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Monday, August 31, 2015

The Fire Cracker Parade and America.

(This was my Spirit column for July---plugged it in here)

The Firecracker Parade is one of those happenings that every community needs, not that it is grandiose or elaborate because participants are only allowed 24 hours to prepare, are discouraged from political statements, and encouraged to be creative. Terry Ludeman has for 34 years marshaled the participants up the three-quarter mile course to waiting throngs gathered under the majestic maples at the New Hope Church. The crowd is festive, closely packed, always fraught with anticipation, above average and attractive.

While it is not a picnic, nor a party, friends do gather to engage in country conversation and marvel at both the charming, entertaining and outright humorous absurdity of some parade entrants. There is not much in the line of noise making as New Hope does not seem to have a fire department, nor police or much of anything capable of really turning up the decibels. The pastoral throb of a fine old two-cylinder John Deere almost, at least to me, sounds like music, and if it is not music, it is the sound of  past farming practices and the hard toil of working the land.

Always appreciated, there were the mounted participants whose mighty steeds polluted not one iota of countryside, even if they did leave small deposits. Yes, there were scoopers in tow and I can only imagine the roadside plants reaching out for some warm homegrown fertilizer. Oh how the horses pranced and the riders grinned.

This year a vintage WWII jeep with its purring, probably Willy’s engine, and the dents of years of use, but standing tall for American security, properly carried the colors but not with a lot of fanfare. It was just a meaningful reminder that there have always been citizens willing to step up for the Mother Country.

A surprise outer space visitor on a bike stopped in front of the attentive judges to explain the human condition. He, I believe it was a he, had been noticing that we, meaning many Americans, were in the habit of blaming others for our problems and he had found the perfect tool to solve that issue as he took out a mirror and demonstrated its use. It was prophetically unique, he thought, because it implied we needed to look at ourselves. He spoke of love, peace and accountability---a new outer space twist.

The tuba band, with horns gleaming in the afternoon sun, provided the hits of the past, and it was not just marches but rock and roll, The word resplendent comes to mind as the tossed candy filled the street and scampering urchins scurried about securing their share. In the rear of the parade, Helen, the Milfoil lady, all festooned in undesirable aquatic weeds, and looking much like a fish monger, wheel-barrowed past the crowd advocating the removal of the aquatic weed that is now an invasive force.

With great pride, and an ego blown up like a toad under a streetlight, our group garnered the first place magic-marker-decorated paper plate. What can only be described as classic performance art, this group of individuals with no sense of pride or decorum, attached a skit to each and every letter of the words New Hope.  N stood for Norwegian, of course. The crowd was treated to an Ollie and Lena story from an appropriately dressed Viking. It seems this young man, who in third grade, was awarded a prize for having the largest feet. In asking his father, “was this because he was Norwegian?”. He was then told he had large feet because he was eighteen.

E stood for the noble Eagle. Out of almost nowhere, and in a single swoop, a rather ghastly eagle swooped in and consumed a stuffed duck ---great naturalistic theater. W stood for Wisconsin, the home of the brave and land of the confused as the two Miss Wisconsins bellowed On Wisconsin and called for a W. at the same time.  H, of course, had to stand for Holstein, and there casually leaning against a wagon was a superb, well uddered, bovine in casual repose. At the sound of an auto, she was back on all fours acting like a cow when car traffic went by, but like real cows, she returned to lounging after the vehicle was past.

O was for onions. This, a fine locally produced vegetable, was glorified by two beauties doing a dance commonly done while entertaining at a bar, I believe, called the Airport Lounge. They were synchronized in their swinging of great long onions. Some thought they were equivalent to synchronized water dancing. “Truly profound” was a description heard from one roadside observer---while lifting her eyes in amazement.

P was pick-pockets from Peru. Mimes, two of them, brushed by each other to demonstrate their devious skills. The expressive gentleman managed to latch on to a nice watch and some money, all the while thinking himself the victor, but the woman of the pair, while seeming distraught about the financial loss, held up a pair of boxer shorts. On close examination, the gentleman found himself shortless and embarrassed (pun). The final E was flipped over to make an M for music at which point the entire entourage went to dancing the polka to the lilting notes of a flute and fiddle.

So while I have an inflated ego, let us not forget that next year will be the thirty-fifth of the firecracker and while it is not appropriate to officially plan your float, it is time to put it on your calendar.







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The Frog and the Fly




It was time to take the grandkid fishing. He had been all over me to get on with it, quit reading, having tea and palavering about the economy. It was the usual nagging of a kid who has only one intention at that very moment. This particular child has focus and whether it is rock hounding, gathering pumpkins or fishing, he looks only in that direction and makes sure I am aware of it---particularly if it takes me getting off my butt to make it happen.


He had the entire outing all planned out, the site of action set, and his gear, lame as it is, ready for action. He knew of a pond in a park right in the middle of town where he had seen fish and had, on a few occasions, managed to land a couple of adequate pan fish. Fortunately, he doesn’t seem particularly intent on catching size but rather just wants action, be it a nondescript minnow or a gapped-mouth carp. It is just the journey, not the destination---apparently he had read Robert Louis Stevenson who said. “I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.”

Having developed that philosophy at a young age, is helpful to a grandparent, who in my age, has developed a certain amount of sloth. At the same time, it is my responsibility to introduce him to the greater pleasures of life and to facilitate the desires, which have developed, a result of my earlier encouragements. Simply put, I had to get off my posterior, put down the computer with it’s  never-ending sob stories of how lousy we as a species are treating the world, and take Jake to the pond.

In a fit of ambition and an exhaustion from being badgered by the kid with comments about my inability to catch fish, I tossed the angling swag in the car along with the chattering nine-year old and lit out for the water. From the back seat he, for reasons unknown, proclaimed he was one of the world’s best fishermen and wondered, aloud, if he was a professional. With eyes lifted in disbelief,  I was not able to imagine where he got this idea because I had told him numerous times I was the best fisherman in the universe. He fidgeted and carried on as we approached the rather stagnate, algae filled pond still confident he was about to set records with his prowess.

He bolted from the backseat and headed, Tom Sawyer-style, for the edge of the pond where he threw down his bait box, unraveled the tangled pole and began chucking the miserable looking lure into the depths. On my arrival, somewhat belated due to my noticeable inability to run, he pointed out the fish he could actually see in the water. Yup, there were some small fish there all right, not monsters, but fish. He threw a few more casts but didn’t attract any attention as his bait was, to some extent, bigger than the fish he was pursuing. While he was still confident of success, I noticed a shift in his patter in that he was now making note of the small crawdad-filled stream just to the north. He was beginning to conger up an option if fishing should not play out.

It was at that moment I decided to increase his angling possibilities and began drawing on my world’s reputation as grand master fisherman. It seems he had a rubber frog in his tackle box, one of those that floats, is weedless, and has enough weight for him to be able to really send it flying out in the small lake. The frog itself was not a suitable lure in that the pond probably didn’t have a single fish in it capable of devouring the plastic frog. This is where a little imagination had to come in. After showing him how to tie the fisherman’s knot, and laying out the strategy I was pursuing, we then attached a second line from the hook of the frog. The line being about twenty-four inches long and lighter in weight from the main line. We were being crafty and drawing on my fly fishing experience----I, of course, reminded the over-egoed kid about my skills not wanting him to think himself so superior when he was, in fact, in the presence of a fishing god.

I have to admit he was not very impressed with my bragging and did tell me I had an inflated eagle. At the end of the second line, I attached a fly, a wooly bugger if you will. We now had a real rig, one that would bring home the bacon. I even liked it because if there was a big bass in the pond, he might just have a chance, but in truth, we were after the pan fish.

On the first cast, he managed to hook an eight inch Green Sunfish and the afternoon was off to a great start. While a number of the bass-like sunfish tried to gobble up the frog, the wooly bugger carried the day and in the next hour he managed to haul in twenty flopping fish, which inflated his eagle but also made traveling for travels sake a reality.