It is easy to sit down at the keyboard and churn out a thousand words when the subject has some local interest, which I can do for no other reason than I have some very vivid memories of life here in the Valley that resonate with some readers. I’m not alone in this respect as is evident on social media, for me that usually means Facebook, when locals post photographs of events or people from days gone by, often long gone, and get more information from a plethora of responses from folks who either lived those times or were told of those times in family histories. Here are two quick examples of what is easy to write.
This is Karen’s story, but first some context. I knew of Karen just as any student at KCHS back in the late 1960s knew other students who were not friends or even associates; most of us knew names that went with faces, though we may have never said 10 words to each other. Karen was a year younger, and though I was a Greenfield boy, I did know her family ran a business on Broadway; they sold furniture. Decades later here in KC, I became a member of the board of directors of a nonprofit. Karen was on that board and her husband, Dave, was a dedicated volunteer, and we have become friendly enough to know about each other’s children and grandchildren.
As happens in a small-town, volunteers often have multiple interests which is how last Thursday Karen and I were both guides for Farm Day, held at the Fairgrounds. As we waited for our assigned classes at Gate Two, where the landscape manager for the Fair lives (a house that we have all seen for decades), Karen stated that her mother was born in that house. It was her grandparents’ house on their land, and if I heard correctly, and I think I did, it was handed down from Karen’s great-grandparents. I don’t know how many know that little bit of local history, but I’m sure there is more to it and should be recorded for the city’s historical record.
Here is another easy-peasy thing to offer up with little trouble. Last Friday evening there was a fundraiser for the same nonprofit organization, and Jason and myself were part of the entertainment. Jason is a school teacher but is also a thespian, so we were a good fit. Our bit was to present Abbott and Costello’s famous “Who’s on First” routine (younger readers will need Google), and to add a little local flavor, I wrote an intro. As rehearsed, Jason was to be the new “reporter” for the Rustler, but I had him misspeak and say “columnist” instead, at which point I stopped the act as we realized his mistake, so I ad-lib with “What, the other guy just left?” It then went thusly — Jason: “Too far left, apparently, and they farmed him out.” Me: “Plowed him under, did they?” Jason: “No, I heard they used a pesticide!” While some would surely get the innuendo, I scrapped it as inappropriate to the occasion.
And now I have reached 600 words. I don’t have 400 more that are easy because I am at a loss to find common ground on serious issues facing this country. I cannot for the life of me see any justifications in the attitude of many conservatives, especially those who consider themselves MAGA adherents. Two white citizens have been murdered by Republican-backed renegade thugs and both have been characterized as terrorist protestors threatening the lives of law enforcement. One was an unarmed women whose murderer has been vindicated by the administration but, though innocent, he and his family are in hiding. Fools are contributing online donations for him and so are accessory to this crime.
The other dead citizen was easier to paint as a deadly threat because he carried a gun to the protest. Images fail to show the man pulled the weapon, that he ever touched it, nor if it was in his possession when he was shot nine times in the back while laying on the ground. I remember when Western movie heroes told us youngsters that shooting someone in the back was cowardly; now it is heroic. But this action shows me those staunch supporters of the Second Amendment are hypocrites to the bone; they are unprincipled in their rhetoric and actions. They have ignored the original constitutional principle and instead pay homage to a man.
To have a musket in your home to defend against a rogue government, to keep military from kicking in your door, from snatching you out of your fields or shops was a fundamental right. But where are these defenders of an abusive administration now? Where are the armed defenders of our constitution? Why are they not in the streets standing up for their rights? Because they showed where their allegiance lies back in 2020, when a 17-year-old kid crossed state lines to a protest with an AK-47 assault rifle and killed two unarmed men and was praised as a hero, then invited to the Il Duce’s Golden Palace in Miami as reward.
If Kyle Rittenhouse is your hero and Renee Good and Alex Pretti are your terrorists, then I am at a loss to understand where your loyalty to the Constitution of the United States of America is intact. Others have noted this type of government before: “Terrible things are happening outside. Poor helpless people are being dragged out of their homes. Families are torn apart. Men, women, and children are separated. Children come home from school to find that their parents have disappeared.” Those are words of a 12-year-old girl in hiding in 1943 Nazi occupied Netherlands, her name was Anne Frank. And like 32 people this past year in the United States, she died in a concentration camp.
As I noted; not always easy to write easy.
Take care. Peace.
