In the days before we’d inherited a mortgage, the hubby and I enjoyed traveling overseas.  Our first foray, buoyed on the pages of Tom Fowler’s The Magus, was to Greece.

Our arrival in the Athens airport was not auspicious; two weeks earlier, terrorists had targeted that airport.  Too late to secure a refund, we assumed that lightning would not strike twice in the same place.  But as the metal detector shrieked at us like the Sirens of mythology, we were politely pulled aside by airport security.  My husband had packed a tiny mustache scissors and these, apparently, constituted a potential threat.  In typical New York fashion, I snatched up the scissors, brandishing them angrily in the security guard’s face, demanding if he were kidding.  God rescues the idiots among us, so we were free to go, with the scissors in tow.

The lovely hotel room had a private bath that included a bidette. I stumbled upon it, and nearly into it, with all the wonder of Stanley beholding Dr. Livingston for the first time.  Clueless as to its use, I made a transatlantic call to my grandmother, who’d been born in Italy and who knew about these things.  She revealed the most basic of directions and told me I’d love that bidette.  The ensuing scene, replete with a frenzied call to the concierge, resembled the Three Stooges film when the clueless trio assumed the job of plumbers and proceeded to flood their client’s home.  My first and last time with a bidette!

After three days in Athens, we sailed the blue Aegean.  As the sun blossomed in the sky each morn, we toured various islands, including Crete, the home of the legendary Minotaur, and Santorini, the rumored resting place of the lost civilization of Atlantis.  But when we debarked from the skiff in an emerald cove to see the empty funicular upon the shores of Rhodos (“Rhodes”), my heart sank.  We were ordered to either board the funicular or take a donkey ride up the mountain … provided the donkeys didn’t decide to mate on the way up (a popular spectator sport in Greece, apparently).  Allergic to equines, not keen to watch Dominic and Doris do the horizontal, er, vertical mambo, and deathly afraid of heights, I crept into the funicular and hugged the floor.  Literally.

From that position, as the car creaked slowly up the side of the mountain, as I was certain that the cable would snap any moment, plunging us down to a horrific death, I confessed every sin I’d ever committed — and what I’d planned to do to make up for each one.  Unfortunately, I had an audience … dang pesky American tourists along for the ride! … who so enjoyed the impromptu entertainment that they begged me step up to the mic for Amateur Comics Night on board the ship that night.

Fearing the funicular on the return trip like most people fear a root canal without anesthesia, we were told that we could simply walk down to the beach!  Going, the dreaded funicular was optional!  Good thing the Greeks were unschooled in Italian curses, or I’d have set American-Greek relations back a few hundred years.

That night, we set sail for the island of Lesbos, where we were unable to debark due to extremely rough waters.  An unexpected storm tore through our path, rocking the cruise ship a helluva lot worse than any runaway train down the New York City subway tracks.  The dining room was only one-third full when we arrived, with my husband already green at the gills.  One look at the bread basket and he nearly lost it.  A minute later, he was high-tailing it back to our cabin, with a lot of other passengers, just as green, hot on his heels.

Me? I ate and loved the entire, delicious meal.  The waiter eyed me as if I’d suddenly sprouted another head upon my shoulders, sort of like a child of Zeus.  “What’s for dessert?” I quipped, wiping my lips daintily as other passengers tossed their cookies ’round the dining room … and not the kind of cookies that came on a dessert tray.  I was enjoying the pleasant swaying motion of the ship, whose deck was now positioned skyward, at a 45-degree angle.  As glasses, dinnerware, and wine bottles slid off tables, as passengers slid beneath them, I asked the waiter, “Can you please make up a tray for my husband?  He missed his dinner; I’ll take it to him.”  Again, I got that odd look; I knew not why.

I negotiated the roiling deck uphill, balancing the tray like a pro and taking perverse pleasure in the obstacle course of scattered silverware, spilled wine, and doubled-over passengers.  I should probably insert here that I excelled at gymnastics in high school, due to my petite frame and height.  As my center of gravity is lower than most humans’, I never get seasick and very much enjoy a rocking ocean when I’m sailing upon one.

It took a few tries to steady the key in the lock of our cabin, as the door shifted along with the sea.  Once successful, I proffered the sumptuous tray to my husband, who was hanging out of our berth like a parched man off a camel in the desert.  “Look what I brought you!” I chirped.  “The entire dinner!”   He barely made it to the head intact and to this day, calls me a sadist for my innocent act of kindness.   To the sound of his upchucking, I fell into a blissful sleep, rocked as if in the cradle.  I still swear that that was the best night’s sleep of my entire life!

Our last day was spent on the beautiful, laid back isle of Mykonos … which the guides had failed to warn us boasted a topless beach.  “Cool!” I breathed, untying the top of my bikini under the hot sun.  “What the hell are you doing!?!” my husband thundered.  “No one on this beach knows us,” I pointed out reasonably.  “If I’m ever going to go topless, now’s the time.”  He gave me so much grief that I abandoned the idea, even as the eyes roll around in his head like errant pinballs at the sight of all the nubile, unbounded flesh.  “I’m sorry, I’m oblivious, I swear, I won’t look any more!” he promised.  But when we patronized a small food stand on the beach, the words that rolled off his tongue like butter were, “I’ll take two burgers, two Cokes, and two tits!”  In revenge, I managed to go topless for not quite 60 seconds before he tossed his towel over me like Sir Walter Raleigh throwing his cape over a noxious puddle.

En route back home, we got stopped again in the Athens airport.  This time, it was my box of Borghese® eye shadows that set off the alarms.  The very same guard eyed me with deep trepidation, easing the cover off the makeup case as he would the top of Pandora’s Box.   Nothing inimical in there but twenty gorgeous shades of sparking eye shadow (hey, this was the late ’80′s!). “I don’t understand,” he admitted in his thick accent.  “Me either,” I shrugged, and then, it dawned on us both.  The metals in the eye makeup had set off the alarms; they’d been overlooked the first time, in light of the tiny moustache scissors!  “Lady,” the guard muttered, closing the box with a shudder and handing it back to me, “You’re dangerous!”

“You don’t know the half of it,” my husband muttered under his breath. 

Veterinarians state that cats possess IQs similar to that of a human six-year-old child.  But vets lie.  From long association with two Applehead Siamese kitties, I can tell you that a human’s IQ, at any age, is miniscule compared to that of domestic felines.  I’d learned this before the second Christmas that Gremlin — named for the little imp in the old Bugs Bunny cartoon and not the tiny monsters in the popular film — graced my home with her presence.

Two weeks after Gremlin’s first birthday, Christmas Eve arrived.  In Italian-American tradition, I cooked the “feast of the seven fishes” as my family attended church and toured the neighborhood to enjoy the lights.  The mouthwatering scent of seafood-laden tomato sauce wafted through my house, where Gremlin and I were the sole creatures stirring.  Suddenly, a very distinct and unfamiliar male voice spoke clearly into my head.  In no uncertain terms, it urged, “Check the cat!”

I hadn’t imagined that voice; I wasn’t crazy.  And I couldn’t ignore the insistent voice or its implicit warning — for neither my husband nor I had ever called Gremlin by the plebeian term, “the cat.”  Clearly, this was something external.  I tossed down my ladle and the unseen Christmas angel who’d just spoken into my head led me one flight up.  Beneath my beautiful Christmas tree, on the open split-level overlooking the dining room, was Gremlin — curled beneath the tree, with a golden light bulb from the lowest branch clenched delicately in her tiny jaws.  The tree was lit!  One little crunch from those jaws and she’d be toast, literally, or prey to a horrible death by broken glass!  Terrified, I unplugged the tree at once and wove the lowest-hanging strand of lights out of her reach.

My husband, who always reverts to childhood at Christmas, wasn’t thrilled with the darkened tree.  Rob him of any single glitzy, commercial symbol of Christmas and he morphs into Scrooge.  He vowed that we would outsmart Gremlin the following Christmas, so that we could have a tree with “all that glittered.”

True to his word, the following year, as Gremlin dozed peacefully upstairs, my husband put his finger to his lips and drew two half-circles of fabric from a shopping bag.  Quilted and printed with sprigs of holly, these were no ordinary tree skirts — or half skirts.  Hidden within the quilting was an electric wire attached to a remote control device.  The dial on the control was clearly marked, “Kitten, medium-sized cat, large cat.”  “What the hell is this?!?” I demanded with a sick feeling in my stomach.

“You put the half-circles together under the tree to form a full circle,” said my husband, sotto voce.  “There’ll be a bit of carpeting exposed, in the area that the skirts won’t cover — right around the tree stand, just like a regular tree skirt.  But that’s okay; there’s no way that Gremlin is going to step into that zone after she hot-foots it on the skirts.  It’s a very, very low-level electrical jolt.”

“No!!!!!”

“It trains her not to get close to the tree and keeps her safe.”

“She’s not one of Pavlov’s dogs,” I reminded him with narrowed eyes.  “She’s a Siamese cat, the Albert Einstein of all domestic felines.  She won’t take orders. And I’ll be damned if you electrocute her, even mildly!”

“Look,” he said testily. “I’m the father figure here.  I’m going to train her!  I want the tree and all the trimmings.  We want to keep Gremlin safe.  This is the best way to accomplish both.”

“She sees you put those things under the tree, she’ll figure it all out,” I warned.

“I thought of that,” he grinned evilly.  “You stay behind closed doors with her while I do all the work.  I’ll put up the tree, trim it, and install the tree skirts.  The nosy little thing won’t see me working; she won’t be forewarned. And she’ll train easily; you’ll see.”

‘though something told me Gremlin would get the best of my husband, I agreed to his madness.  It gave me, you see, more than three hours of peace, an unprecedented respite during the insanity of the holiday.  Three hours in which I read, napped, and stroked Gremlin, who sat beside me as my husband connived in secret, behind a closed door, to dupe her. “Let her loose!” he finally bellowed up from the split-level, like a lion tamer ordering his assistant to let the lionesses into the circus arena.

Sprung, Gremlin ran immediately to the top of the stairs and peered down, spying a winter kitty carnival.  There was an enticing Christmas tree, a forest of bright baubles ripe for swatting around and all-aglow with enticing lights.  She also eyed the half skirts, awaiting her like an executioner ready to throw the switch.  On soft paws, she padded to the bottom of the stairs and then, in one fell swoop, leapt gracefully through the air to land squarely and unerringly in the small circle of carpeting uncovered by the electric skirts.

For an animal of her size, her balletic jette was equal to a human jumping the length of an Olympic-sized swimming pool without ever touching water.  Not a paw, not a whisker, not a silken hair of Gremlin’s had brushed the electrified fabric.  That small patch of carpet was, to her, what an American Embassy would be to a U.S. citizen in a pickle overseas.  And the look in Gremlin’s sapphire blue eyes clearly telegraphed to my husband, “Pathetic human! Mine is the superior intellect!”

I laughed myself silly.  Gremlin remained inscrutable in her safe haven, licking her paws in studied nonchalance and every once in a while, glancing at my husband from slit, knowing eyes.  Understanding when to concede defeat, he unplugged the tree and proceeded to dismantle it, lights, faux pine boughs, and ornaments.  Never again has a Christmas tree graced our home.  Gremlin trained my husband very, very well!

Other Christmas Articles:

White Christmas

A Practical, Magical Christmas

My Christmas List

The Star in the Window

The Origin of Saint Nicholas

The Empty Stocking

The Most Meaningful Gift

Christmas Eve in Italy (Vigilia di Natale in Italia)

A Christmas Tree Grows in Brooklyn

The Hope Still Lives

The 25th of December

Merry Mithras

An Old Fashioned Christmas

Surviving the Holidays: 24 Useful Tips

La Famiglia

How often have you heard and dismissed the phrase “time is money” as an old cliché?  But, if you really give it thought, it makes a lot of sense.  If you hire a person to, for example, rake and weed your lawn, the cost includes that person’s labor as well as the supplies that he needs.  If you order a meal in a restaurant, the cost covers not only the food but also the time that it took to prepare that meal.  Labor translates to time or man-hours worked.  Understanding that, let’s take a look at the average paycheck.

After a week of work, an hourly employee receives a check for hours that he or she put in on the job.  A salaried employee is paid for his or her time as well, but the actually hourly compensation may vary from pay period to pay period.  A closer look at that paycheck reveals that the gross sum is larger than the net (take-home pay).  The difference between the two figures represent governmental deductions:

1.       Federal tax

2        State tax

3.       Local tax

4.       Union Dues (if applicable)

Add up all the deductions and divide the total by the hourly rate of pay.  The resulting figure illustrates how many hours were worked to pay those deductions.  For example:

$10.00/hour x 40 hours = $400

Total Deductions = $80

400 divided by 80 is 5.

That makes 5 hours worked by an employee just to satisfy Uncle Sam.

And now we get down to the nitty-gritty of a union worker’s check.  Let’s say that you are a union laborer, working a three-day holiday weekend (i.e., Memorial Day).  You might receive:

1.       Time and a half for Saturday (equating to 12 hours of pay)

2.       Double time for Sunday (equating to 16 hours of pay)

3.       Double time and a half for Monday (the actual holiday, equating to 20 hours of pay).

Total up those hours and you’ll see that you would have been paid for 48 hours worked. In addition to your 40 regular hours worked the rest of the week, you’d have racked up grand total of 88 hours in the shop for which you are to be paid.  At $10.00 an hour, your gross pay would have been $880 for that week.

As you review your big fat paycheck, reality slaps you upside the head.  Your gross pay did increase, but it increased along with your deductions, the latter of which are based upon percentages.  When $80 was deducted from $400, as shown above, it accounted for 20% of the paycheck.  But 20% of $880 is $176.00.  At $10.00 an hour, that turns out to be 17.6 hours worked solely to pay those taxes.

As they say in Denmark, “Aw shucks!”  Your wife and kids were ticked off because you weren’t there to barbeque or picnic or go to the beach with them on the long holiday weekend.  And you were ticked because you got shortchanged, literally.  But, the good ol’ boys in government had a blast with your hard-earned money and never missed a beat enjoying the fruits of your blood, sweat, and tears!

You were screwed by percentages and not just as you perused that dwindled paycheck.  By April 15th of the following year, you will have spent many hours trying to recover your wages from the IRS (Internal Revenue Service), or as I like to think of this agency, The Income Removal Service.

To add insult to injury, think about this.  If you did not work that holiday weekend, you would have had three days off to relax with your family and enjoy life, instead of being tied to your job.  And, the extra money that you did not remit to the government would have been time well spent! 

As the famous rhyme goes, “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.”  Indeed he did, ‘though the rhyme doesn’t mention the little fact that Columbus was waaaaaaaaaaay off course.  Intending to discover a shorter trade route to India, for its prized spices and silks, he pitched his scheme to the Queen of Spain.  Immediately, pesos danced before Her Majesty’s eyes.  Columbus’ eyes, too, for the Queen promptly bankrolled the intrepid explorer’s expedition.  She even outfitted him with three fine sailing vessels, which he christened in honor of his two ex-girlfriends and a long-suffering saint who put the bug in Queen Isabella’s ear: the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria.

While Columbus made off with the loot and the ships, he was duped by the dude who sold him his compass; his fleet wound up navigating the wrong part of the globe.  Thus did Columbus stumble upon a new continent. And that’s when all the trouble started.  A sly fox, he knew how to turn lemons into lemonade.  He figured he could placate the Queen by hauling Chicago back to her.  But, all was not so hunky dory.

In later years, everyone and his brother sought to lay claim to being the first to step foot upon the once beautiful, once unsullied North America.  The Irish claim that one of their own was the first to land here, striking out in a tiny boat that only Divine Intervention could have seen safely upon the fierce Atlantic.  Then again, perhaps the Irishman had been fortified by a wee nip, or more than a wee.

Meanwhile, Nordic people claim evidence of Vikings having landing in the region long before Columbus.  Since Columbus is now vilified in politically correct circles for setting the stage to bilk the Native Americans of their land, I’m surprised that anyone wants to claim having landed here first!

For argument’s sake, let’s say it was those bloodthirsty Vikings.  If Leif Erikson were credited with discovering America, would our land today be known as Erikstadt, Eriksylvania, or Eriksland?  Would the natives have been called Rodemenneskers?  Can you imagine John Wayne’s impassioned, “Rodemennesker!” instead of “Comanche!”?

And would General Gorge Custer’s last words at the Battle of Little Bighorn have been, “Where are all these Rodemenneskers coming from?”  In the time it took him to utter, “Rodemenneskers,” he and his men would have died all the faster.  Maybe this is why we celebrate Columbus in America, and not Leif Erikson.

But, the arguments as to who got here first continue, as do those surrounding Columbus’ true nationality.  I was present in a local tavern when a barroom brawl erupted as to whether the explorer was Portuguese, Spanish, or Italian.  As the argument escalated, more customers got involved, gesticulating wildly, hurling slurs, and making threats.  Patty the bartender could not believe his eyes or ears as he watched good friends and neighbors descend into hostility.  It wasn’t that he didn’t enjoy a good fight; he feared for the safety of his establishment.  All those bottles behind the bar did not come cheap!

Taking the bull by the horns and pounding his fist vehemently on the bar, Patty got the crowd’s attention, thundering in his Irish brogue,  “Dis has gone too far, ya jaloons! We need a referee for the lot o’ ya eejits; somebody’s gotta make da final decision as to dis bleedin’ argument, and dat somebody is me!“

And with that, he gave us all a round of drinks on the house.  After the cheering had died down, Patty said, “I’ll settle the question of Columbus’ nationality, I will.  He was a PortuGreaser.  And while we’re on da topic, everyone knows it was dat Irishman in dat wee little boat dat discovered America.  God bless America and God bless dat wee little nip that saw ‘im across da ragin’ sea!”

Now, I would like to toast Christopher Columbus, no matter what he was or where he is.  Join me, please, in raising your glasses to that geographically clueless SOB, Christoforo Columbus.

In light of the current climate of our nation — a total lack of humor with respect to ethnicity — I apologize to any who may have been offended by this article. It wasn’t my intent to offend, but rather, to make you laugh.  Besides.  We all know that Columbus was Italian! 

Related Articles:

The Curious Case of Christopher Columbus: A Study in Historical Revisionism

Christopher Columbus On Trial

As Moammar Khadafy (alternately spelled Gadhafi or Gaddafi) exits the world stage, fashionistas everywhere are no doubt mourning his loss.  Known for his cutting edge use of color, bling, and especially hats as fashion accessories, Khadafy was always outfitted to make a statement (although, the exact meaning of that statement was not always readily apparent).

Mo, as his friends call him, likes to don his military dress uniform for special occasions.

And, he is always surrounded by his crack staff of colorful, impeccably dressed bodyguards.  Hugh Hefner has nothing on Mo.

 During state visits, Mo frequently wears his royal garb, using gold accents and green earth tones to give him a peaceful, yet noble appearance.

For everyday governing, Moammar favors attire in the red, blue, purple family of colors – often combining colors to make bold fashion statements.

At home, Mo often wears basic black.

But, don’t confuse him with Bob Dylan, for whom he is frequently mistaken.

Yet, Mo will be best remembered for his signature use of tans and browns that so beautifully complemented his swarthy, rugged skin tone and texture.

So, as we bid a fond farewell to Mo, we also remember that he is a man for all fashion seasons. 

Yesterday’s market sell-off caught many investors off guard. Among the most high profile of those with substantial losses yesterday was the E-Trade Baby.

 I sincerely hope this will not end his career in television commercials.

At the tail end of July, as the temperature creeps toward the 100-degree mark here in New Jersey, and the A/C system in my office continues to taunt me and the other residents of this building, temptation rears its cool little head.  I’m thinking of purchasing a pool, but I’m stalling … probably because of the memories I have, all wrapped up in slimy pool liners and chlorine-flavored water.

When I was a kid, I never had a swimming pool.  There simply wasn’t room for one, unless one of our family members was brave enough to dig up my grandmother’s amazing roses, herbs, zucchini, and prized fig tree.  No one was that brave, not even my grandfather, who had fought in World War I and had the scars to prove it!

So, before my two best friends Kim and Billy got their pools, I once made the long trek into another neighborhood on foot, in search of a public pool. Known as Farragut Pool, it was located deep in the heart of the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, New York. My friend Anita, whose family had more money than mine, had snagged a season pass to this pool, as had her brother and sister.  “Your mom is great!” I exclaimed, withering inside and secretly wondering if my own mother loved me less than Anita’s. What had never occurred to me then was that Anita’s mom probably thought she gotten off cheaply by buying season passes for her three kids and thereby getting them out of her hair on those long, hot Brooklyn days when air conditioning was still an amenity for the truly wealthy.

Anita sang the praises of this pool as if it were a Roman mineral bath laden with special healing properties.  Thus, I bugged and bugged my mom until she eked out enough dough to get me into the pool for a single, expectantly blissful day.  I packed my towel, bathing suit, Coppertone sunscreen lotion and headed off for my maiden voyage to Farragut Pool with Anita, Kim, and our other good friend, Laura.

The pool was large and brilliantly blue; under the white-hot sun, diamonds danced upon the inviting water.  Gaggles of children and harried parents dove in and out of the pool, splashing everything in their path and batting around inflatable beach balls.  The tempting aroma of grilled hot dogs and burgers wafted upon the humid July air.   My friends, all strong swimmers, slid into the deep end of the pool.  But me, I had to be content with the kiddy area of the pool, a rather embarrassing situation for a nine year old dying to fit in and frolick with her friends.  Not having the financial resources of Anita’s family, and possessed of a mother who screamed bloody murder each time I came within ten feet of the surf at Manhattan Beach, I had never learned to swim.

Once out of the pool and onto the blistering cement surrounding it, I hot-footed my way toward the cabana, stepping by accident onto the towel of a teenaged princess wearing … you got it! … a teeny weeny polka dot bikini.  Said princess cussed me like a sailor every which way to Sunday, thus adding insult to injury (blisters were indeed forming on the soles of my feet).

Inside the cabana, which smelled of other people’s sweat and stuff I’d rather not mention, I stripped off my sodden one-piece suit just as another patron hauled the door open, exposing me to one and all within eye-shot.  Needless to say, I never again patronized the Farragut Pool.   A few years after this incident, the public pool was demolished to make way for a Pathmark, the first supermarket in a neighborhood dotted with small, family-owned grocery stores.

Bowing to pressure from their four children as Pathmark’s foundation was poured, Kim’s parents bought a large outdoor pool from Sears.  It was supposed to have been the summer’s respite for those four kids, their two cousins with whom they’d shared the same roof, the friends of those kids, including yours truly, and various and sundry neighborhood strays who always drifted down, somehow, to the sounds of delighted splashing and children’s laughter.

But, still I could not swim, and still, Donald haunted that pool.  Kim’s older cousin, he was already six feet tall at the age of fifteen and my nemesis.  Young and innocent, it never occurred to me that I could pretty much cripple Donald if I chose to grab a certain part of his anatomy as he dunked me and held me under the water — as he did invariably on every visit to Kim’s pool.  I exacted my revenge upon Donald in other ways.

At the end of that first summer with Kim’s pool, the pool had to be cleaned and Kim and I were conscripted for this task.  Funny, but all those other kids who’d enjoyed the pool with us were nowhere to be found that day or for the rest of that week.  If you’ve never manually cleaned an outdoor pool, a pool drained of its water, you have no notion of how utterly disgusting a task this is.  It was putrid.  It was stomach churning. I vowed never to step a foot in that pool again if it meant cleaning it, and I kept my word.  And sweltered!

The following summer, Billy’s family got a pool for their backyard.  But with five kids, three of them boys, it was more like a feeding frenzy in a shark tank.

The summer that the Billy’s pool arrived, I’d taken a little job teaching English to an 8th grader whose mom was desperate for her to enter Catholic high school, my high school, via better grades.  So I tutored the pretty blond girl, received my wages, and got a bonus in the form of a red bikini whose top had obviously been engineered for Mattell’s Barbie and not skinny lil’ ol’ me.  But, I had grown a few curves in my freshman year of high school, and my frugal parents had taught me never to waste anything.

So, I donned the bikini and innocently stepped into Billy’s pool.  Whereupon, his little brother Johnny, who’s probably doing time in Sing-Sing now, lunged for me.  Without warning, he pulled down my bikini top to get a good look at what lay beneath it.  It happened in the blink of an eye and Johnny, apparently, liked what he saw, even though I was nowhere in Barbie’s league.  In fact, the look in his eye was akin to that of a little boy finding a long-hoped for present beneath his Christmas tree.

This behavior and rapid-fire remarks as to my feminine pulchritude, earned Johnny a black eye from Billy.  In the screaming match that ensued, whereupon I was looking for that hole going down to China that I can never find when just I need it most, I slunk away with my arms over my chest, leaving the bikini top floating blithely between the two warring brothers.  It was the first and last time I ever visited Billy’s pool.

Years later, my boyfriend got a pool for his backyard.  He also had a young German shepherd who adored me … a pooch, not a strapping young man!  …  and the feeling was mutual.  That dog (honest) used to pee with joy whenever he saw me coming down the drive.  My boyfriend had to hose down the driveway every time I visited.  That sweet dog just couldn’t get enough of me, and I loved him to pieces.  But when the pool went up, the dog went in — to be close to me.  He would not take direction; he wanted to swim with me, who could not swim … still!   But dog hair in the pool, the smell of moist dog, and impromptu showers from said dog shaking the water off his fur put an end to me going into the pool.  My guy had chained the shepherd up one day so that we could enjoy the pool in peace, but my heart broke for the poor, whimpering dog.  End of that!

So, as cool and inviting as thought of my very own outdoor pool may be, I think I’ll stay put on dry land.  Or maybe not.  I wonder how big of a glass I can find for a nice, cool raspberry margarita. Maybe I can take a dive in that! 

Once again, I find myself sitting on my canopied deck, which I have nicknamed Shangri-La.  Here I am, conversing with a replica of Saint Francis (okay, so it’s a one-way conversation).  I was telling Saint Francis  about God’s infinite wisdom, vis a vis the promise that we mortals will achieve everlasting life in the Kingdom of Heaven, in return for following the Commandments handed down to Moses eons ago.

During this one-sided conversation, I think I may have stumbled upon the revelation to the mysterious wonders that our Creator has promised.  So, I’ve decided to share it with you, dear readers.

Although we were promised life everlasting, God has never revealed the exact location of his Kingdom (Heaven).  As taught to good Catholic boys and girls, and as preached in other sects and religions, Heaven is a place hidden high above the clouds.  Much like the ancient lamasery of Shangri-La, lying sheltered in the towering mountains of Tibet, Heaven is a final resting place where the inhabitants live worry free.

Gee it almost sounds like a PSE&G ad!  Anyway …

I was explaining the miracle of Creation to my silent companion, as told in the Bible via the analogy of the seven days needed to complete Project Planet Earth.  I regaled St. Francis with the various phases of creation: of how God parted darkness from light, constructed the flora and fauna, and placed the animals on land, the fowl in the air, and the fish in the sea.  “Mother Nature, St. Francis,” I clarified to the inscrutable statue of he who so loved the animals.  “It’s what we down here call Mother Nature.”

And then it hit me.  The Lord was telling us very clearly that … to quote an old Belinda Carlisle song … “Heaven is a place on Earth!”

Yes, friends!  Crown me, for I have found heaven!  It’s right beneath our very feet!  How do I know this?  Mother Nature works the same way that God works.  So, is God, in reality, Mother Nature?  Well, that’s fodder for another article.  Right now, let’s compare Mother Nature’s modus operandi with that of God the Almighty.

In Mother Nature’s world, the four-footed, eight-footed, aerial, and finned creatures inhabiting this planet do not work for their existence.  This is how God Himself fashioned these critters.  And yet, they are provided with food, shelter, and their own form of clothing (feathers, fur, or scales).  In other words, the basics of survival.  Man, however, is compelled to toil his butt off for his basic necessities, particularly in this post-Bush, current-Obama economy.   If I give this too much thought, I’d think that we were cheated because God, and Mother Nature, had played favorites!

Getting back to my revelation and powers of deduction (which, quite frankly, seem to be rivaling those of Sherlock Holmes today), we know that when something dies in the natural world, whether it is animal or vegetable, it returns to the earth either as food for the living inhabitants or as nutrients that nourish the soil from which grow the crops that sustain all forms of life, one way or another.  This is called the nitrogen cycle.  How is this not Heaven-on-Earth?   These are the keys to eternal (self-renewing) life!

These facts, coupled with careful deduction and consolations with the solver of The DaVinci Code (Tom Hanks, disguised as Doctor What’s His Name), I have concluded that we mere mortals can enjoy everlasting life by the way that we are returned to the Earth.  The ancient Chinese, you see, believed in a specific form of reincarnation.  It was a process whereby a person was transformed, after death of the body, into some living thing that he or she disliked while he/she was alive (i.e., animal, vegetable, or for all I know, mineral as well).  I guess that’s where the old saying, “Don’t kick horseshit; it may be your Uncle,” comes from.

Getting back to our central subject, now.  Think, please about the road along which a dead person must journey immediately following clinical death:

1.       Investigation and autopsy (for undocumented deaths)

2.       Funeral arrangements

3.       Burial/interment or cremation

Mandated by law, the above-mentioned rituals can become extremely expensive.  But, we can dispense with these costs, and the proceeds can be used to finance the deceased’s grandchildren’s college tuitions.

We can dispense with autopsies, embalming, caskets, and other deathly accoutrements; all we need is some inexpensive cotton gauze.  What was good for the wise ancient Egyptians ought to be good for us.  We can wrap the bodies in the gauze in preparation for interment, then dig a hole in the ground, and let Mother Earth accept what she is about to receive.  Thus, we will feed the nitrogen cycle.

Now here is where everlasting life truly begins.  By planting a tree above the gravesite of the deceased, instead of an expensive granite stone marker, the tree will flourish as a result of the added nitrogen (the deceased), and the tree shall bear fruit.  If the deceased loved apples, then plant an apple tree in his/her memory.  When it bears fruit, the loved ones left behind on this Earth can enjoy his/her memory by tasting of the fruits of these non-verboten trees.  If the deceased loved peaches, the family and friends will enjoy peaches, and so on.  This takes care of the cycle of reincarnation; there is no need to reincarnate as something you don’t like!  I would, however, steer clear of planting gorgeous white oleander trees, whose beautiful blooms are deadly if ingested, thus demanding the planting of yet additional trees!

Cemeteries as we now know them will become non-existent.  Instead, orchards will blanket the land in the way that Johnny Appleseed once envisioned but never quite caused to be, despite his best efforts.  No doubt, the fruits of those orchards will appear in our local supermarkets.  Hey, it’s cheaper to buy local than it is to import.  And as the Good Book says,  “… and by their fruits you shall know them.”

As in the Biblical Kingdom of Heaven, where God takes care of everyone and everything, so does Mother Nature, right here on Heaven on Earth.  Or rather, Heaven as Earth!  In their infinite wisdom, both God and Mother Nature complete the cycle of life without waste.  If we eat the natural fruits of the land, when we go to Heaven on Earth, others will eat us.  Remember … only God can make a tree.  Or is that Mother Nature? 

Among all of the music world’s one-hit wonders, Zager & Evans, the rock-pop duo formed by Denny Zager and Rick Evans in the early 60’s, is the first to pop into my mind.  Their hit recording, In the Year 2525, topped the Billboard charts in the U.S. for six weeks in 1969, a period during which popular culture was forever changed by two seminal events, the first manned moon landing by Americans Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin and the Woodstock Festival.

The song speculated about the nature of the future and mankind’s part in it traversing the period from the years 2525 to 9595.  Although not particularly original, the ideas expressed by the song’s lyrics – along with an email I received, stimulated my own thoughts about the future; albeit, a future not so distant as that portrayed in the song.

I have always been fascinated by the thought of time travel as a means of discovering how mankind’s past has shaped its present and future.  And so, I have traveled into the future – at least in my own mind, and now share with you some headlines from the year 2054.

In the news…

Statue of Liberty Displays New Signage: “Screw You, Blood Sucking Foreigners!”  Holds up Middle Finger in Lieu of Torch

Millions Die from Ozone Created by Electric Cars in the Recently Annexed Mexican State of California

Spotted Owl Plagues Northwestern U.S. Crops and Livestock

U.S. Postal Service Raises First-Class Stamp to $17.76, Reduces Delivery Schedule to Wednesdays

In world and interplanetary affairs…

France Pleads for Global Assistance after Takeover by Jamaica

Americans Jailed for Jumping U.S.-Mexican Border … Into Mexico!

Fidel Castro Finally Dies at Age 128 – Cuban Cigars Can Now Be Imported Legally, But President Chelsea Clinton Bans All Smoking

Sheiks Pay $500 per Gallon at Gas Pumps after Israel Levels Middle East.  Camel Market Soars.

Pollution on Mars Reaches Zenith in Wake of Mass-Human Migration

In science…

Scientists Cross Pigeons with Rats; New Yorkers Assaulted in Streets and on Roof Tops

Mutated Cats and Dogs Escape from Pharma-Testing Facility; Conduct Experiments on Humans

Baby Conceived Naturally! Scientists Stumped!!

Fountain of Youth Discovered in Peoria.  Nobody Jumps In!

In religion…

Roman Catholic Priest Renounces Vows, Leaves Church to Marry Choir Boy

Followers of the Late Harold Camping Post Billboards Guaranteeing the Lord’s Return on May 21, 2051

Jesus Finally Returns to Earth.  Says, “What a Mess!” and Ascends to Heaven

In politics…

George Z. Bush Announces Formation of Exploratory Committee for 2056 Presidential Run

Couple Petitions Supreme Court to Reinstate Heterosexual Marriage

U.S. Congress Votes to Increase Debt Ceiling to $20.4 Quadrillion

In entertainment…

Dick Clark’s Mummified Corpse to Host This Year’s New Years Rockin’ Eve; Larry King to Co-Host

Suri Cruise, Daughter of Tom and Katie, Establishes Roman Catholic Convent

Chaz Bono Enters Monastery After Reversing Sex Change Operation in His … Her … Golden Years

Daughter of the Late Lady Gaga, Lady GooGoo, Shocks Music World by Performing Fully Clothed!!! 

In spite of all the hoopla about a government shutdown, the need to balance the budget, Presidential birth certificates, and who shot Osama Bin Ladin, both the media and the White House have been eerily silent about J-Day.

The only hint I have seen of this prophesied event of the Second Coming of Jesus, to render judgment upon the world, has been in articles posted on writeonnewjersey.com, articles that have created a firestorm of controversy. Otherwise, the silence is deafening.  It boggles my mind that no one else is interested in this literally Earth-shattering prediction.  If it does come to pass and Jesus pulls the plug on us, there will be no need to worry about paying back our debts to the Chinese or even the banks underwriting our credit cards. You know, it almost sounds like heaven!

According to the sagacious Father Guido Sarducci, when the end comes you will have to pay for your sins.  At the final judgment, we will each receive an endowment of $15,000 dollars to pay for our sins.  Not much of an endowment, I’ll admit, but Father Sarducci preached to the faithful decades ago, before Chevy Chase was forced to make those awful “vacation” movies and before rampant inflation besieged us all.

The good Father also explained that each sin will be assigned a monetary value.  Small sins, such as self-gratification, or what the Church would call self-abuse, can cost a mere 35 cents. But depending upon how often you indulge yourself, that 35 cents can add up exponentially, running into hundreds if not thousands of dollars.  More serious sins, such as stealing or adultery, carry a heftier price.  And the ultimate sin — murder — can run into the millions.  So, you see, that $15,000 will not cover much if you have lived a wicked life.

What, then, will befall, the truly wicked if they cannot pay the piper?  Will they end up impaled or have strawberries growing out of their nether-regions, as do the pitifully damned in the paintings of Bosch?  Will they be forced to watch re-runs of “Charles in Charge?”  Will they be compelled to listen to Lindsay Lohan’s album, or worse, her incessant excuses to the judge?   Quake now with fear, for the answer is “No!”  The punishment will be far worse than you may imagine.

According to Father Sarducci, if you should run out of money, you will be sent back to Earth in order to increase your income (and in this economy, that sounds like hell to me).  However, you will not be returned as the same person you were when you quit this earth.  Wicked people return as nuns, sewer workers, or (shudder!) Star Jones.

Of course, if God turns out to be related to Charles Darwin, the Second Coming would herald a return to nature.  We could swing blithely through the trees in the canopy, gorging ourselves on fruits and veggies and crying, “Brad Pitt!” or “Angelina!” rather than “Tarzan!” or “Jane!” and alternately calling for Chunky Monkey ice cream and hot fudge sauce to go with all of those bananas.  In light of the economy, this might even be a step up for some, but certainly, not the end of the world.

So why isn’t the good news of our imminent demise being spread?  Is Big Oil or Wall Street trying to cash in before the s**t hits the fan?  Or is J-Day but a myth conjured up by certain religious leaders of the world in the hope of scaring their followers into donating their wealth as repentance?

Only time will tell, and we’re running out of time.  Forewarned, as they say, is forearmed.  On the 20^th of May, if the White House or the news media interrupts your TV viewing with a special announcement before midnight, you can put your head between your legs and kiss your ass goodbye!