All Entries in the "Fractured Opinion" Category

Yemanja and the Rain – Candomble Chants Awaken the Spirits

Perhaps the drought crept in from Laguna Negra, carried on the fangs of poisonous reptiles from the somewhere where rains persisted and hills were plush with green. Some say so. Already in December a forest fire charred the land and the trees were crisp with foreboding. A lone skinny pine waiting for the next spark, spared the first time around.

The grand affair of fire, rain and rebirth in cactus and acacias has been interrupted. No rain fell along the South Atlantic coast from November to February. Dust has replaced sea breeze. Only the sand is unchanged. This was 2010. In 2021 another even more devastating drought threatens daily life in the country of Uruguay.

Stars and silence were my companions. Living on my wooded land in a field tent offered many pleasures, one of which was not the luxury of cooking over an open fire. I didn’t dare. From November through April I ate a lot of cheese, nuts and apples. I went out for coffee. Beer helps on the more stressful days.

One night I had neighbors from Montevideo at a cabin down the way. They stopped to say hello and seemed impressed with my woodsman within. My tent was complete with airbed, blankets, pillows and sheets. Outside were chairs and a desk along with outhouse, the plans of which were concocted by a famous New York architect Peter Francois, now of Chuy.

Despite tradition there was no bidet anywhere on the property or even an aviary since it as far too dry to rely on carrier pigeons to conduct our daily commerce. Rope and garlic surrounded my leafy perimeter, compliments of a local who said they would keep snakes away. That may have worked since in six-month residency I never saw any one.

Even though the sky rain-coated itself in clouds and darkness there was little moisture in the air. I accepted an invitation to join my neighbors on their patio for a glass of wine. The bunched up woodlands running to the beach afforded a quiet rest from the heat of the day.

After lamenting at the lack of rain one of the young women looking more Gitana than Galician began talking to a Guarani goddess she called Yemanja. The others smiled peacefully familiar with the chanting.

“Oh Yemanja, hear your thirsty children. We are sad and alone. Surely your tears will drench the land and save us from the flames,” she sang out. One of the men told me Yemanja was a sea goddess. The others brought out candles, flowers, perfumes and fruit to decorate an altar for her blessings and approval.

“All your tears will make it rain.”

“Kind of like the Virgin thing, isn’t it,” smirked one of the kids to the frowns of the Gitana. “Isn’t everything in Latin America?” said another.

Candomble is an ancient African religion that passed through the slave markets of Montevideo in the 1600s. Many people still adhere to its colorful rituals, mixing it masterfully with Iberian Catholicism and pieces of the surviving Guarani culture.

The Gitana kept up the chanting, encouraging all to join her, which we did. We sat on the porch focused on the goddess and the rain. An occasional breeze gave us hope. A sense of the sea gave us salty energy. We sipped our wine and tried to concentrate as a group. Nothing but our chanting filled the night. Pleas to Yemanja fell to the dry ground unheard. Our petitions lost on a lonely coast in the middle of the night. Then…solo raindrop. Then another.

We looked at each other part in shock, part in celebration. In moments here would be enough water to dance above, below and between the drops. Then a little more rain and the sandy path home felt good under my bare feet. It had rained.

Two days later a major storm arrived from the east drenching the village and the region for 2 days. The land began to return to normal. All your tears will make it rain.

And I for one don’t care if you buy my story or not. I was there. I heard the chanting. I chanted. It rained all he way through the Pampas to Paysandu and from La Paloma to the Brazilian frontier.

February 2 is the Feast Day for Yemanja when thousands of worshippers descend on beaches from Montevideo to Bahia bearing candles, flowers, perfumes and fruit to petition the goddess of rain to intercede on behalf of a mistreated planet.

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Children’s Advocacy PAC Slams Leftist Media

(Dayton, OH) A little know child-advocacy committee has criticized a host of former allies in what they call the irresponsible liberal media. The alleged charges, according to persons familiar with the case, will likely morph into a civil lawsuit with potentially embarrassing results for all parties concerned.

The legal action claims “associating personality traits of innocent four-year-olds with former president Donald Trump is libelous to children and borders on child abuse”.

Initiated on the grounds that children were unfairly “linked to abnormal behavior on the part of an adult” (Trump) the suit has expanded to include the bugaboo card (abuse claims) and seeks to clearly identify victims and perpetrators.

“Every time we hear the liberal media lambaste Trump as a four-year-old it casts negative light on millions of pre-school Americans,” said Betsy Devisive, one of hundreds of former Education Secretaries tied to our schools. “It’s unacceptable. It makes these kids look bad and must stop.”

Defenders of the comparison say they never meant to compare anyone to anyone else.

“What a spin these bastards put on everything,” said Stan Pureheart (D-Costa Rica). “Instead of understanding the expectations of maturity levels and putting the ball in play these critics refuse to see the patterns of behavior here. We are saying that Trump is a baby not that all four-year-olds need a spanking!”

One independent voice from the back of the room said: “Democrats should be happy they have the GOP across the aisle allowing them to escape the scrutiny of inaction and naked class privilege that has haunted our political institutions since Yorktown. The Republicans should be relieved that their adversaries have no plan and no teeth to go with that absent plan. Both parties have more in common with each other than with the average working American.

Sadly, when asked, most heel-digger supporters of Trump did not recognize the reference to Yorktown in this piece nor could they expound on any analogies made to The Reichstag. Since none carried maps of the world no further instruction was possible. Many called the question itself fake news and ranted on about Hillary’s emails.

Meanwhile mob violence in the United States has achieved great strides in entertaining its detractors all over the globe while strengthening anti-democratic dictatorships as agreed to in the Putin Doctrine, loosely disguised as a take-out Chinese menu, and signed into law by the Senate on Thursday.

– Finn McCool

New decades and old resolutions

“We’ll be in Richmond by summer or I’ll eat Mr. Lincoln’s hat.”

-General George B. McClellan, Army of the Potomac, January 1, 1862.

“I can’t believe the bear ate Grandpa. Next year we’ll have to be more careful.”

– Melvin Bedwetter-Toole, Glacier National Park, Montana.

“I hope to go peacefully in a whiskey barrel and end up in Heaven on Sunday afternoon.”

– If Wishes Were Nickels, by Attila Gudgeon Jr. Testosterone Bros., Boston

It’s New Year’s Resolution season again but don’t despair, this is not one of those stupid resolution columns that demands towering commitments or a burning desire for improvement. Although documented episodes of out with the old, in with the new exist throughout the annals of history, perhaps there is no better time to categorize these vows than at the beginning of a decade.

Conveniently enough, this enlightened harvest of historically linked passages arrived in our semi-cognizant copy basket on New Year’s Eve. While we realize that there are a multitude of promises and pledges that have had far more impact on mankind, we have chosen to focus on resolutions that were actually kept.

Despite other images that this piece may conjure up, it is apparent that the elements, the planets, and the gods have always looked favorably on 20th year resolution makers. It’s kind of an eleventh hour plus nine thing.

It should be of some relief to all that Big Brother has yet to get around to making these annual covenants mandatory for all citizens. Our earliest concurrent reference point is 600* that, in itself, represents an epic journey into the past by a bush league research team that has yet to recover from the office Christmas party.

Centuries after Guana, a Neanderthal inhabiting Asia Minor in about 4521 BC, started her New Year by promising that she would get her family out of “this drafty old cave and into something modular”, St. Augustine started the ball rolling. Curiously enough it was January 1 in the 20th Year of the 6th Century. The stodgy bandwagon moralist had promised Pope Gregory he would convert Britain to Christianity. Two months later he baptized a leading antagonist, Ethelbert of Kent. Ethelbert would go on to become one of the most abrasive lounge singer/performers in Canterbury. Seeing what he had done, Augustine made a second resolution in which he promised never to discuss religion or politics. He then retired to a remote monastery to write his memoirs. Highlights of other maintained resolutions quite possibly include:

721 AD: Marauding Arabs, searching for the legendary oil reserves described by the Roman poet, Sinclair, sack Carthage mistaking it for the planned community of Mesopotamia. Their leader, Caliph Abdelmelik III, then makes a New Year’s Resolution to have a map of Asia Minor stenciled on his right forearm.

821 AD: Byzantine Empress Irene overthrows her son, Constantine, blinds him, and assumes sole power. She then proposes to marry Charlemagne. After repeated rejections of that conjugal arrangement, Irene promises to quit chasing men and to stop blinding people. Despite her behavior and due to family money, the Greek Orthodox Church later canonized her.

921:  After a string of architectural disasters, early electrical contractor, Alfonso III, resolves only to wire castles built with drywall. Saracens, looking for an open service station, get into a gas war with Bulgarians. In January they make a resolution to put their condos in the Holy Land on the market in order to pay for further military excursions into Europe.

1021: On December 31 Danes promise to stop sacking the Irish Coast but they don’t say anything about rape and/or pillage. The Sultan of Ghazi resolves to send his gums to the dentist once a year. Gondola operators in Venice pledge to go on strike until tips improve. A dramatic population explosion in China gives birth to the concept of 1/2 orders on sweet and sour pork.

1121: The Cid takes Valencia from the Moors and promises to return it when he’s finished with a Christian remodel. Unfortunately it is mislabeled as a present to his precocious offspring, who break it the day after Christmas.

1221: An assortment of holy men, including St Anthony of Padua and Chinese philosopher, Chu-Hsi promised to stop talking to the sky.

1221: Scots defeat British at Stirling Bridge and then again at Chevy Chase. King Edward I of England’s New Year’s Resolution is to refrain from playing his bagpipes before dawn. He instructs his troops to avoid looking up the kilts worn by anyone related to Robert T. Bruce.

1421: The Duke of Gloucester vows to stick to his diet in 1398 but is murdered before he can properly push himself away from his dining room table.

1521: Lucretia Borgia, daughter of Pope Alexander VI, shocks the Vatican by divorcing Giovanni Sforza and running off with Alfonso of Naples. Her New Year’s Resolution: Don’t unpack until the ring is paid for. Michelangelo sculpts “Bacchus” and pledges to stop using profane language during his next project.

1621: Vasco de Gama rounds the Cape of Good Hope under the flag of Lisbon. However, after the check bounced, the explorer resolves that further business dealings with the Portuguese would be on a COD basis. The Second Spanish Armada is scattered by storms in the Atlantic. Spanish King Phillip II makes a resolution to start watching the Weather Channel in 1620. He further pledges to move out of his mom and dad’s basement by summer.

1721: Peter the Great luggage is once again lost during a journey through Prussia, Holland, England and Vienna. He makes the trek disguised as Peter Michailoff in order to study European ways. In January of 1701 he vows to travel with only a carry on.

1821: Casanova drops dead moments after vowing to stop chasing young women. After taking Vienna, Napoleon resolves to keep an extra pair of dry socks in his pack. He then exhorts his tired soldiers to “let the good times roll”. Headhunters in New Guinea make their first New Year’s Resolution: To eat only vegetarians. The Court of Versailles promises to clean its Venetian blinds once a month.

1921: The citizens of Savage Basin, Colorado pledge to stop carousing and staying up late. Old Man Roberts, proprietor of Tuller and Roberts Grocery vows to stop bitching and chewing tobacco when he has to cut up a chicken. Mrs. Williams, a cook at the Victor Restaurant in Ophir, promises to stop burning her husband’s toast. “Shorty” Bridgeman, “the racker salesman” resolves to stop spitting while during conversations. Dr. Copp, a Durango dentist vows to stop drinking at the New Sheridan Hotel before oral surgery. The United States government promises to uphold all future treaties with the Ute Nation since most of the tribe has already been relocated to Utah anyway.

Next time: 20th Century Dog and Pony Resolutions

*All dates approximate and generally rounded off to the next decade by eunuchs mining the vast expanse of archival material strewn about the breakfast dishes like concrete and raisins. Is this art? I asked myself, or just hope’s excuse to be a dreamer.

Elf Season Expected to have major impact

(Gunnison) The 2021 Elf Season is expected to bring over 5000 hunters into the Gunnison basin over the two-weeks of January. Despite conflicts over licenses and access to traditional hunting areas, the hunt is expected to have a major economic impact. Revenues collected could leap into the millions allowing residents extra cash with which to live it up or perhaps an escape to warmer climates over the winter.

Both the Colorado Treasury and the IRS remind merchants that they are not required to report earnings related to elves since there is no proof that they actually exist. Both taxing agencies went on to wish everyone Good Hunting!

CDOT Crews To Decorate Roadkill

(Gunnison) Due to a still muddy policy as to the timely removal of animal carcasses from the highways, state crews have been instructed to decorate the dead beasts for Christmas. According to a directive from top road officials the crews will “dress up the roadkill with reflecting lights and festive bulbs” until a specific policy on the matter can be determined.

At present jurisdictional conflicts have sullied the waters regarding responsibility for hauling off the carnage caused by collisions with vehicles, usually after dark. Despite a plethora of flashing signs that warn of game crossings, accidents involving herd animals and cars remain about the same as last year.

The action comes as winter knocks at the door. A spokesman for CDOT told The Horseshoe that his department didn’t want to offend visitors by leaving dead animals on the highway but that other priorities had to be considered.

“We want to establish a clear approach to the disposal of these unfortunate victims,” said Eleanor Trout, director of exterior design for the state. “Right now nobody knows where the responsibility for this unpleasant cleanup may lie. We need to examine job descriptions, masterplans and basic hygiene before formulating a solution.”

In the meantime crews will attempt to disguise the roadkill with all kinds of costumes and fanfare. One particularly innovative group near Almont has taken to placing hats and sunglasses on dead deer while an elk killed near Never Sink has been donned with ribbon, balloons, tinsel and solar-powered Christmas lights.

“To the average citizen this behavior may appear insensitive but it’s better than looking at blood and guts,” continued the spokesman. “Our hands are tied here until a specific directive comes down from the top.”

Traditionally crows and magpies have helped ease the tension by employing instinctive janitorial methods while scavengers such as coyotes and developers have also done their part.

“The birds are our best allies but how much can we expect them to do?” asked Trout. “They are small and deer and elk are big. According to our research it takes three weeks for nine crows to eat a deer and over a month for them to consume and elk. Sure, it’s all natural enough but in these days of air-conditioned cars, designer cows and hermetically sealed suburbs it looks shoddy at best.”

While most regional road crews have embraced the idea of decorating the roadkill others have shunned the concept preferring to engage in asphalt patching and mowing operations. In one case crews left a dead mule deer to rot for days while painting guardrails and manicuring shoulders.

“These guys work hard on the highways. Some may be in denial when it comes to removing roadkill but for the most part they are cooperative and do a good job,”added Trout. “After all we’ve built miles and miles of deer fence for these animals and they should shoulder part of the blame”

Officials in Denver say the matter will be resolved just as soon as they return from vacation. – Kashmir Horseshoe

“We don’t have twelve years’ experience in Vietnam. We have one year’s experience twelve times over.”

– John Paul Vann, who died in a helicopter crash near Kon Tum, Vietnam in 1972.