Personal theme song these days, 

     La Bambaleo as mixed by DJ Chico and recorded on LATIN HOUSE Viva Latino ☕  😅

  Similar beat was booming long ago in a Holston Heights learning the hard way about love and loss.  

  The sound of two dueling buzz saws awoke a sleeping, lazy, hiding "crowd" in the early afternoon.  Waitress tips had bought sticks of lumber to erect some privacy walls.  In theory--privacy, non-attached partitions, would help the whole neighborhood sleep better since some of the neighbors could not un-divide themselves from each other locked into only fighting. 

  Snooty poets in turbans and flowy sun-clothing shook-crooked necks with heads ready, bring it.  The day.  

  Children of different families roamed and ran in a park near the library.  "You wouldn't have to hide out if you would just click, get your W2's or whatevah." 

  "Really?" The man pretended dumb face.  "You a Fed now?" 

  Eyes at ground, not daring to look into the face of another's love.  "Hardly.  Just know what I hear about people.  Less trouble to just do the tax thing." 

  "How you know I made money?" 

  "Duh.  Everybody seen you working all summer." 

  "It's not summer now." 

  "Naw man, taxes are from last year's wages." Another man who'd picked up two girl children from the table area stepped in as man-to-man FYI.  "Loretta does all that paperwork 'round here." 

  Hammering sounds filled the stale air hanging over the street.  Little people eyes looking across the street out of windows.  Two with a fixed up wagon of water to drink.  "Polenta snacks cost ONE DOLLAR." 

  "EACH." 

  "Oh my God.  What are you all doing in there?" An Indian woman asked at the stretch limo's cracked open but tinted window.  "They mustah bailed on the struggle," a young black woman decided, stated, and squinched her lips up towards her nose.  A back window was electronically lowered and five or six mentors waved.  Some did not smile, but one sneered.  "We paid for gas.  It's her husband's," one pointed to the front passenger seat.  "Mrs. T, Mrs.T," a very young boy called out as he came toward the vehicle, "Can we come too?" 

  One mentor got out to stretch legs.  Leaving a door open.  Into a neat and orderly scene of church lady clothes and perfume went three of the youngest children. 

  "Time for a smoke?" A young writer asked the tall woman with a lot of white and graying hair who'd gotten out.  "Just stretching my legs, but I don't mind if you do since you do." 

  "You heard I didn't quit?" 

  "We've been sitting over there for a good half an hour." 

  "Where are you all going?" 

  "To the car wash." 

  "Why so dressed up?" 

  "My typical way of dressing." 

  "Can I tempt you?" Offering a cigarette.  She shook her head no.  "Sucked up a lot of oil fumes over there." 

  Silence.  Then she said, "Out here in the world,

  "Yeah? 

  "I want you to let them be the avant garde." 

  "Who?" 

  "Whoever they are." 

  "I gotta think about that." 

  More kids got into the limo.  "Want to just take a walk?" 

  "Not strong enough yet.  But I will be." 

  "I believe you." 

  "I'll keep in touch." 

  "Okay." 

"Flipping out" because

  it takes an enormous amount of energy to survive.  Especially to survive something precious like a decent nation or the next generation.  It takes ingenuity and a 24/7 caring or tending to. 

  Whenever we are pressed to deal with "bad" and "evil" we are also in danger of sliding into the same category of madness.  

  Despite accidents and unclear situation the United States military has historically upheld itself as different than a brute force.  Better than just joining a rally to obliterate.  But that takes the effort of more than only the military itself. 

  And that's why wartimes also bring a sharpening of how we function as a fort as well.  Where we don't party like it's 1999.  And we respect each other's rights and responsibilities.  

  Lead ups to war stance always bring these issues up for the whole. 

Dumb reporting.

  That was what our in-the-field "report cards" said a time or two, before experiencing the stakes of war and the costs of "truth".  I think we'd used the opportunity to complain, or, in our exuberance tried to alert people to "the fears here".  Like everybody wasn't aware of fears taking the stage next to everyday reality. 

  When we were lucky there were professionals in other fields cautioning...yeah, we know.  And blurting out about a confusion of the people upholding the Country isn't going to earn anyone a paycheck.  Our colleagues would disown us, somewhat disgusted that they'd been naìve once too.  "Like, duh, as hostages of systems boarding a plane, uh, we don't know WHY there aren't very many workers today."  Our lips kept bubbling but, buts and do you know what this means?! 

  The most poignant moments would come with parents and mentors, and pass in the tumble of that war that was Overseas, that's here now.  In sentiment surely, and if we don't pull ourselves into secure, in action as well.

"Why so many curtains?" The very obese

  person called from a lake dock that had been removed to land.  Very frustrated people trying not to blow a fuse blew out breaths, sighed, and made other visible signs of this is unbelievable.  

  "NO PLACE TO GO SO I GUESS I'LL JUST SHIT RIGHT HERE," 

  "YOU, you LANGUAGE.  MIND YOUR LANGUAGE." 

  "Shove it up your bucket!" 

  "I'll tell you what I'm gonna do with this bucket." 

  "There are more pods under here somewhere," a Reservist looked at the hand drawn map. 

  "Is this the end of the world?" An autistic child asked a social-worker-for-the-day.  To a background of sure hope so's and our ship has come in the social worker gathered the charges around the proverbial "obstinate obese" person who was unburying self from the pile of camping gear put around.  This had been covered in trash bags for the clean up day portion of the day.  "It is probably not," the social worker said, "Because it says here to make sure everybody gets the right snack at the right time.  So let's figure that out!" 

  Not much enthusiasm. 

  "The obese person LIED." One person announced.  And held up a NAME CARD on a piece of yarn.  "I DID NOT." 

  "What kind of snacks do you like?" And to the skinny obese person: Check out these charts the parents and guardians made. 

  "Just so you know all the roads in this area are loops, so, not telling you what to do, but, if we all get 'lost' we could all meet at a stop along the way." 

  "How would we do that if we're lost?" 

  "Just sayin'." 

  "Just remember the season is just beginning." 

  "Yeah, we'll get a rhythm going.  Right?" 

  "Absolutely.  And by getting word from the different teams on team, we won't or shouldn't have to rush." 

  "Did you know how many injuries happened the other night in that raid or whatever it was?!" 

  "All treated." 

  A whistle blew and people in running wear filed out of a van.  Started streching and adjusting outfits, topping off hydration bottles and bags.  Some started away from the van in a walk.  One seemed to be smacking himself to get his blood flow awake.  Then he bolted into a run and ran right into a vehicle creeping up.  "Watch where you're going!" The driver yelled. 

  The people in that big old car parked.  And took their time getting out picnic things.  A younger couple helped two elderly couples to the picnic.

  "Did you know that none of us can join or not join?" A trim bouncing from one foot to the other woman asked the social group.  "Join what?" A beaming smile boy asked her.  She clicked on a walkman and turned and lightly jogged away. 

  "What was that about?" the social worker asked the skinny obese person.  That person had pocketed all the individual files into a binder covered with stickers that boasted stuff like, WNC STRONG and Keepin' the Faith.  Little tree frog stickers were perched on the sayings. 

  "Um, shortlong...Overseas war so, even people midstream in careers and stuff are kind of on hold." 

  "Oh." 

  "And, there's a fahruckus in the Psych Depts." 

  "Really?" One moved closer to another.  "Why?" 

  "Longshort?"  One asked.  The other nodded.  "Apparently, something or someone busted down too many walls.  And very few people who shrink heads have studied this new element of distinctions between cats of people like sociopaths and murderers and people whose duty it is to defend." 

  "Whoa.  That's fascinating.  My brain can just picture all the chaos." They both divvied up highlighters and crayon pencils between two holders.  "Ya know, that's what I heard the curtains are for." 

  People finishing snacks brought wrappers and wrappings and bags to the garbage bag. 

  "Distinctions?" 

  "One professor who works in classroom and outdoors wants to set up some sort of nature walk where people choose which direction they want to go in at such and such a point.  Help filter the learners into directions." 

  "Really?!  That sounds supercool.  Hopefully I won't be on shift." 

  "Set schedule yet?" 

  "No.  Too much crimefighting for some of the others still." 

  "I might have a spot for flyers back in town.  FYI." 

  "Awesome." 

Today's

  American Public Media's On Point may just be some of the most important critical thinking on fluid situation that we've heard yet regarding Rules of Engagement (ROE) and laws about war. 

  Really excellent conversation. 

  It reminds that we need to have full faith and confidence in our military.  And the complexities of civil/military engagement are why there's "ugly talk" and abrupt disengagement at ill-timed questions and endangering outward-facing communications. 

  As we went into the Gulf War we often pretended "curtains" between all people; switched hats a lot; and emphasized lifelong learning.  War brings ongoing tensions to a head between friends and enemies.  Taking on the responsibility of learning is both guard rails and respect.  It is, the world over, a way to build bridges and defense.  And it helps define boundaries which is core to all fighting and healing. 

  In total war boundaries get tromped on and dragged around, stolen, and manipulated so the better a citizenry can join forces and establish common ground about that concept the better chance of everyone's survival.

It was routine.

  A hand from the passenger side reached over and put the blinker on.  "But 

  "I lost one." 

  Felt like the car turned itself into the next possible turn indicated by the blinker. 

  "You lost an airplane?" 

  Pulling over as a flood of tears came like a tsunami.  Car off.  Hyperventilating.  Paper bag breathing. 

  "An Airman." 

  "I'll call one of my mentors whose not wrapped up in hot." 

  A blurry faced nod and sssshhhh's keep breathing. 

  Ring, ring, ring, ring, ri..."Good morning." 

  "I need to speak to," passenger grabbing for phone and a dodge, blurt of who.  "I'll get her.  Here she is." 

  "Good morning?" 

  "No one told us what to do in a relay routine for sig, uh, communicators if one in the action is lost." 

  "Putting us all on speaker." 

  "Here.  Drink your tea love.  It's cool enough now." 

  "They're going to help us." 

"YOU MAKE SENSE OF ME"

  "Okay." 

  "I've had ten different commanders in as many days." 

  "Okay." 

  "They want to know, need to know, exactly what program?" 

  "There are no exactlies right now." 

  "Like in this moment?" 

  "Can you just..." 

  "What's the matter with the person?" 

  A stuffed with gauze nose voice blared speaking for self, "Sommody mroke mymose." The gauze came out with a stream of blood. 

  A fully dressed EMS swiped open the canvas tent flap and hands quit trying to tie it open and dove to the injury.  "I need a recorder," the EMT shouted.  The person with the broken nose started squirming and blaring from chest moooo, moooo. 

  "Where we heading first?" An Overlander asked an assymetrical "team".  "We'll have to split up very soon." People passed an agenda around.  Memorized points.  "Weather is why today." 

"Write ME a war."

  The man was drunk. 

  What he said came out in one slur, all four words one stinkin' belch. 

  "Go to bed." An honorable man admonished. 

  A woman who'd toasted to another day of survival, poured a thimble full of sour mash into her mouth and gargled it like mouthwash, and was walking away, stopped dead in her tracks.  She turned but was too far from the campfire to be lit up well.  "Is that what you think all these people are up to?" 

  The man didn't answer. 

  The woman shook her hair like a jelly fish had come too close.  Looked at the brilliant starry night sky.  "You bloody fool." Was all she said before definitively walking to her tent. 

  Two men with guns got up and went and sat on both ends of the tent. 

  In the morning they were still there.  The fire was still going.  But the drunken, bitter man was gone.

Excerpt from novel,

  The Siege

  Story by Lawrence Wright

  "A van sped down the alley toward Kahlil, its side doors sliding open, two pairs of hands reaching out.  From nowhere a man appeared.  He bodychecked Kahlil, sent him careening into the van, and jumped in after him.  The doors clanged shut; with the howl rubber makes when applied liberally to pavement, the van shot out of the alley, barged through traffic, and disappeared. 

  Hub stared after it, panting, his fists clenched.  Frank ran up, also panting.  'Damn,' he gasped.  'Shit!' 

  'Yeah,' Hub said quietly.  'Yeah.' 

  "Ten minutes later Hub presided over an impromptu huddle in the alley.  Agents gathered around him, their radios making a racket.  Overhead, helicopters circled. 

  Fred Darius spoke up, his youthful face drawn.  'They just found the van.  Doesn't look like they're gonna find any fingerprints.' 

  Hub nodded.  Par for the course in this game; everything had blown up in his face.  Not far away, the agent who'd taken telephoto pictures activated a digital printer in an unmarked car.  A photo slid forth.  The agent brought it to Hub: a clear shot of Kahlil and the handsome Palestinian. 

  'Run him down, bring him in,' Hub ordered wearily. 

  Fred Darius's cell phone buzzed." 

"READ IT!!" The shortest shorty shouted.

  "Divorce papers?" A man standing around waiting for a piece of toast asked of the just past pre-dawn bug up her ass. 

  "Comply with what?!" The man handed the piece of paper grump-barked. 

  "Whatever I say." She crossed her arms after quickly stomping a foot in a ballerina way and taking the posture of a marching soldier choosing not to just grab the rifle. 

  Another end of the run. 

  The hurricane had come and gone.  Scrubbed the summer from concrete now perched on missing underground.  A civilian convoy of caring had mustered who wasn't tied to "day job" that day.  Locals in a tiny "town" in between National Parks were appalled at the type of trash that had blown through Main Street. 

  "Don't just grab shit." One team captain warned but without vigor having told crew that for weeks and watching one person after another do just that.  Stabbed, poked, splintered, rashed, fevered, "SICK!  Leave." 

  "Like sick leave?" The wisecracks. 

  "Like," the typically word-able editor/writer stifled pure anger and took a pull from a flask instead of saying anything.  Trying to preserve people willing to be servicepeople from a world exploding into war and decimated by drugs was proving to be more than trying.  "We'll see." She settled on.  The responses to what should I do had also settled into a kind of roulette wheel of rote. 

  "Hand me the binoculars." A man's voice quietly wandered from buried in a gilly suit.  His love's hand drifted from a two-hand hold of a thermos top worth of sweet smelling one more minute of not awake enough, yet, to follow orders.  But the platform reached for...bare. 

  Tents unzippering, being re-zipped.  

  "Why would it be?" 

  "See, more left on the range." 

  "No." 

  "You're other left." A fellow enthusiast put the parade-wave flag in the left hand of the person trying to understand when nothing much could be said. 

  "I think I see smoke!" 

  "Stand still." 

  "Did we make it in time?"  Healed limb ends on missing forearms shrugged shoulders and bobbed the question.

"Because

  we have to keep the economy going." The man explained of some air travel.  "Especially while the bad guys are doing that," he laid out photographs of the slain on a workbench.  Mumbled to the lead tradesperson on the project, those are somebody's loved ones. 

  "That way when you come back, you can pick up where you left off in this trade," a person coaching young people on how to handle all this sudden responsibility said reassuringly. 

  "Sir, we are going to need you in the field," a casually dressed officer stuck head inside and called out.  Everyone looked to see who was being pointed at.