Passing by
We only got a glimpse this time. You can’t do everything. Some things are once. We stopped before. We nodded and remembered the first time around. This time around we passed up on the Eisenhower library and the cathedral on the plains in Victoria. We tried to see different things. I can’t believe that I have been to Kansas as many times as I have. Shhhhh, let’s keep this fact quiet.
Fading
As the windmills capture renewable energy, it’s free right? You don’t own the wind? The old plains windmills are fading. I think they were used to pump water. You still see the quaint windmills and the farm houses one following the other. But now more and more they are dwarfed by progress. And with progress the family farm is fading into the industrial farming that requires big money and less risk. Nature prevails. And we leave behind the abandoned buildings that will gradually fall down.
Windmills of my mind
Windmill farms. It’s not traditional in the conventional sense of a farm. We are in tornado alley. How appropriate. The winds sweeping down the high plains… “Oklahoma…” (the Broadway song). There is a random planned layout I assume. It looks random to me but there is an engineer somewhere who decided on placement and spacing. The giant turbines sit in the fields of multiple use. Look closely. There is a tiny little water wheel mill dwarfed by the big ones. I assume it is worth the expense. At night the warning lights all blink simultaneously. That’s kind of spooky soothing. This is the future. Renewable energy. More?
Supermoon
There have been a few of late. The next will be in 2034, so they say. I keep running into one. The last was in Saudi a couple years back. It’s nice that the news keeps telling me that a supermoon is in the sky. At least the sky has not fallen given recent events. I had to make adjustments for the supermoon to expose itself on my point and shoot. It ain’t easy. But I got it. I’m not at all certain to be here when the next one comes around. In the meantime, could you dial up a blue moon soon?
Another Sunset
The term high plains comes to mind. It is around here somewhere. Probably not here but it is a term that sounds good. It’s flat. My GPS shows the road stretching straight due west. The sun does not exactly set due west either. I guess that’s another misconception. Grain silos dot the landscape. They are tall majestic structures that interrupt the skyline like trees or mountains if there were any around here. There aren’t. As the sun sets you take what you can get. I shot from my car window on the go way over the speed limit and my spiffy point and shoot did what it was supposed to do. Am I good or am I good?
SSDD
You’d have to be on the inside to get the title of my post. Yup. St Fidelis church/cathedral. The cemetery was just a few blocks away set on the open plain. Long long ago the winds were so strong that the local blacksmiths began making iron crosses from scrap materials at hand. It’s unusual.
We met a woman who had lost her husband a year ago to the day and she was visiting the grave site. She struck up a conversation; his sudden death was from a cerebral aneurysm. My specialty. We spoke. I sympathized. The nearest hospital with a neurosurgeon was more than three hours away. Her husband of 60+ years was gone in about 10 days. Sad.
The past several days have been a time of reflection. Media, emails, conversations – direct and overheard, all of this has filled the dialog. It’s different, not the same, visceral unlike ever before. Its too late. This is not a novel or some movie. The ending is not what was expected. We are stuck with this turn of history. Civility and decency seem to have been turned on its head. The obvious is not so. What I read, saw, and heard is not what others experienced. I am bewildered. Others want to demonstrate and protest and resist. The contest is done. There is a winner. We may all be losers. Or not. It’s not over. That is the scary admission. Sometimes I think that it is good to have faith…
Inspiration
In the aftermath of the recent national election I found myself in the most unlikely of places – Kansas, a red state – at the Eisenhower Library. I guess there is a plan. I had expected Dorothy and the wicked witch and instead got some comfort and inspiration. All is not lost despite the news and the horror of the outcome. (I guess you how I voted.) “I’ve never voted for a winner,” I had proclaimed after I cast my vote. And as always I was completely surprised that the “left wing biased media” had failed to predict the election with failure as abysmal as a weatherman during a winter blizzard.
It was heartening to watch a dated video from my childhood ’60’s and realize that there are good people. Evil does not prevail. There is good that comes from horrific war (WW II). The bad guys (bad hombres) may have their day, but, good can win out. Patience. To all of those who agonize, patience. To the smug, your time will come.
Healing
After the recent election there has been a good deal of turmoil. I daresay it is worse than any other time. We are deeply divided and this will not change nor will it be better any time soon. There are many calls to a peaceful transition. The passions are high, the sides are opposed, and the opponents are both horrified with each other. This is not a usual time. I feel unclean.
I am in Kansas in the Cathedral of the Plains. There was no one else there, not a soul, and we meditated. I lit a candle of my brother John. A church program talked of the turmoil within the congregation. The sign said enough to make me realize that I am not alone. There are 59 million other voters who disagree with my view. Some I call friends. Others I would rather not know because I cannot understand their vote. And, they cannot understand me. I am sad. But I also know that I am not alone. At a place far from my home, I have found there are those who share the same concern. We may have lost our way but we are not lost. One man one vote, there is virtually nothing else to be done until the next opportunity comes in a couple years. Petitions, demonstrations, protests, marches, all are useless. The vote is done. No one will care about what I say or do now. Only my vote in two years may have any possibility to change things. Don’t forget. I won’t. There will be a reckoning. My vote will count then. To be sure, you will remember then that I did not forget.
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