dual personalities

Month: October, 2024

October 17, 2024

“Their foot shall slide in due time.”*

by chuckofish

Well, fall is finally here. I wore a turtleneck yesterday and switched out all my summer clothes. Now we have to enjoy it while we can before the winter winds begin to blow!

In other news the biggest pumpkin of the year weighed in at 2,471 pounds in California. Well, hey, congratulations. I had two pumpkin vines going and they flowered and grew, but, alas, no pumpkins emerged. C’est la vie. I suppose I will have to hop over to the pumpkin patch at the Methodist Church and buy some.

In my daily Bible reading, I am finally in the New Testament. It was a long haul through the OT–not that I’m complaining–but I’m ready to move on. Maybe I should watch The Ten Commandments (1956) to make sure I won’t forget what a great thing it was when God parted the Red Sea and how bad we stiff-necked sinners are who doubt and fuss and want to turn back to Egypt over and over and over again.

We do not have all the time in the world to repent and change our ways. And we are not reminded of this enough. Memento mori. Even at this time of year, when my neighborhood is populated with giant skeletons and plastic grave markers galore and the world is teetering on collapse, we go blithely on our merry way.

Well, here’s your reminder to turn back, O man, forswear thy foolish ways.

The bow of God’s wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing but the mere pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without any promise or obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with your blood.

(Jonathan Edwards–read the whole sermon here.)

But I’ll let Isaiah have the last word today.

“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
    I have called you by name, you are mine.
2 When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
    and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
    and the flame shall not consume you.
3 For I am the Lord your God,
    the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

(Isaiah 43:1-3)

*Deuteronomy 32:35

3 Comments
October 16, 2024

A little bit o’ history

by chuckofish

On this day in 1849 at a convention in St. Louis’s old courthouse, 800 delegates heard a speech by Missouri’s veteran U.S. senator Thomas Hart Benton. With his customary persuasiveness, Benton launched into a recital of the glories and riches which would come from a transcontinental railway.

Summing up his argument, he pointed majestically westward and cried, “There is the East! There is India!” Expertly phrased, perfectly timed, and dramatically delivered, Benton’s stunning conclusion electrified his audience and strengthened the case for the projected railroads as no other argument had done.

The occasion is preserved in the bronze statue of Benton in Lafayette Park as portrayed by American sculptor Harriet Hosmer. The closing words of his speech are engraved at his feet.

Harriet Hosmer was about 30 years old and living in Rome when she received the commission. She sculpted the statue in Rome in 1861. It was then cast by the Royal Bronze Foundry in Munich in 1864.

The resulting statue is a colossal standing figure of Senator Benton. It stands ten feet tall and is two feet, ten inches wide and deep. Benton wears a classical toga over a contemporary jacket and neck scarf. He is wearing sandals, faces west and holds a partially unrolled scroll of a map with the word “America” on it. Dedicated in 1868, it was the first public monument in the State of Missouri.

The park also boasts a bronze casting from a life-sized statue of George Washington by French sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon, which was placed in the park in 1869.

Lafayette Park was set aside from the St. Louis Common in 1836 and dedicated in 1851 as one of the first public parks, and by far the largest of its era, in the City of St. Louis, Missouri. It is considered by many historians to be the oldest urban park west of the Mississippi. Indeed, at 30 acres, Lafayette Park is one of the larger parks in the city even though it is still dwarfed by Forest Park which is about 46 times larger.

*Information for this post is from St. Louis Day By Day by Frances Hurd Stadler and the Lafayette Park Conservancy.

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October 15, 2024

A leaf in shadow

by chuckofish

Yesterday Ron, my co-editor of the Kirkwood Historical Review, came over to discuss the issue I am currently getting ready to send to the printer and he grumbled about how nippy it was outside. Indeed, the frost will be on the pumpkin very soon! And about time, really. I am ready for nippy.

Today we toast Jane Darwell, the wonderful character actress of 170+ films, who was born on this day in 1879.

I was surprised to learn that she was born in Palmyra, Missouri, the daughter of the president of the Louisville Southern Railroad. You can actually visit her birthplace, which is on the National Register of Historic places. I just saw her in My Darling Clementine (1946) and she was wonderful as always. Other favorites include: Bright Eyes (1934) plus four other Shirley Temple movies, 3 Godfathers (1948), Wagon Master (1950), and her final film, Mary Poppins (1964) as the old Bird Woman. She won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for The Grapes of Wrath (1940).

In October desiringGod is on a 31-day journey with Heroes of the Reformation. Every day they highlight a different hero, such as Thomas Cranmer. Not surprisingly, I am enjoying it a lot.

This is a very hopeful article about preaching the gospel in the wasteland of New England.

Meanwhile, the prairie girls went to the library and Ida was, as usual, too cool for school.

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October 14, 2024

Be thou my battle shield

by chuckofish

Well, things are getting back to normal after our exciting travels/recovery. We even had a DAR meeting on Saturday. Madame Regent (daughter #1) asked me to step in and be the Chaplain for the meeting, which I enjoyed. I was praised for my extemporaneous grace before our meal, but as a former Episcopalian, it was hardly off-the-cuff.

Give us grateful hearts, O Father,

For all thy mercies

And make us mindful of the needs of others;

Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

We had a guest speaker from the Gateway Arch Park Foundation, who was very interesting. We were reminded, of course, by a former regent that it was our Cornelia Greene Chapter who gave the original beacon which tops the Arch and that two dauntless ladies from the chapter made a presentation up there back in 1974. Indeed, the ladies stood on a 5-foot flat section and were warned to stay in the middle as there was no railing! Everything went fine, except a helicopter from a local news station spotted Mrs. Schoetker’s orange pantsuit and reported all afternoon that there was a jumper on the Arch! (We have a photo to prove this.)

You gotta love it.

It is time to sponsor Wreaths Across America–a donation ensures the placement of a veteran’s Christmas wreath for one or more veterans laid to rest at participating national cemeteries. I sponsor wreaths for my father and for my father-in-law. Lest we forget. If you would like to sponsor a wreath(s) go here.

Our Sunday church service was outside on the lawn and it was a beautiful sunny morning. Just perfect. The boy and the twins joined me and helped me with my folding chairs. I noticed that there was a Tesla Cybertruck in the parking lot and when I pointed it out to the bud, he could hardly contain his excitement. At the end of the service all the little boys in the congregation swarmed the area where it was parked. I should have taken a picture! It was pretty funny. I never did find out to whom the truck belongs.

One little boy asked me if it was my truck and I said, No. He said, My grandpa has a Cybertruck Beast which is five times faster than the Cybertruck. “As fast as a cheetah!” Boys do not change. Thank God.

Meanwhile daughter #2, DN and the prairie girls went to a fall festival and went on a hayride!

Team Pink Shoes

And I am very proud of Mr. Smith who can now ride in the front seat like a big boy. (He prefers to sit in the driver’s lap and look out the window, but…the front seat is a big step up from the crate in the back.)

This article about how one Florida zoo got creative to keep its animals safe during both hurricanes was very interesting.

This article expresses what I have been thinking about lately: No little people, no little places. “Jesus commands Christians to seek consciously the lowest room. All of us—pastors, teachers, professional religious workers and nonprofessional included—are tempted to say, ‘I will take the larger place because it will give me more influence for Jesus Christ.’ … But according to the Scripture this is backwards: We should consciously take the lowest place unless the Lord himself extrudes us into a greater one.” (Remember Luke 14:10.)

Have a good week. Fight the good fight.

Be Thou my battle shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tow’r:
Raise Thou me heav’nward, O Pow’r of my pow’r.

    –Ancient Irish poem, translated by Mary E. Byrne, 1905, versified by Eleanor H. Hull, 1912

    3 Comments
    October 11, 2024

    “Forget the workin’ blues and let the good times roll!”

    by chuckofish

    Hello and happy Friday. Never have I related more to George Jones than after this work week. Eyeroll. I don’t have a wild weekend planned, just a DAR meeting and Sunday School, but I understand the sentiment.

    Anyway, as is usual after a wild trip with my parents, I am here to regale you with tales from the road. And the roads were not what I expected in Arizona. I was apprehensive about driving many hours across what I presumed, incorrectly, would be vast, empty desert. Instead, what I found was several hours of mountainous speed driving with a lot of traffic and then several hours of even faster desert driving with traffic. The passing games were wild. At times, it felt like I was in a driving video game–Grand Theft Auto: Navajo Nation Edition. Okay, maybe more like MarioKart–there were many of levels and obstacles.

    And by levels and obstacles, I mean exciting warning signs, including, but not limited to:

    –Chain-Up Area

    –Brake-Check Area

    –Elk Next 40 Miles

    –Truck Run-Off Ramp

    –Run-Off Ramp for Out-of-Control Vehicles Only (this sent my mother into hysterics)

    –6% Grade Next 20 Miles

    –Watch for Rocks

    –SAVE YOUR BRAKES (seriously, this is a real sign)

    –Cattle Next 11 Miles (so specfic)

    –No Services 20 Miles

    –Rest Area TRUCKS ONLY (discrimination!!)

    It was quite the adventure. And thankfully, there were no signs about being wary of bears. Although, we did see a number of billboards for a wildlife park in Williams called Bearizona which, frankly, gets all the points for best name ever.

    And I know you’ve been waiting for an update on Mr. Smith–he spent seven whole days at the kennel and then had to get a bath on the last day before I picked him up. He was happy to see me and very tired. And he has been my sweet shadow all week.

    It’s finally Friday–have some fun!

    4 Comments
    October 10, 2024

    Bric-à-brac

    by chuckofish

    Hard to believe it is October 10th already and we are well on our way to Halloween (or, if you prefer, Reformation Day) and the slide to the end of the year!

    Don’s  chrysanthemums

    Yesterday I had lunch with my friend Ben at his fancy retirement community. We were joined by three other friends who live there which made it almost a party. It was quite enjoyable and a reminder that old friends are best. We talked about poetry and old times and avoided politics.

    Speaking of celebrating, today we toast the great Yul Brynner on the anniversary of his death in 1985. Yul was without peer and we will enjoy watching one of his movies.

    Shall it be The King and I (1956) or The Magnificent Seven (1960) or The Ten Commandments (1956)?

    We are experiencing absolutely beautiful weather here in flyover country and I feel almost guilty considering what those south and east of us are enduring. There but for the grace of God…Here’s an inspiring article about God’s Grace working through the church in the wake of Hurricane Helene.

    Daughter #2 sent this picture and it made me chuckle:

    Preschool on the prairie

    And finally, this made me laugh–100 raccoons! ‘Somehow the word got out in raccoon land and they all showed up to her house expecting a meal,’ Kevin McCarty, a spokesperson for the Kitsap County Sheriff, said.

    Have a good day and keep praying.

    6 Comments
    October 9, 2024

    Semper Fidelis, Code Talkers

    by chuckofish

    While staying on the Navajo Rez in Monument Valley we were reminded several times of the Navajo code talkers of WWII fame. You will recall that this was the ingenious idea of using the Navajo language to write an unbreakable code–one of America’s all-time great secret weapons. After Pearl Harbor, and because the Japanese had broken all the codes previously sent over the radio waves, the Marines were desperate to find a secure way to communicate vital information with precious little time. After several successful tests, the Navajo language was approved as a communication code.  

    But we wondered, who originally had this brilliant idea?

    Well, I looked into this and it was Philip Johnston, the son of a Christian missionary, who had grown up on a Navajo reservation and had learned the language in his youth. In fact, Johnston became so fluent in the (very difficult) Navajo language that he was asked in 1901 at age 9 to serve as an interpreter for a Navajo delegation sent to Washington, D.C., to lobby for Indian rights. Philip was the Navajo/English translator between the local Navajo leaders and President Theodore Roosevelt.

    Johnston said he came up with the idea of enlisting Navajos as signalmen early in 1942, when he read a newspaper story about the army’s use of several Native Americans during training maneuvers with an armored division in Louisiana. The article also stated that, during World War I, Native Americans had acted as signalmen for the Canadian army to send secure messages about shortages of supplies or ammunition.

    Shortly thereafter, Johnston contacted the military with his idea: “My plan is not to use translations of an Indian language, but to build up a code of Indian words. Let’s imagine this code included terms such as ‘fast shooter’ to designate a machine gun, and ‘iron rain’ for a barrage. Navajo personnel would be thoroughly drilled to understand and use these substitutions.”

    I mean, brilliant.

    During the course of the war, about 400 Navajos participated in the code talker program. Their hard work was not recognized until after the declassification of the operation in 1968.

    President Ronald Reagan gave the Code Talkers a Certificate of Recognition and declared August 14 “Navajo Code Talkers Day” in 1982. President George W. Bush presented the Congressional Gold Medal to the four surviving Code Talkers at a ceremony held in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington in July 2001.

    To my knowledge Philip Johnston was never recognized with a medal or special ceremony for his great idea. But hats off to him.

    If you would like to read more about this, check this and this out.

    4 Comments
    October 8, 2024

    “Crying – acceptable at funerals and the Grand Canyon.”*

    by chuckofish

    Well, I did not cry at the Grand Canyon. And I did not cry in Monument Valley, despite a lot of teasing by daughter #1 concerning that.

    But the Grand Canyon is pretty overwhelming, I must say.

    “We are all starved for the glory of God, not self. No one goes to the Grand Canyon to increase self-esteem. Why do we go? Because there is greater healing for the soul in beholding splendor than there is in beholding self.”

    –John Piper

    Always promoting Ultimate Lacrosse

    I talked to my Bible Study leader, a woman in her eighties, on Sunday about our trip and she said she had been to the Grand Canyon with her husband and they had hiked from the South Rim to the canyon base. I was, like, WHEN? She said, oh, a few years ago, when I was in my late fifties-early sixties. Well, we made it to the South Rim (by train) and stayed there! The OM was really having trouble, but even so, I would not have attempted hiking. I saw three separate elderly men trip and fall and other people take ridiculous risks to take photos. I was not there to prove anything.

    We stayed at the Grand Canyon Railway Hotel in Williams, AZ, “where comfort and leisure await”…

    …and took the two-hour and fifteen minute train ride to the canyon and back with a three-hour stopover. This was perfect for us. During that time we spent a goodly portion in the bar of the historic El Tovar Hotel just steps away from the Rim. Teddy Roosevelt stayed there.

    I feel no shame about this.

    We all really enjoyed the train ride to and from the Canyon. There were even cowboy re-enactors who arrived on horseback…

    …and then appeared on board to rob the train. (One was a dwarf.) Lottie perked up when she heard about this development–“Wait a minute. You were robbed?! The train was robbed?”

    Hokey, maybe, but enjoyable, although daughter #1 was unamused when she, of course, was singled out by the “Marshall” (twice) to engage with.

    Anyway, the train is the way to go–no parking, no waiting in line, a bar car.

    We had some fun on this trip, but, as always, I was glad to get back to my flyover home.

    Also, if you want to help the people in North Carolina and all those effected by Hurricane Helene, give to Samaritan’s Purse.

    Samaritan’s Purse is responding in five locations after Hurricane Helene left a 500-mile trail of devastation from the Gulf Coast of Florida to the mountains of western North Carolina.

    • The storm hit Florida late on Thursday, Sept.26, as a Category 4 hurricane. It then tore through Georgia and the mountains and foothills of the Carolinas, toppling trees and causing severe flash flooding. The damage is historic. More than 225 people have died, with many still missing.
    • We have established 3 relief bases in North Carolina and stretching into eastern Tennessee. Volunteers are also working at sites in Georgia and Florida.
    • Volunteer teams started work on Sept. 30 from all six locations.

    Please pray.

    *Ron Swanson, “Parks and Recreation”

    4 Comments
    October 7, 2024

    Yá’át’ééh

    by chuckofish

    Hello! We made it back from the Navajo Nation and Arizona.

    All went pretty smoothly and my travel planning skills were generally high-fived all around. The OM had some trouble adjusting to the altitude, but he soldiered on. We hydrated. Daughter #1 did a A+++++ job as our driver/navigator/community engagement coordinator.

    Monument Valley is a remote place and it is not easy to get to. It was a six hour drive from Phoenix (this after getting up at 3 a.m. to make a 6:00 a.m. flight!) through the mountains. No one told us Flagstaff is in the mountains! (If I knew, I had forgotten.) Daughter #1 will regale you with her memories of this later in the week.

    But we made it and I am amazed when I look back at my photos and realize, yes, we were actually there in this amazing, other-wordly place. You literally can not take a bad picture.

    We stayed at Goulding’s Lodge, which has been in operation 100 years. It is where John Ford and his actors and crew stayed and that is respected and honored, but not overdone or commercialized.

    We enjoyed it very much and would recommend it highly. There is a dusty old museum…

    …and you can go in Nathan Brittles’ (John Wayne’s) cabin from She Wore a Yellow Ribbon.

    We stayed in a “villa” and not the main hotel…

    This was our view in the morning, drinking coffee on the porch…

    We took a great 3.5 hour tour led by Sam, our Navajo guide, through Monument Valley. We rode in a Hatari-reminiscent open vehicle and got out at many points along the way and walked around.

    Our fellow tourists, most of whom were Europeans (French and German), looked exactly like variations on my brother and sister-in-law. We were all exhausted and dusty by the end. Wonderful.

    Truly it was kind of a religious experience for me, on the level with going to the Holy Land a few years ago. No kidding. I loved everything.

    Back home on Saturday night I watched My Darling Clementine (1946) and it was awesome.

    On Sunday we watched Ford’s masterpiece, The Searchers (1956). OMG.

    Wow.

    Tomorrow I’ll tell you about our adventures at the Grand Canyon!

    P.S. Many thanks to daughter #2 and DN for taking care of the blog last week! Much appreciated. (Hope it didn’t inconvenience the prairie girls too much 😉!)

    There’s not a plant or flow’r below, but makes Thy glories known,
    And clouds arise, and tempests blow, by order from Thy throne;
    While all that borrows life from Thee is ever in Thy care;
    And everywhere that we can be, Thou, God, art present there.

    –Isaac Watts, 1715

    6 Comments
    October 4, 2024

    Make yourself a bongo

    by chuckofish

    DN here with a Friday guest post. But don’t worry, I won’t be exhorting you to flip through a book…unless that book is full of compact discs! Hundreds of compact discs? Binders full of compact discs, and a car with a compact disc player to boot? Yes, please.

    Thank you for saving these, mom and dad!

    Unfortunately, a few of these discs do not play in our Subaru. Do you remember when a handful of record labels began copy-protecting CDs, so that a disc’s content could not be burned to a blank CD-R or even played on a computer at all? The band My Morning Jacket was so displeased that they sued Sony over it and offered to rip copies of their album themselves for fans. It’s a shame. That album has some great tracks.

    This copy protection technology continues to haunt me, because it seems that our Subaru’s sound system works by reading or downloading the tracks rather than simply “playing” them. Is this different from the anti-skip technology found in portable CD players of yore? I have no idea. Was life better when the tunes were pumped through a cassette adapter attached to the Panasonic Extra Anti-Shock ((Shock Wave)) with XBS [extra bass]?

    Well, no. This thing skipped constantly from the floor on the front passenger’s side. I guess I’ll just have to learn to live without the few albums that Subie won’t play. Even if this 2003 article from a law journal argues that copy protection violates my First Amendment rights.

    Even without the copy-protected CDs, there is plenty to listen to. Ever on-trend, Katie’s recent favorite has been Oasis’s (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? How many four-year-olds do you know who wander around the house singing softly to themselves about how it’s never going to be the same / cause the years are falling by like the rain? Her wistfulness is haunting. What could my four-year-old feel nostalgic for?


    Katie’s mood calls to mind our return trip from Michigan last month, when she burst into tears listening to a Pete the Cat song about how hard it is to be “the new kid.” Despite her tears, Katie wouldn’t let us stop playing the song. She wanted to hear the song! She wanted to feel sad. She told us this. She has a rich interior life.

    Among the pleasures of replaying (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? is the chance to introduce my incredible Oasis Voice™ to a new generation. Katie does not appreciate it—yet. En uh shahm-payn soup-er-know-ver en the skaw-eye.


    Nailed it.

    Another fun wrinkle is that Katie has begun to mashup Oasis and Pete the Cat. For example, in “One Cat’s Bucket,” a song about finding the good in every day, the chorus is:

    One cat’s bucket is empty
    He ain’t got nothing to show
    Another cat flips it upside down
    And makes himself a bongo


    But now—and you’ll never be able to unhear it after reading the following words—the other cat flips it upside down, and cham-pagne sup-er-nov-er.

    For the record, Ida loves my Oasis impression.

    I am of the opinion that the disappearance of physical media also entails the loss of certain listening habits—habits that provided the conditions for an important attitude or value. Be patient with art. The hassle of unwrapping, uncasing, and inserting a CD meant that you were more likely to listen to an entire album. The difficulty of fast forwarding to a specific moment on a track meant that you didn’t even try. You just waited–and not even for that long! Just for a little bit. You waited, and while you were waiting, you listened. Now our Subaru has a digital slider that I can tap and drag to any moment in a song.

    On the other hand, zoomers are apparently buying CDs again. Maybe there is hope after all. At least we know this for certain: Ida will never stop thinking that her dad is hilarious.

    6 Comments