local news

Sunrise takes on poignancy

ALONG U.S. HIGHWAY 20, Ore. — This sunrise greeted me today as I sped along the roadway toward Burns.

I have to tell you something that many of you likely will presume about me … which is that a tragic event in my life will require me to look differently at the sky when these events occur.

My bride’s passing from cancer in early February shattered my heart, but when I saw this sunrise today, I thought immediately of Kathy Anne.

The sunrise didn’t mend my heart, but it did give me pleasant form of pause.

I cannot prove what I am about to say, but please know it is what I believe, which is that I felt her gazing on Toby the Puppy and me as we moved along in the light of the dawn.

It filled my heart with a bit of sadness, but also with happy memories of the life we shared on this Earth. I also was filled with hope at the life we will share in eternity.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Join another state? Huh?

BURNS, Ore. — I have just breezed through a portion of my home state that appears to rival Texas — my new “home” state — as a hotbed for right-wing lunatics.

Granted, I only have read bits and pieces about this so-called “movement” in Oregon, so I don’t know many of the details.

It goes like this: Some residents of Oregon’s eastern counties want to detach themselves from Oregon and join the neighboring state to east, Idaho. I have no clue how they would accomplish such a thing, whether a statewide referendum — which is legal in Oregon — ever would pass. Do they do it legislatively?

It seems the folks in places like Malheur, Harney and Lake counties feel more akin to politicians in Boise than those who work in Salem. It seems the folks in places like Malheur, Harney and Lake counties feel more akin to politicians in Boise than those who work in Salem. Oregon is strongly blue; Idaho is just as strongly red. Oregon favors Democratic candidates for president; Idaho favors Republicans. Get it?

I saw only one outright political demonstration while breezing through Burns; it was a “Trump 2020” sign on the side of someone’s house, with the subtitle “Keep America Great.” I guess the folks didn’t get the memo, which is that Trump lost that election and that America is still the greatest nation on Earth.

There’s a tiny bit of similarity to those in the Texas Panhandle who want that part of the state to break off from the rest of it, believing that Austin doesn’t listen to the needs of those who live so far away. Well, they have chosen to ignore all the highway work that the Texas Department of Transportation is doing to improve rights-of-way in Amarillo and elsewhere.

And, of course, we have the secessionist cabal that wants Texas to become — once again — an independent nation. Umm, can’t do it. It’s illegal, you know?

The Oregon “rebellion” never will see the light of day. For that, I am glad. I like the state being the ninth-largest geographically in the nation. Besides, the wackos in eastern Oregon do a good job of reminding those who live in the rest of the state of their presence.

It’s best to keep everyone in plain sight.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Finally … the sun shines!

WINNEMUCCA, Nev. — Take a good look at the picture you see with this brief post. What don’t you see?

Time’s up! You don’t see a cloud in the sky. Nothin’, man! Clear blue sky from horizon to horizon to horizon to horizon.

It took me a while on this westward journey Toby and the Puppy have taken, but we finally freed ourselves from the dreary rain that has inundated California and the Pacific Northwest. We were unable to lay eyes on the great peaks of the Cascades. Mount Hood, Mount Rainier, Mount St. Helens, Mount Adams, Mount Jefferson, the Three Sisters? All were hidden by clouds.

We had to travel past the Central Oregon Cascades to see what I fondly refer to as El Sol. I don’t know what the future of this journey holds for us, but I am going to remain hopeful that we can avoid much of the misery that has soaked by home state of Oregon, Washington and much of California.

The mountains in the photo, by the way, stand in northern Nevada and can be seen in the place where we’re spending the night before heading on to our next stop in southern Utah.

Let me be clear about another point: I had planned to drive along U.S. Highway 50, billed as the “Loneliest Highway in America.” I will offer a differing point of view. Highway 50 will have to go some to beat U.S. Highway 20 east from Bend to Burns.

I didn’t count them, but my best guess is that we saw maybe a dozen other vehicles on the highway between those two cities. No fuel stations. No public restrooms. No eateries.

Not a single thing out there but a few vehicles … plus Toby the Puppy and me.

Oh, but I do love the open road.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

It’s the ‘rule of law’

The “rule of law” has nearly become a cliche, given the frequency of its use by politicians on both sides of the great divide.

It is much more than that, of course. The rule of law needs to apply to every single citizen of this great country, even former presidents of the United States.

Thus, it is critical to view the indictment of Donald Trump on 34 counts relating to his hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels as a victory for the rule of law.

Trump’s allies on the right wing of the Republican Party say that an ex-POTUS is above being prosecuted, that the Manhattan district attorney overstepped his authority by persuading the grand jury to indict Trump.

The translation of that, naturally, is that the rule of law doesn’t apply to an ex-POTUS.

Baloney! It damn sure does apply. Indeed, it must apply if the judicial system is going to work as the founders designed it. Either we cherish the system or we toss it aside.

I am going to cherish it with the hope that the rule of law will run its complete course.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

‘Shoe Tree’ is gone

BEND, Ore. — Well, gang, I have made the turn and am heading for the house in North Texas.

And along the way I suffered a semi-serious disappointment. I was told about a tree on the east side of U.S. Highway 97 a bit north of Bend that I needed to see. It was called colloquially the “Shoe Tree.”

My cousin and his wife told me it was a tree that had died some years ago, but motorists would pass by and hurl shoes onto the branches. It stood apparently for years along the highway.

I guess its time ran out, as in someone must’ve lost patience with seeing it there, collecting old shoes.

Me? I would have loved to see the Shoe Tree. That’s the kind of thing that makes outstanding roadside attractions. Heck, the folks nearby could spring for a concession stand, they could sell artifacts such as bumper stickers, ball caps, t-shirts.

Hey, that’s what they have done along Interstate 40 west of Amarillo, where motorists gather to spray paint graffiti on the cars that comprise Cadillac Ranch!

Well, unless I missed it as I whizzed by, the Shoe Tree appears to have gone on to tree heaven.

An opportunity lost. Would’ve made a great picture to go with this post.

It’s on to the next stop.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

We’re going to survive

“The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize their teachers.”

How many of us who have brought children into this world, reared them and guided them toward adulthood have shared those thoughts are something like them along the way? My hunch is that we all have.

The quotation I have posted here is attributed to Socrates, the Greek philosopher who lived from 470 until 399 … B.C. That’s more than four centuries before the birth of Jesus Christ!

I want to offer this quotation as my brief statement of faith in the future of our world. I believe that humankind is going to get through all the things that seem to trouble us today.

I mean if Socrates can express these misgivings about the youth of his day and the world can survive as it has done in the two millennia since the great man’s time, who are we to worry about the future of our species going forward?

I continue to think well of our young people. They have answered the call to arms. They are continuing to behave like good citizens. Our great nation and humanity will survive … even as old folks far into the distant future will bitch about young people.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

Come clean, Mr. Justice … or else!

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas should be in a world of hurt right now, but he isn’t. Not by a long shot.

Why? Because the court on which he has served since 1991 has no rules governing its members’ conduct.

Oh, my … that needs to change!

It has been revealed that Thomas accepted ritzy travel gifts from a rich Republican donor, Harlan Crow of Texas, without reporting them to authorities. Thomas  now says he was advised by others that he didn’t need to do such a thing and, of course, accepting such extravagant gifts did nothing to influence his rulings on political matters.

Democrats are outraged over these findings. They have good reason to be angry. They also are a bit dispirited because they have few legislative options in Congress available to them.

Thomas is a walking case of judicial hypocrisy. The high court demands that lower courts set strict ethical standards and requires them to enforce them strictly. The SCOTUS, though, is immune from such protection. Justices are free to flout the rules whenever they please. Clarence Thomas is the worst of the bunch.

He needs to be impeached by Congress and put on trial for his ethical transgressions. Will it happen? Hah! Hardly.

The man is a disgrace to the court and to the nation.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Now for the return

MONITOR, Wash. — I am getting ready to make the turn and head for the house.

My return to North Texas will commence in a couple of days, after I visit with a couple of family members and we get caught up on what’s happening in our lives.

They know my story, as I have been chronicling it on this blog.

To be candid, I am ready to start the return to familiar haunts … not that those I have seen already aren’t plenty familiar to these 73-year-old eyes.

The constant rain that has fallen during my entire stay in the Pacific Northwest is maddeningly familiar to be sure. I grew up in Portland, where it seemingly drizzles forever and then some. Yes, I also saw old friends, five high school classmates, plenty of family, my godmother (who also is family, according to Orthodox Church tradition) and some old haunts.

But it’s time to make the trek back to Collin County. I’ll take a different route than the one that brought me to this place on the eastern slope of the Cascade Range.

What’s more, I am going to travel along some highways that I’ve never seen before. I trust that my late bride, Kathy Anne, will smile in approval as Toby the Puppy and I wind our way back to the house.

More family will greet us in the Texas Hill Country and some friends await us in West Texas.

This journey was intended for me to simply get away from the nearness of the event that broke my heart in early February. I will miss Kathy Anne forever and then some.

But I am ready to start assembling my life for the still-unknown journey that awaits.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news

This ain’t Wal-Mart, Mr. Justice

Clarence Thomas once declared he is favors RVs and Wal-Mart parking lots over luxury vacation retreats.

He said he comes from “simple stock.”

Oh, really, Mr. Supreme Court Justice? How does he explain the luxurious vacations he and his wife, Ginni, took on the dime of a wealthy Republican donor? Well, he isn’t talking because the Supreme Court doesn’t have any ethics rules for justices to follow.

Justice Thomas is a hypocrite of the lowest order. He needs to be resign from the court. The House ought to impeach him. The Senate ought to try him and he ought to be removed from the court.

Recall, too, how Justice Thomas voted against rules sanctioning the 45th POTUS after it was revealed that Ginni Thomas is a vocal supporter of The Big Lie about the 2020 election, which she contends was “strolen” from the ex-POTUS.

Good grief! This baloney has got to stop.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

How am I doing? Umm … OK

PORTLAND — The question is inevitable as I make my way across the western United States and begin thinking about the return trip to my home in North Texas.

“How are you doing?” my friends and family members ask with the look of those who know the pain I am feeling.

My answer is truthful. “Oh … I’m OK.” They know I’m not really OK, but they understand the reason the shrug I give them and the look in my eyes.

But in truth, I actually am doing a bit better than just OK. It’s not a lot better, but it’s a little bit so.

I embarked on this venture to clear my head after my wife passed away suddenly in early February after getting a cancer diagnosis that knocked me for a loop … but which seemed in the moment to have been something Kathy Anne might have expected.

She was stoic and steadfast in her response to the doctor: “Let’s just get it out of there.”

I had to leave the house. So, I did. I am very close to the halfway point. Soon I’ll be turning my pickup around and heading toward the house.

My sense is that I’ll be able to walk into my Princeton home feeling a bit of emotional relief as a result of the time I have taken away.

To be sure, there are likely to be more of these ventures in my near and medium-term future. This one, though, has been fairly successful in that I have been able to accomplish much of what I intended when Toby the Puppy and I hit the road nearly two weeks ago.

I’ll get more of the “How are you doing?” questions along the way. Those who ask it will get the same answer I’ve been giving. I trust they’ll understand.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

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