Archive for the ‘My view of the world’ Category

Chance Encounters

Posted: November 10, 2018 in Life and Memories, My view of the world
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“You wander down the lane and far away, leaving me with a song that will not die…”

                                                                                                                            Nat King Cole

In one of those chance encounters that can happen so unexpectedly in a person’s life, I saw her, my childhood friend and companion of so many years ago. I spotted her immediately as she entered the hallway just a few feet in front of me. I don’t really know why, but I desperately wanted to rush up to her and announce my presence…but I couldn’t. I’m not sure if simple shyness or fear of a cold reception held me back, but whatever the reason, I found myself silently walking along behind her, fearful of approaching. For reasons unknown, she suddenly stopped and turned around and my fears and uncertainties instantly disappeared in a flash as she walked toward me, a smile blossoming across her face.

“Ricky, it’s so good to see you!” she gushed as she unabashedly threw her arms around me, “how have you been? It has been so long.” I despise the name Ricky, having worn it throughout my childhood, but somehow, coming from her it sounded sweet and natural and fitting. We continued to hug like the long-lost friends we were and it lasted for a moment and an eternity and felt amazingly nice. I found myself not wanting to let go but people were beginning to stare, so I reluctantly let go.

I felt the same closeness and affection toward her as I did when we were children. In fact, some of my earliest childhood memories were created with her as we spent many of our formative years together. We sat next to each other in church and also at school, we played together, sang together, discovered the world together and cried together. We  had developed a bond that I have rarely felt with anyone since.

Eventually though, the inevitable happened. At the end of our third grade school year she moved away. I was totally distraught and it seemed like my world was collapsing about me. I still recall the overwhelming sadness I felt the day she left. Life moved on and I moved on with it and even though the emptiness and grief waned, I never quite forgot her.

Thirty years have passed and as we sat and talked, I perceived and experienced the same bond I had felt as a child. It suddenly seemed like only yesterday we were hopping and bouncing on her pogo stick, or playing with stuffed animals or discovering new things and treasures within our yards or walking together to her grandfather’s store to share candy or a coke. I’m not sure whether she felt the same sensations or not, but I suspect she did by the smile on her face as we spoke. Eventually we parted, promising to keep in touch.

This evening as I pause from catching up on work, I can’t help but wonder what life would have been like if she had not moved away all those years ago. I know her life would probably radically different that it is now. She is a successful teacher and mother, happily married to a well respected physician. I am very grateful that I had the chance encounter to meet the grown-up version of my closest childhood companion and I am jubilant she has the wonderful life she has been blessed with. A person can never really know what extreme and considerable differences small changes could have made in our lives. However, as I sit here in the gloaming of the evening twilight, I still wonder though, what it would have been like if she had never moved away.

For Darlene

1996  written under the pseudonym, Richard Corey

Insurance Companies

Posted: November 10, 2018 in Life and Memories, My view of the world
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“and the days dwindle down to a precious few…”

Frank Sinatra

It seems to become more apparent every time I open a statement from an insurance company, that they are blatantly becoming more fearless about raising their consumer rates, often from one statement to the next. In the not too distant past insurance companies would employ surreptitious and covert techniques in raising their rates, to the point we almost had to compare statements to even detect their ploy. They are still fluidly sleek and shark-like in their approach, but now they are completely and overtly informing us of the fact they are, once again, going to be dipping their hands into our wallets (or at least my insurance carrier is).

For example, I received a birthday card from my insurer a few days before my last birthday, which I thought was a nice touch. Their card had a nice, genteel look to it as had all the others I had received over the years…only this card was a little different. Inside was a poem instead of the expected generic greeting that I had come to envisage from my insurance carrier.

It goes as follows:

Happy birthday to you, Happy birthday to you. I hope it’s great one, you know that I do.

   Now that I have that out of the way, I’m raising your rates, effective today.

I’ve done you a service, (I’m sure you won’t mind) By installing a siphon from your bank to mine.

Hard monthly payments and nasty old cash. Won’t worry you now, there’s no time for that.

You’re no longer young, life’s passing you by. So stop by and thank me, before you die.

All at once I was sunned, mortified and flabbergasted, by their audacity and boldness, then I sat back and slowly started to realize that they are no different than most any other company that I deal with today. I suppose, what really bothers me about this whole episode, is that they are forcing me to acknowledge the reality that I am getting older. If they hadn’t been so bloody audacious about it all, I possibly could have gone on several more years pretending that death’s winged chariot is not breezing past my front window on a slowly increasing schedule, and that I am still a young, virile, strong twenty-something year old, instead of the old geezer I am swiftly becoming.

It was a nice card though, I have to say.

1998, newspaper article written under the pseudonym Richard Corey

What do the Golan Heights, Hebron and the Gaza Strip have in common…and why should we care?

Posted: August 22, 2012 in Christian, Israel, My view of the world
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With the volatile situation in the Middle East all over the news lately, I have recently become interested in the historical links between the conquest of Canaan and the surrounding area today and so I decided to do a little research.

We learn in the bible about the covenants the Lord has made with His firstborn children, the children of Israel. We also read in several places in the scriptures, references to the Jews and the conquest of Canaan, the promised land, where the Israelites fell short of doing what God commanded them to do whenever they were sent to attack and conquer the land of Canaan. Let us take a quick look at these areas and see what we can glean from the price the Jews paid, and continue to pay, for the lack of completing what The Lord commanded them to do…to kill and conquer and to not take hostages in the battles for these areas.

First, let’s look at the region of Bashan of the bible. A major city in the region of Bashan is Golan. We know the area today as the Golan Heights with Golan still as the major city of this hill country. Og of the Amorites was one the major king of the area during Joshua’s time and as you recall, Joshua didn’t utterly wipe out all the Amorites, these highland mountaineers are described as powerful people of great stature, “like the height of the cedars”1. In fact, Joshua got duped by the Gibeonites, a branch of the Amorites, into signing a treaty with them, against advice, and later The Lord ended up punishing His people for not honoring this ill-fated treaty when Saul killed a bunch of the Gibeonites and King David had to decide which punishment the Israelites would receive in 2 Samuel chapter 21. It may have been a horrible treaty, but this is an example that shows The Lord always honors His treaties and covenants.

Next, let’s look at Hebron2.. During the time of Joshua and the Canaan conquests, Hebron was under the control of three sons of Anak who was considered a descendant of the nephilim (Numbers 13:33) and also referred to as Rephaite3 (Rephaim) Anak is also linked to the name Anax in Greek mythology which was a king of giants and considered about 18 feet tall.4 Today, Hebron is the largest city in The West Bank.

OK, how about Gaza…Gaza is located along the western coast of Canaan (Israel) bordering Egypt and after Joshua and the tribe of Judah failed to completely eliminate all the Anakim (nephilim) from here, as well as Gath and Ashdod, and the rest of the the area as they were directed (as we read about in Joshua 11:22), it became a major city of the Philistines and remained a major thorn in the side of the Jews all through the book of Judges. Gaza happened to have been the city where Samson pulled the temple down around him in Judges 16:21.

A couple more…

Gath was the hometown of Goliath and his four brothers and David took care of those guys.

Ashdod is another coastal city near Gaza and was the city of Philistia where the Ark of the Covenant was taken and it kept pulling down the statue of Dagon, night after night…too bad they didn’t have video cameras…it would have been a fantastic thing to watch…

What do all these areas have in common? They are all locations within Canaan where Joshua was ordered by the Lord to utterly destroy the kingdoms within the land of Canaan. I used to have problems with apparent cruelty of Our Lord to kill not only the soldiers, but the women and children of these nations within the borders of Canaan until I studied about the nephilim and I realized the purpose behind the orders (destroy all signs of the corruption of the human genome). I truly feel because they didn’t fully carry out the orders of The Lord’s commandment and utterly destroy their enemies that lived in the above strongholds four thousand years ago. The Israelites are discovering that the dweller of the areas are once again a major thorn in the side of God’s people. I believe there is more to this than just the failure to eradicate all traces of the nephilim. We have found from the bible that demons are territorial and the failure to wipe out the races of the nephilim within their borders also meant that whatever demons (demons would be a study in its own right) Satan also planted in those areas are most likely still there doing their bidding for their master, just as they would have in the Bronze Age when Joshua fell short of fully obeying The Lord. The results we read about in the papers on a daily basis.

What is that you say? You don’t know who the nephilim are? Look here: http://www.nwcreation.net/nephilim.html

God Bless,

Jim

1http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amorite

2 http://www.burlingtonnews.net/hebron.html

3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rephaite

4http://www.theoi.com/Gigante/GiganteAnaxAsterios.html

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