It’s federal election day in the United States, for those who otherwise wouldn’t know it.
I made this picture so that fans of any side could use it and laugh.
I’m devoutly liberal for all social policies, if you need help guessing how I cast my votes.
On a recent afternoon, I went and ate at Burger King, the place where you can don an artificial crown and forget that the food there is intent on killing you. Outside, an older gentleman was ambling around the parking lot, picking up discarded cigarettes. I watched as he found about half of a full cigarette, brushed it off and carefully lit it. I could see the glint of satisfaction in his face as he inhaled deeply. Inside, the workers casually ignored everything except their immediate tasks; homelessness obviously was a constant backdrop for them. Discarded cigarettes are their manna from Heaven.
As I took a bite of my delicious burger, I watched him walk up toward the obscured end wall of the restaurant and place a couple more butts on the concrete table. My wife pointed out that someone else was out there. Using the reflecting wall glass behind me, I could see that another person was hunched against the wall, a younger man, head down, quietly mumbling to the older gentleman.
I ate my meal, savoring the french fries and the hardening of my arteries. It was a beautiful day in so many different ways and I couldn’t help but wonder what might comprise the average day of the gentleman outside collecting discarded cigarettes. I didn’t feel sorry for him or guilty for enjoying the guilty pleasure of a Burger King burger. I was certain that the warm November weather was a gift for him, one he was appreciating on such a day.
When I left, I made sure to exit using the door closest to the two men outside. I handed the older of the two a ten-dollar bill and said, “Have a great day!” and smiled as I walked away. The older man’s face lit up and he replied, “Thank you so much, sir.” I could hear the tenor of his voice rise as the unexpected gift he hadn’t solicited gave him a boost of happiness.
Even if but for a moment, we both felt uplifted. There was no hurry to get back to reality – life always comes back to slap us into alignment.
Later, somehow the story of the $10 gift came up.
One of the people with me interjected, “But you know what he probably did with that money, right?” She looked at me, anticipating everything except what I said.
“Yes, I hope he bought alcohol or drugs or five seconds of relief. I hope he wasted the money in the most superficial way possible. Imagine having no such choice in life.” I laughed.
“What did he do to deserve it?” she asked me.
I paused. “What have any of us done to deserve such great lives, free of the capricious whims of the universe?”
Once again, Burger King, a place to slowly poison oneself with delightful calories, opened its doors and reminded me that the weirdest lessons are repeated in the strangest places. It is possible that the man I rewarded for no reason had made a succession of poor choices, ones rooted in personal responsibility. It’s also possible that he found himself being tested and simply couldn’t keep up with body blows life had thrown his away.
As Jean-Luc Picard said, “It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not a weakness; that is life “
Yet, we prance through life, simply and arrogantly fooling ourselves to think that if we press all the right buttons and pull the appropriate levers that we will never be the ones ambling around the detritus of other people’s lives, looking for any small comfort, no matter how harmful.
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I made the above picture for a friend so that he could see that I don’t just do ‘zany.’ I love the effects of this picture.
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I made the above to poke fun of a friend who wondered why I hadn’t been picking at her lately. She recently broke her arm in a bicycle accident. Here’s what I wrote:
“For any of you following the saga of Jill “Nunchuck” Norris, please be aware that her cover story has been proven false.
Rather than an innocent mishap on a bicycle, her broken arm was the result of a no-holds-barred fight to the east of Mt. Sequoyah. Jill is now more dangerous than ever; although she can’t carry her sword around with her fighting arm, she can conceal a couple of knives under the cast.
Approach with caution. Preferably with candy, restaurant gift certificates, and a smile. Due to her injury, she is charging half of her customary rate to beat the daylights out of anyone you choose.
(Rumor has it that I might be next, given that I’m officially blowing her ‘accident’ cover story.)”
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Now that everyone is early voting, I made this in response to the dozens of “I voted!” posts on social media: “Due to my liberal views, I thought it best to vote more than once. Oddly enough, they had stickers for this, too.” #rigged 🙂
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During meetings instead of experiencing the drudgery I commit myself to the creation of at least one work of art. I was surprised at how much reaction I received from this work effort.
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Remember when you could really pick on someone without mud slinging? Here’s my John Boozman joke.
Boozman goes to a dermatologist and tells him, “Doc, the skin on my face is peeling really bad! What can you do for me? My opponent Conner Eldridge is a great-looking guy and I can’t have something like this during a campaign. I already look like Steve Buscemi.”
The doctor examines him, frowns several times, and leaves the room for at least 30 minutes.
“Well?” asks Boozman as the dermatologist returned, obviously reluctant to give the senator bad news.
“John, the reason your facial skin is peeling off is that it’s trying to escape the ugly.”
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PS: I’m only kidding about John Boozman being ugly.
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But I have heard rumors that he salts his ice cream before eating it. And he hated the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act so badly that he won’t even attend a county fair for fear of a typographical mix-up. Also, when I went to buy a suit, I thought I saw him at Dillard’s, but it turned out to be a literal empty suit on the end of the aisle.
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This is the kind of political rhetoric needed in today’s climate of poison eye darts. 
“I often dream I have wings
but am unable to discern their usage.
While awake, I know that I should fly
but the ground irresistibly beckons.”
A poem for the day, X
The above picture is what went through my mind while I listened to yet another person complain about the “aliens” in Springdale. My vision is more creative and hopeful than that which caused it to appear in my head.
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It was around 1:00 in the afternoon on a typical Wednesday afternoon. For no apparent reason, I stopped at the store to get something I didn’t really want or need. It was only afterward that I recognized that time itself had seemed to pull at me.
Wandering the aisles, I picked up and then put down various foods, turning them in my hands to then ignore the nutritional information emblazoned there. My mind was clear and although I had entered the store with the urge to buy something specific, I felt no urgency or recollection of that which had drawn me inside.
I turned to head to another aisle and saw a relatively young man standing near the canned vegetables. His clothes were dirty and even his shoes didn’t match. His posture indicated a rough life, one filled with arduous work and commensurate pain to accompany it. I think he was doing the math of hunger in his head, dividing the contents of his wallet between as many cans as possible. He had two different cans in his hands, studying them. As I neared him, I took out a twenty-dollar bill from my own wallet. The young man looked up at me and smiled.
As we made eye contact, I handed him the $20 and said, “It will not always be like this.” It’s not what I expected to say and even though I said the words, they were a surprise to me.
“Thank you, sir.” The young man spoke and even though his voice lifted at the end, no further words were offered. He continued to smile as I waved at him and turned the corner, losing him from my field of vision.
I stopped in front of the soups, randomly picking one from the shelf as my eyes welled with tears. For a few moments, I blindly turned the same can of chicken soup in my hands.
A hand tapped at my right shoulder. I turned to see an older black man looking at me with apprehension. His hair was as silver as any I’ve ever seen. He was wearing a blue suit with a matching blue shirt. The effect was both startling and calming.
The stranger cleared his throat and then said, “That profound and elusive clarity wherein what we already know is revealed to us in a burst of obvious truth.“
I looked back toward the shelf to place the can of chicken soup in its spot. When I turned back, the older man in the blue suit was quickly walking away from me, his cane echoing on the floor as his arms moved.
I moved to catch up to him. When I cleared the end of the aisle, I could no longer see him. Instead, I found myself in front of register 4. The young man I had helped was carefully loading at least a dozen cans of food onto the conveyor belt.
In that moment: clarity.
I found out today I didn’t win the Old Mill logo contest. This means I should have submitted one of my 340 other ideas, I suppose? Not only did I have a litany of photo/vector ideas, but a plethora of slogans as well. I was limited to one entry, which in hindsight seems odd to me. Next time, I’m going to enter on behalf of a dozen friends and family members. If I win by such skullduggery, I undoubtedly will have to explain how they won a contest they hadn’t entered. I still am amused that people had trouble coming up with more than one idea. I had to stop myself. Writer’s block isn’t something I’m familiar with most of the time.
I thought using black and white effects on the Old Mill building itself was a nice touch. The judges evidently thought I was completely mistaken. I do wonder what exactly happened during the judging and how much happenstance occurred while it progressed.
One of my other ideas had been to use a pair of glasses, with one side being black and white and the other in color to juxtapose past and present. I would have also used a variant of “Come see us,” as a play on the visual aspect of tourism. Since I didn’t submit that version, I instead used it for a much more important reason: social media profile pictures.
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I still think my ideas for Springdale were wasted, though. We’re still stuck with a waffle fry of some sort as our official logo. (see below…) I see it on city vehicles and some other places but it’s certainly not anything memorable.
The one that I made to conform to design rules (aka “the serious one”) was this one:
And the funny one, the one that pissed off the establishment folk in some places:
For anyone who doesn’t know, Springdale is nick-named Chickendale, primarily because of it being the nexus of so much poultry business over the last few decades. We are finally getting past it. Springdale is a spectacular place to live. The logo design initiative, though, was not handled nearly as well as it should have been. That’s just my opinion, of course, and should in no way be a focus of criticism.
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I’m glad I had the chance to enter the Old Mill logo contest this year. I’m definitely cheating next time.
So, if you win a graphics contest you never entered, please let me know, okay?
This isn’t a funny anecdote. I wrote it quite a while ago and like so many of the things I write, I filed it away, almost forgotten. This week, I fortuitously encountered someone ranting on almost the same subject, yet with an inability to capture the essence of what was bothering about her.
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In the book “Like Water for Chocolate” (Como Agua Para Chocolate), Tita lovingly shares her recipes and story. The principle point is that the cook’s emotions and aspirations merge with the food she prepares. Those consuming her food would cry her tears, feel her ecstasy, and experience her life through her food. When I read the book in Spanish the first time, I learned a few cooking points, but I also got a revelation into the content of human spirit – and yet another glimpse into the possible world I would enjoy living in.
By way of full disclosure, I’m unqualified to judge cuisine, as vittles are more aligned with my appetite. I am qualified to recognize the discomfort I have in the way some people decide to run their places of business, though. Charge more for your food if it is necessary and allow those working for you to enjoy a more human experience. I do not want to witness anyone being scolded, berated, or demeaned while I’m enjoying the great luxury of dining. (If I want that, I’ll invite my sister-in-law to eat with me.)
One particular local chef enjoys one of the best skill reputations in the kitchen. (He’s not the chef with an Italian name, either.) Unfortunately, he is also highly regarded as being a mean bastard to many people who’ve worked with him. Like the book (and movie) I mentioned, I don’t relish the idea of frequenting a restaurant owned or operated by someone who might contaminate the spirit of my food with his penchant for tirades. I’m frustrated frequently enough by my own mistakes and anger without ingesting those of another person.
I’ve had people over the years volunteer stories about this skilled chef. None of the stories originated from me inquiring – all of them extemporaneously emerged, so to speak. They all share the common theme of the chef being gifted, yet tormented by a lack of understanding of his inability to treat others as equal human beings. A few times, the stories have sprung forth with swift surprise. One of the most memorable came from a former chef working at Logan’s, opting to wait tables if it meant he could work in a place not dominated by anger and finger pointing. (PS: The food at Logan’s that day was exceptional.)
The last time I entered one of the chef’s restaurants, he was in my vicinity being loudly vicious to an employee who was clearly struggling. No matter how good the food could have been, all I could picture was the employee seriously considering giving the chef a knock to the head with a stack of plates. The chef focused solely on his own angry voice, oblivious to the human distress he was feeding. It diminished everyone witnessing it. That time, I saw and heard the anger – and felt the contempt personally. The stories became true to me. The chasm between allegation and confirmation becomes shallow when you witness the behavior, doesn’t it?
As for the employee receiving the public rant, I wish he would have taken the plates and hurled them like Olympic culinary Frisbees through the windows. It wouldn’t have helped him, but what a victory for decency it would have been. I would have stood and applauded his rashness.
I left with a bitter aftertaste that had nothing to do with the food served that day.
As I see or hear this chef receive praise, I remember that his success doesn’t affect me directly. It affects me as a person, however. I know that he must be screeching at those he hires, saucepans echoing as they clatter against stainless steel counters, plates cracking with the force of dropped velocity. Justifying behavior that diminishes people is indicative of a larger problem, in my opinion.
I would rather eat bologna or cheese sandwiches if it guarantees that no one preparing my food is subjected to the likes of this storied gourmand. Monetary success built on animosity is a hollow measure. I wonder to what great heights this chef might have reached had he chosen a light touch with his fellow human beings.
I never comment on the chef when I see him mentioned on social media. It seems appropriate for me to let it pass and hope that the stories accumulate to some critical mass at some undefined future time. Being human, I will admit that it pains me a little, though. I know that for every word of compliment he receives, he is dishing out an appetizer of avoidable reprimand to someone in his presence. I wonder if he knows in his heart of hearts how many stories are floating around, tarnishing his reputation as a human being. There’s no glaze or gastronomical flourish to remove that bitter taste.
I hope that the above is true!
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In a feverish bout of clarity, I devised a way to express what the single biggest problem facing us might be. Perhaps you will not only ‘see’ it, but also nod your head in agreement.
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I always wear underwear that conveys a mixed message so that if I’m in an accident, no one will want to take pictures – or look too closely.
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You can make lemonade from lemons if that’s what life gives you – it is true. But you can take it too far, like when you take a burrito to a riot just to get the pepper spray on it to improve the flavor.
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P.S. Parenthetically Speaking 