James M. Piehl
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By James M. Piehlabout a year ago in Poets
Champ.
My dog is long passed, gone to another world where he runs free like the clouds across the sky but we made memories. We were an odd couple. I was a gangly stub of a string bean. Under five feet tall and under seventy pounds. He was a muscle freak. Half boxer half Rottweiler but I threw him around and I threw myself around with him. I used to knock him around pretty good, too. He would bound into me, "playing", so I had to get up and knock him around so he would understand that isn't how this can go. You'll get lost in this world if I let you get away with that. I told him he had to remember I look out for him, I know my way around better than he did. He did not understand how big he was, how much smaller I was and what the physics of all of that meant but I did. We had to put him outside because he was a bundle of energy. And with all his muscle he would have torn the house down. I remember all this. I remember watching exactly the way things were going. He knocked a few things in the basement down so my father built a pen. He jumped out of it after awhile. So my father put some boards over the top of it. He
By James M. Piehl2 years ago in Families
Cataclysm extinction event possible
I have challenged the entire scientific community and my controversial point of view is that I believe some dinosaurs were much more birdlike than previously spoken about. There is no doubt many were reptilian but I believe some species were much more like birds and an evolutionary shift occurred. And science recently discovered and published some evidence of these specific findings. A fossil, well preserved, was found in southern China of a nine inch very birdlike animal with long tail. I am not sure I entirely believe Darwin's theories but there are elements of it that make sense and I do believe his research has value. As far as I can tell at this point, the ice age, the weather shift that happened, stunted some of their growth into the smaller animals we have now. When food was abundant they fed until reaching those enormous sizes. There diet and meal time was uncontrolled as they did not personally regulate it and so competition with human beings in this respect caused an external regulation of their food consumption. They had no mental regulation controlled by their ID or Ego and lacked the complexity of reasoning that human beings have and developed, so whatever dinosaurs felt like doing is what they did especially when unchecked. They ate as often as they felt like and reached those enormous sizes. Man realized this was wicked as witness to the troubles and limits in those animals thinking which helped man emerge with a smarter sense of preservation and understanding of why. When you pluck a chicken of its feathers or any avian, if you will, the skin beneath can look very reptilian. If the heat kept them molted and featherless the skin would become more leathery from what we know are the effects of the sun's radiation. That would cause the differences in skin color and texture as well. When the cold came in food became less abundant also. Meals were limited. The animals had a harder time feeding when it was harder for them to figure out where to find food. There growth was stunted for survival. That is how modern birds like hawks and eagles came to be how they are. Crocodiles and snakes shrank down. We see examples now of when they more closely resemble the time of dinosaurs with Forty foot boa constrictors showing up in the jungle, huge crocodiles lurking in the Nile River as there meals are not limited or regulate so there growth potential is much larger. Now a dark army of bats are actually growing too large and we see this happening in or near Australia. Animal and human life will be effected by this. The bats can travel farther distances and are much larger. These were a fruit bat variety but they will become more vampirous. They will eat anything and have no concerns about killing, no guilt or remorse. They can travel on the thermal air waves farther distances and be a huge disruption and harder to detect. I believe there are real vampire stories out there now that a generation are too afraid to admit the first hand experience, knowing how they could be ostracized for reporting those things. But the large fruit bat that is the flying fox is without doubt a vampire. If human beings turn a blind eye to this as strange as it might sound that animal is poised to takeover. One has already reached about two and a half feet in size and there are one hundred thousand more of them that are 18 inch or so variety in size. In such a large group they could land like locusts and strip and devour a countryside. They would be hard to detect until it was too late and they were right upon you. People are often slow to believe and slow to respond to these things. Right now these animals have shown a distinct behavior of study, in that, they have landed nearby human beings and shown themselves to be learning their prey. They will battle with birds for food source and just to fight the large sized animal in a series of study and attempt for dominance. And birds aren't greatly equipped for that fight as in bats are more vicious and blood thirsty. I believe they have been in a fight with the whooping crane for awhile and these birds need our help. These animals need man's help. We can choose and need to choose the side of the whooping crane. We cannot allow that bird to lose. There is no doubt some dinosaurs were more birdlike rather than only reptilian. If you think about that, how wildly crazy the world was with these animals devoid of reasoning. These large vicious predators that felt nothing as they devoured whatever they felt like chewing on. We have to realize man survived these horrible conditions on the power of his mind more than just the power of his physical strength. In observations of bird behavior now and the way it eats, picks at the ground, picks up a worm I think what it must have been like as early man witnessing these heartless creatures peck and tear these things to pieces without thinking about or showing any sense of caring at all. Reptiles are just as cruel in their handling of life. So imagining the enormity of these animals stomping over the land the way they were, how they turned on each other to fight for fun, territory or aggression and compete for food or eat each other there are frightening aspects. The climate shift had calmed that wild away but it is still man's job to keep dominion over the wild of the world lest it race away out of our control and return to a time it was rampant. It takes an educated approach to achieve this success and even with all of the modern weaponry and advancements on weapons man needs to exhibit a real knowledge of tact. Tact will be man's greatest ally.
By James M. Piehl2 years ago in Earth
How the birds learned language
This story comes from a time long ago. It had been purported that Leif Ericson had traversed the waters west and found America's gleaming shores and the vast solitude and space of a great countryside. Here is the story of those things, the beginnings before far migration of people and expansion, of a flight that had never been written but was legendary in its time. In a life in a land where people gathered and learned to survive the cold. Fur wrappings and cloth were necessity. When people taught their children of heaven. The Norse called it Valhalla.
By James M. Piehl2 years ago in Fiction
How a butterfly defeated the powerful French Empire
To add some more depth to the the story and lore of Le Papillion, The Butterfly, that the world itself did not know but some of the facts are widely known as world history, I bring these facts to you as pieces of the puzzle that might make the current world make sense to you from out of the past world. This is how a butterfly defeated a tyrant and set the world free from his tyranny. Napoleon Bonaparte was a general in The French Army who declared himself Emperor of France. Some very famous words of his inspired his troops and there love of their native land. Napoleon himself and all the others may not have known, at the time, what all his words equaled. They were simply spoken and added to and added to. One of his famous quotes was "An army marches on its stomach ...Victory belongs to the most persevering...Glory is fleeting but obscurity is forever...Until you spread your wings you'll have no idea how far you can fly...If you want a thing done well do it yourself...Impossible is a word found in the dictionary of fools." The army on its stomach and the how far you can fly quotes by him remind me of the butterfly. The caterpillar marches on its stomach, it's long road to the leaves of plants and trees take perseverance to get to and then it's transformation into the beauty of the butterfly. After all the work of the caterpillar it's earns the freedom to fly and the faster mobility of flight. That keeps them more likely out of harms way as well. Napoleon's words so inspired Jacques MacDonald that MacDonald was a faithful follower and believer in the greatness of Napoleon. Another thing Napoleon said is, "Who is that man? Does he think he's God? Well he is not God." when speaking about a man and group of people he wanted to dominate into submission. Napoleon then sent one of his General's into a fight against me, he sent him after my ancestors and so he essentially attacked me as well. Bonaparte said "Then this will be his waterloo." He meant this will be his toilet, his latrine and he sent Jacques MacDonald to dispatch the news that Napoleon himself was unwilling to concede and had predicted French victory in the battle. Well Jacques and the French forces were defeated in that battle in 1813. This led to Napoleon's banishment and exile to Elba in 1814.
By James M. Piehl3 years ago in FYI
One embarrassing moment to remember
As far as purely embarrassing goes, I think back to youth soccer and a truly bone headed moment comes to memory. In case you didn't know the term bone headed is a description of neanderthalic thinking or lack of thought. A bit of caveman simplicity of thought that lacks much thought involved. It comes from pterodactyl who had a large femur-like bone sticking up from their head. I played soccer as a kid and enjoyed the exercise. The fresh air, the sunshine, the field of play. I began playing soccer when I was four or five years old. I was an Aztec. We had bright yellow and white uniforms and I loved being an Aztec. I loved my uniform and it even sort of matched my bright blonde hair. I even bought an Aztec calendar necklace on a school trip to a science museum in grade school. I played soccer in the town league for many years but I began transitioning to football in seventh grade. I played football for our high school but still played soccer for the town at the same time. A lot of times I would go directly from football practice to soccer practice and in eighth grade it was still the same. One sunny afternoon, in soccer, I dribbled the ball toward the corner just outside the goalie box. I had my head down a bit watching the movement of the ball as I drove it past some of the other players. When I looked up I had broken into the clear and I paused their in the open with the ball but now several players were rushing toward me and the space was getting smaller. As they were closing the distance rapidly, I searched for my teammates couldn't see any of them, so, without much thought, I did what made so much sense to me to keep the ball safe right then. I simply bent down and picked it up. As soon as I stood entirely upright again I dropped the ball before the referees whistle even blew. As the ball was falling the whistle blew and I was already turned back up field walking away. Everyone was speechless just watching me in my wide-eyed retreat. I walked up to the sideline and right off the field. I said, "Coach, someone needs to go in for me. I think I was thinking in football terms. Maybe coming here right after football practice isn't going to work anymore. That is just embarrassing. What was I going to run it into the goal past the goalie for a touchdown? I gonna take a break." He just laughed a little bit and said "What were you thinking of football?" And I said, "Yes, I think so." I'll never forget that. You can pretty much use every part of your body in soccer just not your hands. There is inadvertent handball where the ball accidentally strikes your hand but I went out of my way to take the time to bend down and just pick it up in both hands. I was not mentally with it on that play. There is no handball more obvious than that. So in my confusion I stayed on the sidelines for awhile lost in thought. I had played soccer since I was like four or five years old. The most important "no-no, never" that you are taught is just don't use your hands unless you are the goalie. To think of it now, it was all of those things but also I had some new family members as well. In eight grade I had a one year old niece and a new born nephew, so, all in all I don't think my thinking was out of line considering precious cargo, to keep those new little additions safe but on the soccer field you aren't going to get very far if you are breaking a rule as fundamental as just don't use your hands. Soccer is made to use your feet that's why Europeans and the world outside the United States call it football. There's a lesson in that somewhere otherwise it is just a purely unthinking moment of the most obvious hand ball there might have ever been in Soccer.
By James M. Piehl3 years ago in Confessions
First look at strange true history
Uncommonly known, and perhaps not ever told, is the link of the Three Musketeers, the Romance or Love poets and Cyrano de Bergerac. William Shakespeare, thought to be a pen name, had started a rivalry with some of the other poets of the time and a fight broke out. Henry Constable, Michael Drayton, Samuel Daniel, Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Campion, Sir Henry Wotton, and John Donne were the group of poets I am talking about during this time. This lead to the pen is mightier than the sword phrase but that was quickly put to the test as swords became involved. The Shakespeare was called out by the other poets into sword battle, the Rapier, being the weapon for dueling. His name alone made them angry as he was shaking his weapon mockingly at them, they had said. They wanted to draw him out of the place where he wrote his poetry. This they claimed was him putting, equivalently, his big nose, in their business. Cyrano de Bergerac has the famous, he being the greatest of all sword fighters or duelists, scene where he voices off in poetic display giving a grand performance and flourish to the point he emerges victorious in the fight striking his opponent dead at the very moment he predicted he would at the onset. He was a very good a sword fighter, the Frenchman, De Bergerac. Shakespeare had died in 1616, three years prior to De Bergerac's recorded birth. De Bergerac, by the way, only lived until age 36. Shakespeare had lived until age 52. De Bergerac had claimed to help a dullard and lesser man gain the affections of a woman he decided he personally loved more instead in his tale, the one written by Edmond Rostand. The other man in Rostand's story had died in a war away from the woman, she had taken her love away from him and placed it with De Bergerac where it rightfully belonged instead because of his words of Romance instead of the good looks of the dullard. It is that De Bergerac followed after Shakespeare that made him the fourth musketeer. This is where Dumas had gotten the idea for the story. Although, much was ripped from the halls of history before him, the adventures of the Musketeers were imagined and fictionalized. I don't believe any of the Musketeer adventures were actually from the real men I am talking about. Shakespeare dueled with a pen, was commonly a playwright but I am sure he was a duelist of swords as well. This was a game they played. They wrote love poems to woo women and each believed he was the best and often sang his own praises in a sort of campaigning for popularity in Elizabethan England. If you read the poems by these men you can see where the turn and escalation into the fight had happened. The fight had begun at the play house, the theatre. Marlowe had finished a successful night of performance of his play and began deriding Shakespeare. Word got back to William Shakespeare that Marlowe was calling him a coward and if he didn't go to him they would hunt him down to kill him so Shakespeare went to the bar to confront him. The entire scene depicted in Cyrano de Bergerac occurred between Shakespeare and Marlowe resulting in Marlowe's death at age twenty nine when Shakespeare slew him. Marlowe known as Shakespeare's rival, killed in the same duel depicted in De Bergerac's story penned by Edmond Rostand. De Bergerac was so romanced by those facts that he sought to recreate those circumstances for legendary standing of his own. Shakespeare and Marlowe were born in the same year. Constable and Daniel were born two years before that, Daniel it is actually not certain about but is believed to be 1562 just like Constable. Drayton was a year later in 1563. Campion '67 Wotton '68 and Donne in '72. Shakespeare and Marlowe were born in 1564 of course. All of them lived into their 50's, some 60's and one his 70's. Other than of course Marlowe. De Bergerac came after and claimed to have been of the same caliber as those men, but he wasn't Shakespeare. Shakespeare was bar none the master and all could not rival him, his poetry is loved and renowned for it's mastery, though he wasn't for a long time. De Bergerac romanticized about the story he had heard and to claim it as his own looked to recreate the same fight in which to attain the same victory. He was of course very like them and he wanted to be. He would have heard the story from Drayton who had a first hand account. Wotton and Donne who lasted into the years of Cyrano's life enough could have known the story also because Wotton was twenty-five at Marlowe's death and Donne was twenty-one. Both were also likely to be at the fight that killed Marlowe. These facts carried their effects into Cyrano's life. He died at thirty six though because he did not understand the powerful forces he was playing with. Dumas of course took the story further and shaped it into The Three Musketeers and since much of the Musketeers adventures were, I guess, imagined, even their names fictionalized, they were even possibly unknown to Dumas to be taken from the real story of the rivalry of Marlowe and Shakespeare and the love poets. Incidentally, we all know an English policeman is a Constable and well, also a Bobby, but that is where the term Constable was created and came into the world. We see the seething anger from Daniel, in his poem "If this be love, to draw a weary breath". Daniel by the way has a famous whiskey here in America from Tennessee. Daniel is mocking all the love poetry saying if this is love, if this is what love is, to draw a weak breath then do I love and draw this weary breath. In this poem Daniel asks is it love to die, to draw a weary breath, am I the one who will draw this weary fading breath but Shakespeare went to confront the conflict head on and killed Marlowe in the sword fight. Drayton though, his poetry was pure bold faced statement of fight as well. The only one saying anything different was Shakespeare. But also the entire debate they were often engaged in has been a polarizing issue for thousands of years and was a millennia and a half old at that time. Shakespeare explains it in dramatic fashion with Macbeth and no one has pointed that out until now. Marlowe was angry that Shakespeare thought himself to be a better writer than he and the ugly fight that could not be turned away from ensued. Marlowe issued far too much of a challenge and the entire affair turned violent to his death and Daniel and Drayton then became the other two Musketeers to Shakespeare after he defeated Marlowe. Drayton grew to love Shakespeare and they were great friends but Daniel never could care for Shakespeare as much and Drayton's fondness of Shakespeare of course intensified Daniel's opposition to a more caring friendliness toward Shakespeare. Because Daniel couldn't quite let things go entirely he finally slew Shakespeare at fifty-two and was, so then, slain after by Drayton at age fifty-seven. Drayton lived until age sixty-eight and would have certainly given the first hand story to Cyrano de Bergerac. Drayton may have even asked in this story who would you be, but probably never told about his own involvement in it letting Cyrano choose the path of his life into manhood for his own, first, before ever revealing it. I think not only out of fairness Drayton would have killed Daniel but he also grew to love Shakespeare as a friend and poet and master of writing. They were perhaps the best friends of the trio. The fact that a French kid admired an Englishmen is something strange, beautiful and intriguing about it as well. In fact all of it is intriguing. All three of the men Cyrano admired were Englishmen but the often disliked Shakespeare was the one he admired. So he wanted him to be his father. He was victorious as well which usually makes people want to be "that one" in any story even though Daniel lived three years after Shakespeare's death, into the year of De Bergerac's birth. Cyrano De Bergerac was Daniel's child and Drayton then raised him. All of the cloak and mirrors regarding it are because of the complexity of it all. So Drayton as the adoptive parent would have checked to see in his surrogate role how Cyrano would feel about the facts that either way his father was English even though he himself was French. He would have stored him away to raise him and over time explained these facts to him. So Cyrano, the birth son of Daniel, an Englishmen who killed Shakespeare, the one most beloved even by Cyrano de Bergerac, and then raised and taught by Drayton, the Englishmen who had killed Cyrano's father, Samuel Daniel. Wotton was the only one who made it three years longer than Drayton to the age of seventy-one. Cyrano and the Shakespeare affair and The Musketeers appear often in popular culture. De Bergerac appears as the little gray savoir faire cousin mouse of Jerry the Mouse from Tom and Jerry, and also appeared as a musketeer mouse ready to fight everything for glory over dishonor which then shaped some more of the story and carried it into the popular culture of cartoon. Also in the eighties the movie Roxanne with Steve Martin gave the tale a modern twist as well. De Bergerac just didn't want to be left out of what he felt romantic about, which was being a sword fighter and writer like those men before him meaning his own father, Samuel Daniel, William Shakespeare and his surrogate father Michael Drayton. It is also because he wanted the power of protecting himself from this vile enemy that stalked him into the unfair life he was born with. I am also certain that the romanticized character, Indigo Montoya from "The Princess Bride", was a true depiction of Cyrano. In De Bergerac's attempts to chase down the hatred that killed his father the confliction was that both the men that he loved in this true story were neither of them, his Father. His father finished in third place to those men in his life and was the one he personally would have chosen to fight to the death. De Bergerac would have, of course, loved Drayton so even if he had ran around fully unaware that Drayton was the one who had killed his father he would be too grateful for all that Drayton had done for him, therefor Cyrano would have felt no real animosity toward Drayton, whom he would have loved more than his own father either way, even if both had lived during his life which would mean no real conflicting emotions were involved in De Bergerac choosing Drayton for a father. There would have been no doubt that Drayton was De Bergerac's father and the man De Bergerac was seeking to kill for Drayton would have been his own actual father Daniel. It is certain Samuel Daniel is Cyrano de Bergerac's real birth father. And there is the entire amazing twist, the son turned by the duty of what is right so much he would have killed the man who brought him into the world instead of avenge his birth father's death. Cyrano, of course, felt he deserved the glory of writer and sword fighter, as well, and wanted to achieve the greatness Shakespeare, Daniel, and Drayton had achieved but obviously more Shakespeare than the other two, even Drayton. He of course did not live as long as Shakespeare or the others excluding Marlowe. De Bergerac was claiming he would have been the victor in that fight just like Shakespeare was, who incidentally might have been the "Mother" of his who had died in 1616 three years before his birth, but he may not have been happy to find out the man he identified most with was in fact an Englishmen and none other than the reviled William Shakespeare, the man his own father had killed. I think De Bergerac would have been learning most of this through letters which would have pulled him back and forth as he tried to figure it out, through all this mystery, trying to figure out who his father was. When of course De Bergerac began "the game", he said he was searching for the man that killed his father. He was simply looking for a fight and finally based injustice on the physical size of his famously known large nose. He though lost 16 years sooner than Shakespeare did even though Shakespeare himself hadn't even intentionally sought a fight. I don't know that Henry Constable, Sir Henry Wotton and Henry King weren't all King Henry's extended bloodline, who perhaps pilfered Shakespeare's works which is why it might be believed to this day some of Shakespeare's works were stolen. Constable and Wotton, may have actually been the same man the constable and then also the knight, or either one may have been Henry King's father and King Henry's bloodline. The reason is Henry would always want it known his belief that he deserved to be king and so would not ever want to lose the distinguishment of it and so kept it as a last name just to never part ways with it. Always of course wanting to hear the sound of that word attached to him so forcing others to call him that. So it is likely that Constable was also Wotton which would have meant as one man he lived until seventy-seven and probably fathered Henry King. King Henry would have loved keeping mythical and mystery alive, rather than proven fact. Calling it a claim by Shakespeare or accusation and letting his tale reach as far as it could go into the future constantly looking to disprove and disrupt the truth. Constable would have utilized the dual egos, sort of split personality to keep the mystery and liked remaining a bit hidden from watchful detection especially all the way back then when it was easier to do. A subtlety of his. The blond man killed in war in Rothstand's Cyrano de Bergerac was likely Shakespeare himself, then looking to elude the fact that Daniel had killed Shakespeare, De Bergerac was born three years later when was killed by the third Musketeer Drayton for the crime he committed in murdering Shakespeare. Cyrano's contrived conflict was the English vs. French thing and the slain father details of his life. French-English rivalry and the father-son relationship and the slain father-surrogate father complex were what all the real conflict is. But the English-French historical details and the father-rival-slain father-surrogate father truth of it all were simply explained so the size of his nose was what made him angry enough to fight and may have been where Rothstand got the actually story he wrote, from something Cyrano wrote about himself while living it out. That is why even the fictionalized and imagined parts in Rothstand's story carry much more fact with probably not much embellishment. From the actual fight that erupted without premeditation ending with Shakespeare killing Marlowe to the tale told and penned by Rothstand about De Bergerac to Alexandre Dumas recounting it forward with The Three Musketeers in explanation of it all and to keep the history of the truth alive throughout the World, however much garbled and strewn about in pieces through history, to be put back together for the entire story to be known. So from my pen to your mind, these are the facts and that is why they say fact is stranger than fiction.
By James M. Piehl3 years ago in FYI
Black women in music
If you want to talk music, music has had a real influence in my life. The sound of Etta James was pure poetry and beauty. She sang these stories that grabbed my attention and her sound was both powerful, lovely and alluring to me. I'd rather go blind and At last were two that grabbed my attention immediately when I was young. Everybody knew Aretha, and Diana Ross and I think Donna Summer. They were big names in the T.V. era and they sound great. Everybody knows Whitney Houston her vocal power is amazing. I loved T.L.C. I think Chili was my favorite but T-Boz and Lisa 'Left Eye' Lopez were great part of the group, too. I think used to try to pick one to like but it didn't fully work, so I gave up and decided I could like them all. I'm not sure I could choose a favorite. I loved Salt and Peppa. I wanted to be some fries with my shake shake booty. They were two beautiful women, singing a women perspective that I liked to here, like with the song Schoop. Mary J. Blige, Mariah Carey, Toni Braxton. They just had these amazing sound qualities. Bessie Smith, Muddy Waters made me want to go to the mighty, muddy Mississippi river. They romanticized radio for me. I wanted to be around the airwaves when they were new, first beginning. Even the look of the microphones that caught and funneled the sound were cool. The large head microphones are the ones I am speaking about, not the big screen in front of the ice cream cone looking microphones. Etta James sound seemed to me the same country sound as Patsy Cline. I never looked into were Etta James was, I know Detroit had a big blues influence, I guess St. Louis must have, I know Harlem was a big place for it. I don't know where it started, I know Hank Williams was one of the first, televised or radio, I think. The Supremes, The Ronettes, whoever the woman in the Platters was. The sounds of the seventies and then my lifetime. My cognitive lifetime. Whitney was biggest which lead into Salt and Peppa and T.L.C. and the current culture of music today. It is a talent to tell a story in short form, to give a full visual picture with the lyric representation of the poetry of song. It is one thing to sound good but paired with the beauty of a great lyrical story really gives life to music. I always loved listening to what they had to say. They had these stories of life. Some were fraught with tragedy, some were just joyous exclamations but that is the beauty of music. Whatever it was that made this person or that person sing what they were singing about and bring that message to a large audience and carry that story into the future on a recording meant to last forever. It was a new technological transition. We, people, invented writing to carry stories of the past to the future forever. Before writing, they were word of mouth passed on from person to person, family to family, carried on through family and conversation. Then they invented symbols to represent sound and when put together they formed a word, then they invented writing utensils, ink, parchment and paper, then pen, pencil. Right now I don't know which came first the paper or the ink. Anyway, after that, people came up with a way to carry the voice of a person into the future, so you can hear the way that person sounds as they sing their song first hand I am grateful for that. I am glad I can hear the beauty of that singers sound, even if I can't meet them in person any more. I love the fact that I can experience the sound and songs of these artists and musicians even if I can't get there in person or even whenever I want at my convenience, and don't always have to wait for a live performance. I thank the black women of music for the beauty and entertainment they have brought to my life.
By James M. Piehl3 years ago in Beat
Fifteen hundred pound Bull
Here's one you won't normally hear, from my personal vault of only known by a few, true stories. Of all the adventures to have in life, in our modern world we found some untouched by time's movement into the modern era moments. In this one, a true story as I have said, I hope you see my Huck Finn-ishness combined with my Tom Sawyer-nese. Right out of circa 1887, we here in our small town found a test of manhood that most 12 or 13 year olds are not faced with in this world today. it was either 1990 or 1991, but I and my two pals, all three of us the same age had decided to walk a long distance in search of a ride home because we were slightly stranded in the vast landscape of our hometown. I had begun a discussion about tests of manhood and adventure. I told them this would test us. It didn't seem very strenuous or much of a test, we merely had to walk like ten miles. We couldn't quite sit still and wait plus our town is always teeming with traffic, the streets, less busy than many streets, allowed us to get away with walking these country roads with less fear of being hit by a car then. I was rambling on and on and the guys were just looking at me and listening so I was the first to see it and it astonished me. I think at that time my cousin was telling me that I wasn't God, that I dpn't always have the right answer. I was a 69 pound pip squeak by the way. But I have noted in my life time I have saved our life something like hundreds of times. I didn't want to alarm the boys because I knew that would disadvantage us. So, I think, I just calmly transitioned in story to, "Remember when I was talking about adventure and testing our manhood? Well, I may have unwittingly called a little more down upon us than I had intended, too." My cousin said, "What do you mean?" and Ryan just kept smiling. I remember Ryan hadn't said much during most of the talk he just listened and smiled. So, I answered my cousin. I said, "I don't want to alarm you because we need to keep a calm head right now." And he said, "Jimmmmmyyy." a little frustration in his tone. So I continued, "It's just that there is a fifteen hundred pound Bull right there." and they turned and looked, and I continued even more with "and that fence looks small and flimsy. I'm not sure how a fifteen hundred pound bull is kept confined by such a shabby fence. If he learns that he can turn that fence to matchsticks we are in trouble." And then my cousin said, "What do we do?" and there was no smile on Ryan's face anymore. So I said, "Keep walking a normal pace, I'm going to show you something. See, they say red makes a bull charge but I'm sure it isn't the color of the cloth at all. I think it is movement and he's staring at us, so, do you see that big tree over there? I'm going to to get that bull moving and we need to run to that tree and get behind it out of sight. So when I say, run fast to the tree." I turned so that I was walking backwards when I took off my ball cap before the bull could gently walk up to and through the fence and gave my ball cap a wave as I watched him. Then I said run, and we ran and it started to chase us. We got to the tree and around it and out of sight. My cousin asked, "Is it still coming after us?" And I said,"No." He said, "How do you know?" I said, "I didn't hear the fence break." I said, "Chuck, can you please carefully look around the tree to confirm that?" We called Ryan Chuck for a nickname. My cousin said, "What would you have done if it broke through the fence? I said, "I would have thrown you in that tree and made you pull me up and I would pull him up because bulls don't climb trees." At that point I peaked cautiously around the tree and the bull had lost interest and was heading back up the hill away from the tiny fence that somehow contained him. I looked at Ryan, who hadn't spoken in a very long time and said, "I guess I should have told you 'and report back to me what you see' huh? Because I guess when I said look to see you decided you would keep that information to yourself but I did want you to report it back to me. That's ok though." Then we walked back out from behind the tree down the road away from the large beast and my cousin asked, "What do we do if he chases us again?" I said, "Just keep walking steady, we could run to that house if we needed but I think we are far enough away to be less concerned and then we will be far enough to be unconcerned." We saw my uncle in his own yard just ahead and I asked him is it a little unusual for a fifteen hundred pound bull to be kept in a yard behind a fence that seems to be made of material as flimsy as a bunch of McDonald's straws strung together, especially so close to town?" And he said, "There's a bull?" And I said yeah right over there. It was at his neighbors house on the backside of Main Street and he didn't even know it, hadn't even seen it. He walked out to his car and looked down the road and you could see the visible shock on his face. I said ok, you might want to tell the police because it is so close tot the center of town and if it got loose and rampaged that wouldn't be good. I might tell them, also" And he said Yeah. Then I said have a nice day. And the three of us wandered on down the road. That is my hometown. A little bit 1700 something, a little bit 1800 something, a little bit 1950 and a little bit 1970. A crazy mix of time capsule country and a part of what made me.
By James M. Piehl3 years ago in Families