A Great Thing, and Sharing A Few Discoveries

A Great Thing, and Sharing A Few Discoveries

There is a great thing I've discovered about writing here.  I can wander off the reservation whenever it comes to mind and receive no criticism about it.  Like many other people I'm sure (or maybe I'm all alone this way!) I'm usually first in line to offer criticism of what I do.  It's perfectly normal for me to criticize myself before anyone else gets around to it.  I've been asked more than once why I choose to write here instead of some sort of personal journal, and I have been at a loss to explain it.  I enjoy reflecting on things that pass my way, and hope that other people will see this and say one of the following:  "That's goofy, why would anyone think that way," or "By Jove he's got it right!" or "What is wrong with this nut case?" Or, "I totally disagree with this whole line of reasoning and I'm not going to even look at this again," or "He's right, you know, I just never looked at it that way."  Or, one might say "OK, it's mildly entertaining, so I'll read on." or....

In the end it really doesn't matter.  At least I know what I'm noticing will not be inaccessible.  If anybody wants to know what I thought of late one evening or early one morning, here it will be, to the extent that I could express it.

I've taken to jotting the briefest of notes to capture things that strike me during the day, and, if I feel like I have nothing to say, I can look back at these cryptic references and try to recall why I thought it noteworthy at all.  Today's notes--Shrimp Shack, Spaghetti Squash, Chocolate Tree, Lowcountry Store and Oh, Canada (really a note I should have made yesterday, but I forgot), and lastly, is Jury Duty still one of my duties?

Our motoring adventure on this, a gorgeous Fall day in South Carolina, was to venture to Beaufort, SC, the county seat to which I have been summoned to appear for jury duty.  This is the second call, my previous one was to municipal court in Bluffton, SC, where I made an appearance about eight weeks ago, and was dismissed with the thanks of the court when all matters set for trial were either settled or postponed.  I received, just this past week, a check in the amount of $26.95--ten dollars of which was termed "subsistence" and the remaining $16.95 reimbursement for mileage expenses.  How these numbers were arrived at probably did not include deliberation by any jury, as the potential jurors who were dismissed with me grumbled about the time they had lost--as if to say we would have retained that time and kept it for some other time when it might be more useful.  Let's say at the end of life on this earth, although my present understanding of those final hours is such that I might not want two or three more hours of extension.  So, where would I have spent these two hours?  Nowhere special, I think.  Just where and when they were.  Hence, whether they were wasted or not had been up to me and not the Municipal Court of Bluffton, SC--a town in which I do not reside, unless or until my wife persuades me to move to Sun City Hilton Head for the camaraderie and socialization it might afford us.  The notion of wasting or even spending such hours is preposterous, isn't it?  I mean, time passes, with or without our petty little decisions to "spend" or "waste" it.  Oh but this is probably farther down that path any of us wanted to go, so...

Back to Beaufort, SC.  We found our way, and determined it was suitably simple to allow even a dullard like me to locate it (as long as I had the help of the car’s satellite navigator, I mean, there were two turns after leaving our residential area).

After that, we pursued the Shrimp Shack, which turned out to be nearly thirty minutes further along the same road as the courthouse.  It was (and probably still is) named the Shrimp Shack.  There we lunched on shrimp burgers, cole slaw and diet coke.  Moments later, despite my spouse's concern as to whether we had ordered enough or not, we headed back.  We stopped at a pumpkin stand in search of Spaghetti Squash (see 2nd note above)--I guess the people minding the stand looked to be likely suspects in possession of spaghetti squash, I don't know, and if you don't know what spaghetti squash is, why should you even care?

Next stop (see third note above), as I had hoped, was the Chocolate Tree, a small chocolate shop which I believe to be the only real justification for the existence of Beaufort,  Sorry, Beaufort people, you should have shown me something better than a few over-priced seafood restaurants and a riverfront park if you wanted me to remember you for anything beyond the Chocolate Tree.  I escaped that store having spent slightly less than I had at the Shrimp Shack (mainly because I acted as if my wallet was stuck in my pocket and I was having trouble getting it out in time to pay the cashier).  My wife paid for the twelve dollars worth of chocolates (hey, lunch was $19.76!).

We stopped at the Lowcountry Store and another similar shop in Beaufort and escaped without further damage to my pocket.  The latter two stores consisted of stalls maintained by a collection of local artists who “over priced” their work by charging about half the minimum wage for each hour they had spent painstakingly creating their various works of art.  You do that sort of work for the joy of creating it, not to make a profit, of course.    

On to Oh, Canada--I was traveling and in recovery therefrom when the recent tragic shootings in Canada took place.  Oddly enough, the morning of our own Washington State school shooting, I saw an editorial cartoon of the U.S. President making a condolence call to Canada's Prime Minister, in which our President was depicted saying, "I'm sorry, Mr. Prime Minister, here in the U.S., we call it Wednesday."  To me, that simply meant that these had become commonplace in the U. S., even to our highest elected official.  To Canada, these things are not so at all, hence the ceremony I observed at the opening of a professional hockey game where the Canadian people visibly pulled together and sang their national anthem to honor their dead and the bravery of those who put a stop to their shootings.  I was moved to tears, but now I sit and wonder--what will it mean to "pull together?"  We haven't after thirteen years or so after 9/11 and a series of tragic school and workplace shootings figured out what to do, except to care a little more about one another, I think.  But that promptly disappears when that other fella pulls out in front of you in the road.  In Italy and France, I saw all sorts of aggressive driving and people cutting amiably in front of one another, but I never saw a driver express anger openly toward another.  No road rage?  I wonder why?  Well, that’s all folks.