Lessons from a funeral

I've been a little out of it for the better part of a week which is why my posts have been a little erratic.

Yesterday, the Gekko's headed north to Circleville, Ohio for a funeral for my grandmother.

My grandmother died at 89 and was a testament to alcohol, nicotine, lard, cream, butter, and sugar; all the ingredients for a good life.

As we headed for Stoutsville (where I hadn't been for over 30 years) for her burial, I had lot's of memories of my dad and I picking wild black berries and sponge mushrooms.

I also had memories of some of my relatives there who had no indoor plumbing and had to pump their water out of wells.

And that's where the lessons begin.

As I grew into adulthood, I had little interest in the old country ways. I was smarter, better, faster than those pedestrian hillbillies; too metropolitan. Is it a coincidence that I was a flaming liberal as well?

As I've gotten older, when I came to one of those forks in the road of life, I don't think I've ever regretted a decision I ever made out of some good old common sense.... country style.

When I make a financial decision I always remember my dad telling me.... "If you can't draw it out on a cocktail napkin, it's too complicated".

Or my mom's lessons on freedom/responsibility.... "If you're mature enough to drink and drive you're mature enough how to get out of jail without calling home".

Or my friend's dad who taught the lessons of maturity..... "As long as I can kick your ass, you'll do what I tell you. The day you can kick mine, you get to move out."

Of course the David Brook's, Charles Krauthammer's, and Karl Rove's of the world believe our problems are way to complicated for a bunch of yahoo's in fly over country.

Can you imagine one of these simpletons in a sub committee hearing on the budget. "I've been looking at our federal checkbook and it seems to me that we don't have the money for (name your project)".

Or a hearing on health care. "If people want health insurance, why don't they buy it and if they can't afford it, figure out a way to get the money for it."

The fact is, that people have always figured out a way to make their lives work. I once asked my dad why my great aunt had a flannel covered toilet seat hanging over a heating stove in the living room. He told me that in the winter that outhouse gets mighty cold so you grab the toilet seat off the hanger and take to sit on in the out house.

I'm thinking if those pedestrian hillbillies can figure out a way to have a nice warm seat in the winter, they could probably bring some common sense to congress.