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by John R. Williams

Tuesday, July 18, and the summer (and some say, “What summer?”) is flying by. Note to young people: The older you become, the faster time goes; the next thing, it will be raking leaves and shoveling snow. If you are going to do anything that is sunshine related, do it now or it will be too late.

The Old Men of the Mountain met at the Chuck Wagon Diner in Princetown. A contingent of OMOTM arrived at the same time at the Chuck Wagon and were standing outside in the early-morning mist, talking to each other for about 10 minutes before going inside to continue the conversation. It was eerie and nostalgic at the same time, that is, a group of old men standing in the mist of early morning just talking and laughing.

A recurrent conversation this summer is how often the lawns or yards have to be mowed, and how the weeds are taking over. The plants we want to grow are fussy — not enough water and the plant dries up, too much water and they wither and rot.

Weeds, on the other hand, grow like weeds in a drought, or with constant rain like this year. It makes no difference. One OF commented that it is beginning to look a lot like Ireland on the Hill because it is shimmering green.

The case for mowing the lawn brought out comments on the old TV show “Home Improvement with Tim Allen.” The OFs felt now is the time for jet-engine lawn mowers, or at least six-cylinder turbo-charged engines — not only so the OFs could cover more ground in a shorter period of time, but also zoom through higher, tougher grass.

One OF has a large lawn with few shrubs and trees that allows him to make passes of 200 feet or so. This OF swears that, when he starts back for a returning pass, the grass has already grown a couple of inches in the pass he has just mowed.

One OF (who takes a lot of the remarks seriously and misses the sarcasm or humor on many of the pronouncements the OFs utter) said that it is necessary to be careful how fast the OFs get the blades spinning because, if they go too fast, the lawnmower will become like a hydrofoil or Hovercraft and take off.

This OF said that lawn mowers are generally top heavy and will tip over easily causing the OF to get hurt. (Say what! Or is this OF just putting all of the other OFs on?)

Lost and found

The next topic is about a common phenomenon and age has nothing to do with it, neither does dementia or Alzheimer’s, nor even just plain forgetfulness. How many times does anyone set something down — quite often after just using it — something that they use all the time and then not be able to find it?

The OFs brought this up and mentioned hunting for the item until the OF’s hunter is sore. Eventually the OF said it becomes give-up time and the OF goes out to purchase another one, at which point, son-of-a-gun, the old one turns up in no time.

Of the stories told, one OF recounted a story about another OF who wears transition glasses. The OF said that they transition from light to dark almost instantly; however, the other way around, not so — going from light to dark, the lens takes it time.

This transition generally requires the wearer to either lift these glasses up, or take them off to find, for instance, a light switch inside a garage. This is the scenario that confronted the OF whom the second OF was telling the story on.

The OF pulled into his dark garage but it was still light outside so the lenses remained dark. The OF raised the glasses to find the light switch. Later on, the OF decided to put the glasses back on and could not find them. The OF hunted and his family hunted all over to no avail, no glasses.

After a week of no glasses, the OF finally decided to take his prescription and purchase another pair of transition-lens glasses.

The OF wore the new glasses for a couple of days and looked for the original pair, still to no avail. One day, he took the car and ran some errands; it was a bright sunny day (this had to be a year ago) and the lenses turned almost black.

When he pulled into the garage, the same thing happened. The OF had to remove his glasses to find the switch and, when he did this, the OF set the new transition glasses directly on top of his old ones!

The words here “raise” and “remove” are not the same thing. Habits can get anyone, not only OFs, into a lot of trouble. In this case, the habit is remove; the thought was raise.

The OFs said the most common situation for this happening is with tools. One OF said this happens so frequently he wonders if there has ever been a survey done on hunting for lost items that are not lost and how much time is spent doing this.

This OF said the worst time he remembered was when he was repairing some siding on one of his sheds. The OF said he had an apron full of nails, took a hammer and drove in a nail. He was distracted by his son who asked a simple quick question.

The OF said, after he answered his son, he took a nail and went to drive it in but — no hammer. The OF swore he never put it down, but he must have because he and the son looked all over and eventually found it on the ground under a sawhorse, and under a board that was on top of the hammer. Happens all the time!  The OFs do one thing and think they have done another.

Those Old Men of the Mountain who at least found their way to the Chuck Wagon Diner in Princetown and didn’t have to go hunting for the diner were: Bill Lichliter, his nephew Josh Buck, Roger Chapman, Pete Whitbeck, Robie Osterman, George Washburn, Chuck Aelesio, Richard Frank, Wayne Gaul, Ted Feurer, Ted Lehermann, Harold Guest, John Rossmann, Art Frament, Herb Sawotka, Joe Ketzer, Lou Schenck, Jack Norray, Herb Bahrmann, Gerry Irwin, Mace Porter, Glenn Patterson, Otis Lawyer, Mark Traver, Russ Pokorny, Warren Willsey, Mike Willsey, Ted Willsey, Bob Lassome, Duane Wagonbaugh, Bob Fink, Bob Benninger, Elwood Vanderbilt, Roger Fairchild, Harold Grippen, and me, and I think I have written this.

 

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July 27, 2017

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by Dennis Sullivan

— “A Lonely Grave,” by Alexander Gardner, pictures Union soldiers standing near a comrade’s grave at the battlefield of Antietam, September 1862
Current Civil War: “To take away or radically modify the health-support system of 22 million Americans is an Antietam of sorts in that it strips people of the support — MRIs, medications — that keep them afloat.”

 

It’s a national tragedy that the United States is currently engaged in a fight over who deserves or has a right to assistance when they’re in pain or their life is threatened by some physical or emotional illness.

It’s a shame but not a surprise. It’s just the latest explosion in our current civil war, which began when the United States had its emotional breakdown several decades ago. Neurotic symptoms are everywhere.

And let’s not minimize the situation; it is a civil war. It’s not a war of bullets and bombs as in the original War of the States but a war of ideology when threats, identity-slashing labels, lying, and administrative decisions that punish and exclude, are used as assault weapons.

This kind of warfare is like the cyber warfare discussed of late, in that cyber warfare has nothing to do with bullets and bombs either and yet the hacking and invasion of people’s consciousness by electronically rifling through their private lives has deleterious consequences (for everyone).

Thus to take away or radically modify the health-support system of 22 million Americans is an Antietam of sorts in that it strips people of the support — MRIs, medications — that keep them afloat.

It’s also a stripping away of the economic security that supports emotional well-being as well as access to procedures that end pain and allow people to feel life is worth living.

The president of the United States has referred to the current measures to strip people of such supports as “mean” but to support the wellbeing of his fragile ego, has railed against the weak as unworthy for any communal consideration.  

And this from a man who never cooked a meal or washed a dish, from a man whose main source of mental anguish derives from whether to install the Kohler K-4886 or Panorama Round Ceramic bidet in a football-field-size bathroom.

But keep in mind that the issue of the providing for or stripping people of health care is only a symptom. The real issue is economic and has to do with the concept and definition of worth, what or who is worth something.

The current prevailing ethic is: Some citizens are worth more than others and therefore deserve more attentive consideration. The same ethic also says: Some citizens are worth nothing and therefore deserve nothing from the collective coffers.

Worth is a political economic variable — as university professors might phrase it — because it has to do with the differential allocation and provision of resources to those whose needs are defined as worthy versus those whose needs are minimized or dismissed as unimportant.

Worthy means “worthy of our attention” and worthy of our attention means worthy of receiving that attention when we are in need. We allocate resources to those persons, groups, places, and events we say will help the nation progress.

I have a hard time trying to fathom how a person manages — practically as well as psychologically — after he has been defined as having no worth by the collective and is refused support even when his cries for help are loud.

Thus the debate over “pre-existing conditions” is a sinister, sadistic joke. It translates into: If you come to us without being sick, without something wrong, we will attend to your needs. But if you come with medical problems you are out, we will not pay for what ails you. The logic is: Come back when you get better, then we’ll help.

Who we define as worthy of the community’s attention is what constitutes the definition of “united,” whether we consider ourselves a national community or a pack of tribes pitted against each other over supposed scarce resources.

The current civil war is a tribal war fueled by the policies and projects of the financially and culturally worthy who benefit from the conflict. Amid this war the president marveled recently: Hey, the stock market keeps going up!

The guilt of “taking the life” of fellow citizens is diminished or not felt at all through the creation of relational distance. Keeping the victim out of sight.

Thus the conflicting tribes have developed their own language and cultural reference points which serve as buffers between themselves and the enemy — the person or group of lesser or no worth.

In his July 11, 2017 column in The New York Times, “How We Are Ruining America,” David Brooks addressed the issue of relational distance and some of its consequences.

He says the well-to-do, the worthy, structure exclusionary, distance-creating, worthlessness-defining strategies to protect their privilege. In terms of this kind of protectionism he says, “Members of the college-educated class have become good at making sure their children retain their privileged status.” They do this “by making sure the children of other classes have limited chances to join their ranks.”

In the past 20 years, he adds, the affluent have increased what they spend on education by 300 percent while such expenditures for “every other group is basically flat.”

Those with the cultural, financial, and political capital to define worthiness also create and implement policies that say to some, as Brooks notes, “You are not welcome here.” In terms of health care, your body is of no value.

But it’s far more nefarious because the policies are geared to take away from the unworthy the means to consider membership anywhere. They become displaced.

Surprisingly, Brooks confesses his own blindness. He says he recently took a friend to a gourmet sandwich shop who had “only” a high school education.

When she looked at the sandwich menu with “Padrino” and “Pomodoro” and ingredients such as soppressata, capicola, and striata baguette listed, she froze. The tribal “cultural signifiers” got to her.

When asked if she would like to go elsewhere “she anxiously nodded yes,” Brooks says, “and we ate Mexican. (He should have known better; he should have inquired of her from the beginning where she preferred to eat.)

In terms of the health-care policies that are currently being asked for, it is possible that close to 22 million people will never see a Padrino M.D., they will never be the recipients of Pomodoro surgery. The medical counterparts of soppressata, capicola, and striata baguettes will never be there for their ailing bodies to taste.

The only way to end the war is to transcend political economies that speak in terms of deserving and entitlement and to adopt a view of life where we meet the needs of everyone. This means treating the poorest among us as the richest treat themselves. That is a 21st-Century Sermon on the Mount.

Healthcare-wise it means that every citizen of the United States, at the very least, will receive the same level of care a U. S. Senator gets from the collective and the president from private coffers. When this occurs we will finally be able to say: Blessed are the Peacemakers.

 

Post date: 
July 20, 2017

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by John R. Williams

The Old Men of the Mountain were considering starting a petition to change the name of the third day of the week from Tuesday to OMOTMday. The petition would change the name so OFs all over the world would have their own day and on that day, the world-wide OFs would gather with friends someplace for either breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, or evening snack time.

The gathering could be just two old friends who could spend a couple of hours a week solving the problems of the world, or 40 or 50 old friends of the male gender sitting down together with no agenda, no rules, and no plans, or plans to make plans, only to do the same thing next week on OMOTMday.

This would accomplish two things, get the OFs out of the house, and give the lady of the house a couple of hours to herself.

So on Tuesday, July 11, the Old Men of the Mountain met at the Duanesburg Diner, in Duanesburg on a typical day (so far in 2017) with a good dash of fog and rain. The OFs all showed up trying to brush the green mold, which is beginning to sprout on most of us, from their shoulders.    

Maybe some of you have seen this adage on T-shirts but with the OFs (in many cases) the statement is so true. The shirt reads “I am NOT sorry I arrived late. I didn’t want to come anyway!” One OF said many places he goes is because he is dragged there by some other party.

He declared, “I would rather be anywhere than at some high-brow art show trying to eat some tiny crackers with a green slimy dip that looked like it was used as a prop in Ghostbusters.”

One OF bristled a tad and said, “That art show is my kind of place, but I bring my own snacks.” This OF did add he has just as much fun in a junkyard, or at the Gas-up as well as the art show.

Some stand out

Baseball season is about half over and the All-Star game with the Home Run Derby a part of the build-up was being played. It seems that one player has considerably piqued the interest in the sport this year. That player is Aaron Judge of the Yankees.

This scribe cannot remember when the All-Star game (and in particular the Home Run Derby) was ever mentioned at an OMOTM breakfast, but this year it was.

This scribe is amazed how at times one person can interest many outside of their field so we all know who they are and what field of endeavor they were involved in: We all recognize Carl Sagan, Dr. Jonas Salk, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Marilyn Monroe, Mother Teresa, Bonnie and Clyde, Hitler, Dan Patch, and quite a few others, but those names would still be on a short list compared to all the billions of people or animals that have taken a breath of air on this terrestrial ball.

Making history real

A couple of OFs talked about participating in re-enactor groups. One OF stayed with one period in time — the Revolutionary War — and the other was a time-jumper. This second OF participated as a re-enactor in both the Revolutionary and the Civil wars.

These two OFs mentioned how American history was made real by being members of these groups and how much of the history of our country is not taught in schools. A major reason, unless someone becomes a history major, there is not time to cover it all, so just the highlights are taught. However, this way of teaching means many interesting and important parts of our nation’s history are missed.

Green thumbs

The gardening OFs discussed their gardens; this is an ongoing topic at the OMOTM Tuesday-morning conventions during the growing season. It is not so much “I can top your garden” as it is “since my garden is doing bad, what are you doing to make yours grow right?”

So far, in most of the discussions, if one OF’s garden is having a prolific year the others are, too, and vice versa. This year, the OFs say they have beautiful tomato plants but very few blossoms. No blossoms means no tomatoes.

The other is that the zucchini are about ready to pick. The garden growers are beginning to say: Enough with the rain; we need a little sunshine.

Picky about Pickers

Some of the OFs watch the TV show “American Pickers,” and some of the OFs have places that the Pickers might like to get into. However, other OFs maintain that their places, which the OFs think the Pickers would frequent, are nowhere near as bad as the places these two Pickers really do get into.

The places the OFs have are generally orderly with pieces they keep there to restore; other pieces the OFs are working on. In the TV show, many of the places they get into are no more than junkyards back in the woods.

The OFs say the places these guys pick are downright dangerous and hangouts for vermin. The OFs say that, if they spot critters around their collections, out come the traps — none of those pesky rodents, or creepy crawling stuff for them.

Those Old Men of the Mountain (and some are old enough to be collectibles for the Pickers to consider) who met at the Duanesburg Diner in Duanesburg were: Roger Chapman, Miner Stevens, Bill Lichliter, John Rossmann, Robie Osterman, George Washburn, Chuck Aelesio, Richard Frank, Peter Whitbeck, Dave Williams, Bill Bartholomew, Mark Traver, Otis Lawyer, Glenn Patterson, Roger Shafer, Lou Schenck, Jack Norray, Mace Porter, Gerry Irwin, Herb Bahrmann, Russ Pokorny, Rev. Jay Francis, Ted Willsey, Bob Lassome, Bob Fink, Bob Benninger, Mike Willsey, Warren Willsey, Art Frament, Herb Sawotka, Joe Ketzer, Ray Kennedy, Gerry Chartier, Harold Grippen, and me.    

Post date: 
July 20, 2017

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by John R. Williams

Thank goodness for the Declaration of Independence; because of this document, a group of Old Men of the Mountain (at an area smaller than a pin prick on this whirling blue sphere) was able to gather at the Your Way Café in Schoharie on July 4, 2017 and have a peaceful breakfast.

The OMOTM started this holiday by having breakfast together, then each, as they left the Your Way Café, headed out to celebrate in his own fashion.

One OF was going to install a new LED light fixture in the kitchen. Big whoop. Another was going to mow the lawn if he could figure out what was the matter with the mower. Another big whoop.

Still another had a boat that runs only when it was at the dock. The OF said that, once it gets out on the lake, it quits. The OF would get it back to shore, restart it, and the dumb thing would start right up and run fine; however, get it out on the water and it would die.

The problem is that the OF isn’t using the right cuss words when he gets the engine started at the shore. The OF doesn’t know that engines have minds of their own and it is necessary to speak to them correctly and sometimes forcibly. Engines (like wives and teenagers) need a good scolding every now and then to keep them in line.

The Enterprise is on vacation as always for Fourth of July Week, printing its Keepsake Graduation Edition on July 6. Because of this the paper is put to bed early so this article needs to be kept short (and short it will be) because not much different was discussed by the OFs anyway.

Those OFs who met at the Your Way Café in Schoharie and continued their conversations of nothingness were: Roger Chapman, John Rossmann, Harold Guest, George Washburn,. Robie Osterman, Bill Lichliter, Chuck Aelesio, Miner Stevens, Otis Lawyer, Pete Whitbeck, Richard Frank, his son Richard Frank, Jr. visiting from North Carolina, Glenn Patterson, Mark Traver, Dave Williams, Wayne Gaul, Lou Schenck, Mace Porter, Jack Norray, Gerry Chartier, Herb Sawotka, Ted Willsey, Bob Lassome, Ray Kennedy, Duane Wagonbaugh, Mike Willsey, Warren Willsey, Joe Ketzer, Harold Grippen, and me.

JUNE 27

On June 27, the Old Men of the Mountain met at the Country Café on Main Street in Schoharie.

Some of the OFs wonder how one cook, one dishwasher, and one waitress can take care of over 30 guys in no time at all and the wife goes nuts when there will be 10 for dinner at Thanksgiving. It has to be a girl thing.

The restaurant doesn’t care if all the silverware matches, or if the flowers are just right. The house is clean and smells like perfume. The restaurants must have a motto: Take it or leave it — we are doing the best we can.

The best of times

This is often said in many senior circles and on June 27 it was a topic of the OMOTM, and of course we are seniors, but not elderly. The OFs resent the term “elderly,” but don’t mind being called OFs.

The topic of discussion has the heading the OMOTM believe they have lived in the best of times, even though, when most of the OFs were young, they were poor, but so was most everyone else. Being poor was normal and no one noticed they were poor.

We did not have the medicine of today, or the ability to view everything going on all over the world in real time. The times of the OFs’ youth just seemed more relaxed.

It was not all peaches and roses — we had the Depression, World War II, segregation, and cigarettes. Yet it just seems like people were more congenial.

Familiar brands disappear

Sears has already left the Rotterdam mall and is now pulling out of Colonie Center. The OFs discussed how many of us own Kenmore products and they are good products. Sears’ tools are in most all the OFs’ garages.

The OFs wonder, without Sears in Colonie Center, where are they going to kill time while the wife shops.  One OF mentioned first Montgomery Wards went and now Sears; all that is left of our time is Macy’s.

It seems many of the names the OFs are and were familiar with are going by the wayside. Hudson, Packard, Whippet, Nash, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Plymouth, Mercury, Farmall, Sanka, Lincoln Logs, Lionel Trains, Woolworth, and TWA are gone, although a few have been replaced with names the OFs can’t even pronounce.

One OF maintains much of the new stuff by the strange-name companies is only crap, made to last just so long and then fall apart.

Online is intangible

The new phenomenon of ordering items and paying bills “online” puzzles the OFs.

The OMOTM were brought up by getting out and doing things, building things, and talking face to face when purchasing an item. Looking at the item from all sides, checking if it appears to be constructed well, and asking a salesperson questions if unsure about the purchase.

Paying for something in cash, getting a receipt, is all tangible — this “online” business is scary at best. (This scribe thinks 100 years from now that the new now will be the antiques then, and this time will be remembered as the best of times.)

Firehouse palaces

When entering the village of Schoharie from the Fox Creek side, you see the new firehouse from Route 30. The OFs are wondering why so many firehouses are so elaborate.

It seems to many OFs that a well-built Butler or Morgan building would be more than adequate. The OFs also think that these buildings are easily expandable if the need arises

No matter how you cut the mustard, one OF said, “It is our tax dollars being spent. They could cut the cost of the building and put the money into updated equipment that would do some good when the fire company arrived at the fire.”

To which another OF added, “The fire truck doesn’t care how fancy the building is.”

It seems to the OFs it is a case of one-upmanship: My fire house is better than yours, na-na-na.

Ship collision spurs cynicism

The OFs spent time rehashing the collision of the destroyer and tanker on June 19 off the coast of Japan. The OFs feel someone on the destroyer was asleep at the wheel and someone on the tanker should have moved instead of flashing lights and blowing whistles and apparently playing bully with its size, and “I have the right of way.”

The inquiry on this accident should be interesting. One OF mentioned, with all the fancy navigation equipment that is supposed to be on both ships, there should be some concrete evidence of what happened.

“Unless,” one OF said, “some of it has not been altered by now.”

This shows how skeptical the OFs are on both sides of the argument.

When viewing the size of some of today’s ships and how fast they can travel through the water, it boggles the OFs’ pea-pickin’-brains. Like planes, many ships now are driven by computers from port to port.

The OFs are wondering how someone on each ship could not see the other and notice their course was to come darn close to one another or even collide. (Which we now know they did.) Like at our breakfast on June 20, the Navy guys in the OMOTM are still scratching their heads.

The OFs who think their being on the short end of the ruler, and living through the best of times is not that bad, were: Miner Stevens, John Rossmann, Bill Lichliter, Roger Chapman, Glenn Patterson, Roger Shafer, Chuck Aelesio, Robie Osterman, George Washburn, Harold Guest, Richard Frank, Dave Williams, Bill Bartholomew, Pete Whitbeck, Marty Herzog, Jim Heiser, Kenny Parks, Otis Lawyer, Art Frament, Lou Schenck, Mace Porter, Wayne Gaul, Ted Feurer, Jack Norray, Ray Kennedy, Bob Benninger, Bob Fink, Jake Lederman, Warren Willsey, Mike Willsey, and me.

 

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July 9, 2017

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