Ahhhh, Valentine's Day, the day for lovers and friends. Contrived, forced, fake affection, the kind most Americans can relate to. No? Well, as many of you well know, I'm not overly fond of “contrived affection” also called “mandatory fun” in the Army. Yay. So much fun. The real reason this is such an emotional event for me? It was 26 years ago today that I joined the Army on Active Duty!

Took the oath in Tampa, FL, at the MEPS Station, hopped on a plane to Atlanta where I changed planes for St. Louis, MO. Eventually loaded onto a bus with a bunch of subdued guys headed for Oblivion or the at least the Unknown. Three full days later I was issued a uniform. Importance? I got on the plane in Tampa in a pair of shorts. I'll give you a single guess whose baggage, which included a pair of jeans and a sweat shirt, didn't make it to St. Louis? Yes, I had to stand around in the holding area for 3 days in a pair of shorts. In Missouri. In February. Yes, it was cold. No, the drill sergeants didn't let it pass.

The Senior Drill of our company made a point of asking me when it was incredibly cold, “Florida! Cold enough for ya?!” “No, Drill Sergeant! Not cold enough, yet!” was my stock response. This was even after 3 hours of Drill & Ceremony (D&C) on the asphalt pad in very, very cold weather with no protection from the foul elements. No one could feel anything below their knees, many could feel nothing above their shoulders but, just like many Americans and most of the Bush Administration, that numbness pre-dated basic training and has absolutely no correlation to the ambient temperature nor exposure to the elements. As my step-daughter is fond of saying when she feels her Muse of Sass has inspired an especially delicious talk-back to her mom or me, “Oh Snap!”

Here's the present situation: Sitting in the den, watching the beginning of a storm that will eventually dump another 6”-10” of new snow on our snow-saturated asses and streets. Ell and I watching “The World's Greatest Dad” with the Robin Williams (the movie is surprisingly good, especially for Robin Williams), the kids sound asleep. The movie is a huge surprise, and poignant, too. The music is SUPERB! Ell agrees that it is a legitimate 4 1/2/5 stars!

My Ell is on the couch. It's Valentine's Day, the singular, most concocted, bullshit “holiday” on God's green earth. She bought me a card knowing full well how I feel about this stuff. I'd rather buy my sweet a surprise set of tickets to a concert when she doesn't expect it. Sometimes, I buy her a bouquet of flowers for the dining room table because she works her ass off--both here for her family and at the office for Kentucky's veterans--
and because she's the most beautiful woman who's ever been in my life. And she stays with me despite my warts and foibles and darkness and “weird” movies (foreign or Indie, not “snuff flicks” you sick bastards! You know who you are!) and pain and depression and pain pain pain pain...

If ANY ONE person understands me and STILL loves me, it is her. She sees the good as greater than the bad, knows what I can do when things are relatively well, and still has faith that I'm intrinsically a good, decent, loving person who genuinely cares about others, usually more than I care about myself. Some jackass asked me once if I was the type of person who ran from gunfire or towards it, and I can honestly say that I've always been the type—for good or bad, but for all the right impulses—to run towards the gunfire. Not that I have a death wish, mind you, but because I used to believe that my personality and good intentions could help solve the situation or protect someone in harm's way.

I'm not sure I feel so cocky about myself these days, especially in my physical abilities, but it means everything for me to believe that Ell knows I'd do that for her, our kids, other family members in crisis, even friends if they let me get close enough. I don't know if it's enough for her to keep me around, to keep pulling me out of my dark corners, but she is the light in my dark, the spark in my step, the rock upon which I stand and sea in which I flow.* I wish every person worthy of such true, deep feelings gets to have a relationship and share their world with someone like my Ell.

Ell: I love you now, and I always will. Happy Valentine's Day.

XOXO
Ernst W.

* With apologies to Coldplay's “Green Eyes” which was written with my green-eyed Ell in mind. Ask THEM, not me.

Who am I? Who the Hell are you? (I AM NOT SUICIDAL)

Here's my proposed tombstone. It will measure slightly less grande than the Arc de Triomphe (below). The little things circling it are cars.

                 JOSEPH RUDOLPH BAUER, III, aka ERNST WOLFGANG
                                       "J.R." thrived, more or less, from
                              15 APRIL 1963  TO  31 DECEMBER 2043

Here lies the dessicated remains of one urbane, humble polymath and renowned philanthropist who donated over 1000¢ per month to various humanitarian causes by which we mean anything remotely anti-LimbaughBeckHannityMcCarthyPalinO'ReillyCoulterRobertsonesque. 

He commanded at least ONE language well enough to be considered a "native speaker" though he claimed allegiance to no particular tribe, and was an honorable, decorated, disabled veteran despite having done nothing of note in combat, kinda like Pat Robertson but with more decorations, greater dignity and fewer STDs.

He is missed by but a few; however, they are the likes anyone should be honored to know. He insists the rest can go fuck themselves silly, redundant though that may be.

He desperately misses his Ell, the kids, English football, the NY Times' crossword puzzles, and his futile pursuit to understand why ANYONE intelligent enough to figure out how to breed could have voted for George W. Bush in 2004. He's hoping the change of venues allows better search capabilities.

Lastly, it is his greatest hope that if there is indeed a Heaven--and his invitation is still valid--it is engineered and designed by Steve Jobs and PIXAR Studios. And that Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-KY, never be allowed in, even if just for a visit.

Actually, I'm a happily married father of 2 sons and step-father of one daughter who served in the Army as a linguist and signals intelligence analyst for nearly 8 years until the lingering effects of a serious ankle injury & surgery along with increasing lower back pain forced my honorable discharge due to disability in December 1991.

Part of the motivation for this blog is the attempt to re-create my identity and self-worth as a person and as a man now that the pain in my spine and radiates down both legs is severe and unremitting. The causes of the pain are also inoperable largely because I'm a diabetic and the risk of infection to the spinal cord or brain is too great, but also because a good deal of the pain is caused by spondylosis, an arthritis particular to spinal mechanisms called "facet joints," which not only creates swelling and muscle spasms but impingement of the nerve roots as they exit the central canal space on their way to connecting the peripheral nervous system of the arms, torso and legs to the spinal cord and ultimately the brain.

Simply stated, chronic, severe pain is a bitch. I had no idea it would change my world in such devastating and crazy ways. The first real symptoms--other than a deep, ineffable, nauseating pain that felt like a Clydesdale was perched on my lumbar spine about 3 inches above the crack in my butt cheeks--included the overwhelming desire to sleep...for days on end. I was working from home at the time and felt so bad I was taking sick leave for the simple reason that I was unable to concentrate long enough to do my job, a job I loved: a disability evaluator for the VA. Next, it was becoming very clear that I was unable to sleep secondary to the pain despite the use of prescription opiates--oxycontin, Vicodin, oxycodone, et al--but they were short-term medications not nearly strong enough to even come close to the level of hegemonic pain that was imposing its unruly will on my life. I seriously considered hiring Jesse Jackson to negotiate with the hijackers to no avail; THEY were in control of S.S. Ernst Wolfgang until their mysterious demands were deciphered and met.

And then it got really bad. It began to affect my relationships with co-workers and, surprise surprise, management.* The frustrated "unrecognized genius" that I was began lashing out and pushing back...well, even worse than before, anyway. I loved and respected the job and what we did for veterans to the point that my logical, focused, and reasonably well-honed intellect started an inexorable loosening of the hinges, untying of knots, and horrendous unraveling that met the morons of management head-fucking-on, like a demolition derby king looking for something to hit.

Unfortunately, I failed to realize, 1) how fucking mean-spirited and petty some of the dark forces were, and 2) how little patience they had for any employee who failed to pull his own weight. Shitty, titty-suck managers dumber than boxes full of hair were allowed felonious yards of rope with which to hang themselves, in fact I never saw one get the boot; employees, on the other hand, who were in the trenches, fighting for veterans, helping fellow workers, fixing the goddam printers 10 fucking times a day, repairing internal errors--many of which were malicious and cruel to the claimants--blah blah blah, meant not a whit to the shits driving the damn boat. It was even worse than that. They were so desperate to fuck claimants in order to preserve their bonuses, some resorted to stealing work off my desk while I was on vacation and then lying about it when I confronted them. I even found the folders of terminally ill, homeless veterans HIDDEN so they couldn't be worked "too fast and wreck our numbers." Thankfully, two people in the management chain were humane enough to realize how ill I had become and to stand up and fight on my behalf though they never told me what they were doing or why.

Here's how management "thinks" the world should work and see nothing contradictory or untoward about it. An employee was caught red-handed throwing away crucial evidence precisely because it supported a veteran's claim because the employee wanted to deny the claim. He was allowed to "retire." An "independent review" of his work found "no pattern" of malfeasance. Right. Shortly thereafter, a mandated review of everyone's work that covered a relatively short period of time--18 months, I believe--resulted in no fewer than 32 clear and unmistakable errors on that one person alone. In other words, for the time period involved in the review of everybody's decisions, roughly 1/4th of that haughty Teuton's determinations were purposely denied despite the presence of incontrovertible evidence to the contrary. No pattern, huh? Chicken-shit liars.

Even though they technically had grounds to fire me, the interference of the two doing "the right thing" resulted in the bittersweet though much preferred option called "retirement due to disability." One of the the esteemed members of the HQ cell called me at home where I was nursing a migraine--HEY! THANKS FOR THE GODDAMN RINGING PHONE! IT REALLY HELPS THOSE SUFFERING FROM A MIGRAINE (DEVISE A PLOT TO KILL OTHERS AND DISMEMBER THEIR CORPSES BEFORE JUDGE JUDY RETURNS FROM A BATHROOM BREAK! JUST KIDDING! SORTA)-- in order to inform me not to come back to work. They were expecting my wife to clean out my desk on her own time.

The SADDEST chapter of all this drama? I'd give my left biceps muscle and a Happy Meal to be able to return to work despite all my complaining. Some of the managers are excellent and genuinely concerned about both veterans and employees. It's just that the bad ones are of such poor quality in people and technical skills, their integrity as a person is often questionable. Their obvious weaknesses usually include the basic understanding of what a good supervisor does FOR the employees to make their job easier. When employees are being pushed to produce, which is fair, but not receiving the support to either complete their tasks or feel that the coach is willing to go to bat for them, the wheels come off. There is no worse feeling as a worker than the sensation that no one gives a shit whether you show up or not. Nevertheless, I would love to feel well enough to try.

XOXO
Ernst W.

* This is not to say every manager is bad. Some are great at their jobs. I'm referring to the big bosses primarily, like the ones who throw away mail addressed to someone else. Without asking. That's a federal crime. Especially if one looks like the monster in Young Frankenstein.

WHY!? Because most of America is redneck, that's why! (EXPLICIT LANGUAGE)

The 15th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America:


Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude (a former slave).

Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Without question, our country was founded by some very intelligent and brave men* who were willing to risk everything, including their own lives, in order to try an unfounded experiment in self-government. No violent struggle for the "throne," no need for a "mandate from Heaven," no crazy marriages between a few "royal" families to cement the relationships across national lines, etc.**

Please consider the following questions, slowly and deliberately, before attempting to answer: 

Why was the Voting Rights Act of 1965 necessary when the 15th Amendment had already given black/sub-Saharan African-Americans voting rights?

Stumped?  The 15th Amendment was passed, granting African-American men the right to vote, in early February 1870. HOWEVER, with discrimination still largely unchecked, violence against blacks at voting polls was rampant. Violence against blacks by whites was unchecked as well as local constabularies conspired with local (white) community leaders to ensure that the unwashed masses were reminded, on a daily basis, who belonged where and with whom. 

I know the saying from Shakespeare mentions something about hell having no fury like a woman scorned; but, in our country, the reality was--for HUNDREDS of years including the decade in which I was born--nothing had a fury like a white man thinking his white woman was wanted by a black man.  My mom's second husband was raised in Maryland, a former slave state and one of the border states during the Civil War. He told me a story about the time his elementary school was let out in order for the local sheriff to put on a demonstration for the good kids of Wherever, MD. The sheriff's police car had a black man chained to the rear bumper in such a manner that his hands and feet were bound together and the chain was drawn taut in that the only part of this poor man's body touching the pavement was his neck and back of his head.

Before the action part of the lesson began, the sheriff explained to his captive audience that he was going to "teach this nigger a lesson. Around here, we don't allow them lookin' at our [white] women." At that point, he kicked the terrified man, taunting him with more slurs before motioning for the deputy to start the car. Yes, that's right, while the "Greatest Generation" was fighting fascism and despotism around the globe,* a local yokel sheriff in our "civilized" country was condemning a person to die, in a most gruesome manner possible, in front of an elementary school full of kids, for the egregious act of allegedly leering at a woman. 

According to my step-dad, no one stepped forward or spoke up for the victim. Think about it: if the sheriff is using this training "opportunity" to drive home his savage point, who could one go to for help? The school principal? The FBI?  J. Edgar Hoover was a virulent racist, and the rest of the power structures in the country largely supported (and in some cases, still support), or at least accepted, the knowledge a priori that whites were superior to blacks and that black men in particular were dangerous. 

I think things are largely better, yet the rise of reactionary, poorly educated, and well-funded right-wing organizations has resulted, anecdotally at least, a rise in the popularity of being racist, especially against Arabs and Muslims in general, and Mexicans in particular whether citizens, legal residents, or illegals, actual legal status notwithstanding. Just as Sasha Baron Cohen has proved in his brilliant albeit controversial comedic characters, it doesn't take much pressure for the veneer of civility to wipe away and expose the fearful, hateful bastards who we really are. 

The police car began driving very slowly around the flagpole. The idea is that the vicitm would desperately try and keep their head from resting on the ground, but "Gosh Dang! ain't nobody who can hold it up forever! Yee-haw!" This particular form of execution, called "skull dragging," involves dragging the person until the back half of his skull is rubbed off by the friction off the asphalt. My step-dad said there was a circular, dark red stain around the flagpole for months. He understood the message loud and clear. And people wonder how black/sub-Saharan African-Americans would have any reason to be angry at the power structures in this country. In fact, this is a perfect demonstration of the difference between racial discrimination and racism. The black man, about to be murdered in cold blood without judge or jury, hates the motherfucking crackers who are gonna kill him and all white people in general for letting shit like this happen. That's "racial discrimination." On the other hand, the sheriff arresting him for "looking at our women" and then killing him with impunity? That, my friends, is racism. The full force of the dominant culture clearly behind his actions is what makes the difference in this case. Would a black sheriff have attempted the grisly summary execution of a white man for ogling a black woman?  

NB- During WWII, when German and Italian prisoners of war (POWs) were shipped into interior U.S. bases, black U.S. soldiers were not allowed access into enlisted men and NCO clubs; however, the foreign POWs were allowed in and given extra privileges than black servicemen. Now, you tell me, how fucking infuriating is that?

Although actual statistics are probably impossible to acquire, it would not surprise me if 10,000 black men were killed--"LYNCHED"--in the early 20th century-by groups of white men who were often aided by local law enforcement if the "law" men weren't directly involved themselves. I can hear you now--you know who you are--sighing and rolling your eyes at J.R. the Liberal going off the deep end, again. But one of the great tragedies of the American downfall is also one of its causes is the passivity of the  American. Passive thinker, passive shopper, passive follower, passive whatever. Active thinking requires effort. Active thinking requires the divesture of one's ego in order for new information to land where it may once its been "run through the wringer" a few times. Passive thinking allows one to "fit in" and "not stand out."

I know many of you have college degrees or are intelligent enough to understand the following. Haven't you ever have one of those "A-Ha!" moments every so often when the preconceptions and prejudices and--let's call it what it is, shall we?--accumulated ignorance of your passivity collided with NEW IDEAS or angles never before considered? In my very humble opinion, if you've lived your entire life knowing everything or filtering information to ensure it didn't tip your apple cart of willful stupidity, then you live in a very elaborate and angry cocoon; however, a beautiful butterfly does not emerge from this chrysalis (Latin chrysallis, from Greek χρυσαλλίς = chrysallís). Instead, what emerges is something very ugly, malformed, an abomination: Karl Rove! NO! Just kidding. A little. It's actually Sarah Palin Limbaugh-Coulter.


Literacy tests, poll taxes and other voter qualification laws became common. It took nearly a century and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 for the amendment's intention to be achieved throughout the US. Black women in America attained the right to vote along with the rest of America's adult female population in 1920 with the ratification of the 19th Amendment. But, they, too, had to wait till 1965 to actually exercise that right.

Next Question to think about very carefully before you answer: If it took 100 years or so to ensure that ALL blacks had the right to vote as citizens, how long do you think it will take--if ever--for the United States to ensure the equal protection guaranteed under the Constitution for all adult citizens to marry whomever they wish? 

Marriage has both a legal and religious component; however, the piece of paper that couples receive from the state is a LEGAL document, not a religious one. I, for one, do not begrudge couples their desire to have their union conducted by the religious rite and ceremony of their choosing; nevertheless, it is a LEGAL action in the eyes of the state. Otherwise, why would divorce be handled by the judicial system and not the priest/father/rabbi, et al, who conducted the ceremony and signed the marriage certificate? Marriage is an institution that ensures a relatively orderly exchange of property and responsibilities if
when one or both of the partners passes away. 

I bring all this up because their are some similarities between the struggle for blacks and homosexuals to be recognized in the legal systems as well as the minds of the dominant, ethnocentric culture. While there are unmistakably huge differences between these issues, they ultimately lead to most human of decisions: is EVERYONE endowed with the same inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?  The scope of those "inalienable" rights has, if anything, broadened through time as the republic has wizened through war and civil unrest, perhaps particularly by the reluctance of the populace to pay for the upkeep of the roads, bridges, and pipes necessary for modernity to continue. Nobody likes to pay taxes, but roads, schools, health care, et al, are requisites for a First World country. IMHO, so too are equal and full CIVIL rights as conferred on us by the elegant mind and pen of Thomas Jefferson. As pointed out by a very intelligent man and former Army colleague, Jefferson recognized the need for the Constitution to be a living document despite the howls of "activist judges" and their apparent detriment to the viability of the government to continue its rule.***

The president has proposed an end to the preposterous "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy of the military service. Naturally, this has caused a firestorm of protest from the usual sources who use the aegis of love and understanding and inclusion to propagate hate and fear and revulsion. One of my great puzzlements regarding this issue is this: Does everyone sit around and wonder what the hell their neighbors are doing in bed? Am I the only weirdo who doesn't? Is this all we have to do? 

If we are to accept the responsibility to educate ourselves into enlightened citizenry (ACTIVE THINKING), we cannot conclude otherwise that the denial of full and equal "inalienability" renders the entire exercise of "life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness" meaningless. If you disagree with this line of thinking, would agree that women should be denied the right to vote? Should we allow vigilante justice and return to the days of racially motivated lynch mobs? No? Then why do the "opponents" of the full expression of inalienable rights always deride the need for "special laws" just for homosexuals and their "agenda?" I mean, you can't have it both ways: why was the 1965 Voting Rights Law necessary if the 15th Amendment already guaranteed every (male) citizen the right to vote? Why was the 19th Amendment necessary to guaranty a woman's right to vote? Your arguments against the "special rights" are nearly IDENTICAL to the ones used by your intellectual forebears to deny women and blacks their full rights as citizens. I-D-E-N-T-I-C-A-L. Being homosexual is no more a choice than one's "race." Science is providing more evidence that sexual orientation occurs in the womb. Besides, why would someone "choose" to expose him or herself to open derision, unemployment, housing discrimination, and potential violence from rednecks and other like-minded idiots?

Last Question: Will we need an amendment to guaranty the right for each and every citizen to pursue "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?"  Recently, my sister asked me if we were ready to move forward (socially) and begin accepting people with less prejudice than our mostly racist parents and grandparents did. My answer to her was this: the most progressive, advanced, and cultured in the arts and humanities country in Europe prior to 1932 was Germany. There was open homosexuality, jazz bars, women smoking in public, relatively open sexual mores and practices, etc. We all know what happened in Germany between 1933 - 1945. By 1935, concentration camps were constructed to house "enemies to the state" like leftists, Communists, priests, gypsies, and....homosexuals. I fear my sister's optimism is not warranted though I'd like to believe we're past such barbarity. We ain't. We're no less vicious than the Greeks portrayed in those ancient stories. Or the lynch mobs who roamed rural America contemporaneous to Nazi Germany. 

As always, I welcome your comments, insights, and questions so long as you're respectful and thoughtful. 

XOXO
Ernst W.           

* Nota bene #2 - Before anyone jumps on me about the fact that these "enlightened" souls were slave-owning misogynists, one must recognize that history must account for the times whence its figures emerge. This is not to say that all of their sins are absolved; however, we should not apply our Ethos to those of different eras and cultures. History rarely moves in leaps and bounds. For instance, we trace the development of democracy from the early 6th century BC/BCE  in Athens ( δημοκρατία - (dēmokratía) "rule of the people") , to the Senate of the Romans, to the Enlightenment, to the Magna Carta, to the philosophies of Locke, Montesquiou, and to the Declaration of Independence, roughly speaking. That took more than 2,300 years!  

** Of course, it could be argued that not much has changed since the 2000 election was decided by the "independent" Supreme Court voting along strict ideological lines; no atheist or agnostic has ever come close to winning a Presidential election; and, a number of Presidents are related by blood and marriage and all in recent memory are multimillionaires. Two of them, a pragmatic father and an idiotic son, didn't have to earn a dime since their family had long since secured the power and prestige that accompanies and under-girds generational wealth. But, as usual, I digress. Food for thought, so to speak.  

*** "I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors."

From the inscription on Panel 4 of the Jefferson Memorial 

To Clarify, if I may...

My last post has been cause of some alarm in some quarters, and for that I humbly apologize.

Without going into too many intricate and intimate gyrations, I have no intention of harming myself, now or in the future.

After the psychotic break of April last when I was indeed searching for a solution to stop the pain or whatever the hell I was doing, I agreed to defer decision-making to others in better control of the situation. In essence, whenever Ellen or one of my mental health professionals feel that I'm a danger to anyone, I'm to report to the VAMC ER on Zorn Ave. for an assessment and possible in-patient placement until it is determined that I have regained the healthy state of mind necessary for linear, logical thought processing.

In short, I love and respect my wife, children and siblings far too much to do anything that would paint me into the veritable corner with no path to redemption. My Ellen is, and always will be, the most incredible, beautiful and serendipitous "event" in my world; as a result, I owe it to myself to ensure she never, ever regrets making the decision to build a life with me as her partner.

Also, please understand that at times most bleak, stuck in that place that crushes your lungs, when no relief is imaginable, it is always the thought of my kids--all of them--having to ascertain what is meant by "Dad gone forever" that triggers something primal: the deepest, most profound shame and guilt that bounces me out of the "poor me's" like a Taser to the scrotal sac.    

Again, Mea Culpa for the poor choice of words that caused the unnecessary fright. Despite appearances, S.S. Ernst Wolfgang sails skips vogues does what it can to survive another day, to fight the worthy battle, with all you in tow and for the show.

XOXO
Ernst Wolfgang