A Day in the Life of Chaos

Today as I look out from my window from the 12th floor of a federal building I stare over the top of a picture I hung on my desk as an inspiration.  It is a picture taken not long ago of President Obama sitting in the seat that Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks once occupied on a bus in Alabama when she refused to leave and move to the back of the bus.  He is looking out the window almost as if someone might request the same of him.  It is a sad reminder of a time not long ago when people were not equal in this country.  Yet step by step we move forward yet it is a constant struggle.  It is a lot like a crying child reaching for a candy bar in a grocery store, eventually they will be pulled along and assume a proper course.  It might hurt and embarrass the child's mother in the process but she knows what has to be done and eventually the screaming child will learn as well. Yesterday our President took such a step in acknowledging that LGBT people have a right to join in marriage just

As spring gradually envelopes the South a particular time of year is closing in.  It is moving like Godzilla trampling a Japanese village with results both erratic and final. Just off the interstate in Columbia, South Carolina, there is an access road.  The road passes in front of a menagerie of business selling everything from cars to fireworks and billboards advertising adult novelties.  Wedged between a business selling out buildings including a small lighthouse that would look lovely on my front lawn and an apartment complex is a modest building with a can collection drop and a sign advertising the Jamil Shriner Temple.  These places have always been somewhat of a mystery to me.  It is hard to get beyond the image of grown overweight men wearing a fez and driving a little car in a parade.  The place is however, a humble bastion for events as diametrically opposite as the roller derby and a gun show.  On this particular day, a giant inflatable snake sat on the front lawn and the p