I have come to regard curry as one of the most interesting and pleasing spice mixtures I have yet encountered in my culinary adventures.  Because I love cooking as well as enjoying the products made, I wanted to share some things I’ve learned about this awesome spice.

Recipe #1: Three meat curry chili

This was a real crowd pleaser at our 50th birthday party on October 21st, 2011. It is a beanless chili recipe with three kinds of meat and three kinds of curry. For this recipe I used three premixed curry spices: Curry Powder from Simply Organic, Hot Madras Curry Powder from McCormick’s Gourmet Collection, and Red Curry from Spice Islands Gourmet Blends.

Other ingredients used were three kinds of onion (sweet, hot white, and red onion) and three kinds of sweet pepper (green bell, sweet yellow bell, and sweet red bell peppers), one hot pepper (jalapeno), and fresh canned tomatoes from our garden plus canned tomato juice. Additional spices needed were minced or crushed garlic (lots),  salt, white ground pepper, flaked red pepper, and lots of crushed or minced garlic. The three meats were boneless pork chops, new york strip steak, and ground beef. I didn’t keep records on the amount of meat used as I cook by eye and taste not by written recipe so you will have to use your judgement a bit depending on how much meat you prefer in dishes.

The secret ingredient for all good soups is time; not the spice (thyme) but rather the property of the universe (time). You simply cannot make the best soups in a short period of it. This recipe will take three to four hours.

Start out by cutting the beef steak into cubes 1/2″ to 3/4″ or so in size. Put crude Sesame Oil in a Wok and put a Medium High flame under it. Throw the beef into the Wok and add some crushed garlic to it immediately. Add some white pepper and some Curry Powder to it and stir, stir, stir to cook evenly. Slice up the red onions and add them to the beef mixture as long strips and stir some more. Chop up the Green Bell Pepper into long thin strips and then cut them in half lengthwise and add them in, stirring and folding the meat and vegetables over from bottom to top to keep it from burning.  When it is well cooked, because you are trying to cook in the spice so the meat holds it’s flavor, then remove the beef steak and put it in the big pan you will cook the chili in.

Clean the Wok and start cutting up the pork into narrow strips about 1″ to 2″ long and thin. Start the Wok on the stove again with Sesame Oil and add the pork into it when the oil is hot. Again add garlic and add Red Curry Powder, stir stir stir. Chop up the hot white onions and add them in with the pork and stir some more until the pork is well cooked. Slice up the Sweet Red Bell Pepper and add it in the same manner you treated the Green Pepper in the previous step. Put this mix in the same pan the beef mix went into and clean the wok.

Take the clean Wok and add the ground beef to it on a Medium High flame. You don’t need to use oil with the ground beef. Chop it up with a spatula as you fry it and chop up your sweet onions and throw them in with the ground beef, stirring frequently. If you start to get a lot of grease then remove the excess leaving only some grease to help with the frying of the meat.  Add about two tablespoons of the Hot Madras Curry and a couple heaping tablespoons of minced garlic, then stir it up thoroughly. You want the ground beef to become small pieces that have the spices cooked in. Slice up the Sweet Yellow Pepper and finely slice the jalapenos and add them into the frying ground beef in the same way as the peppers in previous steps were added. Stir it all up and cook it together until the peppers are somewhat limp but not fully cooked. Do not burn the ground beef! When the peppers are a bit limp and the beef looks browned, add this meat into the soup pan. Clean the Wok again and put it away. Now your work will be done in the soup pan.

Chop up any remaining vegetables you have not used and add them to the pan, you may want more jalapenos or sweet peppers and if so you can add them at this point, chopped up and added to the mix in the soup pot.

Turn the burner on Medium under the pan and start heating it. Add the canned tomatoes. Stir more, DO NOT LET IT SCORCH.

Add the tomato juice. Stir more.  It should be simmering when you add the tomato juice. Let it reheat to a simmer, stirring frequently, to keep it mixed up and off the bottom.  When it is good and hot again and at a good simmer you are ready to continue.

Add more garlic and red curry slowly with stirring and some tasting to determine how much spice you want in the chili. The jalapenos will slowly make the mix hotter but you may want to use some red pepper to add a bit of extra hotness. A bit of cumin may also be pleasing but add it slowly and cautiously since it has such a strong flavor. Finally at the end decide how much salt you want added, slowly adding it and stirring it in then tasting for correct level. Reduce the heat under the pan to a low setting and let it simmer slowly one to two hours, frequently stirring it and tasting for level of hotness, garlic and curry flavor. Adjust as desired but add small amounts slowly so you do not overspice. Serve this chili with jalapeno corn bread for a fantastic hot chili meal. It’s a great change from the typical bean chili you find everywhere.

Recipe #2: Thai style Ginger Pork with three sweet peppers and mushrooms in peanut and coconut milk sauce with green and red curry

I had a roommate once from Hong Kong when I was in college, and he was the person who taught me the beginnings of my knowledge of eastern cuisine and cooking technique.  Jackson, as he said we should call him, was a brilliant guy that was working on twin PhD degrees from Michigan State University in Electrical Engineering and in Computer Science.  In his spare time he was a cook at Hong Kong House, because cooking relaxed him and he enjoyed it.  Thank-you for that life lesson Jackson.

Jackson would cut vegetables up differently depending on how they were to be used in a dish.  When you are going to stew a vegetable in a sauce for example, you should cut the pieces thicker and a bit larger so they keep some of their flavor even as they pull in the savor from the sauce while they stew.  This dish starts out like a stir fry but it ends as a stewing simmer of the meat and vegetables in a lovely coconut and curry sauce, so the way the veggies are cut up matters.

This dish starts out with a Wok and Crude Sesame Oil like so many other eastern dishes, except some prefer Peanut Oil.  I like the flavor of the crude Sesame Oil better.  It is kind of expensive unless you buy it in a Chinese Food Store if you happen to live in Chicago, Toronto, or some University Town like East Lansing or Ann Arbor Michigan.  Peanut Oil can be used instead and it is less expensive but won’t be quite as tasty.

Put your clean Wok on the Medium to High flame and put the oil in it.  I use three or so tablespoons of oil most of the time, but it should be enough oil to coat the bottom of the Wok when you slosh it around, and still have some oil standing in the bottom after you slosh.

When the oil is hot it will start to smoke.  You must catch it when the first little bit of smoke comes off the oil, not when it looks like Mt. Vesuvius and your insurance agent will get involved because of the fire damage.  That’s too late, in multiple dimensions.

The oil starts to smoke a little bit so it is good and hot.  You of course read this recipe ahead of time so you also know that you must have crushed or minced garlic ready as well as your thinly sliced pork chops that you sliced ahead of time in 2″ to 3″ long slices and thinly sliced, say 1/8″ or so thick.  You chuck in the minced garlic, I like a ton but you may prefer to stop at 1 to 2 heaping tablespoons of it.  It will throw a lot of steam up so be ready with a long handled wooden spoon to stir it up evenly and then within the sixty seconds following the addition of the garlic to the hot oil you throw in the sliced pork and start stirring and folding it over with two long handled wooden spoons, or if you want to be seriously authentic with cooking chopsticks and a big wooden spoon.

Cook the meat until most of the red color is gone and it is starting to brown.  While you are waiting, between stirrings, slice up our old friends the three colored sweet Bell Peppers, one red, one yellow, and one green.  Make the slices a bit thicker than you normally slice things in stir fry.  Maybe make them twice as thick.  You can leave the slices fairly long for a lovely appearance or cut them in half for easier eating.  Throw the peppers into the meat and stir it up good.  Next you slice up your favorite type of mushroom, but for this dish I really recommend a mild one like a button mushroom.  Slice them up in medium thick slices and add in, then stir and fold the mixture to make sure it is evenly cooking.

Now it is time to add a can of Coconut Milk.  I prefer to get the whole Coconut Milk from Thai Kitchen, and this recipe is also using two of their canned Curry Pastes so you may want to check your local big food store ahead of time in the Ethnic Foods aisle to see if you can buy their products. Look here to see the Thai style curry pastes we will use.      We are using the Green Curry Paste and the Red Curry Paste.  If you cannot get their ingredients, then find another Green Curry Paste and another Red Curry Paste and another kind of whole canned Coconut Milk.

The Coconut Milk will be really think like grease when you open the can.  There is squishy liquid hidden in the middle so be careful when you spoon it into the Wok.  Put the whole can in.  It will quickly melt.  Stir everything up and let it start simmering then reduce your heat to Medium Low and keep it simmering.  It will really start to smell nice.  As it simmers, put a couple heaping tablespoons of Red Curry Paste in and stir it around then do the same for the Green Curry.  They have very different flavors.  The Red is especially good with Pork in my opinion.  After both are mixed in well the color will get a bit odd, like an off green.  That is normal.  Let things simmer until the meat is tender.  Stir frequently.  If it starts drying out add a little water or more Coconut Milk if your cholesterol level isn’t already too high.  Stir stir stir, fold fold fold.  Keep it cooking evenly.

After the meat gets tender you are ready for the last step.  Adding the Peanut Butter.  Yes, Peanut Butter.  I prefer the crunchy kind as some Peanut fragments in the dish add character as well as flavor.  Put about a cup of it in and stir it around really well.  It also will melt.  Mix it into the stewing sauce and stew it all a bit longer.  When you believe it is all cooked together well taste it and decide if you want more curry paste or not, and also add Soy Sauce to make it saltier.  Salt it to taste with Soy Sauce.

Serve this dish with nice fluffy Jasmine Rice.  Put the Pork with Ginger and Thai Curry over the rice and enjoy with a good glass of red wine like a Malbec or a Merlot.

Life is all about the process, not about the product. We are born, we grow up, we grow old, we die; the circle of life rolls on. We all share the same journey but the details vary, so each is unique. Having a good life is not guaranteed, but the definition of what a good life is belongs to each of us as much as the life does. We navigate our way through our lives doing the best we can and hopefully learning every day so we can do a little better the next. Hopefully we hand down the good things we learn to the next generation. When you find yourself learning from that next generation, then you know you did OK.

For whatever reason, be it fate or divine intervention or just bad luck, my son was one of those people who have to go through something very hard when they are young. Until his illness, Logan had experienced a pretty good life growing up. He had dogs, a little sister that adored him, and parents who loved and supported him. He liked school and excelled in high school soccer. A lot of his identity growing up came from his time on the pitch with his team mates working together to make exciting things happen. He graduated as his team’s season MVP and he was all conference first team as a goal keeper. He got accepted at the school of his dreams, the school his parents had attended. Life looked very good, but as is occasionally true in life things were to take a sudden turn.

Logan learned his sophomore year in college that he had cancer; it was the beginning of a lot of changes that would reshape his life and his identity. The initial chemo was difficult but we were somewhat hopeful that the cancer could be managed with treatments. Logan had only one evening to contemplate what would happen to him. One evening to decide, after weeks of chemotherapy, whether he should lose half his pelvis and his leg, or just half his pelvis and possibly keep a non-functional leg. After thinking it through and talking to us a bit, Logan made his choice. I’m sure it was the longest night of his life. The next morning we went to the hospital and the doctors removed that left leg that had carried him through so many matches. That was the day the old Logan died and the new Logan was born.

Logan learned again to walk, fighting through the pain. He could have given up many times, but instead he fought the many battles to get off from the many prescription drugs he had taken for pain from the after effects of his surgery, for nausea, and for that demon Phantom Pain. He eventually learned to play soccer again. Better still he learned to love again despite his changed physique, and he found a woman who was both loving and intelligent. They married last September and are now figuring out all that life stuff together. That is a stunning win after a brutal first half.

Part of the reason this boy not only lived, but rejoined life, was because of the love and support we all gave him. His mother and I and his sister and his brother in Germany did everything within our resources or ability to be there for him in his time of great need. His German brother even went to the lengths of shaving his head bald so Logan wouldn’t feel so alone in his illness.  Part of Logan’s survival and his renewal as a participant in life doubtless came from the love of his close friends and his other family and the love and support they gave him.

We kept hope alive in him in those darkest times when he looked at the real possibility that he wouldn’t make it. We sat, stood, and slept by his side through every step so he would have no time of awakening in the night without one of us there to help him or just keep him company. We stood guard over him on those nights like the one we thought he’d had a stroke, and we held his hand and told him not to lose hope, because when things are darkest hope can still deliver you to the next dawn.

Why we were more fortunate than some of the other families who had kids in treatment I cannot say. Cancer took some of them, and some of the others were spared after giving their pound of flesh in the form of a foot or a femur or a knee. We were fortunate because even though the illness extracted a heavy cost, our child was delivered back from the darkness and for us hope was reaffirmed.

Part of it came from Logan himself because he didn’t sink into despair and stay there. Logan chose instead to fight for his life, to take ownership of it despite the fact that it wasn’t the life he had originally imagined. He just started figuring out how he could make his life what he wanted. He asked for help when he needed it, but he did much of it himself. He accepted the things he had to accept and then he started figuring out how to do the best he could with the rest of it.

It’s a strange kind of blessing, to have walked through such a dark place together and to have learned that we are there for one another, anytime, anyplace; 24×7 and 365.

Really I think it’s fair to say that Logan is our hero because he lived and then chose to live his life, and that we are his because we really wouldn’t let there be any doubt about it that trying to live was the right way to go. That seems an amazing and rare thing between the members of a family in these modern times; that a person would be really serious about family members being their hero. Logan would scoff at any mention of himself in someone’s hero list because as he explains, he didn’t get to choose to do something heroic where you had to be really brave to step forward, like a certain death mission. He says that he just did what he had to do to get through some really dark times. He just wanted to live, and he didn’t give up.

Sometimes you can’t predict how things will go when they look really hard. By going from day to day with a commitment to make things work out and a stubbornness to keep some piece of hope alive in your heart despite adversity, you can overcome that adversity if you don’t give up. There are of course no guarantees, but I know I would rather be wrong believing that a better day can come no matter how dark the current day looks, than be right about predicting hopelessness. I guess it’s just something in my nature, and thank God in the nature of The Boy Who Lived.

The process certainly didn’t lead us to a place we ever expected to be. It led us instead to a different place, but it made us stronger people as individuals and as a family.

The process enriched us even as it took from us, because we were receptive to that enrichment. None of us, for example, believed that life had just been plain unfair. At least none of us got too attached to that notion if it did occasionally cross our minds.

Life can be very unjust, if the determination of such justice is within our limited understanding. Some people have to face far worse than we faced, and in many cases they do not get their loved ones back. We don’t get to decide what happens to us, we only have to decide what to do with the time that is given to us. We are given the choice of finding meaning and value and beauty where we can, or not finding it. Like our lives, the process is also up to us. We may not get to decide a lot of things, but we can accept the process when we must and be enriched by it when we can.

At the end, hopefully we are able to look back at our life with gratitude, and if so then it was a good life. If not exactly as planned, then lived for all it’s worth anyway. Every hand dealt by life played with gusto.  The Circle of Life continues on without us, but we lived and loved and mattered to someone else.

If there is a better measure, I have not yet learned it, but of course the process continues.

Looking over my shoulder at the 50 year old path I have traveled to get to this very point in my life I reflect on the brilliance of it all.

To have been born into a loving, supportive family that encouraged me to succeed in life would really have been enough…but add on the fact that both of my parents are still living vital lives, still loving me, still supporting me is exceptional.

To have found a husband who accepts and loves me no matter what, would have been enough…but if you include the thousands of times in the last 25 years he has stopped me during the most ordinary moments to interrupt the flow of the mundane just to hold me and tell me he loves me is tremendous.

To know that yesterdays issues have evolved into nothing…is laughable.   I remember that 25 years ago, waiting for Logan’s birth I cried in my mother’s arms fearful that when this baby was all grown up he would become too independent and would want his life far from us.  I was afraid of that great loss…and admittedly although fueled by hormones, I am extremely greatful to now see both of our children firmly holding onto a sense of family. That means everything to me.

To know my own experience of surving my high risk birth in 1961, weighing in at a mere 2 lbs and having no developmental issues is essentially a miracle…and then years later to have witnessed Logan’s triumph over cancer beating tremendous odds and surviving all of the devistation his body and soul endured is all a mother could ask of G-d.

Looking over my shoulder…I see places along my path where I carefully picked my way checking my footing before placing full weight upon a rocky spot.  I see places where I ran with careless abandon along smooth, secure stretches.  I can recall times when I walked with gut wrenching determination when the ground conditions were so trecherous, but did not matter because getting to the other side did.  All a part of my life experiences.

I am so prepared to continue this walk along my life path.  I am confident in my strength and thankful for the love and companionship of my family. For those who have been with me from the very start and those who came into my life somewhere along the way.  You have enriched my life and made it joyful and precious.  I am so looking forward to the next stretch along the way. At some point in the future I might have to walk a bit more slowly, but as long as you are all with me it will be a wonderful walk…the walk of my life.

When people decide change is necessary, stand back.

Change is something necessary in the world, in fact life itself is impossible without it.  The year 2011 has seen dramatic changes sweeping our world, but even greater changes are just over the horizon, and are rushing toward us like a juggernaut.

These days I find myself thinking frequently about sustainability; that property which in Ecology represents the ability of a system to remain diverse and productive.  I see myself living in a world which cannot long sustain the use we put it to, and in a nation which cannot sustain the level of debt and spending we as citizens have insisted upon.  For a society fond of the term “You don’t get something for nothing” we seem a remarkably uncomprehending lot when it comes to economics and environmental science.

Global average temperatures are rising and anyone who looks at the data will see it.  Storms are becoming more violent and more frequent.  This May we saw the heaviest rainfall in more than fourty years in Rives Junction, MI after a very warm and stormy April.  This summer was not the hottest on record, that honor was won by 2010 which was the warmest climate in the 150 years of record keeping for the Northern Hemisphere.  The year 2011 was only the 4th hottest on record, but coming in 4th with record rain fall a year after the hottest season on record is scarcely comforting.  It is getting warmer, that much we can see.

The scientific journals I read are pretty clear there is a concensus among scientists that the world average climate is moving towards hotter temperatures, more frequent and more violent storms, longer and more severe droughts.  I can’t say what the nitwits of our society, the Limbaughs and Becks and Coulters say, because they are just animals braying in the wind for the entertainment of the ignorant.  I avoid the opinions of the clearly ignorant, and so should you; this is a serious adult subject where fantasy and ignorance are not helpful.

Do as I did: go find out for yourself what real scientists are working on and what their findings are.  What you discover will frighten you, as it has me, but you are better off knowing where we really are and where we are going.

While flying home on a business trip I sat next to some random person on my flight from Minneapolis to Detroit back in June.  It turned out he was a research professor at South Dakota State University and his specialty was interpreting satellite photos of vegitation.  He does work all over the world, and we talked non-stop for the two hour flight about climate change and sustainability.

At one point he really set me back on my heels.  I had expressed the belief that eventually, the climate in Mexico would become so hot and dry that millions of Mexicans would try to move into the USA in a relatively short period of time, totally overwhelming our ability to control the border.  He thought about that a moment and said he didn’t believe that would happen.  He told me the South-West and the Great Plains were moving into a serious long term drought that was likely to last 50 to 100 years or more.  The chances are, he thought, that the ability of the Great Plains and the South-West to produce food or to sustain a sizable population were slim.

He was telling me the bread basket of the USA was likely to become incapable of growing food, and thus the ability of the USA to feed a large population was likely to become much less.  There would be nowhere to go if you walked north from Mexico, all there would be is drought and starvation.  They would have to go elsewhere he said, but where is elsewhere?  He said climatologists are reluctant to say what many or most of them believe; that it is too late to stop this onrushing train, it’s too late to avoid the unmanageable.

As the spring rolled on toward summer, I learned of another unsustainable reality through my readings.  The USA was fast approaching it’s debt limit of $14 Trillion, give or take a few hundred Billion dollars.  Europe was fast approaching it’s own debt crisis because of Greece and a few other countries’ inability to balance their budgets.  I was worried about Europe and it’s effect on our economy, but I was even more worried about the growing bitterness and partisanship I was seeing in Washington DC and what it likely meant for finding a solution to the Debt Limit.

By late May I had come to believe our broken government couldn’t cooperate sufficiently to avoid a crisis, so I made personal financial decisions which took all of my retirement funds out of anything resembling market exposure.  From that time, to when the stock markets of the USA, Europe, and Asia started nose diving, I saved thousands of dollars of the money that will probably help me live in retirement without the Social Security “Insurance” I had paid into for the past 34 years and would in my opinion never see a penny back.

My concerns were validated:  Our two party system was paralyzed by a highly partisan and rhetorical brawl over who was to blame and how the situation should be fixed.  A meaningful compromise was not attainable, so our leaders finally agreed on a compromise that had no teeth:  an extension of the debt ceiling so the USA wouldn’t default on it’s debt, but no meaningful cuts.  There were a few hundred billions cut over the next twenty years, but the vast majority was more than 12 years in the future, long after most of the Representatives and Senators would be out of office or likely even still be alive.  Financial analysts studied the compromise and then reported that it had no teeth.  The markets moved sharply down again, and Standard & Poors downgraded the USA from a Triple-A (AAA) bond rating to a Double-A+ (AA+), eliminating about 85% of the globally available AAA investment bonds and dropping the USA out of the ranks of the most financially responsible nations for the first time in our history.  Our two parties spent a couple days throwing rocks at each other, then went on summer vacation.  Hoorah for government.

Clearly there is no easy answer to our financial quagmire, it’s going to take sacrifice and constitution to climb this hill and the hill is only getting steeper as we stand around trying to fix the blame on someone.  I can help with that part:  The Democrats and the Republicans positioned us in front of the financial chasm, and then the Tea Party loonies pushed us into it.  Now, I have fixed the blame on the responsible parties, except that I forgot to mention that we are the Democrats and Republicans and the looney Tea Party people.  Yeah, it’s us.  We are to blame.  We had no spine so we elected leaders who have no spine.  We wanted to hear fairy tales so we elected people who were good at telling the kind where people travel to Candy Mountain anytime they want, but they don’t even have to pay bus fare and they never ever get cavities or a stomach ache from all those sweets.

I once heard a quote that goes, “When you are old enough you get to see everything twice”.  Well, I’m having deja vu over this financial debate because one side keeps stating that raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans, who they call the “job creators”, will stifle job growth at a time of slow economic growth and high unemployment.  They decry this as poisonous to the creation of new jobs.  Somehow I can’t help but remember the 1980′s and ol’ President Ronald Reagan, hero of the Republican Party, who was constantly harping about his theory of “Trickledown Economics”.  I voted for Reagan but I always thought his Trickledown to be a load of manure, as we say in the country.

I can best explain how Trickledown Economics works by asking you to imagine a table where there are two very fat people sitting with a dozen very thin dogs laying on the floor around and under the table.  The table is loaded with food and the two fat people can gorge themselves on it all they want.  Occasionally some crumbs and drops fall to the floor where the dogs gobble or lap them up instantly, receiving just enough sustenance to stay alive.  Once in awhile, momentarily seized by pity or perhaps having a morsel that’s not especially tasty, one fat person will throw a scrap or perhaps a mostly gnawed bone to an especially thin dog thus lifting it a bit from it’s desperate state.

Replace the words “fat people” with “job creators” and you have successfully navigated the intellectual rapids of the politics of the privileged from 1980 to 2011.  I speak thus bluntly because I remember reading a report on a study that was done after the era of Trickledown, and the truth of it was that this notion was baseless.  Cutting taxes on the wealthiest did not produce an avalanche of productivity, which is the only true way to grow the rate of wealth creation.  Instead they mostly just kept the gains and spent them on more and better stuff, or worse yet they saved or invested them in the market.  I say this only partly tongue in cheek because by saving or investing in the market the money probably did not stimulate business through consumption of goods, so it likely didn’t help the average dog under the table at all.  So Trickledown Economics was a myth, not unlike Candy Mountain, and like Candy Mountain you fall asleep with dreams of dancing sugerplums in your head and wake up to find your kidney is missing.

Reagan grew the debt more than all other previous presidents combined.  He raised the debt ceiling more than any other president before or since.  He was a profligate spender which is why he was able to get many of his initiatives passed by Congress.  Ronny knew the give and take of politics and he was effective at it.

Now we would be convinced by some that spending cuts are the only way out of this mess, and we mustn’t touch the “Job Creators” with their lowest in 50 years tax contribution rates.  We mustn’t take away their special deductions for essentials like yachts because to take away these sweatmeats would encourage feeding more to the dogs under the table.  There is another group which is even now beginning to caw and bark about the impossibility of trimming back a 730 billion dollar (!!!!!) budget for the military in 2012.  They, meaning the military industrial complex, should all be dancing in the streets instead of acting like almost three quarters of a trillion bucks is a mere pittance they can hardly live on.

Next year’s budget looks like this:

Here is where the Federal Government of the USA will spend it's allowance in 2012.

Defense is the largest line item at 25% of the total, Health Care a close second at 23%, and Pensions third at 22%.  Defense is obvious, but Pensions is Social Security spending, and Health Care is Medicare and Medicaid spending.  Welfare which makes up 12% of spending includes unemployment payments which are to be extended again.  The rest is a bunch of things like Education which are under 5% each, and Interest on the debt at 6% of spending.

The total proposed budget is $3.7 Trillion with a deficit of about $1.06 Trillion.  Good Lord!!!  It makes me feel faint just thinking about nearly 4 Trillion dollars proposed to be spent, and a Trillion going on our Bank of China Master Card.  Who thought that was smart?

It’s times like these you need to carry a really big hatchet, have some broad shoulders and thick skin, and have a backbone.  Having an ounce of sense is helpful too.  Everyone is going to scream bloody murder when the hatchet starts swinging, and swing it we must.  We must reduce that deficit figure to as near as zero as we can.  Cuts will help us get a large part of that distance, but we will have to also reduce the amount of sweatmeats those “Job Creators” are getting and lets not confuse the issue by insisting the Fed can’t take in more money because the Fed must in order to balance the books.  We won’t get there on cuts alone.

I would love to see us try to make it mostly cuts that balance the budget, and we mustn’t get confused by the whining of the fat people or the barking of the military or the sobbing of the congress over the weapons programs their districts will lose.  This is where the thick skin and the broad shoulders and especially the backbone are needed.  There will be people who will want to talk endlessly about how much money the USA gives away to foreign countries, and about how much waste there is in welfare spending, and how much the President spends on golf trips and flying around in Air Force One.  They will talk endlessly about these subjects fully aware that these small percentages are somewhat irrelevant because they are SMALL.

They are probably trying to focus the discussion on these SMALL things in order to divert the national attention from the LARGE things, like the defense budget and sadly also the Medicare budget which is growing out of control and threatens to overtake Defense as the largest category (Medical).  This is the part where having a bit of sense is helpful.  We mustn’t be distracted by all the finger pointing and vilification that will ensue.

There is big money at stake here and it will motivate people to fight hard for their Trillions. They will lie, or at the least they will exaggerate the effects of cuts.  Defense industry people will claim our nations security is at risk if their special bomber or missile or tank or whatever isn’t purchased immediately.  Congress will claim that too if their district doesn’t get to build that bomber, or missile, or tank.  They will also claim we are crapping on the troops if we cut defense, wrapping themselves in the flag to hide the envelope full of cash in their pocket from some big defense supplier whether directly or indirectly given.

We must be clear eyed and recognize that Canada won’t be invading us, and Mexico probably won’t either.  China is too far away to invade us, the swim is simply not likely.  They want us to buy their crap anyway and we can buy more if they leave us alone.  The Muslim extremists might not leave us completely alone but if we aren’t deployed in their hometown they will likely mostly leave us alone.  Certainly enough so that we can cut a few hundred Billion from the military budget and get away with it.  The USA spends more on it’s military than all other nations on Earth put together and that is a trifle absurd because we can’t afford it.  We will have to declare victory in a couple wars and bring the troops home, but we can do it with honor and anyone thinking we won’t crush their skulls if they come mess with us should go talk to bin Laden down with the fishes.

We must get back to a sustainable situation.

I haven’t even spoken about why I started this article out speaking about climate change and environmental sustainability, then switched to economic sustainability:  The answer of course is that they are inseparable.  Climate change will cost us many many Trillions and we will probably be paying for it a very long time.  It will stretch our adaptability and our ingenuity in ways that will show whether or not we as a species are worthy of survival.  We must have both our hands available to tackle this challenge, not be hobbled by a millstone tied around our neck while we try to survive and prosper.  Remember, we have to pay off that 14 Trillion debt too, not just balance our budget.  The hill is very steep and very long, and it’s starting to get dark.

There are monumental changes coming and we had better start planning in a real way, or we risk being swept away by the storm.  It’s all completely up to us.

I flew down to attend his funeral because he was family and it seemed a meaningful gesture to my aunt Naeda and my cousins JS (John Stockton) and Alyssa. It was a good visit even though it was a sad occasion, and I was again impressed by another of my fathers siblings who was so obviously intelligent and vibrant.

If I say this as though a stranger, it would be mostly true. It had been many years since I had seen Naeda and John. My father’s family broke up back in the days when divorce was not common, especially among Catholic families. Sometimes events like these can leave strained relations and hurt feelings that linger long generations after the fact.

As a result, when I was growing up I didn’t really get to know some of my relatives. My father’s family is a collection of the most talented, intelligent, and passionate people you are likely to meet. It was a privilege to spend time with Naeda and her kids, my cousins, and to relate to them what I had learned and experienced from my own fathers death. Ironically, JS and I were the same age when our fathers died.

Sometimes you want to say something but you don’t know how it will be heard, what preconceptions people will place on your words because of history or whatever. In those situations it has worked best for me to listen to my heart and go with what I deeply feel. A person may sometimes act the fool with the words they speak, but if those words are obviously from the heart, in my experience anyway, people mostly give you the benefit of the doubt because they see your intentions are good.
As 2nd Proverbs says: “the Lord gives us wisdom, and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He holds victory in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless, for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones.”

I’ve always understood this to mean that if you have good intentions and try to follow what you know in your heart is right, you will be watched over and guided.

The next morning I had a 3 AM wake-up call so I could get to the airport early for my 6 AM flight back to Detroit. It was 4:15 AM when I reached the Raleigh-Durham Airport and it was deserted and I had no coffee in my system.

I stood at the NorthWest Airlines counter solo about 15 minutes when another traveler showed up. She was heading to Champagne-Urbana to be with her mother who was dying of complications from Emphysema. We talked awhile about that and about how nasty cigarettes are (she and I both used to smoke them) and about my wife’s grandmother who used to get the nursing home employees to buy her smokes and she’d hide them in her clothes drawers.

About this time another 25 or so people suddenly appeared. They all got in the regular line so I didn’t notice them all immediately as I was standing in the Elite line, which really just means that I fly quite a bit and flying too much can make people cranky so the airlines give you a faster line just in case.

After all the customers appeared I began to see signs of life from the other side of the counter. The NorthWest Airlines employees began popping in for a moment to load tickets into printers and such; all the stuff to get ready to help their customers get from A to B. Suddenly the crowd was straining at the leash; we could all sense the impending start of customer service. Then THEY appeared.

It was almost freakish. One moment everyone was behind the lines which demark the “being helped” from the “being helped wannabes”. Just as the first NW Airlines employees looked as though she might call out in her clear voice “Can I help the first person in line?” there was a trio of people there in front of everyone blocking all three lines. Two of them were small elderly persons dressed in the manner of someone from India and they weren’t saying anything but they looked worried. The young man, obviously their son from his demeanor, was appropriating the entire customer service complex and he didn’t even have the ticket with the next number being served printed on it. I remember thinking that Germany had it’s advantages. Such an action there would be unthinkable, they probably have special SWAT teams that rapidly deploy in such unthinkable circumstances.

I admit I was a bit bogued out by the whole line jumping and lane hogging thing, but it was still early so I just minded my own business and bided my time. Soon enough they would be served and I could get my bag checked and go find out if the NW lounge was open at 5 AM. They have coffee there you see, and free high speed internet. At least for the first several minutes I thought that. After that I was at first surprised and then a bit irritated to see that they were STILL hogging all three lines with the son standing over them like a lion defending it’s kill from a pack of hyenas. I switched my ear/brain interface on and started listening to the escalating conversation to try and understand what the heck was going on.

After a couple more minutes the situation was clear. The elderly people were indeed the younger mans parents. They were from India and they neither spoke nor could read English. One or both of them were flying to somewhere in India and the son was very concerned about them making the transfer from one flight to the next in Detroit.

The airline employee kept trying to explain to the younger man that they couldn’t provide Hindi speaking escorts to get them from one terminal to another for free. It wasn’t a language they supported like that, he would have to pay a $100.00 fee and make arrangements in advance. He kept bringing up the promises made over the phone by some anonymous NorthWest employee about the transfer and he wasn’t acting like he felt the fee was appropriate.

After another 5 minutes or so dragged by it suddenly occurred to me that he wasn’t going to give up and the airline employee couldn’t agree to his demands which included letting him beyond the secure barrier into the vitals of the airport so he could personally escort them to their gate.

Like I said, I fly quite a bit. I recognized the look on the airline employees face, it was that deer in the headlights look that says this guy is getting too aggressive and I can’t help him because it’s against rules that none of us can break. In case you didn’t already know this, the airlines have rules and they have RULES. RULES are never, ever broken … rules sometimes are. Wherever the elderly people were going they clearly were not going to be leaving Raleigh-Durham except maybe in cuffs if the son pushed the counter employee a little harder. Airlines are so terribly humorless these days.

With an air of entitlement only possible from someone standing in the (blocked) Elite line I stepped forward and asked what the problem was. I didn’t ask him, I asked her because we shared a bond: I fly NW frequently and she deals with people flying NW frequently. Clearly we had something in common. Also of course I wanted the line to start moving and at that moment there were probably few things she wanted more than that same thing.

She explained again that the elderly woman was flying to somewhere in India and had to transfer in Detroit. The son spoke up and said his mother couldn’t make it through Detroit Airport without help and he wanted the airline to keep the promise the nameless person on the phone had made. We were lining up to go around the whole argument again.

I forestalled that dire possibility by saying, “Look this woman can’t violate TSA guidelines and allow anyone without a ticket into the secure part of the airport. No matter what you say to her she can’t agree to that, she just doesn’t have the authority to make that decision and neither does her boss.” The NW employee nodded vigorously, obviously relieved that someone understood that part of her dilemma.

The younger man started to repeat his litany again about the promises that were made to him when suddenly the answer to this problem popped into my brain and the words came unbidden out of my mouth. I didn’t even think first, I just opened my mouth and said, “I will take responsibility for your relative.” The younger man and the counter person both looked at me like I had just said, “The crayon is purple” or something likewise unexpected and indecipherable. I pulled out a business card and gave it to the son and said, “I’m flying to Detroit too. I fly through Detroit Metro all the time. I know the airport very well and I promise you she will make her connection safely. You just need to explain to her that I will wait for her when I get off the plane at the door and will walk her to the correct gate.”

He looked a bit uncertain, but giving him the card was the right thing to do. He had my name, and he could see I was a business traveler. He agreed, the counter person was relieved, and the people in the line behind our little negotiation team all said nice things about my offer.

I checked my bag and waited for the trio. She didn’t check her bag, wanting to carry it on. The other two people disappeared down an escalator waving goodbye to her and the little woman was hurrying to catch up with me.

As we neared the security checkpoint it suddenly dawned on me that I was escorting someone obviously from another country who couldn’t speak any English and had a carry on. Oops. What if they questioned her? Geeze TSA loves to do that. Would they settle for her answering in Hindi that she didn’t understand them, and my assurances that the little lady in the Sari was harmless? Heck I’d known her almost 10 minutes.

Life is so hard sometimes in the morning before coffee.

It was clearly time for us to just act like it was all totally normal. Fortunately this woman was smart and she watched me carefully doing exactly what I did, removing her shoes and metal stuff and packing it all in her bin like a real travelling pro. We breezed by the TSA people, who at 5:15 AM were looking remarkably like fellow people without coffee. I believe I could have gone right through with my pet Tyrannosaurus and they wouldn’t have blinked. Or maybe my course was being guarded because my actions were just.

Whatever the reason, we got to the correct exit gate and I gestured for her to sit. I checked with the gate person, filling her in on the situation so the lady could board with me and I could see her to her seat. The gate person offered to move her up to seat 5C from the back of the plane so she was close. Clearly good deeds were a contagious phenomena. I thanked her and we switched out the ladies boarding pass. I got her onto the plane, stowed her carry on bag above for her, and took my seat 1D in 1st class going right to sleep. Sleeping is my favorite thing to do on a plane, especially at 5:30 AM and before coffee.

We got to Detroit and I waited for her at the door, then we walked to the nearest monitor and I checked her destination flight. It turned out she was flying to Evansville, Indiana not to India! I could have sworn the NW person told me India, but I’m famous for not hearing things. OK, it’s Indiana. That means terminal C. We are in terminal A. So we walked the forever walk from Terminal A to C, riding the five moving walkways, going down the big escalator, doing three more moving walkways through the weirdly beautiful light and sound art tunnel in between, then up another really big escalator, and finally we arrived at terminal C. That’s when I saw that she was in the very last gate in C. I’m talking this is the last gate on Earth. We rode six more moving walkways while I tried to monitor my walking speed so I didn’t go too fast, but the little lady dogged my heels the whole way never more than two feet behind me. I got her to the correct gate, again gestured for her to sit and be comfortable, and explained to another NW employee what the woman’s situation was and how I had become involved.

This woman also thanked me profusely and promised to put her in the correct seat personally so she would feel secure and looked after. I left feeling pretty good about doing a good deed. I waved goodbye to her and she also waved but in addition she did that praying hands in front of you bowing gesture that in India shows deep thanks and gratitude. I returned the gesture because it’s cool and it seemed both polite and appropriate.

I looked back a bit later and she was still waving good bye so I waved again feeling even better for helping her, but as I walked out of the airport it really came to me how incredibly privileged I had been that morning.

I was given the opportunity to guide a stranger in a strange land through a difficult situation and to be sure that she arrived back to her family safely and that she felt secure and cared about by the people in that strange land.

It was an awesome and humbling feeling because I really had just wanted to see her get to her destination and it seemed such a small sacrifice to make on my part so she could get there. I really hadn’t thought about how frightening it must have been for her and for her family too. I mean heck I knew what my intentions were but for them it must have been a real leap of faith, or perhaps desperation, to accept my help.

I really hoped I would get an email from the son, just telling me his mom had made it safely to Indiana, but I didn’t. It’s not that I wanted thanks, I just wanted to hear than my erstwhile travelling companion had indeed made it safely back to her family in Indiana. I have faith that she made it though and I did my best to be sure she would. I know I’d sure want someone to help my mom out in a similar situation.

As Anne Herbert said, “Practice random acts of kindness, and senseless acts of beauty.”

They are fun and they make you feel really really good.

The black and white dog put his nose through the bars and licked Linden’s hand. That was how she met Baal. Throwing conventional wisdom to the wind they adopted both dogs and took them home. It wasn’t easy. Their place was small and the dogs were very big. They weren’t house broken very well. They didn’t like Reagan’s cats. Baal had however bonded strongly with Linden and she persevered in teaching him to be a good house dog. Baal thrived with Linden and he learned swiftly.

When I first went to visit them I was impressed by how devoted Baal had become to his new master in just a short time. He had that kind of devotion that says, “You saved me and I love you for that”. Linden moved into a townhouse a month later with two of her friends and Reagan moved back to Chicago with “Brown Bear”, Baal’s brother to live with her family again. Baal was alone but he had Linden and her friends. Baal continued to thrive, winning the hearts of everyone who met him with his outgoing affection and his beautiful singing voice. Linden quickly became as devoted to Baal as he was to her, even telling her boyfriend she would help him pack when he gave her the choice of getting rid of Baal or he would move out. Linden said she had made a commitment to save Baal and she wouldn’t go back on that commitment.

At first I thought Linden hadn’t really thought through her decision to take in such a large dog, but when I first met Baal I liked him and he liked me. Every time I went over he was happy to see me again, and how do you do anything but love a dog who so clearly loves you. The first time Linden brought him over to our house Baal was very excited when he saw I lived in this house. He came right over to me and lavished his affection on me. I returned the affections because he had won my heart too and I also saw that Baal would protect Linden if she ever needed to be protected. He was friendly and warm and he was clearly alert too, missing nothing, watching everything, right in the middle of the action.

In the spring of this year Linden got another dog, a little Chihuahua she named “Little Dog” who was as silly and happy and cute as any dog I’ve ever seen. Baal grudgingly accepted the little pest into their home and the two dogs became bonded. Little Dog the worshipful little companion, Baal the big protector and teacher. They were a humorous pair, as unlikely a couple as they were both beautiful.

Last month Linden moved out of her townhouse, her lease up and her future plans unsure. She was staying here at home sometimes, other times with friends. Her dogs were difficult to carry around with her so she asked if they could stay with us and we agreed, mostly because Little Dog was such a funny little thing. Little Dog became Lori’s 2nd shadow, every night vaulting the 40 inches up into the bed and snuggling up close to her. Baal became my companion, following me around everywhere and greeting me every night when I came home from work with his chorus of joy at my return. Baal was so enthusiastic about everything. He sang if you fed him, he sang when you let him out and sang again when you let him back in. If you laughed he sang, if you went for a walk he sang. When company came over he sang his greeting after he was sure they were “OK”. Baal’s love of life was perfectly evident. He was living the life of the condemned dog who is suddenly given a reprieve from the Euthanizer’s needle and greets every day, every happy event with the joy he so clearly felt.

Every day when we went to work we put the big dogs out to spend the day on the porch and locked Little Dog in the garage because he was having some difficulty with the concept of potty is solely an outdoor thing. Every night when we came home the dogs would all be on the front porch and would come out to greet us, Baal in the fore singing his joy at our return. Last week I went to Canada again for a few days to work on a systems’ programming and when I returned Baal was right there to receive some love and to again be my companion while I sat up into the night watching CNN and working on my computer.

Last night was Baal’s end. When I went outside in the evening to make a couple calls on my cell phone he came out with me as was his wont, but he disappeared. He had started to slip away into the woods during the daytime to play in the swamp but he always came right home and was on the porch when we returned. I called him and whistled but he didn’t return. I went back out at midnight and again at 1 AM and whistled and whistled but he didn’t return. At 5 AM we got a call from Linden. She was very distraught and through her tears she told us she had a message on her cell phone that a young woman had found Baal dead, hit by a car. The young woman had communicated her own distress and sympathy for Linden’s loss and had Baal’s collar and tags for Linden.

We got up, dressed, and set off to find him in the area she said he was, but we didn’t see him. On the way home I decided to detour around the country block of roads we live on to check the road just north of our house because the cars drive very fast down that road and it had been a dark night with some fog. We found Baal there on the side of the road, cold and lifeless. I placed him in the back of our truck and we brought him home. It was a very sad experience but it was also clear that Baal hadn’t suffered, though not superficially busted up his neck and hips were broken. There were no skid marks. The car had come over the crest of the road at high speed and Baal unfortunately had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. They wouldn’t have seen him until they were right on him. His face was peaceful, there was no sign of suffering on it. He had probably been running and he left the world feeling great pleasure at hunting in the darkness under the stars with lots of good smells and interesting sights. He left the world a complete and happy dog.

This morning Lori and John and I buried Baal behind our hay field at the beginning of the woods where deer run and the tall grass and bushes are thick. We buried him in one of the places where he was happy, where we walked with him and he splashed in the pools of water that are just beyond.

We dug him a deep grave down into the grey clay that’s below the thick black dirt and below the sandy clay loam so no animal would disturb his resting place. It was a long labor but we did it well for him and I carried Baal, my friend and companion, in my arms and I laid him down to rest with one of Lindens shirts over his face, to keep the dirt off it and so he slept with her scent close to him.

Perhaps we did this for ourselves, for what does treating a dead body with dignity do for the dead? All that matters to me is I did the best I could for my pal and it helped us to feel comforted to treat him with dignity. He was a beautiful animal with a warm loving spirit who was devoted to those he loved. It was impossible not to love him because of the love that was in him freely given. I will miss him greatly.

Linden came over this afternoon, she had needed some time to grieve privately, and we walked back together to his grave. We talked about the funny things Baal did and about how much we all loved him. We especially talked about what a blessing Linden had done for Baal in giving him this last year in his life and what a beautiful dog and member of our household he had become. Sometimes we don’t get all the time we would like to have with someone or some pet that we love. Our time with Baal was too brief, for Lori and I had agreed to keep Baal permanently just last week if it turned out he wouldn’t be able to live at Linden’s new place. Maybe it wasn’t the quantity of time that mattered most though. Baal gave us at least as much as we gave him and we are richer for having known that beautiful animal and faithful companion.