Natural Selection

Contrary to my teachers, I paid attention in school.  They thought I was busy doodling or daydreaming most of the time but, they were clearly wrong.

In fact, I’d like to use the following logical deduction to make several critical points.

Charles Darwin deftly produced Darwin’s Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection, in 1859.  This theory states, according to the NDSU.edu website, “Phenotypic variation exists among individuals and the variation is heritable. Those individuals with heritable traits better suited to the environment will survive.”

For New Jerseyites, this is the part of school that told us why giraffes have long necks, and frogs can live on both land and in the water.

Darwin believed that creatures adapted to their environment in order to survive.  Prey became faster, by growing long legs, to outrun their predators.  Other critters grew long necks to better find edible vegetation, and other animals developed spines in order to fend off hungry cousins.

Simply put, they adapted.  Unfortunately, those traits much-needed to survive developed over time.  A long, long time.  Usually, that time stretched over several generations of not being able to outrun the next meal.

And, according to Darwin, these animals gave their lives for “the cause.”  They somehow adapted by growing bigger, stronger haunches or longer legs or metal plates or even glands to produce a noxious odor, all in the name of survival.

This is where the term “survival of the fittest” was coined.  Only the fittest of each species evolved and survived.

I don’t believe a word of that drivel since the very creatures necessary to develop and pass-on the new needed altered gene usually wound up as lunch.  Hence, the new gene was never passed on anywhere except the diner’s colon.

Still, Darwin and his supporters won out in the secular battle to teach evolution versus Creationism, in school.  Creationism is the belief that God made man and all other creatures.  A big legal battle ensued over “intelligent design” which incorporated Darwin’s ideas, all in the name of proven science.  Too bad none of what Darwin spouted was based in science.  Amen.

That being said, my sainted wife rudely interrupted my Washington Nationals game to inform me she was unable to reach the Hamburger Helper on the top shelf of the kitchen cabinet.

Recalling my scholastic times doodling – er, uh – studying hard, I proudly challenged her to grow about eight inches in height, and extend her arms another three inches.  In which case, my sainted wife would be able to handily reach the much-desired Hamburger Helper, and then some.

As soon as the daggers in her eyes ceased flying, she announced that without the Hamburger Helper for dinner, I would starve to death.  With my stomach growling and gurgling, I neatly reached the top Hamburger Helper on the top shelf of the cabinet.

She was right and Darwin was wrong.  And I was fed. So much for science.

No More Heroes

As a child I didn’t get an allowance as many of my buddies did because my parents weren’t affluent but, I began earning money early in life from mowing lawns and shoveling snow.  My income was meager however, as they say, it paid the bills.

The bills I’m talking about included school supplies in the form of pencils, pens, paper, notebooks, and milk for lunch.  Milk was 3¢ a carton; chocolate milk was 4¢.

Seems pretty inexpensive however, I was making 50¢ an hour, under the table.

And every so often I found some soft drink bottles carelessly tossed onto neighborhood yards.  I redeemed them at the corner store.  Pint bottles brought 2¢, while quarts fetched a handsome 5¢.  These bonuses were what fed my habit of comic books.

When I had time, I helped Superman fight criminals with his super human abilities.  I knew full well he couldn’t really fly or leap tall buildings.  I also had a tough time trying to figure out why he so enjoyed the company of Lois Lane.

Lois was a colleague of Clark Kent, Superman’s disguise.  He would dash behind a hidden space with a business suit and hat only to emerge as Superman replete with cape but, no glasses.

That quick change transformed Clark so much so that he fooled everyone in town.  Maybe the whole city was just plain stupid.

But the comic book version of Superman was so much more entertaining than the television version.  And, it was in color.  We only had black and white televisions to watch which made theater-of-the-mind important.

Still, Superman was one of the comics I regularly reached for with my pocket full of precious change.  Batman was another hero of mine. And again, this guy and his ward, Robin, fooled all of Gotham City.  Their voices were never a giveaway.  Another metropolitan area full of mind-altering drugs, I guess.

Fast-forward to modern times and too much of these characters have changed, and not for the better.

Superman and Batman both left me and my child-like fantasies of good vs. evil, some years ago.  One controversial story line had these two fictional heroes somehow corrupted and doing battle with one another.

Then, the Batman series of movies, and the Superman television series, and associated spinoffs, have totally bastardized the fantasy of these super-characters to the point of no return.  They are no longer heroes, and the line between good and evil has vanished.

The writers seem to have used these franchises as personal playgrounds for their own satisfaction to destroy comic books figures kids looked up to.  In fact, just last week I discovered that according to the New York Post, “Marvel Comics plans to take “disciplinary action” against an artist who slipped political propaganda into a comic book. The comic book giant has been under fire since it was revealed that Indonesian artist Ardian Syaf used Islamist and anti-Semitic verses in the series released on Wednesday, “X-Men Gold #1.” Fans started to point out the hidden messages on social media, prompting Marvel to announce recently that it would pull some of the images, according to Time.

Today, America has little in the way of escapism and it needs some conduit to encourage the youth to want a virtuous side on which to stand.  Indeed, today’s youth have no real heroes, and they seem to fall for anything.

College students love terrorists over President Donald Trump, and they detest America’s police and military in favor of criminals and anarchists.

I’m glad I could experience the comic book characters in their true glory of good and evil where a distinct line could be drawn.  Alas, the good old days.

Go Forth to Serve

As usual, my invitation to appear as a commencement speaker was lost-in-the-mail.  Mail service on The Eastern Shore is tenuous, at best.  But, I digress.

As a high school and college graduate, I still recall my two commencement speeches, along with the speakers themselves.  They were motivational, but not stirring.  As usual, they contained pretty useless information about traipsing out into the world to help others.  Rah.

These were the same type of lectures offered at church.  Amen.

In any case, I am offering this essay to assist those intellectual and emotional sponges who would rather receive the truth about the tomorrow, instead of some secular fluff.

It is an honor to stand before you today as your humble tour guide to your future in the real world.  Many of you pity me as an old guy who needs to be taken back to “the home,” while the astute among you see me as a wise sage.  Both views are correct.

Decades ago I sat right where you are now sitting.  I too went through all the trials and tribulations of trigonometry, physics, and English term papers, as well as discovering my sexuality, time management skills, and social development abilities.

I also dabbled with alcohol, cigarettes, and drugs, satisfying my curiosity with all.

But all of this taught me that not only did I have before me a heaping plate of unfamiliar topics and vices, I also had a wide variety of choices to take.  And I had to choose wisely.

Some of my then-cohorts didn’t select their options well, and are still suffering from those poor decisions.

To be precise, some of the big men on campus – otherwise known as BMOCs – have been stuck in 1974 for decades with dead end jobs, failed marriages, and non-existent retirement plans.  Still, they ran 30-yards for a touchdown one Saturday afternoon.  Rah.

Their receding hairlines, stomach paunches, and rusty Ford Mavericks, are still in fashion in their own little worlds.

Now I didn’t fare much better in life.  But is did learn how to manage my school and work time, earned monies, and brief recreation moments.

I suppose the best way to keep this speech both brief and poignant is to sum everything up in the next few sentences.

I’m not trying to lecture you about doing what is right, or ensuring your community is fulfilled by your efforts, or your efforts will keep the planet spinning. 

I am merely trying to tell you that at your age you know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad.

None of you are pioneers in the arena of temptations, physical and mental changes, and grueling course schedules.  You are novices when your time to find jobs, work with others, be employed by a company whose goal is to turn a profit, and follow established rules, finally arrives.  And that day is nigh.

God gave you two ears and one mouth, so that you can listen twice as much as you talk, according to Judge Judy.  She is right.

If you need questions answered, ask your elders; they likely know the answer, and they will give you the unvarnished truth.

Lastly, if you feel the need to protest something – anything – do it after you have a job, and do it peacefully.  If you don’t have a job, you have no dog in most fights; if you protest peacefully, you exude maturity.  That’s important.

To that end, I wish you well.  I also encourage you to think about the consequences of your actions, or lack thereof.  The choice is yours.

Godspeed.  I’ll be at “the home,” if you need me.

Whiners

A few trying years ago I wrote about protests occurring throughout the country in support of blatant lies concerning the Black Lives Matter movement.

Weak-minded individuals of all colors decided it was time to band together in an effort to garner support for so many perceived injustices, including an effort to obey laws.

We are now in an era when nearly everyone in America is easily offended or has some sort of gripe with the powers-that-be.  To right these half-baked claims, people of all ages, races, and sexes have made it a point to let the whole world know how they feel.

Be it about a fair election, land-grabbing government agencies, political greed, or simply creating a personal time-filler, child-like protesters are filling the streets and airwaves of America with their garbage.

It used to be the chants were somewhat recognizable with “Hey, hey, ho, ho, fill-in-the-blank has got to go.”  It mattered not if it was Richard Nixon, George Bush, some religious figure, or any protector of fetus’ lives, the message was the same.

Anyone with whom the protesters disagreed must be shouted down and invalidated.

This hot mess of a display of intolerance has become quite a joke with the protestees actually laughing and regaling at these easily offended whiners.  They are being ignored more and more.  And more and more, the protesters are becoming violent to make their nebulous points.

Acting as the spoiled children they are, they are now resorting to assault and battery on the pacifists.

During the 1960’s, blacks protested for many reasons, some of which were valid.  Some of those protests turned violent to the point where people were maimed and killed for no apparent reason other than to make a point during manufactured riots.

The genuine nonsense in all those riots was that to punctuate their points of anger by burning their own homes, stores, and businesses.

That sort of behavior made no sense then and makes no sense now.  You see, throwing cinder blocks through a bank window, torching police cars, and shouting down innocent speakers at various forums, are mindless and childish ways to make a point.

These modern protestors are playing clowns as they have now resorted to spraying mace into the faces of common citizens to get attention.

Depraved, is the best way to describe today’s privileged know-it-alls.  And, because they are so insignificant, they need to cause trouble to get that desired attention.

But fear not, they’ll go away if they are ignored.  I promise.

The Back of the Truck

Since I regularly read newspapers, I am rarely without controversial material.  And, I have noticed recently that everything old is new.

Milk delivery is something millennials just discovered; returning empty bottles to stores for a deposit seems novel; living in small, austere houses is frugal; and brewing your own coffee at home appears original.

But today I was stunned to read a lengthy article about something called EQ.  Emotional intelligence, just like life’s intelligence, has morphed into “emotional quotient’ rather than intelligence quotient is designated as IQ.

EQ appears to be another touchy-feely bi-product of some ersatz science dished out in institutions called colleges and universities.

This article was fascinating since it delved into deeply harnessing EQ to use to your advantage in your workplace.

If you’re like me, you are retired and could care less about anything or anyone not connected to the place I buy my lottery tickets and liquor.

So it was with great interest that I followed this serpentine path to nowhere when it posed questions entitled “learning about yourself from others,” “learning from your criticism,” and “not being afraid to apologize.”

I worked for over four decades of my life, and most of those jobs were relatable to my one temporary job as a garbage man.  Yes, I was a garbage man to help pay for my college education; it did.

Not me

My garbage man job serves as a barometer by which my other jobs are based.  I held a variety of jobs which held very few slots called positions.  As a garbage man I had a choice of three slots – pulling full cans from the backyards to the curb, putting empty cans back into the yards from the curb, and tossing those full cans into the back of the truck.

And during those three glorious years, I rarely thought I didn’t want to go to work.  I also never once thought about learning from my criticism, being afraid to apologize, or learning about myself from others.

My other jobs included varying blue collar trade work, teaching, and white collar office employment.

And, in not one other of those arduous career steppingstones did I ever lie awake at night thinking about my feelings, and the feelings of others.

My fellow employees were adults and, as a result, I treated them as such.  And when one of them stepped on one of those EQ no-nos, they were treated as adults and told not to do stupid workplace disrupting stuff again.  Period.

So to say this EQ stuff is nonsense would be a gross understatement.  All these easily-offended clowns need to get their professional lives in order, is a week tossing cans into the back of the truck.  I’m just saying.