Magical Mystery Meme
1. When I was in a Naval Hospital in San Diego, recovering from wounds I was specifically visited by Richard Nixon. He had given me a decoration a few months before. He also read the casualty lists every day. Even on a weekend at the Western White House in San Clemente. One Sunday morning he was doing just that and remembered my name. He, without fanfare, without any notice other than his usual traveling detail drove down to Balboa Park and when I came to, sitting there next to my bed was the President of the United States, watching football. He patted my hand, told me I was "a good boy," and we just stayed there, watching and talking football until the game was over. He told me as he was leaving "Thank you for your courage. You and those boys like you are what will always save this country when we need you." Then he was gone. I did notice that I was treated a lot better by the hospital staff from that moment on.
2. I took Miles Davis to my second grade class for "Show and Tell." My Da was holding down bass duty for the western states portion of his club tour. He couldn't get a decent hotel where we lived. I asked him to come by the school. He did. He brought his trumpet and played "Mary Had a Little Lamb." We sang along. The kids weren't nearly cool enough to know how special it was. But I did.
3. I use Rogaine, and have gone to great lengths to try to halt the process of balding. I'm vain enough to have tried things like hairpeices (which once you go grey are more of a give away than a hiding measure), and have considered surgical replacement.
4. I had a brief, torrid affair with a famous actress who was sentenced to AA meetings by the court. A regular meeting of mine was one that was "off the books" as far as its time and location. This is so that people in the entertainment industry could pretend that they have some small measure of anonymity during their recovery process. She was a newcomer. I wasn't. It was something that I've only done once (screwing newcomers is frowned upon in the recovery community). If you saw her and had a chance you'd have done it too. We're both still sober, but I know that I did something very selfish that was no help at all to her recovery.
5. Even though I am an admitted atheist I have witnessed things done by some of the "medicine men" on the rez that defy all rational explanation. They just know things that can't be known by science or mortals. I admit that there isn't an explanation for what they have done and trust that science will someday catch up to them, at which point there won't be any "paranormal" or "supernatural" implications about what they are capable of doing. It will just be normal and natural.
Pick out the lie. Leave your guess in comments. I'll cop to the winner sometime next week.
Tag yourself if you feel like it. My oldest daughter says that this one is pretty fucking easy.
posted by The Minstrel Boy at 11:29 AM
14 Comments:
ok I am going with the Rogaine story. Just a feeling.
yo soy Horsedooty!
I'm guessing #3 or #4. Can't decide which. I know you are neither vain nor a prig, but could possibly have been either at another time...
This is a tough game. :-)
I am going to pick #2... just to pick something not picked.
:)
txrad and I went out to lunch today (Chipotle Grill, if anyone is curious) and I said I hoped Minstrel Boy would do this meme because no doubt it would be one of the best -- what with your history and all.
But as I read through these, the Rogaine deal just smells fishy to me. txrad just asked me which one I picked and he agrees.
I've done this one myself before. Fun, isn't it? My two cents? You don't use Rogaine. Happy Christmas, my dear!
Number 3.
I'm going with number 1. The president would show up with more fanfare, plus nobody else picked no. 1 and I need to be different.
(Though I want to hear more about no. 5, cool stuff.)
I, too, will call bullshit on the Rogaine. I know that Fuck It personality very, very, very well!
Thank you for your courage. You and those boys like you are what will always save this country when we need you.
Amazing how Nixon was actually being rather prescient there, though he didn't realize it at the time, not that those words would become manifest in whole new ways.
Merry, Merry to you Sir, and all your tribe.
XX
D.
I don't care what ever evil was done by Nixon. When I was lying in a hospital bed, with tubes plugged into my chest, fighting a murderous infection (puncture wounds in the jungle always infect) with a cage around my leg, to see him there. Just being there. Doing something so normal, like watching football. To have him reach out and pat my hand, was something indescribable. I was told by the nurses and corpsmen that he had been quite clear on his desire for "no fanfare or fuss" on that trip. I think he felt personally the danger people were facing on his orders. Something human there that I cannot see our current president being able to feel or do. If they tell him there are votes out there or a good story to be written, sure he'll go and read the cue cards and mug for his photo op, but to just go and sit with somebody who has been greviously wounded on your orders. I can't see that happening today. According to the Woodward book, Bush, against the wishes of the military men (notably Colin Powell) reintroduced the "body count." He wanted a means of "keeping score." Motherfucker.
creature: i promise to try and do some more explaining of the things that can happen on the rez. i have to be careful though. there are ceremonies and rituals that have been secret to all outsiders for a very long time. partly because we know that it just wouldn't be understood, and partly because they knew that the spanish or whatever authority was there would try to have it stopped.
Okay, I'll wait on the explaining, but I really am intrigued.
Here's something that I have written about it. . .Tachih Nádáh
which is the apache sweat lodge.
My father met Nixon when he was running for president in 1968. It was when Nixon was touring Lockheed. My father worked there. He was assigned to guide Nixon around the plant. I don't know exactly what happened - but when I got all excited that dad had spent the entire day with someone so famous my father said, "No man should ever treat his wife like that."
It was never fully explained - but I did hear him tell my mother that Nixon was a bully; so I'm guessing he did or said something to his wife my father considered out of bounds. I have to say it has always colored my perception of Nixon - way beyond Vietnam or Watergate. To me Nixon will always be the man who was cruel to his wife.
Thank you for the Nixon story and your courage that put you in that place, that time .. ..the man had depths and demons we may never know ...
...I can't see that happening today..."
...there wont be any "paranormal' or "supernatural" implications ...they do what they do because they know they can ...they have always known and so too should we ...
one thing that i have trouble dealing with is that we americans have a hard time allowing our leaders (and those in history too) to be human. one of the things that i think is important in studying our history is the factual, warts and all approach. somewhere along the line that has been lost. i can easily imagine nixon being mean to his wife. he was a bully, he didn't get the nickname "tricky dicky" because he was first in his class at charm school. hell, one of his mentors was joe mccarthy for cryin' out loud. but i also have to give him his props as a human. he also was kind to me, for no personal gain one sunday. it doesn't make up for the evil shit he pulled. it doesn't balance out the protestors and civil rights people that were hounded by the irs and the fbi. it just makes him that much more human.
the biggest difference that i see in the people with healing power or other forms of power on the reservation is that most of the ones i have met would rather not be the way they are. it would never cross their minds to put up a chatauqau tent and pass a hat. there's one i know pretty well who will tell you straight up that he would rather not have visions. he would rather be a cowboy. it's something they do because they have to. not because it's something they have sought. most of them lead pretty humble, isolated lives.
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