Rambling Josh

My cousin Jamie, who has been blogging for about the same period of time that I’ve been writing this column (check him out at Thingelstad.com), recently posted a blog regarding his hosting of an “IndieWeb Carnival”. My first thought was, “What’s an IndieWeb Carnival?” followed closely by my second thought, “What does IndieWeb mean?”

Google informed me that IndieWeb is “a community and movement that focuses on empowering individuals to control their online presence and data by building and maintaining their own websites, rather than relying on large, centralized social networks. It emphasizes open standards and protocols for social interaction, allowing users to interact with others on their own sites.”

Google also informed me that an IndieWeb Carnival is “a monthly, hosted blogging event where participants write and share their thoughts on a chosen topic or theme on their own blogs.”

Jamie, the host of this particular blogging event, chose “Renewal” as the topic or theme for his carnival and the questions he posed to his carnival goers were, “Do you have a story of renewal to share? Is there a need for renewal that you see and a way to make that happen? How do you approach renewal?”

While contemplating the theme of renewal, the story of Sisyphus, a figure of Greek mythology who was condemned to repeat forever the same meaningless task of pushing a boulder up a mountain, only to see it roll down again just as it nears the top, came to mind.

What does the myth of Sisyphus have to do with renewal?

Each time Sisyphus neared the top and felt the boulder start to slip from it’s upward progress, I see him giving into the inevitable, stepping aside, watching with amusement as the boulder rocked, rolled and bounced back down the hill, looking around at the world from his vantage point on the high ground, filling his lungs, and exhaling with purpose and renewal as he heads back down the hill through the settling dust the descending boulder has kicked up to begin again…and again…and again…

It is what we all do in some way, shape, or form most every day of the days we get. We get to push our various boulders up our various hills, we get to watch them roll back down, we get to move, we get to ponder, we get to love, we get to laugh, we get to live, we get to lose…we get to do it all until we are at a loss. At a loss of mind, at a loss of body, at a loss of spirit, at a loss of life. So it goes.

Renewal of mind, renewal of body, renewal of spirit…before all is lost. “Pneuma”, the ancient Greek word for “spirit”, can be translated as “wind” or “breath”, and just as we cannot see the wind that moves the trees, others often cannot see the spirit, the meaning, the purpose that moves us. Our “why” may appear to be meaningless toil to others, but if it moves you, it moves you. Afterall, how much choice do we have in what it is that moves us?

To move and to be moved effectively, we must allow for sufficient renewal. We must take a moment to look around at the world we get to be in. We must breathe in and out with purpose and renewal of mind, body, and spirit and then lean into our boulder yet again, because it is our boulder and it is ours to move for as long we can move it. Sometimes we get a little flat. Sometimes that old guitar just needs a new set of strings to renew an old song.

“Do you have a story of renewal to share? Is there a need for renewal that you see and a way to make that happen? How do you approach renewal?”

Enjoy the carnival.

One pair of Levi’s ¾ Bottle of olive oil Small sack of potatoes ½ a bag of cheese ¾ of a bag of Craisins ½ a tube of toothpaste Roughly 6 Dude Wipes Bottle of statin medication Big jug of protein supplement Container of creatine supplement Box fan One pair of black socks Three rolls of toilet paper Tattered brown leather belt About a ½ dozen eggs

I’ve worked at Chadron State College for 11 years, and since Chadron is roughly 100-miles from Rapid City, where my wife and I have lived for about 27 years, I do a bit of commuting during the school year. I don’t drive every day, generally I head out Monday morning and come back home on Thursday.

No, I don’t sleep in my office or my car while I’m in Chadron, I have an apartment across the street from campus. A swanky “studio” apartment. I believe “studio” is Latin for “small enough to fry eggs, do dishes, and brush your teeth without leaving the comfort of your bed.”

This past week I arrived at my apartment Monday morning to drop off my duffel bag before walking across the street to campus, and when I entered my apartment, it was not as I had left it the week before. The cupboard doors were open, the bedding was tossed aside, the mattress was askew…something was amiss, and some things were missing. Little by little the list above took shape. A list of things that were stolen from my apartment. I had been robbed.

It’s an odd thing to stand in your apartment, knowing that someone had been in there doing a bit of discount shopping. Perusing your stuff, while sipping on the ½ empty bottle of orange juice you left in your fridge…or perhaps ½ full…so it goes.

One of my coworkers was impressed that I knew exactly what was missing, and I explained that when you are the sole occupant of a “studio” space you tend to know exactly what items occupy that space with you. There is no blaming the dog for running off with your toothpaste and Craisins, things are always right where you left them. Until they’re not.

Until someone who looks a lot like your neighbor is caught on surveillance camera crawling through your window at 11:02PM the Sunday prior to your Monday morning arrival. When I called the police to report the thievery, an officer stopped by, looked around a bit, and asked me what was missing. I rattled off the grocery list of items and he said they were going to go visit with my neighbor to ask if he had seen anything.

Apparently, he had. A few hours later I was walking back to my apartment and the police had my neighbor in handcuffs. The linchpin? The Dude Wipes. When the police were visiting with him to determine if he had seen anything they noticed the Dude Wipes, and he got a bit shifty when asked about them, so they obtained a search warrant a broke the case of the Studio Shopper wide open.

The perpetrator wasn’t a disgruntled student, just some 21-year old dude that was in a tough spot and made a bad decision. Out my window and into jail in a little over 12 hours…I wish him well. I have yet to learn the fate of my stuff.

What is the street value of statins and cheese?

Happy Spring to you. Less than nine shopping months until Christmas.

Carol Olney, of Lignite, recently posted a picture on social media of a news story that she had clipped from the Burke County Tribune somewhere around 1982. Below the title “Lignite Scouts hold Pinewood Derby” is a photograph of Lignite Scout Troop 347 composed of Justin Young, Travis Chrest, Robbie Gilseth, Ryan Reistad, Grady Bakken, Chad Johnson, Jarvis Ellis, Blain Johnson, and myself.

Nine of us shaggy-haired knuckleheads, lined up and looking in every direction except at Leonard Savelkoul, the photographer. Seeing the picture and reading the article brought back memories that I hadn’t remembered for quite some time.

I remember my mom being the Den Leader, and I remember her occasionally “talking” to Scout Troop 347 through clenched teeth at our weekly after school gathering at the Legion Hall next to Martin’s Barbershop. I remembered that the Beach Boys had a song called “409” that had a bit of motor revving at the beginning of the song, and I remembered that my creative mother (the Den Leader with clenched teeth) had set up a record player, hidden from spectator view, to kick of the Pinewood Derby with that motor revving.

I remember that I was in charge of the record player, I remember that numbers thwarted me once again and I miscounted the number of record grooves to the start of the desired song and on my mom’s signal I dropped the needle at the wrong song. Quick 10-year-old thinking, I ripped the record player plug out of the wall and fled the scene…around the corner to where everyone else was.

I remember being so embarrassed by this, and I remember feeling terrible that I had messed up the grand Scout Troop 347 Pinewood Derby kickoff and that I had let my mom down. It’s strange the stuff we remember and the stuff that flitters by without wedging itself in our psyche.

I remember that my Grandpa Fritz helped my brother and I make our Pinewood Derby cars. Jarvis’s was a slim and sleek racer that fetched him the 1st place trophy, mine wasn’t so slim, sleek or fast.

I remember Grandpa Fritz asking me what I wanted to turn my official Pinewood Derby block of wood into. I asked him if we could make a pickup, and I remember him turning the block of wood over in his hands a bit while he pondered my request, and said, “We can do that.”

I knew he could. He could make most anything out of block of wood. As the great sculpture Michelangelo once said, “The sculpture is already complete within the marble block before I start my work. I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.”

Grandpa could see the pickup I requested in the block of wood, and together, we set it free. I still have that pickup, and when I saw the picture Carol posted, I dug it out of its parking spot in the trunk in our basement. Upon inspection, it is quite obvious what parts of it I set free and what parts my grandpa took the lead on.

The trunk in our basement holds a number of other odds and ends from many moons ago. Odds and ends that hold a lot of fond memories. What will happen to those odds and ends when my end comes? I’m the only one that holds the key to release the memories they hold, so odds are, they will meet their end shortly after I meet mine. So it goes.

I suppose that is the way of things, and I suppose that is as it should be. Locks without keys aren’t much good to anyone.

The pickup has a new parking spot now. A spot on my bookshelf, where I can see it, where I can turn it over in my hands and go wherever it takes me. “We can do that.”

Please give a warm welcome to my daughter, Sierra, as the guest columnist for this week’s Ramblings.

After having to hear me complain about how women’s voices have been silenced for so long, my father gave me the yearly task of writing our family Christmas letter. Be careful what you say and who you say it to. I enjoy writing, and it is something that I have put off for far too long, sort of like this Christmas/St Patrick’s Day letter.

As you may know, I live in New York, and as you may know, there is a bit of distance between Brooklyn and Rapid City. Thankfully, I am able to keep in contact with my family and see what they are up to via social media. Which does the job, but it’s not the same as being all together in person.

Whenever I come home it feels like a new place, but at the same time, it’s still the home that I knew before I moved out, and that’s because of my family.

My dad always sits in the same place on the couch every day with a cup of coffee or a Manhattan (depending on the time of day) to indulge in whatever non-fiction book he has picked up. I always loved that he almost exclusively reads non-fiction because it shows how much he truly enjoys learning and seeing the different points of view from every walk of life. No matter who they are.

I believe this is what makes him such a valuable and well-rounded professor. He loves teaching as much as he loves learning. He taught me to look for the good in everyone, no matter how much I disagree with them. As some of you may know, I am still learning that, but he has 23 years on me, so give me time.

My mom is straight up one of the hardest workers I know. When she isn’t helping people get better through physical therapy, she is at home baking, cooking, taking care of her beautiful yard, or driving around in her Jeep.

She is a woman who is so naturally beautiful and knows how to take care of things and just does it. She is so independent, but cares deeply for those who are around her, you can see it in her eyes and how she talks to people. She truly cares. Her laugh is so loud that you can literally hear it throughout our entire home. It’s so genuine, you simply can’t be mad about it when it wakes you up after a night of drinking too much.

Jackson, my little brother, has become such a caring young man that it sometimes surprises me when he is so sweet to me. He isn’t (as) annoying anymore and is instead chill and fun to hang out with. He really is someone that I have enjoyed seeing grow up.

He is so kind, great with people, and lets me talk at him for hours when we see each other. I’d like to think he finds me entertaining even though he says the reason he doesn’t want to date is because girls always want to talk too much. I fear I have ruined dating for him.

Ok, I hope I did alright? I love my family, and I am proud to be a member of the Ellis clan. 2025 will be interesting, because every year is, and I wish you all the best. Each year is a year to discover new things about yourself, and more importantly, the people who are meant to be in your life.

For me, I must admit that I attempted and failed to put space between me and my family because it’s hard to be away from them. They’ve always supported me no matter what, and they are proud of me no matter what. So I guess now is the time that I tell everyone that I am moving to France to pursue a career as a professional mime.

Wishing you and all you love a wonderful year.

Every other week for the past two semesters the students in my Aging & Death class take a field trip to the nursing home to hangout and chit-chat with the residents. Every other week for two semesters all has gone well, until last week. So it goes.

The visit got off to a rough start due to some technical issues I was having with the front door to the nursing home. Like most nursing homes, there are two ways to enter and exit, rather, I should say that there are two ways for visitors to enter and exit. As for the residents, the ways and the reasons that they enter are many, whereas the way and the reason that they exit are few.

For visitors, there are two keypads by the door, one on the outside to be used to enter the facility, and one on the inside to be used to exit the facility. If you manage to punch in the correct four-digit code the door magically unlocks so that you may enter or you may flee. If you manage to punch in the wrong four-digit code the door buzzes a buzz that one might hear in response to a wrong answer on a quiz show or for not having a steady enough hand with the board game “Operation”.

First time visitors generally press the button labeled “Press Button for Assistance”, which alerts the personnel at the front desk that they need to mosey about 40-feet from their desk to the front door, punch in the code, and open the door. You can plainly see the personnel at the front desk through the window on the door, and through the window on the door you can plainly see the look of annoyance when the “Press Button for Assistance” is pressed.

Generally, scattered about in the 40-feet between the front desk and the front door, are a handful of residents working on puzzles, watching Gun Smoke, gazing at the birds flittering around the birdfeeder, napping, or just staring at you while you try and make pleasantly apologetic and appreciative eye contact with whomever the “Press Button for Assistance” has roused.

Rest assured that the roused will quickly inform you as to the four-digit code so that you can assist yourself rather than press the “Press Button for Assistance” button the next time you come or go from the facility. It will also be pointed out that in the event that you forget the four-digit code, it is written on the hand sanitizer dispenser next to the door. Information that will ratchet your pleasantly apologetic and appreciative expression up a few maniacal notches as you nod and smile like a bobble-head hoping to atone for the 80-feet of angstful movement your button pressing incited.

I’ve never been comfortable pressing buttons or ringing bells for assistance, I’d sooner mill around making rustling noises and clearing my throat than summon the chagrin of whomever has been tasked with responding to the buzzer or bell, so I was much relieved to acquire the four-digit code. Armed with the code I have entered and fled the nursing home without incident many times over the years…until last week.

Last week I punched in the four-digit code, pulled on the door, and “BUZZZZZ”. There it is, the chagrined look from the front desk personnel I’ve managed to avoid for so long. I quickly punch in the code again, pull the door, and “BUZZZZZ”.
The owner of the chagrined look is on the move, so I quickly check the code on the hand sanitizer dispenser, punch it in, pull the door, and “BUZZZZZ”. The chagrined is zigging and zagging through residents, interrupting Gun Smoke, scaring birds away from the birdfeeder, displacing puzzle pieces…I give it one more shot…”BUZZZZZ”.

The chagrined says (demands), “Just stop. It’s loud.” As I plead my case, reciting the code to her, she presses the same four numbers that I had entered, and “Click”…the door opens. As she stalks back to her desk there is a vast chagrin aura present about her whole person, and I apologize again as I walk by the desk. The apology apparently sounded like “BUZZZZZ” to her, as it elicited the same expression.

The door also buzzes if it is held open for more than 10-seconds, after which, the miffed personnel at the front desk has to come and reset the code to make the buzzing stop. I’m not sure why they chose 10-seconds? Nobody in there does anything in less than 10 minutes, so I am skeptical of anyone making a break for it in 10-seconds.

At the conclusion of our visit, I was holding the door open for my students…mentally counting down 10-seconds…4…3…2…just one more student to go…as the door is about to close behind us…”BUZZZZZZZZZ”…I fled and didn’t look back. I didn’t need to look back, I could feel twisted and jagged chagrin shrapnel lodging itself into my backside as I hustled across the parking lot.

I hope she’s on vacation next week. If not, I’ll just swing from the birdfeeder, bust through the picture window, and land on the puzzle table. Gun Smoke will be turned up loud enough that nobody will notice.

There are many quotes and sayings that muse about the journey being more important and more meaningful than the destination. “It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey” by Ralph Waldo Emerson, “It’s better to travel hopefully than to arrive” by Robert Louis Stevenson, “It’s better to travel than to arrive” by Robert M. Pirsig…and so on and so forth.

I suppose it is often the case that such thoughts are important reminders for us to be present in our journeys so as not to miss all that may present itself enroute to our destinations. Destinations that we have possibly festooned with more grandeur in our mind than they produce in reality. So it goes.

Afterall, sometimes, as the Griswold’s discovered, you arrive at your destination only to have Marty Moose tell you, “Sorry folks! We’re closed for two weeks to clean and repair America’s favorite family fun park. Sorry, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh!”

There are very few absolutes in life. The journey isn’t always going to be better than the destination, nor the destination always better the journey. Much depends upon the company one travels with and the destinations one chooses to travel to, with, in my opinion, more weight given to the former.

Enduring a journey captive to boorish company can sully most any destination, especially if the destination is shared and offers no reprieve from your captives. One must also keep in mind that the captivity may run both ways. Misery, after all, loves company.

So, what is one to do? Never venture anywhere? Never venture with anyone? Both viable options I suppose. Afterall, the houseplants get fidgety and sullen when I’m not there to whisper sonnets of adoration and caress their leaves. Or, choose travel companions wisely, and trust that your plants will forgive you.

My wife and I have been fans of David Francey’s music for many years, as have our good friends, Paul and Jodi. Which of us introduced the other to Francey’s music is a question none of us can recollect, nor is it a recollection that seems all that important. What is important, at least to us, is his music, and when I heard that the 70-year-old folk singer from Elphin, Ontario, was going to be performing in St. Paul, Minnesota, the troops were rallied for a road trip.

My cousin Jamie and his wife Tammy live in Minneapolis and knowing that they have similar taste in “folksy” music, I inquired into their interest in attending the concert. They gave Mr. Francey a listen, signed on for the destination and graciously offered to host us Dakota folk in their home on our pilgrimage east.

Through the company and camaraderie of good friends, the kindness and generosity of dear family, and a tremendous night of song and story, this journey and this destination proved to be equally enjoyable. I wish you the same in the journeys and the destinations that await you.

Take it away Mr. Francey…“This morning, this morning the sun rose and then, the world kept turning again and again, singing your songs from beginning to end, while the hearts break without a sound. That′s the way that the world goes ‘round.”

On Christmas Day, while the family was opening gifts, Sierra and Jackson told me, “You will have to wait for your present, it isn’t ready yet, but the wait will be worth it.” Of course, I didn’t mind, I didn’t care if they were just telling me that because they didn’t get me anything and figured I’d forget that they didn’t get me anything within a day or two, because, as most of us eventually figure out, just being together when being apart is the norm, is plenty.

A few days ago, a package arrived, and although I haven’t been skeptically counting the days with suspicions of deceit and gift betrayal, the wait was indeed worth it. The kids had a figurine of myself and Mortimer Snerd made. Who is Mortimer Snerd? As I wrote several years ago in my column entitled “Mort”…

Mort and I go way back many years. Our paths first crossed Christmas of 1982, when my parents entertained my dreams of becoming a ventriloquist and gave me Mortimer and the Edgar Bergen album “Laugh and Learn! Lessons in Ventriloquism with Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd”. A dream, that thanks to The Twilight Zone episode 98 “The Dummy”, soon became a nightmare.

From that point on, Mort and my relationship was a bit tense and tempestuous. I’m 52-years old, but I still have an occasional nightmare involving my pal Mort not being so pal like. The nightmares subsided after I hired Mort on as the night watchman at the Gashole (my garage bar). We all need a purpose in life.

Mort’s factory issued rubber loafers were lost years ago, so I outfitted him with a pair of cowboy boots I wore when I was a wee toddler. He looks snazzy, and I figured that the “clip and clop” of cowboy boots would make it harder for him to sneak up on me. A win-win.

My Edgar Bergen album has been lost to time as well, I have suspicions that Mort, who was always second fiddle to Charlie McCarthy, smashed it in a fit of jealous rage, but he has yet to admit to it.

The album is available on the internet, and if you take a gander at it you will understand Mort’s misgivings. The album cover shows Charlie McCarthy sitting smugly on Edgar’s knee, both dressed in tuxedos and top hats, while Mortimer looks on, grinning and bearing it, perched on a chair beside them in a ratty straw hat.

To further fan the flames, Charlie performed for royalty in England and Sweden, for two U.S. Presidents, and “received an honorary degree of Master of Inuendo and Snappy Comebacks from Northwestern University.” What did Mort get? He got stuffed in a box and exiled to North Dakota to sit on the bony knee of a 12-year-old boy, who soon got distracted by baseball and girls, grew a mullet and failed to give him the voice he yearned for. I dashed his dreams, so he haunted mine. So it goes.

The album cover also talks of how Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy first became famous by performing on radio shows in the 1920s. Ventriloquism on the radio?

Maybe Mort didn’t get exiled? Maybe he was tired of the dog and pony show, tired of listening to Charlie clack his yap, tired of Edgar’s sweaty hand. Maybe his little rubber loafers carried him to North Dakota in search of a little peace and quiet? I see the figurine the kids got me as a representative of “what could have been” if Mort and I had been more dedicated disciples of Mr. Bergen. What could have been if the three horsemen of our ventriloquism apocalypse, baseball, girls, and mullets, hadn’t mercifully interceded. Oftentimes, one never knows of the bullets they’ve dodged in life…I now have a figurine to remind me of one such grazing shot fired back in 1982.

Charlie McCarthy has resided in a case on display at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History for the past 45-years. Mort…he’s among friends…he’s part of a family. Who’s the dummy?

John Boy Walton once said, “The mountains don’t need us, but we need them.” John Boy was a smart lad, a bit serious and prone to being overcome with emotion, but there’s worse ways to be. He was curious about the people and the world near and far to him, cared deeply for his family, and possessed a moral compass for truth and justice that was steadfast and unwavering.

“Passionate” would be a good word to describe John Boy, if one were looking for a word. Perhaps you are fortunate enough to have a John Boy, or two, in your life? Perhaps you are a John Boy? Maybe not in full, but in part. Bibs and bare feet are not for everyone. Apparently, Ike Godsey was not a stickler for the “No Shoes, No Service” policy in his store.

It so happens that I am fortunate enough, as my wife and my daughter are passionate people in possession of strong moral compasses. That is not to say that my son and I are immoral dastardly gangsters, rather that our compasses possess a few air bubbles that perpetually bump the needle about in a laissez-faire manner.

These differences in temperament are not chosen like a hairdo from a magazine (I’ll never make that mistake again), rather they are largely just the hand we are genetically dealt. A double scoop of nature with a sprinkle of nurture that can sometimes give those closest to us intermittent bouts of brain freeze.

Brain freeze, though painful, passes relatively quickly, and we always dig back in for more. Not because we love the brain freeze, but because we love the double scoop with sprinkles. So it goes.

Being around people that are passionate about things can sometimes nudge us to ponder that perhaps we should be a bit more passionate about things, that maybe we should care a little more about things. What things? Things that matter to those that matter to us seems like a good place to start. Beyond that? I guess one must just dabble a bit in life and see what raises their passion flag above the walls of their inner citadel.

Viktor Frankl once said, “Self-transcendence is the essence of existence.” Self-transcendence…moving above and beyond ourselves…the acquisition of more sprinkles for our double scoop.

John Boy Walton and Viktor Frankl…strange bedfellows, but their words were on my mind while I rambled about the Black Hills this past week, hoofing it up snow covered hills to see what I could see. Mostly what I saw was more snow-covered hills, but somehow coffee and jerky always taste better while sitting on a stump on top of hill. Half the jerky anyway, our dog talked me out of the other half.

The Black Hills don’t need me, but I need them. We all need something, or someone, to challenge us now and then. We need someone to point out that some of those sprinkles on our double scoop aren’t actually sprinkles (it’s amazing the places mice can get into).

Goodnight John Boy.

About a week before Christmas, I was wrapping one of the many presents I showered upon my wife in an attempt to offset my refusal to watch Hallmark movies with her, when I heard a knock at our front door. Nobody I know, or generally care to talk to, ever knocks on the front door, that’s what the back door is for.

The silly season has passed, so I didn’t suspect it to be a politician peddling promises, and it’s too cold out for the nice lads with the Latter-Day Saints to be out and about evangelizing in their white short-sleeve dress shirts.

Come to think of it, those nice lads still owe me a visit. A few years ago, they knocked on our front door and asked if they could educate me about their beliefs, but I had a dentist appointment to get to so I said, “Leave me your bible and I’ll study up for the next time you come around.” They awkwardly shifted around looking at each other for a few seconds, and then hesitantly handed over their bible.

Who could it be knocking on our front door at this hour (5:07PM)? The Christmas tree is hogging my vantage point in the front window where I generally lurk to peer out and determine whether to open the door or not. Throwing caution to the wind, I opened the door.

There stood a young boy, about 12-years-old, holding a plate of festively decorated homemade Christmas cookies in various quasi-discernable shapes. Festively decorated in the manner that a 12-year-old boy supplied with a big bowl of icing and a surplus of sprinkles would see fit. Not 4-H Burke County Fair blue-ribbon work…perhaps a participation trophy. So it goes.

We stood and looked at each other for a bit, me attempting to process what was going on, he shyly gathering himself to tell me. “I’m selling Christmas cookies to raise money to buy a snowboard…they’re kind of expensive.” I inquired as to the price of his creations, “$15 dollars for one plate or $25 for two.” he said, while motioning towards the second plate of cookies sitting on the steps behind him.

So as not to deny any of my neighbors a plate of cookies, and to maybe enable him to make five more bucks and experience the joy of enduring his chosen means of entrepreneurship for another cold call, I handed him $15. Knowing full well that I had no intentions of eating the cookies.

You ever watched kids make Christmas cookies with icing and sprinkles? They are an unsanitary lot, especially during cold season, and no matter where they have been or what they have touched, I’ve never known of a 12-year-old boy that willingly washed their hands. That, and the fact that his black hoody was festooned with the fluttery tell-tale signs of a family pet that he liked to pet.

Why would I buy cookies that I don’t intend to eat? For one, it’s Christmas. Secondly, to help a motivated young man achieve his goal, and thirdly, peace of mind.

How would I feel if a few days later I read a newspaper report about a kid, disgruntled with poor Christmas cookie sales, holding up a liquor store to buy a snowboard? “The perpetrator brandished what appeared to be a sugar cookie shaped as a handgun, or a misshapen reindeer (reports vary), and angrily demanded all the cash, a scratch-off lottery ticket, and a fistful of jerky. Investigators followed a trail of festive sprinkles to a local snowboard shop where the perpetrator was apprehended without incident.”

Lastly, I bought cookies I never intended to eat for insurance. A few years down the road, when that pleasant cookie peddling 12-year-old is an angstful teenager marauding the neighborhood with his gang of defrocked Cub Scouts and altar boys looking to slash tires and crack the skulls of garden gnomes, he might say, “Skip that house fellas, old man Ellis bought Christmas cookies from me once.”

May your New Year be shiny and bright with copious fistfuls of festive sprinkles.

When I saw the picture of my Aunt Susie and my first-grade teacher Mrs. McEvers on the front page of the December 4th edition of the Burke County Tribune under the title, “Dixon Celebrates 40 Years in Salon Business”, my first thought was, “No way! 40-years ago wasn’t that long ago.” But, alas, I crunched the numbers, and it all added up.

Susie wasn’t very old when I was born, and coincidentally, neither was I. In genealogical and/or ancestral terms, she is not my Great-Aunt, but she is a great Aunt, and a kind, caring, selfless pillar of the community of Lignite and Burke County.

When I was a wee lad, Susie would sometimes babysit my brother Jarvis and myself while our parents piously attended Reverand Laurie Chrest’s bible study group at The 109 Church. I always knew when Susie was going to be our sitter, there would be a pre-payment of condolences in the form of TJ Swann in the fridge to ease the pain that was my brother and I.

“Little Creeps” as Susie mostly lovingly, and always rightfully, referred to us knuckleheads. I loved when she was in charge for the night, because if she was our sitter there was a good chance that some of the Burke Central High School class of 1983 would be called in for entertainment and reinforcements…and I would get to watch Saturday Night Live. “Back when it was funny.” As we of a certain age like to profess.

We loved being her Little Creeps and diligently strove to live up to the moniker. Oftentimes us Little Creeps would be abandoned at the farm with Susie in charge while the adults did adult stuff somewhere away from the farm. “Abandoned” might be a bit strong, we loved nothing more than going to the farm. Everyone should be so lucky as to have a grandparent’s “farm” in their young lives. A place where rules are bent and often broken.

A place where a bottomless tin of Strawberry Nesquik is in perpetual supply, and when Susie is in charge, you get a bendy or swirly straw to blow bubbles in it until it covers the kitchen table.

A place where the long rubber hose from big red fire extinguisher filled with fine white powder can be stuffed into the front of your little brothers ToughSkins jeans and sprayed until the fine white powder shoots out of the bottom of both of his pant legs…when Susie is in charge.

She isn’t to blame. You turn your back to clean up a kitchen table hemorrhaging Strawberry Nesquik and Little Creeps will do what Little Creeps will do. So it goes.

She had been annoyed with us often, like when we ate her cherry flavored lip gloss or gave her dolls crew-cuts, but the fire extinguisher incident may be the only time I remember her actually being mad at us Little Creeps. Perhaps that’s why she was instrumental in helping me to maintain my glorious mullet, or why she eagerly complied with my ill-fated request to have the New York Yankees symbol shaved into the side of my head? Little Creep payback.

I’m quite proud of my Aunt Susie…a great aunt indeed.