Elementary School

Thank You Mrs. Thomas for teaching me to read.
Thank you Mrs. Krieger for teaching me to write cursive.
Thank you Mrs. Bradshaw for allowing Steve Walton to participate in story telling
even though he had that over-active saliva gland problem.
Thank you Mrs. Waters for reading all those animal stories to us.
I still remember why the Blue Jay is blue, and why the porcupine has quills.

But Mrs. Heaton with your wooden block heeled shoes
and your demented cruelty,
And Mr. Acey with your sadistic treatment of Mike Browan
and the sick way you punched us in the chests with your first two fingers,
and Miss Azzarello with your talon like nails that pinched juglar veins
and your twisted obsessive-compulsive hand washing and clothes changing
throughout the day,
You three can all kiss my fat behind.

But you can't can you?
Because you're all dead.
And so we terrified little ones, we victims of our ages,
We have the last laugh after all, now don't we?

Because you're all dead.
Dead and gone to the eternal teacher's lounge in Hell
where Farrell Bieber's cigarette smoke always hangs in the air,
and the sandwiches in your lunches stay forever dried out.

After The Dance

A year or so ago I sat in my room staring at the e mail on my screen. A friend had sent me an obituary of a former local disc jockey. For a moment I went whirling back to places and times I associated with Wayne Thomas, the disc jockey. I can still hear an echo from the 60's shouting "The Waynillo Thomaso Radio Programmy - I am not a prima donna!!" He was more than a guy that probably lived in a mobile home and struggled to make ends meet. He was a key to a storage cabinet of memories.

I remembered the night one of my high school garage bands played at a high school dance and this very disc jockey was also hired to entertain.
He was angry for having to share the bill with us.

At the end of the dance, we both stood in a breezeway. He was waiting for whoever picked him and all of his records up, and I was waiting for my band-mates to back an equipment trailer up. While standing there together, I mustered up all my courage and muttered something to him. I admired him very much and was star-struck.

He was a much older guy and he looked down with a look of disdain and snapped something at me and looked away. I thought to myself "You needn't be that way - it won't always be like this - you won't always struggle."

I'd like to think I thought that, but maybe at the time I really thought "hey buddy, bite the weenie."

And now that the dance is over, as I looked at his obituary I realized that even though he changed his name to China Smith, and tried his luck in California, he always did struggle. And at the time of our encounter, he was only twenty-five years old.

And I forgive him.

The N Factor

For those of you who didn't see it, this editorial entitled "The N Factor" appeared in The Greenville Daily News on May 15, 2007.
It was edited quite a bit, and in fact in the paper was entitled "Presidency Hinges on 'The N Factor'. So for those of you who didn't see it, and those of you who did, here is the unedited editorial in it's uncensored entirety.

THE N Factor
-Lyle Fales

It's a couple of years away and already stories regarding the next Presidential election are creeping into the occasional news segment. John McCain is being touted as the likely Republican candidate, and of course the bigger story is who the Democrats might select to run. My personal pick is John Edwards, who might make a race with John McCain interesting indeed. Of course there's always the outside chance - I think it's outside anyway - that Hillary Rodham Clinton will toss her hat into the ring and along her husband, the thermonuclear weapon of campaigning, and/or that the religious right will crush the hopes of the moderate McCain.

So there are many who may run, but who is most likely to win? I have long held that the candidate, in order to win, must have a name that sounds wholesome and as American as apple pie. I knew for example that Dukakis never had a chance. His name sounded too... well...foreign. It was practically like they were talking about turning the reins over the the commies for crying out loud. Nothing against Mr. Dukakis, a fine fellow I'm sure... if you're a comrade. I know, I know, Dukakis is actually a Greek. Don't get me started.

And Obama whatever from Illinois? Not a threat. I read about him all the time and I still can't remember his name. Other than it sounds vaguely like a terrorist.

Thus come my theory. I call it "The N Factor". This simply means that in our history we find names - and hence candidates - most appealing if their last names end with the letter N. Yep. That's it. That's my theory. I think if the candidate's name ends with the letter N they have a much greater chance of being elected.

I know you are mentally scrambling right now, so let me save you much time, research, and energy. N Factor Presidents to date are: Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Jackson, Van Buren, Harrison, Buchanan, Lincoln, Johnson, Harrison, Wilson, Truman, Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, and Clinton. And if you didn't know it, we once had a President for just on day and his name was Atchinson. Further, when one pronounces the name Cleveland (as in Grover) it sounds like it ends in N too. And he was President twice.

So when I hear that Hillary Clinton may run against John McCain, it gets my heart racing and I break into a cold sweat. How can this be? Who would win? Would this somehow upset the natural order of things? Contribute to global warming? Would there simply be no clear winner (shades of 2000!)? Since buttered bread always lands buttered side down, and a cat always lands on it's feet, a McCain vs. Clinton race would be like tying buttered bread on the back of a cat and tossing it out the window. It would just get near the ground and spin like opposing magnets.

So let's all hope Edwards runs for the Democrats and the Republicans put up Bill Frist. No N Factor. It's more fair that way.

And if the Democrats want to make it even more sporting, they'd let the Republicans have Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

President For A Day

Here is a little bit about the reference I made in my "N Factor" editorial regarding a President for one day.

His name was David Rice Atchinson. He was President of the United States for a day.

Atchinson was never elected President of the US. He succeeded to the office by accident - and is renowned for having served as President for one day.

The facts are these: Atchinson had been elected president pro tempore of the US Senate 15 times and was president pro tempore in March 1849. President James K. Polk spent his last day as President on March 3, 1849 and as midnight tolled and Sunday March 4th began, Polk was out of office. Meanwhile, his successor, General Zachary Taylor, a staunch Episcopalian, refused to be sworn in on March 4th because it was Sunday, and preferred to celebrate his inauguration on Monday, March 5th. The United States was faced with a full day gap between Presidents. According to the law, when the presidential and vice-presidential offices are not filled, the president Pro tempore of the Senate automatically becomes President of the U.S. Since Senator Atchinson of Missouri was president pro tempore of the Senate, he automatically became President of the United States for the single day of March 4th, 1849.

Detractors claim that he was never elected - true - and that he never took an oath. The Constitution does not set time limits on taking the oath. Nevertheless, the Biographical Congressional Directory published in Washington, D.C. in 1913, called Atchinson the "legal president of the United States for one day."

In 1928 the governor of Missouri and other state dignitaries went to Plattsburgh to dedicate a statue to Atchinson and his brief term as chief executive of our nation.

Holly and Division

It was a cold Saturday night in the spring of 1969. We were all gathered for a cast party since we had just given our final performance of Arthur Miller's "All My Sons". I was fairly new to high school drama, and George Deever had been my first real part. We were all still feeling pretty euphoric since our final performance had been particularly moving and quite successful. Everyone was chatty and excited, feeling, in our minds at least, that we had all just been part of something important. And it had been special to be sure.

High school parties then were coca-cola cheese curl extravaganzas. This one was no different. People were discussing their parts and how their character wove into the story as a whole. Others searched for symbolism and greater truths. My friend Bill and I were mostly just interested in soda pop and potato chips.

Eventually someone produced a guitar and it began to be passed around to the various people who could play. Soon the room was full of people singing along to "Michael Row Your Boat Ashore" and "Rock My Soul In the Bosom of Abraham". I watched the whole thing with total indifference. I didn't know those songs and I didn't care to learn them.

Eventually the guitar made its way around to me. I hesitated because I wasn't the greatest player in the world, but I decided to try my hand anyway. I put my head down, closed my eyes, and took off on a growling, rousing version of Bob Dylan's "Maggie's Farm". "I ain't gonna work on Maggie's Farm no more. I got a head full of I-dee-yas, driving me insane...." When I got done, the room was absolutely quiet. I looked up and some of the girls had been staring at me and were now starting to giggle. They rolled their eyes, and gave me sideways glances as they asked incredulously, "What was that?" It was obvious I'd made a fool out of myself. I decided I needed to look for more snacks and simply went outside to get away.

Out in the cold night air, I began to see things as clearly as I could see my breath slipping out like puffs from a steam engine. I began to see that these girls, who didn't know a songwriter from a typewriter, would never get it. They would never see The Monkees as a corporate marketing ploy, and never see Dylan as the quintessential singer-songwriter. Somehow there in the lonely night of Wyoming Michigan on the corner of Holly and Division, I figured out some empirical truths about art. And how public acceptence has never been an accurate gauge of artistic achievement. I mean, Donnie Osmond sold millions of records for crying out loud, but nobody will ever accuse him of being a great 'artist'. Maybe Arthur Miller was to blame for my realizations; he'd just sent me spinning through empirical truths.

Suddenly I sensed another presence. I turned and saw that I wasn't alone. My hostess and fellow cast member Shawn was there. She came up close to me and whispered in my ear "I thought it was wonderful." And then she was gone. And so was my anxiety.

I have never forgotten that night. I'll always be grateful to Arthur Miller for writing that brilliant play. I'll always be grateful to our director Jim Hoffman for giving me a chance. But mostly I'll always be grateful to Shawn for her simple words that were spoken at just the right time.

I had an opportunity to direct "All My Sons" for a local theater group a year ago or so, and many memories came flooding back. I remembered certain lines and phrases, and how other people delivered them 35 years earlier. But mostly I remembered Shawn and her brilliant, inspired performance as Mother Keller, and her sensitivity to a friend.

So, Why Is...

For all of you out there who have wondered why a boxing ring is square and Madison Square Garden is round, ponder this with me:

Why is it that "Wise Man" and "Wise Guy" mean the opposite, but "Fat Chance" and "Slim Chance" mean the same thing?

And why is "people of color" acceptable, and "colored people" not?

Silly, isn't it?