A new group

I’ve been thinking about something I want. I tried to create my own group in my first campaign and it fizzled. However, true training tells me that most things worth trying are worth trying twice if it doesn’t work out the first time.

With that in my mind for some time, I delayed the action I took today.

Sometimes I do delay, right now it is 12:01, with the old deadline, I’m already too late to write. Gladly, now I’ve learned a bit more and can control my writing, at least each day, a little more. I delayed now to write a perhaps 1000-word reply to a friend that had done the same for me. That was more important to get done yesterday than even this.

I slept better once I went to bed and was up early just before 7, then downstairs. The thought had already been around my mind so many times, I was surprised to see myself taking action today. I created a new facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1105192463774873

I won’t say much more about that now, though I did spend the whole day working on that and posting, messaging, and replying on Facebook. Some candidates do not seem to like having a platform for their views. I did go upstair and take a fairly good nap at three or four in the afternoon. Once I woke up I was hungry, of course, I didn’t need to cook as I have a batch of spaghetti in the fridge. However, I do need to do a load of dishes. Also, this was my last chance to get fair food.

I know I can walk two miles, up to three or four if I ran out of gas- gosh knows, that has been a thought on my mind this year. Yet, that has been through a process with a lot of pain, tears, and grimaces along the way. Seven and a half months now since the bar came out, and I am finally doing a good drunken sailor routine. With respect, a drunk (or hung-over,) Navy sailor is most likely standing up the straightest, marching his finest line, most especially when shore patrol may be watching.

After working up to this, I decided showing the public how well I have learned to walk would be worth an Italian sausage with onions and green peppers. The walking actually went great, down hill on the way there made it seem faster and the food was right up front. By time I got home, I felt well enough I could have walked another mile. Also, I used my cane.

Three noteworthy interactions- among dozens of personal encounters and thousands of people, oh, so many thousands of people.

When I first arrived at the older American One building to pay to enter, there was a short line. As I moved up to the second position in the line, I saw the side of the face of the young woman working the cash box and selling, then ripping the tickets to enter.

As I moved forward and offered my $10 bill to enter I said “You look familiar” as I smiled. She smiled first as her eyes began to light up. Her hands already ripping the next ticket off she began to say “Yeah…” as her eyes narrows as if she were squinting a bit.

“From St. John’s,” I said, “I think I might have taught you.” She was nodding now, a full smile and I added “Or, at least I hope I did.”

She paused momentarily, her face absent. Then she turned her body slightly, squared up directly with me, and looking at me through the steel grate that separated us, she said “You did, it took a couple of years to catch on…” trailing off she started to look down. Holding out my half ticket for proof of entry and looking at me, seeing me, she continued “Yes, you did teach me.” Taking my stub, I brought my hands together and blessed her with a quick “God bless you” as if she had sneezed. We smiled and I walked into the fairgrounds.

Next, I went for food as I navigated the crowd. I’m still getting used to the new fairground layout and I missed my powered wheelchair from last year (I’d seen Caleb at the GOP booth, and told him I’d been thinking of getting a small powered scooter again.) Though the old standard for the fair was lemonade, an Italian sausage, and a ride on the Ferris wheel, last year I had already removed the Ferris wheel, so this year I didn’t feel so bad about skipping the steps to find the good lemonade stand.

Walking down the first row of food vendors, I saw another young woman with a group of others ahead of me that seemed to be pointing in my direction. Continuing on at my speed I thought I might have been blocking someone behind me and I took my next steps slightly more to the right. Coming closer, perhaps ten feet away the girl kept pointing in my direction. I turned and looked behind myself as I heard her say “Fuck you.”

Looking forward again with my next step, she continued pointing, no longer speaking to her friends but rather squarely and directly to me, “No, fuck you.” Looking at her face as she said that, I do not know who she is. However, the feeling she radiated was clear. “I’m sorry,” I told her with my next step. She looked at me and stayed silent as I took my final step to pass her by.

I walked to the end and came back to down the other side of the row and the very first Italian sausage vendor I had seen was the only one, a $12 sausage and a $3 water, plus the $10 to get in the gates. With a meal in me, I decided to do a full lap of the fair until then, I was considering coming back the way I came as an option. The grandstands are in the same place of course and there was plenty of entertainment on the way.

While I was eating, half a dozen Sherriff deputies were rushing into the food court, fanning out and obviously looking for someone. By the time I was throwing away my garbage, there was a large golf cart with a deputy chasing a young man in a red hoodie. It’s good to see the youth at the fair.

The fair of ’97 was… well, I was youthful and that is really a different story, yet I woke that morning with a fifth of tequila and smoked a bunch of weed with my buddy Jon (who had gotten me to join up and travel with the fair the previous year,) then going to the fair for while we made a connection and went over (vagueness is a skill in Jackson,) to some guys house with a double letter first name and bought a bunch of blotter acid.

Loaded on my tongue and eyelids, the next twelve hours were a blur. I remember the powerful thunder and lightning storm and how the rain looks on acid as it drizzles across the rough cobblestone appearance of the aging asphalt of the area by the grandstands. Ushered out at closing, as Jon stayed for another year ride, I found myself out at the house by the East Side Meijers and watched Heavy Metal for the first time.

Thank God I lived long enough to break myself of the past. Is that a flashback? I remember this memory every time I look at the asphalt on my way to the grandstand. Going through, there were the same vendors it seemed as last year. Sadly I did not see my friend Marty; I hope he is well.

Coming out the northside, I continued around the loop to the animal areas- here there is often shit where you walk. I saw two other people I know, a couple of ham radio guys. This was another interesting interaction. One of them complained about the high noise in Jackson- s7 to s9 on most of the HF bands most days. While at the same time, the other was hoping I wasn’t going to bring up the fact that radio operating practices were still causing s9+60db noise on the VHF band, and the one specific frequency of interest to me.

Then I got to meet Jake. I was walking through the barn and it was mostly empty. I stopped and tried to pet him and he moved his head over to the left corner. Side shuffling myself to meet him, he turned in his stall to look out his window briefly then turned back around with his head on the right side where he first began. Looking at his sign, I saw his name and started to talk to him. “Good boy, Jake. Good boy”.

Over a few minutes, he let me begin to pet his nose as I repeated “Good boy, Jake”. It might not be very original, yet I’m not sure what horse whisperers are supposed to say. Soon, he started kicking the door of his stall in response. A few others were just a few feet away and I turned if asked if I was bothering the horse, as he was kicking. No, Jake just wanted hay someone said.

Some quick chatter and a woman assured me that hay is all Jake thinks about. A gentleman replied that Jake is two years old and has not been ridden yet, however, he is a stud and is likely thinking about more than hay. The woman laughed and they went back to their chatter, and I went back to Jake. Now I understood, Jake did know I was talking to him kindly and he thought I would follow that with food.

Good business. Now knowing Jake better, I left finished my lap of the fairgrounds for 2023, and walked home. Rested, smoked, and ate a block of cheese and a roll of Ritz. I could have eaten two or three of those sausages, but not for $12 each. I checked in on the new Facebook group and had a comment I had to approve- someone had posted a URL. I need to go through the admin settings more thoroughly and ensure I’m not blocking content like that.

As a small group, I hope I can set the controls wide open and see if the group I have invited is capable of self-regulation. One twenty-three.

Time to rest.