A place where time stands still

There's a place, a stretch of sacred ground, in Southwest Arkansas that was settled back in the early 1800s.

For more than five generations it has been called The Andres Place. Charles Montgomery and Nancy Ann Andres settled on a small rise near the front edge of 100 acres in the community of Sutton in 1870. They built a strong dogtrot house and raised a strong herd of raw-boned, tough children who, in turn, increased the size of the Andres herd mightily.

The land, once dotted with pine thickets separating fields of grassland and row crops, was left to tend to itself decades ago and a majority of the Andres Place became the Andres Thicket.

Over the past year, it has been a pleasure, nay, an obligation, to reclaim part of that land. With my wife Bobbie Jean McCarty Smith, we build a house of which the ancients would be very, very proud. The new house is a dogtrot, bigger than the original, but the fireplace is built from rocks and bricks from the original chimneys. A couple of pieces of furniture from that original house stand as proud sentinels the two main rooms.

An old single bedspring, once the haven of sweet dreams for a revered aunt, but discarded after it was no longer useful, stands in front of the house, a strong tree having grown up through it.

Over the past 100 years, the main road has changed course, like a river finding a smoother path to flow and grow. Old trails became overgrown and new trails were cut. It's important, as the ancestors knew and we are learning, to visit the land and view its wonders.

A corner cabinet made from wood rescued from a sway-backed, two-room house on the place, holds family relics and precious photos of family members ... those that are gone and those who hold a firm grip on the future.

To those that set the pattern for all the Andres blood kin, and their inlaws and outlaws, and for those who are new to the land and stories (and love them fiercely), history and a hope for the future abound in the place now called Bedspring Ridge on Andres Thicket Farm.

2012 luku

Political
circus usually
full of roaring
lions, elephants and donkeys.
2012 version is just full
of cold hot dogs
along with caravan
of dippy
clowns.

A martyr deserves the best

Obama
got Osama.
Don't mince words,
give the men their
due. Obama did his job
ordering Osama dead.
Osama did his --
died on
cue.

Osama
got Muslim
wish, died a
martyr, ascended into heaven
where virgins greeted him warmly.
Whoa! Where's the girls?
Who ordered all
the durn
sheep!

Oh, my! The evils of politics

Herman Cain's brief flash of light on the national political arena will start ebbing quickly not that "they" have uncovered some dirt on the conservative GOPer.

"They." You know "them," right? Those nefarious nabobs who delight in digging up dirt on those that throw themselves on the alter of Super Political Power and strive for the gold ring of the presidency.

Well, "they" have let leak that two women have accused Cain of sexual harassment when he was in the private sector. Pshaw and bother! That can't be right, right? It's just the left leading with a right cross and trying to knock the current golden boy out of the Republican lead?

Without going into too many cliches -- smoke/fire and all that -- it is safe to assume that Cain, who has changed his story more times than Bill Clinton in his sex scandal days, did do something that was not aboveboard. Despite his pompous and absolute denial of any wrongdoing, and hasty subsequent retreats from those absolute denials, the association which which he was associated did give at least one woman a year's salary as a settlement. Smoke/fire. Remember?

Cain, like most self-important people who think they can do no wrong, and if they do wrong they can hide or run from it, has dug himself a hole full of gasoline.

And, he can only blame himself for lighting the match and trying to blame the mess on the match manufacturer.