crap going down lately on this blog, so how about lightening it up. Let’s switch from the cut-throat world of D.C. politics to the much more transparent world of, The Mafia.

I’ve been embracing my inner TV nerd of late by reading yet another critic’s book by David Bianculli. He’s charting the evolution of scripted TV shows in 18 different genres. Of course, he’s a big fan of The Sopranos.

What a coincidence. So am I.

So here are my top 10 favorite episodes from that landmark series, The Sopranos. As they say, “Come for the whackings, stay for the psychiatry.”

If you haven’t yet seen the series, be warned that spoilers abound.

10. “Made in America” (Season 6, episode 21)

Possibly the most infamous of all Sopranos episodes, it’s still being cussed and discussed to this day.

Overall, the episode isn’t particularly dramatic in the wake of the blood bath that occurred in the series’ penultimate outing, “The Blue Comet.” The whacking of Phil Leotardo is far less anti-climactic than other whackings that appear in this list.

What makes this series finale so memorable is the final seconds. Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) and his family are sitting in a restaurant, eating onion rings and listening to “Don’t Stop Believing,” on the tabletop jukebox. A couple of suspicious characters come in.

Then… Cut to black!

What did the black screen of death mean? Many passionate fans insist that it represents Tony’s death. Other equally passionate fans insist that it just means the story ends and that life goes on in the Sopranos universe. Series creator David Chase has been adamant that we will never know, for he will remain as silent as a whacked rat on the subject.

9. “I Dream of Jeannie Cusamano” (Season One, Episode 13)

The central conflict of The Sopranos in its first two seasons is the battle of Tony with his mother, Livia (Nancy Marchand.) This season finale best illustrates the problem. After Livia nearly burns her house down while cooking mushrooms, Tony puts her in a retirement home. Livia resents him for this, so she colludes with Uncle Junior to have her own son killed.

Tony catches on to the plot and foils it. Tony whacks Junior’s number one hetman, but Junior escapes mob justice by landing in jail, courtesy of the FBI.

Tony pays Livia a visit in her nursing home and screams at her, “I try to do right by you and you try to have me whacked!?”

All of Tony’s issues come boiling out as he bellows at the prone form of Livia on a hospital gurney. The angry, wounded little boy is clearly visible beneath the hulking form. But Tony can’t do anything to his mother as she smiles underneath her mask and is wheeled away.

8. “Whoever Did This” (Season Four, Episode Nine)

Of all the murders committed on this series, this one seems to be referenced the most by fans. Was it because Ralphie Cifaretto (Joe Pantoliano), sociopath and misogynist that he was, also had a charming side? Was it because of the ultra brutal nature of his demise in his own kitchen, with Tony’s big hands wrapped around his neck after a fierce fight? Was it the toupee? Who knows. All we know is that Ralph was killed and buried in three separate places and no one cared.

7. “Members Only” (Season Six, Episode One)

Most of this episode concerns the fate of a small player in Tony’s organization at the hands of the FBI. However, the last moments of the episode serve as a game changer.

Tony is cooking pasta for Uncle Junior (Dominic Chianese) in his kitchen. Junior, who now suffers from advancing Alzheimer’s, thinks Tony is a long dead enemy and shoots him in the stomach.

This episode came along after rival series such as Lost and 24 had raised the bar, making it acceptable to kill off main characters. Fans went crazy on the internet. Would the writers actually let Tony bleed out on Junior’s kitchen floor, thereby rebranding the show as, “The Further Adventures of Christopha and Vito?”

OF COURSE NOT! They still had 20 episodes left to go before the black screen and the late, great James Gandolfini was still an Emmy magnet.

6. “Funhouse” (Season Two, Episode 13)

Speaking of the death of major characters, this episode featured the first. Sal ‘Big Pussy’ Bompensiero (Vincent Pastore) had committed the ultimate breach of the mafia code by turning rat for the FBI. Tony learned about it and thus, Tony along with his two trusted sidekicks Paulie and Sylvio, took Pussy for one last cruise on Tony’s boat. Of all the murders Tony committed, this one had the biggest personal impact on him, as Pussy was one of his mentors.

The other major aspect of this episode were the dream sequences. The show had flirted with them before, but this was the first time (and not the last) that Chase and his cohorts used Tony’s dreams as a means to advance the plot.

5. “White Caps” (Season 4, Episode 13)

Carmela Soprano (Edie Falco) is mad as hell and she’s not gonna take it anymore!

She’s tolerated Tony’s infidelity for years, but when one of his mistresses calls her on the telephone and taunts her over their affair, she explodes and kicks Tony out of the house in a hailstorm of golf balls.

There’s a B-Plot involving Tony’s cold war with a shark lawyer in which we learn that Tony knows how to resolve conflict without violence. There’s also a C-plot involving Johnny Sack and Little Carmine, but it is forgettable in the wake of the nuclear explosion that occurs between Tony and Carmela as their marriage is finally revealed for the crumbling façade that it truly is.

Does Carmela divorce Tony? Hell no! After a season of separation, she makes her peace with her life and her true nature and goes back to him.

4. “Employee of the Month” (Season three, Episode Four)

Tony’s therapist Dr. Jennifer Melfi (Lorraine Bracco) takes center stage in this one. Over the course of the show’s 86 episodes, we saw a lot of violence. But nothing was quite as shocking or brutal as Melfi’s rape in a parking garage.

One of the major themes of The Sopranos is that humans, by in large, are irredeemable creatures incapable of change. But Melfi defies this existential view when she refuses to tell Tony about the rape. She takes the high road instead. Rather than unleashing Tony as the instrument of her righteous vengeance, she handles it by suffering in silence.

3. “Pine Barrens” (Season Three, Episode 11)

The Sopranos wasn’t just all about the drama. It could be hilarious, too. This is the best example.

Christopher (Michael Imperioli) and Paulie (Tony Sirico) go to pick up a collection from one of Tony’s Russian contacts. How they bungle the job and end up spending a freezing night in the Jersey woods is something you have to see to believe.

This wasn’t a Tonycentric episode. Gandolfini was surrounded by a superb cast that often carried the action to great effect. The ending is somewhat ambiguous and served as one of several plots that drove fans to distraction because it was forever left unresolved.

2. “Long Term Parking” (Season Five, Episode 12)

Poor, poor Adriana (Drea de Matteo.) She didn’t mean to get nabbed by the FBI. She didn’t want to become an informant against Christopher. She never, ever should’ve admitted it to him. She winds up buried in an unmarked grave somewhere in the Jersey woods, while Christopher once again falls off the wagon.

This is a wonderful, yet heartbreaking episode from start to finish. It is notable because of the different approaches that the characters take when dispensing with a troublesome FBI rat. Big Pussy dies under a cloud of sorrow while he and his comrades do tequila shots on Tony’s boat with Sinatra crooning in the background. Adriana dies crawling on her hands and knees, begging for her life as Sylvio calls her a “cunt,” and puts three bullets in her back.

1. “College” (Season One, Episode 5)

The Sopranos was noteworthy for its serialized storylines, yet this is what producers call, a bottle episode. That means that all events are self-contained and don’t require having viewed the shows that come either before or after.

Tony is taking his daughter Meadow (Jamie-Lynn Sigler) on a trip to visit several college campuses. While doing so, Tony spots a rat who is responsible for the incarceration of several members of his crew. Much of the episode is a cat-and-mouse game between Tony and the rat, all while Tony tries to keep his daughter out of the line of fire.

The B-plot involves Carmela as she deals with her sexual attraction to her priest. It sounds lame on paper, but Edie Falco makes it work.

Surprise, surprise. Tony catches and kills the rat. This was the first time (and not the last) that we see Tony commit cold-blooded murder on screen. The HBO executives were worried that seeing Tony kill a man would turn the audience against him. David Chase argued that Tony would have no credibility if he didn’t whack the rat in true mafia style. Of course, Chase won out and the audience was clearly behind Tony as he wrapped a jumper cable around the rat’s throat.

Honorable mentions:

“Boca,” “Knight in White Satin Armor,” “Marco Polo,” “University,” “The Test Dream,” “Mr. and Mrs. Sacrimoni Request,” “Full Leather Jacket,” “Another Toothpick,” “The Strong, Silent Type,” “Proshai, Livushka,” and “The Blue Comet.”

“Wa wa wa wa wa wa.”

I am an American first, a Republican second and a disabled person last. If you doubt these words, consider the fact that I went against the grain of my party by not voting for Donald Trump in the last election. I was certain that he would not be the best outcome for this country. Despite my misgivings, I love his cabinet picks.

Speaking of which, Betsy DeVos is officially our new Secretary of Education. This came after a nocturnal Democrat “talkathon” that added up to absolutely nothing but juicy fodder for headlines. At least Ted Cruz was gracious enough to recite Dr. Seuss back in the day.

Many of my disabled friends and colleagues have done a great deal of hand-wringing over the fact that DeVos seemed less than prepared when discussing IDEA (The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act.) I understand the concern. I wish her staff had better prepared her for the adversarial process of a confirmation hearing.

That said, despite video clips taken out of context, DeVos has never demonstrated hostility toward IDEA or disabled students in general. DeVos is our new reality and going forward, we of the National Federation of the Blind had better spearhead the effort to meet with her and educate her.

If I looked at the picture through the lens of my disability, maybe I would have called for DeVos to be benched. As a Republican, on the other hand, maybe I would have blindly followed my party no matter who they chose.

As an American, I have to look at the bigger picture. That picture comes in the form of an article from the Washington Post published on October 28, 2015, in which the latest results of testing from the National Assessment of Educational Progress were revealed. They showed that 64 percent of fourth graders and 66 percent of eighth graders were not proficient in reading. It also concluded that 60 percent of fourth graders and 67 percent of eighth graders were not proficient in math.

Consider those figures for a moment. That is nearly 2/3 of our national student body. If those results were confined to a specific school with 2/3 of the students failing in basic reading and math, how long do you think the principal would last?

After seven years of a digression from results that were already tepid, it’s time for a change. Devos’s signature issue is school choice. Contrary to liberal talking points, school choice would benefit poor and minority students more than the rich, since affluent parents are already sending their children to private schools. If you doubt it, just ask many of the Democrat senators who oppose DeVos as being predisposed against public schools. Many of them, as well as their children, have bypassed public education for the private sector.

I don’t believe that school choice is the stake that will finally put this American vampire to rest all by itself. There are a lot of angles to consider. Standardized testing is proving to be a disaster. The teachers unions have entirely too much influence and that is not likely to change without someone in power to challenge them. Too many parents think their kids live in a snowflake culture and bristle whenever a teacher brings constructive criticism to bear on their child.

But if you believe as I do that America is the most powerful nation on Earth, then these NAEP results are nothing less than embarrassing. We’ve thrown money at the problem for decades and have seen too little improvement. It’s time for a new approach. I believe that Betsy DeVos represents an appropriate shake-up of the status quo. If I’m wrong, she can be removed and replaced, but how will our children get their formative years back if we continue to fail them?

This Cowboy’s Hat

In the wake of Obama’s presidency, I’ve been ruminating on that great big nuclear bomb of politics, race. Before I give you my personal views on race and racism in this country, here’s a snapshot of where we are today.

The media has done Black Lives Matter to death, as well as professional athletes and celebrities who decry the current state of race relations in this country. They are pieces of the puzzle, but they are not the whole

On one hand, we have Professor Michael Eric Dyson of Georgetown University, who recently published the book, “The Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America.” A professor delivering a sermon to a large segment of America… What a concept. He is a black man who clearly views everything through the lens of race in this country. I find this view to be limiting, much as I do whenever I meet a blind person who judges every issue they come across through the prism of his/her blindness.

After preaching to white America in his book, Professor Dyson suggests some possible solutions that white folks can adopt in their personal lives in an effort to combat their inherent and latent racism. One of these strategies is what the good professor terms, personal reparations. That is white people donating money to the United Negro College Fund, or other charities geared toward African-Americans.

When I hear suggestions like that, my political spidey sense starts tingling. What I hear is, give us money. I am a big fan of many charities out there and I believe very strongly that people should give of their time and money to those who are less fortunate. So, I tell you what. Find me a charity that supports philosophy in the mold of Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas and Walter Williams and I will happily donate.

My issue with Professor Dyson’s book is his premise. He seems to believe that white America is the sole source of the problem. When I hear diatribes such as his, I notice a decided lack of interest in looking inward.

Several years ago, I read a book by Juan Williams called, “Enough: the phony leaders, dead-end movements, and culture of failure that are undermining Black America– and what we can do about it.” It was one of the most enlightening books I have ever read. In short, Williams spring-boarded off of remarks made by Bill Cosby at a 2004 meeting of the NAACP in which Cosby took members of his own community to task for behavior that he felt sabotaged their march toward equality.

Sadly, recent revelations about Cosby’s alleged sexual misconduct toward women in his private life have nullified any credibility he may have had on the issue. But Williams’ credibility is still intact, save for the fact that he works for Fox News. Many blacks would call him an Uncle Tom, conveniently ignoring the fact that he has written many books about the civil rights struggle and the continued plight of the African-American community in this country.

All I can do is heartily recommend that everyone (black, white, brown or yellow) read this book.

On the other side of the fence, we have Sally Boynton Brown, current member of the Idaho Democrat Party and candidate for the position of chairperson of the National Democratic Committee. At a debate the other night, she was responding to a question about Black Lives Matter when she said the following:

“White leaders in our party have failed. We have to accept that we have prejudice within our own party.”

She went on to say:

“My job is to listen to the issues. My job is also to shut white people down when they wanna interrupt. My job is to shut other white people down when they say oh no I’m not prejudice. I’m a Democrat.”

So far, so good. She appears to be doing what I’ve done for years; calling out liberals for the unrecognized bigotry they all carry concealed beneath their cloak of sanctimony. But she doesn’t stop there. A few minutes later, her meaning becomes more crystallized when she addresses the training of new Democrat party operatives:

“We need to teach them how to communicate, how to be sensitive and how to shut their mouths if they’re white.”

I am not taking these remarks out of context. The video is widely available on YouTube and you can see her remarks in full. Despite her protestations to the contrary, she is clearly a politician who is preening and pandering to a segment of voters. Her tone of voice is nothing less than unctuous as she speaks of white privilege and, “People of color.” Frankly, if I were a minority under the banner of the Democrat Party, I would be insulted. And, most important of all, she is not calling for a conversation. A dialogue consists of a reciprocal communication between two or more parties. White people shutting their mouths would result in a monologue; a one-sided communication.

You can draw a causal line from Boynton Brown’s remarks back to those of Attorney General Eric Holder in February of 2009. In his first speech after assuming office, he delivered remarks at the Department of Justice African-American History Program. Here is an excerpt from said remarks:

“Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial we have always been and continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards. Though race related issues continue to occupy a significant portion of our political discussion, and though there remain many unresolved racial issues in this nation, we, average Americans, simply do not talk enough with each other about race. It is an issue we have never been at ease with and given our nation’s history this is in some ways understandable. And yet, if we are to make progress in this area we must feel comfortable enough with one another, and tolerant enough of each other, to have frank conversations about the racial matters that continue to divide us.”

I was skeptical when I heard about Holder’s speech. It’s been my experience that, when those of the left use the word, “conversation,” in a socio/political context, they usually mean the exact opposite. A dialogue with a liberal usually transforms into a monologue, with a good deal of imperious finger-wagging in the faces of those who disagree.

When I read the speech in full, I had the benefit of hindsight. Holder’s track record on racial issues prove that my skepticism was well-founded. The best example was his refusal to prosecute members of the New Black Panther Party for their blatant voter intimidation tactics at a polling site in Philadelphia during the 2008 election. The underlying sentiment from many DOJ officials that came out during the ensuing investigation was that the Voting Section of the DOJ wasn’t in the business of prosecuting minorities; ergo, whites have no civil rights worth violating.

I think that Sally Boynton Brown was probably saying the things that Eric Holder was thinking, but was too smart to say. She strikes me as the Sarah Palin type; speak first and think later. The only thing I liked about her remarks was her candor.

Unfortunately, history has taught us that when you live in a country which espouses free speech, and when you tell a segment of the population to shut up, there are consequences. For blacks, said consequences came in the form of Frederick Douglass and Martin Luther King. For women, they were embodied in Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Over the past eight years, where racial matters are concerned, white people (particularly conservatives) have been made to feel that, when the subject of race comes up, they should just shut up, smile and nod respectfully and take whatever the other side is dishing out. If they should ask questions or argue, they are then labeled as obtuse bigots.

So what did liberals get for their high-handed attitudes? Donald Trump!

According to Professor Dyson, the only reason Trump won was because of race. This is a simplistic view. Trump won for many reasons, not the least of which were economics. However, I do believe that he flipped a lot of people who are tired of feeling bullied because he addressed certain issues from his self-made bully pulpit that rendered him impervious to the usual charges of racism and bigotry that are routinely hurled against any and all Republican candidates. This is unfortunate. Trump’s brand of candor will be too boorish to result in any kind of substantive racial dialogue. But then, Obama was quite articulate, wasn’t he? Obama was supposed to be the first post-racial president, and things are far more polarized today than they were when he took office.

Sadly, when one extreme gains traction in society, other extremes also gain traction in an attempt to push back. I don’t think it’s a stretch for me to see a cause-and-effect line between Eric Holder and the legitimization of certain members of the Alt-Right such as Steve Bannon and Richard Spencer.

How does race affect me personally? That’s a tough question. I grew up in a whitebread town in the middle of Nebraska. I knew of three black people growing up who were local residents. One of them went to high school with me, but we seldom spoke.

I became more aware of the black culture in college in the ‘90’s. The rendering of the O.J. verdict in 1995 high-lighted the disparity in viewpoints between blacks and whites. When the verdict was broadcast, I sulked in my dorm room, while a group of black students loudly celebrated across the hall. The contrast was very stark.

Sidebar: I intended to blog about the recent O.J. miniseries after watching it, but that project is still on the back burner. Probably because I’m a flamin’ racist.

When I worked at Gallup, I felt at ease while conversing with black and Hispanic employees. One of them was named Tim, who was an ex con. I remember him as a gentle soul who was very polite and friendly to all, including those respondents who abused him on the phones. There was no trace of the stereotypical, “angry black man.”

I met several African-American members of the National Federation of the Blind when I became active in the Nebraska affiliate. Later, when I moved to Denver, I met many more people of varying races and backgrounds. I never felt nervous or out of place.

In 2009, I left a lousy job working for a couple of reprobates who were white. I immediately found a new job working for a black couple. They showed me kindness and warmth while I was in their employ and, unlike my previous employers, they always treated me fairly. We’ve sort of lost touch, but I remember them fondly.

In 2014, I worked for an orientation center for the blind as a summer counselor. My duties included serving as apartment babysitter for three of our male students. Two of them were Hispanic. I don’t remember any racial tension arising from our interactions. Quite the contrary. I enjoyed hearing their music, sampling their cuisine and hearing about their backgrounds. In that same program, we had seven or eight Hispanic students in total, plus one African-American, two students from China and one from Thailand.

I also had one African-American coworker, two Hispanic coworkers, one Ukrainian and one who was Asian. Honestly, the staff didn’t always get along. Some of the staff meetings we held got pretty contentious. But that was due more to issues of personality and ego, rather than race or ethnicity.

Did my students and I have frank conversations about race? No. I was their counselor. They never brought it up and I wasn’t going to force the issue. I learned more just by listening as they occasionally talked about their families in Mexico. I didn’t stay quiet out of intimidation, but because I was learning. Would I have conversations with them about race today? Sure, as long as it was a true dialogue.

I don’t think I’m a racist. I really try my best to take people as I find them, regardless of what political or social narrative larger forces try to spin around them. If I met a woman of a different race and fell in love with her, I wouldn’t acknowledge any racial barriers. I would gladly break bread with those of other races on any social occasion as long as I was welcome. Of course, my saying that I’m not a racist doesn’t make it so. Richard Spencer probably doesn’t think he’s a racist either. Some pundits would argue that I am racist merely because I’m white and therefore benefit from white privilege. I flip such people the bird. I know my own mind and heart and try my best to let my daily conduct speak for itself.

How do we solve the racial polarization that has left our country fractured? My answer is, we don’t.

I’m not being defeatist. I believe that racism and tribalism will always be a part of the human condition. I believe that it is a tragic flaw that is inherent to our species. Tribalism has existed for thousands of years and I don’t see any signs that it will get better. The 20th century has seen the advancement of mass communications with the advent of the telephone, the radio, the television and the internet. Yet, rather than bringing us closer together, we seem further apart in many respects.

Does that mean we simply wallow in the muck of racism and racial politics? Hell no! I don’t believe we can simply flip a switch and make prejudice disappear. All we can do as individuals is to make our own corner of the world a little better.

How do we do this? It starts with Eric Holder’s speech, which may contain more kernels of truth than he meant for it to. We start by holding frank conversations with those of other races about our situation. I emphasize the word, conversation; a two-way dialogue. We also start socializing with each other more. Think of that cheesy yet effective scene at the end of the movie, “A Time to Kill,” when the black kids and the white kids are playing together. I think this reality already exists to a point, but it’s obviously not yet large enough to eclipse the angry drumbeat of media and professional race agitators who cling to a more convenient and self-serving narrative.

Sidebar: That heart-warming, climactic moment at the end of the movie was pure Hollywood. The original Grisham novel did not contain such a scene. “A Time to Kill,” is the only Grisham story that I enjoyed. The movie is a mostly faithful knock-off of the book. Samuel L. Jackson’s, “You one of the bad guys, Jake!” speech echoes the sentiments of Professor Dyson.

Yes, by all means, let’s have a chat about race. But why stop there. I honestly think that if most people of divergent races really got together, they’d figure out they have more in common than not. Why not talk about the NFL, NBA, food, clothes, Jay Z or Chris LeDoux? Remember his song, “This cowboy’s Hat?” How about a cowboy hat summit across the nation? I didn’t vote for Obama in either election and I didn’t support his agenda, but he and I could talk about The Wire or Al Green if we ever clink beer mugs.

The problem with this approach is that it’s too slow. We now live in an instant gratification culture. It has become too commonplace for people of all ages and of all political stripes to look to their government for quick fixes. They want a leader to come along and wave some magic wand that will make all of the ugliness of humanity disappear. This is why the left loved Obama. They thought he was a transformative figure. Many on the right see Trump in the same way, though I believe that our camp is a bit more divided.

There is no cure-all law or policy that can bridge the gap. Brown vs. Board of Education was a righteous decision, but it doesn’t change hearts and minds. Neither did LBJ’s Great Society, affirmative action or bussing.

No politician, activist or spiritual figure has all the answers. It’s no coincidence that when the followers of a leader realize that very basic truth, said leader loses popularity with his or her flock.

With respect to President Obama, if he was supposed to be the first post-racial leader, he fell down in spectacular fashion. If Obamacare was his signature issue during his first term, then race should’ve been the corner stone of his second. Maybe my memory is bad, but I only remember him speaking in a reactionary, rather than a proactive fashion. The 2009 Beer Summit was a good start, but as it turned out, it was a false start.

When the incident with Trayvon martin occurred in 2012, he had plenty to say, but there was no follow-up. He certainly had plenty to say after Ferguson, Baltimore, New York City and Baton Rouge, but his attitude at his press conferences and his approach to the issue seemed detached. By any yardstick of success I can apply to these various situations, Obama’s policy on racial healing in America was an abject failure.

Trump isn’t going to be any better. Hell, he might even be worse. As I write this, he’s penned an executive order to build a wall. This will only inflame the immigrant communities. As for domestic relations, I don’t see Trump holding any kind of a beer summit with Al Sharpton or the heads of Black lives Matter. He’s just not built that way.

If a forward-thinking president really wants to start a meaningful conversation about race, he/she needs to conduct a national beer summit. The president needs to initiate a multi-city tour. The tour needs to visit locations as diverse as the inner cities of Boston (the most segregated city in the country), as well as Baltimore, D.C., Chicago, Miami, San Francisco, Phoenix, Philadelphia, etc. Let me stress that these tours will have to be held in the inner cities; I don’t care if the president has to triple his/her Secret Service detail.

The tour will also have to visit cities like Lincoln, Nebraska, Colorado Springs, El Paso, Montgomery, Salt Lake City and even Boise, Idaho. Secret Service can bring along electrical tape in case Ms. Boynton Brown forgets to keep her mouth shut.

The tour would include, not just the president, but a diverse group of speakers who would join in the conversation. And not just racially diverse, but politically diverse as well. Possible suggestions for the panel would include Professor Dyson, Juan Williams, Condoleezza Rice, Bill Kristol, Colin Powell, Mia Love, Congressman John Lewis and many more. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton would not be welcome. Local police reps and church members would be encouraged to attend, but the primary focus would be everyday citizens who were interested in a cross-racial dialogue.

Skeptics would call it political theater and charge the president with symbolism over substance. So what? They would do that anyway. But who better to start a national conversation than the president? I don’t know where said dialogue would lead, but if it helped the races to meet on an individual level, wouldn’t it be worth it?

Sidebar: People would assume that a black or Hispanic president would have to take the initiative. Why? If Ben Sasse ever took the White House, I could envision him doing something like this. Wouldn’t a white man benefit greatly from such an endeavor?

In the meantime, I fear that things will only get worse before they get better. History demonstrates that our instincts of tribalism will trump our better nature. I hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am. All we can do in the interim is wrestle with those inherent tendencies toward prejudice that we all hold within ourselves and push back against bigotry when we encounter it in our own lives. Tall order, but very possible.

Of Kings and Fried chicken

Social media is full of people who claim to be physically ill at the prospect of President Trump. I believe that the clinical term for this is, attention-seeking behavior. My sister-in-law will correct me if I’m wrong, I’m sure.

People! Seriously! If real world events are making you physically ill, turn off the friggin’ TV, log off the internet and go breathe some fresh air. Take a walk. Get a nice, long hug from a friend or loved one. Watch Big Bang Theory and make yourself laugh. Whatever. But don’t whine and hand-wring on social media hoping someone will say, “Oh, baby! Are you okay?”

President Trump wasn’t my desired outcome. Neither was President Obama…either time. I played my hand and I lost. I got over it. The day after election, 2012, I sulked in my girlfriend’s bed until 11. Then she kicked my ass into the shower and took me to lunch. By 2 PM, I was over my blue funk. Incidentally, Steuben’s has excellent fried chicken; at least they did four years ago.

I’m not saying elections don’t matter. I’m not saying we shouldn’t be concerned about events larger than ourselves. What I am saying is that we should not allow external events to dictate our own personal happiness and well-being.

And for those of you drama addicts out there, GET THE HELL OVER YOURSELVES!

One final thought. Trump is a president, not a king. If you want a distraction from the relentless inauguration coverage, go refresh yourselves on the Constitution. Learn why we have certain checks and balances in place that will not allow President Trump to do whatever he wants unchecked.

That is all. I’m gonna go distract myself now with a generous helping of BBQ ribs.ocial media

The Rocking Horse People Strike Back

I’m gonna say something that will offend many of you, but I don’t care.

The Beatles are vastly overrated!

Alexa was playing Beatles music at lunch and I casually mentioned that they are overrated. My crazy Wiccan coworker was incensed.

“Those are words that are never used in my house,” she boomed.

Look, I’m sorry if the truth hurts. The Beatles may have been a cultural phenomenon back in their day, but musically, they are mediocre at best.

Seriously. Their harmonies aren’t that tight. John can barely sing. Paul was a little better, but only a little. Ringo was a boring, unimaginative drummer. George was probably the best musician of them all, but I would categorize his guitar playing as only pretty good.

They were kind of in their element in the early years when they were making girls squeal with such bubble gum fare as, “Please Please Me.” I kind of feel their middle-era stuff like, “No Reply.” But when we get to the, “I am the Walrus,” stage, I can’t take any of it seriously. The only reason their legions of fans don’t recognize their music as drug-fueled self-parody is because most of them (though not all) were nibbling the bark off of trees right along with the Fab Four.

Now, I know what some of you are gonna say. “Ryan, how dare you criticize such a transformative period of enlightenment as the 60’s? Donald Trump is about to be our president! No comparison!”

People! Trump is a product of the ‘60’s. Spray that truth on the back of a stamp and lick it off.

I can also anticipate another argument. “Ryan, you’re a product of the ‘80’s, when Michael Jackson was king. Spray that one in your hair and light it on fire!”

Ok, fine! But putting the pedophilia stuff aside (which happened in the ‘90’s, by the way), Michael had real, honest-to-God talent. Just because he was as crazy as a crack house rat doesn’t mean he wasn’t musically gifted.

Not everything that came out of the ‘60’s was bad. Gim’me The Stones. Gim’me The Who. Gim’me The Doors. Gim’me Adam West as Batman and Sean Connery as James Bond! But don’t give me “Octopus’s Garden,” or I’ll force feed you a marshmallow pie.

I’ll throw you Beatles loyalists one concession. I do love the song, “Let it Be.” I much prefer the quiet, personal spirituality of Paul McCartney to the self-indulgent utopianism of John Lennon’s, “Imagine.” Plus, the piano is very moving.

The real purpose of this post is to see whether or not I can make my mellow pal Dan mad. I already got his hackles up when I slammed, “Alice’s Restaurant,” last Thanksgiving. If my clever plan works as it should, I will get to sleep in on Saturdays from now on.

Fire Down Below

So I’m sitting at the Littleton Cafe the other morning (my home away from home) and Oscar, the friendly waiter, brings me my breakfast of a double bacon cheeseburger. I tell him, “Osk, you forgot the jalapenos. I can’t eat this without them.”

He apologizes profusely and quickly brings me a large side of jalapenos. I put all of them on the burger along with some onions, then splash my seasoned breakfast potatoes with a liberal amount of Cholula sauce. There was a time when Oscar would’ve stood by with a fire extinguisher, but he’s used to it by now.

It seems that, as I’ve gotten older, my palate has become far less sensitive to flavor and I need to compensate by spicing things up more than a little bit.

I made my breakthrough in the summer of 2014 when a couple of my students introduced me to a miracle liquid called, Tapatío. Life was never the same after that. We would pass around a big bowl of popcorn at our Friday night card games and Martin or I would sprinkle a generous amount of Tapatío over the popcorn. Some of the students would partake. Others would not. Still others would take a few bites, then quickly leave the table, breathing heavily and grunting in agony.

I’m not embellishing. I brought home a bag of those wimpy buffalo wings from Wal-Mart one night. After we cooked them, this poor kid ate two of them, then stood up and began pacing around the living room. Soon, he was breathing copiously and yelping as if there was a live cobra crawling around loose in his underwear. I had to convince him that water is the worst thing you can drink when you’re in pain from a spicegasm. Luckily, we had milk on hand and it soothed his scorched throat.

Let me pause here to explain that cooking for Mexican students can sometimes be a challenge when you’re a meat-and-potatoes gringo from the middle states. I made them chili one night and was very proud of myself. I figured I’d make it interesting for them by throwing in an entire jar of jalapenos. My three students, all growing boys, ate one bowl and then said, “Ryan, that was so good that I can’t eat anymore.” Now, these are the guys who always cleaned their plates three and four times over, so I silently called bullshit and resolved to learn how to make authentic Mexican chili.

Us white people have it all wrong. You don’t concoct chili by browning hamburger and putting it in a Crockpot with canned tomato sauce, canned diced green chilies, canned kidney beans, pickled jalapenos and chili powder. Turns out that you have to include ingredients such as real steak or pork, raw jalapenos (not pickled), fresh tomatoes, garlic, cumin, freshly-soaked beans and (here’s the kicker) raw chipotle or habanero peppers. There seems to be some controversy as to whether or not beans should be included in “real chili.” I admit it…I’m not man enough to try it.

My coworkers get annoyed because I place an order for spicy Indian or Thai food. When I get it, I always admonish the order-taker, “You forgot to make mine spicy.” “NO I didn’t!” they always retort.

Then, there’s my family. At a recent Christmas dinner, my brother grilled some chicken tenders for me and smothered them with habanero barbecue sauce. I ate the chicken greedily, then washed it down with a cold draft.

“Ryan,” my brother said. “I can barely eat those things, but you powered through them without breaking a sweat.”

I silently called him a wuss as revenge for all those times he kicked my ass in our family room growing up.

I’ve even won the Blazin’ Challenge at Buffalo Wild Wings. It wasn’t easy. I’ll admit that I suffered, but I did it. My suffering wasn’t as dramatic as my pal Joe’s. He finished his 12 wings, then put a napkin over his face and began to shriek. You’d have thought that the CIA had attached wires to his hangie-down parts and cranked up the voltage.

As a man past 40, you’d think my stomach would revolt at such abuse, but spicy food doesn’t generally tend to give me heartburn. People often warn me that this or that spicy concoction will send me to the toilet with fire erupting from my lower aperture, but it never happens.

There is one thing that I’m deathly afraid of. You know that spicy mustard you always get with your Chinese food order, whether you asked for it or not? I don’t know what it’s called, but I’m sure one of you will enlighten me. Well…I can’t go near it. It makes my sinuses tingle just thinking about it.

By the way, if you’re wondering why I overdid it with both jalapenos and onions on my burger, it’s because Marty wasn’t available to kiss. But Mags, my cat, wouldn’t even come near me.

This weekend, I’m going to make homemade burgers. A coworker gave me a bottle of Ghost Pepper Salt as a Christmas gift. Will I endure? Watch this space for the answer.

Love

What is love?

It’s not the crap we hear about in pop music, read about in books or watch unfold on the movie or TV screen. That is superficial love. I mean real love. What is it? I’m not the smartest guy in the room by a long shot, but after nearly 42 years of living, I am beginning to figure it out.

Love is when you hold your partner in your arms, rather than turning away in disgust, when they are too sick to control their bodily functions.

Love is putting a piece of your paycheck into a savings account for your kid, even when it means you’ll have to skip McDonald’s for a month.

Love is comforting your sobbing mate at three in the morning because they just lost someone important to them and you’re the only one they can turn to, even though you have to be up in three hours for work.

Love is going to your parents’ 50th wedding anniversary party, even though you may have better things to do.

Love happens at that worst moment in a fight when you and your partner are screaming at each other and you storm out of the house, but through the white hot anger, you know you’ll be back.

Love is rescuing an animal from a shelter and treating it like a member of the family.

Love is a soldier in a foreign land, fighting for their home thousands of miles away.

Love is when your mate does you wrong and you have them dead to rites, and you choose to forgive them.

Love is standing in a hospital, feeling your heart break as you decide to take someone off of life support because you can’t stand to watch them suffer one minute longer.

Love is the easiest thing to say and the hardest thing to do.

Love is the universal thing that everyone needs.

Love is the thing that some people have.

Love is the thing that too few of us know how to truly give.