Happy Memorial Day

I sat next to a soldier from Ohio during a flight last week. He was heading back to Afghanistan after emergency leave to attend his mother-in-law’s funeral. He’d already served 11 1/2 months there and, in his own words, “I [really] hate that place”

His wife is in the service, as well, presumably on another plane, grieving the loss of her mother and maybe her own destination, as well.

I thanked the soldier for his and his wife’s service to our nation. I gave him my peanuts and cookies. I offered him my headphones. I ultimately respected his right to reflect silently.

How can I really relate to what our military does on a daily basis where every breath, every call or home could be their last?  I really can’t.  All I can do is be thankful for their courage and prayerful for their safe return.

Thank you for all you veterans who have laid down your lives in your service!

Here is a video that I’ve posted before, but it’s a worthy re-post on this Memorial Day.

Guardian Angel Thwarts Hornet Attack

Guardian angels are entities that I’ve had my share of doubts about.  As such, I’ve probably undercut mine a number of times.  Fortunately, his job is not to care whether or not I believe in him, much less whether or not I simply give him props when he does a job well done; his job is, by and large, to protect me.

And so tonight, whether he exists or not, I thank him for a job well done, just in case he does and happens to read my blog.

This spring, I’ve been working as diligently as other duties will allow to make our yard look the best it can. I’ve cleared truckloads (OK, pickup truckloads) of limbs, branches, vines, and weeds, and, I must say, I’m pretty darn pleased with how it’s looking these days.  Still, it always needs more.

Today, I moved to the hedges in front of our house.  I haven’t given them a deep pruning in a few years, so I dove right in. I cut several stalks of a shoulder-high “tree weed” at ground level. I reached into the hedges and clipped several branches with no thought of caution at all.  Then one snip of a thick branch gave the bush a good jolt, and I heard the angry hum of some kind of swarm.

I muttered something under my breath (you can imagine), as I saw dozens of black and white . . . somethings . . .  pouring out of the bush.  I remember an old beekeeper friend of mine telling me that you can’t outrun a swarm, so I stifled my first instinct to run. I took a breath and slowly stepped about 15 feet away.

Not one single sting!  So, naturally, once the hive quieted down, I returned to it with my handy iPhone and took this picture:

It’s actually a lovely nest, as nests go. About the size of a large volleyball, maybe not quite a basketball. And the grained paper exterior produced by chewed wood and hornet spit is exquisite.

Looking around the house for wasp & hornet spray, all I found was a backyard fogger labeled for use against flies, mosquitoes, and other flying insects.  I gave it a go, and the hornets pretty much seemed to ignore it.

Again, not a single sting!

So, I consulted my friend Google and quickly identified the little buggers as “bald-faced hornets”, a non-yellow variety of yellow-jackets.  According to Wikipedia, “Bald-faced hornets are protective of their nests and will sting repeatedly if the nest is physically disturbed. They are more aggressive than . . . yellowjackets . . . and it is not considered safe to approach the nest for observation purposes. The bald-faced hornet will aggressively attack with little provocation.”

Another website I checked said specifically, “Do not use sprays labeled for flies, mosquitoes, or other flying insects. Do not use ‘fogger’ type sprays. They don’t have the knockdown power and you will probably get stung.”

So, to my guardian angel, mad props to you today for the metaphysical invisibility cloak you donned on me on not one, not two, but three occasions where I now seemed doomed to be stung.  If I may be so uncouth, could I ask you for one more kindness when I get a can of hornet spray, so I don’t end up like this poor sap?

My Goofy Creation Myth

I have a coffee mug with the face of Disney’s loveable dog Goofy on it. It’s not mine, actually; I bought it for my wife (then girlfriend) during a family trip to Disney World. I thought it would be a cute gift to return with to show her I had been thinking of her and to remind her of my own “goofy mug”.

Last year, while researching some history in preparation for my mom’s 70th birthday celebration, I also learned a couple funny little details from my own past. For starters, I was the only one in my family born in Florida. That’s interesting enough, but the tale I learned of of how exactly that came to be is worthy of myth.

The year was 1972. My family was living in Florida. Disney’s Magic Kingdom in Orlando was new, and I wasn’t even a twinkle in anyone’s eye.

As a gift to my mother, my father had secretly booked a trip to the Magic Kingdom for the two of them to stay at the Contemporary Resort for a couple days of romantic fun and frolic.

(Now I must ask, did I really just use the words “my”, “mother”, “father”, “romantic”, and “frolic” in the same sentence without ripping my mind’s eye out? Yes? Well, keep reading, because there will be a happy ending. Oh no – I did it again!)

When my dad walked in from work one day, my mother asked him about this strange letter he’d received about reservations for the trip. Trying to keep the secret, he dismissed it as “one of those annoying promotional things they send everyone.” Mom shrugged it off, stuffed it down in the trash, and went about her evening. She probably finished trimming some goopy fat off the raw dinner meat and dumped it in the trash, followed by some slimy seed-guts from a juicy melon before eventually having Dad take the trash out to the street.

Then, at earliest clandestine convenience, he would have to sneak outside to dig through the trash and extract the all-important reservation confirmation letter.

Dig he did, and they made off to Disney World together as he’d planned. What they’d not planned, however, was that some nine months later, on May 25, 1973, I would come along into their lives in all my 10-lb 2-oz glory.

So explains my Goofy mug. And perhaps more than a little of my personality, too. It’s a small world after all!

Note: As soon as this story first reached my ear, one or two family-members present did quick calculations and disputed the timeline of events; I’m keeping it anyway. Not many people are fortunate (or unfortunate?) enough to know the circumstances of their conception, and unless anyone has a known, indisputable alternate account of said conception (I’m talkin’ receipts and ticket stubs here), this one’s it. I’m really not too eager to contemplate opposing versions, anyway. It’s my Birthday, so I can declare it’s so!

Falcone’s Friday Five: Wednesday Edition

This Friday marks my Birthday, and I will be diverging from my famous “Friday Fives” tradition in lieu of a different topic on that day (hey, lay off, it’s my birthday!). Meantime, here are five random musings that fall under a loose association of wordplay.  Enjoy!

1)  I think history has lost the correct spelling of the word “facetious” (adj. meaning to treat serious issues with inappropriate humor). I think it originated as “fecetious”, an adjective describing someone as being “full of feces”.

2)  Funny thing that using “post-” as a prefix means something that comes “after”.  Even calling “post-” a prefix is odd.

3)  I don’t know anything more about him, but Anonymous is the most prolific poet in history.

4)  Nobody is more humble than I.

5)  Is it just me or is it absolutely impossible to correctly enter a computer password with only one hand? Seriously, try it.

I’ll be back on Friday to share a “goofy” creation myth for my birthday, so check back!

The Rich Fisherman

The Rich Fisherman

Water lapped the shore before him

Like a sea of children, babbling and laughing

The rising sun sent sparks to dance a moment on the river then to

Sink beneath like stones

 

Warm breezes rattled reeds and beat the trees

Percussively, in mysterious time with the easy waters and a

Nearby Cinnamon Attila’s song

He clinched an old black fishhook in smiling teeth

 

The world was all right, he thought, and hooked a wiggly frog

To bait a nice bass.  His mind reeled in the night before . . .

Narrow streets awash in rhythm and dance, and making love to his wife

Mutual abandon among shifting torchlight shadows of tibouchina trees

 

This life.  This love.  This passion.

So warm. So full. So right.

He reached back, cast forth,

And prayed of thanks.