A Good Morning.

Good morning!

It was 57 degrees this morning before dawn. Had a light, but long sleeve, shirt on for the first time since the short Texas Spring. As usual, I start work at 5:30, but have twenty minutes of nothing to do but wait at about six-- my favorite time of the day.

All is quiet, and I sit cross-legged under a street light and a tree at the rear of our parking lot, and look up at the stars-- sometimes with coffee, and sometime with a cigar-- this morning it was both.  It is one of my "special places" and I go there for a reason every morning.

Orion was high in the East, Jupiter higher above his head, and the nearly full Moon to the West and, as always, I begin the Daily Office of Morning Prayer-- with only birds and perhaps a few angels near enough to hear. An order of Sisters live in a Chapter House on the other side of the fence and I often wonder if they are praying the same... the unknown Spiritual Community... and the unseen one...

And the birds, when I return to that parking lot at about seven fifteen-- now it was my turn to listen to their morning praise.  Several mockingbirds, quite a few grackles and two dove make up "the regulars" and they flutter about and we all listen to two Mockingbirds sing all our songs into one.

Lesson Learned

He said to them, “But now let the one who has a moneybag take it, and likewise a knapsack. And let the one who has no sword sell his cloak and buy one. For I tell you that this Scripture must be fulfilled in me: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors.’ For what is written about me has its fulfillment.” And they said, “Look, Lord, here are two swords.” And he said to them,  “It is enough.”

I have been brooding. I am quiet and sometimes worry that I seem to others as if invisible.  So it is at present.  Here is what my brooding produced:

The Muslims burn, rape, and murder and the American people, in their anger, respond with disparagement of ALL religion, most often in an anti-Christian form. 

Why?

Because Christianity poses no physical threat to those who disparage it and its believers.

But the lesson is learned, over and over:  Non-Spiritual persons (that is, most Americans), respond only out of fear and attack only the weak.  Most Americans are restrained because they are cowards, but a few are restrained out of discipline.

God knows, even if no one else does, that was my ex-wife’s method in life, and I remained quiet, passive and, as a consequence, her violence and incessant disparagement never ended.  My honest view was that I could never allow my children to learn that anyone was expendable to me, so I stayed. My ex-wife knew I would never hit her back—and called me a “Looser” because I would not.

Christianity holds no tenet concerning pacifism.  We are not even supposed to be passive.  But I tried to endure and love my ex-wife into treating me and others with respect-- and that did not work, and I lost more than enough, I lost everything that mattered.  I lost my children. Lesson learned.

Likewise, I can persuade, by application of reason (apologetics) a fundamentalist to re-think their judgmental view of others, but I have never been able to persuade an atheist.  My failing, perhaps; but… Lesson-learned.  The Muslims know how to persuade cowards, don’t they?

For your, “Aren't you supposed to turn the other cheek?”  I answer, No, and if I was, I am out of cheeks to turn.  Besides, what right do you think you have to quote my scripture to me as if you know what it means?  The arrogance has gone too fare.

You do not have to believe what I believe and my friends know I never expect that of anyone.  My faith is deeply intimate and has been so since my earliest memories; and I know that such spiritual intimacy is rare, so I have no reason to expect others to share it.

You do not have to respect Christians-- but fear of paying a price for intentional violence and intentional disparagement against them might be a good thing.  It is a lesson which can be learned—if necessary.

Middle-age crisis, perhaps. I walked along the sidewalk and into a fast food restaurant.  Five rowdy and drunk foreign exchange students, German, from what I could gather, were boisterously ordering fifty-two tacos plus burgers which overwhelmed the staff.  I waited fifteen minutes before one of the staff so much as acknowledged my presence, much less took my order.  The man before me gave up and left.  He was small, and elderly.

I'm fifty-two and not all that small-- but felt being loud and young would have gotten me better service.

With my bag of tacos in hand I walked down the sidewalk and was confronted by five Middle Eastern college students walking abreast, all wearing the same blue soccer uniforms.  They looked aside as they neared me, obviously expecting me to step out of their way.  I smiled and said in my low and calm voice, "I swear I will walk right through you." I did not change length of step nor cadence.  Just as I spoke the last word, I got the attention of one, who tried, too late, to dodge me, as I sent him sprawling.

I did not bother to look back. But I smiled bigger, and felt wonderful as I walked on listening to my iPod playing a Clash song--  Old man music.  I am an old man to a twenty-something, and I am also well disciplined.  I know how to shame a bully.  America is full of them.

Walking home a few hours later, the streets were mostly quiet and my mood was quieter, too.  I wondered about having just seen freinds I adored, but who I knew could take me or leave me without much thought.  It is has always been that way for me.  I felt depressed, and thought through the past co-workers who saw me as competition rather than a brother in arms-- someone who would always have their backs.  Secretly recommending a peer for a job I actually had hoped to have, but never letting my friend know of my endorsement nor my personal desires which conflicted with it.   Then I thought of the balance, and how difficult it is to know when to stand up for self and when to just be there for others-- and how few care either way.

My mood was darkening and then, that voice of my beloved Other, filled me, saying, "Now, son, you understand.  You love but are not loved, you are invisible and so not real to those who do not see.  Would you rather be loving or merely loved?  Which is your nature?  You have already chosen, so why the regret?  You cannot be any other way." 

The night was dark, clear and warm.  Instead of drunk boisterous college students, I heard birds nestling in the trees as I passed below.  Lesson Learned.

Disenfranchising our own

My friend just posted an excellent piece...

How Voter ID Laws Disenfranchise Individual American Citizens

The author uses excellent examples of those we tend to marginalize in our society which is cause  to rethink our own responsibility.  She comes at the subject from the perspective of an insider working with the struggling poor, the homeless, and those in most need of compassion.

While the recent voter laws spawned the article, voting laws are only one more tool used to remove the voice from those most needed to be heard by us.

There Is Another Kind of Evil...

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
– Leo Tolstoy in War and Peace.*

It had been a difficult few days—struggling to tame my rage.  Invasive memories of past trauma, spiritual contemplation of a recent loss to death and another one imminent.  A poem writing itself as I try to type and keep up, an old wound reopened and a repeating demand to do something about that which I know is wrong but can find no action to resolve... yet again in my life.

The trigger

On the second of July, I was waiting on the city bus which would take me to a restaurant I intended for dinner. I had a Herman Wouk book with me for company at table and was in a joyous spirit.

As I approached the bus stop, glancing at the darkening sky, and silently speaking the Phos Hilaron, (“… our eyes behold the vesper light, we sing Thy praises O God…”) I saw three unformed officers facing a man seated on a low stone wall. The man was homeless, and possibly mildly intoxicated—I saw no signs of that other than his passivity. According the homeless persons with whom I have worked, the University of Texas police rough them up as a message not to go near the campus.

A few years ago, I saw it for myself and spoke up. I was thrown down and arrested for my trouble. About a dozen people watched the homeless man be assaulted, and the police somehow assumed that the homeless man must have deserved it. That same dozen stood by, silently, as the police then turned on me for speaking up for the homeless man.

Not surprisingly, I watched the three officers closely in how they treated this homeless man. Here is what took place:

An unshaven man, of about sixty five years of age, teal colored shirt and beside his backpack was sitting on the landscaping wall bordering the sidewalk, along northbound Guadalupe just before 24th Street, apparently waiting for a bus. Three University of Texas police officers stood facing him, spread out so as to make about a third of a circle about him. The one in the center was a blonde male. Flanking him were two females, one tall and thin, and the other medium height and dark.

The bus was long in coming, I thought, and spent my time sitting on the wall and standing, sometimes pacing. I was about twenty feet from the officers who had been talking with the man, when suddenly the blonde police officer began yelling angrily at the homeless man. It was a sort of “You will agree with me, or else!” sort of tirade.

I do not know what had caused the police officer to be so afraid that his anger had taken the better of him like that. The homeless man was small framed, and appeared to be half a foot shorter than the officer even if he were to stand. He presented no threat at all.

I pulled myself up to sit on the wall about twenty to twenty-five feet from them and facing the scene and close enough to hear what was said in normal tones. The angry officer told the man to stand up, and turn around. The homeless man did stand, and understandable whined a bit about it, “Ah, you don’t need to take me to jail.”

“Turn around and put your hands behind your back.”
He did as the officer ordered, turned his back, stood still and placed his hands behind his back with his wrists about three inches apart.
One of the women officers placed the cuffs on the man’s right wrist. The blonde man yelled, “Hands behind you back!”
“They are!” The man declared, rightly.
Instead of simply cuffing the other wrist, the tall, curly haired officer yelled, “Stop resisting!”

Right then, I knew what was happening. The man was compliant. His hands were behind his back, wrists together. He was not resisting, not even moving. If you could have hit a pause button, and asked me what was going to happen, I would have told you this:

The three officers are going to throw the man to the ground and rough him up, because they think that yelling “Stop resisting!” will make everyone assume that the man deserves it. Nobody will notice that he is not resisting and the officers count on that. They do this because they want to send a message and they do it to the homeless because their voice of protest means nothing to most people; and, most of all, they do it because they are bullies to whom our officials have armed and granted authority to use force.

Exactly what I knew would happen, did happen. After throwing him down, they yanked his arms around for show, knelt on his head, and cuffed him. One of the three, taking turns, was constantly kneeling on his back or his head for the next several minutes.
The dark haired female was mostly up and pacing. She glanced around several times to see who, if anyone, was paying attention. She made eye contact with me three times-- once, briefly, on her first circuit around the man and her partners. A second time, briefly on her second circuit; and then a third time, longer, because she realized I was making and holding eye contact with her.
I was nicely dressed, clean-shaven, recent hair cut and calm. My face and eyes were expressionless. I also sit cross-legged, and that lends itself to being interpreted as a peaceful “lotus position” by some. I did not feel peaceful. I felt resigned. I had been in this very battle before and hurt for days from what the UT police did to me for sticking up for the innocent.
I have an arrest record—no conviction, of course-- but I have been arrested twice for doing the right thing. I am not an activist, just a citizen--just like that man being roughed-up by those three officers. Knowing that one of them realized that I had seen what they had done and were doing, was concerning. She looked like she was going to ask me something. I think she was also checking to see if I had an iPhone out, for worry that I was recording the events.
She chose not to speak. I chose not to speak up. I’m used to hating myself, and sometimes more than other times. This was one awful moment in my life.
They got the man up and escorted him onto campus.  

My bus never came. Anyone of four routes should have come by in the thirty minutes I waited, but not one did. I walked two or three blocks to the next stop in the direction of the restaurant and looked back. Not a bus in sight. There was a reason for this. I was to see what I saw.

The restaurant would be too close to closing-time for me to feel right about going in to order a meal, and my sense of joy was long gone. I grabbed a hot dog from a 7/11 and ate it as I walked into my local pub.

“Our forefathers would be shooting by now”
-- unknown

Mystical Help

I wrote a poem yesterday… sort of. I am not a poet. I do not attempt verse, and have no knack for rhyme.

What I typed, I called, Apathy of the Dead.

Those four words stopped me in my tracks. They just came to mind. I was thinking about injustice. I was thinking about the Christian tenet, expressed in the Apostles’ Creed, “I believe in the Communion of Saints” and my mind whirled into the depressive spiral of “I cannot solve this intolerable problem without help!”

And help is ten years late in coming for me, and five years too late. I know that, and so the death spiral of demanding an answer is rarer than it once was. The desperation is gone, because it is too late. The anger, however, haunts me now and then.

It could happen again! It could happen to others! It is happening to others!

But no one wants to hear that… except for those others.

And so, and getting to the point, I pondered praying to the Communion of Saints in whom I believe. Those are the persons who have died believing. Of the dead, the Communion of Saints are made up of the holiest, and the most powerful. If they have power, I wondered, why do I not see it used?

I have a mystical answer, but at that moment, I smiled, and nodded my head in silent understanding—but not agreement—of how so many have reached a point where they are forced to tolerate the intolerable-- so deciding, “They do not care.”

“The Apathy of the Dead.”

The words came, I knew them to refer to the apparent reality, but not the mystical Reality—and I meant them that way when I spoke them out loud, alone in my room. I nodded again, submitting to the awareness that I was done with what I had been busying myself with, because I knew I was supposed to write.

I typed as quickly as I could as the words came. I was afraid I would lose some and not remember; but the words came just as I was able to keep-up, and then paused. I looked and saw a pattern. I looked for rhyme and there was none. I looked for meter, but knew it could not be.

I filled in with what seemed to fit, neglecting the pattern, which had been visually apparent, knowing that it could not be sustained, and that I had not knowingly intended it in the first place.

I stopped. Emotions, memories, desires, and my whole life-story fought for attention and placement in the poem, but I would not—could not—set the experience of the words down, but only the words given me.

I then read what was before me for the first time.

A tired smile on my lips, I asked myself, “Perhaps, in whatever language these words originated, they might rhyme? Perhaps in that language, they are also in meter. I know I only put signs to what poem was given me, incomplete, but I think power is still underneath what I typed. Perhaps it is for me alone; but perhaps I consider all my stories too intimate—too much “for me” and “too much of me” to believe they are for anyone else.

But then, a flood of thoughts given me by others over the years, confirmed over and over again…

Dr. Reginald Fuller, New Testament Scholar and Anglican Priest told me this mystery first—before any other shared this truth with me. He said it as if wondering why he had to explain it to anyone.

“The Exodus story of the Hebrew people, led by God, escaping from bondage out of Egypt, and spending forty years in the desert before entering into the Promised Land—that is also the story of the Church. You knew that. Right? Of course you did. But have you considered that it is also the story of the individual soul? It is, you know.”

I did not know any of that when Father Fuller spoke those words to me. It is, of course true; I just did not want it to be true.

The Poem

So, the poem is intimately my story, and just as possibly a story of many.

The Apathy of the Dead

Or so it seems

Devoid of material force

And lacking temporal immediacy

Days of extending autonomous power at an end

The Church Militant feels very much alone, abandoned by Them.

The marching-orders only understood in vague and inner sight

The Marian assent of Let it be, the carrying of cross to private Calvary

The uncertainty of purpose when confronted with certain defeat.

The wounded hero’s failure against the victories of a lusty youth

A Merlin’s life convoluting time, purpose’s gain became loss

Boldness still, but confidence at no time, one struggles in weakness

Few siblings-in-arms, few siblings at all, you fight as spy or scout.

A mocking world without sight but much loudness of voice

Drowning your own, preparing you for when, soon, you will be mute to them

Gleaned truths, intimate sights, strobic flashes of Reality

Tell a story of More. Promises unimaginable purpose

Inners tears and unseen blood, the ancient co-mingling of human heart

The left-behind will leave no others, the bleeding heal, the defenseless defend.

Refugees seek out the forsaken because of this; and they, the other.

Neither seeking victory but only meaning, only the More.

The Dead have lived as refugees, shepherds and martyrs;

They were the teachers, the seers,

Intimates with God whose cries of passion still ring and merge into Song

I leave the poem there, hanging—or finished, I do not know which. Out of time to write, and my Muse departed anyway. I must hurry to a friend’s for Fourth of July activities of barbeque, beer, a film and fireworks. The film part seems odd, but my host has mentioned wanting to watch this film with us several times and we had not yet done that.

The Wound

The film was Boondock Saints.

It is a story which begin in a Church. A Priest—a Monsignor—is preaching about a second kind of evil: Good people watching evil done and not taking action.

Of course, I was busy justifying myself in my inner dialogue as the movie continued:

But I have taken action, and usually alone, and when alone, I have rarely made a difference and usually been hurt. I used to think leading by example worked, but no one follows.

It wasn’t working. My excuses did not exonerate my conscience.

According to what I have read, the screenwriter said that opening scene is based upon his own personal experience. Clearly, its is mystical experience in the film—two brothers suddenly stand up in while the Monsignor is preaching, walk right past him to the Altar, kneel, pray, then rise to kiss the foot of the Crucifix above the Altar before turning to leave.

Outside the Church door, one of the brothers says, “It seems the Monsignor finally gets it.”

The rest of the film’s story is those two brothers finding themselves thrust into vigilantism… and loving it.

They have a prayer which mystically justifies what they do, and are considered Saints.

I have no such “marching-orders.” I have no brother who has been thrust into the fray at my side. I have no police force silently approving any such act. I have been the scout, alone behind enemy lines. I have been wounded. “Taken out by sniper fire” as John Eldredge states it in, Wild at Heart.

What I do have is a Muse. A Principality, technically—an Angel. He recited a poem, or a song in my inner hearing and I typed it out—for me, but maybe for another. It said nothing of a promised victory. It said nothing of brothers-in-arms, much less legions of angels at my side. The song said my prayers are heard, but the action is mine to take until I am so wounded that I can take no more.

This, I think, is the same Angel who once told me that God, too, acts by a spiritual restraint—having the power to stop evil and punish evil, but instead crying tears with us to the injustice, and loving me for not demanding justice, but only living it as best I can no matter how much my inabilities bring about rage in me.

When I was young, more than once a police officer chastised me for a good deed, making it clear I should have waited fro them. Only once did one take the trouble to say to me, “You are going to do what you do no matter what; but expecting us to be there is foolish. You did the right thing, but you got lucky. Son, I am telling you that you ought to have a gun. That man is not going to forget that you stopped him—and he is not going to forgive you either; and chances are, he will find you before we find him.”

He was right. That evil man did find me before the police found him. I did not like the advice he gave me, but I had begrudgingly taken it. I did not like Father Fuller telling me (as if I already knew it to be true), that my path would be in wandering in the desert. When family and friends warned me about an evil in my midst, I did not heed, did not believe… and the unthinkable happened; that is, Eldredge’s “sniper” took me out; but he claims that happens to true warriors.

Today, I do not feel like a warrior, but merely a nomad.  But it was never apathy.

Postscript - Not Alone

*Sometimes attributed to Edmund Burke

The IRS Office / Complaints Department / Selection Committee meeting/ (select one) is downstairs.

Yes.  It is photoshopped.

WCG+ 15-Jun-2012

The Great Escape

Stalag Luft III, as seen from a 1944 Allied reconnaissance image shortly after the escape.

RAF image (1944)

Same image as Google Earth overlay.

Marked are the three tunnels "Tom, Dick and Harry" (plus, the later and lesser known, "George").

• "Tom" was discovered by the guards. 
• "Dick" was abandoned when the treeline for which it was intended was cleared for a new section of the POW camp to be built 
• One night in March of 1944, seventy-six Allied POW's escaped the Nazi camp using the 336 foot long tunnel, "Harry." 

Three made it to safety, 73 were ultimately captured, and of those, 50 were executed. Despite the depiction in the film, no Americans took part in the escape, but had been a part of digging the tunnels. In fact, when the prisoners learned the Americans were to be moved to a separate section of the camp, tunneling efforts were increased in hopes of finishing one of the three in time for them to participate in the attempt.

"George," by the way, was begun near the end of the war, but the camp abandoned before it was completed.

The true story of heroism is both tragic and inspiring-- as is the film version.

When the acts of man have been extraordinary, I believe the places associated with those acts become "more" and take on a special significance in and of themselves. I spent a few hours researching, compiling and marking for that reason.

The geographic location is just south of the town Żagań, Poland (formerly, Sagan, Germany).

So a Priest, a farmer, and a Sheriff walk into this...

Sitting here and hearing a sound that sounded out of place...  

That sounds like an aircraft engine-- on the ground on the street below, I think to myself.  I grab the television remote and press the mute button.

Yep.  That is what it sounds like-- but a very small aircraft engine.  Maybe it set down in the storm-- but that is one curvy road it is on.  Nah!  Can't be.  Whatever it is, it is heading the other way.

So, I lose interest in the sound, and realize I wasn't watching the television anyway; but (and better yet) I am reminded of a story:

Cessna 172 (from Wikimedia Commons)

I was living in small town Texas, where cows outnumbered people, and my "city-boy" Mazda 626 successfully did duty as a cutting horse on my way home from work, to block the attempted passage to freedom (or something) of a neighbor's loose bull.

One night, I was driving home on a long, mostly straight country road--  Farm to Market road something or other-- in that same cutting-Mazda.  It was just after 9/11.  We were all supposed to be alert for anything out of the ordinary back then, and since I am anyway, and alive because of it, I am sensing nothing unusual.

It is dusk, and I'm tooling along at sixty miles per hour because that was the speed limit.  Coming up out of a low spot in the road which I know has a fifteen degree curve right at the top of the little rise, I am always alert to the possibility that any traffic coming toward me may not be familiar with that curve, and am watching for headlights to appear.

Instead, I see a flash of red and then a brief glimpse of solid green light and come off the throttle and ease into my breaks.   I am down to a trot on my trusty Mazda as I take in the possibilities, and decide that despite the absurdity, I am rather certain that when I get to the crest of the hill, I am going to find a Cessna airplane on the road before me.

I get to the top of the crest and there is a Cessna aircraft on the road before me.  Not surprisingly, I am not surprised.

A woman in her sixties, wearing a print dress with lacy trim which was undoubtedly sold in a catalog also containing lawn art, model windmills, duck-shaped mailboxes and wooden heart-shaped things to hang on a wall with attached twine-- a woman dressed like that (in case you forgot where this sentence was going) was standing in the road, giving me the universal hand signal to slow down.  I lip-read a little because of some hearing loss.

I spent most of my youth in water.  I love swimming, but have these tiny little ear canals, and the water can get in, but it can't get out.  My physician told me they were small enough to be considered "deformed."  I had ear infections all the time, and so he had plenty of opportunities to consider the tininess of my ear canals.  Still, he never forgot his favorite joke when I went to visit him.  He would put that little dark green plastic funnel thing with the light in my deformed ear canal and then wave his fingers past my other ear so as to pretend he could see straight through.  It cracked him up every time.

Well the lady on the side of the road wasn't doing any of that, she was using one hand to make like she was pushing some invisible dog down that was continuously jumping up on her leg.

I don't know why acting like one is pushing an invisible and overly affectionate dog down is the universal sign for "Slow down" but it is.  Try it-- you'll see.  Anyway, I mentioned I can lip read, sometimes.  Well, I am fairly certain her words were "Slow ya' ass down" and that rather strengthened my interpretation of the hand signal.

I was near a stop anyway, and besides, there was a plane blocking the road in front of me, so I really didn't need any direction as to what to do.  I don't recall any section about right-of-way in the Texas Driver's Handbook mentioning aircraft; but when you have been driving for more that a few decades, some things just start to be intuitive.  In my my mind it went something like, Big vehicle with wings blocking the road with spinning blade bigger than my car-- best to give it room.  Besides that and having a little experience with airplanes (I have even ridden in them), I found it a bit ironic that the woman with the plane on the road was signaling me with suggestions as to what I ought to do with my car.

"Ma'am?  That being a plane... well, pardon me, but isn't it supposed have a bit more altitude?  Have you tried going faster?"

Okay, I did not really say that.  But the plane was turning itself around, and I watched an elderly man, wearing cowboy boots, jeans, and a nice cowboy hat (felt) holding a package, trot off toward a pick up truck blocking the road opposite the plane from me.  There was a car waiting there.  He must have been very experienced because he seemed to have stopped without needing any specific instructions.

The old cowboy backed the truck to the woman, she got in, and they hurried down a dusty drive right there through the pasture beside the road.  The plane was lurching as the engine revved-up and then was airborne before it got to the car facing me.

I was doing my best to catch up so as to read the tail number as it flew almost directly away from me, but by the time I got my Mazda 626 into a full gallop and along side, the plane had slipped too far from the road, and turning sharply, so I never saw any digits or letters.

I didn't have a cell phone in those days but was only three minutes from home, so I raced there and called 9-1-1 as soon as I got inside.

In less than a half hour, a Sheriff Deputy pulls up and comes to the door.  He asks me if I can show him where I saw the plane.  I'm still wearing my clericals:  Black suit, black shirt, white priest's collar, and want my dinner, but this could be important.

I can, and say so, and get in his cruiser.  I direct him to make a right at the end of my street onto the Farm to Market runway, and go a couple of miles.  At the top of the right hill, I say, "This is it.  Right here."

He pulls the cruiser to the shoulder and takes out a note pad and asks me if I could describe the plane.

I tell him it what model of Cessna it was.  He asks how I know, and I am explaining that it has a high wing, fixed tricycle gear, four-seater, white with dark blue or green trim-- couldn't get the tail number.

The Deputy looks at me funny.

I look at the Deputy funny.

"How do you know all that?" He asks.

"I saw it."

"How do you know all about that type of aircraft?"

I explain about my years working as an assassin for the CIA and how the flashy-thing only removed selected memories, but I still remember all my early pilot training which was required before I began flying the space shuttle on secret missions to shoot down the black helicopters that were causing all the alien troubles down in Roswell and their fluoridating our water in retribution and so poisoning our precious bodily fluids.

No, I didn't.  But wouldn't that have been fun?  And in my collar.  Lord knows I am kicking myself to this day for not saying that.  No.  I told him I was a Chaplain for the local Air Force Auxiliary, showed him the related ID, and he put that on his clipboard.  That seemed to satisfy the Deputy.  Some people can't handle the truth.

So, just a hundred yards further on from where we were parked, was a red brick, two story farmhouse.  All the lights were on, and the Deputy says, "Think they might have seen anything?"

I said, "The plane was on the other side of the hill from them, but they must have heard it."  We drive up the driveway and find a man rummaging through a tool box in the well lighted garage.  I like to use "lit" for when a fire has been struck, and "lighted" for a description of artificial brightness.  It seems odd to me to plant in the readers mind the possibility that I might have meant that the man may have been rummaging through a tool box inside a burning garage-- set afire by some arson who knew his craft.  One would think that the man would be frantically looking for a fire extinguisher, but he wasn't.  He seemed to be simply looking for a specific tool.  And since I make no mention of an arson, or a fire, I am hopeful the intent of my word choice created no confusion.

So, anyway,  I get out of the car with the Deputy.

The deputy says, "Howdy.  Say, did you see or hear anything unusual a little earlier this evening?

"You mean the plane?"

God as my witness:  The Deputy answered, "Soooo.  There was a plane."

The gentleman in the garage started, "Oh yeah, we--"

I interrupted, "Now wait just a minute!  You mean, after all the details I gave you, you thought I was making this up?"

Now, I didn't want to insult him more than I needed to because I did not want to walk the two and half miles back home that night; but I was ticked, and perhaps a little emboldened because there was an outside chance that if he did leave me, I could always catch the next plane.

The man in the garage laughed, and continued, "Yeah, there was a plane alright.  Landed right in front of the house, and we heard it.  When we went to look, it was going over that little hill there and down below."

His wife had come out to join us, and she added, "We figure it was drugs."

The Deputy said, "Yes Ma'am.  Out here away from the city, they make their pickups and deliveries and then drive them in to distribute.  Sometimes they just fly low and drop the stuff out.  I guess they had to do a pick-up of some kind."


It was an uncomfortable ride home... for the Deputy.  I enjoyed myself.  I gloated.  He knew I was gloating.  I had earned my gloat, and I was going to have it.

"So, while you may have had doubts, there was no call for you to express such surprise that I, a Priest, was telling the truth."

"Yes sir.  I'm sorry."

"And then it turns out you knew about such things being a way drugs are delivered out here."

"Yes, but until the lady said something about it, I hadn't thought of it."

"But you were quick to think that the Priest must be crazy?"

I was grinning and setting my spurs in, and he was apologizing the whole way.  His only way out was to get me home to my supper as quickly as possible.  He had that engine roaring, and I swear, we were nearly flying.