Cactus and Cotton

Cole Porter once composed a song called “Summertime”, in which he wrote; “the living is easy, the fish are jumping and the cotton is high….” Well, he was right on three out of the four; I don’t have any fish; but my cotton is getting higher. It’s a pity he didn’t mention the cactus though, because mine just keeps on blooming, rain or shine. As a matter of fact, the last two blooms have emerged in the middle of sultry, rainy nights, upending my previous belief that they only bloomed in the hot desert sun. The cactus was a gift from my daughter, and this is the 4^th time it has bloomed in the last several months.

Now; let me get back to the cotton. I have only had one previous experience in growing cotton. That was about 10 years ago on the back porch of the house we were living in at the time. I had quite a crop. There were about 6 plants in all, which is like a plantation to someone from Brooklyn. The seeds come up fast, in only a few days, then after a few more weeks the little pink flowers; which soon turn white; appear. These are the harbingers of the cotton bolls which will take their place, eventually becoming hard and wood like husks protecting the precious cotton growing within.

My crop is small. Mostly, I just take a certain joy out of the plant and its little white balls of fluff. It amazes me; as do most things; that there is a code embedded within these tiny seeds which never changes.  It’s eternal.

There is nothing quite like a field of cotton in bloom, it looks like snow has fallen. There are several cotton fields near my house, which is where I got the seeds last fall. I have given some of the cotton balls which I picked then; and contain the seeds; to some of the kids down the street. I hope that they will have success with them.

There is little that can be compared to watching a seed grow into something as majestic as fully grown cotton.  It’s like looking at the history of ancient Egypt; and also like peeking into our own American past, when cotton was king, and human beings were enslaved for the harvest. And, in spite of the beautiful view, if you look at the fields hard enough, you can almost imagine hearing the crack of the whip.

"Swing Wedding" - MGM (1937)

This is the cartoon which was released by Hugh Harman/Rudolf Ising Productions following their earlier Oscar nominated cartoon “The Old Mill Pond” in 1936. The big difference between that effort and this one is that this cartoon has a story to it.  Among the African-American celebrities pictured here as frogs are Cab Calloway, Ethel Waters, Stepin Fetchit, Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller, Bill Robinson and the Boswell Sisters. If there are any I have missed, let me know.

Some people nowadays will find this cartoon to be politically incorrect. My only response to that is that at the time this cartoon was released most African-Americans were simply glad to be portrayed in cartoons at all, let alone as very talented characters. Imagine going to the movies, week after week; and not only do you have to sit in the balcony; but all the film’s stars were white actors and actresses, with African-Americans playing servants. Followed up by white cartoon characters could leave a black person feeling really left out.

There were some really great African-American films at the time, I have reviewed several here. My favorites are “Cabin In the Sky” and “Stormy Weather”, which showcase both the musical and dramatic talents of the black actors and actresses of the era. I hope that you will enjoy this cartoon for what it is and not for what you may perceive it to be. For me, it is 8 minutes of musical, and visual, delight.

If you are African-American; and over 55 years old; I would love to hear your take on this cartoon. The reason I have chosen this age group is that these would be the people who were at least  about 8 years old at the time of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965. As such, this group would have lived under some form of segregation. In my mind, this gives them a unique perspective on the subject.  

"City of Scoundrels" by Gary Krist (2012)

July 1919 was known as the Red Summer for several reasons. The Bolsheviks had just taken over Russia in the Revolution of 1917, and there was a world war that had just ended, with millions of people heaping blame for the carnage on the backs of the Industrialists, whom many believed suckered us into a war for profit. Coupled with the rise of the Unions in our own country, with their links to the Communist movement taking place world-wide, a young man named J. Edgar Hoover was just launching his infamous “Red Squads”, who were responsible for rounding up, and deporting, those who would foster discontentment and dissent in America.

This was also a time of great scientific and mechanical advancement. The airplane had proven itself useful as a tool for war, but with peacetime there came the question of what to do with airpower. It was already being used to transport the mail, but what about people? Part of that aerial technology was the zeppelin; or dirigible; which carried passengers in a gondola suspended from the zeppelin itself. In July of 1919 one such zeppelin was scheduled to land in Chicago to much acclaim. There was even talk of Chicago becoming the destination for flights from London and Paris, which would bypass New York, carrying her passengers further into the interior of the United States than an ocean voyage to our coast could accomplish. Until this point, if you came from Europe hoping to settle anywhere in the interior portion of the United States, you first took a ship to the coast of New York, or San Francisco, and then worked your way inward from there.

Fresh from our victory in Europe, flush with capital to invest in new technologies, few could have imagined the chain of events which would begin with the arrival of Goodyear’s zeppelin “Wingfoot Express” on July 21, 1919 in Chicago.

At approximately 5 PM on that day; just as the fans at Comiskey Park were 3 innings into a double header between the New York Yankees and the Chicago White Sox; the Wingfoot Express exploded over downtown Chicago, crashing through the glass domed roof of the Illinois Trust Company building, and setting fire to an area of Chicago’s famed loop. The 5 passengers and crew all jumped with parachutes, but only 4 opened properly, and even those caught fire from being too close to the burning zeppelin as they opened.

As horrifying as this event was, it was only the beginning. For the next 2 weeks Chicago would be torn by unrelated tragedies, all unfolding upon the heels of the last one. Within 2 days of the zeppelin incident, a race riot broke out in South Chicago at the 26^th Street section of the beach along the shores of the lake, which was broken up into several segregated places for blacks and whites to swim separately. The riot began as a routine disagreement, but quickly became one of the worst race riots in American history.

A transit strike followed on the heels of that tragedy, forcing many Chicagoans into the street for their commutes to work. This event only served to enlarge the violence begun by the riots at the beach, as blacks and whites were forced, by the strike, to pass through one another’s neighborhoods, and multiplying the odds for even more violence.

As if this was not enough trouble for one town to deal with in such a short period of time, the body of a 6 year old girl, who had been missing, was found in the basement of a tenement building on the North Side of Chicago. This was the worst part of the entire 2 weeks, as neighbors began to distrust their neighbors, and no children played in the streets.

The evangelical put it down to the wrath of God, and while the blacks and whites blamed one another, there were still others, some with political ambitions, who were willing to add fuel to the fire in order to reap some sort of benefits from these combined tragedies.

A wide ranging look at one of America’s most fascinating cities, the author has crafted a highly readable book from the ashes of a summer which spun wildly out of control.

"12 O'Clock High" with Gregory Peck (1949)

When I was kid my parents were good friends with a couple named Ruth and Terry Vine. Terry had been a tail gunner aboard a B-17 bomber in the Second World War, which elevated him to a status usually reserved for the Gods. He was a real live combat veteran. He still had his leather flight jacket hanging in the garage, twenty years after his last bombing run. He didn’t speak much about the war, except to tell me how it was okay to be scared sometimes, as he was in the tail section of the B-17, where there was no room to wear a parachute.

This film, “12 O’clock High”, was released in 1949, and garnered an Academy Award Nomination for Gregory Peck as Best Actor. In addition, it is also one of the earliest movies to realistically deal with the issue of combat fatigue, or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, as we now call it. Up until that point; with the exception of “All Quiet on the Western Front”; most war movies were blood and guts stories about the glory of war. In this film, writers Sy Bartlett and Beirne, who also did the screenplay, dispel that notion. In that sense, this is a very important film.

Gregory Peck plays the seemingly unfeeling General Frank Savage, who has been assigned to a bomber squadron flying out of England. The squadron has become a joke, with more men on the sick list than flying missions. General Savage has been sent to turn the squadron around. He finds them to be the victims of low morale, and sets upon a course to re-invigorate the squadron. His initial efforts are considered too tough and unfeeling by his assistant, Lt. Gately, played by Hugh Marlowe. Lt. Gately feels that the men have been pushed beyond their limit, and like most of the squadron, has become a hard drinker. This puts him at odds with the General, who insist that everyone fly if they are physically capable of doing so. He is not concerned with morale; only results.

As the story unfolds, and the losses in the squadron mount, two things become abundantly clear; as the men get stronger and more confident, the weight of command begins to take its toll on the General, who feels each loss deeply, while struggling to maintain his sense of command.

A brilliantly conceived and filmed story of the men who flew the bombing runs which enabled us to win the war in Europe, this film goes further than any other film of the time in assessing the damage done not only to the enemy, but to our side as well. This is a gripping film about the price of war, and the limitations of the ordinary men who are called upon to fight it.

"The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" with Judi Dench (2011)

This unusually captivating movie follows the adventures of 7 English people, all elderly, who go to India; and the dilapidated Marigold Hotel, located in Jaipur, India; some to discover themselves, and others to recapture the past. Their lives become one story, concerning aging, and the changes one must accept in everything, from thinking to doing. To that end, this story has an interesting perspective on the question of whether all things really do turn out all right in the end.

Tom Wilkinson plays a retired judge with a secret. He is gay, laboring all these decades under a burden of guilt stemming from a relationship he had with an Indian man when younger. He feels that he has ruined the other man’s life, and he has kept the whole event bottled up. When he dies in India, after meeting with the man and his family, he realizes the irony of his whole life, yet dies contented when he sees that the other man has not forgotten him, and has not suffered from the affair. He has even told his wife about his feelings, underscoring what the judge has missed out on his entire life; an honest relationship. His former lover scatters his ashes with his family, and the judge’s fellow travelers, in full attendance.

There is also the widowed woman, played by Julie Dench, who goes to India for financial purposes. When her husband passes away she is forced to leave England in order to live more cheaply. By obtaining a job in a call center, she is able to help others understand that the person on the other end of the phone is a real human being, not just a script to follow in order to close the deal.

The married couple; Douglas and Jean, played by Bill Nighy and Penelope Wilton; are both locked in a marriage clearly on the verge of collapse, and must come to terms with the end of their relationship. This part of the film is one that hits home for a lot of people. They are mismatched; he wants to live and explore life, while she is bitter and unhappy with the 40 years they have behind them. When she goes home without him, he is free to finally admit that the relationship never worked, and so he moves on; surprisingly with the widowed Judy Dench; with whom he has formed a close bond.

There is also the elderly woman who is a bigot, Muriel, played by Maggie Smith, who leaves for India in order to have a hip replaced cheaply. It is there that she discovers people are really all the same, regardless of class or color. When the chips are really down, she is the one who pulls it all together, having learned so much from what she has experienced.

One other woman, whose name I did not catch, plays a character who is closed off to almost everything, except finding a man to grow old with. Money is definitely an object with her. The question is will she change, learn to compromise, or continue to be whom she has always been?

The seventh person is a man, Norman Cousins, played by Ronald pickup, who is desperately trying to recapture his past romantic adventures. But, boorish as he may be, a chance encounter with a wealthy widow leads to a true romance, with the two meeting in the middle, blending their lives into one.

And, leading this whole story is the hotel’s owner, Sonny Kapoor, played by Dev Patel, the irrepressible son of a man who shares the vision of his deceased father to create a hotel in which older people can come to live out their last days; and dreams. His 2 brothers, and judgmental mother, almost scuttle the dream; but dreams die hard, and as he struggles against tradition in order to attain his vision; he has to come to terms with the judgments of others as he seeks his own center with the woman he loves, Sunaina, played with great charm by Tena Desae. But in his own words, “Everything will be all right in the end...and, if it's not all right, then it's not the end.” This film has a lot to say about living, and dying, as well as all of the things which we go through in between, and how they ultimately define who we are as individuals.

Sikhism - A Primer for the Unenlightened

It is obvious from the events of last week, in which a gunman and possible accomplice, shot and killed several people in a Sikh house of worship, that the public needs to be educated about the Sikh religion. They are perhaps the most peaceful, although strict, of all the religions on the planet. They strive to offend no one.

Their belief system is based upon the existence of 10 Gurus, beginning with Nanak in about the 15^th century. They have no affiliation with the Islamic community as far as their religious beliefs, or requirements. The public’s confusion about this distinction between the two regions became abundantly clear after 9-11, when some gas station attendants were murdered at work for wearing Turbans, which have no relation to any type of Arab garment. The dynamics of this tragedy, at the present time, appear to be similar. An ignorant group (it is not clear yet if this was a group action, or a lone gunman, though there is a person of interest being sought in connection with the murders) with no knowledge, or tolerance, of people who are different have once again shown the lack of what freedom means.

So, for the unenlightened, here is a brief re-cap of the Sikh religion based on my own knowledge. Please feel free to correct me if I have it wrong.

The religion is based upon the beliefs of a man known as Nanka; who was the first Guru; followed by 9 others. Their practice consists of 3 basic tenets; the Sikh Rehat Maryada ; which consists of the Prohibitions, much like our own 10 Commandments. They also believe in Ardās; or, Kirtan Dasvand; which is akin to the Baptismal ritual. Their final belief is in the 5 Evils vs. the 5 Virtues, much like our own 7 Deadly Sins. So, you see, they are very much like us in the Judeo- Christian sphere of worship. It is the 5^th largest organized faith in the world today, with something like 25 million adherents. They are mostly congregated in the Punjab region of India.

To be sure, this is a very brief and possibly slightly inaccurate portrait of the Sikhs, based upon my own travels and experiences, but you get the picture. This was a senseless crime, allegedly committed by a man who could not even earn an Honorable Discharge from the Army; which is like obtaining a GED. Whether or not the “person of interest”, who is being sought at present, is related to this crime, there is surely a problem in America today. There is no longer any tolerance for anyone who looks different, acts different, or believes in something you do not. The man being sought; and who filmed the events; wore the same 9-11 tattoo as the shooter did, which points to some possible connection.

This is the same crowd that brought you the Oklahoma bombing several years ago at the Murrah Federal Building. That tragedy was at first blamed on the Islamic community. But the big secret is this; when it comes to killing in the name of ignorance; it’s a tie score between our side and “theirs”. With neither side willing to tolerate the other, there is likely to never be peace.

To educate yourself further on the Sikh religion; or just to reinforce what you already may know; hit up Wikipedia at this link and then pass it on. Communication is the only answer to the ignorance which prevails in today’s society. Here is the link; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikh_beliefs

Please excuse any inaccuracies in my brief overview of the religion. I was writing from my own memory of the religion as I have encountered it in my travels. The only assistance I drew upon was the spelling, and identification, of several, well, all of the names except Nanka.

Tenders Fresh Food Winner

Well, it’s taken a long time, but I have finally won something larger than a free $1 lottery ticket. Well, that’s not quite true, I did once win $10 on Keno in Maryland, but that was so long ago that I almost forgot about it. So, you can imagine my surprise when I won the 1^st prize at Tender’s Chicken in Cornelius the other night.  That's $500 worth of my favorite food.

I eat there 6 out of 7 nights a week; or I should say, I get my food to go, and then I eat it on the side of one of the most beautiful roads in the state, Westmoreland Road, between Route 73 and Mayes Road. There, among the rows of corn and other various crops, I eat my dinner each night, except on weekends.

Tenders Fresh Foods is a growing chain. They currently have establishments in Tampa, Florida as well as here in North Carolina. They have big plans for the future, and you should look for their brand to spread in the coming years. Currently, I believe they are planning an opening in Raleigh this year.

What makes Tenders different than other medium priced restaurants is the fresh food. There is nothing frozen; everything is fresh and cooked to perfection. Even the potatoes are piled in sacks, waiting to be cut and fried. While that may seem sad for the potatoes, it’s great for the customers.

When you walk in, you are greeted by name, and that alone makes you feel special. My favorite order is the Grilled Salad, which contains cran raisins and sliced almonds over a bed of fresh lettuce and red cabbage with sliced carrots. There are at least 6 different dressings to choose from for the salads.


Quick riddle: What’s better than Tenders Chicken?

Quick Answer: Tenders Chicken for free!

Thanks to everyone at Tenders for making me a winner! And you can visit them at; http://tendersfreshfood.com/

Looking at the Insanity Plea

Much has been written of late concerning the use of the Insanity Plea as a defense in general and, in particular, in the case of James Holmes.  Holmes is the young man accused of multiple homicides in the shooting at a midnight showing of 'The Dark Knight Rises' in Colorado, which resulted in 12 people being killed and another 59 wounded. Police say the suspect acted alone and had no prior criminal record or ties to terrorism. He had, though, been under the care of a Mental Health professional at the time, and his case was reviewed, at the direction of his doctor, by a crisis management team just days before the killings took place.

Now the deed is done, and the Monday morning “Quarterbacking” has begun in earnest. The talking heads on my TV all say that the Insanity Plea is a dead end, as Mr. Holmes clearly planned this attack beforehand. This line of thinking, in determining whether Mr. Holmes is sane or not, is like comparing an orange to a watermelon. It makes no sense.

If, for example, I were to plan a murder for profit; and then say I was crazy; that would be a ridiculous plea, which would carry no merit. I would, in that case, be “crazy as a fox.” Obviously my crime would have had a criminal purpose; I was driven by greed. But what about the Holmes case? Let’s take a look at it.

Here’s a young man; with known mental difficulties; whose own doctor even questioned whether or not he was a danger to himself and others. He has planned, in meticulous detail, a crime too heinous to imagine. And then he actually carries it out, resulting in the deaths and injuries mentioned above. He hopes to gain no profit from his act. He doesn’t even have a sense of reality about the whole event; he even asked a deputy, after the shooting, how the film ended.

When considering an Insanity Plea, the question is not whether we believe that the subject was capable of premeditation in the crime for which they stand accused; the real question is how sane was the plan to begin with. What possible gain was there for Mr. Holmes to attain, even if he had gotten away with the crime? The answer is patently obvious. There was no gain, no real motive other than to commit the crime. That’s insane. Just like the guy who contemplates whether or not he can fly by jumping off the roof, he’s clearly insane.

Is this a plea to spare Mr. Holmes life? Not a chance. I believe in the death penalty. I just believe in being honest with ourselves about why we execute people when we do. The law says we do not execute people who are insane. So, in order to execute Mr. Holmes, he must be found to be sane.

No matter how much we kid ourselves to the contrary, Mr. Holmes is damaged, and likely will never be “fixed”. I mourn for the families of those who lost loved ones by his actions. If he is found guilty, I support the application of the death penalty for his crimes. Just don’t expect me to believe that he is sane.