Saturday, April 24, 2010

Old, Glory.

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Part of my current runnings has been a near endless series of inspections, paperwork, and endless hours of stooging around while the inspectors...inspect.
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Today I had the pleasure of watching [and smelling] a septic tank inspection. The inspector turned out to be a hell of a nice gentlemen, who happens to be a conservative, small businessman. While he worked, we talked politics and history and books, weather and it was if I'd known him for years.
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As we closed up the tank [which leaks by the by, and needs a $700 repair GD'it] Bill invited me to a Flag Retirement Ceremony. I decided to take my grandsons and go out there to let them see how a flag should be taken care of.
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Have you ever been in a crowd of TOTAL strangers, but felt at home? Comfortable? Like you were supposed to be there? THAT was this event. It turns out that it was The Boy Scouts. I never asked, Mrs Schteveo asked me earlier what the "organization" was. I hadn't asked Bill when he invited me.
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I can't tell you how many of the adults, and the scouts, asked me if I wanted their CHAIR. I stood for a while, then found a seat I thought would take my big ol' butt. A tail gate on a Chevy picnic truck! They even wiped it off for me.
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The ceremony was what I remembered, with minor adjustments for this troop. They saluted and read about the flag, the history of the flag, how we should treat the flag, it was VERY patriotic. More importantly, I was reminded that there are still families who follow the rules and traditions I was raised with and that my boys were raised with.
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At 5 o'clock I was beat, the kids were happy hanging out with Sponge Bob, Mrs. Schteveo had already decided she was too tired. But I felt the need to do this. First because I was honestly invited, and the kids just don't get exposed to anything based on history and get nothing patriotic other than our political bent. I felt like there was a reason to be there, and I was right. Actually there are a number of things I was reminded that I needed to be...trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.
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I'm quite glad that I went and I'm happier still that I took the boys.
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Schteveo

2 comments:

BOW said...

Obama and his ilk want to retire Old Glory too. He tried to avoid wearing even so much as a oin and removed any trace from Haiti during our nation's aiding that country. That doesn't even include all of his buddies who have been burning and stomping and otherwise defacing her for years.

It's no different than how they want to retire our older citizens.

Dignity and respect are old-fashioned concepts, not hip in the new amerika.

Spider said...

You're right Bill, which is why this new Amerika must be "radically" changed, or brought down and rebuilt. And IMO, i doubt we can make changes that would be radical enough, or thorough enough, to ferret-out all the enemies of America that have been, and continue to be, deeply planted in our govt.