The town marshall chased us...

all through our little village in southwest Indiana. We would stand in a field when he did his rounds, waiting for him. As he made a curve, his head lights would shine on us, and we would break into a run.

He would chase us for somewhere between thirty minutes and two hours, until we slinked home in the dark, or he got bored.

Cynthiana has under a thousand population, and stretches about a mile and a half end-to-end. It is shaped like a diamond: maybe a mile deep in the middle and a half-mile deep at either end. We had two long-term marshalls, and a few short-timers. "Specs" spanned most of my younger years; "Tore" was the marshall during and after my junior high years.

The town marshall knew us all. He knew where we lived. He knew our parents and siblings. He could probably recognize any of our silhouettes in the dark.

Curfew was eleven P.M.

I guess he figured that we'd get in less trouble if he participated in our leisure time activities. He was right. We spent a lot of time "running from the cops" but we never really did anything wrong or illegal. Mostly.

My best friend's parents owned a liquor store. We pilfered the random quart of beer or bottle of Boone's Farm. We were still too young to drive cars, so we were in the pre-DUI days. My best friend Kelly always got the girl. I was the fast one, on foot or on a bike - it didn't matter.

Once, after we had been throwing shelled corn at cars all night on 68/80 on the east end of town, Tore came driving up. It was after a Cynthiana-Haubstadt football game, near Halloween. We were hiding behind a 6 foot privacy fence, lobbing corn over onto passing cars on the highway. We had a guy stationed up the street to read license plates and tell us if the car was from Haubstadt. We had been at it for over an hour, and the road was covered with an inch of corn, when Tore arrived.

"Time to go home, boys", he boomed. "But Bob, it's only 10..." "TIME TO GO HOME!"

I wonder if kids have that luxury today.

I fear that
                 today
                      they
           would
       get shot.

Frank was a drunk and...

a liar and other unpleasant things besides. But you couldn't dislike him.

He cheated at cards when we played for dimes and quarters.

We all stole corn - "roastin' ears" as my Grandfather called them - from the fields in the river bottoms. We took what we needed for a meal to go with a mess of channel catfish. Except for Frank. He didn't take a dozen, he filled up the trunk of his car. It had to go to waste.

He'd bring 3 beers, drink ten of someone else's, and put nine more in his cooler when he left - so he'd have an even dozen.

Or he'd leave his completely full cooler in his car, and deny he had any at all.

He'd seine every living creature out of any "bait pond" he could find, filling five-gallon bucket after bucket with bait - just to let it die. The bait pond would be ruined for a year for all of us. We'd never share the location of any pond we wanted to continue to use.

He was a bastard in every sense I can remember.

But we liked him. As a kid, I spent innumerable Sundays playing poker, spinning yarns and running trot lines with Frank.

He was always welcome. My Grandfather welcomed everyone. Frank came every Sunday.

I mostly remember
                        how much
                I liked
that old bastard.

DB was the nickname...

I gave to a manager I never liked. It was back when I was a snob about such things as people who I didn't think were as smart as I (thought I) was.

He didn't meet the minimum education requirements for the position of IS Manager in a hospital in Nashville. A Bachelors degree is not a high bar, particularly in such an environment, but he had failed to cross that threshold.

The Director of IS, Dave, hired him anyway.

I can't help but believe he regretted it later.

But that didn't give me any pleasure.

Once in a meeting, DB was so quick to agree with Dave that Dave said, "wait, we appear to be one opinion short here."

I liked Dave a lot more after that day, and had more respect for him.

And DB got his name: Dave's Bitch.

Everyone on the team adopted the nickname. So we developed a cover story in case it slipped out in front of him - which it periodically did. We said he looked like the actor who played DB Cooper in the movie (Treat Williams). He didn't.

DB left and went back to the renal facility whence he came.

I took my arrogant ass back to Georgia.

Dave kept the faith until he left.

And none of it matters
              to anyone
         any
more.

The Green River runs...

from it's head near Mammoth Cave to it's mouth on the Ohio River just east of the bridge connecting Evansville, IN with Henderson, KY. It's a deep and gnarly river with a dam at Spottsville, KY, as well as a couple others.

I haven't any idea why there is a dam in Spottsville. I don't think it generates electricity.

I have only been a few miles up river from Hebbardsville, KY, but I've boated the twenty odd miles down to the mouth. The locks in Spottsville are a rush in a canoe. The cliffs at Bluff City provided us a lot of rocks for stepping stones.

I spent my childhood tugging catfish out of the Green River on trot lines baited mostly with crawfish. I seined every wet spot within 25 miles of Hebbardsville for crawfish, minnows, and any other bait we could find.

I was afraid of eels until I showed that fear publicly; the elders ensured I progressed beyond that fear. Ridicule is held in much lower regard now than it was back then.

The water came over the banks in the winter, commonly rising 20-40 feet from pool stage. Coal barges were tough to push through the narrow channel; the tugs regularly failed to navigate the bend above our camp, and came careening out of the channel. All that power.

And me, an 11, 14, 17 year old in a wide beamed 12 foot wooden john boat with a 4 hp Evinrude motor. I barely made any progress against a fast current.

I loved that boat,
                  that river,
            and those old bastards
who taught me poker.

The Road along the Ocoee River...

is a lesson in the tension between engineering and architecture. Maybe there are positive lessons and negative lessons as well.

The road basically tracks the river. Since the river wasn't built in a straight line, niether was the road.

I would complain about the road if I were in a car and I were in a hurry. It forces a moderated tempo. It's very dangerous. This road was not engineered for speed.

Safety wasn't even an engineering after thought.

One might also complain about it if he were in a kayak. Having to look at those cars and buses all day -- and to smell the exhaust -- could be a drag.

I never really noticed the traffic. The river holds my attention.

The road along the Ocoee is, in fact, a marvel in architecture and a beautiful drive.

It's really the best it can be.

I wish
             I
                        had thought
          to build it.

I was never in my life nervous...

before I sat down at the table next to the Commissioner of the Department of Human Resources and a bunch of other politically appointed bureaucrats I didn't know (prior to that time).

I wasn't nervous until I suddenly realized how Gary Redding, then Deputy Commissioner of DCH, very adeptly distorted everything I had said beyond anything I could recognize. I like Gary Redding. Unlike many in public service, he's really quite talented.

But talented at what?

The truth is just another tool to political appointees -- as useful as pliers when you need them, and just as useless when a philips-head screw requires extraction.

I loved working in state government. Being in charge there is not for the timid.

While I came to like and respect Gary and many of the others at the table that day, only a few politically motivated bureaucrats ever gained my trust. (Kate and Tom, among them.) Most state employees are lifers -- with all that comes with such a committment. Many are gifted. A few climb, if only briefly, well beyond their ("her") greatly limited talent.

I hope Gary's still in charge of something substantial and worthy of his enormous talent.

I hope those who work with him
       know enough
           to
       be
nervous.

Criticism is the sole function...

of a critic. A critic is not meant to provide advice. He should not be expected to aid in the development of solutions. He tears apart, rips to shreds, gores, exposes cancerous bloody inner organs to others who have not the native capacity to see them.

Outcomes are not the currency of a critic. Positive input is outside his purview. He is not called a Constructic nor a Solutionist.

His talent is his ability to see in the darkness, his x-ray vision that allows him to look through walls - physical and social walls alike.

The gemutlichkeit of the light he shines there is irrelevant.

I am only sometimes
                worthy
        of
the title.

Pole Vaulters and Distance Runners...

have to be a bit insane. That's what my high school track coach used to say.

But maybe these are two normal evolutionary skills. I mean, didn't humans require long sticks to vault over wooly mammoths after they chased them twenty-five miles or so.

I'll bet there are no vegan pole vaulters. It's an evolutionary impossibility. Same for ultra-marathoners.

I've never been hungry enough to eat a dog, but it's hardly an absurd notion in another reality. I'm afraid eating my cat would give me a giant hair ball. I'm ill equipped for that.

Here I sit, but
                   in my mind,
I run
               and run
                                and run
      and
run.

My Cardiologist...

suggests that I cut down on salt and ranting. Eat aspirin and fleshy green vegetables. Exercise and lose weight.

I think he doesn't like me, because apparently he wants to treat somebody completely different.

And yet, if he had his way, he wouldn't be able to afford that house of his that is worth five times mine; or the several cars he drives -- each of which also cost more than my house.

I hope I die early enough to deprive him of something.

But live long enough to enjoy thinking about it.

I'm sure there is an upside.

But I don't
              have
                     any more time
       to spare.

The guy next door...

is an idiot.

He thinks the same of me. I'm comforted by our incongruent agreement.

I was thinking of buying a dump truck to park in front of his house. Maybe I would store a year's worth of used cat litter in the bed.

Do you suppose there is an ordinance against that?

But for the variable winds...

I'd like to rant, but I simply haven't the energy to spare.

And life is
                        just
            too
short!