Rarely do I see an article that completely impresses me. I read a novel of articles a day, and that’s not counting the 30 or so newsletters that are emailed to me on a daily basis. Occasionally I read one that really stops me in my tracks and makes me think. An article so good that I have to take pause in my day and ponder just what it means. Recently, I read such an article at OpinionJournal.com.

Written by Peggy Noonan, the article talks about what it is to be a man. More importantly, that honor that we love in men - that tough, yet polite guy. Her point is, suddenly in American its very cool to be a Fireman or a Cop. It’s cool to be holding a shovel, sweating for 12 hours, getting dirty while you dig out a hole. That type of man hasn’t been celebrated for a very long time. Not since John Wayne.

More tragically, she points out how we’ve stepped on those men for far to long. The basic thought is, we can go to college so that we don’t have to be like that. It’s not the lawyers and the bankers who are saving our country right now. It’s the guys with the shovels. The firemen, the cops, the plumbers, the construction workers, the electricians, and the carpenters. The people that most of us didn’t consider being as we were going off to college.

They are the people like my dad. The guys that go to work everyday and put in an honest 9 hours. They don’t ask for thanks or to be noticed, while people like me in the “professional” world fight for the next promotion. They are the ones who are now pulling us up by our boot straps, while the professional class stands on the side and cheers them on. It’s about time we cheered.

Click the more link to read the article I’m talking about.

PEGGY NOONAN

Welcome Back, Duke

From the ashes of Sept. 11 arise the manly virtues.

Friday, October 12, 2001 12:01 a.m. EDT

A few weeks ago I wrote a column called “God Is Back,” about how, within a day of the events of Sept. 11, my city was awash in religious imagery–prayer cards, statues of saints. It all culminated, in a way, in the discovery of the steel-girder cross that emerged last week from the wreckage–unbent, unbroken, unmelted, perfectly proportioned and duly blessed by a Catholic friar on the request of the rescue workers, who seemed to see meaning in the cross’s existence. So do I.

My son, a teenager, finds this hilarious, as does one of my best friends. They have teased me, to my delight, but I have told them, “Boys, this whole story is about good and evil, about the clash of good and evil.” If you are of a certain cast of mind, it is of course meaningful that the face of the Evil One seemed to emerge with a roar from the furnace that was Tower One. You have seen the Associated Press photo, and the photos that followed: the evil face roared out of the building with an ugly howl–and then in a snap of the fingers it lost form and force and disappeared. If you are of a certain cast of mind it is of course meaningful that the cross, which to those of its faith is imperishable, did not disappear. It was not crushed by the millions of tons of concrete that crashed down upon it, did not melt in the furnace. It rose from the rubble, still there, intact.

For the ignorant, the superstitious and me (and maybe you), the face of the Evil One was revealed, and died; for the ignorant, the superstitious and me (and maybe you), the cross survived. This is how God speaks to us. He is saying, “I am.” He is saying, “I am here.” He is saying, “And the force of all the evil of all the world will not bury me.”

I believe this quite literally. But then I am experiencing Sept. 11 not as a political event but as a spiritual event.

And, of course, a cultural one, which gets me to my topic.

It is not only that God is back, but that men are back. A certain style of manliness is once again being honored and celebrated in our country since Sept. 11. You might say it suddenly emerged from the rubble of the past quarter century, and emerged when a certain kind of man came forth to get our great country out of the fix it was in.

I am speaking of masculine men, men who push things and pull things and haul things and build things, men who charge up the stairs in a hundred pounds of gear and tell everyone else where to go to be safe. Men who are welders, who do construction, men who are cops and firemen. They are all of them, one way or another, the men who put the fire out, the men who are digging the rubble out, and the men who will build whatever takes its place.

And their style is back in style. We are experiencing a new respect for their old-fashioned masculinity, a new respect for physical courage, for strength and for the willingness to use both for the good of others.

You didn’t have to be a fireman to be one of the manly men of Sept. 11. Those businessmen on flight 93, which was supposed to hit Washington, the businessmen who didn’t live by their hands or their backs but who found out what was happening to their country, said goodbye to the people they loved, snapped the cell phone shut and said, “Let’s roll.” Those were tough men, the ones who forced that plane down in Pennsylvania. They were tough, brave guys.

Let me tell you when I first realized what I’m saying. On Friday, Sept. 14, I went with friends down to the staging area on the West Side Highway where all the trucks filled with guys coming off a 12-hour shift at ground zero would pass by. They were tough, rough men, the grunts of the city–construction workers and electrical workers and cops and emergency medical worker and firemen.

I joined a group that was just standing there as the truck convoys went by. And all we did was cheer. We all wanted to do some kind of volunteer work but there was nothing left to do, so we stood and cheered those who were doing. The trucks would go by and we’d cheer and wave and shout “God bless you!” and “We love you!” We waved flags and signs, clapped and threw kisses, and we meant it: We loved these men. And as the workers would go by–they would wave to us from their trucks and buses, and smile and nod–I realized that a lot of them were men who hadn’t been applauded since the day they danced to their song with their bride at the wedding.

And suddenly I looked around me at all of us who were cheering. And saw who we were. Investment bankers! Orthodontists! Magazine editors! In my group, a lawyer, a columnist and a writer. We had been the kings and queens of the city, respected professional in a city that respects its professional class. And this night we were nobody. We were so useless, all we could do was applaud the somebodies, the workers who, unlike us, had not been applauded much in their lives.

And now they were saving our city.

I turned to my friend and said, “I have seen the grunts of New York become kings and queens of the City.” I was so moved and, oddly I guess, grateful. Because they’d always been the people who ran the place, who kept it going, they’d just never been given their due. But now–”And the last shall be first”–we were making up for it.

It may seem that I am really talking about class–the professional classes have a new appreciation for the working class men of Lodi, N.J., or Astoria, Queens. But what I’m attempting to talk about is actual manliness, which often seems tied up with class issues, as they say, but isn’t always by any means the same thing.

Here’s what I’m trying to say: Once about 10 years ago there was a story–you might have read it in your local tabloid, or a supermarket tabloid like the National Enquirer–about an American man and woman who were on their honeymoon in Australia or New Zealand. They were swimming in the ocean, the water chest-high. From nowhere came a shark. The shark went straight for the woman, opened its jaws. Do you know what the man did? He punched the shark in the head. He punched it and punched it again. He did not do brilliant commentary on the shark, he did not share his sensitive feelings about the shark, he did not make wry observations about the shark, he punched the shark in the head. So the shark let go of his wife and went straight for him. And it killed him. The wife survived to tell the story of what her husband had done. He had tried to deck the shark. I told my friends: That’s what a wonderful man is, a man who will try to deck the shark.

I don’t know what the guy did for a living, but he had a very old-fashioned sense of what it is to be a man, and I think that sense is coming back into style because of who saved us on Sept. 11, and that is very good for our country.

Why? Well, manliness wins wars. Strength and guts plus brains and spirit wins wars. But also, you know what follows manliness? The gentleman. The return of manliness will bring a return of gentlemanliness, for a simple reason: masculine men are almost by definition gentlemen. Example: If you’re a woman and you go to a faculty meeting at an Ivy League University you’ll have to fight with a male intellectual for a chair, but I assure you that if you go to a Knights of Columbus Hall, the men inside (cops, firemen, insurance agents) will rise to offer you a seat. Because they are manly men, and gentlemen.

It is hard to be a man. I am certain of it; to be a man in this world is not easy. I know you are thinking, But it’s not easy to be a woman, and you are so right. But women get to complain and make others feel bad about their plight. Men have to suck it up. Good men suck it up and remain good-natured, constructive and helpful; less-good men become the kind of men who are spoofed on “The Man Show”–babe-watching, dope-smoking nihilists. (Nihilism is not manly, it is the last refuge of sissies.)

I should discuss how manliness and its brother, gentlemanliness, went out of style. I know, because I was there. In fact, I may have done it. I remember exactly when: It was in the mid-’70s, and I was in my mid-20s, and a big, nice, middle-aged man got up from his seat to help me haul a big piece of luggage into the overhead luggage space on a plane. I was a feminist, and knew our rules and rants. “I can do it myself,” I snapped.

It was important that he know women are strong. It was even more important, it turns out, that I know I was a jackass, but I didn’t. I embarrassed a nice man who was attempting to help a lady. I wasn’t lady enough to let him. I bet he never offered to help a lady again. I bet he became an intellectual, or a writer, and not a good man like a fireman or a businessman who says, “Let’s roll.”

But perhaps it wasn’t just me. I was there in America, as a child, when John Wayne was a hero, and a symbol of American manliness. He was strong, and silent. And I was there in America when they killed John Wayne by a thousand cuts. A lot of people killed him–not only feminists but peaceniks, leftists, intellectuals, others. You could even say it was Woody Allen who did it, through laughter and an endearing admission of his own nervousness and fear. He made nervousness and fearfulness the admired style. He made not being able to deck the shark, but doing the funniest commentary on not decking the shark, seem . . . cool.

But when we killed John Wayne, you know who we were left with. We were left with John Wayne’s friendly-antagonist sidekick in the old John Ford movies, Barry Fitzgerald. The small, nervous, gossiping neighborhood commentator Barry Fitzgerald, who wanted to talk about everything and do nothing.

This was not progress. It was not improvement.

I missed John Wayne.

But now I think . . . he’s back. I think he returned on Sept. 11. I think he ran up the stairs, threw the kid over his back like a sack of potatoes, came back down and shoveled rubble. I think he’s in Afghanistan now, saying, with his slow swagger and simmering silence, “Yer in a whole lotta trouble now, Osama-boy.”

I think he’s back in style. And none too soon.

Welcome back, Duke.

And once again: Thank you, men of Sept. 11.

Everybody wants to help the soldiers who are fighting in and over Afghanistan. If you’re like me, you work in front of a monitor all day and your daily work seems petty compared to what some folks are doing. How can you, the lowly graphic designer or HTML whore, help? That’s where the Design Defense Ministry comes in.

You can “join up” in one of several different elite units including: Design Rangers, Code Command, or Copy Corps. There’s plenty of propaganda to download and even some psy-ops material to read through. Get off your duff today, and enlist!

I’m not a huge fan of Halloween, but I thought I would point y’all over to pretty funny retrospective of those cheap 70’s costumes that some of us were forced to wear.

I remember dressing up as Dracula one time and my mom bought me this cheap vinyl-like cape. After running around in that thing for a few hours, the fumes began to work their funny magic on my brain and I became drunk on petrochemical offgas. And there was the time when I was 13 and a bunch of us simply roamed the neighborhood sipping the one hot beer we managed to steal while wreaking havoc on the houses in construction and doing more than a little damage to some mailboxes. Ahh, the sweet memories of Halloween.

Man, it’s been a bad week here at the House that Llama built. Apparently, I have SADS, which is Seasonal Affective Disorder Syndrome. I haven’t been fully diagnosed but my doc says that’s most likely the case.

For me, it’s characterized by constantly interrupted sleep, if not insomnia, overall fatigue, and manic depression. The upshot of the syndrome is that the body does not receive enough light because the winter days are so short. They believe that this has something to do with the irregular production of the melatonin and seratonin in the brain. These chemicals help to regulate your sleep and are increased as your body is exposed to increased amounts of light. Clearly, the overcast dreary days that attend most winters along with the shorter number of hours of daylight could very logically lead to this disorder. The real test here is the severity. Sure, probably everyone feels a little “blah” in the winter. However, when it begins to seriously affect your work and your relationships, it becomes a serious problem that needs treatment. Another problem is that all the treatments are things that the disease “tells” your body not to do. Treatments include: Outdoor walks on sunny days. Winter vacations in sunny locales. Regular exercise. Try to sleep less. Because you are tired and depressed, you don’t want to do any of these things. It’s a great little catch-22.

The strange part for me is that my creativity skyrockets during this time, though that may not be evidenced by my writing on this site. All the little short stories I have laying around get added to and songs and ideas just seem to pop out of my head. It’s strange that the body could seem so “down” while the brain begins to seem more active. It may very well be the brain’s own attempt to try to make the body feel better.

There’s tons of info about this disorder on the net, of course. But one of the funnier things I found was this Scottish description of the disease. I also found this neat light, the Soleil Sun Alarm, which simulates a sunrise to wake you in the morning.

All in all, SADS is not that big of a deal as long as you do a few little things to make yourself feel better. The hardest part is probably realizing that you don’t have to feel bad. In truth, I kind of enjoy the fact that my body is so tied to the Earth and Nature. As Jetteva pointed out in a recent post, it puts a little perspective on the world to know that you are not in total control. I think a lot of us have probably been feeling that way lately.

The last five days of my life have been the most trying on every level. Simply, I found out my son has Asthma (have you ever heard a 10 month old gasp for breath like it was his last?) and I found out my cousin and good friend was called into active duty in the military.

The first call came Thursday as I heard that my cousins National Guard unit was called into full active duty and needed to prepare to ship out. We all understood that it is a role they have; from time to time they may have to be activated to help. No one was arguing that fact. But it did make me question to what level I was ready commit to this war. Right after the September 11th attack, the question was asked. It was in the papers, it was on the round-the-clock national news, it was on the lips of our nation’s leaders: what are we willing to do, what liberties are we willing to give up, to ferret out and destroy terrorism? But that question was posed in the collective, not the personal tense. What are we (American’s) willing to do? Not: What are we (me) willing to do?

I felt a wave of selfishness as I heard the next words. “There is still a chance we could get stood down,” my cousin said, “though it’s unlikely.” Yes, I hoped, you’ll get stood down and we can get back to football season, betting on who is going to be the CART champion, and introducing each other to a new found microbrew. Unlikely. As the day went on I learned he may be gone for a year.

So what am I willing to do for this war? It’s easy to say, yes Mr. President, do what you have to do to fight this. We support you, Mr. President. But what we really mean is, yes Mr. President, do what you have to do to fight this, just don’t call on me or anyone in my family. Yes, make our airports safer, but I really don’t want to stand in line for 2 hours. Yes, I’ll put up with it now, but in two years I’ll find it a nuisance. That is what everyone is thinking.

And Friday I had to sit at work and give a shit about my client’s profit margins. I had to sit there and think up solutions to their problems. Makes ya wonder about what you do and what good it really is.

That’s why we need to change the question. What am I willing to do, what am I willing to give up? I couldn’t help but think about that as I hugged my cousin earlier, not knowing when I’d see him again. My cousin, who is also the godfather of my son, whom will now miss his first birthday party. I got choked up as I said I’d miss him, and he got choked up as he told me not to worry.

Now I’m going to be living with this war everyday. I would have anyway, being a political junkie and lover of the red, white and blue. But now I’m going to be paying attention to it on another level, that is until my cousin comes home.

Saturday my son started wheezing. I was fearful from the start. I had grown up with bad Asthma, and some of my earliest childhood memories are of being in hospitals with inhalers and IV’s. After a long night and several phone calls with the doctor, we go in to see him on Sunday (yes, this office holds Sunday hours.) A few nebulizer treatments later, my son is breathing normally and finally relaxing.

Hearing a 10-month old gasping for breath will rip your heart out, plain and simple. Later in the evening, as I was holding him and he was yielding to sleep after a long sick day, I got choked up for a second time as I whispered, I’m sorry you got this bad stuff from me, little buddy.

I don’t know how it was for my parents, to have to live through it with me. But 28 years later I hope that the medicine is better and the technology is better so that it’s easier. There is just something so desperately unfair about kids being sick. I had to wonder am I now going to live through it again, just from the other side?

It all made me question reality, and where I fit in it.

So many questions, so few answers.

Now is not the time to be capitalist. Now is not the time to get laywered up. Now is the time for logic and understanding.

A group of postal workers in Florida are now suing the US Postal Service saying that management was not proactive enough in protecting them against biological warfare.

Why does it seem like the dumbest shit happens in Florida?

You want to know why the management wasn’t “proactive enough?” Because they never could have fucking guessed in a million years that Islamic extremist would crash three planes into major US buildings, then send a highly developed form of anthrax through the mail. Trust me, if last year the US Post Office asked for extra money to protect it’s offices against biological warfare, they would have been laughed out of Washington. If they raised the price of postage again to cover these “proactive” measures last year, it would have been hunting season on the neighborhood mailperson.

America was showing the world how we react during times of high crisis. But instead you are showing them that we can be exactly what they think we are. Hell, some Americans are happy when something terrible happens to them because they know they can sue themselves into early retirement.

Fucktards.

Former football star O.J. Simpson has shown that would-be tacklers aren’t the only people he’s skilled at evading. In court on auto burglary and battery charges, Simpson was acquitted this week, proving that the justice system also has trouble wrapping up the slippery Hall of Famer. His jury deliberated for about 90 minutes before acquitting the 54-year-old Simpson, who was faced with up to 16 years in jail.

Down the hall from Simpson’s trial, an aging, unknown man with 50 cents to his name was given 20 years in prison for leaving his young kids at home while he went to work a minimum wage job scrapping gum off office building floors.

Several hundred students at the University of Smallville are planning an event they hope will give the U.S. economy a shot in the arm. The students, members of the America Rules Club, will host a party that encourages fellow classmates to go to their local market, buy at least two cases of beer, and attend a party at the club’s house (formerly known as the honors dorm).

The Club’s president had this to say: “By buying brew we’re showing our love of a great American pastime and we’re flooding the local economy with cash. Not only that, but it’s a great way to blow off steam and meet freshmen hotties. America rules!”

Annoyed by the Taliban’s continued fabrications and verbal jabs, the President today decided to strike back in a different fashion. Taking tips from several rappers, President Bush held a news conference to “let them Al-Queda hoes know how it’s really going down.”

Following is a portion of his speech:

“Relax, bin Dover, grab your ankles, stretch ya hammies,

I got deadly weapons ready, so let me cock the jammy.

Understand me, it’s a whammy, I’m flexing knives and swords,

So if you’re ready for war, I’ll lay your head on the floor. Biotch!”

Well, we try to be as uncommercial around here as possible. I’m sure some of you have noticed that there are no ads anywhere on this site. Of course, when only 4 people read this crap, the bandwidth bills stay pretty low. So, in that spirit, please take the following information as a suggestion and not as some commercial, as we certainly get no kick-backs.

I am a fan of Bluegrass and Old-Timey country music. I like many other kinds of music as well, in fact, Ministry’s “Jesus Built My Hotrod” is playing right now, but bluegrass and string bands are certainly near the top of my list. To that end, I have been trying to find a good place to buy CD’s like The Old Crow Medicine Show and The Corndrinkers. While Amazon has some of these titles available, their supply is inadequate and the selection has a certain lack of depth at some extreme ends of the “downhome” musical spectrum.

Finally, a coworker introduced me to County Sales. This site is an unending treasure trove of good down-home, bluegrass music. If you are interested in the least to rural music from the turn-of-the-century to the present, I suggest you give them a try.