Ramblings

Be it ever so humble. It’s good to be home, but it was a great week. I left before daylight last Wednesday and drove cross country to get from my house to I 85 North. I had to meet my daughters assistant at a restaurant along the way to pick up a dog and two cats to carry to NC and PA. My step-daughter, Dr. Amber, is a vet and is TOTALLY dedicated to dogs and cats (and animals in general.) She has been since she was old enough to get into the woods. Sweet tea’s house, both before we married and constantly since, has had dogs, cats, snakes, rats, ferrets, iguanas, birds and homeless boyfriends.

Someone ask on my last blog to tell stories about animal rescue. I don’t rescue animals. I eat animals. My daughter rescues animals. She is so dedicated to dogs and cats that she was Humanitarian of the Year and FSU in Tallassee during college. This is when she found her calling to work with shelters and rescue organizations in making sure animals have a better life. She feels the same way about having kids as I feel about animals. She thinks they would be good to eat, too. It’s not her fault – I blame her real dad (another story.)

But she is so dedicated that she started a non-profit mobile spay and neuter clinic and goes all over GA doing low cost surgery for people who usually will not go to their neighborhood vet. She works through rescue organizations, pet stores and other organizations providing community services. So I help her out sometime by delivering rescued animals to different parts of the country. Enough of this!

I left Charlotte going up I 77 to I 81 through VA, WV, and PA before turning off in Allentown heading toward NJ. It took about 14 hours because of the stops to drop off the animals. But the drive was beautiful. The NC and VA mountains and vistas were some of the prettiest scenery I have seen in years (next to Sweet Tea, of course.) When I travel by car I ALWAYS take a few audio tapes with me to while away the time. However, this time I missed the first hour of the first tape after I realized I had left my camera at home. So the first hours I was saying over the tape, “damn, damn, damn…” Then my throat became sore so I stopped for a cup of coffee (no kin) and I felt better.

New Jersey is one of my favorite States. The two this I hate about the place is that when you cross the boarder in to the State you need to put on a kidney belt because the roads are so rough (PA, too.) And the other is that it is a bastion of Godless heathens and Democrats (they are sometimes interchangeable.) But it is a beautiful State. Unlike GA, the place is full of hard wood trees. Even in the most densely populated areas there are deer feeding in neighborhoods and company grounds. This time of year there are reds, yellows and browns of the fall colors all over the place. Blowing on the roads as cars go by (oh yeah! I hate the semi’s there) and making the place look like Walt Disney threw up there.

While there Sweet Tea and I got a chance to go to Gettysburg, and, to a Southern Boy who loves history, I was in hog haven. We took the tour and one of the markers was of the Georgia Infantry. It wasn’t a great monument. It looks like a 20’ high Washington Monument with a flat top haircut. In a simple and stately fashion it bears the GA state seal. But the inscription is a poignant remembrance of the dead sons:
“We sleep here in obedience to law
When duty called, we came
When country called, we died.”

I brought me to teas. This is how I feel about our guys today. They are my new heroes and deserve all the respect, support and love we can give them. They are not serving because they were drafted. They volunteered to give up family, friends and a comfortable way of life to go into harms way, or just to serve at some outpost or raging sea somewhere in the world. God bless the all.

I am rambling. Sorry!