Dewdrops

Oleg Volk

Sixty miles north of Latterdale is a tiny nameless lake surrounded by
cabins.  Most of them are old prefab affairs put in as summer escapes and
built upon by their subsequent, more permanent residents.  None of these
dwellings were easy to find and this one was no exception. It stood to the
side of a dirt trail which went to the lake.  The careless paint job, grey
with black specks, made it blend into the birch undergrowth.  An ancient man
that lived there, tall and severe, was up and about early.

From where the old man stood, a scant hundred feet away, the cabin was
already barely visible.  The abundant dew of an early summer morning had
already darkened his pants and chilled his pale bare feet.  The man stepped
carefully, trying to avoid the wet vegetation. From time to time, he bent to
set down a faceted glass he had in his hand onto the damp black earth. Then
he would reach to his belt, flick open a small knife and cut a wildflower
with it. After placing the flower, a lily of the valley, carefully into the
glass, he would wipe the blade on his jeans, fold it and clip it back to his
belt.

Some time has passed and the man finished his slow, deliberate sortie.  He
started toward home with light, flowing steps carrying him noiselessly to
the veranda of the cabin.  The wooden steps creaked slightly as he mounted
them easily, the glass in his hand unwavering.  A screen door separated the
den from the outside.  He tried to nudge it aside with his right shoulder
without much success.

The old man was preoccupied with keeping the dewdrops on the bouquet in his
glass undisturbed.  In his bid to open the door without shaking the glass,
he nearly lost his balance and the heavy holstered Webley that hanged from his
left side hit the siding with a thud.  He winced, squatted and set the
flowers on the floorboards of the veranda.  Then his adjusted the shoulder
holster with a practiced, impatient flourish and grasped the door handle
with his right hand.

Inside, he set his improvised vase onto a light wooden tray.  A napkin in a
silver ring was placed by it.  The old man considered the early dawn light
outside and walked to the kitchenette.  There he put on water to boil,
covering the teapot spout with a bit of sponge to keep it from whistling.
He sat down, pulled up a ceramic platter and began to arrange paper-thin
slices of venison alternating with chunks of crispbread and spicy hard
cheese.

The dew on the leaves beaded prettily, refracting the room around them.  The
tiny white flowers held onto their dewdrops as well, listing heavily past
the edges of the glass.  Those droplets were beautiful, ephemeral and
fragile yet life-giving, just like his wife.  He remembered the day when he
had first noticed her.  Unlike most men, he also remembered the day when he
had noticed dew.

They were married four years back then and ready to start on kids.  But the
thunder was on the horizon and so they sought to wait out the troubles.  One
day their truck rounded a curve past a rare hill in the otherwise flat
Dellie County and drove right into a roadblock.  He was at the wheel then
and turned hard onto a dirt road on their right.  The people manning the
roadblock opened up through the thick cloud of dust their wheels kicked up.
He got hit in the arm almost at once but kept the pedal floored.  The gained
a quarter mile when a freak hit stopped the heavy vehicle for good.
He went into a shock then, barely aware of the pain as his wife  dragged him out
of the cab and behind a pile of rocks left there by farmers.  When the dust
settled, their ambushers closed in and set the truck on fire.  The nearest
of them got to about two hundred yards when Reiko centerpunched him.  The
rest fell back, one limping badly.  That was their mistake, as she outranged
them. They could not drive off nor take their prey down, but they could
stand off, keep her pinned down and buy time.

The old man glanced at the watch he left at the table and sighed. It was
noon when they got ambushed.  By nightfall, he had become feverish. They had
no water and thirst threatened to finish what the machine pistols of the
enemy had started.

The full moon saved them as the attackers stayed in the ditch by the
highway.  Trained men would have flanked them in the dark but these were
only jaybooters, well-armed but not so well trained or brave.  Those huddled
for warmth and to keep the fear of darkness away.  By morning, Reiko found
water.  She had crawled to a depression in the ground where a few low shrubs
provided shade for the wildflowers.  Those she picked with the kind of care
that misers reserve for gold and sappers, for mines.

He thought it a bad jest when she crawled back with lilies of the valley in
her outstretched hand.  His glasses lost, he could barely see the closest
blossoms glistening with the drops of the dew.

"Water," she whispered.

The enemy had opened up then and several clumps of dirt kicked up by bullets
marred the perfection of the offering.  He licked the wet leaves anyway,
feebly, selfishly.  A close report hammered on his ears but so tired he was
that he did not even flinch.

He passed out shortly thereafter. As dusk approached, the jaybooters tried
to rush them, three covering, three running forward with a disdain for cover
born of desperation.  Two of the attackers came back after their
front-runner pitched forward, legs still treading but most of the head gone.
That night the jaybooters left.  Reiko probed their egressing cruisers with
her 338 but, fatigued as she was, ineffectively.  Two hours later she dozed
off for the first time in two days and slept for a long time.
Water came to a boil and the old man brewed smoky Japanese tea in a dark,
heavy bowl.

He thought again to the day when he woke up feeling light and unreal. He was
too weak to move and that is why it took him a day to miss his left arm.
His wife was next to him, breathing too softly for him to notice.
She had carried his limp, filthy body to the makeshift hospital set up by
the Marines in Jumo.  It took her two days and all of her strength to cover
the eight-mile distance to town.  She never did recover completely from that
strain.  But she has stood by him in the fifty-six years that had passed
since.  She had borne his children, fought for him again in '21, aged
gracefully and now slept fitfully in the back of their tiny home.

The old man picked up the tray with the tea bowl and the flowers and went
into the bedroom.  There he set the tray on the small folding table at the
head of the bed and made himself comfortable on the floor. Sitting with his
back against the veneer wall, he looked at the white-haired woman whose body
made a tiny lumpy island in the middle of a vast antique bed.  Any minute
now, the smell of green tea would wake her up.
"We are rich now," he thought. "We don't have to save dewdrops."    

North Carolina

Much too kind, but appreciated, nevertheless. It is wonderful to hear that good men still exist and are fighting the good fight.

Dear Brock

Your work on the North Carolina site is nothing less than fabulous and the South thanks you so much for the contributions you are making today for your father’s and great great Grandfather’s history!

The modern day Confederate movement is frustrating to say the least and your blog will hopefully be a magnet to draw the disparate groups closer together. The reason is simple, its purity. Your site shows the love of Confederacy without the hidden political agendas which so many of the organizations reflect. They too love our Confederacy—but their love blinds them to opening their hearts to seeing the others….we all mourn for our brothers who fell and our sisters who stayed home to the abuse of Sherman and others. This point we find common ground but we seldom find the manners to address one another with the respect and understanding that Southern hospitality should require.

I am a modern day Confederate and espouse those values, Christian values, love of God, Family and State. This is the essence of our cause. We can revive it again with the efforts you deliver into that wonderful website.

We believe the Confederacy never surrendered her government, therefore it exists in exile. Some take advantage of that and others wish for the purity in which you write. Our Confederate government exists and we protect it with great effort against the ones who would seek our destruction. Others have done little to support it but it should be conceptualized, a Confederate government waiting in exile for the opportunity to free States from their occupation and tyranny.

After Texas vs. White, secession is no longer a possibility. They took the right away. The South seceded, lost a war and surrendered her Armies, but the Government of the Confederacy NEVER surrendered….and that is our cause. I ask you to consider that point and move us back towards our status as an Independent Nation!

Thank you again for your efforts and hard work, we need more like you!

Kevin Carroll

Obama Supporter Interviews Her 2008 Self

Via The Feral Irishman

Welfare state must rise up, 'exert control over free market' Professor teaches it's necessary for 'racially just society'

Via Cousin John

Should just shoot these Marxists and put them out of their misery.:) Let's see, anyone want to take me up on a bet that 100% he never served? There must be one dumb guy out there......:)

The “welfare state” must rise up and take control in the United States, declares a teacher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The textbook used by Mustafa Emirbayer for his Sociology 134 Class, “American Racial and Ethnic Minorities, is his own book, “Racial Domination, Racial Progress: The Sociology of Race in America,” reports CampusReform.org.

The text calls for a “racially just society” in which “the welfare state would rise up to exert control over the free market,” according to the report.

“The American welfare state – perhaps the skinniest in the developed world – could be fattened up,” he wrote in the book co-authored with Matthew Desmond. “The skimpy American welfare state – in large part responsible for the millions of citizens living hand-to-mouth today – would expand by generous proportions.”

Emirbayer writes the “welfare state would rise up to exert control over the free market, making sure to protect vulnerable citizens from its erratic whims.”

His students can find the book on Amazon.com, where it sells for nearly $70.

His book is the only text he assigns for the class. (How convenient.)

More @ WND

Newsweek Magazine To End Print Edition

If they had continued to be the Newsweek that I bought religiously in Saigon instead of the .gov mouth of today, this might not have been necessary. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

Newsweek will eventually transition to an online publication, owner IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI) said today, marking the beginning of the end for the magazine’s 79-year run as a print weekly.

IAC Chairman Barry Diller made the announcement during a quarterly earnings conference call, saying the New York-based company aims to curb investments in the money-losing business. Still, he stopped short of saying it would be a “total” shift to the Internet.

“The transition to online from hard print will take place,” Diller said. “We’re examining all of our options.”

More @ NewsMax

Two goodies from the Moneychanger

Link

On 25 July 1775 Maryland issued a currency depicting George III trampling Magna Carta. Sound sentiment, but bad judgment. They printed it on paper currency, which has harmed mankind & justice more than all the kings, dictators, & tyrants in history.

On 25 July 1805 Aaron Burr visited New Orleans planning to establish a new country with New Orleans as the capital. I don't know . . . Could that be worse than what we ended up with? Mardi Gras would be a national holiday & the national motto, "Laissez le bon temps rouler!"

Lynyrd Skynyrd - Workin' For MCA (live '76) England

Via Carl

Ahhhhhgggg!

Ohhh ... seven years of hard luck, comin' down on me
From the Florida border, yes, up to Nashville Tennessee
I worked in every joint you can name, yessuh, every honkytonk
Along come Mister Yankee Slicker, sayin' maybe you what I want

Want you to sign your contract
Want you to sign today
Gonna give you lots of money
Workin' for MCA

Ohhh ... nine thousand dollars, that's all we could win
But we smiled at the Yankee Slicker with a big ol' Southern grin
They're gonna take me out to California, gonna make me a superstar
Just pay me all my money and maybe you won't get a scar

Want you to sign your contract
Want you to sign today
Gonna give you lots of money
Workin' for MCA

Ohhh ... slickers steal my money, since I was seventeen
If it ain't no pencil pusher, then it got to be a honkytonk queen
But I'll sign my contract, baby, and I want you people to know
Every penny that I make, I want to see where my money goes

Want you to sign your contract
Want you to sign today
Gonna give you lots of money
Workin' for MCA

Day By Day

Dixie's .gov college entrance tests

Well, I should have realized that going from private school and homeschool environments into the jaws of government education would not bode well. At any rate, Dixie wanted to take an Esthetics's course at Carteret Community College while she continued homeschool next year in the 11th grade. Found out that they would not allow this, but would the Cosmetology course which includes Esthetics's as well as the whole kit and caboodle. I decided not to inquire as to their logic as I was sure I would not have been a happy camper. Anyway, Dixie said that she would do it even though this takes five hours out of her homeschooling day which means almost doubling her workload.

The counselor said she would need to take a basic math test along with English and keyboarding, so we scheduled the tests at 5:40 PM last Monday expecting an hour and half total. When we got there, we were told that she had been scheduled for all the tests required of someone entering after the 12th grade. I mentioned that this wasn't what the counselor had told us, but it was either take them all or comeback after it was straightened out. Dixie went for this which normally takes about 3 1/2 hours and she had only a snack before, because of the time expectation. Beside keyboarding which was no problem, there was an advanced computer test which you could skip and take as a course later, but Dixie decided to go for broke. English was no problem, but math in the last two years of high school was, needless to say, although Dixie does her mother's business books as well as household accounts which is something she will actually use in life. I certainly never used Algebra or Geometry, but did Business Math, Accounting and Bookkeeping.

During the wait I mentioned that the room were too cold, but the girl said she had no way to control it. Figures. At 10:15 after 4 1/2 hours Dixie came out and I could tell she was close to tears. As we walked out, I said don't worry you'll pass, but she said that wasn't her worry but that the room had been so cold she continually made mistakes on the keyboard and was hungry to boot. Poor thing. She passed and now we look forward to whatever gems government education can come up with in the future!

Axelrod: Obama Campaign Appears Negative Because Of Romney

In his appearance on Wednesday on Morning Joe, David Axelrod tried to explain how the public’s perception of the Obama campaign was the most negative. According to an NBC/ Wall Street Journal poll, 22% of Americans viewed the Obama campaign as the most negative while nearly half of them saw the Romney campaign as negative.

So how did Axelrod respond to this? Well he did sort of like his boss does. When Barack Obama is looking for someone to blame, George W. Bush is his “punching bag.” When Axelrod looked for blame, he blamed Mitt Romney. I’m not kidding.

Axelrod said,

“Well that’s because the Romney campaign and their friends in the SuperPAC world have just spent tens and tens of millions of dollars specifically on spots accusing Obama of running a negative campaign. So I’m not surprised to see those numbers jump a little.”

You have to watch the video because Joe Scarborough is giggling a bit and it is classic that he asks without skipping a beat, “So it’s not your negative ads, it’s their negative ads accusing you of being negative that has caused that number to go up?”

More @ Freedom Outpost