WHEN WE GET TOO TIRED TO CARE ANYMORE...

or...almost too tired to care

by Earl R. Stonebridge

There comes the time when we just get too damned tired to care...about much more than the next meal and getting enough sleep to keep from dozing at the steering wheel. Is it apathy? Too tired of what? Basically, too tired of being...an American. Oh, I know, there will be those who will say my exhaustion is a "lack of concern" for my fellow Americans, other citizens I see and sometimes speak to everyday, others I rarely see and never speak to. Would we be better citizens if we were able to speak to each other every day? That's a question for the world of "IF" and hence, a question we can toss. But really, maybe we are not talking to enough of our neighbors and our associates, our co-workers, our family members. I know that some people have more to say to strangers than they have to share with family members. Why? I asked myself that question and decided communications between family members was too complex to contemplate for inclusion in an essay of this scope; kinfolks either love to talk to each other or loathe anything but basic communication.But there is some chance for a vivid conversation with a stranger, right? Don't count on it. As Americans, we are legendary positive thinkers; well, we were once. We were weren't we? I recall lively conversations about subjects other than the price of gasoline per gallon. Do I now or did I ever think the price of gas was exciting? No, not since 1958 when gas was .21 cents per gallon. I was stupid then. I could have purchased enough to last me until now...and didn't do it. Well, not really, but I could have invested in some autos and put them in a cold storage cave. Or I could have invested several thousand dollars in an Arkansas five and ten cent store back in 1970. It became Walmart and several thousand invested eventually turned into a few cool million. I could have bought beach front property in Santa Monica in 1961 for around ten grand, that's $10,000 for a clapboard beachfront cottage with personality. But I didn't. So, I am tired...but it has nothing to do with age or yesterday's opportunities that slipped past my grasp. No, it is deeper than that. It is this burden one must carry for being American. And just what in the hell does that mean? What do you mean...tired of being American? Does anyone remember the man in the grey flannel suit? How about...The Ugly American? Tired, tired, tired of being just another American, one member of the human race most responsible for the way the world really sucks today. And all because...I am an American. You are guilty too if you're an American, especially guilty if you are a Protestant Anglo-Saxon type. Are you sick of it? Okay, you're Italian, and a Catholic,but you know what I mean, right? Sure, sure, you do. You are retired from TWA and it's all your fault! Your taxes in the thousands fed how many hungry orphans all over the world? No, don't try and count. Tired of all the crap...that's right! How many good and great men did we see driven through or pulled through the streets of Washington on the way to their graves for serving the public. Killed in cold blood for what...for being American. And there was that war in Vietnam that was all about freedom...it's long over. There's the Wall and the years between then and now. American men, new dads then... that never returned were fathers never known; they too became grandfathers in time, silent though they were, with grandchildren who left school pictures at the Wall...even in the rain. So many winters since then, since it all ended, since the men and women who were there were about to think that maybe...it was the right thing. Well, at least Vietnam is kind of a democracy today...or it seems so. The people are friendly, I have heard, to the men and women who go back to get a final glimpse. Yes, they are friendly. It's all over, all is forgiven and so on and so on. And then, just about time when it's supper time again, we hear about how many Americans were killed today...somewhere in the Middle East, in some other foreign land with towns and areas with strange names...kind of like it was in Vietnam. Tired, tired, tired...and it is happening all over again so that people in a foreign land will be able to be free...to worship as they please and enjoy freedom. Should I be thrilled that people in the Middle East will be able to worship as they please...now that we have lost another dozen or so soldiers since yesterday? You know, I just don't think I'm the only American who is tired, so very tired of hearing this. Sometimes, when we get too tired to care anymore...or think we are, we hear about another soldier who was shot by an unknown sniper. Or we see the burned and melted steel that was an American vehicle transporting four or five American soldiers who were blown up. American soldiers now being captured, tortured, shot and killed while some members of the American media complain about how the enemy is treated when we permit them to surrender ...and we wonder how much longer it will continue. We are tired, tired of trying to figure out if the war will be won sooner or later or never...May God bless our troops who are trying to do their best. Nobody but Americans care enough to fight and die for a people with a culture and spiritual belief so much different than our own.

IF YOU ARE AS UPSET AS I AM ABOUT SCOOTER LIBBY'S CONVICTION FOR FAILURE TO RECALL HIS COVERSATION ABOUT THE WORDS HE MAY OR MAY NOT HAVE SPOKEN ABOUT THE BLONDE WIFE OF A FORMER AMBASSADOR, let's review the entire mess, in bits and pieces, basically the same way the public learned about it. The exact dates, names and places of when,who and where each of these events took place are irrelevant now that Libby was found guilty on about as much information or as little information that was ever released at the time, due to the fact that from the public's perception, most of that information was created and fabricated as investigations of the case was being created, like biscuits, from scratch.

IS IN INCORRECT OR UNCORRECT?

There was a time when wrong would have been correct when referring to a word that was obscene. There was a time when the only wrong words were words considered obscene.
Okay, okay, by whose standards? I can hear the outbursts now. Well, how about this for an answer: by my standards.
My standards are the ones I follow. Is that okay? I still have the right to say and think whatever I damn well please. My mouth isn't controlled by the duct tape sliced off in increments by the PC Speech Committee in Washington.I was born in the USA before our guys kicked Germany's ass and put the fear of a Christian President named Truman ino the swords of the Japanese Warlords.
During World War Two, the only words that were wrong were words that described sexual acts, sexual organs, urine, manure and some other common combinations of verbs and nouns. The word damn was borderline. Much was made about the word damn in Gone With The Wind, "frankly my dear, I don't give a...darn...no...damn."

EARL WANTS TO WELCOME YOU TO THE WORLD OF WORDS....welcome