Author: J.J. Probasco

Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it.

— Mark Twain

This is what life is like for someone hated with great passion by Mother Nature, not to mention the Universe.

Three weeks ago, I had a tri-axle truckload of topsoil (?) delivered to fill in all the trenches in my front yard caused by the grass unwilling to grow in the shade of all the trees I’m not allowed to cut down, leading to no roots to hold the soil in place, leading to gobs of erosion over the years.  Lawn (?) repair was overdue.

I spent the intervening eternity spreading dirt as I picked out the giant rocks, tree roots, and tangles of rusty barbed wire that somehow appeared in my topsoil (?).

Then I lovingly sprinkled buckets of sun-and-shade-loving (?) grass willy nilly about the property, spread straw everywhere, and started watering because the frequently-promised rain refused to materialize.

The grass began growing.  Success!  Just a little while longer and I would maybe even have an actual lawn instead of a yard of dirt.

Then, today, the forecast was for 40% chance of scattered thunderstorms, with an anticipated accumulation of .02″.  This area has a long history of forecasting rain, pushing the forecast back and back and back, and finally just staying dry.  I jokingly (?) said I should turn on the sprinklers and that way it really would rain.

When it got over an inch of accumulation, I finally put on a poncho and my rubber boots and went out to turn off the sprinklers.  It’s almost stopped now, and so far, we’ve gotten 1.72″.  The rivers going through the yard are starting to drop, but they’ve been running high and very brown from all the topsoil they were carrying away.

Yes, I know.  My fault for making jokes with Mother Nature.

If you hear in the news about a giant sinkhole swallowing half of Tennessee. . .that was me.  Tell my story to the tabloids.

Seventeen years ago today, our nation was stunned by an attack so horrific it was almost incomprehensible that something like that could have happened on our soil. For a lot of people, that has turned into a place in the history books. For the kids who are going into their junior and senior years of high school, it’s something that happened before they were born, shrouded by the mists of time.

But most of us can remember exactly where we were and what we were doing. We can still hear and see and feel the explosions and screams of terror and the shock, whether we were actually there or experienced it through television or the internet. It’s a part of our lives and has had a lot to do with shaping how those lives have been lived since that day.

There was a shift in how we traveled, in how we went through security checkpoints, in how we packed our bags. There was a change in immigration procedures, and how we looked at people who might look or act a little different from us. We changed the way we sensed our surroundings, whether we were comfortable going to public places, and whether we trusted people we’d just met…and even people we’d known a long time.

A lot of what changed was how we banded together against those who wanted to harm us. We had a great feeling of patriotism and a common purpose in protecting our friends and families and our country.

I hope that’s not something that’s fading away in those mists of time…becoming another paragraph in the history books. It’s hard to watch the memorials that have been going on all day, on TV and across social media…but it’s something we really need to do. We need to have those memories to keep the awareness alive, to make sure we never lose the realization of how fragile our freedom and way of life are and how quickly they can be devastated.

I remember it like yesterday. I was deployed to Kuwait for Operation Southern Watch, and I was supposed to be part of the line of defense that protects our country from the forces of evil. But when we turned on the TV news in our little office trailer in the desert after the end of the “normal duty day” and saw smoke pouring out of the first tower, and watched the second plane hit the second tower live on CNN from 6,000 miles away, all we could do was sit and watch.

Everything had changed and we weren’t the ones fighting the enemy. The people confronting the forces of evil were airline passengers, firefighters, secretaries, clerks, stewardesses…all the people we were supposed to be protecting were right in the middle of it and we were powerless to stop it.

We have all of that…the surprise, the shock, the helpless rage…seared into our brains. We’ll never, ever forget it. But those kids in high school, who weren’t even born yet, didn’t feel that impact and don’t have those memories. They’ve seen it on TV, but they don’t feel it inside, like we do. We need to make sure we keep telling them, and showing them, and making sure they understand.

One day soon, they’ll be the ones who will have to confront the forces of evil. They need to understand how essential that feeling of patriotism and unity will be. They need to understand that the world can change in the blink of an eye, and our freedom and way of life might not survive if they don’t come together to protect them.

We need to make sure they understand.

In the blink of an eye, everything can change.  So forgive often and love with all your heart.  You may never know when you may not have that chance again.

Sometimes it’s important to work for that pot of gold. But other times it’s essential to take time off and to make sure that your most important decision in the day simply consists of choosing which color to slide down on the rainbow.

— Douglas Pagels

Since light travels faster than sound, some people appear bright until you hear them speak.

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.

— Adlai Stevenson

I try to stay away from political posts because they usually just cause a lot of uproar and seldom convince anybody of anything, and I’m not strongly partisan anyway.  But I wrote this post on Facebook a year ago and it’s something that bears repeating because I haven’t seen a lot of change.  Maybe a little more exposure might help.  What do you think?

We really, really need to take a good, hard look at what we’re doing to ourselves. We’re poisoning our own air…fouling our own nest…pick a cliché, but we’re doing it to ourselves with all the hate we’re spewing at one another just because we have different political philosophies. And it doesn’t make any sense. What’s happening right now is that the pendulum is swinging, just like it always does. If you look back at the political landscape, you just might notice that ever since WWII, with one small exception, we switch the party in charge every 4 to 8 years. Why? Because half the country is conservative, to varying extents, and half is liberal, to varying extents, and a whole bunch in the middle are willing to be swayed a little if somebody has a good argument. The problem is that we’re not hearing as much argument as angry invective. It seems like people are losing sight of the fact that we all have to live together. We need each other. Conservatives need liberals and liberals need conservatives. What would art, theater, literature, and music be without a liberal side? Who would build our roads and skyscrapers, grow our food, put out our fires, and protect our country without the conservative side? Some folks’ heads probably just exploded because I used some generalities, but you know exactly what I’m talking about. How can we be the greatest nation on earth without social justice balanced with safety and security? We’re all paddling along in the same canoe, folks, and if you paddle too long on the left or too long on the right, you drift off your course and there are more and more people getting unhappy about the direction you’re taking. They start paddling on the other side and before you know it, somebody else is in charge of where you’re going. That’s how we do course corrections as a country…switching the parties in control. It keeps us centered and balanced. Sure, it would be a lot easier to just compromise in the first place, but we don’t seem to want to elect people who will do that, so here we are doing the pendulum thing. And everybody already knows all this, right? So why are we treating one another like enemies?? I know about half the people in the country right now are thinking that Donald Trump didn’t deserve to win the election and this could be the end of civilization as we know it…but half the country thought the same thing about Barack Obama 4 years ago, and 8 years ago, and would have thought the same thing about Hillary Clinton if it turned out a little bit different last November. So when you think about it, whatever your political opinion is, half the country usually disagrees with you. And they can’t all be total morons. No, they can’t, and you know it, so think about that if your focus starts to narrow and you start thinking your opinion is the only one that has any worth. What we’re supposed to do when we don’t agree with the people in charge of the country is debate and argue and compromise and try to maintain our sanity and humanity until the next election rolls around and see if we can’t do better next time. But too many people seem to think the “other side” is some lower form of life, and instead of having discussions on pros and cons of political philosophies, they attack others on a personal level. Arguing is fine, but when your arguments are full of anger and hate and you mock, disparage, and belittle others to make your point, you’re being small-minded and mean-spirited…and besides losing my respect and your own credibility, you’re just pumping more poison into the air we all have to breathe. I’m seeing this too much, from both sides of the aisle, from politicians and pundits and actors and so-called “comedians” and “journalists”…and even from my own friends. The violent rhetoric is bad enough, but some people think that justifies violent action and the whole thing is spiraling farther out of control all the time. Maybe we should think a little harder about that while we still can. Maybe instead of acting like third-graders without adult supervision, we can somehow manage a little maturity and refuse to make that sarcastic comeback. Refuse to “like” hateful Facebook posts. Refuse to re-tweet comments full of contempt and scorn. Maybe if we refuse to feed the hate, it’ll die. At least a little. It’s worth a try, isn’t it?

Hi!  Welcome!  Good to see ya!  My name is J.J. Probasco and I write stuff.  I’ve sorta figgered that part out — how well is up to y’all, but isn’t really the point right now.  What I’m doing now is something entirely alien to me, one of the Great Mysteries of Life: setting up a web site.  I hear it’s enough to make me appear all sophisticated & refined, and make oodles of agents pay attention to me, and good things like that.  So I’m a-goin’ for it, though it’s apparently a task that requires learning new stuff and paying attention, and ain’t no tellin’ where that will lead.  So this is gonna be pretty interesting and most likely time-consuming, and I appreciate you being patient and holding back a few of the catcalls while I learn these tangled ropes and make this thing happen.

I confess. . .I’m only halfway out of the cave and have tons to learn about widgets and sidebars and links and tags and all those mysterious things, but I suspect I’ll have it figured out before Christmas how to post my stories and commentaries and miscellaneous spewings, and link them to Facebook, and link posts from other people who know what they’re doing, and all kinds of stuff.  Don’t hold your breath, but surely it has to happen sooner or later.  Some of it might even be worthy of note. . .you never know.  But it looks like I’m gonna start flailing around and making a mess anyway, so beware but laugh all you want.

In the meantime, a primary goal was to make it possible, and hopefully easy, to buy my recently-published novel in paperback form with my not-yet-legendary signature, if a purchaser would be so inclined, with a credit card.  Some have actually asked, and I’m here to serve.  To my great fascination, I may have actually made that materialize somehow over on my “Books” page.  So if you happen to visit that page and notice that I did manage to make anything. . .anything at all. . .work yet, please pause in wonder and delight for just a few moments, ’cause you just gotta cherish those successes when you find ’em.

And while you’re there, I’d be okay with you trying out that “Buy Now” button if you do get the urge.

Thanks, and see ya in the spin!