Inventing Anna is a Netflix nine-part series about a Russian woman portraying a German heiress. Anna Sorokin claimed to be Anna Delvey. She convinced the rich and powerful that she was a German heiress and bilked luxury hotels and planted herself in New York society as she attempts to start a club for artists…The Ana Delvey Foundation. She formulated an accent that was impossible to trace. It is fascinating to watch a true con artist tell just enough truth..among her many lies…to convince wealthy entrepreneurs and educated people. We believe what we want to believe.

Certain Political Figures would have us believe that they have risen by their profound financial acumen and mental abilities…and that they are a straight talker that represents what is best for our country. Many religious leaders cajole us to accept what they tell us…on faith. However, the faith that they tell us to accept is to take their word for it… Russian leader, Vladimir Putin says that he is on a quest to join Ukraine with Russia for the benefit of the Russian people…but he will not let the Russian people see or read or know the genocide that he is performing in Ukraine. He says that he will jail anyone saying something different than what he approves about the current war…that he will jail them for 15 years…while our former President says that Putin is a great leader and ‘savvy.’

The hypothesis regarding truth is our stock in trade. Our environment and our mental formulation of events cause us to look for things that support our beliefs. I have seen ministers take scripture and tie disparate passages together to prove their doctrinal point of view…when in fact the scripture was in no way related to each other.

Conspiracies are supported by our desire to believe them. Grifter and con-women and con-men are the direct results of our quest to ascertain what is on the other side of the Looking Glass…and what makes the Cheshire Cat smile so broadly…

This morning we attended church in our church building. It was a wonderful experience. It was so good to see our friends and to feel their warmth of spirit. Pastor Kerry preached an uplifting effervescent sermon that has begun my week in the right place. His ever-present humor and good nature make his sermons ever the more so…outstanding. I saw my buddy Jim C. today…and it made my day!

The mystery of why attend church was crystal clear to me this morning…it makes you feel better and centers you in your attempt to walk with Christ. Your fellowship with your fellow congregants is the key to success in the Christian life. The road may appear to be rocky and all uphill until you compare notes with your church family…and then you understand the providence of God.

The struggle is our foray into this life. All of us battle the walls of our minds and our hearts. We, humans, are complex creations. We battle with being self-serving and philanthropy. We lay siege with jealousy and humility. We are prideful and then we are victims of our abject poverty of spirit. We want our good deeds recognized and we want our benevolence to go unnoticed. We have a plethora of motivations doing battle in our conscience and unconscientious and in our dream world…but we seek to know The Creator…

We must do more for our brothers and sisters in Ukraine. We will either help them now or pay the ultimate price later…as a madman overruns an innocent people and seeks to expand his fever dream of domination.

I snapped some photos this morning of once fine university buildings that have been given over to decay and neglect. The sadness of the human blind eye to these once nice office and fraternity and sorority houses is indicative of turning our backs on our fellow humans who are in desperate need of our help…

Today I did the first laps of my walking at Sams. It was time for our monthly visit and the weather is spring-like and the people that we met are happy. We saw our good friend, Lisa, and had a nice visit with her. We purchased some smoked salmon…which is an unusual occurrence for us…and I am anticipating the pleasures of it tremendously. As we visited with Lisa we all reflected on her late husband, Ira, who was a joy to everyone that he encountered. Every time that I spoke to Ira…I was the better for it and I felt encouraged and strengthened. If Ira had a bad day you never knew it. He worked in the Grounds Department for the majority of his University career and everyone loved him.

Mylo has taken to accompanying me for my time on the Writing Porch. He has on his Tartan Jacket and he cuts quite a little figure. ‘and I wish the girls would leave him alone until he gets a little bigger.’ Last night I saw him making love to his little bed…or as Jonathon says…’They grow up so quick.’

MJ becomes a Deacon once again in our church this Sunday. She is the shining star in our family and I am the dim bulb… Anything that she does she gives her whole might and focus. I am happy that she has agreed to serve another term as a Deacon.

Where is 2022 going? It is March and it seems that it should be New Year’s Day. The face-mask mandate for Illinois has been lifted…but I wonder if the lifting is premature? Covid is not gone…there is a new variant and there will be many more coming down the road. Nevertheless, we all need as much goodwill and love and care as is possible to receive. We have been through Hell. Sorrow has been our constant companion. LIfes’ challenges have been compounded and magnified by our Pandemic and now the war in Europe. We need a friend…we need a buddy…we need someone to understand how hard our lives have been and how sad we have been for some time.

Friends without agendas are what we need. Someone who will hang out with us on the Writing Porch…and we both…Chill…and enjoy the company of each other.

Chilly winds are blowing through the Writing Porch this afternoon. Yesterday Mylo accompanied me while I wrote a blog. He enjoys the WR… The chilly breeze makes me think of the Cold Wind that has blown across our world in a week. What many believed was Brinksmanship and that there was an imaginary line that the Bear of Russia would not cross…have been forced to reassess their political science. Not only has Putin declared full-out war on Ukraine but he has developed a plethora of lies to support his war crime incursion into a free and sovereign nation.

As the West levies sanction after sanction on Russia for the unlawful conduct of bombing and killing and maiming innocent Ukrainians…including women and children the elderly and the infirm…we are witnessing a change in the face of Europe and a wave of change across our globe. We all say that we support our Ukrainian brothers and sisters…and what will we say when they are defeated? How will our world be different…then. Well…we will say that they were not in NATO…but they have petitioned to be admitted to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for years.

The Europen Union was the answer they will cry Ukraine is no more…but they only agreed to receive their application this week for membership… My friend and my family’s friend, Helen from Chicago, told my mother after she and my dad divorced that she was going to purchase me a bicycle and ship it to our new home in Eldorado. I am still waiting…

Heroism is remembered…it is memorialized…it is eulogized… General Dwight Eisenhower compelled the Germans who had watched as the Jews were rounded up and packed into cattle cars and driven for days without food or water…to concentration camps…to physically come to the concentration camps to personally bear witness to what their Fuhrer had done. These poor wonderful people had done nothing wrong except for the leader of Nazi Germany having a fever dream and a psychotic vision of their death. They were worked and starved and beaten and then they were gassed to death and burned in Hitler Creamotoriums. The Germans bowed their heads and said that they did not know…

We say…’Not Us!,’ we would not have stood idly by and watched the wholesale destruction of innocent people…because a political leader had a psychotic dream and was unhinged from reality… Not Us!

Warm we are today…and thinking about what we will enjoy for supper…and glad for the blessing of God that we are not like those poor…Ukrainians… God is watching us…

Seventy-five degrees today…and the fish are jumping… Everyone that can be out…is out. Myol just spent the better part of an hour with me on the Writing Porch…and he yawned so many times that I deducted that he was very tired. The Writing Porch is a brand new world for Mylo…

I received a lengthy comment from a follower early this morning that extolled me that anyone who does not realize that Russia is essential to the peace of Europe has their head up their arse… I could not agree more and the present war in Ukraine is a prime example of this fact. However…what is the answer to the present distress…shall Ukraine roll over and play dead and invite Putin to take their country? What if Putin decided to take his country by violence and the killing of untold civilians that including women and children? Perhaps when our nations’ Civil War was fought President Lincoln should have acquiesced and let the South secede from the Union? I am certain that Russia is not only a fascinating country and a lovely nation that is full of wonderful people…that I have on my Bucket List to visit. The perverted megalomaniac actions of a psychotic leader are not indicative of the people that he or she is leading.

One of my favorite University courses was Literature Interpretation. I discovered that two people can read the same piece of literature and come up with two completely different interpretations of the narrative and the author’s intent of the message. Certainly, I am sure that is true with my mediocre scribblings. I took a valuable lesson during the United States’ last Presidential Administration. I have never disagreed so vehemently with friends and family… Yet I respect their point of view and have endeavored to analyze where that opinion comes from. The difference of interpretation of political or religious events does not bother me in the least…until what I am observing is obviously hurting and maiming and killing innocent people.

Blogs and writing and thought are the marketplaces of ideas. Democracies are great because they respect free speech. I have the right to be wrong in my writings and opinions and thought…and you have that same right. My political leanings and religious convictions have changed remarkably since my youth. The utter happiness and contentment of being able to utter my truth and speak my convictions are worth more than all the gold in Fort Knox.

Billy B. thought of his childhood…so many years ago. He remembered the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War. Both events were chilling and he wondered as a youngster and a young man…what purpose did War achieve. He and Chet and Jane had grown old and hoped that the fall of the Berlin Wall and the dissolving of the Soviet Union and the seeming goodwill of Soviet Union Premier Mikhail Gorbachev and the humorous drunken. bumbling of Boris Yeltsin signaled that the worries about a nuclear war with Russia…had finally come to an end. The television images of the people of East Germanys’ first taste of freedom were inspiring. Their standing on the top of the Iron Curtain and demolishing it with sledgehammers was a sweet and long-awaited victory for these oppressed people. Talks occurred among political leaders regarding not only reducing nuclear bombs…but eliminating them. The foolishness of the Cold War and the wasting of human potential and the coming of Glasnost…was the culmination of many hard years of suffering.

Vladimir Putin became the interim leader of Russia when Boris Yeltsin hand-picked him and then stepped down. President George Bush said of Putin that he had looked into Putins’ soul and that he was a person that we could do business with… But we were weary of watching Russia. Our former President had nothing but effusive praise for his buddy…Putin. He accepted his word over his highest advisors.

Chet said that he had been called up to serve as a soldier in the Illinois National Guard. Billy B. and Chet were in their mid-60s and had been retired for some time. Jane said that she had recently traveled to St. Louis…and the Arch was no longer there…

Spring has sprung overnight in our neck of the woods. As someone said on Facebook…Isn’t this the weather that tried to kill us last week?’ New showerheads were in order for MJ and me. Mine had been broken and the holder glued back together with superglue for 5 or 6 times. I asked MJ if she did not want a new head as well since the plumber would take about 10 minutes to install it…and they are paid a minimum of 1 hour. He has installed 1 already in under 10 minutes…

I watched the Parliament of the European Union meet in an emergency session around 5:00 A:M: this morning. Ukraine President Zelensky met by video link to speak to the assembled. This is a man of great courage. He has not left Ukraine…although advised by our government to leave for his own safety. I pondered as President Zelensky spoke… that he was in imminent danger of being killed. Russia is bombing civilian targets and killing children and the elderly. They have surrounded Kyiv with a line of military tanks and trucks and support vehicles that is 6 miles long.

MJ and I were talking last evening and considering how extremely dangerous the war with Ukraine is for the world. We were not involved in World War I…until we were…we were not involved in World War II…until we were. War has a way of spreading. War has ancillary costs that are impossible to see in advance. Putin has already placed his military on high alert…and this includes his nuclear arsenal.

Peace is as elusive as a dove…and never more necessary than now. ‘For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle (dove) is heard in our land; Song of Solomon 2: 11-12. KJV

Chet wondered what Billy B. was up to on this fine Sunday morning. The talk of Russia having so many nuclear missiles pointed at the United States and then to hear that they had placed some of these missiles 90 miles from the State of Florida…caused him to fear the worst. They were going to the Orpheum Theatre at 1:00 P:M: to see Invasion Of The Body Snatchers…and Chet hoped that the movie would take the present distress off of his mind. Jane was going to join them as she thoroughly enjoyed Science Fiction movies. Billy B. had been talking with his mom, Neva J., and Neva J. believed that there could be an attack from Russia. She noted that she had read the writing of Edgar Cayce extensively and that they had prophesied regarding impending atomic warfare. Billy B. remembered his Grandma A telling him on more than one occasion that the Book of Revelation foretold the battle of Armageddon and that the blood would run to the horses’ bridle…although Billy B. did not completely understand what that was… She also read him the scripture from Revelation, ‘And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;’

Jane wanted popcorn and Chet wanted a Coke…and Billy B. was buying. The three settled into the plush seats and the lights darkened. The movie was about alien pods taking over the bodies of humans and becoming clones of the human that they absorbed. Soon every person that you thought that you knew…both family and friends…were aliens. At the conclusion of the flick the actor, Kevin McArthy ran up the street and cried…’ They’re already here…you are next.’

The Author…writing these small stories years later learned that the movie, The Body Snatchers, was a Cold War allegory and the human absorbing pods were stand-ins for Communists.

As Chet and Jane and Billy B. exited the Theatre they heard a strange siren and people were exiting their automobiles and leaving them in the middle of the road…Billy B. looked up at where the Sun had been…and it was black as sackcloth of hair…Jane said…’What if Chicken Little was not wrong?

Chet exclaimed…Look behind you!’ There stood a horse wearing a bridle…standing in blood up to his chest…

What a difference a day makes. Or especially a weekend. Last Friday the trees were bowed with the weight of the ice that they bore on their limbs. Today it is 57 degrees and sunny. February bought more winter weather for Southern Illinois than we have seen in some time.

I have been thinking about passive-aggressive people. I have witnessed ministers who became angry or peeved with members of their congregation and thus sought to preach sermons that were directed toward their anger issues. The same can be said for supervisors and managers and administrators. People who are sweet as Maple Syrup…but have a switchblade held between the shoulder blades of their perceived nemesis…are to be avoided. Our human interaction and communication are often muddied by the games that people play.

Russia is lying through its teeth regarding its motivations for invading and declaring war on Ukraine. I listened as the Russian Ambassador to the United Nations lie in virtually every sentence that he passionately enunciated to his colleagues. Almost everyone in his audience knows that he is lying…and he knows that he is lying…and this substitutes for diplomacy… During my career, I often called out administrators and others who had insulted my intelligence by lying to my face… We will never understand each other unless we speak the truth to each other. When obfuscation becomes an accepted form of communication in the church and the workplace and in international relations…we are all in a terrible conundrum.

Last night was the culmination of the Days of Celebration for MJ. We enjoyed a lovely dinner at Mary’s Restaurant in Herrin, Illinois. As I was reflecting on our many visits, through the years, I calculated that we have been enjoying special occasions at Marys for 25 years.

When I look at the photos above I see a family that has learned to make Lemonade out of Lemons’. We are a happy lot and grateful for all that God has given us and his profound mercy and protection. We are members of the Giant Club of Little People. We are the people that work and laugh and cry and those that attempt to make life better for those that we meet. We did not draw the short straw…no one told us where the straws were… Rather we took whatever was given us and made use of it for a better life. We are no better than anyone…and we are not our fellow humans’ lesser…

Success in life is primarily attitudes. If you believe that others have control over your destiny…they will. If you feel that the education of a colleague places them in an elite status that you will never attain you will forever be at the bottom of the Caste System of Your Mind. Many times others have attempted to marginalize me and put me in my prescribed place…until I went around them and ignored them and succeeded in spite of their nefarious intentions.

Jody Murphy said of me when we were colleagues at the University that she could not tell who my enemies and my friends were as it appeared that I treated my enemies like my friends…and according to her…perhaps a bit better…

When someone places a hurdle in your path…deconstruct it and build a ladder…