I thrived in the two departments I worked at, overcoming sexism and ignoring homophobia.  I became the first woman sergeant at my second department.  I was proud of my achievements.  I made my time a success, but I will not sugar-coat it, I suffered in silence more than a few times.

How would you like to attain a job by lying?  Do you think that is a good way to start a career?  Police departments in Texas are allowed under the law to polygraph incoming cadets.  The third question they asked me on the exam was if I had ever had intercourse with another woman.  I lied and showed no deception.  I don’t know what that says about the polygraph or my skills to mask deception.  I prefer to think the polygraph is a big hunk of junk.

Police departments also send you to a psychologist where they interview you and in the 80s tried to pick up on any mental illness you might have…being a queer was on the list.

I am thankful for my experience as a cop.  I gained a wealth of knowledge and some life-long friendships.  I am a better attorney today because of my time wearing the badge.

But I also endured fag jokes, being called a Dyke at least once a week by a drunk, and not being able to participate in the Explorers.  The Explorers were a group of young school kids that want to learn about being a cop.  It is a mentoring program that was sponsored by the police department and under the umbrella of the Boy Scouts of America.  The Scouts have always been vehemently against gay Americans….I knew that then and politely declined to be involved.

Boy, has it gotten better in the last 25 years!!  I am so excited and cannot wait for what I feel is about to happen in the next couple of years.  Society is evolving and coming to understand what we queers have known all along.  We are just like you, we ARE you.  Our Constitutional rights are going to be acknowledged in the near future….I am happy….and sad that it took until the second decade in the 21st Century….but mostly just happy.

I went to the gay pride parade in San Francisco a couple of years ago with my spouse.  We met up with our cousin Sherry there and watched the parade from the high perch of our hotel window.  I expected a grand party and a very good time that day, I did not expect a life-changing event.

Approaching right underneath our viewpoint came marching uniformed members of the San Francisco Police Department.  They were holding hands with their significant others and their children!  The Chief of Police and the Mayor were in the parade too…it was an unbelievable sight for me.  My twenty-five year old self would have never believed that I would one day see such a thing.  I saw myself walking in the parade that day.  I truly saw myself.

I was acknowledged that day in a way like never before.  The openly gay members of all police departments should know that people like me walk with them.  Those that have come before and suffered the silence of not being true to ourselves….service prefaced on a lie.

I watched the below video this week and was reminded of my feelings at the parade that day.  What a beautiful thing it is.  I want to serve my city…I want to lay my life on the line….I want you to know I am a gay American.  I want to be heard.  I want to speak the truth.

Thank you to the City of San Francisco and to the brave men and women…gay and straight…that serve that wonderful city.  I patiently wait for the rest of the country to follow your lead, as some have already.  Until then know I, and many others, walk the beat with you and relish in your truth.

Juju’s mother had been very excited and anxious for her to see the two gifts.  She seemed quite proud of herself and this made Juju all the more crazy to rip into them!  Sweet Sixteen is different for a girl, Jewel had told her.  You are turning into a woman and soon you will be heading off to college.  All the more reason to need the extra-large tape case Juju had circled for her mother in the Edison’s Gift Catalog.  Had she not seen it opened to the page where Juju had left it…..on her bed pillow??  The case would protect the tapes that Juju would surely have long into the 1980s.

Juju was rock solid in her belief that one of the boxes had the softball cleats inside.  She had gone to Sears with her mother on two occasions, pointing out the exact pair she desired.  Juju told her mother to go down one size because the shoes were in the boys section.  The shoes had rubber cleats and they matched the colors of her softball team uniform perfectly.  Juju imagined how cool she was going to look the following Spring as she played first base for the Fort Worth Chargers.  Maybe Jewel was excited because she had thrown in a pair of Levi 501s in the box with the cleats!!??

Juju had all her favorite 8-tracks stacked on her bedroom dresser in anticipation of the carrying case and complete organization…disco on one side, rock on the other…in alphebetical order!!  Juju was singing along to the John Denver Christmas Special when Jewel came into the room and sat in her chair.  This was it, this was the big moment!  Jewel motioned for Juju to grab the two boxes which Juju did in quick order.

“Today is your birthday Juju, so start with the one with the birthday card stuck to it.” her mother stated.     The card would be read later, Juju tore into the box as paper flew over her head in pieces!  Then….stunned silence.  What is that? Juju asked.  ”Pick it up” Jewel said, “isn’t it gorgeous?”  Juju held in her hand a tan cloth and crocheted purse.  PURSE?!!??  Is this a purse because only about four 8-tracks can fit into this!??  Did I open the wrong box!??!!

Jewel started to frown and sighed loudly.  Juju you need to start carrying a purse to carry your stuff, a compact, some powder, a hair brush, and your car keys.  Some powder?!!  Car keys fit real good in the front pocket of a new pair of Levi’s!!  ”Maybe people will stop calling you a tomboy if you try a little Juju.”

Juju forced a smile and said she would carry the purse, “on occasion” …thanking her mother she scooted the purse off to the side.  Surely the second box would more than make up for the purse.  The box was BIG and heavy….big enough for the 8-track carrying case, jeans, and cleats.  Good old Jewel…it would be just like her to set Juju up with a “gag” gift, then deliver all the goods in the second box!

Smashing into the second box from the top, Juju looked down the opening to see the top of a black pompadour!  ”Be careful Juju! That is a collector’s item.”  Juju reached in and pulled out a fifteen pound sculpture.  A bust of Elvis Presley, painted in day glow colors. (Imagine Elvis on black felt, …but classier)

Jewel told her daughter that she knew she had always loved him, and with him dying four months earlier she knew Juju would want something to remember the King in her bedroom.  Jewel was so happy to see Juju with the bust.  Juju feigned delight and hugged her mother tightly, thanking her for the thoughtful gift.  ”I know you have watched all his movies and had a crush on him…I knew it!” Jewel said.

Juju collected her gifts and walked back to her bedroom.  Neatly re-stacking the 8-tracks in their place beside her stereo system.  She sat on her bed and examined the purse.  It was sweet of her mother to buy her a gift, but there was a lot of meaning behind the gift that was not lost on Juju. She was sixteen now and Jewel was clearly longing for something different from Juju was exhibiting to her on a daily basis.  The purse was one last attempt to see if Juju was the image in Jewel’s head or the girl seated on the bed wearing the Chuck Taylors.  One day soon Juju would let Jewel know the battle was long over, but until then she would make a show of it and walk the purse to the car a couple of times to appease her thoughtful mother.  By February the purse would disappear to the back corner of Juju’s closet, beside the brand new electric curler set.

The Elvis head with the bright orange scarf wrapped around his neck was a whole other story.  That gawd-awful thing would have to sit on Juju’s dresser for the better part of 1978. Juju never had the heart to tell Jewel that she loved, truly loved Viva Las Vegas as a result of a crush…but it had been on Ann Margaret and not the King of Rock & Roll.  Juju turned the bust into a perfect use…Elvis proudly wore her Charger’s softball cap…the team color of orange coordinating perfectly with the scarf.

In a perfect world Jewel would have had a young woman who loved purses and pined for Elvis.  In the real world of the late 1970s, she had a baby dyke that danced privately in her room wearing high tops and jammed to the Beatles.

The Christmas gifts we receive each year not only reflect the giver, but they reflect what the giver sees in us…what they want to see us enjoy.  It is a piece of them in that box, their delight in picking out just the right gift.  It is their hope they wrap up, hoping to see the magic of Christmas light in our faces when we first see their offering.

So remember that when you unwrap the purple socks from Aunt Harriet this Christmas morning or the XXL Snuggie from your mother-in-law.  Show delight and thankfulness no matter how shocked you are in what is in the box before you.  The gift to the giver is written all over your face….make it a happy script.

I know my mother saw disappointment when I held up that purse.  But I think I made up for it with my acting job on the second package.  The following year my mother gave me an orange skateboard and some Levi jeans….I gave her a dust buster.

Tell me Rick Perry, what has repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell done to undermine our military?  Did all the soldiers in Afghanistan lay down their arms and walk away when the butch girl in the vehicle support garage was finally able to verbalize the fact that she is a dyke?  Haven’t seen that on the evening news, have you?  There was a story on how the YouTube video of Perry is fast becoming the most “disliked” video ever.

I know lots of Christians that are tired of their religion being aligned with hate and ignorance.  There are people who pick up a book, besides the Bible, and attend church every Sunday.  I want more of them to post their own videos, please!

I don’t have a problem with Jesus digging the Broncos right now.  Tebow is a sincere kid and fun to watch.  Jerry Jones has only retracted the roof two times since opening Jerry’s World, so Jesus can’t watch his favorite team that often.  The switch in allegiance was expected, the Mile High City, is closer to God than the rest of the fields in America….so it all makes sense.  Pray on Tebow…play on Tebow.  I still think you will be an even better player after you lose, well….when you start acting like the Jonas Brothers did after ditching those bracelets…you get me, right?

If we buy into the belief that Jesus wants Tebow to win, we also have to believe that he wanted Kanye to win a Grammy.  We further have to believe that He wanted the guy with two teeth in the Oklahoma trailer park to survive the tornado and not the family of five that lived next door.  I guess they weren’t Broncos fans.

I know I have always felt that Jesus likes people more if they cite Bible verses, and thank him for every single thing that happens to them on any given day.  I have been remiss in not thanking Jesus for the two times big ass SUVs have rear-ended me this year, sending me to the hospital on one occasion.  What’s that you say?  I should thank Him for escaping the accidents with my life and not being seriously hurt?  Didn’t I tell you I am a Cowboys fan??

While I am getting this off my chest.  I want to give a shout out to Tebow for putting John 3:16  under his eyes on game day…yeah, you heard me right.  He puts Bible verses on the black tape under his eyes …the tape that is usually used to cut down on glare from the sun.  I guess he wants glare from the Son.

I equate the above with people who feel the need to put a religious bumper sticker on the back of their vehicle…or one of those ubiquitous Jesus fish.  Please  disregard that I am a knuckle dragging idiot that just changed lanes in front of you without a turn signal or warning.  Jesus is on board with me and if I should cause an accident, He will want me to live because my kid is an honor student at Our Lady of Victory Catholic School.  I guess I am screwed, I have no bumper stickers, just a Texas license plate that reads, “Please Drive Sober.”

I just made a call out to a friend in Vegas to place my bet for the Broncos winning the Super Bowl this year.  The odds for Denver to win the big show are 55 to 1.  I figure it is a sure thing and a way to pay  my credit card bills about the time the Christmas bills hit my mailbox.  I do like and celebrate Christmas.  It is that time of year when ALL Christians act like they should throughout the year.

So happy holidays to you!  Yes, I say the generic greating…and NO President Obama does NOT call it a holiday tree instead of a Christmas tree.  Our President is a Christian and not a Muslim.  The idiotic thing circulating Facebook about him trying to abolish Christmas in America is well….actually not surprising.  The people who post the nonsense are the same people who re-elected Bush in 2004.  Jesus told them to vote for Bush …..they heard it directly from the pulpit at their church.

Jesus told me to write this blog today.  He was a wise beyond his years prophet when religious zealots staked him to the cross and killed him. I know if He is in the sky somewhere watching over us that he truly cares about football games and who wins the MTV video awards.  He hates gay people and loves people who drive Chevy Surburbans while texting.  He speaks directly to that preacher in Kansas and tells him to picket funerals.  And evidently watches some gridiron action on Sundays. He keeps an eye out for certain people who talk non-stop about their faith and broadcast it on their bodies and motor vehicles.

If Rick has his way, Tebow will add a sticker and place it right beside his Ichthys…..Perry 2012.

Ada was known for fresh-baked bread and her love of soap operas, Lawrence Welk, and Billy Graham; in that order.  Everyone called her grandmother, Ma Ada, Juju just called her Ma.  She lived by herself in a 900 sq foot, red house right off a major highway….with a perfect yard.  Most everyday she ate the bounty right out of her own garden, but every once in a while she would get a hankering for a cheeseburger.  Ma would call in her order to the local Dairy Queen, wait 10 minutes then walk the 30 paces to her backyard fence.  The DQ happened to be her backside neighbor you see. One of the kids working there would trot behind the restaurant and meet Ada with her lunch, she always  tipped exactly one dime.

Ramsey was a kid Juju’s age that lived across the street from Ma.  He had been her companion for about 4 years now…playing catch or hide and seek in and around Ma’s shed.  On that particular day they had been hiding and peering out a hole in the wall of the shed as they noticed Ma running around in circles.  It was an awkward and funny thing for Juju to see.   She stopped laughing when she noticed Ma was chasing a chicken.  She caught it, and wrung its neck in one swift movement. Juju had been just familiar enough with the condemned to have given it a name. She passed on the fried chicken served up an hour later when Juju’s mother finished sweeping up the front sidewalk and sat down with a glass of iced-tea.  The traumatized Ramsey had run back across the street to his house.  Juju sat down at the kitchen table and helped herself to a second roll with jelly this time.

Ma Ada had seven children and her daughter Jewel had duplicated the feat.  Ma was not a touchy or demonstrative person.  Juju never saw the two women show any emotional connection other than a quick hug when they departed. Nevertheless, it was obvious that Ada was Jewel’s touchstone.  They spoke on the phone everyday and Ada’s well-being was always at the forefront of Jewel’s mind.

As the Cadillac backed out of Ma’s driveway that day, Juju turned to Jewel and saw tears in her eyes.  They waived bye to Ada and drove west on Catalpa Drive. What is wrong, Juju asked…also tearing up.  What is wrong and why do I cry every time you do!!??  ”Well, Jewel said, “she is my mama and she is getting way up there in years.  Sometimes when I leave I think it might be the last time I see her, it makes me sad.  I know I should appreciate every minute I have with her.  Do you understand she is thirty years older than me?”

Jewel went on to explain that Juju cried too because she loves her mother and doesn’t like to see her upset.  Juju thought about what her mother was trying to teach her all the way home to Hurst.  The panic started to hit her when the car was turning onto Oak Street.  ”What’s wrong with you now?” asked Jewel.  You are FORTY years older than me Juju yelled!!  That means I will have ten years less with you than you get with Ma!!!

One day in 2001 Jewel came over to Juju’s house for dinner.  They went out to a nice restaurant for a steak and were joined by Juju’s partner, Linda.  Juju did not mow her mother’s yard every week.  Jewel had a very fancy riding lawn mower and took much pleasure “mowing my own damn yard!”  Juju did other things for her mother.  She had created one golden rule when she reached adulthood.  Her mother had provided for her in the beginning of her life and now it was time for Juju to pay.  For the rest of Jewel’s life, she never picked up a check when the two of them were out…NEVER.

The dinner was fine and the three women chatted a spell at Juju’s house before it was time for Jewel to depart.  Juju grabbed Jewel at the door and a hug lingered.  With no words spoken their eyes met…the mutual comparison to that long ago, 1971 day was evident by their shared, flushed faces.

Juju watched  as her mother turned, got into her car, and drove away.  She shut the door and sat down sobbing.  Linda walked over and offered a hug, wondering what was the matter??  Juju told her, my mother’s eighty, she’s getting up there…..every time I say goodbye could be the last time.  Juju was marking the moment in her mind, never to forget the tender exchange at the door.

Ma Ada lived to be ninety-three, Jewel very much wanted to match her mother, but came up short by ten years.  Juju came to believe the time element meant absolutely nothing.  It was being IN the moment, not the length of the moment.  Being truly in the moment kept it alive forever and perhaps that is what Jewel was trying to express in 1971.  Grab onto this moment, this person…never let go, because one day they won’t be here…but that memory surely will be.

Every time Juju smells fresh-baked bread she thinks of Ada.  And the smell of fresh-cut grass is like getting a squeeze from Jewel.  Juju has to chuckle when she envisions an eighty year old woman running in circles after a chicken….or another eighty year old woman driving a red lawn mower in circles like Mario Andretti…..full circles.

The most that Americans can rely on, even if they try to be healthy, is maybe about 88 years.  Unless you find a mass on your pancreas like Steve Jobs did and die at 56.  Your imagination can also abruptly end  if a lunatic steps out of the shadows and shoots you at 40.  Life sucks too.

This is an uplifting blog….I mean that, …I think.  Stick with me and don’t look up from your computer to continue watching Dancing With The Stars, that show…you guessed it…sucks.  You have to know by now that you subscribe to a middle-aged (again, doubtful) queer with depression, don’t you?? However, I am not Debbie Downer!!

I really am happy today.  I booked the caterer for my 50th birthday party extravaganza I am having on December 3rd of this year.  There is going to be a Beatles cover band to entertain too. I needed to have one last big hurrah while I am still spry and agile enough to make a fool (originally typed “full”…senior moment and I just ate a large sandwich) of myself on the dance floor.

I can’t take the fact that I am turning 50.  The only solace I have is that if I died today people would say I died way too early, at such a young age.  That makes me feel good.

I just launched a nationwide legal services company.  The thought of massive success has begun to depress me.  If I become insanely rich, I don’t have that many years left to enjoy the money!  I actually had a thought yesterday that I would be immensely more happy if the company fails!!

Welcome to my world.  I know you guys are out there.  Already dreading the day you get that AARP membership card in the mail.  Driving down the highway with Stairway to Heaven vibrating your car windows.  Ahh, the good “young” days.  I once spent an entire afternoon writing DOS commands for my new Apple IIc in 1981.   The purpose?  So when I turned it on, one sentence would flash on the black screen in green print.  ”Hello Julya!”  That was a good day.

I learned and read about the death of Steve Jobs this week on my iPad 2.  I also check court dockets, do all of my shopping, pay all of my bills, and play Chess with some guy in Australia on the darn thing.  All while I am listening to my Beatles catalog through those little white ear buds.

If I could accomplish all that Jobs did in his 56 years, I wouldn’t be bummed about not hitting the target 88.  I am sure he would have completed more projects and given the world more gadgets had he lived.  But I am also sure he would be satisfied with his successful life and loving family.  I am sure he had hundreds of perfect moments in his life.  It doesn’t always suck.

I wrote a couple of blogs ago about cutting and pasting the moments of perfection in your life.  This party is going to be one of my moments.  One of the moments that I can take with me, tuck in my pocket for my drift towards whatever.  There are no promises or guarantees, and that is okay with me.  I don’t jest when I say it sucks.  Because some people are here but a short while…and some don’t have the best of lives when they are here, upright and breathing.

Being 50 makes you want to scream at the passage of time and rejoice in the opportunities that lay before you.  So it is the true mid-line of your life, the life that streams through my mind.  It doesn’t matter if it is cut short, it really doesn’t.  And you really can’t live your life thinking about when it will end…you just gotta live!!  Wake up each day and live it as though it is your last, but knowing one day….hopefully in 38.2 years…. you will be right!!

For Steve.

• In a Wonderland they lie,
• Dreaming as the days go by,
• Dreaming as the summers die;
• Ever drifting down the stream
• Lingering in the golden gleam
• Life, what is it but a dream?

(poem excerpt by Lewis Carroll)

I start this blog with the lyrics from Paul McCartney’s “Let “Em In” song for a reason.  Even musical geniuses can have a miss every once in a while.   The funny part though is I still love that song.  It reminds me of a trip I took  with my mother one time in 1977.  Songs can transport us back to another place and time.   Hell, I have such vivid recollections of memories with musical accompaniment that they come with smells!  If you are a steady reader of my blog you should have noticed by now that the pieces have song titles sprinkled in them.  I will be at my office or in my car and a song will come on the radio and I will write a blog entry in about 5-10 minutes….in my head…then once I get in front of my computer the words just come spilling out.  It’s all in the song.

All of us remember the songs played at our weddings or the class song played at the senior prom.  But I think I have some measure of savant syndrome…my expertise being an uncanny memory where music plays in the background of every scene.  I saw a 60 Minute episode recently where they found 6 people in the U.S. that have absolute recall….meaning they remember every detail of every minute of their life…it was unbelievable.  One of the confirmed people with this ability is the actress, Mary Lou Henner.  She can tell you what shirt she was wearing on March 3, 1983, where she was, what she was eating, etc.  In no way I am saying that I have that gift.  I am simply saying that I have decided my personal history is better with a soundtrack and for some reason have chosen to remember every note.  I am not saying the songs would make my top 20, they just happen to be the mental imprints that came with the day….my neuro-synapses took the jump to their beat.

Pizza eating days of my 10th summer?  That’s easy….Seals and Croft are singing Summer Breeze….and it did make me feel fine.

Practicing with my volleyball team at Hurst Jr. High in 1976?  That would be “Right Back to Where we Started From.”  Maxine Nightingale.

Driving with a car load of friends from high school graduation to a party at my parents’ lake house?  ”Another One Bites the Dust”  Queen

Studying for law school final exam in 1996?  ”No Diggity”  Blackstreet with Dr. Dre.  I break into a sweat every time I hear this, even now 15 years later….it equals STRESS.

I also associate songs with people in my life.  I have never told anyone this before…confession right here.  The songs are not commentary on the person or their personality…or their place in my life.  For example, my spouse Linda is forever in my mind as one tune I heard in 2000 about the time I met her.  There is nothing I can do to change this….Linda is forever linked to this melody.  The song is “Yellow” by Coldplay.  I friggin hate Coldplay.

I am listening to my new vice at my office while I write this blog today…Spotify.  It is a music sharing site that I have on all day as I work.  I had it playing a random selection of some downloaded songs that I like.  This blog and this five minutes will forever be linked with….”I Can’t Stand the Rain.” by the fabulous Tina Turner.

I will end with a mean trick.  I am about to give you a “brain worm.”  You know, like the song you hear the first thing in the morning that is stuck in you all day…you find yourself humming it and you don’t even like it!??  Yeah, one of those……I am giving you a brain worm so that forevermore you will remember this blog as being associated with it.  Well, maybe not for forever….but I will settle until about 6pm tonight.  I will end where I began…

Someones knockin at the door
Somebodys ringin the bell
Someones knockin at the door
Somebodys ringin the bell
Do me a favor,
Open the door and let em in
Sister suzie, brother john,
Martin luther, phil and don,
Brother michael, auntie gin,
Open the door and let em in.

Someones knockin at the door
Somebodys ringin the bell
Someones knockin at the door
Somebodys ringin the bell

Do me a favor,
Open the door and let em in.

The house had the look of a grieving soul. It’s frame looking ready to collapse, burdened by some unseen weight. She looked out her front window and longed for ordinary. She prayed for her ordinary life to come back on a daily basis. She remembered rushing to go to the grocery store after work, the kiss at the back steps every evening. The smell of his neck as they embraced…she wanted to smell him again. Drowning in grief and self-pity, she wondered if this was the day it would all stop.

She had locked herself in a suburban prison for the last five years, hell-bent on a life sentence. She had created her own form of cosmic punishment for living, for breathing in and out every day. In her world food had no taste, flowers were devoid of color and sadness was a badge she wore on a dirty smock. Self-loathing was her hobby and she had become quite adept at it. She didn’t abuse drugs or alcohol, they would mask the sadness…she wanted to feel every particle of it. She wallowed in sadness and refused to allow anything or anyone to deny her. Sadness welcomed her to each new day and was lying beside her each night.

Like the rest of the world, she was stunned to see the second plane hit the tower. Anger flushed her face as she, like everyone else, surmised this was a planned terror attack on America. She watched TV non-stop most days, but even for her, leaving it on for three straight days was unusual. The pictures were what did it, the photographs stuck to every sign, telephone pole, and wall in New York. The faces of the lost met her gaze in the sad house. She heard her own voice come out of the survivors on the television. The desperation, the prayers, the tears flowed from them over loved ones that were never coming home. She ached for the people she did not know, she cried for America.

After a couple of days of being mesmerized at the television, she realized something. She had stopped wallowing in self-pity and was actually thinking of others. Her hands started to shake as she began to think about leaving the house. She would drive as far as they would allow her, and then set out on foot. She didn’t know what she would do, hand out water, pick up trash, it didn’t matter. She had to get down there and lend a hand to help the people of New York.

Pulling out of the drive-way she looked at the front of the house and slammed on the brakes, exited the car, and ran back inside.  She unfurled the flag and placed it in the holder mounted on her porch. The stars and stripes flapped sharply in the September air. She trotted back to her car and took off towards the city. The man walked by and looked at the house with the flag out front; she passed him in her car. The two of them exchanged waves and knowing smiles. Nothing was ever the same again after that.

My OCD makes me obsess in the small things in my life, but I am convinced that the perfect moments are life itself, the true meaning of life. They are why we have evolved to be here in the first place.  Religious people will tend to think that the moments I am talking about are devine moments, moments of true inspiration.  The word “inspiration” has several different meanings, but the breath of a divine being…the intensity and purity of a moment is one way to perceive this unit of time I am writing about today.  I tend to regard the moment or moments as our reward for fighting through what can most certainly be a tough existence on this earth.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not getting all mystical on your ass, nor have I started to watch Joel Osteen on Sunday mornings.  I just want to express that I have these moments tucked in my jean pocket and I rely on them when times are hard. These short, cerebral films are touchstones for me, snippets of happiness, sometimes sadness, but perfectly edited.  Sadness you say?  Yes, sadness and sad memories can reach perfection as well.  When we are sad or devastated at some point in our lives, the level of sadness equals the level of loss.  For example when I am feeling sad over the loss of a loved one, what follows are moments of perfection that I shared with that person.  The bitter is always followed by the sweet.

One movie I have on my DVR is , Home for the Holidays, directed by Jodie Foster and starring Holly Hunter.  A grown woman goes home for Thanksgiving. The movie shows her dealing with real middle-aged problems as she comes face to face with her dysfunctional family for a holiday weekend.  I have watched the movie about 12 times because of two reasons.  First off, it shows me that there are other families as screwed up as the one I am in.  And secondly, it shows a scene about a perfect moment at the end of the film.

The great character actor Charles Durning plays the patriarch.  Toward the end of the film he is shown watching old 8mm films of his kids in the basement of his house.  The Holly Hunter character joins him for a talk and he tells her of one of his pieces of perfection that he keeps in his own pocket of memories.  Durning tells the story of working at the airport and one afternoon in the 60s his wife brought his 3 kids out to see where he worked.  He stood close to the tarmac with his kids and watched as a jet took off, rumbling over the family.  The father remembered holding tight to his kids, the squeeze of a hand, the exchange of excitement and love.  Raising 3 kids, now drastically different adults, those few moments he had held onto as tightly as the small child’s hand had grasped his so long ago.  Sixty seconds he guessed….approximately 30 years ago…the perfection sustained, the smile eases across his face.

As we get older we tend to pull these moments up more often, with time we increase the need because as we know, all is not perfect in this world.  I write this today knowing in my heart that my best moments are in front of me, not behind me.  I believe that the best day of my life has not occurred yet.  How wonderful a belief that is to me, because my history has some mighty fine moments!

I will leave you with this today.  If you don’t think you have enough of these mental vacations in your vault….look again.  They are not all births of children, marriages, or parachute jumps.  One of my moments came in May of 1981 in Oklahoma City of all places.  I was 18 years old and working for my softball coach in a summer job.  He owned a cookie company and I was driving a large van to OKC to deliver a load of chocolate chip cookies.  After the first week of working for the company, I never wanted to eat another cookie again…I think I broke their record!

The smell of the cookies was nice though and it was wafting to the front cab of this van.  I was driving down the road and I remember the song “Make Me Smile” by Chicago came on the radio.  I rolled down the window and the temperature was a perfect 75 degrees, cool for May I thought.  I felt like an adult in that moment doing something very adult-like.  I was making my own money and in college.  I had traveled to another state for the first time alone.  I was my own person for the first time, you know what I mean?  Sounds silly, but that cookie delivery was a benchmark for me….that moment was about 3 minutes of greatness.  3 minutes described 30 years later…..must have been friggin awesome.  It was……perfection.

Go ahead, sweat the small stuff….and file the good.  Your life is a motion picture and you are the editor.  Cut and paste at will, do whatever it takes to get through this…enjoy the scenes.

Juju and the woman simultaneously looked at the car next to the Cadillac, a tan Chevy Impala.  A teary eyed child had her face pressed against the window, her yelps silenced by the separation of glass.  The woman’s faced reddened and she made a hasty exit, switched cars and drove off.  Juju’s mother exited the building and now was seated inside the car looking for her keys in her purse.  Juju stated, “you know there was another mommy in here while you were gone.”  Oh yeah, her mother asked…where is she now?  ”She drove off with the other kid.  I am the right kid for you.”  Yes you are dear, now we have to go to Piggly Wigglys for some grocery shopping.

Grocery shopping was pretty fun stuff Juju thought.  She liked the cereal aisle and all the stuff at the ends of each aisle tended to be good too.  Juju’s goal today was to get her mother to buy a boxed Chef Boy-ar-dee Pizza mix, in addition to the obligatory two boxes of fish sticks she required a week.  Juju had made the brave decision to insert this particular boxed pizza into her daily diet of fish sticks for one reason.  Chef Boy-ar-dee had his picture on the box and he looked surprisingly similar to her dad.

Juju wondered if all chefs looked like her dad?  This guy had the same hat, mustache and handkerchief around his neck.  Plus the pizza was plain cheese, Juju’s favorite.  She didn’t like cheese on a sandwich or hamburger, but on pizza is was just right.  It was made with just the red sauce and sprinkles of fake cheese, the absolute best fake cheese though, for sure!  Juju thought her mother would be happy too, she was willing to try real Italian food.

With a minimal amount of negotiation, (Juju was child number seven), the boxed pizza was securely in the basket beside the two green boxes of Mrs. Paul’s fish sticks.  Juju had been eating nothing but the cylindrical white fish for the first several months of first grade. Juju’s mother had informed her that she would have to eat one piece a fruit a day for the entire week and then on Friday night she would help her make the pizza.  Deal!

Juju wandered up and down the aisles for a while, then met her mother at the check out line.  Something for the road was secreted in the front pocket of her blue shorts.  She had to lift up her skirt to get to her shorts underneath, but didn’t think anyone had seen her.  The shorts were required at Harrison Lane Elementary because boys and girls had P.E. together.  Juju heard the teachers talking that maybe the next year they and the female students might be allowed to wear pants!  Juju thought 2nd grade was going to be much better because of that one possibility!

The groceries were placed in the backseat and Juju and her mother took their places once again in the car.  The right mommy this time Juju chuckled.  Her mother, still not knowing what she was talking about, looked over to see Juju unwrapping something.  Juju was nonchalantly unwrapping one Brach’s Neopolitan candy with four more on her lap.  What on earth do you think you are doing!!  I didn’t pay for any candy Juju!  ”But this candy is not in a box, everybody takes a piece, it’s free,” said Juju.  It is most certainly not free Juju.  You march your butt right back in the Piggly and give it back.  Be sure and say you are sorry!

Juju begrudgingly exited the Cadillac and walked back into the Piggly. carefully re-wrapping the piece she almost had in her mouth.  She walked up to the young bag boy in the starched white shirt and black bow-tie.  She handed him the candy and confessed her theft.  ”I took this candy and didn’t pay for it. Will you accept my sorry?”  Yeah kid, it’s okay, said the pimply sixteen year-old, who himself probably ate 10 pieces of Brach’s a shift.

Juju’s mother spoke to her about shoplifting on the way home and said that people actually went to jail for it.  Juju was happy her mother had helped her stay out from behind bars, but still had a hankering for some candy.  As the car pulled into their drive-way on Oak Street, Juju’s mother patted her on the shoulder.  Remember you still have pizza for Friday, we can eat it and watch The Partridge Family.    That put the smile back on Juju’s face, Friday was nine fish sticks away!

Boy, what a day, the wrong mother had almost taken her and then the police could have thrown her in jail.  She wondered if Natalie’s mom would have let her keep the candy?  She had seen her mother eat grapes in the produce section before, she would go for those next time.  Wow, Juju did have the right mom after all.

It’s like that old adage, walk a mile in my shoes.  Look at this life through my eyes, I won’t make you stick your feet in my Nike….you thought I was going to say Birkenstocks, didn’t you?

Congress could benefit from changing perspective, if not for just a few moments.  I watched the NBC special last night on a day in the life on the Hill and it disgusted me.  The personality types that run for office and who wind up sitting in those prestigious offices are sorely inadequate to govern the greatest nation on earth.  That is the main problem.

They could learn a thing or two by looking at different perspectives and not just standing firm in their stance on the debt ceiling.  They always come to a solution at the last-minute that makes no one happy.

Republic. That form of government in which the powers of sovereignty are vested in the people and are exercised by the people, either directly, or through representatives chosen by the people, to whom those powers are specially delegated. NOTE: The word “people” may be either plural or singular. In a republic the group only has advisory powers; the sovereign individual is free to reject the majority group-think.

Democracy. That form of government in which the sovereign power resides in and is exercised by the whole body of free citizens directly or indirectly through a system of representation, as distinguished from a monarchy, aristocracy, or oligarchy. [NOTE: In a pure democracy, 51% beats 49%. In other words, the minority has no rights. The minority only has those privileges granted by the dictatorship of the majority.]

Newsflash people….the United States of America is a Republic.  I wake up everyday very happy about that fact.  I have blogged before today that we would be in trouble if we were a true Democracy.  Oh, it’s fine and dandy if you are in the majority on an issue, but my friends it is a bitch if you are not.

The men and women on Capital Hill are reminded every day that they are representative of the people in our fine republic.  They choose to ignore it by acting like petulant children.  Is this what we want the rest of the world to see as “us”…is it??  The current members of Congress are embarrassments, with few exceptions.  Idiocy comes in all forms, Republicans, Democrats and Tea-Baggers.

There are 22 registered lobbyists for every member of Congress.  Behind every lobbyist there is a company or group…and behind that company or group is money….lots of money.  That money is buying perspective.  That money is not allowing people to jump out of their shoes and to take a hike in mine or yours…it comes down to that.  Money makes the world go round…money corrupts, money discriminates, money kills spirit and people.

Brian Williams said it last night and it is true, the system is broken. In fact, he said it about 12 times.  A republic is a beautiful thing…but you have to elect people who know the meaning of perspective and agree to open their heart and mind to others….to not be swayed by the dollar.

Remember….representatives chosen by the people, to whom those powers are specially delegated.  By the PEOPLE, for the PEOPLE….the people on the Hill are not for me.  Are they for you?  I looked at it from their perspective today…I did try my best.  They get paid five times what our field soldiers in combat get paid.  They wear $1000.00 suits and their shoes are made of Italian leather.  I tried people…I saw their perspective and it sickened me.  The shoe just didn’t fit.