THE LEGEND OF DOUGIE THE FIR TREE

A Christmas Story

Way out west where the mountains are really tall, snow comes early in the winter and stays long into the spring. In the winter the air is clean and crisp but it is very cold. In the spring though, the sun warms the woods quickly and causes great stirring among the plants and the animals.

On one particular mountainside there lived a magnificent stand of Douglas fir trees. They grew tall and straight destined to become the finest lumber in all the land for building. The great trees were rightfully proud of their destiny. No other trees grew straighter or made finer lumber. In the fall the trees would shed seed cones which would feed the squirrels and other small animals in the woods. Inside the cones were many nutritious seeds. These morsels were the feed for most of the forest’s critters.

Occasionally some of the seeds would be buried by the squirrels for later use. Sometimes the squirrels bury so many seeds that they forget where they all are buried. This is just what happened one autumn on one of these tall mountains. The next spring when the sun warmed the earth and melted the snow, the little seeds sprouted into seedlings. In the life cycle of Douglas firs, new great trees are born. All over the forest young seedlings were sprouting and showing their new growth to the warming sun. All was right with the world as new life was born to take the place of the older trees which would be removed to become the finest lumber in all the land.

Dougie was just such a seedling. He stretched his young needles trying to reach the warming sunlight. But there was a problem. He had sprouted under a giant log which was blocking his sunlight. Dougie thought, “This is not such a big deal. I’ll just grow around the giant log and reach the sunlight.” That is just what Dougie did.

Every winter he slept under the heavy snowfalls and waited until the warming spring melted the snow and let Dougie stretch, further bending around the giant log to grow.

All went well for a few years until Dougie became a sapling. He was now about three feet tall, gangly and spindly as you would expect a teenager to be. Trees don’t grow as fast as humans but they grow much taller. Because Dougie had to grow around the giant log, his trunk was developing a curve. “Don’t worry,” his mother had said. “I am sure your trunk will straighten up when you grow a little more. I just know you will become a great tree and you will be sought out for your destiny to become the finest lumber in all the land.”

The next winter was particularly harsh. Snowfall far exceeded normal. All the young saplings were pushed down by the weight of the snow. But it is the nature of mountains and snow and trees to have these little experiences. When the warming sun returns and melts the snow, all the trees will spring back and grow to become the tallest and straightest trees on the mountain. Dougie had another problem however. The shade over him had caused the snow to stay considerably longer than normal. To deal with it, Dougie decided he would just grow around it as he had before. This time though, he had to grow in a different direction to get to the sun’s warmth. This caused his trunk to develop an “S” shape. “I’m not going to worry,” thought Dougie. “I will just continue to grow taller and taller to become the tallest, straightest tree in the forest. I will achieve my destiny to become the best lumber in all the land.”

Sadly it was not to be. As Dougie grew, his curvature only got worse. His growth became stunted. All the other trees grew taller and taller leaving Dougie in their shade.

“Now what? What is to become of me? All my life I had planned to achieve my destiny to become the tallest and greatest tree in the forest and now it looks like I will be nothing more than a scrub bush. I will never be good enough to be the finest lumber in all the land. It looks like I will have to spend my life as a nothing.”

Well life has a strange way of dealing with things. Just when you think things are the darkest, sometimes great light is shown. As it turns out, Christmas was approaching. Snow had fallen and the forest was even more beautiful than usual. Dougie heard a strange noise in the distance. It seems a family had come to the woods looking for a Christmas tree. The family was a Dad with his three children. The children were very excited looking for the perfect tree to decorate for their home. As they walked around and among the many beautiful young Douglas firs, they would shout “How about this one?” or “Dad, I think this is the best one.” They seemed not to even notice Dougie.

Dougie thought, “I cannot do anything right. I can’t even become a Christmas tree because of my curved trunk. Now I will never be a great tall tree and I won’t even be a Christmas tree. How sad is my life.”

Just then Dougie noticed a little girl looking at him. She was part of the family who was out looking for a tree to decorate. She was smaller than the other children. She stood in a strange way. She seemed to have some difficulty getting around in the snow, but she had a huge smile on her face. She was definitely having a good time. Dougie looked closer and saw that this little girl had a strange curve in her spine much like the curve in his trunk.

“Dad, come and look at what I have found. I think this could be the Christmas tree for us.” Dad came over and said “Honey, this tree has a crooked trunk. I don’t think it would be the perfect tree for us.” He then went off to be with the other kids continuing to look for the perfect tree.

The little girl just stood there and stared at the crooked tree. Dougie was as sad as the little girl. Off in the woods there was the rustling of the kids as they continued to look for the perfect tree. Dad called to the little girl to come with them. “No Dad,” she said. “This tree and I both have a curve in our spines and you always told me that I was as good as anybody else, so I think that just because this tree has a curve in his spine, he can be as good as anybody else also.”

Dad stopped in his tracks. His eyes filled with tears as he suddenly recalled his feelings when he learned of his little girl’s condition known as scoliosis. He remembered the fear both he and the little girl’s mother felt. He knew that he and his daughter had to learn to live with her condition. He had, for years, told her she could do anything she put her mind to. He and her mother had told her to reach for the stars and not allow her physical limitation to slow her down. Now here before his eyes was the essence of the lesson he had tried to teach his daughter for years and today he had to learn it from her. She had become the teacher.

Dad immediately called all the kids together and announced that we had indeed found the perfect tree. The kids were surprised at the choice of the tree with the bent and curved trunk. Dad said, “Just you wait until you see what this tree will become. We will decorate this Douglas fir as no other tree has ever been decorated.” Dad quickly cut the tree down and it was lovingly loaded in the van for the trip home.

When Mother saw what the family had done she was also surprised. “Is this the best you could do?” she asked. When Dad told Mother what had happened, the matter was immediately settled. Mother said, “Let’s decorate this tree as no other tree has ever been decorated.” And so they did.

Dougie saw what he had become and he was truly the finest Christmas tree that has ever been. The tinsel and lights were so grand that no one could ever notice that there was a curve in his trunk. His heart sang. Dougie never again thought of his destiny of being the finest lumber in the land for now he had become the finest Christmas tree in the land.

Often in our lives we make great plans. We prepare for lives with one destiny on our minds. Then on occasion, things happen to change our plans. That’s the way life is sometimes. If we can somehow become like Dougie and this little girl, perhaps we will find a different direction that we could never have prepared for. Perhaps our destiny is yet to be decided. Life truly begins when we accept those things which we cannot change and then live our life to its fullest. Whether you are to be the tallest, straightest tree in the forest or the most magnificent Christmas tree that has ever been, success in life is being the best that you can be.




Copyright © 2010 by Ron Scarbro

CHRISTMAS SHOPPING

At the risk of sounding chauvinistic, I believe women are better shoppers than men. I am a buyer, not a shopper. When I want something, I go and buy it. I detest shopping all around for something. My wife, on the other hand, could spend days just looking and shopping and never spend a dime. I dare not complain too much however because she might suddenly change and start spending instead of just shopping. That could be tragic.

I decided this Christmas I would turn over a new leaf and join the throngs of shoppers to try and buy some Christmas gifts for my grandchildren. Thus begins my tale of woe as a shopper.

Let’s see now. Is it Wii or what about the iphone or the imax? Should I look at an itouch, ibox or ipad or how about an ibex? No, wait a minute. I think that’s a Tibetan mountain goat. I’m so confused. Is there nothing that isn’t electronic? Are there no gifts for today’s kids that aren’t electric? And what about what everything costs? Wow, I had no idea.

Some would say that I am living in the past. That’s probably true. One of my favorite memories of a Christmas past was when I received a Daisy Red Ryder BB Gun. I think Santa might have spent maybe five or ten dollars on a gift that was for me one of the greatest gifts in the world. With my new BB gun I could go out into the woods behind my house and be a hunter, or I could be a cowboy, or I could even be a soldier fighting in a war. I was allowed to use my imagination. I was allowed to make up my own games and scenarios. Today, I fear, all the imagination is gone with the electronic devices we give our kids. Everything is decided for them. As a youngster I received a set of Lincoln Logs. We were able to build houses. Our imagination was our only set of instructions, and our imagination was our only limitation. Lincoln Logs were indestructible. They lasted for years and we never grew tired of building with them. Then there was the erector set. What a great gift. Again it was used for building. Building everything from houses to automobiles and everything in between. I had a small wrench and my mind. There was no end to the marvelous things I could construct with my erector set.

Many among you will say that these new electronic devices which entertain our kids are also training them for their future. I hope so, but we will still have to build houses and create things made with our hands and our imaginations. I admit to being “computer illiterate”, but at the same time I certainly wouldn’t want the future to be a bunch of people sitting around on their very ample rear ends unable to create anything with their hands. We dare not out smart ourselves. Somebody is going to have to produce the food, build the roads, and do the uncomputer-like things that make the world go round. These things take skills also.

This column is not about electronic gifts however. It is about shopping. I hereby resign as a shopper. I admit shopping is better left to the experts, like my wife for example. I will continue to live in the past and just shake my head as the world goes on without me. I am surely not the only one who feels this way.

I do hope you shoppers out there have success in your endeavors and that you find the gifts you are looking for. I also hope the recipients of those gifts appreciate your efforts. Tomorrow will be whatever tomorrow will be.

Ron Scarbro December 1, 2010

THE REPUBLICAN WAVE

As of this writing President Obama has agreed on a compromise with the Republicans to, among other things, extend the so-called Bush tax cuts. There is also an extension of unemployment benefits for another thirteen months. Now you can draw unemployment for over three years without a break. That’s enough time to get a complete college education at the taxpayer’s expense, but I digress. As Obama has said, the compromise includes items that almost everyone could find fault with as well as agree with. Everyone, that is, except the left wing of the Democrat party. They appear to be up in arms. It would seem that to them a compromise is an agreement between two parties that only one side agrees with. In other words it is either their way or the highway.

Now I don’t want to be the one to pour water on their party but, in two weeks or so the Republicans will be in charge of the House and the Senate will have the barest of a majority of Democrats. If the left wing is unhappy this month, imagine how they will be next month and for the next several years.

You will notice I said the next several years and not just the next two years. I read recently that the Democrats have reconciled themselves to the fact that the Republicans have ridden this great wave and it “crested” on Election Day. Well I have some bad news for the Democrats. The wave has not yet crested. In fact it may not crest for several years yet. In my view the Democrats who survive the next few elections are going to have to learn how to compromise with the Republicans in order to be relevant at all.

This country has lived through two years of complete Democrat control and on seeing the result has decided to change the way things are done. This is terrible news for deeply entrenched liberals from both parties who are living in some dream world all by themselves. There is a big country out there and they will be heard. They have and will continue to put their collective foot down. It is not going to be business as usual.

I know this is not going to be comforting news for some of my Democrat friends out there. I know many of you read these columns as you often comment on their content. But the news is good. The country will prosper under new ideas. We need to put people back to work, not just continuing to collect benefits to be unemployed. Jobs are produced when there are markets for products. Jobs are produced when there are needs that are unfulfilled. Jobs are produced when unbridled and unfettered ingenuity is cut lose on the society. The government doesn’t produce jobs. Their only role is to create an environment whereby entrepreneurs can feel like they have a chance for success, then get out of the way. That situation is at hand.

Successful Democrats in future elections as well as successful Republicans are facing a different world. The first order of business is to read the Constitution and understand what the role of government is in America. We don’t want to be Europeans. We reject socialism. We support individual responsibility. We endorse individual initiative and hard work. We support taxation if it is done responsibly, honestly, and fairly with responsible spending of those tax dollars.

I believe the so-called Republican wave is actually an American wave. That wave is rapidly becoming a tsunami, and that is good news for all of us. The crest is yet to occur and the best is yet to come.

Ron Scarbro December 8, 2010

VT DAY???

How many people know that May 8 is VE Day? Did you know that August 15 is VJ Day? VE Day is the celebration of victory over Europe. VJ Day celebrates victory over Japan. For my generation and my parents’ generation these are very important dates. Lately I fear these dates have lost some of their import to the younger generations. Maybe it is because of the way history is being taught in schools today or maybe it could be because history is not being taught in schools today. Either way I bring this up because of our current war on terror.

Will there be a VT Day? Will we have a victory over terrorism? Let’s face it. We have been at war in the Middle East for ten years now and we seem no closer to a resolution today than when we began this war. By comparison, our involvement in WWII lasted a total of four years. How will we know when we have won this war and can rest on our laurels? Another question is can we in fact win this war? Can we defeat a worldwide network of rag tag religious zealots who are completely misled, suicidal, and have no allegiance to any particular country? They carry no flag and dress in no particular uniform. They hide behind women and children and kill indiscriminately. I suspect that most of them don’t even know why they are doing what they are doing. Since this all began for us ten years ago, our enemy has probably killed more of their own than we have. This is for sure a different kind of war, but it is a war nonetheless.

These are my thoughts. You cannot have a winner until you have a loser. Seems simple enough, right? We have, for these past several years, been spending millions of dollars and thousands of lives pursuing what appears to be an unobtainable goal. Now I believe we have two basic choices. Either win it all out, or just leave this mess to those Middle Eastern countries that have put up with the nonsense for eons. Of course, if we just leave and “pull out”, these radicals will continue in their attempt to return the world to the twelfth century. All of the free world will be under constant threat of their terrorism.

That leaves us with the only other choice. Win it. How, you ask? Here’s one way. We have the capacity to bring any country on earth to their knees in a matter of seconds. We could, in fact, turn the entire Middle East into a parking lot in seconds. But, I don’t think we have to go that far, thankfully. For our victory over Japan, we only had to use two bombs. Up to that point we had spent millions of dollars and thousands of lives, but when we decided to end it, it only took two bombs.

The enemy we are fighting today is being funded and sheltered by a very few small insignificant third world countries who could ill afford our all out retaliation. And we need to come to understand that war, by its only definition, is an all out, unlimited affair. I sincerely believe that one or at most two well placed nuclear devices would cause a rapid rethinking on the part of those countries that offer safe haven to terrorists. As was the case in Japan, the choice would be theirs whether to continue and risk total annihilation or try to live in peace with the rest of the world.

For war to end somebody has to win and somebody has to lose. Pulling out one’s forces doesn’t end anything. It only serves to extend it.

Personally, I don’t want to kill anybody. I suspect David didn’t want to kill Goliath, but sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do. We have spent enough of our treasure. We have given enough of our best military. Now we just need to end it. I look forward to VT Day.

Ron Scarbro November 21, 2010

BECAUSE I SAID SO

When I was a child, I would often ask my parents for something or permission to do something and just as often they would answer no. When I would ask why, their answer was usually, “Because I said so”. That, without fail, ended the discussion. While that didn’t satisfy my curiosity, it was all I got.

Recent events have made the news concerning activist judges and their responses to various cases they have heard. The state of Oklahoma, in the last election, approved by a seventy percent majority a law which would disallow Sharia Law from being used in that state. A single Federal Judge, on hearing the case, stopped it in its tracks. Why? Because she said so.

Recently in Arizona, the people, by a huge margin, enacted a law which would go a long way in dealing with their illegal immigration problem. Another Federal Judge threw it out. Why? Because she said so.

All across the country judges are setting themselves up as supreme dictators usurping the will of the people and making law from the bench. Why? Because they said so. Somehow some have come to believe that these elected or appointed former lawyers are granted some divine right of intervention once they don the robe of judge.

In both of the cases cited above, appeals have been sought and in the final analysis will probably find their way to the Supreme Court where they will doubtlessly be overturned.

If the last election taught us nothing else, it should have alerted the powers that be that we the people are in charge. An example of this is the state of Iowa. There, three state Supreme Court Judges were fired by the voters for, among other reasons, finding Iowa’s law requiring legal marriage to be between one man and one woman, to be unconstitutional. Their ruling would have allowed so called “gay marriage”. The people said no. It has been reported that in the next election the remaining judges will also be eliminated by the voters.

Too often special interest groups go “judge shopping”. They research sitting judges to determine those who would be sympathetic to their cause and bring actions in their courts in an effort to stack the deck in their favor. Apparently, if you have enough money, it isn’t very difficult to do.

We the people need to face this fact. Just because a lawyer puts on a black robe and sits on a bench in a courthouse, doesn’t increase his or her intelligence or judgment. They don’t park their bias at the courthouse door. Judges are people and people are fallible. Judges, like all people, have their prejudices and their political opinions. Their job is not to write law however. That is the job of legislatures throughout the country and in Washington, DC. Judges, like all officials who govern and control our lives, must be accountable to the people. When they violate their oath and try to usurp the will of the people by writing law instead of interpreting law, they need to be fired.

Too often, I suspect, we become enamored with the pomp and circumstance of the courthouse. We have been led to believe that judges are somehow blessed with this unquestioned wisdom. One of my childhood friends is now a judge. He is a great friend and he definitely is smart, but judicial wisdom? I don’t even know what that means.

Because I said so is not a reason to usurp the will of the overwhelming majority of the people and I am pretty sure that this is not what our framers had in mind when they established the three branches of government. Laws are made by duly elected legislators and judges serve as referees, and not just because I said so.

Ron Scarbro November 15, 2010

WHAT IF???

If you can believe the news reports, there are anywhere from fifteen to twenty-five million illegal aliens living and working in this country. Who knows, really? I am going to use this essay to try and examine some of these numbers and their implications.

I believe that there is an agency that does know or at least has a pretty good idea of how many illegals are actually here and working. That agency is the Social Security Administration. Some have said that this agency is so large with so much on their plate that they cannot possibly know who is legal and who is illegal. What if that is just nonsense? Consider this. What would happen if you collected five dollars too much on a check from that agency? What would happen? Well, they would know within a very short period of time and they would collect back the over payment as well as any interest they can collect. What if you didn’t pay into Social Security the amount they decided you should? How long before they would be all over you? Trust me, it would not take very long.

Now think of this. Every illegal alien working in this country on a legitimate job has used a Social Security number and all of those numbers are phony. Their employer has collected and sent to SSA the amount necessary. Let’s look at the numbers. What if we use for demonstration purposes, that instead of twenty-five million illegals, there are just say fifteen million. Let’s further figure that only ten million of them have so-called legitimate jobs because we know that many, many of them work in the “underground economy” and are paid in cash with no records kept. So what if those ten million paid just fifty dollars a month into Social Security. That, my friends, comes to six billion dollars per year. Using this scenario, SSA is collecting six billion dollars each year with no real possibility of ever paying any of it out. Is it any wonder that those in power in Washington refuse to do anything about illegal aliens? If they did, this little flood of money would come to a screeching halt. Then they would have to deal with the real issue that they have spent the Social Security Trust Fund and have no way of repaying that fund.

But Ron, you’re such a skeptic. Do you really think our government could be so devious? To that question I would just answer, what do you think? If any of this is true, then our government, the Social Security Administration and the IRS are co-conspirators in a massive racketeering fraud. There is no way that the SSA can receive these millions of dollars each month with these phony Social Security numbers being used and not know what is going on. Twenty year old computers with ancient soft ware would have alerted them years ago. So you be the judge.

As a recipient of Social Security, I am glad they have found a way of funding their liability. I just wish it could be done in a more legitimate fashion.

Here’s a thought. What if these illegals could be allowed to work here legally? What if there was in place a guest worker program whereby persons from other countries could work, pay taxes, and return to their homes when that work was finished? To those among you who cry that such a program would cause lettuce to double in price, I say too bad. If I want to eat lettuce, I will pay whatever it costs or I will do without. I refuse to believe that this matter could not be fixed. We just need people in place who are willing to do the work to fix it. We are spending a fortune trying to shore up a porous border with no solution in sight.

Finally, what if we elected people who were serious about fixing this mess? One thing is certain, it is not going to fix itself.

Ron Scarbro October 27, 2010

FREE SPEECH???

Are there limits on free speech in America? We are about to find out. The US Supreme Court is hearing the case of the small church which likes to go to military funerals and scream protests. The church is Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas. They appear to be a church of about fifty to sixty people, most of whom seem to be related to each other. One thing is clear, this is a group of haters. From all indications this is the most un-Christian Christian church I have ever heard of. They were sued by the father of a fallen Marine. At that Marine’s funeral they protested in an ugly and disgusting way. Their stated view is that since America is tolerating homosexuality, God is punishing us by killing our servicemen in combat. Further, they seem to believe that we deserve all the grief being visited upon us, and it should continue until we revert to their very narrow way of thinking. The Marine’s father won a judgment of eleven million dollars which was later reduced to five million. An appeals court threw out the judgment claiming it violated the church’s free speech rights. The case has now found its way to the Supreme Court.

So, what to think of this. I am going to offer an opinion which could probably upset some folks. As Americans we are freedom loving people and freedom can sometimes get pretty messy. Freedom of speech means that even ugly speaking people have the right to that speech. There is no one on earth who can decide for me what I can say. As a free American I can open my mouth and reveal my inner most stupidity at any time if I so choose. So can the Waterboro Baptist Church. Free speech doesn’t mean just the speech that you happen to agree with. Freedom of speech doesn’t mean just the pretty words that are not controversial. No, this right allows for all speech, ugly, hateful, disgusting, and just plain down right stupid also.

I believe The Supreme Court will find the same way. Some may feel that this is a bad decision. Consider this, what if someone decided some day that your choice of songs you wished to sing, or the poetry you wished to recite, were uncomfortable to them. Would you favor their right to shut you up? What if they felt that your newspaper held the wrong political opinion? Would you favor a law shutting up that newspaper? We have, in our history, fought and died for this right, and sometimes, even when we don’t like the message of some moron, they still have the right to spew that view. Both hate speech and love speech are just speech in the eyes of the law and the Constitution.

The absolute best way of dealing with the Waterboro Baptist Church is to ignore them. No press, no TV coverage, just ignore them. Trust me, they will go away. If we denied them publicity, they would disappear just as quickly as they appeared. The Marine whose funeral they protested died so they could have the freedom to hold that protest. Seems ironic, doesn’t it.

You, who are reading this, are reading it on the Opinion Page of this newspaper. This column is my opinion. I have the freedom to express my opinion because this is America. The nitwits who display their ignorance at military funerals have the same freedom. They can scream all the hate they wish. It only serves to show the world what morons they are.

Ron Scarbro October 10, 2010