Fried Scrapple
Warm, soft chewy pretzels
Mennonite women with caps and long skirts
Catholic priests who laugh, pound the pulpit
Hug their flock
Much has changed in Pennsylvania Dutch Country
HOWEVER
Store keepers, teachers, role models
Here in the hinterlands
God’s country remains intact.
Born in the USA
News announcers up and down the East Coast
Change the channel : clones of each other
Bemoaning the blizzard of 2016
Similar stories, tragedies abound, horrific storm
Three days and counting
The nation’s government in DC is paralyzed
Offices closed, streets blocked
Nothing moves, only sledding on capital hill
Profit motive to clear the streets- absent
SOCIALISM – Yes: Government employees on leave with pay
State of emergency continues, continues, continues
The world functions while DC sleeps
A comparative analysis
New York City: 6,000 miles of streets
More people, more cars, same snow
State of emergency: one day: roads cleared
Offices, restaurants, Broadway, all open
Profit motive – YES: Capitalism YES
Watching MLB.com as my beloved Phillies scratched and clawed to a season ending victory last evening the memory tape rewound again and again as to how fortunate we are to be a nation of traditional baseball fans. In the mid 194o’s my grandfather sat next to me as the Phillies announcer read the ticker tape account of the games from Shibe Park in Philadelphia.. Legends were born with Robin Roberts, Richie Ashburn, later Mike Schmidt. TRADITION , honoring those who went before. Sixty five years later we locker room jocks originally from Central Pennsylvania are now feverishly tweeting about the upcoming playoffs. Amazing the continuity of loyalty which was planted in our psyches as a child.
45,000 screaming Brewer fans watched their long maligned heroes capture home field advantage in the playoffs yesterday.. A new TRADITION for a team playing in a 21st century park with Fielder and Braun potential Hall of Famers. Fans remember 20 years ago when the legacy let by Robin Yount brought home the bacon. The beat continues in brew city. Loyalty runs deep in Milwaukee and West Allis and on the banks of the Fox River.
Then there is the collapse of the Red Sox – What are Yastremzki and Ted Williams thinking? How could decades of pride and TRADITION crumble in September? Tears are streaming from the shadows of the Green Monster. Alas, Fenway park will shake again with cheering fans when spring comes in April.
The grainy pictures of Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth hitting balls into the seats in New York. Sandy Koufax and Bob Feller throwing hard strikes barely i to the naked eye. No matter where your loyalties lie, what your station in life, baseball binds us all together since the 1800’s.
And now it is October ( remember Reggie Jackson). Face book and Twitter are humming with good natured partisan discussions. We are joined together by the social media as never before. It used to be 4-5 guys at the local bar discussing who would win what. Now there are thousands joining in the chat.
We are reminded of that song from “ Fiddler on the Roof”. TRADITION. The game is now international. Players from Dominican Republic, South Korea, Japan, Venezuela , etc. Politics is a non factor –can he hit?
Anyone checking the nationality of the great Manny Rivera? – nah, the question is can anyone get a hit off him in the 9th with the bases loaded. It’s about wins and losses: Home Town Pride: and for Brewer fans – Bob Uecker and Uzinger Sausage.
The leaves are falling here in the Midwest.. and cases of Miller Lite are being consumed as we lustily cheer for our October heroes. While the politicians pontificate, procrastinate, and pander, the rest of us sit back and enjoy a true American treasure – Baseball TRADITION.
People back home told him war is hell..
What is hell on the battlefields?
Seventeen years old (lied about his age) he found
himself resting against a tree on an island in the South Pacific.
The scent of mortars filled the air. Small arms fired crackled.
Blood, guts, cries for “mother” laid all around.
Victory, what a price was being paid.
One day after landing, several days out of boot camp, he
came face to face with death, screaming buddies, the smoke, sound and fury
of both sides fighting for their very lives.
The sheer terror caused his body to shake, his eyes always searching the brush
for his Japanese killers.
Physically exhausted, he rested against a tree: helmet by his side.
What were the marks ? Either side of the helmet bore the creases of
bullets: he survived by inches the fate of the Gods.
With others, he charged up hills to confront Japanese caves and nests: life hanging in the
balance: kill or be killed.. Firing into huts: hearing screams: watching others die.
The seemingly endless nightmare returns to this day.. now we call it Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Proud of his service: wondering WHY he survived when those around him died,
This 80 something patriot talks wistfully of the war. Tough, wizened, laughter on
The outside, years of pain on the inside.
Rubbing his nose, eyes glistening from tears, part of the past comes rushing back. He looks away,
paces the floor, grapples for the right words. Shoulders bow, one sees the memory tapes
passing before his eyes: the smells, sounds , and consequences of the war and life since are
evident.. he tries to hold back – but there is a need for him to share, to talk, to again relieve
the pain of life’s journey. To share his story so that those who follow benefit from history.
Three marriages, businesses created, relationships moving on:
It took 30 years to begin the recovery from being .
“Always the need for excitement, the desire to be in control , to survive”,
The ghosts of the cries of buddies dying on the battlefields –
Those for whom he really cared– true men friends for the 1st time in his life.
The fear lingers deep in his soul fear that in life there is no permanency, or trust, or faith.
Seventy years have passed into the annals of history.
Why me he asks, why did I survive and others beside me die?
He carries his military exploits close to his chest
Not a chest pounding hero
A small Semper Fidelis sticker on his vehicle
Marriages unraveled , children without a family
Money squandered: Johnny Walker consumed by the gallons.
Fear, like a low grade fever, is always present. Trust whom?
The ripple effects of combat inexorably, silently pass from generation to generation.
One , just one of the unspoken prices paid by the “ Greatest Generation”.
The unmistakable gutteral roar of propeller driven airplane engines
Grew louder, as these workhorses flew closer.
Not a movie, nor a dream, the sound, the roar is part of America’s DNA.
Cloudy, overcast, a replication of the long ago skies of Northern Europe.
Hidden, protected, the planes approach – somewhere above the cloud bank..
Clouds cast a grey blanket, then open for a few moments.
We can hear them, but where are they? Who goes there?
Who breaks the silence of rural America?
The clouds answer the query and part for a few moments.
Majestic and proud, these gladiators of the sky trundle on
carrying the memories of daring young heroes who would give the ultimate sacrifice.
Seven decades and counting – how the pages of history inexorably turn.
We stand in the yard remembering the leather head coverings, the A on the jacket,
and watch humble with crooked neck and searching eyes in silence . Whence they fly?
Our fathers generation flew in these cockpits over Dresden with flack left and right.
They helped make the Furher hide in this death bunker.
The flyboys who risked it all.. and made their country proud.
As Tom Brokaw named them “ The Greatest Generation”.
Humbled, respectful we are as these patriotic air travelers cross overhead.
A seamless transition from air borne machines to living reminders of victory
sacrifice, and the saviors of western civilization.
One more time – “ God Bless America”.
Reserved, introverted, a smile for a friend here or there.
Intellectually astute, few knew him .
Hi Jim, we would say, as he passed by
head down, was he thinking or avoiding eye contact?
Over a beer at Blackwelders in Salisbury he’d talk a bit about his home town,
A farming village tucked away in Southern PA.
Nothing much happened there , which suited Jim just fine.
Jim wanted to be a numbers cruncher, an accountant.
A quiet contributor in an honest firm .
The 1st in his family to graduate from college, he would succeed.
Graduation came, followed by a “ Uncle Sam wants you” letter.
Stoic, resigned, no flight to Canada for this young patriot.
Off to Fort Knox, just tell me what to do made him ideal for the ARMY.
A follower rather than a leader, Jim was assigned to a rifle company.
An expert marksman, he became a man, a real man.
Fighting for what was right in South East Asia.
The rice fields of Vietnam claimed the future of this brave American.
Jim later said he was not a hero. His Company was overrun by the Viet Cong.
Death everywhere. He was flown out by helicopter.
He lost most of his eyesight. Skin was raw and ravaged. Legs weakened.
I saw Jim in a vocational rehab program several years after the war.
Struggling to walk, straining to see in the sunlight, Jim offered his
hand, we exchanged hugs. How are you doing I awkwardly asked?
I’m ok – getting along he muttered..
A purple heart winner – Jim wanted to remain anonymous.. Didn’t want to
talk about the lives he saved.
He returned to the village from whence he was raised. There were rumors of his heroism.
But Jim remained silent. Home bound and separated from most of the community he didn’t
want others to see his scarred and maimed body. A high school athlete reduced to an invalid.
Dependent on medical pain killers, crutches, darkened glasses, his dream of being
an accountant faded and disappeared as the Grim Reaper stood and smirked in the doorway.
His story revealed posthumously. One of those heroes whose names will not appear on the
Vietnam War Memorial. One of thousands who died quietly in the service of our country.
A tiny church yard in an out of the way town .
Military honors.
Jim slowly and humbly laid to rest . No reporters or TV. No articles in the Baltimore papers. Dust to
dust in the simplest of terms.
No listing on the nightly news.
An intelligent young man, a product of the best this country has to offer. Laid to rest without notice, or
acclaim. His parents long since passed, a few neighbors stoically watched Jim enter hallowed ground.
Vietnam? The scars of this war are open and reeking pus to this day. When I asked Jim how he was
doing, his dark, vacant, weary eyes said it all – he knew what could have been, how he could have raised
a family and given back to the Lord he revered and honored . All denied, who would have this crippled
body? Incapable of making a living: denied the right to father children.
Denied the future of making his immigrant parents proud. They fled Europe and became American
citizens for what – for their eldest son to be sacrificed on the altar of lies told about the Gulf of Tonkin .
The ultimate sacrifice – may we all be honest about our past and our future.
rlhassociates 