thanksgiving, 2012

I'd been walking around all last week thinking
about Thanksgiving.
I looked at my calendar and saw that Thanksgiving fell on November 22 this year.
"Why the hell. . ." I asked myself, "is that date significant
 for me?"
It seemed to be so stuck in my head but, being distracted by the mayhem of real life, I didn't really take pause to
think it through.

Then last Tuesday morning as I was waking from my deep sleep, it hit me. . .
November 22 was the day, in 1963, that President Kennedy was murdered.
That was 49 years ago and in all those years I couldn't remember Thanksgiving ever falling on November 22.
So I poked around on the internet and sure enough, it never has and probably won't again for another 75 years.

 

 I've got no deep philosophical point here but it surprised me that - even with my more creative than average brainpan - I never even considered that one year Thanksgiving must inevitably fall on the day the President was killed.

I think I've mentioned, earlier posts, that I was 10 or 11 years old when JFK died so I didn't know or care much about politics or anything much more than I didn't want to go to school any more. But since then, I've read and learned a lot about the man and I've come to really like him.

John Kennedy was 46 when he died and in my child mind at the time, never imagined I'd ever live longer than that.
I guess I was wrong.

Happy Thanksgiving, my friends.

JFK pardoning a Thanksgiving turkey

another shameless plug

the dreaming goddess & a barber-pole with feet

"dreaming goddess" watercolour by Arthur A Winstanley ©2012 Arthur A Winstanley

"barberpole with feet" coloured pencil 
by Arthur A Winstanley ©2012 Arthur A Winstanley

politics & a change in the weather

politics

So mercifully, the great American election cycle is finally over.
(yes Virginia, there is a God)

John Boehner is still Majority Leader in the House while Nancy Pelosi is still the minority Leader, Harry Reid is still Majority Leader in the Senate while Bitch McConnell (sorry, I really don't like the guy) is still the Minority Leader and Paul Ryan got his Congressional seat back.
Joe Biden remains Vice President and Barak Obama is still President of the United States.

 Think about it. . .
Hundreds of millions of dollars spent and an incessant parade of irritating political ads later, absolutely nothing
has changed!
Sweet leaping Jesus, what has our government come to?

Still worse than that, thanks to the attempted voter suppression meddling of Florida's imbecile Governor (I don't care for him either), all of the votes any of us, here in the Sunshine State, cast; counted for nothing.

Now four days later, the horsesh*t political posturing has begun again.
(Talk about business as usual)

But whatever they do or don't get done for "the American People", those of us in Key West, will enjoy
another day in paradise.

a change in the weather

Even if I didn't have a calendar, I'd know it was November.

As she has for the past thirteen Novembers we've been together, Maxine (the cat & my feline barometer) has abandoned her warm weather resting place on the porch and re-adopted her cozy spot in the warmth at the foot of the bed.

I'll never understand how she knows there'll be a change in the weather.

it's time for another word from our sponsor - VIDEO

view from the hammock

So there I was, swinging in the hammock at the end of the day, wondering what I would take my next picture of. . .